Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest Part 19

Until I read these two sermons I hardly believed that in this day and generation anybody believed that G.o.d would make a child an idiot simply because the mother had prayed for its sweet dear life, or that G.o.d's visits are only in dreams. But so it is.

Orthodoxy has not advanced upon the religion of the Fiji Islander. It is the same yesterday, today and forever. Now we are told that there is a G.o.d; and nearly every nation has had a G.o.d; generally a good many of them. You see the raw material was so cheap, and G.o.ds were manufactured so easily, that heaven has always been crammed with the phantoms of these monsters. But they say there is a G.o.d, and every savage tribe believes in a G.o.d. It is an argument made to me every day. I concede to you that fact; I concede to you that all savages agree with you. I admit it takes a certain amount of civilization, a certain amount of thought, to rise above the idea that some personal being, for his own ends, for his own glory, made and governs this universe. I admit that it takes some thought to see the universe is good and all that is good, and every star that s.h.i.+nes is a part of G.o.d, and I am something, no matter how little, and that the infinite cannot exist without me, and that therefore I am a part of the infinite. I admit that it takes a little civilization to get to that point.

Now every nation has made a G.o.d, and every man that has made a G.o.d has used himself for a pattern; and men have put into the mouth of their G.o.d all their mistakes in astronomy, in geography, in philosophy, in morality, and the G.o.d is never wiser or better than his creators. If they believe in slavery, so did he; if they believe in eating human flesh, he wanted his share; if they were polygamous, so was he; if they were cruel, so was he. And just to the extent that man has become civilized, he has civilized his G.o.d. You can hardly imagine the progress that our G.o.d has made in four thousand years.

Four thousand years ago He was a barbarian; tonight He is quite an educated gentleman. Four thousand years ago He believed in killing and butchering little babes at the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of their mothers; He has reformed. Four thousand years ago He did not believe in taking prisoners of war. He said, kill the old men; mingle their blood with the white hair. Kill the women. But what shall we do, O G.o.d, with the maidens? Give them to satisfy the l.u.s.t of the soldiers and of the priests! If there is anywhere in the serene heaven a real G.o.d. I want him to write in the book of His eternal remembrance, opposite my name, that I deny that lie for Him.

Four thousand years ago our G.o.d was in favor of slavery; four thousand years ago our G.o.d would have a man beaten to death with rugged rocks for expressing his honest thought; four thousand years ago our G.o.d told the husband to kill his wife if she disagreed with him upon the important subject of religion; four thousand years ago our G.o.d was a monster; and if He is any better now, it is simply because we have made Him so. I am talking about the G.o.d of the Christian world. There may be, for aught I know, upon the sh.o.r.e of the eternal vast, some being whose very thought is the constellation of those numberless stars. I do not know; but if there is he has never written a bible; he has never been in favor of slavery; he has never advocated polygamy, and he never told the murderer to sheathe his dagger in the dimpled breast of a babe. But they say to me, our G.o.d has written a book. I am glad he did, and it is by that book that I propose to judge them. I find in that book that it was a crime to eat of the tree of knowledge. I find that the church has always been the enemy of education, and I find that the church still carries the flaming sword of ignorance and bigotry over the tree of knowledge.

And if that story is true, ought we not after all to thank the devil?

He was the first school master; he was the first to whisper liberty in our ears; he was the author of modesty. He was the author of ambition and progress. And as for me, give me the storm and tempest of thought and action rather than the dead calm of ignorance and faith. Punish me when and how you will, but first let me eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge. And there is one peculiar thing I might as well speak of here. While the world has made G.o.ds, it has also made devils; and as a rule the devils have been better friends to man than the G.o.ds. It was not a devil that drowned the world; it was not a devil that covered with the mult.i.tudinous waves of an infinite sea the corpses of men, women and children.

