c/^^t^ Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://www.archive.org/details/lincolnsdevotionOOhave Lincoln's Devotional I I LINCOLN'S Introduction by Carl Sandburg CHANNEL PRESS Channel Press, Inc. ■ Great Neck, N. Y. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^.s^s^^ Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 57-13,471 W The special contents of this edition copyright © 1957 by Channel Press, Inc., Great Neck, New York. All rights re- served. Manufactured in the United States of America. Designers: Ernst Reichl Associates En December of the year 1849, Edward Baker Lincoln, the second of the Lincoln boys, was struck down with illness. It may have been diphtheria. No records of the exact nature of the sickness exist. After fifty-two days of waiting and fear, on the first day of February, Abraham Lincoln held in his arms the white still bodv of a child of his own. He could call the name of Eddie to his boy, and the boy had no ears to hear nor breath to answer. This was his own kith and kin, who had come out of silence and gone back to silence, back where Nancy Hanks had gone the year he helped his father peg together a plank coffin. He tried to pierce through into regions of that silence, and find replies to questions that surged in him. On the day that Eddie was buried, a funeral sermon was pronounced by the Reverend James Smith of the First Presbyterian Church of Springfield, Illinois, and a friendship developed INTRODUCTION between the Lincoln family and Mr. Smith. The minister had been a wild boy in his young days in Scotland, had been a scoffer at religion, and then had become a preacher in Kentucky. He could tell a story — he and Lincoln were good company. "A good story," said Lincoln, "is medi- cine to my bones." It wasn't long after Eddie's death that the Lincolns rented a pew in the church. In 1852 Mrs. Lincoln took the sacrament and joined in membership. Pastor Smith presented Lincoln with a copy of his book, "The Christian's De- fense," a reply to infidels and atheists. Lincoln read the book, said he was interested, later at- tended revival meetings held in the church, and served in several capacities, but when asked to join the church, said he "couldn't quite see it." In the same year, the Religious Tract Society of London, England, published a daily devo- tional titled "The Believer's Daily Treasure; or, Texts of Scripture Arranged for Every Day in the Year." On the title page appeared this verse from Psalm cxix:72: The law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver vi INTRODUCTION How Abraham Lincoln acquired his copy of the devotional we do not know. In 1852 he re- ceived as a gift at least one other book con- cerned with religion, but there is no word to be found of "The Believer's Daily Treasure." It could have been a gift from Mary Lincoln; some- time after 1847, Lincoln gave her a large family Bible, and perhaps this handy, vest-pocket book was a present from her in return, one he could carry with him for occasional reading on the Old Eighth Circuit. We do know that on the inside cover of the tiny book of Scripture and verse, Lincoln signed his name with typical abbreviation. And from this we can surmise that either the volume itself or the person who pre- sented it to him was held in deep regard, for throughout his life Lincoln was sparing in the number of books in which he wrote his name. His signature, it would seem, was inscribed more as an expression of strong interest or affec- tion than as a precaution against a book's be- coming lost, strayed, stolen. From his earliest reading days as a boy, Lin- coln turned the pages of the Bible, and over all the years of his life he went on with his reading vii INTRODUCTION of it, often quoting from it in private conversa- tions and public addresses. He and his family owned several Bibles. Writing to Mary, the sister of his best friend, Joshua Speed, he said, "Tell your mother that I have not got her pres- ent with me, but I intend to read it regularly when I return home." The gift was an Oxford Bible. In 1864 he received a beautiful Bible from a group of Negroes from Baltimore. In ac- knowledging the gift, Lincoln said, "In regard to this great book, I have but to say it is the best gift God has given to man." Among universal possessions of the American people are certain speeches and letters of Lin- coln that are colored and in part drenched with biblical references and learning. Why did Lin- coln say "Four score and seven" instead of the plain figure "eighty-seven" at the opening of his Gettysburg speech? Probably, it has been sug- gested, because in the Old Testament it reads most often "two score" instead of "forty," and "four score" instead of "eighty." In the Second Inaugural he spoke as an interpreter of the pur- poses of the Almighty, as a familiar of the pages of Holy Writ: "The Almighty has his own pur- viii INTR ODUCTION poses. 'Woe unto the world because of offences: For it must needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh'." In this Second Inaugural address, of biblical derivation is the expression, "Let us judge not, that we be not judged." As the end of the War came into sight, and the awesome tasks of recon- struction and reconciliation loomed, Lincoln's deep heart's desire was a minimum of hate. When Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts spoke of Jefferson Davis— "Do not allow him to escape the law— he must be hanged"— Lincoln replied calmly, "Judge not, that ye be not judged." Again, as Sumner later wrote of it, he pressed Lincoln with a remark that the sight of Libby Prison made it impossible to pardon the President of the Confederate States, and Lincoln repeated twice over the words, "Judge not, that ye be not judged." In his message of December 1, 1862, Lincoln told Congress of the need for action by the pres- ent and living generation, the territory of a nation, its land, being the only part which is of certain durability; and quoting from Scripture, he said: "One generation passeth away, and an- ix INTRODUCTION other generation cometh, but the earth abideth forever." In Springfield, in the year 1858, biblical in color was Lincoln's address which ever there- after was known as The House Divided speech. He quoted, "A house divided against itself can- not stand," adding, "I believe this Government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free." The brevity and portent of a Bible verse was there in the opening sentence of that speech: "If we could first know where we are and whither we are tending, we could better judge what to do and how to do it." The odor of true sanctity and an air of con- secration past words saturates the letter of Lin- coln to Mrs. Lydia Bixby of Boston, who had lost four sons in the war: But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heav- enly Father may assuage the anguish of your be- reavement, and leave you only the cherished mem- ory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of Freedom. INTRODUCTION The secretaries Nicolay and Hay were amazed at one instance of Lincoln's familiarity with the Bible. In 1864 news had come of the Cleveland, Ohio, convention of a third party which nomi- nated John C. Fremont for President. A friend drifted into the White House, gave Lincoln an account of the convention, and said that instead of the many thousands expected there were present at no time more than 400 people. The President, struck by the number mentioned, reached for the Bible on his desk, searched a moment, then read the words : " 'And everyone that was in distress, and everyone that was in debt, and everyone that was discontented, gath- ered themselves unto him; and he became cap- tain over them; and there were with him about four hundred men/ " In proclamations, in recommendations of thanksgiving or of fasting and prayer, and in numerous references to God, Providence, the Almighty, the Common Father, Lincoln gave the impression to the multitude that he had a creed. A clergyman — William E. Barton — sought to formulate such a statement of faith from Lincoln's own words, changing the text merely xi INTRODUCTION to the extent of transposing pronouns from plural to singular, making other slight modifications, and prefixing the words, "I believe." The result was almost liturgical, containing expressions such as these: I believe in penitential and pious senti- ments, in devotional designs and purposes, in homages and confessions, in supplications to the Almighty, solemnly, earnestly, reverently. I believe in blessings and comfort from the Father of Mercies to the sick, the wounded, the prisoners, and to the orphans and widows. I believe it pleases Almighty God to pro- long our national life, defending us with His guardian care. I believe in His eternal truth and justice. I believe the will of God prevails; without Him all human reliance is vain; without the assistance of that Divine Being I cannot succeed; with that assistance I cannot fail. I believe I am a humble instrument in the hands of our Heavenly Father; I desire that all my works and acts may be according to xii INTRODUCTION His will; and that it may be so, I give thanks to the Almighty and seek His aid. I believe in praise to Almighty God, the beneficent Creator and Ruler of the Universe. Henry C. Deming, Congressman from Con- necticut, reported that when Lincoln was asked why, with his obvious interest in religious mat- ters and his familiarity with the Bible, he did not join a church, Lincoln replied: When any church will inscribe over its altars, as its sole qualification for membership, the Savior's condensed statement for the substance of both law and gospel, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor as thyself," that church will I join with all my heart and soul. And his law partner, William H. Herndon, quotes Lincoln as saying that his religion was like that of an old man he once heard speak at a church meeting: "When I do good," the man had said, "I feel good; when I do bad, I feel bad; and that's my religion." Although the Lincoln field has been worked and winnowed year after year, from time to xiii INTRODUCTION time, happily enough, something new does turn up. It was not until some eighty years after his death that a printed statement was discovered in which he answered election campaign charges that he was "an open scoffer at Christianity" by saying, in part, "I have never denied the truth of the Scripture" and "I do not think I could myself, be brought to support a man for office whom I knew to be an open enemy of, and scoffer at, religion." John Jay, grandson of the great Chief Justice and a notable Civil War figure himself, was re- ported by Frank B. Carpenter as saying he had seen Lincoln reading a "pocket edition of the New Testament." Cautious students have not ac- cepted fully the report by Jay and others, due primarily to the lack of the Testament itself. Perhaps the discovery of this little book will increase research into the religious attitudes of Abraham Lincoln and throw new light on that long debated problem. In the meantime, some may ask themselves if the reported pocket Test- ament might not indeed have been this little devotional. In "The Believer's Daily Treasure" Lincoln xiv INTRODUCTION could come upon many sentences and phrases famous, important and often quoted; and many of the passages in the book could have had spe- cial interest for him, and direct or indirect in- fluence on his thought and speech. This daily devotional, unseen for many years, takes us no farther toward placing Lincoln within creed or denomination; but it is new testimony that he was a man of profound faith. "Take all this book upon reason that you can, and the balance on faith," Lincoln said of the Bible to his friend Joshua Speed in 1864, "and you will live and die a better man." CARL SANDBURG XV The devotional portion of this volume contains the entire text of "The Believer's Daily Treasure; or, Texts of Scripture Arranged for Every Day in the Year," published in 1852 by the Religious Tract So- ciety of London, England. The material is reprinted as it appears in the copy of the book which Abraham Lincoln owned, and therefore contains the several inconsistencies and typographical errors found in the original edition. Lincoln's signed copy of "The Believer's Daily Treasure" is now a part of the collection of Lin- colniana owned by Mr. Carl Haverlin. No other copy of any edition of the book has been found at the time of this writing. Mr. Haverlin, president of Broadcast Music, Inc., is active in a number of or- ganizations in the field of American history. He is president of the Civil War Centennial Association, founder and past president of the New York chapter of the Civil War Round Table, and a trustee of Lincoln Memorial University. The photographs which follow show the book owned and inscribed by Abraham Lincoln. i / ttter, thru I THE I BELIEVER'S I | DAILY * I TREASURE; f % or ' I Texts of Scripture, f | arranged for every day in the year. | ?> ^ a The law of thy mouth is better unto me £ * than thousands of gold and silver.