Abraham Lincoln: Was He A Christian? Part 17

The distinguished lawyer, soldier and journalist, Donn Piatt, who knew Lincoln in Illinois and who met him often in Was.h.i.+ngton, writes: "I soon discovered that this strange and strangely gifted man, while not at all cynical, was a skeptic. His view of human nature was low, but good-natured. I could not call it suspicious, but he believed only what he saw" (Reminiscences of Lincoln, p. 480).

Those who are disposed to believe that Lincoln's Christian biographers have observed an inflexible adherence to truth in their statements concerning his religious belief would do well to ponder the following words of Mr. Piatt: "History is, after all, the crystallization of popular beliefs. As a pleasant fiction is more acceptable than a naked fact, and as the historian shapes his wares, like any other dealer, to suit his customers, one can readily see that our chronicles are only a duller sort of fiction than the popular novels so eagerly read; not that they are true, but that they deal in what we long to have--the truth.

Popular beliefs, in time, come to be superst.i.tions, and create G.o.ds and devils. Thus Was.h.i.+ngton is deified into an impossible man, and Aaron Burr has pa.s.sed into a like impossible monster. Through the same process Abraham Lincoln, one of our truly great, has almost gone from human knowledge" (Ibid, p. 478).

HON. SCHUYLER COLFAX.

Previous to the war no cla.s.s of persons were louder in their denunciation of Abolitionism than the clergy of the North. When at last it became evident that the inst.i.tution of slavery was doomed, in their eagerness to be found on the popular side, they were equally loud in their demands for its immediate extirpation. In September, 1862, a deputation of Chicago clergymen waited upon the President for the purpose of urging him to proclaim the freedom of the slave.

Notwithstanding he had matured his plans and was ready to issue his Proclamation, he gave them no intimation of his intention. In connection with their visit, Colfax relates the following: "One of these ministers felt it his duty to make a more searching appeal to the President's conscience. Just as they were retiring, he turned, and said to Mr.

Lincoln, 'What you have said to us, Mr. President, compels me to say to you in reply, that it is a message to you from our Divine Master, through me, commanding you, sir, to open the doors of bondage that the slave may go free!' Mr. Lincoln replied, instantly, 'That may be, sir, for I have studied this question, by night and by day, for weeks and for months, but if it is, as you say, a message from your Divine Master, is it not odd that the only channel he could send it by was that roundabout route by that awfully wicked city of Chicago?" (Reminiscences of Lincoln, pp. 334, 335).

In a lecture delivered in Brooklyn, N. T., in 1886, Mr. Colfax stated that Lincoln was not a Christian, in the evangelical sense. To a gentleman who visited him at his home in South Bend, Ind., he declared that Lincoln was not a believer in orthodox Christianity. Again at Atchison, Kan., he informed Mr. Perkins that Lincoln had never been converted to Christianity, as claimed.

HON. WILLIAM O. KELLEY.

William D. Kelley, for thirty years a member of Congress from Pennsylvania, relates an incident similar to the one related by Mr.

Colfax. A "Quaker preacher" called at the White House to urge the President to proclaim at once the freedom of the slave. To ill.u.s.trate her argument and emphasize her plea, she cited the history of Deborah. "Having elaborated this Biblical example," says Mr. Kelley, "the speaker a.s.sumed that the President was, as Deborah had been, the appointed minister of the Lord, and proceeded to tell him that it was his duty to follow the example of Deborah, and forthwith abolish slavery, and establish freedom throughout the land, as the Lord had appointed him to do.

"'Has the Friend finished?' said the President, as she ceased to speak.

Having received an affirmative answer, he said: 'I have neither time nor disposition to enter into discussion with the Friend, and end this occasion by suggesting for her consideration the question whether, if it be true that the Lord has appointed me to do the work she has indicated, it is not probable that he would have communicated knowledge of the fact to me as well as to her'" (Reminiscences of Lincoln, pp. 284, 285).

HON. GEORGE S. BOUTWELL.

