In regard to his religious views, Lincoln was always exceedingly reticent, but this reserve gives but greater force to the striking proof of the deep faith professed in his proclamations and public addresses, and that his life was actuated by high religious principles. He was too broad, too big brained, to care for doctrinal beliefs or sectarian differences.

His mother and father were Free-Will Baptists in Kentucky. In Indiana they became members of what was then known as the Predestinarian church, not from any change in belief, but because it was the only denomination in the neighborhood. When Thomas Lincoln removed to Illinois he united with the Christian church, commonly known as "Campbellites," and in that faith he died.

In his early days Lincoln had little opportunity for the practice of religion, and his parents, though religious enough in themselves, as has just been pointed out, took little trouble to inculcate its precepts on his youthful mind. The charge has been brought against him that he was an agnostic, but this arose from the fact that when a young man at Salem, in 1834, he prepared a review of Thomas Paine's "Age of Reason" and Volney's "Ruins of Empires," with a view to reading it before a literary society that had been organized in the neighborhood. A friend of his—Sam Hill—burned the manuscript, which made the young man very indignant, as he had spent much time in its preparation. He had, to an extent, indorsed the views of these deistic writers, and their works had made a deep impression on him, but he came to realize their specious sophistries at their true value and turned away from them with feelings of strong aversion, so that he thanked Sam Hill for the service he had done him in destroying the manuscripts of approval and thus turning his thoughts in the right direction which led him to see the evils of infidel teachings.

He never was an unbeliever, and as he advanced in years his religious conceptions deepened and his faith and reliance on the Divine Power strengthened with time.

In common with those reared under similar circumstances in rural localities he was highly superstitious, and this superstition he was never able to shake off in after life, though to offset it and counteract the morbid influence it exerted over him he had recourse to humor and tried to look on the bright side of everything, often on the ludicrous side, and gave such free rein to his inclination in this direction that he gained for himself something of the reputation of a humorist and wag, but in reality his love for jesting and telling humorous stories came to him as a second nature, an inheritance from his father, who was renowned in his section for droll sayings, funny anecdotes, and striking illustrations.

He was also somewhat interested in spiritualism, but as the occult art of communicating with the denizens of the unseen world had not attained such a degree of perfection in his day as in ours, his opportunity for investigation was limited to a few seances given by peripatetic mediums, which, however, instead of increasing his faith in intercommunication with the manes of the departed, only excited his disgust for the fakirs who laid claim to the power of summoning spirits to mortal presence.

All his life Lincoln was a man who thought for himself; he would not allow the opinions of others to obtrude themselves on him, he investigated for himself, and his intellectual honesty would not permit him to make pretense to faith or simulate what he did not feel.

Some writers would have us believe that he was not a Christian at all, in fact, was an out and out infidel of the stripe of Voltaire and Paine; but we have seen what gave rise to this misconception of his character and caused it to gain circulation. The works of Paine and Volney were the only books of an infidel tendency that he ever read, and when he saw his error he tried to disabuse his mind of their teachings as quickly as possible.

To get at a right consideration of his religious beliefs, we must go back to those early days in the life of the future statesman after the family had removed from Kentucky to Indiana. It was a wild place in which his boyhood was spent; the primeval American wood which was only beginning to hear the voice of a crude civilization, and had not, as yet, heard the sound of a church bell. There were no places of worship; there were no schools or even stores or shops; in truth, so isolated and primitive was the location of the Lincoln camp that the necessities of life were many miles removed from it.

His father, Thomas Lincoln, though a good man in a general way, was but an indifferent parent, and consequently a poor guide or mentor for the youth. The poor man had received many hard knocks from the iron hand of misfortune and had become almost wholly disheartened, which led to carelessness and thriftlessness, and besides, he was illiterate and unpolished. It could not be expected that a man thus handicapped himself could give his boy good training, either morally or intellectually. The mother, too, had been ground down by poverty to such a degree as to lose almost all interest in life; her burden soon became too heavy to bear, and she had to lay it down before coming to the middle milestone of life. It is not to be wondered that, under such circumstances and amid such surroundings, the boy Abraham grew up after the manner of a wild, strong weed, following the bent of his own rugged nature.

It was a dark time and the Lincolns were in dark struggles. Their abode at first was a rude hut, a mere shed of rough poles, open to the suns of summer and the snows of winter. Even when a cabin was at length erected, there were neither doors nor windows in it. The beds were composed of dried leaves and their coverings of the skins of wild animals. Food was scarce and of the coarsest kind and had to be brought from a long distance. In after years Lincoln never cared to refer to this period in his career.

In 1818, when Abraham was nine years old, his mother died and was buried in a cleared space a little beyond the cabin, without any religious ceremonies or observances whatever. However, there was a service held over the grave some months afterwards by an itinerant preacher who came at the request of young Abraham. The prayers that Parson Elkin said above the mound of Nancy Hanks were the first public prayers to which Abraham Lincoln listened.

