"a poor hand to quote scripture": lincoln and genesis 3:19

"A Poor Hand to Quote Scripture": Lincoln and Genesis 3:19Author(s): Earl SchwartzSource: Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, Vol. 23, No. 2 (Summer, 2002), pp. 37-49Published by: University of Illinois PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20149031 .

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"A poor hand to quote Scripture": Lincoln and Genesis 3:19

EARL SCHWARTZ

"My friend has said to me that I am a poor hand to quote Scrip ture. I will try it again, however." Poor hand or not, Lincoln was

persistent. The 1858 Senate campaign was in full swing and the

Democratic candidate, Stephen A. Douglas, had recently charged that quoting Scripture did not suit his Republican adversary. Lin

coln's response to his "friend's" claim, as he told an audience in

mid-July, was to "try it again," concluding his address with a vig orous defense of human equality, cast as a homily on the verse "Be

ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which in heaven is per fect" (Matt. 5:48).x

It was easy enough for Douglas to impugn Lincoln's grasp of

Scripture. Lincoln was the product of a short and shallow formal

education, and he had never fully identified with a Christian de

nomination or doctrinal tradition.2 And yet in this case, as in so

many others, Douglas was mistaken. Lincoln's legacy, far more

than any other president, has, over time, become inextricably bound up with the words and themes of the Bible.3 He has been

endowed repeatedly with biblical features?sometimes cast as

1. Roy P. Basler, ed., The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, 9 vols. (New Brun

swick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1953-1955), 2: 501 (hereafter cited as Collect

ed Works). Quote is from the King James Version.

2. Richard Current, The Lincoln Nobody Knows (New York: Hill & Wang, 1958),

chap. 3, for a review of the literature on Lincoln's religious life, including the con

tention that he formally embraced Christianity in his later years. 3. Elton Trueblood concluded that it was "partly in response to the pioneer cul

ture in which he was steeped, [that] Abraham Lincoln's religion was centered far

more in the Bible than in the Church," and cites William J. Wolf's comment that

for Lincoln, "... the Bible rather than the Church remained the highroad to the

knowledge of God." See Trueblood, Abraham Lincoln, Theologian of American Anguish,

(New York: Harper & Row, 1972), 55, and Allen C. Guelzo, introduction to Abra

ham Lincoln, Redeemer President (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1999).

Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, Vol. 23, No. 2, 2002 ? 2002 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois



38 Lincoln and Genesis 3:19

Moses, on other occasions as Father Abraham, and yet again as a

fiery prophet or martyred savior. An aura of prophetic authority has accrued to his own words,4 heightened by his skillful use of

literary devices that are also characteristic of biblical texts.5 The

Poor Hand's homilies, like the man himself, now belong to the

ages.

Lincoln contributed to this biblical aura through his adamant

advocacy of what he referred to in his address to the Young Men's

Lyceum of Springfield in 1838 as an American "political religion."6 In remarks at Independence Hall in February 1861, he adopted a

distinctly biblical metaphor to characterize his commitment to the

ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution,

announcing, "'May my right hand lose its cunning and my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth' [Psalms 137:5-6] if ever I prove false to those teachings"?an oath that had originally referred to

an abiding attachment to vanquished Jerusalem. Ten days earlier

in Indianapolis, he made a similar transposition, declaring, "When

the people rise in masses in behalf of the Union and the liberties

of their country, truly may it be said, 'The gates of Hell shall not

prevail against them'" (Matt. 16:18).7 In death, Lincoln became an

icon of this American political faith?the only faith, it would seem, for which he could give his own last measure of devotion.

Lincoln's Collected Works are, in fact, peppered with biblical ref

erences, including several dozen direct quotations. These are tak

en, for the most part, from Hebrew Bible narratives, the Psalms, Wisdom texts, and the Gospels.8 The Bible was the common coin

of literate nineteenth-century Americans, and Lincoln made good use of its currency.

4. In reference to Lincoln's "Letter to Mrs. Bixby," Carl Sandburg commented,

"Here was a piece of the American Bible." See Roy P. Basier, Abraham Lincoln, His

Speeches and Writings, Universal Library Edition (New York: Grosset & Dunlap,

1962), 35.

