The big biography of Lincoln necessarily had to do so much with his political career, his ambitions, his accomplishments in public, with less time to spend on his private life, his inner life, and I thought this might be a way of getting at that.

What I thought we ought to try to do in a book like this is to focus closely on Lincoln, himself, to see what he knew, how he knew it, how he came to make the decisions that he did, and how he implemented them.

I love mysteries, and I read them every night before I go to bed.

But having said all of that, that still doesn't account for a lot of the increase in popularity which stems, I think, from Lincoln's personal characteristics.

The more I have studied Lincoln, the more I have followed his thought processes, the more I am convinced that he understood leadership better than any other American president.

Maybe I will write a memoir, perhaps I'll do some essays, or maybe I will write a mystery story.

At the beginning, Lincoln was so inexperienced he had reverence for military expertise, not realizing that there wasn't any military expertise, that the most anybody had commanded up to that point had been somebody, some troops in the Mexican War, and it had been years ago.

And, finally, Lincoln was not a good impromptu speaker; he was at his best when he could read from a carefully prepared manuscript. Though maybe a teleprompter could have helped that!

In Lincoln's day a President's religion was a very private affair. There were no public prayer meetings, no attempts to woo the Religious Right. Few of Lincoln's countrymen knew anything at all of his religious beliefs.

The big biography of Lincoln necessarily had to do so much with his political career, his ambitions, his accomplishments in public, with less time to spend on his private life, his inner life, and I thought this might be a way of getting at that.

I'm not sure Lincoln would fare well if he were a presidential candidate today.

If you think about it, the historian's task is like that of the detective.

I was able to sit at Lincoln's side and see how he thought and how he acted, and how he felt about what was going on around him. I felt the pressures that were on him. You can see what people were writing to him, how they were nudging him.

But I have tried to go over it very carefully, not merely what the evidence is, but with psychoanalysts and psychologists, and I think we're just about all agreed that Lincoln and Speed did not have a homosexual relationship.

I think, with the gay liberation movement has had need for heroes and heroines, and it would be rather nice to have Abraham Lincoln as your poster boy, wouldn't it?

Well, it seems to me Lincoln, I suppose, is kind of a model of a particular sort of presidency, a presidency that first of all is elected by a minority of the votes.

Lincoln had no such person that he could talk with. Often, as a result, he debated with himself, and he would draw up a kind of list of the pros and cons of an argument, and carefully figure them out, and he might test them in public.

No matter what accomplishments you make, somebody helped you.

No matter what accomplishments you make, somebody helps you.

I had no accomplishments except surviving. But that isn't enough in the community where I came from, because everybody was doing it. So I wasn't prepared for America, where everybody is glowing with good teeth and good clothes and food.

I thought I would reflect here on a theme most scientists enjoy recalling: the part luck played in their accomplishments.

The sports page records people's accomplishments, the front page usually records nothing, but man's failures.

However, I hope I am also judged on my accomplishments as an actor and not just on my pretty face!

Do not let your grand ambitions stand in the way of small but meaningful accomplishments.

Her death contributed to my later interest in studying biochemistry, an interest that has not been fulfilled in the sense that my accomplishments remain more at the basic than the applied level.

I think a lot of Jim Thorpe, the Olympian, and his accomplishments.

We know these men are professionals whose services are up for bid and whose bags are packed, and yet we call them our own and take personal, even civic pride in their accomplishments.

Getting a degree, being on Sesame Street... those were like real accomplishments to me.

A man's accomplishments in life are the cumulative effect of his attention to detail.

The intelligent man is one who has successfully fulfilled many accomplishments, and is yet willing to learn more.

Man can acquire accomplishments or he can become an animal, whichever he wants. God makes the animals, man makes himself.

I've been a very lucky guy. I played on championship teams. I played for Canada. I've won some awards and I'm very proud of those accomplishments. But I don't think there's anything greater than to come home and to be recognized at home. This is the pinnacle.

The most glorious moments in your life are not the so-called days of success, but rather those days when out of dejection and despair you feel rise in you a challenge to life, and the promise of future accomplishments.

For this reason, it is essential that our Nation's rural transportation professionals be provided with the necessary tools and support to promote and showcase the value, benefits, and accomplishments of rural transportation planning and development.

Knowledge may give weight, but accomplishments give luster, and many more people see than weigh.

Man is always more than he can know of himself; consequently, his accomplishments, time and again, will come as a surprise to him.

I have to consider my greatest accomplishments winning the Olympics because everything that I've done after that is really because of the Olympics.

In wilderness I sense the miracle of life, and behind it our scientific accomplishments fade to trivia.

Give a boy address and accomplishments and you give him the mastery of palaces and fortunes where he goes.

Let the future tell the truth, and evaluate each one according to his work and accomplishments. The present is theirs; the future, for which I have really worked, is mine.

Perhaps one of the most important accomplishments of my administration has been minding my own business.

The big biography of Lincoln necessarily had to do so much with his political career, his ambitions, his accomplishments in public, with less time to spend on his private life, his inner life, and I thought this might be a way of getting at that.

I think the world is filled with so much hype and PR bull. Frankly, it all comes out in the end. Good or bad, I'd rather just let our accomplishments really speak for themselves.

I always turn to the sports pages first, which records people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures.

I don't want to be remembered for my tennis accomplishments.

Accomplishments have no color.

As for accomplishments, I just did what I had to do as things came along.

I've never really spent a lot of time thinking about my individual accomplishments actually.

Man, unlike anything organic or inorganic in the universe, grows beyond his work, walks up the stairs of his concepts, emerges ahead of his accomplishments.