misspent, and the intellectual antagonisms begotten, which then, as now, divided the hearts of men, caused him to reject dogmas which were considered essential to salvation by the denominations of his day. They moved, as alas! too many of them still do, in the old rut of orthodox tradition, steeped in human creeds and almost incapable of an original idea.

Lincoln preferred new truths to old falsehoods, and, like Christ, was out of sympathy with men who swallowed dogmas whole and produced only pious platitudes. This very thing to-day accounts for the fact that so many brilliant men and interesting women are unconnected with the churches and therefore unreached by the pulpits. Everywhere, in increasingly large numbers, we find men, energetic, learned, and refined, humane, generous, reverent, open to argument and spiritual persuasion, moral men with religious sensibilities, who often set a worthy example to professors themselves, the very choicest spirits in the community, not identified with any church, but whose lives, we all must admit, are as much and often more Christian than those of professed church-goers.

Mere water, whether a person is "buried in it," or whether it is applied at the tips of a bishop's fingers, makes no change whatever in character. Faith in religion as an institution is faith in a machine,—its application is what tells.

When a member of Congress, knowing Lincoln's religious character, asked him why he did not join some church, he replied: "Because I find difficulty without mental reservation in giving my assent to their long and complicated creeds. When any church inscribes on its altar, as a qualification for membership, the Saviour's statement of the substance of the law and the Gospel,—'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind ... and thy neighbor as thyself'—that church will I join with all my heart and soul."

John G. Nicolay, who probably was better acquainted with Lincoln and more closely attached to him than any one outside his own family and near relatives, writes: "I do not remember ever having discussed religion with Mr. Lincoln, nor do I know of any authorized statement of his views in existence. He sometimes talked freely, and never made any concealment of his belief or unbelief in any dogma or doctrine, but never provoked religious controversies. I speak more from his disposition and habits than from any positive declaration on his part. He frequently made remarks about sermons he had heard, books he had read, or doctrines that had been advanced, and my opinion as to his religious belief is based upon such casual evidence. There is not the slightest doubt that he believed in a Supreme Being of omnipotent power and omniscient watchfulness over the children of men, and that this great Being could be reached by prayer. Mr. Lincoln, was a praying man; I know that to be a fact. And I have heard him request people to pray for him, which he would not have done had he not believed that prayer is answered. Many a time have I heard Mr. Lincoln ask ministers and Christian women to pray for him, and he did not do this for effect. He was no hypocrite, and had such reverence for sacred things that he would not trifle with them. I have heard him say that he prayed for this or that, and remember one occasion on which he remarked that if a certain thing did not occur he would lose his faith in prayer.

"It is a matter of history that he told the Cabinet he had promised his Maker to issue an Emancipation Proclamation, and it was not an idle remark. At the same time he did not believe in some of the dogmas of the orthodox churches. I have heard him argue against the doctrine of atonement, for instance. He considered it illogical and unjust and a premium upon evil-doing if a man who had been wicked all his life could make up for it by a few words or prayers at the hour of death; and he had no faith in death-bed repentances. He did not believe in several other articles of the creeds of the orthodox churches. He believed in the Bible, however.... He used to consider it the greatest of all text-books of morals and ethics and that there was nothing to compare with it in literature....

"It would be difficult for any one to define Mr. Lincoln's position or to classify him among the sects. I should say that he believed in a good many articles in the creeds of the orthodox churches and rejected a good many that did not appeal to his reason.

"He praised the simplicity of the Gospels. He often declared that the Sermon on the Mount contained the essence of all law and justice, and that the Lord's Prayer was the sublimest composition in human language. He was a constant reader of the Bible, but had no sympathy with theology, and often said that in matters affecting a man's relations with his Maker he couldn't give a power of attorney.

"Yes, there is a story, and it is probably true, that when he was very young and very ignorant he wrote an essay that might be called atheistical. It was after he had been reading a couple of atheistic books which made a great impression on his mind, and the essay is supposed to have expressed his views on those books,—a sort of review of them, containing both approval and disapproval,—and one of his friends burned it. He was very indignant at the time, but was afterwards glad of it.

"The opposition of the Springfield clergy to his election was chiefly due to remarks he made about them. One careless remark, I remember, was widely quoted. An eminent clergyman was delivering a series of doctrinal discourses that attracted considerable local attention. Although Lincoln was frequently invited, he would not be induced to attend them. He remarked that he wouldn't trust Brother —— to construe the statutes of Illinois and much less the laws of God; that people who knew him wouldn't trust his advice on an ordinary business transaction because they didn't consider him competent; hence he didn't see why they did so in the most important of all human affairs, the salvation of their souls.

"These remarks were quoted widely and misrepresented, to Lincoln's injury. In those days people were not so liberal as now, and any one who criticized a parson was considered a sceptic."

An orthodox believer Lincoln may not have been, in fact was not, but he was better,—he had the spirit of Christ which manifests itself more peculiarly in actions than in words. Love to God and man was his creed, the world was his church, kindly words and merciful deeds his sermons.

In a certain formal sense the baptized man or woman is a Christian, just as all foreigners who have been naturalized are Americans before the law, but the simple act of naturalization will not make any man a good American. There is a vast difference between naturalizing a man and nationalizing him. He is an American who is an American at heart, who owes but one allegiance, is loyal to but one country, and is true to but one flag, whose sympathies and choices, whose heroic labors and sacrifices in behalf of his country make him deserve the peerless name of American.

So the mere act of baptism or church membership gives a man but a poor title to the Christian name. Paul said, the man was not a Jew who was only one outwardly, that the mere rite of circumcision was nothing, that the true Jew was one inwardly and at heart. If Paul could thus express himself as to the qualifications which characterized a member of the Jewish church, which was avowedly a ritualistic organization, it must be safe to say the same thing about those who