For me, Lincoln is like just a handful of people - a Gandhi, or a Picasso, or a Martin Luther King Jr. - who is an original and captures something essential.
Canst thou, O partial sleep, give thy repose to the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude, and in the calmest and most stillest night, with all appliances and means to boot, deny it to a king?
A king may be a tool, a thing of straw; but if he serves to frighten our enemies, and secure our property, it is well enough; a scarecrow is a thing of straw, but it protects the corn.
This blessèd plot, this earth, this realm, this England
This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings,
. . .
This land of such dear souls, this dear dear land.
I knew I had him in the first round. Almighty God was with me. I want everyone to bear witness, I am the greatest! I'm the greatest thing that ever lived. I don't have a mark on my face, and I upset Sonny Liston, and I just turned twenty-two years old. I must be the greatest. I showed the world. I talk to God everyday. I know the real God. I shook up the world, I'm the king of the world. You must listen to me. I am the greatest! I can't be beat!
This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle, This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, This other Eden, demi-paradise, This fortress built by Nature for herself Against infection and the hand of war, This happy breed of men, this little world, This precious stone set in the silver sea, Which serves it in the office of a wall Or as a moat defensive to a house, Against the envy of less happier lands,--This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.
I'm the king of the world, I am the greatest, I'm Muhammed Ali, I shook up the world, I am the greatest, I'm king of the world, I'm pretty, I'm pretty, I'm a baaaad man, you heard me I'm a baaad man, Archie Moore fell in four, Liston wanted me more, so since he's so great, I'm a make him fall in eight, I'm a baaad man, I'm king of the world! I'm 22 years old and ain't gotta mark on my face, I'm pretty, I easily survived six rounds with that ugly bear, because I am the greatest.
When the heart is hard and parched up, come upon me with a shower of mercy. When grace is lost from life, come with a burst of song. When tumultuous work raises its din on all sides shutting me out from beyond, come to me, my lord of silence, with thy peace and rest. When my beggarly heart sits crouched, shut up in a corner, break open the door, my king, and come with the ceremony of a king. When desire blinds the mind with delusion and dust, O thou holy one, thou wakeful, come with thy light and thy thunder.
History, that is to say, the unconscious, universal life of humanity, in the aggregate, every moment profits by the life of kings for itself, as an instrument for the accomplishment of its own ends.
Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs; Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth.... [W]hat can we bequeath, Save our deposed bodies to the ground?... [N]othing can we call our own, but death... [L]et us sit upon the ground, And tell sad stories of the death of kings: - How some have been depos'd, some slain in war; Some haunted by the ghosts they have depos'd.
First Moloch, horrid king, besmirched in blood, Of Human sacrifice, and parent's tears, Though, for the noise of drums and timbrels loud, Their childrens' cries unheard, that passed through fire, To his grim idol.