while his antecedents prevented him from loving
the negro. His anti-slavery sentiments were held strongly in check by
his sound sense of justice. He had the temperament of a humanitarian
with the intellect of a lawyer. While not combative by nature, he
possessed the characteristic American trait of measuring himself by
the attainments of others. He was solicitous to match himself with
other men so as to prove himself at least their peer. Possessed of a
cause that enlisted the service of his heart as well as his head,
Lincoln was a strong advocate at the bar and a formidable opponent on
the stump. Douglas bore true witness to Lincoln's powers when he said,
on hearing of his nomination, "I shall have my hands full. He is the
strong man of his party--full of wit, facts, dates--and the best stump
speaker, with his droll ways and dry jokes, in the West. He is as
honest as he is shrewd; and if I beat him, my victory will be hardly
won."[681]

The nomination of Lincoln was so little a matter of surprise to him
and his friends, that at the close of the convention he was able to
address the delegates in a carefully prepared speech. Wishing to sound
a dominant note for the campaign, he began with these memorable words:

"If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we
could better judge what to do and how to do it. We are now far into
the fifth year, since a policy was initiated with the avowed object,
and confident promise, of putting an end to slavery agitation. Under
the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only not ceased,
but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, it will not cease, until
a crisis shall have been reached and passed. 'A house divided against
itself cannot stand.' I believe this government cannot endure
permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be
dissolved--I do not expect the house to fall--but I do expect it will
cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other.
Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it,
and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is
in the course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it
forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as
well as new--North as well as South."[682]

All evidence, continued Lincoln, pointed to a design to make slavery
national. The Kansas-Nebraska Act, the popular indorsement of
Buchanan, and the Dre