Lincoln, the unknown

28 • LINCOLN THE UNKNOWNI have not been to school since. The little advance I now haveupon this store of education, I have picked up from time totime under the pressure of necessity."And who had been his teachers? Wandering, benighted pedagogueswho had faith in witches and believed that the worldwas flat. Yet, during these broken and irregular periods, hehad developed one of the most valuable assets any man canhave, even from a university education: a love of knowledgeand a thirst for learning.The ability to read opened up a new and magic world forhim, a world he had never dreamed of before. It changed him.It broadened his horizon and gave him vision; and, for a quarterof a century, reading remained the dominant passion of hislife. His stepmother had brought a little library of five volumeswith her: the Bible, ^Esop's Fables, "Robinson Crusoe," "ThePilgrim's Progress," and "Sinbad the Sailor." The boy poredover these priceless treasures. He kept the Bible and iEsop'sFables within easy reach and read them so often that they profoundlyaffected his style, his manner of talking, his method ofpresenting arguments.But these books weren't enough. He longed for more thingsto read, but he had no money. So he began to borrow books,newspapers, anything in print. Walking down to the Ohio River,he borrowed a copy of the Revised Laws of Indiana from alawyer. Then, for the first time, he read the Declaration ofIndependence and the Constitution of the United States.He borrowed two or three biographies from a neighboringfarmer for whom he had often grubbed stumps and hoed corn.One was the Life of Washington by Parson Weems. It fascinatedLincoln, and he read it at night as long as he could see;and, when he went to sleep, he stuck it in a crack between thelogs so that he could begin it again as soon as daylight filteredinto the hut. One night a storm blew up, and the book wassoaked. The owner refused to take it back, so Lincoln had tocut and shock fodder for three days to pay for it.But in all his book-borrowing expeditions, he never madea richer find than "Scott's Lessons." This book gave him instructionin public speaking, and introduced him to the renownedspeeches of Cicero and Demosthenes and those ofShakespeare's characters.With "Scott's Lessons" open in his hand, he would walkback and forth under the trees, declaiming Hamlet's instruc-