After a time Thomas Lincoln went back to Kentucky, and shortly returned with a new wife, Sally Bush Johnson, widow of the jailer of Hardin County. She had three children, and these, with the Lincoln household, which included two Hanks boys, kin of the late Mrs. Lincoln, formed a somewhat heterogeneous family.

They were, however, extremely domestic and tenderly attached to one another, which is very seldom the case in mixed households, but they were all of the same class, born and reared under similar circumstances.

The two branches even united in religion and joined the little church a few miles distant, which had as the seat of worship a small frame building lately erected in that region. Young Abraham, however, did not affiliate and follow the example of his kin. He had to work hard, and religion at this time seemed to give him little concern, for, as before observed, he had little opportunity to cultivate it had he desired to do so. At an early age he was cast upon the bitterness of the world, and in the sweat of his brow had he to earn his daily bread. With him the stern battle of life began early; he had to gird on his sword for the combat at an age when the cares and shadows of the world are in the far perspective of the future and the sunshine of happiness illumines the morning of life with its brightest rays.

The specter of poverty was at his side; he could not get away from it; his only hope to exorcise it from his presence lay in unremitting toil, constant endeavor to overcome its influence on his career, and with this end in view he sternly resolved to do all that hard work, patience, and perseverance demanded to free himself from its sinister companionship.

The story of his thirst for knowledge and the limited means at his disposal for assuaging it need scarcely be repeated, for it is a pathetic story familiar to almost all, and becomes hackneyed with repetition.

In August, 1831, at the age of twenty-two, being satisfied that he had fully discharged any debt which he owed his father for such rearing and opportunities as he had received, he left the parent cabin, and, as it turned out, forever. Deep down in his soul he had resolved to make himself something better and higher than his father was or ever could hope to be. From this stage onwards his career is a matter of national history; the man is almost lost sight of in the statesman, and his private life is submerged in the public eminence to which he attained.

We must, however, deal with those phases of his boyhood and young manhood which bear a relation and lead up to the illustrious heights he was destined to gain as the ruler of a nation and the emancipator of a race.

We have said that most people believe that Lincoln was a Providential man, was called of God to be the preserver of a nation and the deliverer of the slave, and this really seems to be the explanation which accounts for the singular success of his unparalleled career; otherwise, how could this backwoods youth, rough, uncouth, little educated, reach the greatest eminence possible for an American; how could he have climbed the heights of fame until he arrived at the culminating pinnacle; how could he have become the recipient of the greatest and grandest honors his countrymen had in their power to confer upon him?

His accomplishments surely prove beyond question that this obscure, lowly born man was the chosen instrument of a Divine Wisdom, raised up to fulfill the designs of an all-wise Providence in freeing a race from bondage, just as Moses was raised up to lead 'the chosen people' from the land of their captivity.

Despite his early training, or rather lack of training, regardless of his seeming early indifference to religion, and all for which it stood, Abraham Lincoln was on all occasions and at all times not only a good Christian and sincere believer, but a man of the deepest religious sentiments, imbued with a strong faith and earnest allegiance to moral principles; a man who all through life had the utmost dependence upon and reliance in divine guidance, and who undertook nothing without invoking God's assistance to enable him to determine what was right from what was wrong. Unwavering trust in the Almighty was the keynote to his success and the foundation stone of his greatness.

Let us pause to consider what really were the religious convictions of this wonderful man.

That he was a true and sincere Christian, in fact, if not in form, is fully proved by many extracts from his letters and numerous addresses; his public utterances more than verify his belief in the intervention of a Supreme Power in the affairs of men.

Apart from this, however, we have explicit testimony of the sincerity of his convictions of the truth of religion by the fact that he was a faithful attendant on divine service. For four years in Washington he attended Dr. Gurley's Presbyterian church, and such attendance is certainly conclusive that he was in form, as well as in fact, a believing Christian.

That he attended church merely for the sake of appearance is not tenable, for his nature was too open and honest to do that which was not based upon sincere conviction.

His reply to the negroes of Baltimore who, in 1864, presented him with a beautiful Bible, confirms his belief in the divine inspiration of God's word as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. On the occasion of this Bible presentation he said: "This great Book is the best gift God has given to man; all the good from the Saviour of the world is communicated through this Book."

He was an habitual reader of the Bible, more familiar with its contents than most ministers. His familiarity with its pages is shown in his literary style and in the frequent quotations from it with which his writings are interspersed. He once wrote his early friend, Joshua Speed,—"I am profitably engaged reading the Bible. Take all of this Book upon reason that you can and the balance upon faith and you will live and die a better man."

To deny that he was a believer is to accuse him of hypocrisy and double dealing, an accusation which is made more emphatic in view of his regular church attendance and the fervent religious sentiments which characterized his public acceptance of the teachings of Christianity.

When he left his home at Springfield, with a full appreciation of the grave responsibility devolving upon him, in bidding farewell to the Christian community in which he had lived for more than a quarter of a century, he gave expression to his sentiments in this pathetic valedictory: "I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may return, with a task before me greater than that which rested upon Washington. With the assistance of that Divine Being who ever attended him I cannot fail. Trusting in Him who can go with me and remain with you and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope that all will yet be well. To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers you will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell."

