Miss Smith has placed at my disposal her own copy of this book, which was her grandfather's, and I have been able to locate about a half-dozen copies in various public libraries, and by rare good fortune to buy one for myself.
Dr. Smith's statement was made in a letter from Cainno, Scotland, dated January 24, 1867:
"It was my honor to place before Mr. Lincoln arguments designed to prove the divine authority and inspiration of the Scriptures, accompanied by the arguments of infidel objectors in their own language. To the arguments on both sides Mr. Lincoln gave a most patient, impartial, and searching investigation. To use his own language, he examined the arguments as a lawyer who is anxious to investigate truth investigates testimony. The result was the announcement made by himself that the argument in favor of the divine authority and inspiration of the Scriptures was unanswerable."—Rev. James A. Reed: "The Later Life and Religious Sentiments of Abraham Lincoln," Scribner's Magazine, July, 1873, p. 333.
Mr. Thomas Lewis, a lawyer whose office adjoined that of Mr. Lincoln in Springfield, and who for a time was in the same office, was an elder in the church which Lincoln attended. In 1898 he wrote his recollections of Dr. Smith's book and its influence upon Mr. Lincoln:
"I was an elder, trustee, treasurer, collector, superintendent of the Sunday school, and pew-renter. The following Tuesday, after the second Sunday, Mr. Lincoln called on me and inquired if there were any pews to rent in the church. I replied, 'Yes, and a very desirable one, vacated by Governor Madison, who has just left the city.' 'What is the rent?' said he. 'Fifty dollars, payable quarterly.' He handed me $12.50. Said he, 'Put it down to me.' From that date he paid each three months on said pew until he left for Washington; and from the first Sunday he was there I have not known of his not occupying that pew every Sunday he was in the city until he left. The seat was immediately in front of mine. The third Sunday his children came in the Sunday school.
"Shortly thereafter there was a revival in the church, and Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln, when he was in the city, attended meeting. In his absence she was there. They attended not only the regular meetings, but the inquiry meetings also, and it was the belief that both would unite with the church. When the candidates were examined Mr. Lincoln was in Detroit, prosecuting a patent right case, a branch of the profession in which he had acquired an enviable reputation. Mrs. Lincoln stated that she was confirmed in the Episcopal Church when twelve years of age, but did not wish to join the church by letter, but upon profession of faith, as she was never converted until Dr. Smith's preaching. She was admitted [1852]. Mr. Lincoln never applied. Some months later the session of the church invited Mr. Lincoln to deliver a lecture on the Bible. When it became known that Mr. Lincoln was to lecture in the Presbyterian church it assured a full house. It was said by divines and others to be the ablest defense of the Bible ever uttered in that pulpit.
"From the introduction of Mr. Lincoln to Dr. Smith their intimacy was of a most cordial character. At their last meeting previous to Mr. Lincoln's leaving for Washington, as they parted, Mr. Lincoln said, 'Doctor, I wish to be remembered in the prayers of yourself and our church members.'"—Illinois State Register, December 10, 1898.
A very interesting bit of testimony to the relations of Mr. Lincoln and his pastor, Dr. Smith, was given by Rev. William Bishop, D.D., in an address at Salina, Kansas, on February 12, 1897, and published in the local papers at the time. Dr. Bishop was graduated from Illinois College in 1850, and for a time was a member of the faculty there. In the summer after his graduation, he supplied Dr. Smith's pulpit during his vacation:
"I first met Dr. Smith in the summer of 1850 in Jacksonville, at the commencement exercises of Illinois College, from which I had graduated and had just been appointed a member of the faculty of instruction. The acquaintance then formed ripened into mutual and congenial friendship. And during the two years of my connection with the college I was frequently a visitor and guest at his house in Springfield, and when, by reason of removal to another institution in another State, the visits were fewer and farther between, 'a free epistolary correspondence' continued to strengthen and brighten the links of fellowship. With his other accomplishments, Dr. Smith was an interesting and instructive conversationalist—in fact, quite a raconteur, somewhat like his friend Lincoln, always ready with a story to illustrate his opinions, and which gave piquancy to his conversation. Whenever he had occasion to speak of Lincoln he always evinced the strongest attachment and the warmest friendship for him, which was known to be fully reciprocated. Democrat as he was, and tinged with Southern hues—though never a secessionist—there seemed to be a mystic cord uniting the minister and the lawyer. This was subsequently beautifully shown on the part of Mr. Lincoln, who never forgot to do a generous thing. When he was elected President Dr. Smith and wife were getting old, their children all married and gone, except their youngest[42] son, a young man of twenty-three or four years of age. One of Lincoln's first official acts, after his inauguration, was the appointment of this young man to the consulate at Dundee, Scotland. The doctor, with his wife and son, returned to the land of his birth. The son soon returned to America, and Dr. Smith himself was appointed consul, which position he retained until his death in 1871.