That was the good G.o.d. The devil never sent pestilence and famine; the devil never starved women and children; that was the good G.o.d. The meanest thing recorded of the devil is what happened concerning my servant Job. According to that book G.o.d met the devil and said: "Where have you been?" "Oh, been walking up and down." "Have you noticed my man Job; n.o.body like him!" "Well, who wouldn't be; you have given him everything; but take away what he has, and he will curse you to your face." And so the devil went to work and tried it. It was a mean thing. And that was all done to decide what you might call a wager on a difference of opinion between the serene highnesses. He took away his property, but Job didn't sin; and when G.o.d met the devil, he said: "Well, what did I tell you, smarty?" "Ah," he said, "that is all very well, but you touch his flesh and he will curse you; and he did, but Job didn't curse him. And then what did G.o.d do to help him! He gave him some other children better looking than the first ones. What kind of an idea is that for a G.o.d to kill our children and then give us better looking ones! If you have loved a child, I don't care if it is deformed, if you have held it in your arms and covered its face with kisses, you want that child back and no other.

I find in this bible that there was an old gentleman a little short of the article of hair. And as he was going through the town a number of little children cried out to him "Go up, thou bald head!" And this man of G.o.d turned and cursed them. A real good-humored old fellow! And two bears came out of the woods and tore in pieces forty-two children!

How did the bears get there? Elisha could not control the bears.

n.o.body but G.o.d could control the bears in that way. Now just think of an infinite G.o.d making a s.h.i.+ning star, having his attention attracted by hearing some children saying to an old gentlemen, "Go up, thou bald head!" and then speaking to his secretary or somebody else, "Bring in a couple of bears now!" What a magnificent G.o.d! What would the devil have done under the same circ.u.mstances? And yet that is the G.o.d they want to put into the const.i.tution in order to make our children gentle and kind and loving.

You hate a G.o.d like that. I do; I despise him. And yet little children in the Sabbath-school are taught that infamous lie. Why, I have very little respect for an old man that will get mad about such a thing, anyway. What would the Christian world say of me if I should have a few children torn to pieces if they should make that remark in my face? What would the devil have done under the same circ.u.mstances?

I tell you, I cannot wors.h.i.+p a G.o.d who is no better than the devil! I cannot do it. And if you will just read the old testament with the bandage off your eyes and the cloud of fear from your heart, you will come to the conclusion that it was written not only by men, but by barbarians, by savages, and that it is totally unworthy of a civilized age. I believe in no G.o.d who believes in slavery. I will wors.h.i.+p no G.o.d who ever said that one of His children should own another of His children. But they say to me, there must be a G.o.d somewhere! Well, I say I don't know. There may be. I hope there is more than one--one is so lonesome. Just think of an old bachelor, always alone! I want more than one. And they say, somebody must have made this! Well, I say I don't know. But it strikes me that the indestructible cannot be created. What would you make it of? "Oh, nothing!" Well, it strikes me that nothing, considered in the light of a raw material, is a decided failure. For my part, I cannot conceive of force apart from matter, and I cannot conceive of matter apart from force. I cannot conceive of force somewhere without acting upon something; because force must be active, or it is not force; and if it has no matter to act upon, it ceases to be force. I cannot conceive of the smallest atom of matter staying together without force. Beside, if some G.o.d made all this, there must have been some morning when he commenced! And if he has existed always, there is an eternity back of that when he never did anything; when he lived in an infinite hole, without side, top or bottom! He did not think, for there was nothing to think about.

Certainly he did not remember, for nothing had ever happened. Now I cannot conceive of this! I do not say it is not so. I may be d.a.m.ned for my smartness, yet--I simply say I cannot conceive of it, that is all. But men tell me, you cannot conceive of eternity! That is just what I can conceive of. I cannot conceive of its stopping. They say I cannot conceive of infinite s.p.a.ce! That is just what I can conceive of; because, let me imagine all I can, my imagination will stand upon the verge and see infinite s.p.a.ce beyond. Infinite s.p.a.ce is a necessity of the mind, because I cannot think of enough matter to fill it.

