it's a pleasure to have my friend lynn advice me to speak before you today i've been here several times before so i was given me a great pleasure to give a talk about my favorite subject abraham lincoln i've been a student of abraham lincoln for some sixty ideas and i know here as i've come to were many things about was the like that and one of the things that i learned or i tried to interpret was several years ago thought was the real abraham lincoln but even this book was think the controversy it was criticized for not being factual today i would like to tell you a story or tell you some facts and figures about abraham lincoln that hopefully will make this story true to you because i would like to read you a portion of that book and it's a story about what mr lincoln possibly could have done and i think it's true i like to begin the opinion of abraham lincoln by himself what history records and finally what some of his friends and cohorts fellow politicians have you know at what they thought of him you think about his writing capability he writes my dear sir here with a little sketch as you requested there is not much of it for the reason i suppose that there is not much of me i was born february ads and others in macon county illinois my father at is death was but six years i was but six years of age it is that he moved from kentucky to what is now spencer county indiana in my eighth year we reached out to our new home about the time the state came into the union there were some schools so called but no qualification was ever required of a teacher beyond reading writing and ciphering to the rule of three if a straggler supposed to understand what had happened to be happened to sojourn into the neighborhood he was looked upon as a wizard of course when i came of age i didn't know how much they still somehow i could read write and cipher to the rule of three but that was all i have and that was all that i have not been able to school sense the little advance i now put on have upon this store of education i think that from time to time and other the pressure of the city that may have possibly succeed but he did perseverance one of the things that he learned from was reading he loves to read he read such books as a sub stables arabian nights editorials newspapers he loves poetry he read many many books on poetry he read the journals and debates of the federal constitution he also read books loved to read when shakespeare he was an avid reader of shakespeare so as far as this political attitude he was he kept his eyes on the prize he would do this is associate himself from the attacks of other politicians and he wrote that even he had been controlled by events concerning abraham lincoln was in his ability to write like keep in mind abraham lincoln was the author of the good it broke address probably one of the most famous speeches of all of american history  take his little slips of paper out and he would use that to memorize what he wanted to write addressed by such thing as the little slips of paper as an example abraham lincoln did not write to get a very good rest when he got to get it for he didn't write it on the back of a piece of brown paper that right on the back of a piece of  box abraham lincoln already had his speech written well before he got to get it over because he always thought of what he wanted to say and what makes the gay very good rest so beautiful is his use of because he wanted to relate back to seventeen seventy six he made people feel safe he also would interpret himself and his house divided speech we were first now where we are and whether we are tending and we could better judge what to do and how to do it that's what history records as abraham lincoln now what did his friends and part of political allies say about it if anyone knew the inner mind of the president it was the two secretaries they were waiting in preferred rofl effect letter writers inflexible and a perspective that was john hey john nicola debt the greater they grew for having known him somewhere up and intimately in the life everyone wanted to know that if only to ask what had it been like what he had been like it was a tough question to answer was a journalist and that we have heard the lincoln's law applied to fairly claim to have known him as well as any man during the springfield days said that he was the most struck mouth man you ever lived he also told only enough of his plans and purpose to induce the belief he had communicated all but observations by other by his other friends yet he observed enough to have communicated nothing like that acknowledged this when he sent i am rather inclined to silence and rather than be wise or not is not the least more unusual nowadays to find a man who can hold this thought that the fine one who cannot so what that i'd like to tell you is the story that i would hope it's true because to i hope that you'll agree with it it's a story that begins in washington lincoln is walking down the street and he just accidentally bumps into a young man of broccoli fourteen years of age and trip on the streets over him back to stick the light here and stared heartily at the president and the president regarding him saw that his blue eyes were blind with tears you are all a public highway to cancer gentlemen from the south even walking the streets without a mad tirade against the government from the president down like that listen patiently and when the lad parsed for breath go ahead he said good naturedly every little bit helps with that the yanks there was silence and drew himself up with a stiff dignity offended get fascinated unable to tears of away from the strange giant who was so insultingly kind and there was abuse who he had inspired him with such a sense of trust and hope to go back to trust home back to my original description i want to lawyer he said looking up actually into the deep blank face to just be above him i don't know where to find a lawyer in this horrible city and i must have one i can't wait it may be too late i want a lawyer and once more he was in a fever of excitement i wanted to draw for well my brother is as he caught his breath with a gasp and a desperate impression as he had it my brother is carter hamilton blair of georgia i'm white and black at the hampton court pleasure know also the president and the lad went on it would have been all right if now he hadn't left washington today my sister miss eleanor have to glare harder was better this morning and so she went with the senator she secretary to senator washington you know and he's on the yankee side the tone was full of contempt but yeah he's our cousin it was a relief to him to talk at the large hand which rested on the shoulder as they walked off seemed to the surance that his words were recorded respect and understanding of course if now he had been here she would have known how to get a lawyer but lawyer but carter had to bad turn half an hour ago and the doctor said he might be better off to die any minute and carter remembered about the money and some going excited that he said he was hurt again so i said i would go get a lawyer and i rushed out and the he can you see what mother will be about carter is engaged to marry miss sally maxfield and they would have been married now if it had