Lincoln believed in the Bible. I am not sure that he accepted the whole content of the positive arguments set forth so cogently by his pastor, Dr. Smith. When he called this argument "unanswerable," it need not imply that his every doubt was satisfied, his every misgiving reassured. It is entirely possible that there lingered in his mind some vestiges of what he had read in writers opposed to the doctrine of the inspiration of the Scriptures as it was then taught; indeed, that doctrine in the form in which it was currently stated was not one by which a modern man's orthodoxy ought to be tested. But he read the Bible, honored it, quoted it freely, and it became so much a part of him as visibly and permanently to give shape to his literary style and to his habits of thought. When Mrs. Speed presented him an Oxford Bible in 1841, he declared his intention to read it regularly, believing it to be "the best cure for the blues"; and he kept and loved and constantly used his mother's Bible. How he would have defined his theory of its transmission and of the relation of its divine and human elements we do not know, and we need not be too curious to inquire. It is more than possible that Mr. Lincoln never made this definition in his own mind. His attitude toward the Bible was a thoroughly practical one. We do not know that he ever heard Coleridge's pragmatic affirmation, but we have every reason to believe that he would have accepted it, namely, that he valued the Bible because "it finds me as no other book."
Concerning his opinion of Jesus Christ our material for constructive hypothesis is exceedingly scanty.[69] Herndon says he does not believe the name of Jesus can be found in any of Lincoln's authentic writings. I have found it in his writings but I must confess that I have not found it frequently in any which I count to be certainly genuine.[70] There are, however, a number of references to Jesus Christ in his writings and published addresses, and they are both positive and reverent.
On July 4, 1864, the colored people of Baltimore presented him a beautiful copy of the Bible of the usual pulpit size, bound in violet-colored velvet. The corners were bands of solid gold and there was a thick plate of gold upon the cover, bearing this inscription:
"To Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, the friend of universal freedom. From the loyal colored people of Baltimore, as a token of respect and gratitude. Baltimore, July 4, 1864."
In accepting this gift, which was presented in person by a committee of five, the President said:
"In regard to this great book, I have only to say it is the best gift which God has ever given man. All the good from the Saviour of the world is communicated to us through this book."—Carpenter: Six Months in the White House, p. 199; also Nicolay and Hay: Works of Lincoln, twelve volume edition, X, 217-18.
Such references as this show to us the instinctive place which he accorded Jesus Christ in his own unpremeditated thinking. This was the best thing he had to say about the Bible, that through it alone we have knowledge of the Saviour of the world.
Herndon tells us that Lincoln ridiculed the doctrine of the virgin birth of Jesus. If this is true, I am very sorry. But Abraham Lincoln's faith in Christ did not depend wholly or even primarily upon his interpretation of the mystery of our Lord's birth. I approach a discussion of this question with some hesitation, for it is one which, as related to Lincoln we do not know very much about, but it is a subject which we are not free to pass over in silence.
It is a sad fact that the argument for the divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ should ever have been based on the mystery of his birth. Not thus does the New Testament establish the doctrine of his divinity. The wonderful story of the birth of Jesus is told in two places only,—in the introduction to the two Gospels of Matthew and Luke, and these are the very two that contain genealogies tracing his descent through Joseph. The theory that one of these gives the family tree of Mary is unsupported by any evidence. So far as we know, Jesus never referred to the mystery of his birth, or attached any importance to it. His two brothers, James and Jude, each wrote a book which we have in the New Testament, and there is no reference in either of them to this doctrine. Peter preached his mighty sermons at Pentecost and afterwards, proclaiming the faith on which the Church was established, and he grounded his argument for the divinity of Jesus not upon his birth, but upon his resurrection from the dead. Paul preached the gospel of Christ throughout the Roman world, and neither in any recorded sermon nor in any letter did he make any reference to that dogma. Mark, earliest of the gospels, and for we know not how long a period the only one, is silent as to the birth of Jesus; and John, the most definitely spiritual of them all, begins and concludes his profound philosophy of the person of Christ without a word concerning the manner of his birth.