Sympathy was
the strongest element in his nature. One of his biographers, who knew
him before he became President, says: "Lincoln's compassion might be
stirred deeply by an object present, but never by an object absent and
unseen. In the former case he would most likely extend relief, with
little inquiry into the merits of the case, because, as he expressed it
himself, it `took a pain out of his own heart.'" Only half of this is
correct. It is certainly true that he could not witness any individual
distress or oppression, or any kind of suffering, without feeling a pang
of pain himself, and that by relieving as much as he could the suffering
of others he put an end to his own. This compassionate impulse to help
he felt not only for human beings, but for every living creature. As in
his boyhood he angrily reproved the boys who tormented a wood turtle by
putting a burning coal on its back, so, we are told, he would, when a
mature man, on a journey, dismount from his buggy and wade waist-deep in
mire to rescue a pig struggling in a swamp. Indeed, appeals to his
compassion were so irresistible to him, and he felt it so difficult to
refuse anything when his refusal could give pain, that he himself
sometimes spoke of his inability to say "no" as a positive weakness.
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