[Pg 129]
How Lamon, being a friend of Lincoln, could ever have written such a book has been the subject of much conjecture5. Herndon believed that during the latter part of his life in Washington Lamon had become embittered6 against Lincoln. Lamon's daughter in a magazine article on the subject professed7 her father's abiding8 friendship for Lincoln, but maintained that he was endeavoring to tell the true story of a great life and to recover the real Lincoln from the realm of myth (Dorothy Lamon Teillard: "Lincoln in Myth and in Fact," World's Work, February, 1911, pp. 14040-44).
The basis of Lamon's book is the Herndon manuscripts, copies of which Herndon sold to Lamon for $2,000 in 1870. That Herndon bitterly regretted the necessity of this sale, there is clear evidence; but he had come to a condition of great poverty; and there were other reasons why it seemed unlikely that he himself would ever write a Life of Lincoln. That Lamon himself wrote the book without assistance was disputed from the beginning, and Herndon was accused of being its real author. In letters to Horace White in 1890, Herndon told the truth, as is now believed, concerning the authorship.
"You regret, as well as myself, that I sold my MSS. to Lamon. The reason why I did so was that I was then, in 1870-72, a poor devil and had to sell to live. From 1853 to 1865 I spent all my time and money for the 'nigger,' or rather for Liberty and the union—lost my practice, went to farming, and went under in the crash of 1871-73, and that, too, from no speculations9, vices10, etc. Today I have to work for tomorrow's bread, and yet I am a happy and contented11 man. I own a little farm of sixty-five acres and raise fruits for a living. Now you have the reasons for my acts.
"In reference to Lamon's book, I can truthfully say that Chauncey F. Black,[34] son of J. S. Black, wrote quite every word of it.... I have for years been written to by various persons to know why Lamon was so much prejudiced against[Pg 130] Lincoln. The bitterness, if any, was not in Lamon so much as in Black, though I am convinced that Lamon was no solid, firm friend of Lincoln, especially during Lincoln's administration, or the latter part of it."—Newton: Lincoln and Herndon, pp. 307-8.
Herndon stoutly13 denied having written a single line of Lamon's book, but he furnished the greater part of the material in the form of documents, and gave further aid by letters and suggestions. Thirteen years after it was published he wrote to Lamon, who was still hoping to issue a new biography which would include the volume already issued and a second volume, and said:
"I desire to see your new Life win. Your first Life is nearly suppressed—is suppressed or will be by rings—bears, and like. Lamon's first Life of Lincoln is the truest Life that was ever written of a man, as I think. I do not agree to all it says, and yet it is the most truthful12 Life of Lincoln written, or to be written probably, except your second Life. . . . Why, Lamon, if you and I had not told the exact truth about Lincoln, he would have been a myth in a hundred years after 1865. We knew him—loved him—had ideas and had the courage of our convictions. We told the world what Lincoln was and were terribly abused for it."—(World's Work, February, 1911, p. 14044).
One of the chief things which Lamon set out to do was to refute Holland's estimate of Lincoln's faith, particularly as it appeared in Holland's account of the Bateman story. Lamon held that any impression which people got that Lincoln possessed14 substantial Christian15 faith, was due to the fact that Lincoln was a wily politician, who saw the power and appreciated the prejudices of the churches and was determined16 not to suffer from their hostility17. He not only grew more cautious as he grew older, but actually dissembled. His religious references were made as vague and general as possible, and he permitted himself to be misunderstood and misrepresented by ministers and others because of "his morbid18 ambition, coupled with a mortal fear that his popularity would suffer[Pg 131] by an open avowal19 of his deistic convictions" (Lamon, Life of Lincoln, p. 498).
His estimate of Lincoln is that "On the whole, he was an honest, although a shrewd, and by no means unselfish politician." He attributes Lincoln's melancholy20 definitely to his utter lack of faith.