5. See Charles B. Strozier, Lincoln's Quest for Union: Public and Private Meanings,

(New York: Basic Books, 1982), 225-27, and Basier, Speeches and Writings, 34-49.

6. "'The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions': Address Before the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, January 27,1838," Collected Works, 1:108-15.

7. Trueblood, 55^56. Matt. 16:18 is also the closing words of Lincoln's "Address

Before the Young Men's Lyceum," Collected Works, 1: 115.

8. Lincoln was clearly well read in Bible. Though it is an exceptional case, Wil

liam J. Wolf counted no less than thirty-four biblical references in Lincoln's manu

script of his 1858 Address to the Bloomington Young Men's Association on "Dis

coveries and Inventions." See William J. Wolf, Lincoln's Religion, (Philadelphia:

Pilgrim Press, 1970), 132.



Earl Schwartz 39

On occasion Lincoln would cite a biblical text strictly for the sake

of its imagery. The best-known example of his use of a biblical text

for this limited purpose are his references to "a house divided"

(Matt. 12:22-28, Mark 3:22-26, Luke 11:14-20). Lincoln consistent

ly employed the metaphor of "a house divided" in literary settings

wholly disassociated from its biblical context.9 Herndon maintained

that this was intentional. "I want to use some universally known

figure [of speech]," Herndon recalled Lincoln telling him, "ex

pressed in simple language as universally well-known, that may strike home to the minds of men in order to raise them up to the

peril of the times."10

In the case of the "house divided" references, literary and anec

dotal evidence coincide to demonstrate that Lincoln's primary in

terest was in decontextualized use of the text's imagery rather than

exegetical exploration of its content. Historians may speculate con

cerning his subconscious affinity for this and other decontextual

ized citations,11 but it is clear that his conscious intention in such cases was to employ a passage's imagery without reference to its

original significance. However, many of Lincoln's biblical citations are exegetical. These

latter references not only evidence the rhetorical skill with which he

appropriated biblical imagery, but also shed light on his understand

ing of the passages cited. Foremost among these exegetical referenc

es, in terms of frequency as well as significance of occasion, are his

citations of Gen. 3:19, which, according to the King James Version

he used, reads, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread." The Collected Works include four direct references to Gen. 3:19.

First, in the so-called "Fragments of a Tariff Discussion," which

9. In its biblical context Jesus employs the image of "a house divided" to deflect

the charge that his ability to exorcise demons came from Satan. Surely, he retorts,

Satan would not divide his own house between exorcists and exorcised. Lincoln

used the image in an 1843 pamphlet calling for unity among Whigs, and then again, more memorably, during the 1858 Senate campaign, in reference to the divisive ef

fects of slavery. 10. William H. Herndon and Jesse W. Weik, Life of Lincoln, ed. Paul M. Angle,

(Cleveland: World Publishing, 1930), 325; David Donald has suggested that Lincoln took the metaphor from Aesop's fable "The Lion and the Four Bulls." Herndon's

reference to Lincoln's stated motive for using the metaphor is ambiguous enough to allow for this possibility, but absent additional evidence in support of Donald's

contention, a biblical derivation would appear to be more likely. See Donald, Lin

coln Reconsidered (New York: Vintage Books, 2001), 68.

11. See Strozier's Lincoln's Quest for Union for an example of this type of analy sis of the House Divided motif.




Lincoln recalled having written in late 1847; next, in a response to a

resolution of support he had received from a delegation of Baptist missionaries, written in May 1864; third, in a short autobiographi cal anecdote he arranged to have published in December 1864; and

finally, in his Second Inaugural Address, delivered in March 1865.

In addition, he appears to allude to the verse on several occasions

in speaking about labor, as in his observation that the "old general rule" was that educated people "managed to eat their bread, leav

ing the toil of producing it to the uneducated,"12 and his insistence

that every human being has the right "to put into his mouth the

bread that his own hands have earned. . . ."13 As will become clear, what all of these references have in common is their association with

what historian Gabor Boritt has contended was Lincoln's most fun

damental, far-reaching and enduring political principal: the right of

workers to claim and enjoy the fruits of their labor.

