(1) He has made an effort to provide an adequate historical background for the study of the religious life of Abraham Lincoln in the successive periods of his life; and without immediately going too deeply into the material of the main subject, to relate the man to his environment. In this the author has been aided not only by books and interviews with men who knew Lincoln, but by some years of personal experience in communities where the social, educational, and religious conditions were in all essential respects similar to those in which Mr. Lincoln lived during two important epochs of his career. The author was not born in this environment, but he spent seven years of his youth and young manhood as a teacher and preacher in a region which give him somewhat exceptional opportunities for a discriminating judgment. (2) The author has assembled what is, so far as he knows, all the essential evidence that has appeared in print concerning the religious life and opinions of Mr. Lincoln, a larger body, as he believes, than any previous writer has compiled. He has added to this all evidence available to him from written and personal testimony. He has subjected this evidence to a critical analysis, in an effort to determine the degree of credibility with which its several portions may reasonably be received. The author is not unaware that this is the most disputable, as it is the most difficult part of his task, and, as he believes, the most valuable part of it. Unless some such analysis is made, the evidence resolves itself into chaos. (3) Several entirely new avenues of investigation have been opened and lines of evidence adduced which find no place in any previous book on Mr. Lincoln's religious life, and very scant reference, and that without investigation, in one or two of the biographies. (4) The book also contains a constructive argument, setting forth the conviction to which the author has come with regard to the faith of Abraham Lincoln. It is entirely possible that some readers will find themselves in essential agreement with the author in the earlier parts of the book, but will dissent in whole or in part from his own inferences. Whether the reader agrees or disagrees with the author in his conclusions, he will find in this book some material not elsewhere available for the formation of an independent judgment. Nevertheless the author counts himself justified not only in adducing the evidence but in stating frankly the conclusion which to his mind this evidence supports.