LINCOLN AS A SPEAKER
President Lincoln owed his success as a speaker to his ancestry and parentage, his knowledge of human nature, and his mastery of English. His Puritan-pioneer ancestry endowed him with the great physical and mental vigor that characterized all his life; and his parents inspired him with the love of learning, the high moral sense and the devotion to truth, freedom and religion, that made him the man we so revere. His knowledge of human nature was due to his early life and studies, and is best illustrated by his use of stories. By them he could at need rebuke, explain, or encourage, for he had studied men till he knew them and their motives as he did his scanty library. His mastery of English was due to his study of the best models in our tongue, the Bible, Shakespeare, Milton, and Blackstone. These books he read until he had memorized their words and absorbed their spirit so thoroughly that when he came to clothe in words his own great and wise thoughts he spake as a master of English style. Lincoln's early environment was rough, but he made it subserve great and mighty purposes; and those of us who labor in his spirit may hope also to do great works.