Lincoln's reading of Gen. 3:19 is a preeminent example of his skill

in political homiletics, a skill rooted in his ability to draw radical

ly new insights from ostensibly familiar sources. His idiosyncratic

application of the verse demonstrates his ability to give memora

ble expression to his perspective on an issue through rhetorical

coordination of both the form and content of a citation. In addi

tion, careful examination of his references to the text, which extend

from the beginning of his term in Congress through the Second

Inaugural Address, can help to clarify the development of his think

ing on the role of labor in human society, and, in turn, the origins and depth of his opposition to slavery.

The References

Gabor Boritt makes a convincing argument for the importance of

practical economic concerns to Lincoln's political and moral out

look, with the rights of workers situated at the center of these con

cerns. Boritt concludes that, "Above all, there remained in Lincoln,

unchanged, that firm, moral-materialistic core.... Surely, Lincoln was also a highly moral, indeed spiritual, being. Yet this charac

teristic was thoroughly intermingled with his materialism and

while cleansing it, also strengthened it."14 This intermingling of the

moral and material, born along by images of "sweat," "face," and

12. Collected Works, 3: 479.

13. Ibid., 2: 520.

14. Gabor Boritt, Abraham Lincoln and the Economics of the American Dream, (Ur bana: University of Illinois Press, 1978), 240.



Earl Schwartz 41

"bread," is nowhere more clearly illustrated than in his references

to Gen. 3:19.

Reference 1: From "Fragments of a Tariff Discussion" (December 1, 1847?)

In the early days of the world, the Almighty said to the first

of our race 'In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread' [Gen.

3:19]; and since then, if we except the light and the air of heav

en, no good thing has been, or can be enjoyed by us, without

having first cost labour. And, in [as] much as most good things are produced by labour, it follows that [all] such things of right

belong to those whose labour has produced them. But it has so happened in all ages of the world, that some have laboured, and others have, without labour, enjoyed a large proportion of

the fruits. This is wrong, and should not continue. To [secure] to each labourer the whole product of his labour, or as nearly as possible, is a most worthy object of any good government.15

Commenting on that passage, along with related references and

allusions by Lincoln to Gen. 3:19 in connection with the rights and

aspirations of workers, Boritt contends that "Whatever ideal he

held to, whatever stood for America in his eyes, in the most basic sense was embodied for him in this faith." Boritt concludes that

this was, to use Lincoln's own expression, the "central idea" of his

political outlook throughout his public life.16

Boritt's contention notwithstanding, one could easily pass over

Lincoln's reference to Gen. 3:19 in the "Fragments of a Tariff Dis

cussion" as unexceptional. In form and language, it closely resem

bles a passage from Francis Wayland's Elements of Political Economy:

"Labor has been made necessary to our happiness. No valu

able object of desire can be produced without it... the Uni

versal law of our existence, is, "In the sweat of thy face shalt

thou eat bread, until thou return to the ground."17

Wayland, a Unitarian minister and President of Brown University,

published Elements of Political Economy in 1837. It quickly became

the most popular book on economics in the country. Herndon re

called that Lincoln had a special liking for Wayland's work.18

15. Collected Works, 1: 411-12.

16. Boritt, Lincoln and Economics, 278.

17. Ibid., 123.

18. Ibid.




Lincoln begins the "Fragment" by reiterating Wayland's com

monplace identification of Gen. 3:19 with the inevitability of labor.

Wayland's contention that, given this inevitability, workers should

have the opportunity to prosper from their efforts may also have

influenced the composition of the "Fragment." But if Wayland is

to be credited with the initial coupling of Gen. 3:19 with economic

issues in Lincoln's rhetoric, the implications Lincoln drew from the

verse differed markedly from those Wayland endorsed.19 Lincoln's

inference that it is a wholly appropriate and "worthy" object of

good government to assist workers in securing the "whole prod uct" of their labor suggests a personal connection to working peo

ple and comfort with political activism on their behalf that went

far beyond Wayland's tepid affirmation of workers rights. It is clear

from numerous remarks Lincoln made throughout his career that

he believed labor to be the source of all productive value, or, as

Wayland put it, that capital was "pre-exerted labor."20 However, in opposition to Wayland, Lincoln went on to concur, he said, with

a "certain class of reasoners," that "labor is prior to, and indepen dent of, capital; that, in fact, capital is the fruit of labor, and could

never have existed if labor had not first existed?that labor can exist

without capital, but that capital could never have existed without

labor. Hence they hold that labor is the superior?greatly the su

perior?of capital."21 Wayland's adamant insistence on an even

handed "equality" between capital and labor finds no echo here.

