Whom did Lincoln admire?

[David Lockmiller]

(03-26-2019 09:03 AM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  I belive there was a scene where he read some lines from a poem out to someone and added something like "I wish I could write/produce a piece like this", directly expressing admiration for the writer. Maybe someone knows more specifically?

[President Lincoln] was at this time, from an unusual pressure of office-seekers, in addition to his other cares, literally worn out. Pushing everything aside, he said to one of the party: "Have you seen the 'Nasby Papers'?" "No, I have not," was the answer; "who is 'Nasby'?" "There is a chap out in Ohio," returned the President, "who has been writing a series of letters in the newspapers over the signature of 'Petroleum V. Nasby.' Some one sent me a pamphlet collection of them the other day. I am going write to 'Petroleum' to come down here, and I intend to tell him if he will communicate his talent to me, I will 'swap' places with him."

Thereupon he arose, went to a drawer in his desk, and, taking out the "Letters," sat down and read one to the company finding in their enjoyment of it the temporary excitement and relief which another man would have found in a glass of wine. The instant he ceased, the book was thrown aside, his countenance relapsed into its habitual serious expression, and the business before him was entered upon with the utmost earnestness.

-- Six Months at the White House, by F.B. Carpenter, page 151.

[Steve]

David, I think you're missing the context of the anecdote:

https://books.google.com/books?id=b4UpAA...&q&f=false

Lincoln was making fun of the book's character, Rev. Petroleum V. Nasby.

[David Lockmiller]

(03-27-2019 01:20 AM)Steve Wrote:  David, I think you're missing the context of the anecdote:

https://books.google.com/books?id=b4UpAA...&q&f=false

Lincoln was making fun of the book's character, Rev. Petroleum V. Nasby.

Steve, I ask you to consider the following two paragraphs from Doris Kearns Goodwin's book Team of Rivals at pages 661-62.

Both Republicans and Democrats considered the state elections in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana on October 11 harbingers of the presidential election in November. Not only would the results reveal public sentiment, but the party that gained the governor's offices in those states would have "a grand central rallying point" for its partisans. That evening, Lincoln made his customary visit to the telegraph office in the War Department to read the dispatches as they came over the wire. Stanton was there, as was his assistant secretary, Charles Dana, and Thomas Eckert, chief of the telegraph office. Early reports from Cincinnati and Philadelphia looked hopeful, but reliable figures were unbearably slow in coming.

To defuse the tension, Dana recalled, Lincoln took from his pocket "a thin yellow-covered pamphlet" containing the latest writings of the humorist Petroleum V. Nasby. "He would read a page or a story, pause to consider a new election telegram, and then open the book again and go ahead with a new passage." John Hay, who had accompanied Lincoln, found the selections "immensely amusing" and mistakenly thought Stanton felt the same way. During a break in the readings, however, the solemn war secretary signaled Dana to follow him into the adjoining room. "I shall never forget," Dana later recalled, "the fire of indignation at what seemed to him to be mere nonsense." Stanton found it incomprehensible that "when the safety of the Republic was thus at issue, when the control of an empire was to be determined by a few figures brought in by the telegraph, the leader, the man most deeply concerned, not merely for himself but for his country, could turn aside to read such balderdash and to laugh at such frivolous jests." Stanton never would understand the indispensable role that laughter played in sustaining Lincoln's spirits in difficult times.

[Steve]

(03-27-2019 11:49 AM)David Lockmiller Wrote:  

(03-27-2019 01:20 AM)Steve Wrote:  David, I think you're missing the context of the anecdote:

https://books.google.com/books?id=b4UpAA...&q&f=false

Lincoln was making fun of the book's character, Rev. Petroleum V. Nasby.

Steve, I ask you to consider the following two paragraphs from Doris Kearns Goodwin's book Team of Rivals at pages 661-62.

