Page:Life of Abraham Lincoln - Bowers - 1922.djvu/20

 18 vented, his congressional ambitions had to be postponed. Also there were other candidates. He stood aside for Hardin and for Baker. In 1844 he was on the Whig electoral ticket and stumped the state for Henry Clay whom he greatly admired.

Finally in 1846 the Whigs nominated him for Congress. The Democrats nominated the pioneer Methodist preacher, Peter Cartwright, who used the Washington's birthday address against Lincoln and even the charge of atheism, which had no worthy foundation, for Lincoln was profoundly religious, though he never united with any church. He said that whenever any church would inscribe over its altar as the only condition for membership the words of Jesus: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy strength, and thy neighbor as thyself;" he would join that church. Lincoln's life proved his sincerity in this statement.

Lincoln made a thorough campaign, watching most carefully all the many interests which can contribute to the success of a candidate, and was elected by an unusual majority. Moreover, he was the only Whig who secured a place in the Illinois delegation that year.

In 1847, when he took his seat in the thirtieth Congress, he saw there the last of the giants of the old days,—Webster, Calhoun, Clay and old John Quincy Adams, dying in his seat before the session ended. There were also Andrew Johnson, Alexander H. Stephens and David Wilmot. Douglas was there to take his new