Walter Berns — always thoughtful, eloquent, and worth the read — reflects in today’s Wall Street Journal on why Lincoln is our greatest public hero. He reminds us that history was not always (or even mostly) moving in Lincoln’s direction at the time he led the country, and that, time and again, Lincoln stood alone.

Near the end of the piece, Berns deconstructs the Gettysburg Address, concluding, “[W]e remember everything he said. And we remember it because he took great pains to say it beautifully.”