Eternity is a necessity of the mind, because I cannot dream of the cessation of time. But they say there is a design in the world, consequently there must be a designer. Well, I don't know.

Paley says that the more wonderful a thing is, the greater the necessity for creation; that a watch is a wonderful thing, and that it must have had a creator; that the watchmaker is more wonderful than the watch, therefore he must have had a creator. Then we come to G.o.d; He is altogether more wonderful than the watchmaker, therefore He had no creator. There is a link out somewhere; I don't pretend to understand it. And so I say, that had the world been any other way, you would have seen the same evidence of design, precisely. We grow up with our conditions, and you cannot imagine of a first cause. Why? Every cause has an effect.

Strike your hands together; they feel warm. The effect becomes a cause instantly, and that cause produces another effect, and the effect another cause; and there could not have been a cause until there was an effect. Because until there was an effect, nothing had been caused; until something had been caused, I am positive there was no cause. Now you cannot conceive of a lost effect, because the lost effect of which you can think, will in turn become a cause and that cause produce another effect. And as you cannot think of a lost effect, you cannot think of a first cause; it is not thinkable by the human mind.

They say G.o.d governs this world. Why does He not govern Russia as well as He does Ma.s.sachusetts? Why does He allow the Czar to send beautiful girls of sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, simply for saying a word in favor of human liberty, to mines in Siberia, where they draw carts with knees bruised and bleeding, with hands scarred and swollen? What is that G.o.d worth that allows such things in the world He governs? Did He govern this country when it had four millions of slaves?--when it turned the cross of Christ into a whipping-post--when the holy bible was an auction-block on which the mother stood while her babe was sold from her breast?--when bloodhounds were considered apostles? Was G.o.d governing the world when the prisoners were confined in the Bastille?

It seems to me, if there is a G.o.d, and someone would repeat the word "Bastille." it would cover almost his face with the blood of shame.

But they say heaven will balance all the ills of life. Let us see: A large majority of us are sinners--at least a large majority with whom I am acquainted; and a majority of the Christians with whom I am acquainted are worse than sinners. And if their doctrine is true, you will be astonished at the gentlemen you will see in h.e.l.l that day. You will know by the cast of their countenance that they used to preach here. They say that it may be that the sinners here have a very good time, and that the Christians don't have a very good time; that it is awful hard work to serve the Lord, and that you carry a cross when you deny yourself the delights of murder and forgery, and all manner of rascality that fills life with delight. But they say that while the rascals are having a good time, they will catch it in the other world.

But, according to their account, ninety-nine out of a hundred will be d.a.m.ned, and I think it will be a close call for the hundredth. Like that dear old Scotch woman, when she was talking about the Presbyterian faith, some one said to her: "My dear woman, if your doctrine is true, n.o.body but you and your husband will be saved." "Ah," said she, "I'm na' sae sure about John." About one in a hundred will be saved, and the other ninety-nine will be in misery. So that on the average there will not be half as much happiness in the next world as in this. So, instead of G.o.d's plan getting better, it gets worse; and throughout all the ages of eternity there will be less happiness than in this world.

This world is a school; this world is where we develop moral muscle.

It may be that we are here simply because men cannot advance only through agony and pain. If it is necessary to have pain and agony to advance morally, then n.o.body can advance in heaven. h.e.l.l will be the only place offering opportunities to any gentleman who wishes to increase his moral muscle.

A gentleman once asked me if I could suggest any improvement on the present order of things, if I had the power. Well, said I, in the first place, I would make good health catching instead of disease.

There will be no humanity until we get the orthodox G.o.d out of our religion. I want to do what little I can to put another one in G.o.d's name, so that we will wors.h.i.+p a supreme human G.o.d, so that we will wors.h.i.+p mercy, justice, love and truth, and not have the idea that we must sacrifice our brother upon the altar of fear to please some imaginary phantom. See what Christianity has done for the world! It has reduced Spain to a guitar, Italy to a hand organ and Ireland to exile. That is what religion has done. Take every country in the whole world, and the country that has got the least religion is the most prosperous, and the country that has got the most religion is in the worst condition.

