We have a yet further difficulty to face in the conflict of testimony of habitually truthful people. If it were becoming in the author of a book such as this to pass any general criticism upon those authors who have preceded him in the same field, it might, perhaps, be counted not invidious to say that for the most part writers on the religion of Lincoln have been content to adduce the testimony of a limited number of apparently truthful witnesses in support of their theory, but have not given the evidence very much examination beyond the general fact that the witnesses were habitually truthful people. We shall not arrive at the truth in this fashion. We may borrow an illustration from a field which lies just outside the scope of our present inquiry. Even to this day it is possible to start a warm discussion almost anywhere in Springfield over the question of Lincoln's domestic affairs. It is possible to prove on the testimony of unimpeached witnesses that Lincoln loved his wife passionately, and that he did not love her at all; that he married Mary Todd because he loved her and had already answered in his own heart all his previous questions and misgivings, and that he married her because she and her relatives practically compelled him to do so, and that he went to the marriage altar muttering that he was going to hell; that Mary Todd not only admired Abraham Lincoln, but loved him with a beautiful and wifely devotion, and that she hated him and never ceased to wreak revenge upon him for having once deserted her upon the eve of their announced marriage; that Mary Todd wore a white silk dress on the night of her wedding, and that she never owned a white silk dress until she had become a resident of the White House; that the wedding was a gay affair, with a great dinner, and was followed by a reception for which several hundred printed invitations were issued, and that the wedding was hastily performed on a Sunday evening, Mr. Dresser, the minister, cutting short his evening service and dropping in on the way home to solemnize a quickly extemporized marriage contract. It would seem fairly easy to discover from a calendar of the year 1842 at least what day in the week was chosen for the wedding, but few if any of the disputants, or even of the biographers, appear to have taken this pains. If the present writer should ever have occasion to write about Abraham Lincoln's married life, he would not proceed very far without consulting a calendar for that year; and he would hope to settle at least one point in the controversy by telling the world that in 1842 the fourth day of November did not occur on Sunday or Tuesday, but on Friday;[28] Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln both being tinged with superstition, he might raise the question whether the celebration of the wedding upon that date probably was or was not long premeditated. But the present book does not concern itself with these questions, and the matter is