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 mmm FAVORITE 
 
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 ic(^:o:^:<>: oh, why should the 
 
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 HYMN. 
 
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 Spirit of Mortal 
 be Proud 
 
 The Biblio Company 
 
 New Jersey 
 
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Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2012 with funding from 
 
 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/lincolnsfavoriteOOknox 
 
Lincoln's Favorite Hymn 
 
 Oh, Why Should the Spirit of 
 Mortal be Proud. 
 
 1924 
 
 The Biblio Co. 
 
 Pompton Lakes 
 
 New Jersey 
 
7^ 
 
 LINCOLN'S FAVORITE HYMN. 
 
 The poem Mortality, by William Knox, was 
 a special favorite with Abraham Lincoln, up 
 to the period of his death. Indeed the poem, 
 or hymn, was often ascribed to the pen of 
 Lincoln. 
 
 A mournful, melancholy poem with its 
 familiar line "0 Why Should the Spirit of 
 Mortal be Proud," remained throughout 
 President Lincoln's life the favorite expres- 
 sion of his own melancholy nature. 
 
 Lincoln never went far afield in the walks 
 of literature. He knew his Bible well, and 
 was fond of Burns, Milton and Shakespeare. 
 These with the poems of William Knox were 
 his literature. 
 
WILLIAM KNOX. 
 
 William Knox, a Scottish poet, was born at 
 Firth, Roxburghshire, 17 August, 1789, and 
 died at Edinburgh, 12 November 1825. He 
 was educated at Lilliesleaf and Musselburgh. 
 In 1820, his family settled in Edinburgh, and 
 there Knox, as a young man, became a jour- 
 nalist. Two years before he had published 
 his Lonely Hearth and Other Poems. In 
 1824, appeared The Songs of Israel, followed 
 in the year of his untimely death by The 
 Harp of Zion. A complete edition of his 
 poems was published in 1847, and has long 
 since been out of print. 
 
 6 
 
The verses of Knox are pervaded with 
 pathetic and religious sentiment. Scott con- 
 sidered Knox superior to Michael Bruce, 
 especially in The Lonely Hearth. The hymn 
 Mortality, or more commonly known as 0, 
 Why should the Spirit of Mortal be Proud, is 
 found in The Songs of Israel. 
 
MORTALITY. 
 
 why should the spirit of mortal be proud ? 
 Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-flying 
 
 cloud, 
 A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, 
 He passes from life to his rest in the grave. 
 
The leaves of the oak and the willow shall 
 
 fade, 
 Be scattered around, and tog-ether be laid ; 
 And the young and the old, and the low and 
 
 the high, 
 Shall moulder to dust, and together shall lie. 
 
 9 
 
The infant a mother attended and loved, 
 The mother that infant's affection who 
 
 proved, 
 The husband that mother and infant who 
 
 blest, 
 Each, all, are away to their dwelling of rest. 
 
 10 
 
The hand of the king that the sceptre hath 
 
 borne, 
 The brow of the priest that the mitre hath 
 
 worn, 
 The eye of the sage, and the heart of the 
 
 brave, 
 Are hidden and lost in the depths of the 
 
 grave. 
 
 11 
 
The maid on whose cheek, on whose brow, in 
 
 whose eye, 
 Shone beauty and pleasure — her triumphs 
 
 are by; 
 And the memory of those that beloved her 
 
 and praised 
 Are alike from the minds of the living erased. 
 
 The saint who enjoyed the communion of 
 
 heaven, 
 The sinner who dared to remain unforgiven. 
 The wise and the foolish, the guilty and just 
 Have quietly mingled their bones in the dust. 
 
 12 
 
So the multitude goes, like the flower and the 
 
 weed 
 That wither away to let others succeed ; 
 So the multitude comes, even those we behold, 
 To repeat every tale that hath often been 
 
 told. 
 
 For we are the same that our fathers have 
 
 been; 
 We see the same sights our fathers have 
 
 seen; 
 We drink the same stream, and we feel the 
 
 same sun, 
 And run the same course that our fathers 
 
 have run. 
 
 13 
 
The thoughts we are thinking our fathers 
 
 would think; 
 From the death we are shrinking our fathers 
 
 would shrink; 
 To the life we are clinging they also would 
 
 cling; 
 But it speeds from the earth like a bird on 
 
 the wing. 
 
 Yea! hope and despondency, pleasure and 
 
 pain, 
 Are mingled together like sunshine and 
 
 rain; 
 And the smile and the tear, the song and the 
 
 dirge 
 Still follow each other, like surge upon surge. 
 
 14 
 
Tis the twink of an eye, 'tis the draught of 
 
 a breath, 
 From the blossom of health to the paleness 
 
 of death, 
 From the gilded saloon to the bier and the 
 
 shroud : — 
 why should the spirit of mortal be proud ? 
 
 16