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Diversity of thought.. Abraham Lincoln: Abraham Lincoln loved to read the Bible, but he was never a Christian or a Unitarian. In his younger days he was described by friends and associates as either an infidel or an atheist, but as he grew older his views moderated, and he came to believe in a providential God. However, even in his later years, he almost never made reference to Jesus or Christ, and never in such a way as to indicate a belief in the divinity of Jesus. Quotes "My earlier views of the unsoundness of the Christian scheme of salvation and the human origin of the scriptures have become clearer and stronger with advancing years and I see no reason for thinking I shall ever change them" -- Letter from Lincoln to Judge John A. Wakefield, a Kansas abolitionist. The famous words of a government, "of the people, by the people, and for the people" were taken by Lincoln from a sermon by the great abolitionist Unitarian minister Theodore Parker. President Lincoln kept a set of his pubished sermons by his bedside. "My husband is not a Christian but is a religious man, I think." -- Lincoln's wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, in "Toward The Mystery". "It will not do to investigate the subject of religion too closely, as it is apt to lead to infidelity." -- Abraham Lincoln, from "What Great Men Think Of Religion" by Ira Cardiff "The Bible is not my Book and Christianity is not my religion. I could never give assent to the long complicated statements of Christian dogma." -- Abraham Lincoln "Mr. Bateman, I am not a Christian -God knows I would be one -but I have carefully read the Bible, and I do not understand this book" -- Abraham Lincoln, quoted by Newton Bateman, Superintendent of Public Instruction for the State of Illinois, from "The Religious Beliefs of Our Presidents, From Washington to F.D.R.", by Franklin Stiner