Both Republicans and Democrats considered the state elections in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana on October 11 harbingers of the presidential election in November. Not only would the results reveal public sentiment, but the party that gained the governor's offices in those states would have "a grand central rallying point" for its partisans. That evening, Lincoln made his customary visit to the telegraph office in the War Department to read the dispatches as they came over the wire. Stanton was there, as was his assistant secretary, Charles Dana, and Thomas Eckert, chief of the telegraph office. Early reports from Cincinnati and Philadelphia looked hopeful, but reliable figures were unbearably slow in coming.

To defuse the tension, Dana recalled, Lincoln took from his pocket "a thin yellow-covered pamphlet" containing the latest writings of the humorist Petroleum V. Nasby. "He would read a page or a story, pause to consider a new election telegram, and then open the book again and go ahead with a new passage." John Hay, who had accompanied Lincoln, found the selections "immensely amusing" and mistakenly thought Stanton felt the same way. During a break in the readings, however, the solemn war secretary signaled Dana to follow him into the adjoining room. "I shall never forget," Dana later recalled, "the fire of indignation at what seemed to him to be mere nonsense." Stanton found it incomprehensible that "when the safety of the Republic was thus at issue, when the control of an empire was to be determined by a few figures brought in by the telegraph, the leader, the man most deeply concerned, not merely for himself but for his country, could turn aside to read such balderdash and to laugh at such frivolous jests." Stanton never would understand the indispensable role that laughter played in sustaining Lincoln's spirits in difficult times.

That's my point.

[David Lockmiller]

(03-26-2019 07:21 PM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  Thank you, Gene, that was it.

I believe that before you made your edit that you mentioned that Lincoln had for a long time sought in vain to learn who was the author of his favorite poem.

I remembered a specific request that he had made to his visitors after "a season of literary recreation."

Mr. Lincoln turned to Mr. McDonough, who seemed lost in contemplation of the grave and dignified man who, despite the cares of his great office, was so easy in social intercourse, and said, “I am very glad to meet you, Mr. McDonough, and am grateful to Kelley for bringing you in so early, for I want you to tell me something about Shakespeare’s plays as they are constructed for the stage. You can imagine that I do not get much time to study such matters, but I recently had a couple of talks with Hackett—Baron Hackett, as they call him—who is famous as Jack Falstaff, but from whom I elicited few satisfactory replies, though I probed him with a good many questions.”

Mr. McDonough avowed his willingness to give the President any information in his possession, but protested that he feared he would not succeed where his friend Hackett had failed. “Well, I don’t know,” said the President, “for Hackett’s lack of information impressed me with a doubt as to whether he had ever studied Shakespeare’s text, or had not been content with the acting edition of his plays.” He arose, went to a shelf not far from his table, and having taken down a well-thumbed volume of the Plays of Shakespeare, resumed his seat, arranged his glasses, and having turned to Henry VI. and read with fine discrimination an extended passage, said, “Mr. McDonough, can you tell me why those lines are omitted from the acting play? There is nothing I have read in Shakespeare, certainly nothing in Henry VI., or the Merry Wives of Windsor, that surpasses its wit and humor.” The actor suggested the breadth of its humor as the only reason he could assign for its omission, but thoughtfully added that it was possible that if the lines were spoken they would require the rendition of another or other passages which might be objectionable.

“Your last suggestion,” said Mr. Lincoln, “carries with it greater weight than anything Mr. Hackett suggested, but the first is no reason at all;” and after reading another passage, he said, “This is not withheld, and where it passes current there can be no reason for withholding the other.” But, as if feeling the impropriety of preferring the player to the parson, he turned to the chaplain and said: “From your calling it is probable you do not know that the acting plays which people crowd to hear are not always those planned by their reputed authors. Thus, take the stage edition of Richard III. It opens with a passage from Henry VI., after which come portions of Richard III., then another scene from Henry VI., and the finest soliloquy in the play, if we may judge from the many quotations it furnishes, and the frequency with which it is heard in amateur exhibitions, was never seen by Shakespeare, but was written, was it not, Mr. McDonough, after his death, by Colley Cibber?”

