To take another brace of qualities, he was at once a powerful fighter and an habitual peace-maker. His long, gaunt, sinewy frame, and his tough courage, made him a formidable antagonist, but it was hard to provoke him to combat. Lamon,--whose biography is a treasury of good stories, sometimes lacking in discretion, but giving an invaluable realistic picture,--relates an encounter with the village bully, Jack Armstrong. The "boys" at last teased Lincoln into a wrestling match, and when his victory in the good-natured encounter provoked Jack to unfair play, Abe shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Then he made peace with him, drew out the better quality in him; and the two reigned "like friendly Caesars" over the village crowd, Abe tempering Jack's playfulness when it got too rough, and winning the boys to kindly ways. In that day and region, men were very frank about their religious beliefs and disbeliefs. The skepticism or unbelief which lies unspoken in the hearts of a multitude of men,--silent perhaps out of regard to public opinion, perhaps from consideration for mother or wife--found free and frequent utterance in the West, long before Robert Ingersoll gave it eloquent voice. Lincoln, though we have called him an idealist at heart, habitually guided himself by logic, by hard sense, and by such evidence as passes in a court of law. He was one of the class to whom books like Tom Paine's _Age of Reason_ appealed strongly. In early life he wrote a treatise against Christianity. A politic friend to whom he showed his manuscript put it in the stove, but the writer was not changed in his opinions. To Christianity as a supernatural revelation he never became a convert, but the belief in "a Power that makes for righteousness" grew with his growth and strengthened with his strength. With deepening experiences, the awe and mystery of life weighed heavily on him. When travelling on circuit, his days spent in law-cases, diversified with sociability and funny stories, he would sometimes be seen in the early morning brooding by the fire-place with hands outspread, and murmuring his favorite verses,--a soliloquy on the mournfulness and mystery of life: "Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud!"