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Washington was a typical American. Napoleon was a typical Frenchman, but Lincoln was a humanitarian as broad as the world. He was bigger than his country - bigger than all the Presidents together. We are still too near to his greatness,' (Leo) Tolstoy (in 1908) concluded, 'but after a few centuries more our posterity will find him considerably bigger than we do. His genius is still too strong and powerful for the common understanding, just ..
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doris kearns goodwin |
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06b1c1d
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An adult friend of Lincoln's: "Life was to him a school."
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lifelong-learning
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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61dc2c4
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This, then, is a story of Lincoln's political genius revealed through his extraordinary array of personal qualities that enabled him to form friendships with men who had previously opposed him; to repair injured feelings that, left untended, might have escalated into permanent hostility; to assume responsibility for the failures of subordinates; to share credit with ease; and to learn from mistakes. He possessed an acute understanding of th..
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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b350aab
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In order to "win a man to your cause," Lincoln explained, you must first reach his heart, "the great high road to his reason."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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3f35483
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With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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96f99d1
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I liked the thought that the book I was now holding had been held by dozens of others.
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libraries
social-networking
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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2dc8e5c
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Having hope," writes Daniel Goleman in his study of emotional intelligence, "means that one will not give in to overwhelming anxiety, a defeatist attitude, or depression in the face of difficult challenges or setbacks." Hope is "more than the sunny view that everything will turn out all right"; it is "believing you have the will and the way to accomplish your goals."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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1d44111
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Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition," he wrote. "I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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3eeb712
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Tolstoy went on to observe,"This little incident proves how largely the name of Lincoln is worshipped throughout the world and how legendary his personality has become. Now, why was Lincoln so great that he overshadows all other national heroes? He really was not a great general like Napoleon or Washington; he was not such a skillful statesman as Gladstone or Frederick the Great; but his supremacy expresses itself altogether in his peculiar..
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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c639c27
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A real democracy would be a meritocracy where those born in the lower ranks could rise as far as their natural talents and discipline might take them.
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inspirational
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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6653130
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Mental health, contemporary psychiatrists tell us, consists of the ability to adapt to the inevitable stresses and misfortunes of life. It does not mean freedom from anxiety and depression, but only the ability to cope with these afflictions in a healthy way.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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f4b38ba
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from John Hay's diary) "The President never appeared to better advantage in the world," Hay proudly noted in his diary. "Though He knows how immense is the danger to himself from the unreasoning anger of that committee, he never cringed to them for an instant. He stood where he thought he was right and crushed them with his candid logic."
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crush-them-with-logic
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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5a4b664
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Moreover, Lincoln possessed an uncanny understanding of his shifting moods, a profound self-awareness that enabled him to find constructive ways to alleviate sadness and stress. Indeed, when he is compared with his colleagues, it is clear that he possessed the most even-tempered disposition of them all.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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1bd6978
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Lincoln reflecting on) George Washington's words: "It is of infinite moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the palladium of your political safety and prospertiy. Washington advised vigilance against "the first dawning of eve..
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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38dbdff
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And Lincoln, as would be evidenced throughout his presidency, was a master of timing.
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lincoln
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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7c9696b
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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 a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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91ce2c6
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Unlike depression, melancholy does not have a specific cause. It is an aspect of temperament, perhaps genetically based. One may emerge from the hypo, as Lincoln did, but melancholy is an indelible part of one's nature.
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melancholy
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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3f982fa
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On the return trip, they passed a brigade of black soldiers, who rushed forward to greet the president, "screaming, yelling, shouting: 'Hurrah for the Liberator; Hurrah for the President.' " Their "spontaneous outburst" moved Lincoln to tears, "and his voice was so broken by emotion" that he could hardly reply."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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915b433
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As he had done so many times before, Lincoln withstood the storm of defeat by replacing anguish over an unchangeable past with hope in an uncharted future.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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563ebf4
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Simon Cameron: "I loved my brother, as only the poor and lonely can love those with whom they have toiled and struggled up the rugged hill of life's success--but he died bravely in the discharge of his duty."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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a255428
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Lincoln had internalized the pain of those around him--the wounded soldiers, the captured prisoners, the defeated Southerners. Little wonder that he was overwhelmed at times by a profound sadness that even his own resilient temperament could not dispel.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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216c0f4
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We do not have to become heroes overnight," Eleanor once wrote. "Just a step at a time, meeting each thing that comes up, seeing it is not as dreadful as it appears, discovering that we have the strength to stare it down."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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48229a8
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Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed, is more important than any other one thing.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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b0f6bf6
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Lincoln was as calm and unruffled as the summer sea in moments of the gravest peril;
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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86fb6c6
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The ambition to establish a reputation worthy of the esteem of his fellows so that his story could be told after his death had carried Lincoln through his bleak childhood, his laborious efforts to educate himself, his string of political failures, and a depression so profound that he declared himself more than willing to die, except that "he had done nothing to make any human being remember that he had lived."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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479f462
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Lincoln understood the importance, as one delegate put it, of integrating "all the elements of the Republican party--including the impracticable, the Pharisees, the better-than-thou declaimers, the long-haired men and the short-haired women."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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03e31ac
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They are not dead who live in lives they leave behind. In those whom they have blessed they live a life again.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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5db31f4
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Excitement about things became a habit, a part of my personality, and the expectation that I should enjoy new experiences often engendered the enjoyment itself.