-- Remininscences of Abraham Lincoln by Distinguished Men of His Time, Chapter XIV (William D. Kelley), Section III, pages 265-67. (Previously posted by me on a different thread.)

It was now past eleven o'clock. We had been with him more than four hours, and when I expressed regret for the thoughtlessness which had detained him for so long, he responded: "Kelley, I assure your friends that in bringing them here this evening you have given me the benefit of a long holiday. I have not enjoyed such a season of literary recreation since I entered the White House, and I feel that a long and pleasant interval has passed since I closed my routine work this afternoon. Before you go I want to make a request of each of you, and exact a promise that you will grant it if it shall ever happen that you can do so. The little poem I just now brought to your notice is truly anonymous. Its author has been greatly my benefactor, and I would be glad to name him when I speak of his poem; and the request I make of you is, that should you ever learn his name and anything of his story you will send it to me, that I may treasure it as a memorial of a dear friend."

-- Remininscences of Abraham Lincoln by Distinguished Men of His Time, Chapter XIV (William D. Kelley), Section III, page 270.

[Mylye2222]

Add also Voltaire's philosophy.

[Rogerm]

I think that Voltaire's philosophy would have been a bit too cynical for Lincoln.

[LincolnMan]

(02-13-2020 09:16 AM)Rogerm Wrote:  I think that Voltaire's philosophy would have been a bit too cynical for Lincoln.

Voltaire and Lincoln: Sounds like a good thesis for a degree.
As far as religious belief- I understand Voltaire was an atheist. Some contend Lincoln was also. This has been examined quite a bit on this Forum- as to whether or not Lincoln was an atheist, deist, or even a Christian (at least later in his life).
Both accorded human reason high on their personal values list.

[Mylye2222]

(03-28-2019 02:59 PM)Steve Wrote:  

(03-27-2019 11:49 AM)David Lockmiller Wrote:  

(03-27-2019 01:20 AM)Steve Wrote:  David, I think you're missing the context of the anecdote:

https://books.google.com/books?id=b4UpAA...&q&f=false

Lincoln was making fun of the book's character, Rev. Petroleum V. Nasby.

Steve, I ask you to consider the following two paragraphs from Doris Kearns Goodwin's book Team of Rivals at pages 661-62.

Both Republicans and Democrats considered the state elections in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana on October 11 harbingers of the presidential election in November. Not only would the results reveal public sentiment, but the party that gained the governor's offices in those states would have "a grand central rallying point" for its partisans. That evening, Lincoln made his customary visit to the telegraph office in the War Department to read the dispatches as they came over the wire. Stanton was there, as was his assistant secretary, Charles Dana, and Thomas Eckert, chief of the telegraph office. Early reports from Cincinnati and Philadelphia looked hopeful, but reliable figures were unbearably slow in coming.

To defuse the tension, Dana recalled, Lincoln took from his pocket "a thin yellow-covered pamphlet" containing the latest writings of the humorist Petroleum V. Nasby. "He would read a page or a story, pause to consider a new election telegram, and then open the book again and go ahead with a new passage." John Hay, who had accompanied Lincoln, found the selections "immensely amusing" and mistakenly thought Stanton felt the same way. During a break in the readings, however, the solemn war secretary signaled Dana to follow him into the adjoining room. "I shall never forget," Dana later recalled, "the fire of indignation at what seemed to him to be mere nonsense." Stanton found it incomprehensible that "when the safety of the Republic was thus at issue, when the control of an empire was to be determined by a few figures brought in by the telegraph, the leader, the man most deeply concerned, not merely for himself but for his country, could turn aside to read such balderdash and to laugh at such frivolous jests." Stanton never would understand the indispensable role that laughter played in sustaining Lincoln's spirits in difficult times.

That's my point.

Lincoln needed to laugh, he said, otherwise his heart would break. It was a defense mechanism.