Books: Lectures Of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Vol. I

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Can we believe a being of infinite mercy gave this command: "Put every
man his sword by his side; go from the gate throughout the camp, and
slay every man his brother, every man his companion, and every man his
neighbor. Consecrate it, yourselves this day. Let every man lay his
sword even upon his son, upon his brother, that he bestow blessing upon
Me this day." Surely that was not the outcome of a great, magnanimous
spirit, like that of the Roman emperor, who declared: "I had rather
keep a single Roman citizen alive than slay a thousand enemies."
Compare the last command given to the children of Israel with the words
of Marcus Aurelius: "I have formed an ideal of the State, in which
there is the same law for all, and equal rights and equal liberty of
speech established for all--an Empire where nothing is honored so much
as the freedom of the citizens." I am on the side of the Roman emperor.

What is more beautiful than the old story from Sufi? There was a man
who for seven years did every act of good, every kind of charity, and at
the end of the seven years he mounted the steps to the gate of heaven
and knocked. A voice cried, "Who is there?" He cried, "Thy servant, O
Lord;" and the gates were shut. Seven other years he did every good
work, and again mounted the steps to heaven and knocked. The voice
cried, "Who is there?" He answered, "Thy slave, O God;" and the gates
were shut. Seven other years he did every good deed, and again mounted
the steps to heaven, and the voice said: "Who is there?" He replied
"Thyself, O God;" and the gates wide open flew. Is there anything in
our religion so warm or so beautiful as that? Compare that story from a
pagan with the Presbyterian religion.

Take this story of Endesthora, who was a king of Egypt, and started for
the place where the horizon touched the earth, where he was to meet God.
With him followed Argune and Bemis and Traubation. They were taught
that, when any man started after God in that way, if he had been guilty
of any crime he would fall by the way. Endesthora walked at the head
and suddenly he missed Argune. He said, "He was not always merciful in
the hour of victory." A little while after he missed Bemis, and said,
"He fought not so much for the rights of man as for his own glory." A
little farther on he missed Traubation. He said, "My God, I know no
reason for his failing to reach the place where the horizon touches the
earth;" and the god Ram appeared to him, and opening the curtains of the
sky, said to him: "Enter." And Endesthora said: "But where are my
brethren? Where are Argune and Beinis and Traubation?" And the god
said: "They sinned in their time, and they are condemned to suffer
below." Then said Endestbora: "I do not wish to enter into your heaven
without my friends. If they are below, then I will join them." But the
god said: "They are here before you; I simply said this to try your
soul." Endesthora simply turned and said: "But what of my dog?" The
god said, "Thou knowest that if the shadow of a dog fall upon the
sacrifice, it is unclean. How, then, can a dog enter heaven?" And
Endesthora replies: "I know that, and I know another thing; that
ingratitude is the blackest of crimes, whether it be to man or beast.
That dog has been my faithful friend. He has followed me and I will not
desert even him." And the god said: "Let the dog follow." Compare
that with the bible stories.

Long before the advent of Christ, Aristotle said: "We should conduct
ourselves toward others as we would have them conduct themselves toward
us." Seneca said: "Do not to your neighbor what you would not have
your neighbor do to you." Socrates said: "Act toward others as you
would have others act toward you. Forgive your enemies, render good for
evil, and kiss even the hand that is upraised to smite." Krishna said:
"Cease to do evil; aim to do well; love your enemies. It is the law
of love that virtue is the only thing that has strength." Poor,
miserable pagans! Did you ever hear anything like this? Is it possible
that one of the authors of the new testament was inspired when he said
that man was not created for woman, but woman for man? Epictetus said:
"What is more delightful than to be so dear to your wife as to be on her
account dearer even to yourself?" Compare that with St. Paul: "But I
would have you know that the head of every man is Christ, and the head
of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God. Wives, submit
yourselves unto your husbands as unto the Lord." That was inspiration.
This was written by a poor, despised heathen: "In whatever house the
husband is contented with the wife and the wife with the husband, in
that house will fortune dwell. In the house where the woman is not
honored, let the curse be pronounced. Where the wife is honored, there
God is truly worshiped." I wish Jehovah had said something like that
from Sinai. Is there anything as beautiful as this in the new
testament: "Shall I tell you where nature is more blest and fair? It
is where those we love abide. Though the space be small, it is ample as
earth; though it be a desert, through it run the rivers of Paradise."