Though Wayland's comment would appear to anticipate the

"Fragment," the differences in how the two men understood the

salient implications of Gen. 3:19 far outweigh the similarities. There

is, in fact, no record of a commentator having read Gen. 3:19 as an

unambiguous affirmation of the rights of workers to enjoy the fruits

of their labor before Lincoln's "Fragment." In future references Lin

coln would continue to ignore the conventional interpretation of

the verse as a curse brought upon humanity by Adam's disobedi

19. For a summary of Wayland's economic views see Joseph Dorfman, The Eco

nomic Mind in American Civilization (New York: Viking Press, 1946), 758-67. Though it is possible that Lincoln's rendering of the verse was sparked by a pamphlet, ser

mon, or conversation, I can find no evidence of such a source. Though written a

century before Lincoln's birth, Matthew Henry's exegetical comment that "we are

bound to work, not as creatures only, but as criminals; it is part of our sentence

..." succinctly conveys the typical reading of the verse among both Christians and

Jews of all denominations in Lincoln's day as well.

20. Ibid.




Earl Schwartz 43

ence, in favor of his own novel and daring inferences concerning the primacy of labor and the rights of workers.

Lincoln, of course, was not alone among mid-nineteenth-centu

ry thinkers in his preoccupation with the rights of workers. His

"central idea" connected him to a far-flung chorus of observers,

ranging from Marx to Mill, who would also lash out against "the same tyrannical principle": "You work and toil and earn bread, and

I'll eat it."22 However, the manner in which Lincoln gave voice to

his convictions about rights purchased by the sweat of a worker's

brow, amidst the unparalleled circumstances that converged upon him, was distinctly his own. Informed by his understanding of the

priority of labor over capital, Lincoln's reading of Gen. 3:19 as a

statement about labor and its just rewards takes on revolutionary

implications. He arrived at these implications by transforming a

verse that was (and still is) commonly interpreted as a description of the human condition into a moral imperative.

In Lincoln's hands, Gen. 3:19 serves as a stepping-off point for

his conclusion that the fruits of labor rightfully belong to those who

do the work, and that it is a public concern of the highest order

that these rights be secured. In the earliest of his "sweat of thy face"

texts, these two points are laid out in the form of commentary. In

the remaining three cases, Lincoln progressively clarifies the con

nection between verse and commentary through underlining, para

phrase, and hypothetical antithesis. These devices will serve to di

rect the reader's attention away from the theme of inevitable toil

and toward a consideration of the moral significance of the pos sessive pronouns, actual and inferred, that Lincoln viewed as the

verse's pivotal terms.

Reference 2: From a "response to the preamble and resolutions of the

American Baptist Home Missionary Society" (May 30, 1864)

To read in the Bible, as the word of God himself, that 'In the

sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread' [Gen. 3:19] and to preach therefrom, that 'In the sweat of other mans faces shalt thou eat

bread,' to my mind can scarcely be reconciled with honest sin

cerity. When brought to my final reckoning, may I have to an

swer for robbing no man of his goods [I Sam. 12:3]; yet more

tolerable even this, than for robbing one of himself, and all that was his. When, a year or two ago, those professedly holy men

of the South, met in the semblance of prayer and devotion,

22. Ibid., 315.




and, in the name of Him who said 'As ye would all men

should do unto you, do ye even so unto them' [Matt. 7:12],

appealed to the Christian world to aid them in doing to a whole race of men, as they would have no man do unto themselves, to my thinking, they contemned and insulted God and His

church, far more than did Satan when he tempted the Saviour

with the Kingdoms of the earth. The devils attempt was no

more false, and far less hypocritical. But let me forbear, remem

bering it is also written, 'Judge not, lest ye be judged' [Matt.

