There is something in Washington or in Lincoln or Grant, that defies analysis. It is a moral elevation, a magnanimity, a nobleness and profoundness of mind. It is force of character and ability by which man is able to meet great emergencies. This is true greatness. Nothing discloses real character like the use of power. If you wish to know what a man really is, give him power. This is the supreme test. Judged by this standard Abraham Lincoln stands out one of the purest, grandest and noblest characters of all time. Greatness was never more unconscious of itself than it was in him. It consisted in the fact that he made mistakes but rose above them. Lincoln was a man of marvelous growth. The statesman or the military hero born and reared in a log cabin is a familiar figure in American history; but we may search in vain among our men of honor and fame for one whose origin and early life equaled Abraham Lincoln’s in obscurity and lack of education. He sprang from the poorest class in the border south. Hard work his early lot; his education a minus factor. In the year of his majority his father moved to Illinois. Here Lincoln began for himself the hard battle of life. He became an ambitious young man. Unquestionably in some mysterious way, he arrived at the conclusion that this world had something far higher for him than neighborhood joker, champion wrestler or prize wood chopper. A lawyer lent him a copy of Blackstone and he commenced the study of law; was admitted to the bar in 1836; rose rapidly in his profession and became an eminent lawyer. Being more adapted to the part of a jurist than an advocate, owing to the striking uprightness of his character, he applied himself to this branch of his profession, and it may truly be said that his vivid sense of truth and justice had much to do with his effectiveness as a jurist. When he felt himself to be the protector of innocence, the defender of justice, or the prosecutor of wrong, he frequently disclosed such unexpected resources of reasoning, such depth of feeling, and rose to such fervor of appeal as to astonish and overwhelm his hearers, and make his appeal irresistible. He continued to “ride the circuit,” read books, tell funny stories to his fellow lawyers in the tavern, chat familiarly with his neighbors and become more and more widely known, trusted and beloved among the people of his State for his ability as a lawyer and politician, for the integrity of his character and the ever-flowing spring of sympathetic kindness in his heart. His main ambition was that of political distinction, yet no one, at that time, would have suspected that he was the man destined to lead the nation through the greatest crisis of the century. Nevertheless, he was growing, indeed, this is one prominent fact in Lincoln’s life--he never ceased growing. As captain in the Black Hawk war, as candidate for the legislature, as storekeeper, postmaster, surveyor and law student, he was always growing.