My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.

I do not think I could myself, be brought to support a man for office, whom I knew to be an open enemy of, and scoffer at, religion.

When I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher to the Rule of Three.... The little advanceI now have upon this store of education, I have picked up from time to time under the pressure of necessity.

When the white man governs himself, that is self-government; but when he governs himself and also governs another man, that is more than self-government-that is despotism.

The Bible says somewhere that we are desperately selfish. I think we would have discovered that fact without the Bible.

It doesn't mater if you're a slow walker, so long as you don't walk backwards.

The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew.