Abraham Lincoln: “Now, without detaining you any longer, I propose that you help me to close up what I am now saying with three rousing…”

As a general rule I abstain from reading the reports of attacks upon myself, wishing not to be provoked by that to which I cannot properly offer an answer.

The question is, will it be wiser to take it as it is and help to improve it, or to reject and disperse it?

If I were to try to read, much less answer, all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business.

He said, with a great deal of emphasis, and with an expression of countenance I shall never forget: "When a man is sincerely penitent for his misdeeds, and gives satisfactory evidence of the same, he can safely be pardoned, and there is no…