Compare these things with the curses pronounced in the old testament,
where you read of the heathen being given over to butchery and death,
and the women and babes to destruction; and, after you have read them,
read the chapters of horrors in the new testament, threatening eternal
fire and flame; and then read this, the greatest thought uttered by the
greatest of human beings:

The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain
from heaven Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed: It blesseth
him that gives and him that takes; 'Tis mightiest in the mighty; It
becomes the throned monarch better this his crown.

Compare that with your doctrine of the new testament! If Jehovah was an
infinite God and knew things from the beginning, He knew that His bible
would be a breast-work behind which tyranny and hypocrisy would crouch,
and knew His bible would be the auction-block on which the mother would
stand while her babe was sold from her, because He knew His bible would
be quoted by tyrants; that it would be quoted in defense of robbers
called kings, and by hypocrites called priests. He knew that He had
taught the Jewish people; He knew that He had found them free and left
them slaves; He knew that He had broken every single promise made to
them; He knew that, while other nations advanced in knowledge, in art,
in science, His chosen people were subjects still. He promised them the
world; He gave them a desert. He promised them liberty, and made them
slaves. He promised them power; He gave them exile, and any one who
reads the old testament is compelled to say that nothing could add to
their misery.

Let us be honest. How do you account for this religion? This world;
where did it come from? You hear every minister say that man is a
religious animal--that religion is natural. While man is an ignorant
animal man will be a theological animal, and no longer. Where did we get
this religion? The savage knew but little of nature, but thought that
everything happened in reference to him. He thought his sins caused
earthquakes, and that his virtues made the sunshine.

Nothing is so egotistical as ignorance. You know, and so do I, that if
no human being existed, the sun would shine, and that tempests would now
and then devastate the earth; violets would spread their velvet bosoms
to the sun, daisies would grow, roses would fill the air with perfume,
and now and then volcanoes would illuminate the horizon with their lurid
glare; the grass would grow, the waters would run, and so far as nature
is concerned, everything would be as joyous as though the earth were
filled with happy homes. We know the barbarian savage thinks that all
this was on his account. He thinks that there dwelt two very powerful
deities; that there was a good one, because he knows good things happen
to him; and that there was a bad one, because he knows bad things
happen to him. Behind the evil influence he puts a devil, and behind
the good, an intention of God; and then he imagines both these beings
are in opposition, and that, between them, they struggle for the
possession of his ignorant soul. He also thinks that the place where
the good deity lives is heaven, and that the place where the other deity
keeps himself is a place of torture and punishment. And about that time
other barbarians have chosen too keep the ignorant ones in subjection by
means of the doctrine of fear and punishment.

There is no reforming power in fear. You can scare a man, maybe, so bad
that he won't do a thing, but you can't scare him so bad he won't want
to do it. There is no reforming power in punishment or brute force;
but our barbarians rather imagined that every being would punish in
accordance with his power, and his dignity, and that God would subject
them to torture in the same way as those who made Him angry. They knew
the king would inflict torments upon one in his power, and they supposed
that God would inflict torture according to His power. They knew the
worst torture was a slow, burning fire; added to it the idea of
eternity, and hell was produced. That was their idea. All meanness,
revenge, selfishness, cruelty, and hatred of which men here are capable
burst into blossom and bore fruit in that one word, "Hell."