7:1]23

Lincoln's "Response to. . . the American Baptist Home Mission

Society" was composed in the midst of the 1864 presidential cam

paign, a period of deep political and military uncertainty. Nearly

twenty years had passed since the composition of the "Fragment on Labor," including three years of war, but Lincoln's application of Gen. 3:19 remained essentially the same, though it was made

more explicit by his underlining of "thy" and "other mans faces," and his use of the antithetical "In the sweat of other mans faces shalt

thou eat bread," in counterpoint to the biblical quotation. In doing so, Lincoln reaffirms his general critique of the theft of the fruits

of labor, and he unflinchingly extends it to the specific issue of sla

very.

The manner in which Lincoln links the themes of workers' rights and slavery in his "Response" to the Baptist missionaries suggests that he derived his position on the specific issue of slavery from

his general perspective on the rights of workers. It is the unreason

ableness of slavery that commands Lincoln's attention here, and this unreasonableness allows no play for the paternalism or racism that in other contexts sometimes adhered to his remarks. Whatever pa

tronizing biases Lincoln may have harbored are subordinated to a

line of reasoning about the rights of workers that he found incon

trovertible. It is not necessary to reconfigure Lincoln as complete

ly free of such biases to appreciate his commitment to abolition, if we understand that in Lincoln's case it was his revulsion at the

exploitation of workers rather than anti-racism that was the initial

catalyst for his opposition to slavery. When it came to defending the rights of workers, Lincoln had

little difficulty finding common ground with slaves. Two months

earlier, in a letter to the New York Workingmen's Democratic




Earl Schwartz 45

Republican Association, he had told his correspondents that "...

the existing rebellion, means more, and tends to more, than the per

petuation of African Slavery... it is, in fact, a war upon the rights of all working people."24 In an early political address he went so

far as to announce that in his impoverished youth he too "used to

be a slave," and that "we were all slaves one time or another," but

that he had seized the proffered opportunity to shake loose the

bonds of economic subordination. Twenty years later he confirmed

the persistence of this facet of his self-image when he concluded

the autobiographical sketch circulated during the 1860 presiden tial campaign with the oblique comment that aside from his height,

weight, and coloring, there were "no other marks or brands recol

lected"?an expression commonly used in the South in identify

ing runaway slaves.25

Lincoln's application of Gen. 3:19 to the issue of slavery was a

natural extension of his previously stated position that all work ers have the right to enjoy the fruits of their own labor. However, this application is only possible on the basis of his atypical under

standing of the verse, in which emphasis is placed on the sweat of

thy brow purchasing thou the right to eat thy bread. In his "Re

sponse" to the Baptist missionaries, Lincoln refers to the verse as

he moves from a general concern for worker's rights to the specific case of slavery. He argues his case in the strongest of terms, char

acterizing slavery as a stealing of another's "self," more worthy of

contempt than the theft of another's "goods," or even Satan's at

tempt to seduce Jesus in the wilderness. The introduction of the latter motif carries with it a furious condemnation of the hypocri sy Lincoln ascribed to those who would attempt to reconcile the

enslavement of others with Christian faith. This condemnation, in

varying degrees of harshness, also accompanies his two subsequent uses of Gen. 3:19.26

Reference 3: "The President's Last, Shortest, and Best Speech," (published in the Washington Daily Chronicle, December [6?], 1864)

On Thursday of last week two ladies from Tennessee came

before the President asking the release of their husbands held as prisoners of war at Johnson's Island. They were put off till

24. Ibid., 259.

25. Guelzo, Redeemer President, 121.

26. See also La Wanda Cox, Black Freedom and Lincoln (Urbana: University of Illi

nois Press, 1985), 24-26, concerning Lincoln's views on race, his personal relation

ships with African Americans, and his commitment to emancipation.




