Repentance before forgiveness is a provision of the Christian system, and on that condition alone will the Republicans grant his forgiveness.
Regarding his debate with Judge S. A. Douglas, in his Springfield address (17 July 1858), published in The Life, Speeches, and Public Services of Abraham Lincoln: Together with a Sketch of the Life of Hannibal Hamlin: Republican candidates for the offices of President and Vice-President of the United States (1860), p. 50
Lincoln was alluding to the words of Jesus in Luke 15:7 http://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Luke%2015%3A7
1850s
“… But listen, there will be more joy in heaven over the tears of a repentant sinner than over the white robes of a hundred just men.”
Source: Les Misérables
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Victor Hugo 308
French poet, novelist, and dramatist 1802–1885Related quotes
“You, mad to expect repentance,
Tear your robe all you want;
I will never repent!”
Diwan, 11–12.
“There are more tears shed over answered prayers than over unanswered ones.”
Attributed to Teresa by Truman Capote in "An Interview with Truman Capote" by Don Lee Keith, in Contempora (October/November 1970), p. 40, as the source of the title of a work in progress which he intended as a novel, to be called Answered Prayers; no earlier publications of such an attribution has yet been located.
Variants:
There are more tears shed over answered prayers than over unanswered prayers.
Attributed in The Last Word: A Treasury of Women's Quotes (1992) by Carolyn Warner
Disputed
“More tears are shed over answered prayers than unanswered ones.”
Disputed
Socrates, p. 107. Ellipsis in original.
Eupalinos ou l'architecte (1921)
Our First Ambassador to China (Biography, 1908)
Savannah Morning News (23 April 1863), As quoted in Our Flag: Origin and Progress of the Flag of the United States of America (1872), by George Henry Preble, Albany: Joel Munsell, pp. 416–417
Only the Good Die Young.
Song lyrics, The Stranger (1977)