been wounded and taken prisoner so of course like any gentleman that's a gage he wants to give her everything  entrance before into the big building and behind him in live strides caymans young friend a young man almost a boy to have twenty three or four his handsome face and a white shadow laid propped up against the pillows watching the door eagerly as they entered good boy warring the greed of the little fellow you got me a lawyer and the pale features laden with some with a smile of such a radiance that is the scene in groups to this gruesome place he held out his hand to the man his head fell back into the pillows his muscles twisted his arms about his neck of the newly born tight and yet while the agony still held him he was smiling again with gay courage it nearly blown away whispered his voice shaking but as eyes bright with amusement we better get to work before one of those little breezes carries me too far the pen thinker on the table mr might my brother did not tom we are many your brother and i met informally the other answered setting the materials in order for writing he charged it to me like a young steer and the boy out there was a deep trouble laughed the lively but it was like the young officer regarded him that's a good name from your standpoint that makes me wish to call you if i may a friend he had a happy instinct which shapes a sentence to fall on a smooth surface and the president and whom the same instinct was strong shortly drawn and then impromptu gloria rose to take his leave but the wounded man put out his hand don't go yet he pleaded with the imperious winning accent which was characteristic of both brothers the sudden radiant smile broke again over the face young drawn with suffering prophetic of close that i'd like you he brought be brought frankly i've never liked the stranger as much as that short order as i do to you its head fair is the boys boys lay back on the pillows like some pear damp against the whiteness the blue eyes shone like jewels from the color of his face a weak arm stretched from protectively of monthly about the young brother who pressed against them there was so much pathetically to make conversation which might be of interest might hold his guest the man who stood hesitatingly control the start of a movement i'm a southerner to the core and i believe with all my soul in the cause i f that perhaps i ought he took out his watch and made a quick mental calculation it's only a question of going without my dinner and the boy is dying he thought if i can give him a little bit of pleasure the dinner is but a small officer said and the king in his strong but going to be more gracious and more and more morally yet i'm conscious way by the way this great man isn't any relation to you is it mr lincoln what he's kind of a connection through my grandfather late going to go i was going i don't know the sort of fellow that he is you can say that what you want what i want to say first is that he yesterday made one of the great speeches of history what demand i know the one i'm talking about the young fellow brought him his thin fist down on the bedclothes my father was a speaker all my uncles and grandfather all speakers i've been brought up on the oratory i've studied and read the best model since i was a britches and i know a great speech when i see it and when now that my sister brought in the paper this morning and that to me i told her of the that and i told her at once that not six times since history began as a speech been made much more equal there was before she told me that what the senator said to the senator say asked the quietly listen it was senator warrington to whom my sister is acting as secretary the explanation was the state's role but when i carried past the drug by the interest of the story he was again gettysburg asked the date with the president's party and he told me he told my sister that the speech so went home to the hearts of all those thousands of people that when i was ended it was as if the whole audience held its breath there was not one handed one hand lifted to a cloth one might as well apply the lord's prayer it would have been and they they all felt it down to the lowest there was a long matter of reverence silence after this from all the great throne it seems to me an enemy that it was the most perfect tribute that ever was paid by the people to any or fifty years from now american school boys will be learning as part of their education which is kind of a funny story for maybe that's why i give this talk about the getting very good as one of the things that i will put out to the were living that sweet fifty years from now out american school boys will be learning it as part of their education it's not merely my opinion he went on i wanted to set the whole country is ringing with it and you haven't read it and your name's lincoln worried why speech the deep silence which followed it all were limited as his mind went back with new meaning with the realisation of the stillness that meant not indifference but perhaps as generous as we had said the most perfect tribute ever pai stillness and the hospital work as it had been stillness of the field the better it is where the soldiers voice broke it's a wonderful speech he said there's nothing fire other men are spoken stirring words for the north and for the south but never before i think with the love of both breeding through them it is only the greatest who can be partisan without bitterness and only such that they can we call ourselves not in the world or some other but america the fear that your enemy can fight you to the death without agree with me he demanded abruptly and lincoln answered slowly with a happy heart i believe it's a good speech is that the impetuousness of and i went on of course it is all wrong from my point of view and the gentleness and the sudden brilliant sweet smile but the transparency of his face like a lamb and i like to tell you that i know that i know that what you are fighting for the best of us is the right atmosphere than that they can smell things of long away the bitterness of the fight has faded for me i only feel the love of country the satisfaction of giving my life for the speeches made it look higher and simpler your outside as well as door of death had opened wide and a stormy wind was carrying the bright conquered spear into a larger atmosphere which he had spoken suddenly the struggle ceased the conscious had rested in the boy's are and the hand of the southern historical facts the story with lincoln enters a room where a dying to federalize the young man has a certain mobility about him that reveals the unlikely confession that is unlike his compatriots he has always admired president li in to bind up the nation's wounds to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his the widow and his orphan to do all the things that made shiva cherished a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all with it what i deal with it's too vast for malicious dealing and that's what he said and when he made a speech in louisiana one hundred sixty two  so my interpretation of abraham lincoln was as a put it here he was the most meek person i think ever that you could ever want to be i only wish the world would have been nicer if we c