Success Quote by Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln is doing something more politically radical than offering comfort: he is severing moral action from guaranteed success. In a democracy obsessed with outcomes, “probability” is the language of caution, of committees and careerists. He borrows it deliberately, then refuses to be governed by it. The line works because it treats fear of failure as a respectable impulse, then quietly demotes it. “Ought not to deter” is courtroom phrasing, a controlled rebuke that sounds reasonable even as it demands courage.

The subtext is aimed at wavering allies. Lincoln isn’t speaking to the already-convinced; he’s addressing the person who privately agrees, publicly hedges, and waits for history to make the first move. By framing the conflict as “the struggle,” he concedes difficulty without conceding defeat. “Support” is equally strategic: it’s broader than heroics. It includes voting, organizing, funding, speaking up - the everyday scaffolding of a movement. He makes participation feel like a duty, not a gamble.

Context matters because Lincoln’s political life unfolded amid moral crisis and uncertain odds: slavery, disunion, and war were not causes with tidy win conditions. This sentence is the anti-alibi for times when “realism” becomes an excuse for inertia. Justice, he implies, is not a bet you place when the odds improve; it’s a position you take that changes the odds.