From “The Human Condition: A
User’s Manual,” by Arnold Kunst
13 September
How did Lincoln face
criticism? Part Three
So, how DID Lincoln handle criticism? Simple: when it was valid, he bent to it, and when it wasn’t, he steped around it. Here’s another read on how Lincoln handled criticisms: they never amounted to much because his focus was always on the big picture. Some 40 years after Lincoln’s death this was the assessment of of Lincoln by Eliju Root [former Secretary of State, Nobel Peace Prize winner]: Lincoln "won by infinite patience and sagacity. During those terrible years of the Rebellion he was not disturbing himself about what principles he ought to maintain or what end he ought to seek. He was struggling with the weaknesses and perversities of human nature at home. He was smoothing away obstacles and converting enemies and strengthening friends, and bending all possible motives and desires and prejudices into the direction of his steady purpose. Many people thought, while he was doing this, that he was trifling, that he was yielding where he ought to have been splendidly courageous and peremptory. He understood as they did not how to bend his material without breaking it; he understood as they did not how many a jest bridged over a difficult situation, and made it possible to avoid a quarrel injurious to the Union cause."
So, how DID Lincoln handle criticism? Simple: when it was valid, he bent to it, and when it wasn’t, he steped around it. Here’s another read on how Lincoln handled criticisms: they never amounted to much because his focus was always on the big picture. Some 40 years after Lincoln’s death this was the assessment of of Lincoln by Eliju Root [former Secretary of State, Nobel Peace Prize winner]: Lincoln "won by infinite patience and sagacity. During those terrible years of the Rebellion he was not disturbing himself about what principles he ought to maintain or what end he ought to seek. He was struggling with the weaknesses and perversities of human nature at home. He was smoothing away obstacles and converting enemies and strengthening friends, and bending all possible motives and desires and prejudices into the direction of his steady purpose. Many people thought, while he was doing this, that he was trifling, that he was yielding where he ought to have been splendidly courageous and peremptory. He understood as they did not how to bend his material without breaking it; he understood as they did not how many a jest bridged over a difficult situation, and made it possible to avoid a quarrel injurious to the Union cause."
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