Signal successes ... call for devout acknowledgment to the Supreme Being in whose hand are the destinies of nations.--Thanksgiving Proclamation, September 3, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 571. God knows best ... surely He intends some great good to follow this mighty convulsion, which no mortal could make and no mortal can stave.... That you believe this I doubt not; and believing it, I shall still receive for our country and myself your earnest prayers to our Father in Heaven.--Letter to Mrs. Gurney, September 4, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 573-74. I do further recommend to my fellow citizens aforesaid, that they do reverently humble themselves in the dust, and from thence offer up penitent and fervent prayers and supplications to the Great Disposer of events for a return of the inestimable blessings of peace, union, and harmony.--Thanksgiving Proclamation, October 20, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 587. I am thankful to God for this approval of the people; ... I give thanks to the Almighty for this evidence of the people's resolution to stand by free government and the rights of humanity.--Response to Serenade following Re-election, November 9, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 595. I am naturally anti-slavery. If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong. I cannot remember when I did not so think and feel, and yet I have never understood that the Presidency conferred upon me an unrestricted right to act officially upon this judgment and feeling.... I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me. Now at the end of three years' struggle, the nation's condition is not what either party, or any man, devised or expected. God alone can claim it. Whither it is tending seems plain. If God now wills the removal of a great wrong, and wills also that we of the North as well as you of the South, shall pay fairly for our complicity in that wrong, impartial history will find therein new cause to attest and revere the justice and goodness of God.--Letter to A. G. Hodges, April 4, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 508-09. Enough is known of army operations within the last five days to claim an especial gratitude to God, while what remains undone demands our most sincere prayers to, and reliance upon, Him without whom all human effort is vain.--Recommendation of Thanksgiving, May 9, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 519. I invite and request ... all loyal and law-abiding people ... to render to the Almighty and merciful Ruler of the universe homages and confessions.--Proclamation of Day of Prayer, July 7, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 544. Again the blessings of health and abundant harvest claim our profoundest gratitude to Almighty God.--Annual Address to Congress, December 6, 1864. _Complete Works_, II, 604.