Lincoln has been ranked with Socrates; but he
has also been compared with Rabelais. He has
been the target of abuse that knew no mercy; but
he has been worshiped as a demigod. The ten big
volumes of his official biography are a sustained,
intemperate eulogy in which the hero does no-
thing that is not admirable; but as large a book
could be built up out of contemporaneous North-
ern writings that would paint a picture of unmiti-
gated blackness -- and the most eloquent portions
of it would be signed by Wendell Phillips.

The real Lincoln is, of course, neither the Lin-
coln of the official biography nor the Lincoln of
Wendell Phillips. He was neither a saint nor a
villain. What he actually was is not, however, so
easily stated. Prodigious men are never easy to
sum up; and Lincoln was a prodigious man. The
more one studies him, the more individual he
appears to be. By degrees one comes to under-
stand how it was possible for contemporaries to
hold contradictory views of him and for each to
believe frantically that his views were proved by
facts. For anyone who thinks he can hit off in a
few neat generalities this complex, extraordinary
personality, a single warning may suffice. Walt
Whitman, who was perhaps the most original

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