In his "Life of Lincoln," Holland endeavors to convey the impression that Lincoln was always a devout Christian. He declares that even during the years of his early manhood at New Salem, "he was a religious man;" that "he had a deep religious life." When Herndon and Lamon exposed his shameful misrepresentations he retreated from his first position, and in _Scribner's Monthly_ wrote as follows: "What Abraham Lincoln was when he lived at New Salem and wrote an anti-Christian tract (which the friend to whom he showed it somewhat violently but most judiciously put in the fire) is one thing, and it may be necessary for an impartial historian to record it. What he was when he died at Washington with those most Christian words of the Second Inaugural upon his lips, and that most Christian record of five years of patient tenderness and charity behind him, is quite another thing." He admits that Lincoln was an Infidel in Illinois, but would have us believe that he was a Christian in Washington. He refers to "those most Christian words of the Second Inaugural," and "that most Christian record of five years of patient tenderness and charity." In the Second Inaugural there is not a word affirming a belief in Christianity--not a word in reference to Christianity. He mentions God, and quotes from the Bible, but does not intimate that the Bible is God's word. That Christians have a monopoly of "patient tenderness and charity," can hardly be accepted. The history of the church does not confirm this assumption. Many Christians have possessed these virtues. So have the votaries of other religions. These attributes belong to good men everywhere, but they are the distinguishing features of no particular creed. Smarting under his exposure, with that whining cant so peculiar to the vanquished religionist, Holland finally sent forth this parting wail and virtually abandoned the whole case: "The question is, not whether Abraham Lincoln was a subscriber to the creeds of orthodoxy, but whether he was a believing--that is to say, a truthful Christian man; not whether he was accustomed to call Jesus Christ 'Lord, Lord,' but whether he was used to do those things which Jesus Christ exemplified and enforced. He was accustomed, as we know well enough, to speak of an Almighty Father, of whom justice and mercy and sympathy with weak and suffering humanity were characteristic attributes. Who was it that revealed to man a God like this? Who was it that once 'showed us the Father and it sufficed us?' Whoever it was that made this revelation to mankind it was of him that this man, even though he knew it not, had learned, and it was in his spirit that he acted" (Scribner's Monthly). The concluding words of Dr. Holland's testimony, as quoted from his "Life of Lincoln," are as follows: