Withal, Lincoln was rated as a man of integrity.  He had strong convictions and the courage of his convictions.  His generous instincts made him hate slavery, while his antecedents prevented him from loving the negro.  His anti-slavery sentiments were held strongly in check by his sound sense of justice.  He had the temperament of a humanitarian with the intellect of a lawyer.  While not combative by nature, he possessed the characteristic American trait of measuring himself by the attainments of others.  He was solicitous to match himself with other men so as to prove himself at least their peer.  Possessed of a cause that enlisted the service of his heart as well as his head, Lincoln was a strong advocate at the bar and a formidable opponent on the stump.  Douglas bore true witness to Lincoln’s powers when he said, on hearing of his nomination, “I shall have my hands full.  He is the strong man of his party—­full of wit, facts, dates—­and the best stump speaker, with his droll ways and dry jokes, in the West.  He is as honest as he is shrewd; and if I beat him, my victory will be hardly won."[681]

The nomination of Lincoln was so little a matter of surprise to him and his friends, that at the close of the convention he was able to address the delegates in a carefully prepared speech.  Wishing to sound a dominant note for the campaign, he began with these memorable words: 

“If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could better judge what to do and how to do it.  We are now far into the fifth year, since a policy was initiated with the avowed object, and confident promise, of putting an end to slavery agitation.  Under the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only not ceased, but has constantly augmented.  In my opinion, it will not cease, until a crisis shall have been reached and passed.  ’A house divided against itself cannot stand.’  I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free.  I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—­I do not expect the house to fall—­but I do expect it will cease to be divided.  It will become all one thing, or all the other.  Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new—­North as well as South."[682]

All evidence, continued Lincoln, pointed to a design to make slavery national.  The Kansas-Nebraska Act, the popular indorsement of Buchanan, and the Dred Scott decision, were so many parts of a plot.  Only one part was lacking; viz. another decision declaring it unconstitutional for a State to exclude slavery.  Then the fabric would be complete for which Stephen, Franklin, Roger, and James had each wrought his separate piece with artful cunning.  It was impossible not to believe that these Democratic leaders had labored in concert.  To those who had urged that Douglas should be supported, Lincoln had only this to say:  Douglas could not oppose the advance of slavery, for he did not care whether slavery was voted up or down.  His avowed purpose was to make the people care nothing about slavery.  The Republican cause must not be intrusted to its adventitious allies, but to its undoubted friends.