Love to God, as the great Father, love to man as his brother, constituted the basis of his political and moral creed.
One day, when one of his friends was denouncing his political enemies, "Hold on," said Mr. Lincoln, "Remember what St. Paul says, 'and now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.'"
From the day of his leaving Springfield to assume the duties of the Presidency, when he so impressively asked his friends and neighbors to invoke upon him the guidance and wisdom of God, to the evening of his death, he seemed ever to live and act in the consciousness of his responsibility to Him, and with the trusting faith of a child he leaned confidingly upon His Almighty Arm. He was visited during his administration by many Christian delegations, representing the various religious denominations of the Republic, and it is known that he was relieved and comforted in his great work by the consciousness that the Christian world were praying for his success. Some one said to him, one day, "No man was ever so remembered in the prayers of the people, especially of those who pray not to be heard of men, as you are." He replied, "I have been a good deal helped by just that thought."
The support which Mr. Lincoln received during his administration from the religious organizations, and the sympathy and confidence between the great body of Christians and the President, was indeed a source of immense strength and power to him.
I know of nothing revealing more of the true character of Mr. Lincoln, his conscientiousness, his views of the slavery question, his sagacity and his full appreciation of the awful trial through which the country and he had to pass, than the following incident stated by Mr. Bateman, Superintendent of Public Instruction for Illinois.
On one occasion, in the autumn of 1860, after conversing with Mr. Bateman at some length, on the, to him, strange conduct of Christian men and ministers of the Gospel supporting slavery, he said:—
"I know there is a God, and that He hates injustice and slavery. I see the storm coming, and I know that His hand is in it. If He has a place and work for me—and I think He has—I believe I am ready. I am nothing, but truth is every thing. I know I am right, because I know that Liberty is right, for Christ teaches it, and Christ is God. I have told them that a house divided against itself can not stand; and Christ and Reason say the same; and they will find it so.
"Douglas don't care whether slavery is voted up or down, but God cares, and humanity cares, and I care; and with God's help I shall not fail. I may not see the end; but it will come, and I shall be vindicated; and these men will find that they have not read their Bibles right."
Much of this was uttered as if he were speaking to himself, and with a sad, earnest solemnity of manner impossible to be described. After a pause, he resumed: "Doesn't it appear strange that men can ignore the moral aspect of this contest? A revelation could not make it plainer to me that slavery or the Government must be destroyed. The future would be something awful, as I look at it, but for this rock on which I stand (alluding to the Testament which he still held in his hand). It seems as if God had borne with this thing (slavery) until the very teachers of religion had come to defend it from the Bible, and to claim for it a divine character and sanction; and now the cup of iniquity is full, and the vials of wrath will be poured out." After this, says Mr. Bateman, the conversation was continued for a long time. Every thing he said was of a peculiarly deep, tender, and religious tone, and all was tinged with a touching melancholy. He repeatedly referred to his conviction that the day of wrath was at hand, and that he was to be an actor in the terrible struggle which would issue in the overthrow of slavery, though he might not live to see the end.[9]
[9] The foregoing statement has been verified by Mr. Bateman as substantially correct.