How many legs does a dog have if you call his tail a leg? Four. Saying that a tail is a leg doesn't make it a leg.

You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right.

Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves.

No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar.

Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.

The ballot is stronger than the bullet.

The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.

I don't like that man. I must get to know him better.

All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.

Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth.

I am a slow walker, but I never walk back.

Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be.

Be sure you put your feet in the right place, then stand firm.

Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other.

I do the very best I know how - the very best I can; and I mean to keep on doing so until the end.

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, and stand with him while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong.

When I do good I feel good, when I do bad I feel bad, and that's my religion.

We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.

I will prepare and some day my chance will come.

It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.

I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts.

I have always found that mercy bears richer fruits than strict justice.

Don't worry when you are not recognized, but strive to be worthy of recognition.

My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.

Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say, for one, that 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.

Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?

I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives. I like to see a man live so that his place will be proud of him.

Lets have faith that right makes might; and in that faith let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves; and under the rule of a just God, cannot long retain it.

The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just.

The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep's throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty. Plainly, the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of liberty.

You have to do your own growing no matter how tall your grandfather was.

That some achieve great success, is proof to all that others can achieve it as well.

No matter how much cats fight, there always seem to be plenty of kittens.

Marriage is neither heaven nor hell, it is simply purgatory.

If this is coffee, please bring me some tea; but if this is tea, please bring me some coffee.

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.

Avoid popularity if you would have peace.

The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.

This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.

At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.

My dream is of a place and a time where America will once again be seen as the last best hope of earth.

A friend is one who has the same enemies as you have.

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.

Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.

I remember my mother's prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life.

All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Buonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years.

Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can. As a peacemaker the lawyer has superior opportunity of being a good man. There will still be business enough.

He has a right to criticize, who has a heart to help.

The things I want to know are in books; my best friend is the man who'll get me a book I ain't read.

No man is good enough to govern another man without the other's consent.

A house divided against itself cannot stand.

If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it.

Important principles may, and must, be inflexible.

A woman is the only thing I am afraid of that I know will not hurt me.