"Lincoln was an extremely religious man, though not a technical Christian. He thought deeply, and his opinions were positive. His seriousness was a characteristic trait, showing itself even in his genuine good humor. His very jokes were a part of his seriousness.... Lincoln was an extremely practical man. He believed not for belief's sake, but for his own sake. He made a practice of religion; he used it. His religion was his life, and his life was his religious service. It was his own public profession. Religion was a fact to him. He believed in prayer, because he found use for it: and when the fate of the Union seemed to waver, when doubt and despair hovered over the land and the future was uncertain, Lincoln often shut himself within his room and offered up his prayer to God. 'So, many times,' he said, 'I was forced to my knees, not knowing where else to go.' "While there is considerable in his writings to indicate a strong faith in God and prayer, there is little to indicate his beliefs regarding Christ, the Bible, etc. But the very absence of anything on those points is good evidence that he did not hold the views that have been attributed to him.... "He was a firm believer in the 'great and good and merciful God,' but not in a revengeful or cruel God who could consign them to an eternal hell when nothing good to those who suffered could possibly come from such punishment. He believed in and used prayer as a means to bring himself in closer relations with right in everything.... He believed in 'universal inspiration and miracles under law,' and that all things, both matter and mind, are governed by law. He believed that all creation is an evolution under law, not a special creation of the Supreme Being. He hoped for a joyous meeting in the world to come with many loved ones gone before. He believed that Christianity consists in being, not believing; in loving 'the Lord thy God with all thy heart and thy neighbor as thyself.' He believed that the Bible is a book to be understood and appreciated as any other book, not merely to be accepted as a divine creation of infallibility. He believed in the man Christ, not in the God Christ.... He was once an admirer of Volney, Paine, and Voltaire; later of Theodore Parker, Emerson, and Channing. He was once a scoffer of religion; later a supporter."--R. C. ROPER, Religious Beliefs of Abraham Lincoln, _Open Court_, 1903, pp. 76-85.