THE STORY OF LINCOLN'S LIFE When Abraham Lincoln once was asked to tell the story of his life, he replied: "It is contained in one line of Gray's 'Elegy in a Country Churchyard': "'The short and simple annals of the poor.'" That was true at the time he said it, as everything else he said was Truth, but he was then only at the beginning of a career that was to glorify him as one of the heroes.