His position and opinions, he said, had already been declared
in his speeches with all the clearness he could give to them, and the
people had appeared to understand and approve them. He could not improve
and did not desire to change these utterances. Occasionally he privately
expressed his dislike to the conceding and compromising temper which
threatened to undo, for an indefinite future, all which the long and
weary struggle of anti-slavery men had accomplished. In this line he
wrote a letter of protest to Greeley, which inspired that gentleman to a
singular expression of sympathy; let the Union go to pieces, exclaimed
the emotional editor, let presidents be assassinated, let the Republican
party suffer crushing defeat, but let there not be "another nasty
compromise." To Mr. Kellogg, the Illinoisian on the House Committee of
Thirty-three, Lincoln wrote: "Entertain no proposition for a compromise
in regard to the extension of slavery. The instant you do, they have us
under again; all our labor is lost, and sooner or later must be done
over again." He repeated almost the same words to E.B. Washburne, a
member of the House. Duff Green tried hard to get something out of him
for the comfort of Mr. Buchanan, but failed to extort more than
commonplace generalities. To Seward he wrote that he did not wish to
interfere with the present status, or to meddle with slavery as it now
lawfully existed.
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