A great many pious stories have been circulated in regard to the Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation. We are told that he made a "solemn vow to G.o.d" that if Lee was defeated at Antietam he would issue the Preliminary Proclamation. And yet this doc.u.ment contains no recognition of G.o.d. He even completed the draft of it on what Christians are pleased to regard as G.o.d's holy day. Mr. Boutwell states that Lincoln once related to him the circ.u.mstances attending the promulgation of the instrument. He quotes the following as Lincoln's words: "The truth is just this: When Lee came over the river, I made a resolution that if McClellan drove him back I would send the Proclamation after him. The battle of Antietam was fought Wednesday, and until Sat.u.r.day I could not find out whether we had gained a victory or lost a battle. It was then too late to issue the Proclamation that day, and the fact is _I fixed it up a little Sunday_, and Monday I let them have it" (Reminiscences of Lincoln, p. 126).

E. H. WOOD.

Mr. E. H. Wood, one of Lincoln's old Springfield neighbors, who visited him at Was.h.i.+ngton during the war, made the following statement to Mr.

Hern-don, in October, 1881:

"I came from Auburn, N. Y.--knew Seward well--knew Lincoln very well--lived for three years just across the alley from his residence. I had many conversations with him on politics and religion as late as 1859 and '60. He was a broad religionist--a Liberal. Lincoln told me Franklin's story. Franklin and a particular friend made an agreement that when the first one died he would come back and tell how things went. Well, Franklin's friend died, but never came back. 'It is a doubtful question,' said Lincoln, 'whether we get anywhere to get back.'

Lincoln said, 'There is no h.e.l.l.' He did not say much about heaven. I met him in Was.h.i.+ngton and saw no change in him."

I have given the testimony of two of Lincoln's nearest neighbors in Springfield, Isaac Hawley and E. H. Wood. Mr. Hawley _believes_ that Lincoln was a Christian; Mr. Wood _knows_ that he was not. Mr. Hawley never heard Lincoln utter a word to support his belief; Mr. Wood obtained his knowledge from Lincoln himself. Mr. Hawley's belief is of little value compared with Mr. Wood's knowledge. Mr. Hawley never heard Lincoln defend Christianity and probably never heard him oppose it.

Lincoln knew that Mr. Hawley was a Christian--that he had no sympathy with his Freethought views. He did not desire to offend or antagonize him, and hence he refrained from introducing a subject that he knew was distasteful to him. Mr. Wood, on the other hand, was a man of broad and Liberal ideas, and Lincoln did not hesitate to express to him his views with freedom.

J. J. THOMPSON, M.D.

Dr. J. J. Thompson, an old resident of Illinois, now in Colorado, in a letter, dated March 18, 1888, writes as follows: "I knew Abraham Lincoln from my boyhood up to the time of his death. I was in his law office many times and met him several times in Was.h.i.+ngton. He was a Liberal, outspoken, and seemed to feel proud of it."

"This great and good man," concludes Dr. Thompson, "claimed Humanity as his religion."

REV. JAMES SHRIGLEY.

Rev. Jas. Shrigley, of Philadelphia, who was acquainted with President Lincoln in Was.h.i.+ngton, and who received a hospital chaplaincy from him, says: "President Lincoln was also remarkably tolerant. He was the friend of all, and never, to my knowledge, gave the influence of his great name to encourage sectarianism in any of its names and forms" (Lincoln Memorial Alb.u.m, p. 335).

HON. JOHN COVODE.

In connection with Mr. Shrigley's appointment, the following anecdote is related. Mr. Shrigley was not orthodox, and when it became known that his name had been sent to the Senate, a Committee of "Young Christians"

waited upon the President for the purpose of inducing him to withdraw the nomination. Hon. John Covode, of Pennsylvania, was present during the interview and gave it to the press. It is as follows:

"'We have called, Mr. President, to confer with you in regard to the appointment of Mr. Shrigley, of Philadelphia, as hospital chaplain.'

"The President responded: 'Oh, yes, gentlemen; I have sent his name to the Senate, and he will no doubt be confirmed at an early day.'

"One of the young men replied: 'We have not come to ask for the appointment, but to solicit you to withdraw the nomination.'

"'Ah,' said Lincoln, 'that alters the case; but on what ground do you ask the nomination withdrawn?'

"The answer was, 'Mr. Shrigley is not sound in his theological opinions.'

"The President inquired: 'On what question is the gentleman unsound?'

"Response: 'He does not believe in endless punishment; not only so, sir, but he believes that even the rebels themselves will finally be saved.'

"'Is that so?' inquired the President.

