And in all his intimate and immediate fellowship with men his personal contribution was entire. In his co-partnership he had no treasure too precious to invest. He gave his all. Imposing, almost impossible as is the meaning of these words, all mankind do recognize, and that with wondering reverence, that when Lincoln rose to take the presidential oath, he held nothing back. In his service of the Union he invested his life, his honor, his hope, even all he had. It was little else he had to give. His lineage was of the lowliest. His education was of the meagerest, and wholly a by-achievement. In social graces he was quite unversed and unadorned. He was no flatterer. The fawner's dialect he never knew. He would not boast. To beg he was ashamed. He was too honest for any knavery. Pure integrity was his only asset. As he took his stand at the presidential post, he stood without a single decoration, unsupported, all alone. It was literal truth that when he took his official oath the only bond he had to furnish was his naked honor. But that possession was no counterfeit. Its value did not fluctuate. It was solid gold. In his honest rating, the plighted faith in the words of his official pledge was beyond all price. As he discerned and understood the crisis of his day, the Nation's very being was at mortal stake. And when in that momentous hour she summoned him to take the presidency, she laid sovereign requisition upon his total being. And when he obeyed the call, he invested all. No reserve of his possession was kept in hiding for his refuge and reimbursement, in case the Nation failed. He ventured all he had, even all his honor. And this complete consignment by Lincoln to the Nation's use of all his moral wealth, of all his pure and priceless personal worth, was an act of unalloyed benignity. It was for the Nation's welfare that he devoted himself. It was that the Union might be preserved, and that all men might be free, that he plighted his integrity.