In this way a God of infinite wisdom experimented with man, keeping him
between an outstretched abyss beneath and a heaven above; and in time
the man came to believe that he could please God by having read a few
sacred books, could count beads, could sprinkle water, eat little square
pieces of bread, and that he could shut his eyes and say words to the
clouds; but the moment he left this world nothing remained except to
damn him. He was to be kept miserable one day in seven, and he could
slander and persecute other men all the other days in the week. That
was the chance that God gave a man here, but the moment he left this
world that settled it. He would go to eternal pain or else to eternal
joy. That was the way that the supernatural governed this world--
through fear, through terror, through eternity of punishment; and that
government, I say tonight, has failed. How has it been kept alive so
long? It was born in ignorance. Let me tell you, whoever attacks a
creed will be confronted with a list of great men who have believed in
it. Probably their belief in that creed was the only weakness they had.
But he will be asked, "So you know more than all the great men who have
taught and all the respectable men who have believed in that faith?"
For the church is always going about to get a certificate from some
governor, or even perhaps members of the Legislature, and you are told,
because so-and-so believed all these things, and you have no more
talents than they, that you should believe the same thing. But I
contend, as against this argument, that you should not take the
testimony of these men unless you are willing to take at the same time
all their beliefs on other subjects. Then, again, they tell you that
the rich people are all on their side, and I say so, too. The churches
today seek the rich, and poverty unwillingly seeks them. Light thrown
from diamonds adorns the repentant here. We are told that the rich, the
fortunate, and the holders of place are Christians now; and yet
ministers grow eloquent over the poverty of Christ, who was born in a
manger, and say that the Holy Ghost passed the titled ladies of the
world and selected the wife of a poor mechanic for the mother of God.
Such is the difference between theory and practice. The church condemns
the men of Jerusalem who held positions and who held the pretensions of
the Savior in contempt. They admit that He was so little known that
they had to bribe a man to point Him out to the soldiers. They assert
that He performed miracles; yet He remained absolutely unknown, hidden
in the depth of obscurity. No one knew Him, and one of His disciples
had to be bribed to point Him out. Surely He and His disciples could
have met the arguments which were urged against their religion at that
time.

So long as the church honored philosophers she kept her great men in the
majority. How is it now? I say tonight that no man of genius in the
world is in the orthodox pulpit, so far as I know. Where are they?
Where are the orthodox great men? I challenge the Christian church to
produce a man like Alexander Humboldt. I challenge the world to produce
a naturalist like Haeckel. I challenge the Christian world to produce a
man like Darwin. Where in the ranks of orthodoxy are historians like
Draper and Buckle? Where are the naturalists like Tyndall, philosophers
like Mills and Spencer, and women like George Eliot and Harriet
Martineau? You may get tired of the great-men argument; but the names
of the great thinkers, and naturalists and scientists of our time cannot
be matched by the supernatural world.

What is the next argument they will bring forward? The father and
mother argument. You must not disgrace your parents. How did Christ
come to leave the religion of His mother? That argument proves too
much. There is one way every man can honor his mother--that is by
finding out more than she knew. There is one way a man can honor his
father--by correcting the old man's errors.

Most people imagine that the creed we have came from the brain and heart
of Christ. They have no idea how it was made. They think it was all
made at one time. They don't understand that it was a slow growth.
They don't understand that theology is a science made up of mistakes,
prejudices and falsehoods. Let me tell you a few facts: The Emperor
Constantine, who lifted the Christian religion into power, murdered his
wife and his eldest son the very year that he convened the Council of
Nice to decide whether Jesus Christ was man or God; and that was not
decided until the year of grace 325. Then Theodosius called a council
at Constantinople in 381, and this council decided that the Holy Ghost
proceeded from the Father. You see, there was a little doubt on that
question before this was done. Then another council was called later to
determine who the Virgin Mary really was, and it was solemnly decided
that she was the mother of Christ. In 431, and then in 451, a council
was held in Chalcedon, by the Emperor Marcian, and that decided that
Christ had two natures--a human and a divine. In 680 another council
was held at Constantinople; and in 1274 at Lyons, it was decided that
the Holy Ghost proceeded not only from the Father but from the Son; and
when you take into consideration the fact that a belief in the Trinity
is absolutely essential to salvation, you see how important it was that
these doctrines should have been established in 1274, when millions of
people had dropped into hell in the interim solely because they had
forgotten that question. At last we know how religions are made. We
know how miracles are manufactured. We know the history of relics, and
bones, and pieces of the true cross. And at last we understand
apostolic succession. At last we have examined other religions, and we
find them all the same, and we are beginning to suspect that ours is
like the rest. I think we understand it.