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personality
enthusiasm
cheerfulness
curiosity
parenthood
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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ac8a6b4
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There are two antagonistic elements of society in America," Seward had proclaimed, "freedom and slavery. Freedom is in harmony with our system of government and with the spirit of the age, and is therefore passive and quiescent. Slavery is in conflict with that system, with justice, with humanity, and is therefore organized, defensive, active, and perpetually aggressive." Free labor, he said, demands universal suffrage and the widespread "d..
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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1eca8b0
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In fact, Lincoln and Stanton had already heard similar complaints. After dispatching investigators to look into General Grant's behavior, however, they had concluded that his drinking did not affect his unmatched ability to plan, execute, and win battles. A memorable story circulated that when a delegation brought further rumors of Grant's drinking to the president, Lincoln declared that if he could find the brand of whiskey Grant used, he ..
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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f57e3b0
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Lincoln replied that he was more than willing to die, but that he had "done nothing to make any human being remember that he had lived, and that to connect his name with the events transpiring in his day and generation and so impress himself upon them as to link his name with something that would redound to the interest of his fellow man was what he desired to live for."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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5bce301
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It is not until one visits old, oppressed, suffering Europe, that he can appreciate his own government, "he observed, "that he realizes the fearful responsibility of the American people to the nations of the whole earth, to carry successfully through the experiment... That men are capable of self-government."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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4c0e72c
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For your penance, say two Hail Marys, three our Fathers, and," he added, with a chuckle, "say a special prayer for the Dodgers."
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humor
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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275caa4
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With public sentiment, nothing can fail," Abraham Lincoln said, "without it nothing can succeed." Such a leader is inseparably linked to the people. Such leadership is a mirror in which the people see their collective reflection."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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795677a
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Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall argued in another context many years later, the "grave threats to liberty often come in times of urgency, when constitutional rights seem too extravagant to endure."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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7e998f5
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Sometimes, sitting in the park with my boys, I imagine myself back at Ebbets Field, a young girl once more in the presence of my father, watching the players of my youth on the grassy fields below--Jackie Robinson, Duke Snider, Roy Campanella, Gil Hodges. There is magic in these moments, for when I open my eyes and see my sons in the place where my father once sat, I feel an invisible bond among our three generations, an anchor of loyalty a..
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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f519dd3
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It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed," Abigail Adams wrote to her son John Quincy Adams in the midst of the American Revolution, suggesting that "the habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues." --
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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22fad88
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grave threats to liberty often come in times of urgency, when constitutional rights seem too extravagant to endure.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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4c46756
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His success in dealing with the strong egos of the men in his cabinet suggests that in the hands of a truly great politician the qualities we generally associate with decency and morality--kindness, sensitivity, compassion, honesty, and empathy--can also be impressive political resources.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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e3d9f81
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Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition," he wrote. "I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem. How far I shall succeed in gratifying this ambition, is yet to be developed."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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ed86706
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Lincoln was "the most truly progressive man of the age, because he always moves in conjunction with propitious circumstances, not waiting to be dragged by the force of events or wasting strength in premature struggles with them."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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edd9f13
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I HAVE NO DOUBT that Lincoln will be the conspicuous figure of the war," predicted Ulysses S. Grant. "He was incontestably the greatest man I ever knew."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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0ca3c4a
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I am a vague, conjectural personality, more made up of opinions and academic prepossessions than of human traits and red corpuscles.
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |
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ebdd7c6
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To find the best authors," he boasted, "is like being able to tell good wine without the labels."
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Doris Kearns Goodwin |