In 1856 the Republican party of Illinois was organized at Bloomington, and the foremost man in its organization was Abraham Lincoln. With one of his ablest speeches on that occasion he fired all hearts. Mr. Scripps says: "Never was an audience more completely electrified by human eloquence. Again and again during the progress of its delivery they sprang to their feet and upon the benches, and testified by long continued shouts and the waving of hats how deeply the speaker had wrought upon their minds and hearts."

From the organization of the Republican party, Mr. Lincoln was not only the first Republican in Illinois, but also in all the Western States; and a month later, at the National Republican convention to nominate a candidate for President, his name was brought forward for the Vice-Presidency. On the informal ballot he received one hundred and ten votes, and Mr. Dayton two hundred and fifty-nine. This complimentary vote was secured without Mr. Lincoln's knowledge. He was attending court at Urbana in his own State. The newspaper report that reached Urbana said, "Lincoln received one hundred and ten votes."

"Is that our Lincoln ?" inquired one of the lawyers. "Of course it is," replied another. And turning to Mr. Lincoln, who made his appearance just then, he remarked,

"I congratulate you upon so handsome a vote for Vice-President."

Me!" exclaimed Lincoln, who had already read the paper. "Have you any idea that means me?"

"Certainly, I have no idea that it means anybody

else."

"Well, you were never more mistaken in your life," protested Mr. Lincoln. "It can't mean me. It must be the great Lincoln from Massachusetts."

He utterly refused to believe the newspaper report until he read a full account of the proceedings of the convention. The humble estimate he put upon his own abilities and influence, and the fact that he had indulged no aspirations for the office, is sufficient explanation of the affair.

He took part in the campaign that followed for Fremont and Dayton, striking some telling blows for liberty. The opposition found a powerful antagonist in him, and sometimes resorted to mean expedients to show their hostility. At a meeting at Charleston, Coles County, a Democrat interrupted him by saying, “Mr. Lincoln, is it true that you entered this State barefooted, driving a yoke of oxen?"

Mr. Lincoln paused a few moments, and then answered. "I think I can prove the fact by at least a dozen men in the crowd, any one of whom is more respectable than my questioner."

Then he branched off upon the helps of a free government to a poor boy, and "the curse of Slavery to the white man, wherever it existed," speaking in a strain of thrilling eloquence, and closing his response with the following inspiring sentence, that thoroughly aroused the assembly:

"Yes, we will speak for freedom and against slavery, as long as the Constitution of our country guarantees free speech, until everywhere on this wide land the sun shall shine, and the rain shall fall, and the wind shall blow upon no man who goes forth to unrequited toil."

Mr. Lincoln had prophesied not only bloodshed in Kansas but also a bloody contest between the North and South, in consequence of the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and the Kansas-Nebraska outrage. Already the first prophecy was fulfilled, and "Border Ruffians" were burning houses, shooting Free-State

men, and sacking villages, to frighten freedom out of Kansas. Douglas saw that political death awaited him. in Illinois if he pursued his Kansas-Nebraska measure; and all at once he changed front, and voted with the Republicans in Congress against the very measure his own political recklessness inaugurated. His senatorial term was drawing to a close, and now he sought a re-election by appealing to Republicans for support. Those of Illinois were too familiar with his duplicity to believe he was honest, and refused to support him. In other States, where his political character was not so well understood, there were prominent Republicans who asked their brethren of Illinois to return him to the United States Senate.

Mr. Lincoln was never bolder, more earnest, and stronger than he was in this campaign. The Republican State convention met at Springfield on the sixteenth day of June; and it was scarcely organized when a banner was borne into the hall, on which was inscribed, "COOK COUNTY FOR ABRAHAM LINCOLN." The sight of it seemed to craze the whole assembly. They sprang to their feet, jumped upon the benches, swung their hats, shouted, cheered, and gave themselves up to demonstrations of delight for several minutes. Mr. Lincoln was unanimously nominated; and in the evening delivered before the convention his famous speech, known in history as "The House-divided-against-itself Speech." This title was derived from a single paragraph at the opening of the speech, as follows :—

"A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved, I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other." Late in the afternoon

of that day Mr. Lincoln went over to his office, with his carefully-prepared speech in his pocket; and, locking the door behind him, he said to his partner, Mr. Herndon :

"Let me read you a paragraph of my speech." He read the foregoing extract, which was a part of the first paragraph.

"How do you like it?" inquired Mr. Lincoln, before Herndon had time to express his surprise. “What do you think of it?"

"I think it is true," replied Mr. Herndon, "but is it entirely politic to read or speak it just as it is written?" "That makes no difference," answered Mr. Lincoln. Mr. Herndon was still more surprised. "Radical" as he was, Lincoln was in advance of him.

"That expression is a truth of all human experience, -'a house divided against itself cannot stand,'" added Mr. Lincoln with emphasis. "The proposition is indisputably true, and has been true for more than six thousand years; and I will deliver it as written. . . I would rather be defeated with this expression in the speech, than be victorious without it."

An hour before the address was to be delivered in the Representatives' Hall, a dozen of his friends assembled in the library room, and Mr. Lincoln read to them several paragraphs of his speech, including the extract quoted.

"What do you think of it?" he asked.

Fifty years in advance of public opinion," answered one leader, almost angrily.

"Very unwise," replied another.

"It will kill the Republican party," said a third.

"And you too, Lincoln," said a fourth.

Nothing could be more unwise; it will certainly

defeat your election," added a fifth.

And so the criticisms fell fast from nearly every tongue. Every one, except Mr. Herndon, condemned the extract in question. He sprang to his feet after all had delivered themselves freely, and said: "Lincoln, deliver it just as it reads."

Mr. Lincoln sat in silence for a moment, then, rising from his seat, he walked backwards and forwards a few moments longer. Suddenly stopping and facing the company, he said:

Friends, I have thought about this matter a great deal, have weighed the question well from all corners, and am thoroughly convinced the time has come when it should be uttered; and if it must be that I must go down because of this speech, then let me go down linked to truth-die in the advocacy of what is right and just.”

He delivered the speech just as he had prepared it, and great, indeed, was the excitement occasioned thereby. Many of his warmest friends were provoked by his "unwisdom."

"A fool's speech," cried one.

"Wholly inappropriate!" cried another.

"That foolish speech of yours will kill you, Lincoln," remarked Dr. Loring. "I wish it was wiped out of existence; don't you wish so now?"

"Well, Doctor," replied Mr. Lincoln, "if I had to draw a pen across, and erase my whole life from existence, and had one poor gift or choice left as to what I should save from the wreck, I should choose that speech, and leave it to the world unerased."

More than a year afterwards he was dining with a party of friends at Bloomington when that speech became the theme of discussion, and every person present declared it was "a great mistake."

"Gentlemen," replied Mr. Lincoln, " you may think that speech was a mistake; but I never have believed