Question

As expressed by Lincoln, what are two central ideas in this sentence from this paragraph? “If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him?”

Answer 1

Two main ideas in this sentence of the paragraph are:

1. Slavery, which was a social and economic system based on the use of slaves as labor and its entire process through history. It was precisely President Abraham Lincoln who succeeded in abolishing slavery through the Proclamation of Emancipation.

2. The terrible war referred to is the Civil War that took place in the United States by the northern states and the segregated states of the South, where slavery was the trigger for that incident. By asking the question if any deviation from the divine attributes attributed to God could be discerned, Lincoln on more than one occasion could show himself as a man of faith and a believer in God, for which he mentioned it in many of his famous speeches and phrases.

Answer 2

D) Slavery is an inevitability continued or discontinued at God’s will, and God’s power must be honored even when punishment causes suffering.