"It is very probable that much of Mr. Lincoln's unhappiness, the melancholy that 'dripped from him as he walked,' was due to his want of religious faith. When the black fit was on him, he suffered as much mental misery21 as Bunyan or Cowper in the deepest anguish22 of their conflicts with the Evil One. But the unfortunate conviction fastened upon him by his early associations, that there was no truth in the Bible, made all consolation23 impossible, and penitence24 useless. To a man of his temperament25, predisposed as it was to depression of spirit, there could be no chance of happiness if doomed26 to live without hope and without God in the world. He might force himself to be merry with his chosen comrades; he might 'banish27 sadness' in mirthful conversation, or find relief in a jest; gratified ambition might elevate his feelings, and give him ease for a time: but solid comfort and permanent peace could come to him only 'through a correspondence fixed28 with heaven.' The fatal misfortune of his life, looking at it only as it affected29 him in this world, was the influence at New Salem and at Springfield which enlisted30 him on the side of unbelief. He paid the bitter penalty in a life of misery."—Lamon, Life of Lincoln, p. 504.
In support of this thesis, Lamon, aided and abetted31 by Herndon, sought for testimonials from those who had known Lincoln, endeavoring to prove that he had no religious faith. Herndon himself wrote a letter which we shall quote later because of its bearing upon a particular point which we have yet to discuss, and gave the names of Judge Logan, John T. Stuart, Joshua F. Speed, and James H. Matheny as those who would confirm his declaration that Lincoln was an infidel. Herndon's own definition of the term infidel is susceptible32 of such varying definitions in his different letters and published articles that it is not always easy to tell just what he meant[Pg 132] by it, but in some of these he was specific and told, from his own alleged knowledge or his memory of the testimony33 of others, what Lincoln believed and denied. Judge Logan appears not to have contributed to the discussion, but from several of the others and from some other men whose letters Herndon already had, Lamon made up a considerable volume of testimony concerning the unbelief of Lincoln. Some of these we quote, reserving others for later consideration.
Hon. John T. Stuart was alleged to have said:
"I knew Mr. Lincoln when he first came here, and for years afterwards. He was an avowed34 and open infidel, sometimes bordered on atheism35. I have often and often heard Lincoln and one W. D. Herndon, who was a free-thinker, talk over this subject. Lincoln went further against Christian beliefs and doctrines36 and principles than any man I ever heard: he shocked me. I don't remember the exact line of his argument: suppose it was against the inherent defects, so called, of the Bible, and on grounds of reason. Lincoln always denied that Jesus was the Christ of God,—denied that Jesus was the Son of God, as understood and maintained by the Christian Church. The Rev37. Dr. Smith, who wrote a letter, tried to convert Lincoln from infidelity so late as 1858, and couldn't do it."—Lamon, Life of Lincoln, p. 488.
It later developed that these quotations38 which appeared in Lamon's book in the form of letters to Herndon were in some instances, if not in all, Herndon's own reports of conversations with these friends of Lincoln, and not, in any case, signed letters. Several of the putative39 authors repudiated40 the statements attributed to them.
Dr. C. H. Ray was quoted as saying:
"I do not know how I can aid you. You [Herndon] knew Mr. Lincoln far better than I did, though I knew him well; and you have served up his leading characteristics in a way that I should despair of doing, if I should try. I have only one thing to ask: that you do not give Calvinistic theology[Pg 133] a chance to claim him as one of its saints and martyrs41. He went to the Old-School Church; but, in spite of that outward assent42 to the horrible dogmas of the sect43, I have reason from himself to know that his 'vital purity,' if that means belief in the impossible, was of a negative sort."—Lamon, Life of Lincoln, pp. 489-90.
Hon. David Davis was quoted as saying:
"I do not know anything about Lincoln's religion, and do not think anybody knew. The idea that Lincoln talked to a stranger about his religion or religious views, or made such speeches, remarks, etc., about it as are published, is to me absurd. I knew the man so well: he was the most reticent44, secretive man I ever saw, or expect to see. He had no faith, in the Christian sense of the term,—had faith in laws, principles, causes, and effects—philosophically: you [Herndon] know more about his religion than any man. You ought to know it, of course."—Lamon, Life of Lincoln, p. 489.
Lamon also printed a letter from James H. Matheny, who had been Lincoln's "best man" at his wedding, and a long-time and intimate friend. It would be included in this chapter, as it is to be referred to in the next, but it is reserved for a more important use in the chapter on "Lincoln's Burnt Book."