"In the spring of 1857 Dr. Smith, anticipating a necessary absence from his church of two or three months during the summer, invited me to supply his pulpit until his return. Being young and inexperienced in the ministry, with considerable hesitation I accepted his urgent invitation. So I spent my college vacation performing as best I could this service. Mr. Lincoln was a regular attendant at church and evidently an attentive hearer and devout worshiper.
"As a college student I had seen and heard him and looked up to him as a being towering above common men; and, I confess, I was not a little intimidated by his presence as he sat at the end of a seat well forward toward the pulpit, with his deep eyes fixed upon me, and his long legs stretched out in the middle aisle to keep them from [using one of his own colloquialisms] being scrouged in the narrow space between the pews. My 'stage fright,' however, was soon very much relieved by his kindliness and words of encouragement.
"On a certain Sunday, the third, as I recollect it, in my term of service, I delivered a discourse on the text, 'Without God in the World.' The straight translation from the Greek is, 'Atheists in the World.' In discussing atheism, theoretical and practical, I endeavored to elucidate and enforce the fallacy of the one and the wickedness of the other. At the close of the service Mr. Lincoln came up and, putting his right hand in mine and his left on my shoulder, with other impressive remarks, said, 'I can say "Amen" to all that you have said this morning.' From that time on my interest in him grew apace.
"He was then known extensively all over the West as a great and good man, and only a year afterward he bounded into national fame by his victory in the great debate with Douglas, who, up to that time, was regarded as a debater invincible.
"During my brief sojourn in Springfield I had many opportunities of meeting Lincoln, hearing him, and talking with him at home, in church, in society, and in the courts of justice.
"Dr. Smith returned in due time to resume his pastoral functions. In reporting to him, in general, my labors in the church as his substitute during his absence, and in particular my conceptions of Lincoln's religious character, he intimated that he knew something of Lincoln's private personal religious experiences, feelings, and beliefs which resulted in his conversion to the Christian faith. After some urging to be more explicit, he made the following statement, which is herewith submitted, couched substantially in his own language. The doctor said:
"'I came to Springfield to take the pastoral charge of this church [First Presbyterian] about eight years ago [1849]. During the first of these years, I might say, I had only a speaking or general acquaintance with Mr. Lincoln [then forty years old]. Two or three years previous to my coming here Mrs. Lincoln, who had been a member of our church, for some reason changed her church relations and was a regular attendant at the services of the Episcopal Church. Mr. Lincoln, at that time, having no denominational preferences, went with her. And so the family continued to frequent the sanctuary for a year or more after I began my ministry here. The occasion which opened up the way to my intimate relations to Mr. Lincoln was this, viz.: In the latter part of 1849 death came into his family. His second son died at about three or four years of age. The rector, an excellent clergyman, being temporarily absent, could not be present to conduct the burial service, and I was called to officiate at the funeral. This led me to an intimate acquaintance with the family, and grew into an enduring and confidential friendship between Mr. Lincoln and myself. One result was that the wife and mother returned to her ancestral church, and the husband and father very willingly came with her, and ever since has been a constant attendant upon my ministry. I found him very much depressed and downcast at the death of his son, and without the consolation of the gospel. Up to this time I had heard but little concerning his religious views, and that was to the effect that he was a deist and inclined to skepticism as to the divine origin of the Scriptures, though, unlike most skeptics, he had evidently been a constant reader of the Bible. I found him an honest and anxious inquirer. He gradually revealed the state of his mind and heart, and at last unbosomed his doubts and struggles and unrest of soul. In frequent conversations I found that he was perplexed and unsettled on the fundamentals of religion, by speculative difficulties, connected with Providence and revelation, which lie beyond and above the legitimate province of religion. With some suggestions bearing on the right attitude required for impartial investigation, I placed in his hands my book (The Christian's Defence) on the evidence of Christianity, which gives the arguments for and against the divine authority and inspiration of the Holy Scriptures. Mr. Lincoln took the book, and for a number of weeks, as a lawyer, examined and weighed the evidence, pro and con, and judged of the credibility of the contents of revelation. And while he was investigating I was praying that the Spirit of Truth might lead him into the kingdom of truth. And such was the result, for at the conclusion of his examination he came forth his doubts scattered to the winds and his reason convinced by the arguments in support of the inspired and infallible authority of the Old and New Testaments—a believer in God, in His providential government, in His Son, the way, the truth, and the life, and from that time [nearly seven years] to this day his life has proved the genuineness of his conversion to the Christian faith. For this I humbly ascribe to our heavenly Father the honor and the glory.'"
In an earlier statement than that previously quoted, Mr. Thomas Lewis, under date of January 6, 1873, said:
"Not long after Dr. Smith came to Springfield, and I think very near the time of his son's death, Mr. Lincoln said to me that when on a visit somewhere he had seen and partially read a work of Dr. Smith on the evidences of Christianity, which had led him to change his view of the Christian religion, and he would like to get that work and finish the reading of it, and also to make the acquaintance of Dr. Smith. I was an elder in Dr. Smith's church, and took Dr. Smith to Mr. Lincoln's office, and Dr. Smith gave Mr. Lincoln a copy of his book, as I know, at his own request."