The influence of the Bible on the life and literature of Lincoln was
remarkable. It gave to this nation and the world a life of service, and in
that service he placed the most delicate spirit of sincerity, sobriety,
sympathy, and love. In literature he has given to us abiding beauty in its
simplicity and strength of expression. Of his Gettysburg speech the London
Quarterly Review said, substantially, that the oration surpassed every
production of its class known in literature; that only the oration of
Pericles over the victories of the Peloponnesian War could be compared to
it, and that was put into his mouth by the historian Thucydides. Mr.
Sumner said it was the most finished piece of oratory he had ever seen.
Every word was appropriate. None could be omitted and none added and none
changed.
Professor Albert S. Cook, teacher of English Language and Literature in
Yale, in his book, The Bible and English Prose Style, seeking to show the
influence of the Bible on the style of great writers, says: "But the
matter is beyond dispute when we come to a piece of classic prose like
Lincoln's Second Inaugural, which certainly owes nothing to the Romans of
the Decadence." Then this sample of the Bible style is given: "'Neither
party expected the magnitude or the duration which it has already
attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease
with, or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an
easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read
the same Bible and prayed to the same God, and each invoked his aid
against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a
just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other
men's faces; but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of
both could not be answered. That of neither has been fully. The Almighty
has his own purposes!'
"At this point we may pause, for we need no further demonstration of the
indebtedness of English prose style to the Bible, nor would it be easy to
discover a better illustration of biblical qualities in modern guise
exemplified in a passage of more interest to all the world. South
recognized it as a mark of illiteracy to be fond of high-flown metaphors
and allegories, attended and set off with scraps of Greek and Latin. If
this be true, the American people so far escape the imputation as they
have set their seal of approval on such writings as Lincoln's; and that
they have had judgment and taste to do so is due, more than to any other
cause, to their familiarity with the Bible."
The spirit life of the Bible was built into Lincoln's boyhood, expanded in
his young manhood, ripened in his middle age, sustained him when sorrows
seared his soul, and gave to him a grip upon God, man, freedom, and
immortality. The influence of the Bible upon him gave him reverence for
God and his will; for Christianity and its Christ; for the Holy Spirit and
its help; for prayer and its power; for praise and its purpose; for the
immortal impulse and its inspiration.
Truly might Henry Watterson ask: "Where did Shakespeare get his genius?
Where did Mozart get his music? Whose hand smote the lyre of the Scottish
plowman, and stayed the life of the German priest? God, God, and God
alone, and surely as these were raised up by God, so was Abraham Lincoln."