I read a little story, a short time ago, from the Japanese, that throws
light upon the question. There was an old priest at a monastery. This
monastery was built over the bones of what he called a saint, and people
came there and were cured of many diseases. This priest had an
assistant. After the assistant grew up and got quite to understand his
business, the old priest gave him a little donkey, and told him that
henceforth he was to take care of himself. The young priest started out
with his little donkey, and asked alms of those he met. Few gave to
him. Finally he got very poor. He could not raise money enough to feed
the donkey. Finally the donkey died; he was about to bury it when a
thought occurred to him. He buried the donkey and sat down on the
grave, and to the next stranger that passed he said: "Will you not give
a little money to erect a shrine over the bones of a sinless one?"
Thereupon a man gave money. Others followed his example, a shrine was
raised, and in a little while a monastery was built over the bones of
the sinless one. Down in the grave the young priest made an orifice, so
that persons afflicted with any disease could reach down and touch the
bones of the sinless one. Hundreds were thus cured, and persons left
their crutches as testimonials to the miraculous power of the bones of
the sinless one. Finally the priest became so rich that he thought he
would visit his old master. He went to the old monastery with a fine
retinue. His old master asked him how he became so rich and prosperous.
He replied: "Old age is stupid, but youth has thought." Later on he
explained to the old priest how the donkey had died, and how he had
raised a monastery over the bones of the sinless one; and again
reminded him that old age is stupid, but youth has thought. The old
priest exclaimed: "Not quite so fast, young man; not quite so fast.
Don't imagine you worked out anything new. This shrine of mine is built
over the bones of the mother of your little donkey."

We have now reached a point in the history of the world when we know
that theocracy as a form of government is a failure, and we see that
theology as a foundation of government is an absolute failure. We can
see that theocracy and theology created, not liberty, but despotism. We
know enough of the history of the churches in this world to know that
they never can civilize mankind; that they are not imbued with the
spirit of progress; that they are not imbued with the spirit of justice
and mercy. What I ask you tonight is: What has the church done to
civilize mankind? What has the church done for us? How has it added to
the prosperity of this world? Has it ever produced anything? Nothing.
Why, they say, it has been charitable. How can a beggar be charitable?
A beggar produces nothing. The church has been an eternal and
everlasting pauper. It is not charitable. It is an object of charity,
and yet it claims to be charitable. The giver is the charitable one.
Somebody who has made something, somebody who has by his labor produced
something, he alone can be charitable.

And let me say another thing: The church is always on the wrong side.
Let us take, first, the Episcopal church--if you call that a church. Let
me tell you one thing about that church. You know what is called the
rebellion in England in 1688? Do you know what caused it? I will tell
you. King James was a Catholic, and notwithstanding that fact, he
issued an edict of toleration for the Dissenters and Catholics. And
what next did he do? He ordered all the bishops to have this edict of
toleration read in the Episcopal churches. They refused to do it--most
of them. You recollect that trial of the seven bishops? That is what
it was all about; they would not read the edict of toleration. Then
what happened? A strange thing to say, and it is one of the miracles of
this world: The Dissenters, in whose favor that edict was issued,
joined hands with the Episcopalians, and raised the rebellion against
the king, because he wanted to give the Dissenters liberty, and these
Dissenters and these Episcopalians, on account of toleration, drove King
James into exile. This is the history of the first rebellion the Church
of England ever raised against the king, simply because he issued an
edict of toleration and the poor, miserable wretches in whose favor the
edict was issued joined hands with their oppressors. I want to show you
how much the Church of England has done for England. I get it from good
authority. Let me read it to you to show how little influence the
Christian church, the Church of England, had with the government of that
country. Let me tell you that up to the reign of George I. there were
in that country sixty-seven offenses punishable with death. There is
not a lawyer in this city who can think of those offenses and write them
down in one day. Think of it! Sixty-seven offenses punishable with
death! Now, between the accession of George I. and the termination of
the reign of George III. there were added 156 new crimes punishable with
death, making in all 223 crimes in England punishable with death. There
is no lawyer in this State who can think of that many crimes in a week.
Now, during all those years the government was becoming more and more
cruel; more and more barbarous; and we do not find, and we have not
found, that the Church of England, with its 15,000 or 20,000 Ministers,
with its more than a score of bishops in the House of Lords, has ever
raised its voice or perfected any organization in favor of a more
merciful code, or in condemnation of the enormous cruelty which the laws
were continually inflicting. And was not Voltaire justified in saying
that "The English were a people who murdered by law?" Now, that is an
extract from a speech made by John Bright in May, 1883. That shows what
the Church of England did. Two hundred and twenty-three offenses in
England punishable with death, and no minister, no bishop, no church
organization raising his or its voice, against the monstrous cruelty.
And why? Even then it was better than the law of Jehovah.

