y do we hope--fervently do
we pray--that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet; if
God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's
two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until
every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn
with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must
be said, 'The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.'

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the
right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish
the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who
shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to
do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among
ourselves, and with all nations."

The address ended, the Chief Justice arose, and the listeners who, for
the second time, heard Abraham Lincoln repeat the solemn words of his
oath of office, went from the impressive scene to their several homes in
thankfulness and confidence that the destiny of the nation was in safe
keeping.

Nothing would have amazed Mr. Lincoln more than to hear himself called
a man of letters; and yet it would be hard to find in all literature
anything to excel the brevity and beauty of his address at Gettysburg
or the lofty grandeur of this Second Inaugural. In Europe his style has
been called a model for the study and imitation of princes, while in
our own country many of his phrases have already passed into the daily
speech of mankind.

His gift of putting things simply and clearly was partly the habit
of his own clear mind, and partly the result of the training he gave
himself in days of boyish poverty, when paper and ink were luxuries
almost beyond his reach, and the words he wished to set down must be the
best words, and the clearest and shortest to express the ideas he had
in view. This training of thought before expression, of knowing exactly
what he wished to say before saying it, stood him in good stead all his
life; but only the mind of a great man, with a lofty soul and a poet's
vision; one who had suffered deeply and felt keenly; who carried the
burden of a nation on his heart, whose sympathies were as broad and
whose kindness was as great as his moral purpose was strong and firm,
could have written the deep, forceful, convincing words that fell from
his pen in the later years of his life. It wa