Friday, when they came again; and were again put off till Sat

urday. At each of the interviews one of the ladies urged that

her husband was a religious man. On Saturday the President

ordered the release of the prisoners, and then said to this lady 'You say that your husband is a religious man; tell him when

you meet him, that I say I am not much of a judge of religion, but that, in my opinion, the religion that sets men to rebel and

fight against their government, because, as they think, that

government does not sufficiently help some men to eat their

bread on the sweat of other men's faces [Gen. 3:19], is not the sort of religion upon which people can get to heaven.'27

Lincoln passed this anecdote on to Noah Brooks, a reporter with

whom he had close ties, with the request that it be published "right away." It appeared in the Washington Daily Chronicle, along with

the headline Lincoln had composed for it, on December 7, 1864.

The humorously self-deprecating headline is significant. Though this is neither his last nor best speech, its reference to Gen. 3:19 in

connection with the injustice and cruelty of unrequited slave la

bor, prospered or tolerated by the nominally "religious," establishes

the anecdote, along with the response to the Baptist missionaries, as a precursor to the climactic Second Inaugural Address. Howev

er, in this new setting, Lincoln sharpens his earlier renderings of the verse by his interpolation of the word "their" prior to "bread."

Lincoln had been working from this inference all along, but in this

case, as well as in the Second Inaugural Address, he makes explic it his sense of the verse as a declaration of the right of workers to

enjoy the fruit of their labors, and the wrong done workers when "some men ... eat their bread on the sweat of other men's faces." It

is also significant that Lincoln speaks here in terms of those who are disappointed with their government's unwillingness to assist

them in this theft. This reference to government as a potential "fence" for the stealing of labor's just rewards flows directly from

Lincoln's long held conviction, already stated in the 1847 fragment, that it was "a most worthy object of any good government" to help secure for each laborer "the whole product of his labor, or as near

ly as possible."

Reference 4: "Second Inaugural Address" (March 4, 1865)

It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of oth

27. Collected Works, 8:154-55.



Earl Schwartz 47

er men's faces [Gen. 3:19]; but let us judge not that we be not

judged [Matt. 7:1]... . The Almighty has His own purposes. 'Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be

that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence

cometh!' [Matt. 18:7]... . Fondly do we hope?fervently do we

pray?that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass

away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth

piled by the bond-man's two hundred and fifty years of unre

quited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn

with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said

'the judgments of the Lord, are true and righteous altogether'

[Psalms 19:10]28

In this short passage Lincoln strings together four direct biblical

quotations.29 Nevertheless, each quote enters the address honed

and shaped by many years of conceptual and rhetorical develop ment. Gen. 3:19 now carries for Lincoln the accumulated implica

tions of twenty years of reflection, as indicated by his retention of

an inferred "their" prior to "bread," a condensed version of his

earlier antithesis of "their bread" over against the "sweat of other

men's faces," and the addition of the tortuous image of oppressors

"wringing" their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, rath

er than simply eating it, as he had expressed it earlier.

Lincoln's juxtaposition of Gen. 3:19 to Matt. 7:1 ("Let us judge not. . .") reiterates his previous condemnation of slavery as the

theft of another's "self," as well as his claim that he was obliged not to "judge" the motives of those who would lend their support to such a crime. Here, as in the "Response" to the Baptist mission

aries, the counsel that one must withhold judgment appears iron

ic, though his convincing reference to "charity for all" in the per oration indicates a tempering of his earlier sarcasm. However,

having counseled forbearance, Lincoln immediately goes on to de

clare that it was not to be expected that restraining the urge to

judge would save the nation from undergoing judgment. Instead, in a passage punctuated by repeated references to justice ("just,"

"judge," "judged," "judgments") he joins his "materialist" reading of Gen. 3:19 to a corresponding vision of an immanent Divine judg

ment which was "true and righteous altogether," purging the na

28. Collected Works, 8: 332-33.

29. The use of the terms "widow" and "orphan" in the closing paragraph of the

Address also appear to be influenced by biblical usage, e.g., Exod. 22:22,24, Isa. 1:17.




