John Drinkwater

“ To speak plainly to the world in standing by our resolution to hold Fort Sumter with all our means, and in a plain declaration that the Union must be preserved, will leave us with a clean cause, simply and loyally supported. I tremble at the thought of war. But we have in our hands a sacred trust. It is threatened. We have had no thought of aggression. We have been the aggressed. Persuasion has failed, and I conceive it to be our duty to resist. To withhold supplies from Anderson would be to deny that duty. Gentlemen, the matter is before you. ”

“ A very fine thing for young girl to be servant to Mista Lincoln.
Susan: Well, we get on very well together.
Custis: A very bad thing to be slave in South.
Susan: Look here, you Mr. Custis, don't you go mixing me up with slaves.
Custis: No, you not slave. You servant, but you free body. That very mighty thing. A poor servant, born free.
Susan: Yes, but look here, are you pitying me, with your poor servant?
Custis: Pity? No. I think you very mighty.
Susan: Well, I don't know so much about mighty. But I expect you're right. It isn't every one that rises to the White House. ”

“ But the best of us have an instinct to resist aggression if it won't listen to persuasion. You may say it's a wrong instinct. I don't know. But it's there, and it's there in millions of good men. I don't believe it's a wrong instinct, I believe that the world must come to wisdom slowly. It is for us who hate aggression to persuade men always and earnestly against it, and hope that, little by little, they will hear us. But in the mean time there will come moments when the aggressors will force the instinct to resistance to act. ”

“ Many people in this country want abolition; many don't. I'll say nothing for the moment as to the rights and wrongs of it. But every man, whether he wants it or not, knows it may come. Why does the South propose secession? Because it knows abolition may come, and it wants to avoid it. It wants more: it wants the right to extend the slave foundation. We've all been to blame for slavery, but we in the North have been willing to mend our ways. ”

“ Come, gentlemen. What is it?
Jennings: It's this matter of Fort Sumter, Mr. President. If you withdraw your garrison from Fort Sumter it won't be looked upon as weakness in you. It will merely be looked upon as a concession to a natural privilege. We believe that the South at heart does not want secession. It wants to establish the right to decide for itself.
Lincoln: The South wants the stamp of national approval upon slavery. It can't have it.
White: Surely that's not the point. There's no law in the South against slavery.
Lincoln: Laws come from opinion, Mr. White. The South knows it. ”

“ Every audience has the same experience at Abraham Lincoln, and I laugh privately when I think of that experience. The curtain goes up on a highly commonplace little parlour, and a few ordinary people chatting in a highly commonplace manner. They keep on chatting. The audience thinks to itself: "I've been done! What is this interminable small talk?" And it wants to call out a protest: "Hi! You fellows on the stage! Have you forgotten that there is an audience on the other side of the footlights, waiting for something to happen?" ”

“ You, who have sacrificed nothing, babble about destroying the South while other people conquer it. I accepted this war with a sick heart, and I've a heart that's near to breaking every day. I accepted it in the name of humanity, and just and merciful dealing, and the hope of love and charity on earth. And you come to me, talking of revenge and destruction, and malice, and enduring hate. These gentle people are mistaken, but they are mistaken cleanly, and in a great name. It is you that dishonour the cause for which we stand—it is you who would make it a mean and little thing. ”

“ Good-bye, gentlemen. Come along, Hay.
MEADE salutes and LINCOLN goes, followed by HAY.
Grant: Who is with Lee?
Meade: Only one of his staff, sir.
Grant: You might see Malins, will you, Sone, and let us know directly General Lee comes.
Sone: Yes, sir. He goes out.
Grant: Well, Meade, it's been a big job.
Meade: Yes, sir.
Grant: We've had courage and determination. And we've had wits, to beat a great soldier. I'd say that to any man. But it's Abraham Lincoln, Meade, who has kept us a great cause clean to fight for. It does a man's heart good to know he's given victory to such a man to handle. ”

