Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, of a deliverance from Egypt, of the covenant of Sinai, of mighty acts of God. Even their private visions were dated, as “in the year that King Uzziah died,” even the moral law was anchored to an historical event, and even God was defined less by his metaphysical and moral character than by his historical relations, as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Interpretation of our meaning with the aid of a story is a well-known pedagogical device. So Lincoln told his homely