tion, measure for measure, of slavery's "wealth" and "lash." The

ravages of war had extracted a terrible price from those "by whom

the offence cometh," be they collaborators or bystanders, but the

debate was over, and the conclusion, as he had long insisted, was

"self evident." The Almighty had had His own wrenching purpos es. Those purposes having been accomplished, the time for rend

ing was now speedily passing away, and a time for mending had

begun.30 It is not surprising that Lincoln would return on several occa

sions over the course of his political career to Gen. 3:19. Its images of "sweat, "brow," and "bread," contrary to Douglas's friendly con

cern, fit well with his rhetorical style. James M. McPherson points out that Lincoln's facility with metaphor, as well as the particular

types of metaphor he tended to employ, reflected his formative

experiences in rural Indiana and Illinois. His skill with concrete

imagery was nurtured through conversation with neighbors, and

was therefore, as he later noted, well suited for political talk with

his constituencies.31 In addition, the verse's imagery was neatly bound up with the themes of labor and, for Lincoln, justice, both

of which were central to his political outlook.

But Lincoln's ability to shape and apply the implications he drew

from the metaphorical possibilities in Gen. 3:19 ran far deeper than

nostalgia or stylistic considerations alone. Even an appreciation of

the passage's capacity to rhetorically integrate themes that were

central to Lincoln's political outlook, and to do so with great econ

omy, does not adequately explain his persistent affinity for the

verse. When purely rhetorical motives for repeated references to

the verse are exhausted, there remains a personal dimension to its

30. During the war years, Lincoln frequently referred to Providential "purpose,"

"will," and "justice." One could see these references to the unsparing judgment of

a Sovereign Will as a late personification of his earlier belief in the "doctrine of ne

cessity." Ann Douglas, discussing the Calvinist underpinnings of Herman Melville's

Billy Budd, connects Captain Vere's unwillingness to spare Budd from condemna

tion with Lincoln's reference to Luke 1:17 in the Address. She concludes that in

Budd's story "history, presented in its uncompromised detail, merges, no matter

how inscrutably and partially, ambiguously, with providence." The same might be

said of Lincoln's observations concerning the Almighty's "purposes." See Douglas, The Feminization of American Culture (New York: Avon, 1977), 391-95. On the "doc

trine of necessity" see Current, Lincoln Nobody Knows, chap. 3.

31. James M. McPherson, "How Lincoln Won the War With Metaphors," in Abra

ham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution (New York: Oxford, 1990), 93-112,

and see the discussion of Lincoln's use of metaphors in Strozier, Quest for Union,

177-81.



Earl Schwartz 49

prominence. For Lincoln, Gen. 3:19 was not only a verbal metaphor, it was also a life metaphor. His reading of the verse is wholly con

gruent with his own experience and character. It was not only an

expression of what he thought, but of who he was. Though histo

rians have done much to correct the popular romantic image of the

young, pastoral Lincoln, it is clear that an overlay of middle-class

gentility acquired in his later years could not completely obscure

his own personal knowledge and appreciation of physical labor.

Francis B. Carpenter, in his memoir Six Months at the White House

with Abraham Lincoln, recounted a remarkable demonstration of this

aspect of Lincoln's personality as part of his description of a visit

to Grant's headquarters at City Point, Virginia, in late March 1865.

According to Carpenter, Lincoln was enthused by the warm recep tion he received from the soldiers, and he spent several hours with

patients at the army hospital. As he concluded this marathon of

handshaking, a surgeon commented that his arm must be terribly sore from the workout. Lincoln smiled and replied that he had

"strong muscles," and picking up a heavy ax, proceeded to vigor

ously chop wood for a few minutes. He then held out the ax hori

zontally, keeping it absolutely still?a feat that none of the soldiers

present could duplicate.32 Lincoln's pride in his continued physical strength is indicative

of a "poor hand" well acquainted with labor. In his letter to the

New York Workingmen's Democratic Republican Association, he

maintained that "The strongest bond of human sympathy, outside

of the family relation, should be one uniting all working people, of all nations, and tongues, and kindreds."33 A lifetime of social

advancement could not sever this bond. One can safely assume that

if Lincoln's hand did not quiver as he held out the ax, there was,

nevertheless, the gleam of sweat on his brow.

32. See David Herbert Donald, Lincoln (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), 575.




"a poor hand to quote scripture": lincoln and genesis 3:19

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