Move over, Gutenberg, Chaucer and Shakespeare. Abraham Lincoln is coming to San Marino.

Preparing for a unprecedented event, the Huntington Library plans to move its greatest hits--including a Gutenberg Bible, the Ellesmere manuscript of Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" and Shakespeare's "First Folio"--out of the main exhibition hall to accommodate a landmark presentation on the life and achievements of the United States' 16th President.

"The Last Best Hope of Earth: Abraham Lincoln and the Promise of America," scheduled for Oct. 12 through Aug. 30, 1994, will comprise about 175 original letters, documents and artifacts along with supplementary material. It will be the largest assembly of original Lincoln material ever mounted and the biggest show ever presented at the Huntington.

Among the rarities to be displayed are Lincoln's handwritten manuscript of the Gettysburg Address, a signed souvenir copy of the Emancipation Proclamation, a flag flown over the White House during the Civil War and a pardon to a soldier, handwritten on a bandage. Personal memorabilia include Lincoln's marriage license, one of his stovepipe hats and a pair of white gloves that he wore to Ford's Theatre on the night he was shot.

The sweeping exhibition draws its title from Lincoln's 1862 annual message to Congress, in which he declared that the Union must be preserved to maintain "the last best hope of Earth" for "man's vast future."

"What we are trying to show is the promise of America, a promise that Lincoln as a self-made man strongly believed in," said Huntington archivist John Rhodehamel, who organized the exhibition with Thomas F. Schwartz, curator of the Lincoln Collection at the Illinois State Historical Library in Springfield. "We want to show that Lincoln believed slavery was a contradiction to the American promise and that the breakup of the Union would end that promise."

Working in consultation with James D. McPherson, professor of history at Princeton University and author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book "Battle Cry of Freedom," the two curators selected objects from the collections of the Huntington, the Illinois State Historical Library and Barry and Louise Taper of Beverly Hills. Barry Taper, an investor-developer, is a son of Los Angeles philanthropist Mark Taper. The couple, who are founders of the Music Center of Los Angeles, have built the world's most extensive private collection of original Lincoln manuscripts and memorabilia.