Lamon's Life of Lincoln lashed45 into greater fury the tempest that already raged concerning Lincoln's religious faith. Nor was this the only criticism upon it. It was the first of the Lives of Lincoln to which the later term of "muckraking" might have been applied46, and its spirit of hostility is best accounted for by the fact that its real author was not Lamon but Black, who not only entertained all the local prejudice which one element in Springfield had against Lincoln, but represented also a bitter political hostility, Black's father having been a member of Buchanan's Cabinet. Indeed there is alleged to have been a three-cornered and acrimonious47 dispute among the publishers, Lamon, and Black concerning an omitted chapter on Buchanan's administration which had something to do with one aspect of the book's financial failure.[Pg 134] Black and Lamon and the publishers all lost money and the book was a financial disaster.
Notwithstanding its tone of astonishing bitterness against Lincoln, its shocking bad taste and its perverted48 viewpoint, Lamon's biography is a valuable source of information. Concerning it John Hay wrote to Lamon, "Nothing heretofore printed can compare with it in interest, and from the nature of the case all subsequent writers will have to come to you for a large class of facts."
In 1895 Lamon's daughter Dorothy, subsequently Mrs. Teillard, published a book of "Recollections" of Lincoln by her father, with no objectionable matter, and with a considerable number of valuable incidents. But this later book, while avoiding the occasions of criticism which the first book evoked49, added little to the character study which the first volume, with all its manifold defects, had contained.
Lamon was a very different man from Lincoln—so different that men who knew them both wondered at Lincoln's fondness for him. And he knew Lincoln intimately. But he was not capable of interpreting the best that was in Lincoln.
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1
ward
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| n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开 | |
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slated
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| 用石板瓦盖( slate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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assassination
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| n.暗杀；暗杀事件 | |
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alleged
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| a.被指控的，嫌疑的 | |
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conjecture
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| n./v.推测，猜测 | |
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embittered
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| v.使怨恨，激怒( embitter的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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professed
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| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
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abiding
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| adj.永久的，持久的，不变的 | |
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speculations
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| n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断 | |
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vices
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| 缺陷( vice的名词复数 )； 恶习； 不道德行为； 台钳 | |
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contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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truthful
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| adj.真实的，说实话的，诚实的 | |
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stoutly
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| adv.牢固地，粗壮的 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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hostility
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| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
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morbid
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| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
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avowal
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| n.公开宣称，坦白承认 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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consolation
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| n.安慰，慰问 | |
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penitence
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| n.忏悔，赎罪；悔过 | |
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temperament
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| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
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doomed
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| 命定的 | |
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banish
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| vt.放逐，驱逐；消除，排除 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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enlisted
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| adj.应募入伍的v.（使）入伍， （使）参军( enlist的过去式和过去分词 )；获得（帮助或支持） | |
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abetted
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| v.教唆（犯罪）( abet的过去式和过去分词 )；煽动；怂恿；支持 | |
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susceptible
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| adj.过敏的，敏感的；易动感情的，易受感动的 | |
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testimony
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| n.证词；见证，证明 | |
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avowed
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| adj.公开声明的，承认的v.公开声明，承认( avow的过去式和过去分词) | |
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atheism
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| n.无神论，不信神 | |
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doctrines
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| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
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rev
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| v.发动机旋转，加快速度 | |
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quotations
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| n.引用( quotation的名词复数 )；[商业]行情（报告）；（货物或股票的）市价；时价 | |
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putative
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| adj.假定的 | |
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repudiated
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| v.（正式地）否认( repudiate的过去式和过去分词 )；拒绝接受；拒绝与…往来；拒不履行（法律义务） | |
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41
martyrs
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| n.martyr的复数形式；烈士( martyr的名词复数 )；殉道者；殉教者；乞怜者（向人诉苦以博取同情） | |
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42
assent
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| v.批准，认可；n.批准，认可 | |
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sect
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| n.派别，宗教，学派，派系 | |
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reticent
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| adj.沉默寡言的；言不如意的 | |
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45
lashed
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| adj.具睫毛的v.鞭打( lash的过去式和过去分词 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
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46
applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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acrimonious
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| adj.严厉的，辛辣的，刻毒的 | |
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48
perverted
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| adj.不正当的v.滥用( pervert的过去式和过去分词 )；腐蚀；败坏；使堕落 | |
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49
evoked
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| [医]诱发的 | |
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