all pull together in this
struggle. What are your sentiments? If it be true that on the ground which
I occupy--ground which I occupy as frankly and boldly as Judge Douglas
does his,--my views, though partly coinciding with yours, are not as
perfectly in accordance with your feelings as his are, I do say to you
in all candor, go for him, and not for me. I hope to deal in all things
fairly with Judge Douglas, and with the people of the State, in this
contest. And if I should never be elected to any office, I trust I may go
down with no stain of falsehood upon my reputation, notwithstanding the
hard opinions Judge Douglas chooses to entertain of me.

The Judge has again addressed himself to the Abolition tendencies of a
speech of mine made at Springfield in June last. I have so often tried
to answer what he is always saying on that melancholy theme that I almost
turn with disgust from the discussion,--from the repetition of an answer
to it. I trust that nearly all of this intelligent audience have read
that speech. If you have, I may venture to leave it to you to inspect
it closely, and see whether it contains any of those "bugaboos" which
frighten Judge Douglas.

The Judge complains that I did not fully answer his questions. If I have
the sense to comprehend and answer those questions, I have done so fairly.
If it can be pointed out to me how I can more fully and fairly answer him,
I aver I have not the sense to see how it is to be done. He says I do not
declare I would in any event vote for the admission of a slave State into
the Union. If I have been fairly reported, he will see that I did give an
explicit answer to his interrogatories; I did not merely say that I would
dislike to be put to the test, but I said clearly, if I were put to the
test, and a Territory from which slavery had been excluded should
present herself with a State constitution sanctioning slavery,--a most
extraordinary thing, and wholly unlikely to happen,--I did not see how I
could avoid voting for her admission. But he refuses to understand that I
said so, and he wants this audience to understand that I did not say
so. Yet it will be so reported in the printed speech that he cannot help
seeing it.

He says if I should vote for the admission of a slave State I would be
voting for a dissolution of the Union, because I hold that the Union
cannot permanently exist half slave and half free. I repeat that I do not
believe this government can endure per