I am an optimist because I don't see the point in being anything else.

The working men are the basis of all governments, for the plain reason that they are the most numerous.

My father taught me to work, but not to love it. I never did like to work, and I don't deny it. I'd rather read, tell stories, crack jokes, talk, laugh -- anything but work.

I will either be America's greatest president or its last.

Wise statesmen ... established these great self-evident truths, that when in the distant future some man, some faction, some interest, should set up the doctrine that none but rich men, or none but white men, were entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, their posterity should look up again at the Declaration of Independence and take courage to renew the battle which their fathers began.

That some achieve great success, is proof to all that others can achieve it as well.

My paramount objective in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not to either save or destroy Slavery.