Abraham Lincoln never claimed to...
Illustration
Object:
Abraham Lincoln never claimed to be a Christian. His closest friends were in agreement
in their assessment that neither at age twenty nor at age fifty, nor despite some of the
religious language of his speeches, was Lincoln a Christian in any orthodox sense of the
word.
"When he was making an old woman's will, he could indeed, at her request, repeat for her a psalm out of his head; and when, after the death of their little boy, Eddie, Mary joined the Presbyterians, he rented a pew in the church, and became friendly with the minister; but he would not himself become a church member. He said, 'Probably it is to be my lot to go on in a twilight, feeling and reasoning my way through life, as questioning, doubting Thomas did.' "
(from Emil Ludwig, Lincoln [Little, Brown, and Co., 1930], p. 166)
"When he was making an old woman's will, he could indeed, at her request, repeat for her a psalm out of his head; and when, after the death of their little boy, Eddie, Mary joined the Presbyterians, he rented a pew in the church, and became friendly with the minister; but he would not himself become a church member. He said, 'Probably it is to be my lot to go on in a twilight, feeling and reasoning my way through life, as questioning, doubting Thomas did.' "
(from Emil Ludwig, Lincoln [Little, Brown, and Co., 1930], p. 166)
