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Now let it be written in history and on Mr. Lincoln's tombstone: "He died an unbeliever."
--
William H. Herndon, Abraham Lincoln's law partner in Springfield since 1844, on Lincoln's religion. Abraham Lincoln: The True Story of a Great Life, 1896. Quoted in Freethinkers by Susan Jacoby, 2004.

 

Abraham Lincoln

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If the Confederacy falls, there should be written on its tombstone: Died of a theory.

 

Jefferson Davis

 

When Lincoln died, hate died—
* * * * * *
And anger, came to North and South
When Lincoln died.

 

Abraham Lincoln

 

His language had a special vocabulary — not just "the SF" [God] and "epsilon" [child] but also "bosses" (women), "slaves" (men), "captured" (married), "liberated" (divorced), "recaptured" (remarried), "noise" (music), "poison" (alcohol), "preaching" (giving a mathematics lecture), "Sam" (the United States), and "Joe" (the Soviet Union). When he said someone had "died," Erdős meant that the person had stopped doing mathematics. When he said someone had "left," the person had died.

 

Paul Erdos

 

Lincoln's proclamation is even more important than the Maryland campaign. Lincoln is a sui generis figure in the annals of history. He has no initiative, no idealistic impetus, cothurnus, no historical trappings. He gives his most important actions always the most commonplace form. Other people claim to be "fighting for an idea," when it is for them a matter of square feet of land. Lincoln, even when he is motivated by, an idea, talks about "square feet." He sings the bravura aria of his part hesitantly, reluctantly and unwillingly, as though apologising for being compelled by circumstances "to act the lion." The most redoubtable decrees — which will always remain remarkable historical documents — flung by him at the enemy all look like, and are intended to look like, routine summonses sent by a lawyer to the lawyer of the opposing party, legal chicaneries, involved, hidebound actiones juris.

 

Abraham Lincoln

 

"A great man" [...] "and the greatest and most representative of the Spanish people of the 20th century" [...] "one of the great leaders we have had in our history" — The day Francisco Franco, the dictator, died.

 

Manuel Fraga Iribarne