What "With malice toward none; with charity for all" Means

Many visitors come to this blog trying to find out what Lincoln meant by "with malice toward none; with charity for all", probably for a school assignment. Instead they find filthy duck jokes, pedestrian baseball observations and lame reviews. So in an attempt to do one decent thing, here are my thoughts on what Lincoln meant by "with malice toward none; with charity for all".

"With malice toward none; with charity for all" comes near the end of Lincoln's second inaugural address where he was preparing the nation for peace and reconstruction of the war ravaged Confederate states. The country had just endured four years of war where over 600,000 Americans had been killed and countless others crippled for life. The phrase "with malice toward none" reminds people that the war will soon be over and to look upon their fellow man with forgiveness and love, not malice or hate. The phrase "with charity for all" means that we are to love our fellow man so "that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away." Lincoln agonized over the nation's injuries as well as profound personal loss during the previous four years and thought that the war was God's judgement for the evils of slavery:

Fondly do we hope—fervently do we pray—that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bond-men’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn by the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord, are true and righteous altogether.”

To Lincoln the antidote to slavery is emancipation, the antidote to war is peace and the antidote to malice is charity for all.