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The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.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