Abraham Lincoln: Was He a Christian?

by John E. Remsburg

He says that, "Like the immortal Washington, he believed in the efficacy of prayer." The comparison is happily drawn. Lincoln probably did believe as much in the efficacy of prayer as Washington; that is to say, he did not believe in it at all, in the evangelical sense. There is no evidence that Washington believed in prayer, no proof that he ever uttered a prayer. That story about his praying at Valley Forge is as truly a myth as the story about the hatchet. The Rev. E. D. Neill, an eminent Episcopal minister, and a relative of the person who is reported to have seen Washington engaged in prayer, pronounces it a fiction.

Dr. Gurley is represented as saying: "I considered him sound not only on the truth of the Christian religion, but on all its fundamental doctrines and teachings." This, remember, is from a Calvinistic standpoint. Lincoln, then, not only accepted Christianity, but its most ultra variety—Calvinism. He believed in original sin, predestination (including infant damnation), particular redemption, irresistible grace, and perseverance of the saints. Because he sometimes went with his wife to the Presbyterian church, of which she was an adherent, the priests of this denomination have the contemptible assurance to assert that he was a rigid Calvinist!

When he died Dr. Gurley, being Mrs. Lincoln's pastor, delivered the funeral oration in Washington. In that oration Dr. Gurley did not affirm that Lincoln was a Christian, a thing he would not have failed to do had it been true. Long after Lincoln's death, Dr. Gurley, if Reed has correctly reported him, makes a statement that he had not the courage to make over his dead body.

A reputable Christian gentleman, of Springfield, who desires to have his name withheld from the public, declares that Dr. Gurley knew and admitted that Lincoln was a disbeliever in Christianity.

It is quite probable that Gurley did not state in full what Reed reports him to have stated. A man who can take up his pen and at one sitting indite a score of falsehoods and misrepresentations, as Reed, on a subsequent occasion, is shown to have done, can not be relied upon for accuracy as a reporter.

The reader has doubtless not failed to notice the introduction of a claim by Reed to the effect that Lincoln at the time of his assassination was intending to unite with the church. That the idea was suggested by Reed is shown by the fact that no less than three of these witnesses, including Reed, allude to it. Reed says: "While it is to be regretted that Mr. Lincoln was not spared to indicate his religious sentiments by a profession of his faith in accordance with the institutions of the Christian religion, yet it is very clear that he had this step in view." Dr. Gurley is made to say: "It was his intention soon to make a profession of religion." Mr. Brooks says: "I absorbed [the porosity of some of these witnesses is remarkable] the firm conviction that Mr. Lincoln... was seriously considering the step which would formally connect him with the visible church on earth."

This dernier resort of an argument has been repeated respecting nearly every notable person who has died outside of the church. Soon after the publication of Reed's lecture, the New York World contained the following pertinent answer to this stale fabrication:

"It is admitted by Mr. Reed and everybody else that Mr. Lincoln was a working Infidel up to a very late period of his life, that he wrote a book and labored earnestly to make proselytes to his own views, that he never publicly recanted, and that he never joined the church. Upon those who, in the face of these tremendous facts, allege that he was nevertheless a Christian lies the burden of proof. Let them produce it or forever hold their peace. In the mean time it is a sad and puerile subterfuge to argue that he would have been a Christian if he had lived long enough, and to lament that he was not 'spared' for that purpose. He had been spared fifty-six years and surrounded by every circumstance that might soften his heart and every influence that might elevate his faith. If he was at that late, that fatal hour standing thus gloomily without the pale, what reason have we to suppose that he intended ever to enter?"

Reed speaks of "the poverty of his early religious instruction," apparently forgetting that he was raised by Christian parents. His father was a church-member, his mother was a church-member, and his stepmother was a church-member. Reed states, also, that the books he read were all of an anti-religious character. Holland, on the contrary, declares that better books than those he read could not have been chosen from the richest library. The fact is, Abraham Lincoln did not become an Infidel to Christianity from a lack of knowledge respecting its claims. He thoroughly examined its claims, and rejected them because he found them untenable.

One important feature of this subject Reed has either inadvertently omitted or purposely ignored, and that is in regard to the validity of the Bateman story. As the result of previous controversy this evidence had been rendered valueless. Lincoln's partner had declared it to be false, had asserted that Mr. Bateman in private conversations acknowledged it to be in part untrue, and announced his readiness to substantiate his assertions if Mr. Bateman could be prevailed upon to permit the publication of his notes of these conversations taken at the time. If Mr. Herndon's affirmations were true, it destroyed the testimony of Holland and Bateman; if untrue, it challenged Mr. Bateman to reaffirm the statements recorded by Holland, and allow the seal of privacy to be removed from his conversations on the subject. Why did Mr. Reed not rehabilitate this damaged evidence? Did he forget it? No, it is plainly evident that he did not dare to attempt it.