Let us ask what were the preparation and training Abraham Lincoln had for oratory, whether
political or forensic.
Born in rude and abject poverty, he never had any education, except what he gave himself, till he was approaching manhood. Not even books wherewith to inform. and train his mind were within his reach. No school, no university, no legal faculty had any part in training his powers. When he became a lawyer and a politician, the years most favourable to continuous study had already passed, and the opportunities he found for reading were very scanty. He knew but few authors in general literature, though he knew those few thoroughly. He taught himself a little mathematics, but he could read no language save his own, and can have had only the faintest acquaintance with European history or with any branch of philosophy.
The want of regular education was not made up for by the persons among whom his lot was cast. Till he was a grown man, he never moved in any society from which he could learn those things with which the mind of an orator to be stored. Even after he had gained some legal practice, there was for many years no one for him to mix with except the petty practitioners of a petty town, men nearly all of whom knew little more than he did himself.
Schools gave him nothing, and society gave him nothing. But he had a powerful intellect and a resolute will. Isolation fostered not only self-reliance but the habit of reflection, and indeed, of prolonged and intense reflection. He made all that he knew a part of himself. His convictions were his own—clear and coherent. He was not positive or opinionated and he did not deny that at certain moments he pondered and hesitated long before he decided on his course. But though he could keep a policy in suspense, waiting for events to guide him, he did not waver. He paused and reconsidered, but it was never his way to go back on a decision once more or to waste time in vain regrets that all he had expected had not been attained. He took advice readily and left many things to his ministers; but he did not lean on his advisers. Without vanity or ostentation, he was always independent, self-contained, prepared to take full responsibility for his acts.
It is said in the second paragraph that Abraham Lincoln ______.
A．was illiterate
B．was never educated
C．was educated very late
D．behaved rudely when he was young
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