And the Protestants were as bad as the Catholics. You remember the time
of Henry IV. in France, when the edict of Nantes was issued simply to
give the Protestants the right to worship God according to the dictates
of their conscience. Just as soon as that edict was issued the
Protestants themselves, in the cities where they had the power,
prevented the Catholics from worshiping their God according to the
dictates of their conscience, and it was on account of the refusal of
those Protestants to allow the Catholics to worship God as they desired
that there was a civil war lasting for seven years in France. Richelieu
came into authority about the second or third year of that war. He made
no difference between Protestants and Catholics; and it was owing to
Richelieu that the Thirty Years' War terminated. It was owing to
Richelieu that the peace of Westphalia was made in 1643, although I
believe he had been dead a year before that time; but it was owing to
him, and it was the first peace ever made between nations on a secular
basis, with everything religious left out, and it was the last great
religious war.

You may ask me what I want. Well, in the first place I want to get
theology out of government. It has no business there. Man gets his
authority from man, and is responsible only to man. I want to get
theology out of politics. Our ancestors in 1776 retired God from
politics, because of the jealousies among the churches, and the result
has been splendid for mankind. I want to get theology out of education.
Teach the children what somebody knows, not what somebody guesses. I
want to get theology out of morality, and out of charity. Don't give
for God's sake, but for man's sake.

I want you to know another thing; that neither Protestants nor
Catholics are fit to govern this world. They are not fit to govern
themselves. How could you elect a minister of any religion president of
the United States. Could you elect a bishop of the Catholic church, or
a Methodist bishop, or Episcopal minister, or one of the elders? No.
And why? We are afraid of the ecclesiastic spirit. We are afraid to
trust the liberties of men in the hands of people who acknowledge that
they are bound by a standard different from that of the welfare of
mankind.

The history of Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Cuba, and Brazil all show
that slavery existed where Catholicism was a power. I would suggest an
education that would rule theology out of the government, and teach
people to rely more on themselves and less on providence. There are two
ways of living--the broad way of life lived for others, and the narrow
theological way. It is wise to so live that death can be serenely
faced, and then, if there is another world, the best way to prepare for
it is to make the best of this; and if there be no other world, the
best way to live here is to so live as to be happy and make everybody
else happy.

INGERSOLL'S LECTURE ON THE GREAT INFIDELS

Ladies and Gentlemen: There is nothing grander in this world than to
rescue from the leprosy of slander a great and splendid name. There is
nothing nobler than to benefit our benefactors. The infidels of one age
have been the aureole saints of the next. The destroyers of the old
have always been the creators of the new. The old passes away and the
new becomes old. There is in the intellectual world, as in the
material, decay and growth; and even by the sunken grave of age stand
youth and joy. The history of progress is written in the lives of
infidels. Political rights have been preserved by traitors;
intellectual rights by infidels.

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