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Leadership|Reading Time: 2 minutes

Lincoln on Leadership

Fight the Good Fight

The probability that we may fall in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just.

Try Honey Before Vinegar

If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. On the contrary … mark him as one to be shunned and despised, and he will retreat within himself, close all avenues to his head and his heart; and tho’ your cause be naked truth itself, transformed to the heaviest lance, harder than steel, and sharper than steel can be made, and tho’ you throw it with more than Herculean force and precision, you shall no more be able to pierce him than to penetrate the hard shell of a tortoise with a rye straw.

Work Hard, Then Work Harder

The leading rule for the lawyer, as for the man of every other calling, is diligence. Leave nothing for tomorrow which can be done today. Never let your correspondence fall behind. Whatever price of business you have in hand, before stopping, do all the labor pertaining to it which can then be done.

Believe In Yourself

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other one thing.

The Idea of Democracy

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy—Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference is no democracy.

Stay Committed

I would rather be assassinated on this spot than to surrender it.

Know Your Friends

I distrust the wisdom if not the sincerity of friends who would hold my hands while my enemies stab me.

Heal Their Wounds

On the whole, my impression is that mercy bears richer fruits than any other attribute.

Accept Lessons As They Come

In any future great national trial, compared with the men of this, we shall have as weak, and as strong; as silly and as wise; as bad and good. Let us, therefore, study the incidents of this as philosophy to learn wisdom from, and none of them as wrongs to be avenged.

​​(h/t historynet.com)

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