The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Quotations (273 page)
Read The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Quotations Online
Authors: Elizabeth Knowles
1904–63
Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.
"The Wayward Press: Do you belong in Journalism?" (1960)
1735–1814
Le congrès ne marche pas, il danse.The Congress makes no progress; it dances.
Auguste de la Garde-Chambonas
Souvenirs du Congrès de Vienne
(1820) ch. 1
1693–1739
There's sure no passion in the human soul,
But finds its food in music.
The Fatal Curiosity
(1736) act 1, sc. 2
1809–65
To give victory to the right, not bloody bullets, but peaceful ballots only, are necessary.
often quoted as, "The ballot is stronger than the bullet"
speech, 18 May 1858
"A house divided against itself cannot stand." I believe this government cannot endure permanently, half slave and half free.
speech, 16 June 1858.
In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free—honourable alike in what we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last, best hope of earth.
Annual Message to Congress, 1 December 1862
Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal…In a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and these dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced…we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
the Lincoln Memorial inscription reads "by the people, for the people"
address at the dedication of the National Cemetery at Gettysburg, 19 November 1863, as reported the following day, in R. P. Basler (ed.)
Collected Works…
(1953) vol. 7.
I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me.
letter to A. G. Hodges, 4 April 1864
It is not best to swap horses when crossing streams.
reply to National Union League, 9 June 1864
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.
second inaugural address, 4 March 1865
As President, I have no eyes but constitutional eyes; I cannot see you.
attributed reply to the South Carolina Commissioners.
People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like.
judgement of a book
G. W. E. Russell
Collections and Recollections
(1898) ch. 30
So you're the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war!
on meeting Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin
Carl Sandburg
Abraham Lincoln: The War Years
(1936) vol. 2, ch. 39
You may fool all the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can't fool all of the people all the time.
also attributed to Phineas Barnum
Alexander K. McClure
Lincoln's Yarns and Stories
(1904)
1879–1931
Booth led boldly with his big bass drum—
(Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?)
"General William Booth Enters into Heaven" (1913).