Every repetition of the choice only hardened the issue.

He was the most persuasive speaker, less for his words than character behind them. He made every listener feel he had done his best to master every aspect of this question, who has been driven by logic to arrive at certain conclusions, and who is disguising from us no argument on either side.

Henry Adams, like most people, saw society in his own image.

Without a country, you are the basket of humanity.

The fate of warnings in political affairs is to be futile when the recipient wishes otherwise.

A writer at the time said, "Lincoln means to sink the man in the public officer.