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Am I not destroying my enemies
by Abraham Lincoln

Am I not destroying my enemies
when I make friends of them?
- Abraham Lincoln

Related topics: Life Human-Nature Psychology Government Political Hate

Quotes by Abraham Lincoln

In great contests, each party claims to act
in accordance with the will of God.
Both may be, and one must be wrong.
- Abraham Lincoln

I don't like that man.
I must get to know him better.
- Abraham Lincoln

I have always found that mercy bears
richer fruits than strict justice.
- Abraham Lincoln

The best thing about the future is
that it comes one day at a time.
- Abraham Lincoln

Common looking people are the best in the world:
that is the reason the Lord makes so many of them.
- Abraham Lincoln

If there is anything that a man can do well,
I say let him do it. Give him a chance.
- Abraham Lincoln

You cannot escape the responsibility
of tomorrow by evading it today.
- Abraham Lincoln

How many legs does a dog have
if you call the tail a leg? Four.
Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.
- Abraham Lincoln

If I had eight hours to chop down a tree,
I'd spend six hours sharpening my ax.
- Abraham Lincoln

The Lord prefers common-looking people.
That is why he makes so many of them.
- Abraham Lincoln

Marriage is neither heaven nor hell,
it is simply purgatory.
- Abraham Lincoln

My great concern is not whether you have failed,
but whether you are content with your failure.
- Abraham Lincoln

Don't worry when you are not recognized,
but strive to be worthy of recognition.
- Abraham Lincoln

Every one desires to live long,
but no one would be old.
- Abraham Lincoln

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed
is more important than any other one thing.
- Abraham Lincoln

Give me six hours to chop down a tree
and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.
- Abraham Lincoln

Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves.
- Abraham Lincoln

When you have got an elephant by the hind legs
and he is trying to run away, it's best to let him run.
- Abraham Lincoln

No matter how much cats fight,
there always seem to be plenty of kittens.
- Abraham Lincoln

That some achieve great success,
is proof to all that others can achieve it as well.
- Abraham Lincoln

If this is coffee, please bring me some tea;
but if this is tea, please bring me some coffee.
- Abraham Lincoln

I care not much for a man's religion
whose dog and cat are not the better for it.
- Abraham Lincoln

Whatever you are, be a good one.
- Abraham Lincoln

Things may come to those who wait,
but only the things left by those who hustle.
- Abraham Lincoln

Books serve to show a man
that those original thoughts of his
aren't very new at all.
- Abraham Lincoln

You cannot build character and courage by
taking away a man's initiative and independence.
- Abraham Lincoln

The philosophy of the school room in one generation
will be the philosophy of government in the next.
- Abraham Lincoln

I do not think much of a man who is
not wiser today than he was yesterday.
- Abraham Lincoln

If we could first know where we are,
and whither we are tending,
we could then better judge what to do,
and how to do it.
- Abraham Lincoln

You have to do your own growing
no matter how tall your grandfather was.
- Abraham Lincoln

I remember my mother's prayers and they have always followed me.
They have clung to me all my life.
- Abraham Lincoln

No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar.
- Abraham Lincoln

Towering genius disdains a beaten path.
It seeks regions hitherto unexplored.
- Abraham Lincoln

I don't know who my grandfather was;
I am much more concerned to know what his grandson will be.
- Abraham Lincoln

You can fool all the people some of the time,
and some of the people all the time,
but you cannot fool all the people all the time.
- Abraham Lincoln (sometimes attributed to P. T. Barnum)

When I do good, I feel good.
When I do bad, I feel bad.
That's my religion.
- Abraham Lincoln

I will prepare and some day my chance will come.
- Abraham Lincoln

He has a right to criticize, who has a heart to help.
- Abraham Lincoln

Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another,
but let him work diligently and build one for himself,
thus by example assuring that his own
shall be safe from violence when built.
- Abraham Lincoln

There is nothing true anywhere,
The true is nowhere to be seen;
If you say you see the true,
This seeing is not the true one.
- Abraham Lincoln paraphrasing Lao Tzu' Tao te Ching

Those who deny freedom to others
deserve it not for themselves.
- Abraham Lincoln

A house divided against itself cannot stand.
- Abraham Lincoln

Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow.
The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.
- Abraham Lincoln

A friend is one who has the same enemies as you have.
- Abraham Lincoln

If you call a tail a leg, how many legs has a dog?
Five? No, calling a tail a leg don't make it a leg.
- Abraham Lincoln

We should be too big to take offense
and too noble to give it.
- Abraham Lincoln

And in the end, it's not
the years in your life that count,
it's the life in your years.
- Abraham Lincoln

I destroy my enemies when I make them my friends.
- Abraham Lincoln

Stand with anybody that stands right,
stand with him while he is right
and part with him when he goes wrong.
- Abraham Lincoln

All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.
- Abraham Lincoln

When I am getting ready to reason with a man,
I spend one-third of my time thinking about myself
and what I am going to say
and two-thirds about him and what he is going to say.
- Abraham Lincoln

Everybody likes a compliment.
- Abraham Lincoln

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.
- Abraham Lincoln

I am a firm believer in the people.
If given the truth, they can be depended upon
to meet any national crisis.
The great point is to bring them the real facts.
- Abraham Lincoln

I want it said of me by those who knew me best,
that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower
where I thought a flower would grow.
- Abraham Lincoln

A woman is the only thing I am afraid of
that I know will not hurt me.
- Abraham Lincoln

If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one?
- Abraham Lincoln

The best way to get a bad law repealed
is to enforce it strictly.
- Abraham Lincoln

If once you forfeit the confidence of your fellow-citizens,
you can never regain their respect and esteem.
- Abraham Lincoln

With the fearful strain that is on me night and day,
if I did not laugh I should die.
- Abraham Lincoln

Avoid popularity if you would have peace.
- Abraham Lincoln

Hold on with a bulldog grip,
and chew and choke as much as possible.
- Abraham Lincoln

I have been driven many times to my knees
by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere to go.
My own wisdom, and that of all about me,
seemed insufficient for the day.
- Abraham Lincoln

As our case is new, we must think and act anew.
- Abraham Lincoln

It has been my experience that folks who
have no vices, have very few virtues.
- Abraham Lincoln

The highest art is always the most religious,
and the greatest artist is always a devout person.
- Abraham Lincoln

Let's have faith that right makes might;
and in that faith let us, to the end,
dare to do our duty as we understand it.
- Abraham Lincoln

You cannot help men permanently by doing for them
what they could and should do for themselves.
- Abraham Lincoln

The way for a young man to rise is
to improve himself in every way he can,
never suspecting that anybody wishes to hinder him.
- Abraham Lincoln

Surely God would not have created such a being as man,
with an ability to grasp the infinite,
to exist only for a day!
No, no, man was made for immortality.
- Abraham Lincoln

Some single mind must be master,
else there will be no agreement in anything.
- Abraham Lincoln

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Today is Your Day to Dance Lightly with Life.  It Really Is.
      - Jonathan Lockwood Huie