"The members of the committee both responded, 'Yes,' 'Yes.'

"'Well, gentlemen, if that be so, and there is any way under heaven whereby the rebels can be saved, then, for G.o.d's sake and their sakes, let the man be appointed'" (L. M. A., pp. 336, 337).

And he was appointed.

JAMES E. MURDOCH.

It is claimed that few public men have made greater use of the Bible than Lincoln. This is true. He was continually quoting Scripture or alluding to Scriptural scenes and stories, sometimes to ill.u.s.trate or adorn a serious speech, but more frequently to point or emphasize a joke. The venerable actor and elocutionist, James E. Murdoch, who had met Lincoln, both in Springfield and Was.h.i.+ngton, relates an anecdote of him while at Was.h.i.+ngton which serves to ill.u.s.trate this propensity: "One day a detachment of troops was marching along the avenue singing the soul-stirring strain of 'John Brown.' They were walled in on either side by throngs of citizens and strangers, whose voices mingled in the roll of the mighty war-song. In the midst of this exciting scene, a man had clambered into a small tree, on the sidewalk, where he clung, unmindful of the jeers of the pa.s.sing crowd, called forth by the strange antics he was unconsciously exhibiting in his efforts to overcome the swaying motion of the slight stem which bent beneath his weight. Mr. Lincoln's attention was attracted for a moment, and he paused in the serious conversation in which he was deeply interested and in an abstracted manner, yet with a droll cast of the eye, and a nod of the head in the direction of the man, he repeated, in his dry and peculiar utterance, the following old-fas.h.i.+oned couplet:

'And Zaccheous he did climb a tree, His Lord and Master for to see.'"

(L. M. A., pp. 349, 350).

Mr. Murdoch states that in connection with this incident Lincoln was charged "with turning sacred subjects into ridicule." He apologizes for, and attempts to palliate this levity, and affects to believe that Lincoln was a Christian. But almost daily Lincoln indulged in jokes at the expense of the Bible and Christianity, many of them ten-fold more sacrilegious in their character than this trifling incident related by Mr. Murdoch. If the scrupulously pious considered this simple jest, uttered in the midst of a mixed crowd, irreverent, what would have been their horror could they have listened to some of his remarks made when alone with a skeptical boon companion? With Christians and with strangers he was generally guarded in his speech, lest he should give offense; but with his unbelieving friends, up to the end of his career, his keenest shafts of wit were not infrequently aimed at the religion of his day. This shows that the popular faith had no more sacredness for Lincoln, the President, in Was.h.i.+ngton, than it had for Lincoln, the farmer's boy, who mocked and mimicked it in Indiana, or Lincoln, the lawyer, who scoffed at it and argued against it in Illinois.

HON. MAUNSELL B. FIELD.

Mr. Field, who had met nearly all the noted characters of his day, both of Europe and America, in his "Memories of Many Men," has this significant sentence respecting Lincoln:

"Mr. Lincoln was entirely deficient in what the phrenologists call _reverence [veneration]_."

This made it easy for him to emanc.i.p.ate himself from the slavery of priestcraft and become and remain a Freethinker. Professor Beall, one of the ablest of living phrenological writers, says:

"No man can 'enjoy religion,' as the Methodists express it, unless he has well developed veneration and wonder" (The Brain and the Bible, p. 109). "All those who rebel against any form of government which in childhood they were taught to revere, must of necessity do so in opposition to the faculty of veneration. Thus it is obvious that the less one possesses of the conservative restraining faculties, the more easily he becomes a rebel or an Infidel to that which his reason condemns. On the other hand, the profoundly conscientious and reverential man, who sincerely regards unbelief as a sin, of course instinctively antagonizes every skeptical thought, and is thus likely to remain a slave to the religion learned at his mother's knee" (Ibid, p.

228).

Mr. Field also relates the following anecdote of Lincoln: "I was once in Mr. Lincoln's company when a sectarian controversy arose. He himself looked very grave, and made no observation until all the others had finished what they had to say. Then with a twinkle of the eye he remarked that he preferred the Episcopalians to every other sect, because they are equally indifferent to a man's religion and his politics."

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE.

The noted author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" had several interviews with the President. She wrote an article on him which has been cited in proof of his "deeply religious nature." But if her words prove anything, they prove that he was not an evangelical Christian. They are as follows: