دانلود کتاب رهبری در دوران پرتلاطم

Lincoln was only twenty-three years old on March 9, 1832, when he declared his intention to run for a seat in the Illinois state legislature. The frontier state had not yet developed party machinery to o􀐓cially nominate candidates. Persons desiring to run simply put forward their own names on a handbill expressing their views on local a􀐐airs. “Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition,” Lincoln began. “I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem. How far I shall succeed in gratifying this ambition is yet to be developed. I am young and unknown to many of you.” For many ambitious young men in the nineteenth century, politics proved the chosen arena for advancement. While Lincoln’s ambition was as central to his makeup as his backbone, it was, almost from the start, two-fold. It was not simply for himself; it was for the people he hoped to lead. He wanted to distinguish himself in their eyes. The sense of community was central to the master dream of his life—the desire to accomplish deeds that would gain the lasting respect of his fellow men. He asked for the opportunity to render himself worthy: “I was born and have ever remained in the most humble walks of life. I have no wealthy or popular relations to recommend me. If the good people in their wisdom shall see 􀐙t to keep me in the background, I have been too familiar with disappointments to be very much chagrined.” Where did this ambition come from, his “strong conviction,” as one friend described it, “that he was born for better things than seemed likely or even possible”? When asked later to shed light on his beginnings, Lincoln claimed his story could be “condensed into a single sentence: The short and simple annals of the poor.” His father, Thomas, had never learned to read, and, according to his son, never did “more in the way of writing than to bunglingly sign his own name.” Trapped in an exitless poverty, Thomas cleared only su􀐓cient land for survival and moved from one dirt farm to another in Kentucky, Indiana, and Illinois. While traces of the life of Lincoln’s mother, Nancy Hanks, are sketchy, those who knew her agreed “she was superior to her husband in Every way.” She was described as “keen—shrewd—smart,” endowed with a strong memory and quick perception. “All that I am or hope ever to be I get from my mother,” Lincoln later said.