Abraham Lincoln the Practical Mystic

Publisher Marketing: The side of Lincoln you did not know. This book was written almost 100 years ago. A classic on its own. NOAH BROOKS, in his Life of Lincoln, gives the following account of a vision which the President described to him: - It was just after my nomination in 1860 when the news was coming thick and fast all day, and there had been a great Hurrah Boys, so that I was well tired out, and went home to rest and threw myself on a lounge in my chamber. Opposite where I lay was a bureau with a swinging glass, and looking in the glass I saw myself reflected, nearly at full length, but my face, I noticed, had two separate and distinct images, the tip of the nose of one being about three inches from the tip of the other. I was a little bothered, perhaps startled, and got up and looked in the glass, but the illusion vanished. On lying down again I saw it a second time, plainer, if possible, than before. Then I noticed that one of the faces was a little paler, say five shades, than the other. I got up and the thing melted away. I left, and in the excitement of the hour forgot all about it, nearly but not quite, for the thing would once in a while come up and give me a little pang, as though something uncomfortable had happened. Later in the day I told my wife about it, and a few days later I tried the experiment again, when, sure enough, the thing came again. My wife thought that it was a sign that I was to be elected to a second term of office and that the paleness of one of the faces was an omen that I should not live through the last term. Not long after his second inauguration he said to a friend in Washington: - I have seen this evening what I saw on the evening of my nomination. As I stood before a mirror I saw two images of myself - a bright one in front and one that was pallid, standing behind. It completely unnerved me. The bright one I know is my past, the pale one my coming life. I do not think I shall live to see the end of my second term. In his biography, Morgan relates a dream which Lincoln had. He thought he was in Images and Dreams a vast assembly, and the people drew back to let him pass. Just then Lincoln heard someone say: He is a common-looking fellow. Lincoln, in his dream, turned to the man and said: Friend, the Lord prefers common looking people; that is the reason He makes so many of them. Shortly before Lincoln's assassination some friends were talking about certain dreams recorded in the Bible when the President said: About two days ago I retired very late. I could not have been long in bed when I fell into a slumber, for I was weary. I soon began to dream. There seemed to be a deathlike stillness about me. Then I heard subdued sobs, as if a number of people were weeping. I thought I left my bed and wandered downstairs. There the silence was broken by the same pitiful sobbing, but the mourners were invisible. I went from room to room; no living person was in sight, but the same mournful sounds of distress met me as I passed along. It was light in all the rooms; every object was familiar to me, but where were all the people who were grieving as if their hearts would break? I was puzzled and alarmed. What could be the meaning of all this? Determined to find the cause of a state of things so mysterious and so shocking, I kept on until I arrived at the East Room, which I entered. Before me was a catafalque on which was a form wrapped in funeral vestments. Around it were stationed soldiers who were acting as guards; there was a throng of people, some gazing mournfully upon the catafalque; others weeping pitifully. 'Who is dead in the White House?' I demanded of one of the soldiers. 'The President, ' was the answer. 'He was killed by an assassin.' Then came a loud burst of grief from the crowd, which woke me from my dream.