since his arrival in Illinois, he gave special attention to the speech of mine delivered on the sixteenth of June.  He says that he carefully read that speech.  He told us that at Chicago a week ago last night, and he repeated it at Bloomington last night....  He says it was evidently prepared with great care.  I freely admit it was prepared with care....  But I was very careful not to put anything in that speech as a matter of fact, or make any inferences which did not appear to me to be true and fully warrantable.  If I had made any mistake I was willing to be corrected; if I had drawn any inference in regard to Judge Douglas or any one else, which was not warranted, I was fully prepared to modify it as soon as discovered.  I planted myself upon the truth and the truth only, so far as I knew it, or could be brought to know it.

Having made that speech with the most kindly feelings toward Judge Douglas, as manifested therein, I was gratified when I found that he had carefully examined it, and had detected no error of fact, nor any inference against him, nor any misrepresentations, of which he thought fit to complain....  He seizes upon the doctrines he supposes to be included in that speech, and declares that upon them will turn the issues of the campaign.  He then quotes, or attempts to quote, from my speech.  I will not say that he wilfully misquotes, but he does fail to quote accurately.  His attempt at quoting is from a passage which I believe I can quote accurately from memory.  I shall make the quotation now, with some comments upon it, as I have already said, in order that the Judge shall be left entirely without excuse for misrepresenting me.  I do so now, as I hope, for the last time.  I do this in great caution, in order that if he repeats his misrepresentation, it shall be plain to all that he does so wilfully.  If, after all, he still persists, I shall be compelled to reconstruct the course I have marked out for myself, and draw upon such humble resources as I have for a new course, better suited to the real exigencies of the case.  I set out in this campaign with the intention of conducting it strictly as a gentleman, in substance at least, if not in the outside polish.  The latter I shall never be, but that which constitutes the inside of a gentleman I hope I understand, and am not less inclined to practise than others.  It was my purpose and expectation that this canvass would be conducted upon principle, and with fairness on both sides, and it shall not be my fault if this purpose and expectation shall be given up.

He charges, in substance, that I invite a war of sections; that I propose all local institutions of the different States shall become consolidated and uniform.  What is there in the language of that speech which expresses such purpose or bears such construction?  I have again and again said that I would not enter into any one of the States to disturb the institution of slavery.  Judge Douglas said at Bloomington that I used language most able and ingenious for concealing what I really meant; and that while I had protested against entering into the slave States, I nevertheless did mean to go on the banks of the Ohio and throw missiles into Kentucky, to disturb them in their domestic institutions.