Such language does not sound much like that of an unbeliever, but on the contrary is pregnant with faith and hope in the guidance and watchfulness of a Supreme Being.

When requested to preside at a meeting of the Christian Commission in Washington, held February 22, 1863, he replied, "The birthday of Washington and the Christian Sabbath coinciding this year, and suggesting together the highest interests of this life, and of that to come, is most propitious for the meeting proposed."

In the February of the preceding year Lincoln was visited by a severe affliction in the death of his beloved son, Willie, to whom he was much attached, and by the extreme illness of another son, Thomas, familiarly called "Tad." This was a new burden and a heavy one, but through his firm faith in Providence he regarded the double visitation as direct from God, accepting the otherwise inexplicable affliction as a manifestation of the divine design in regard to himself. A devout Christian lady from Massachusetts, who was officiating in one of the hospitals at the time, came to attend the sick children. She reports that the President watched with her about the bedside of the sick ones, and that he often walked the room, saying sadly, "This is the hardest trial of my life,—why is it, why is it?" In the course of conversation with this nurse, he closely questioned her concerning her situation; she told him that she was a widow, and that her husband and two children were in heaven, and added, that she saw the hand of God in it all, and that she never loved Him so much before as she had since her affliction.

"How is that brought about?" he inquired.

"Simply by trusting in God and feeling that He does all things well," she replied.

"Did you submit fully under the first loss?" Lincoln again inquired.

"No!" she answered, "not wholly, but as blow came upon blow, and all were taken, I could and did submit and was very happy."

"I am glad to hear you say that," said the President, pathetically, "your experience will help me to bear my affliction."

On the morning of his boy's funeral, when assured that many Christians were praying for him, the tears welled in his eyes as he faltered out to his comforter, "I am glad to hear that, I want them to pray for me, I need their prayers." When the nurse came forward to express her sympathy, the President thanked her and said, "I will try to go to God with my sorrows." A few days afterwards she asked him if he could trust God, and he answered, "I think I can and I will try." Continuing, he expressed himself more fully, "I wish I had that childlike faith you speak of and I trust He will give it to me." Then he went on to speak of his mother who, so many years before, had been laid to rest in the lonely Indiana clearing; the memory of her who had pillowed his head on her bosom came back to him with the tenderest recollections. Though, as has been stated, she had little time or opportunity to teach him the principles of her own simple faith and reverence, she did not wholly neglect him. She taught him a few short prayers and pious precepts, and these he never forgot in the after time. "I remember her prayers," said he, "and they have followed me; they have clung to me all my life."

Some think that it was Sally Bush Johnson to whom he here refers, who was a good and religious woman, but there can be little doubt that the allusion is to his own mother, for whose early death he sorrowed deeply and whom he recalled to memory many a time, though he was but a lad when she passed away.

Many a time Lincoln sought the prayers of others, which proves that he believed in the efficacy of appealing to heaven when in doubt and difficulties. Bishop Simpson often called upon him, and on these occasions they would talk as brothers. On parting the President would say, "Bishop, don't leave without prayer." The doors would then be locked and the two great men, as little children, would unite their petitions.

General Daniel E. Sickles puts on record a remarkable interview with Lincoln, in which the latter expressed himself as follows: "When Lee crossed the Potomac and entered Pennsylvania, followed by our army, I felt that the crisis had come. I knew that defeat in a great battle on Northern soil involved the loss of Washington, to be followed, perhaps, by the intervention of England or France in favor of the Southern Confederacy. I went to my room and got down on my knees in prayer. I felt that I must put all my trust in Almighty God. He gave to our people the best country ever given to man. He alone could save it from destruction. I had tried my best to do my duty and found myself unequal to the task. The burden was more than I could bear. God had been often our Protector in other days. I prayed Him to help us and give us victory now. I felt that my prayer was answered. I knew that God was on our side. I had no misgivings about the result of Gettysburg."

"How do you feel about Vicksburg, Mr. President?" asked General Sickles.

"Grant will pull through all right," returned Lincoln, "I am sure of it; I have been despondent, but am so no longer. God is with us."

Rising from his seat, the President took Sickles by the hand, and continued, "Sickles, I am told, as you have been told, perhaps, that your condition is serious. I am in a prophetic mood to-day. You will get well."

Do not such sentiments as these show conclusively his faith in divine power and his utter dependence upon God?

To express such deep feelings of religious principles did not necessitate his being a sectarian or even an attendant at church.

Yet we know Lincoln did attend church. We have already mentioned that he went regularly to Dr. Gurley's Presbyterian church in Washington, but he was a regular worshiper long before he came to Washington. When in Springfield he was an attendant of the First Presbyterian Church, of which the Rev. Dr. James Smith was pastor. This clergyman aided Lincoln, who had then begun the practice of law, in an investigation into the claims of the Bible. The future President at that time made a frank acknowledgment of his belief that the Bible is an authoritative revelation of God.