Price: It will be for you to decide, and we believe you to be an upright man, Mr. Lincoln.
Lincoln: Seward and Hook would be difficult to carry as subordinates.
Tucker: But they will have to be carried so, and there's none likelier for the job than you.
Lincoln: Will your Republican Press stand by me for a principle, James, whatever comes?
Macintosh: There's no other man we would follow so readily.
Lincoln: If you send me, the South will have little but derision for your choice.
Hind: We believe that you'll last out their laughter.
Lincoln: I can take any man's ridicule—I'm trained to it by a ... somewhat odd figure that it pleased God to give me, if I may so far be pleasant with you. But this slavery business will be long, and deep, and bitter. I know it. If you do me this honour, gentlemen, you must look to me for no compromise in this matter. If abolition comes in due time by constitutional means, good. I want it. But, while we will not force abolition, we will give slavery no approval, and we will not allow it to extend its boundaries by one yard. The determination is in my blood. When I was a boy I made a trip to New Orleans, and there I saw them, chained, beaten, kicked as a man would be ashamed to kick a thieving dog. And I saw a young girl driven up and down the room that the bidders might satisfy themselves. And I said then, "If ever I get a chance to hit that thing, I'll hit it hard."
A pause.
You have no conditions to make?