Page:Abraham Lincoln -- his life.djvu/41

 The cares that fell upon his shoulders would have overcome any but the strongest of wills. Newspaper censure, dissension in the army, the building of the Merrimac and its victories over the Union vessels, all combined to create a spirit of panic. Then the Monitor was built and its glorious fight became one of the bright spots in the history of that awful war.

On July 22, 1862, Lincoln presented his Emancipation Proclamation to the senate, and on January 1, 1863, it was returned to him for signature. This document, one of the most wonderful of its kind, was to free all slaves. It was one of the greatest factors in the advance of modern civilization.