"Creeds and confessions, high church or the low I cannot say; but you would vastly please us If some pointed scripture you would show To which of these belonged the Saviour, Jesus. I think to all or none. Not curious creeds, Or ordered forms of church rule He taught, But love of soul that blossomed into deeds With human good and human blessings fraught. On me nor priest nor presbyter nor pope, Bishop nor dean may stamp a party name, But Jesus with His largely human scope The service of my human life may claim; Let prideful priests do battle about creeds-- The church is mine that does most charitable deeds." There was not a day, nay, not an hour of Lincoln's life but was devoted to some good work, some act of charity, some message of consolation or comfort or mercy to the miserable and the suffering; in short, Abraham Lincoln carried his religion into daily life; it accompanied him everywhere and on all occasions. Every phase of his character was a demonstration of the Golden Rule. From boyhood to manhood, from manhood to fame, honesty was his distinguishing trait. As a lawyer all his transactions were above suspicion. He would not take a case to which there could possibly be attached any stain of falsehood or foul-dealing. To a man who once offered him a case of which he could not approve, he gave this explanation, quoted by his partner, Herndon, who vouches for it: "There is no reasonable doubt that I can gain your case for you. I can set a whole neighborhood at loggerheads, I can distress a widowed mother and her six fatherless children, and thereby get you $600, which rightly belongs, as it appears to me, as much to them as it does to you. I shall not take your case, but I will give you a little advice for nothing,--you seem to be a splendid, energetic man,--I would advise you to try your hand at making $600 in some other way." Here is an example of how he brought his religion into politics. When he was in the legislature and the caucus sought to get him into schemes that were not creditable, in a discussion which lasted until midnight, contending that the end would justify the means, Lincoln closed the debate and defined his own position by saying, "You may burn my body to ashes and scatter them to the four winds of heaven; you may drag my soul down to the regions of darkness and despair, to be tormented forever, but you will not get me to support a measure which I believe to be wrong."