“ There's no other man we would follow so readily.
Lincoln: If you send me, the South will have little but derision for your choice.
Hind: We believe that you'll last out their laughter.
Lincoln: I can take any man's ridicule—I'm trained to it by a ... somewhat odd figure that it pleased God to give me, if I may so far be pleasant with you. But this slavery business will be long, and deep, and bitter. I know it. If you do me this honour, gentlemen, you must look to me for no compromise in this matter. If abolition comes in due time by constitutional means, good. ”

“ Gentlemen, we cannot escape history. We of this administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us. In giving freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the free. We shall nobly save or meanly lose the last, best hope on earth.
He places the proclamation in front of him.
"Shall be thenceforward and forever free." ”

“ Ma'am, I too believe war to be wrong. It is the weakness and the jealousy and the folly of men that make a thing so wrong possible. But we are all weak, and jealous, and foolish. That's how the world is, ma'am, and we cannot outstrip the world. ”

“ Do not deceive yourself. You urge me to discretion in one breath and tax me with timidity in the next. While there was hope that they might call Beauregard back out of their own good sense, I was determined to say nothing to inflame them. Do you call that timidity? Now their intention is clear, and you've heard me speak this morning clearly also. And now you talk about discretion—you, who call what was discretion at the right time, timidity, now counsel timidity at the wrong time, and call it discretion. ”

“ And then we must turn again, and again, and again to persuasion. This appeal to force is the misdeed of an imperfect world. But we are imperfect. We must strive to purify the world, but we must not think ourselves pure above the world. ”

“ We may not be able to do enough to be effective. The question is whether we shall do as much as we can.
Hook: If we withdrew altogether, wouldn't it give the South a lead towards compromise, as being an acknowledgment of their authority, while leaving us free to plead military necessity if we found public opinion dangerous?
Lincoln: My mind is clear. To do less than we can do, whatever that may be, will be fundamentally to allow the South's claim to right of secession. ”

“ With malice toward none, with charity for all, it is for us to resolve that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
There is a great sound of cheering. It dies down, and a boy passes through the lounge and calls out "Last act, ladies and gentlemen." The people disperse, and the box doors are closed. SUSAN is left alone and there is silence. ”

“ As I returned home that night from what are known as "the wilds of Hammersmith" (Hammersmith is a suburb of London) I said to myself: "This play is bound to succeed" The next moment I said to myself: "This play cannot possibly succeed. It has no love interest. It is a political play. Its theme is the threatened separation of the Southern States from the Northern States. Nobody ever heard of a play with such an absurd theme reaching permanent success. No author before John Drinkwater ever had the effrontery to impose such a theme on a London public." ”

“ Mrs. Lincoln: It's all right, Abraham. I told the girl to keep it out. The cupboard's choked with papers.
Susan (coming in with bottle and glasses) : I'm sure I'm sorry. I was told—
Lincoln: All right, all right, Susan. Get along with you.
Susan: Thank you, sir. She goes.
Lincoln (pouring out drink) : Poor hospitality for whiskey-drinking rascals like yourselves. But the thought's good.
Mr. Stone: Don't mention it, Abraham.
Mr. Cuffney: We wish you well, Abraham. Our compliments, ma'am. And God bless America! Samuel, I give you the United States, and Abraham Lincoln. ”

“ Seward, but it is. Now, I'll give you my answer. Gentlemen, it's no good hiding this thing in a corner. It's got to be settled. I said the other day that Fort Sumter would be held as long as we could hold it. I said it because I know exactly what it means. Why are you investing it? Say, if you like, it's to establish your right of secession with no purpose of exercising it. Why do you want to establish that right? Because now we will allow no extension of slavery, and because some day we may abolish it. You can't deny it; there's no other answer. ”

“ My people much to learn. Years, and years, and years. Ignorant, frightened, suspicious people. It will be difficult, very slow. (With growing passion.) But born free bodies. Free. I born slave, Mista Lincoln. No man understand who not born slave. ”

“ We have contrived to make all London come to Hammersmith to see a play without a love-interest or a bedroom scene, and the play will remain at Hammersmith. Americans will more clearly realize what John Drinkwater has achieved with the London public if they imagine somebody putting on a play about the Crimean War at some unknown derelict theatre round about Two Hundred and Fiftieth Street, and drawing all New York to Two Hundred and Fiftieth Street. ”

