highest prosperity, they could have brought about in his favour. On the
contrary, nobody has ever expected me to be President. In my poor, lean,
lank face, nobody has ever seen that any cabbages were sprouting out.
These are disadvantages, all taken together, that the Republicans labour
under. We have to fight this battle upon principle, and upon principle
alone. I am in a certain sense made the standard-bearer in behalf of the
Republicans. I was made so merely because there had to be some one so
placed,--I being in no wise preferable to any other one of the
twenty-five, perhaps a hundred, we have in the Republican ranks. Then I
say, I wish it to be distinctly understood and borne in mind, that we
have to fight this battle without many--perhaps without any--of the
external aids which are brought to bear against us. So I hope those with
whom I am surrounded have principle enough to nerve themselves for the
task, and leave nothing undone that can fairly be done to bring about
the right result. As appears by two speeches I have heard him deliver
since his arrival in Illinois, he gave special attention to the speech
of mine delivered on the sixteenth of June. He says that he carefully
read that speech. He told us that at Chicago a week ago last night, and
he repeated it at Bloomington last night.... He says it was evidently
prepared with great care. I freely admit it was prepared with care....
But I was very careful not to put anything in that speech as a matter of
fact, or make any inferences which did not appear to me to be true and
fully warrantable. If I had made any mistake I was willing to be
corrected; if I had drawn any inference in regard to Judge Douglas or
any one else, which was not warranted, I was fully prepared to modify it
as soon as discovered. I planted myself upon the truth and the truth
only, so far as I knew it, or could be brought to know it.

Having made that speech with the most kindly feelings toward Judge
Douglas, as manifested therein, I was gratified when I found that he had
carefully examined it, and had detected no error of fact, nor any
inference against him, nor any misrepresentations, of which he thought
fit to complain.... He seizes upon the doctrines he supposes to be
included in that speech, and declares that upon them will turn the
issues of the campaign. He then quotes, or attempts to quote, from my
speech. I will not say that he wilfully misquotes, but he does fail to
quote accurately.