My father… removed from Kentucky to… Indiana, in my eighth year… It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up… Of course when I came of age, I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher… but that was all.

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 some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.

The highest art is always the most religious, and the greatest artist is always a devout person.

My dream is of a place and a time where America will once again be seen as the last best hope of earth.

I do the very best I know how – the very best I can; and I mean to keep on doing so until the end.

I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.

The things I want to know are in books; my best friend is the man who’ll get me a book I ain’t read.

The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.

I never had a policy; I have just tried to do my very best each and every day.

Important principles may, and must, be inflexible.

Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can. As a peacemaker the lawyer has superior opportunity of being a good man. There will still be business enough.

If there is anything that a man can do well, I say let him do it. Give him a chance.

I will prepare and some day my chance will come.

It was that which gave promise that in due time the weights should be lifted from the shoulders of all men, and that all should have an equal chance. This is the sentiment embodied in that Declaration of Independence.

The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.

Upon the subject of education, not presuming to dictate any plan or system respecting it, I can only say that I view it as the most important subject which we, as a people, can be engaged in.

For my part, I desire to see the time when education – and by its means, morality, sobriety, enterprise and industry – shall become much more general than at present, and should be gratified to have it in my power to contribute something to the advancement of any measure which might have a tendency to accelerate the happy period.

These men ask for just the same thing, fairness, and fairness only. This, so far as in my power, they, and all others, shall have.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.