“ It is a perfectly right question. Ma'am, I have but one thought always—how can this thing be stopped? But we must ensure the integrity of the Union. In two years war has become an hourly bitterness to me. I believe I suffer no less than any man. But it must be endured. The cause was a right one two years ago. ”

“ The play did succeed. It is still succeeding, and it will continue to succeed. Nobody can dine out in London to-day and admit without a blush that he has not seen Abraham Lincoln. Monarchs and princes have seen it. Archbishops have seen it. Statesmen without number have seen it. An ex-Lord Chancellor told me that he had journeyed out into the said wilds and was informed at the theatre that there were no seats left. He could not believe that he would have to return from the wilds unsatisfied. But so it fell out. West End managers have tried to coax the play from Hammersmith to the West End. ”

“ The task of reconciliation, of setting order where there is now confusion, of bringing about a settlement at once just and merciful, and of directing the life of a reunited country into prosperous channels of good-will and generosity, will demand all our wisdom, all our loyalty. ”

“ But, though I cannot claim undivided confidence, I do not know that, all things considered, any other person has more; and, however this may be, there is no way in which I can have any other man put where I am. ”

“ What time do you expect the deputation, ma'am?
Mrs. Lincoln: They should be here at seven o'clock. (With an inquisitive nose.) Surely, Abraham hasn't been smoking.
Mr. Stone (rising) : Shall I open the window, ma'am? It gets close of an evening.
Mrs. Lincoln: Naturally, in March. You may leave the window, Samuel Stone. We do not smoke in the parlour.
Mr. Stone (resuming his seat) : By no means, ma'am.
Mrs. Lincoln: I shall be obliged to you.
Mr. Cuffney: Has Abraham decided what he will say to the invitation?
Mrs. Lincoln: He will accept it.
Mr. Stone: A very right decision, if I may say so. ”

“ And you hope that if you can tide over the first crisis and make us give way, opinion will prevent us from opposing you with force again, and you'll be able to get your own way about the slave business by threats. ”

“ But that would have decided nothing, and I saw what I believed to be the truth as I now put it to you, ma'am. It's a forlorn thing for any man to have this responsibility in his heart. I may see wrongly, but that's how I see.
Mrs. Blow: I quite agree with you, Mr. President. These brutes in the South must be taught, though I doubt whether you can teach them anything except by destroying them. That's what Goliath says.
Lincoln: Goliath must be getting quite an old man.
Mrs. Blow: Indeed, he's not, Mr. President Goliath is only thirty-eight. ”

“ But the ungenerous elements make the most noise, and you hear them only. You will run from the terrible name of Abolitionist even when it is pronounced by worthless creatures whom you know you have every reason to despise. ”

“ Seward.
Chase: Good-morning, Mr. President. Something urgent?
Lincoln: Let us be seated.
As they draw chairs up to the table, the other members of the Cabinet, SIMON CAMERON, CALEB SMITH, BURNET HOOK, and GIDEON WELLES, come in. There is an exchange of greetings, while they arrange themselves round the table.
Gentlemen, we meet in a crisis, the most fateful, perhaps, that has ever faced any government in this country. It can be stated briefly. A message has just come from Anderson. He can hold Fort Sumter three days at most unless we send men and provisions.
Cameron: How many men? ”

“ But once given, it's for the deep good or the deep ill of all this country. In the face of that a man may well ask himself twenty times, when he's twenty times sure. You make no qualification, any one among you? ”

“ If you please, ma'am, I should like to apologise for smoking in here.
Mrs. Lincoln: That's no matter, Samuel Stone. Only, don't do it again.
Mr. Cuffney: It's a great place for a man to fill. Do you know how Seward takes Abraham's nomination by the Republicans?
Mrs. Lincoln: Seward is ambitious. He expected the nomination. Abraham will know how to use him.
Mr. Stone: The split among the Democrats makes the election of the Republican choice a certainty, I suppose? ”