In the vast cemetery, called the past, are most of the religions of men and there, too, are nearly all their G.o.ds.

The sacred temples of India were ruins long ago. Over column and cornice; over the painted and pictured walls, cling and creep the trailing vines. Brahma, the golden, with four heads and four arms; Vishnu, the sombre, the punisher of the wicked, with his three eyes, his crescent, and his necklace of skulls; Siva, the destroyer, red with seas of blood; Kali, the G.o.ddess; Draupadi, the white-armed, and Chrishna, the Christ, all pa.s.sed away and left the thrones of heaven desolate. Along the banks of the sacred Nile, Iris no longer wandering weeps, searching for the dead Osiris. The shadow of Typhon's scowl falls no more upon the waves. The sun rises as of yore, and his golden beams still smite the lips of Memnon, but Memnon is as voiceless as the Sphinx. The sacred fanes are lost in desert sands; the dusty mummies are still waiting for the resurrection promised by their priests, and the old beliefs wrought in curiously sculptured stone, sleep in the mystery of a language lost and dead Odin, the author of life and soul, Vili and Ve, and the mighty giant Ymir, strode long ago from the ice halls of the North; and Thor, with iron glove and glittering hammer, dashes mountains to the earth no more.

Broken are the circles and the cromlechs of the ancient Druids; fallen upon the summits of the hills, and covered with the centuries' moss are the sacred cairns. The divine fires of Persia and of the Aztecs have died out in the ashes of the past, and there is none to rekindle, and none to feed the holy flames. The harp of Orpheus is still; the drained cup of Bacchus has been thrown aside; Venus lies dead in stone, and her white bosom heaves no more with love. The streams still murmur, but no naiads bathe; the trees still wave, but in the forest aisles no dryads dance. The G.o.ds have flown from high Olympus. Not even the beautiful women can lure them back, and Danae lies unnoticed, naked to the stars.

Hushed forever are the thunders of Sinai; lost are the voices of the prophets, and the lard once flowing with milk and honey is but a desert waste. One by one the myths have faded from the clouds; one by one the phantom host has disappeared, and, one by one, facts, truths and realities have taken their places. The supernatural has almost gone, but man is the natural remains. The G.o.ds have fled, but man is here.

Nations, like individuals, have their periods of youth, of manhood and decay. Religions are the same. The same inexorable destiny awaits them all. The G.o.ds created with the nations must perish with their creators. They were created by men, and, like men, they must pa.s.s away.

The deities of one age are the by-words of the next. The religion of our day, and country, is no more exempt from the sneer of the future than others have been. When India was supreme, Brahma sat upon the world's throne. When the sceptre pa.s.sed to Egypt, Isis and Osiris received the homage of mankind. Greece, with her fierce valor, swept to empire, and Zeus put on the purple of authority. The earth trembled with the tread of Rome's intrepid sons, and Jove grasped with mailed hand the thunderbolts of heaven. Rome fell, and Christians from her territory, with the red sword of war, carved out the ruling nations of the world, and now Jehovah sits upon the old throne. Who will be His successor?

Ingersoll's lecture on The Religion of Our Day

Ladies and Gentlemen:--I am glad that I have lived long enough to see one gentleman in the pulpit brave enough to say that G.o.d would not be offended at one who speaks according to the dictates of his conscience; who does not believe that G.o.d will give wings to a bird, and then d.a.m.n the bird for flying. I thank the pastor and I thank the church for allowing its pastor to be so brave.

I admit that thousands and thousands of church people, with their pastors and the deacons, are today advocating religious principles that they deem right and good. I honor these men, but I do not believe that their method is a good one. I do not want these people to forgive me for the views I entertain, but I want them so to act that I will not have to forgive them. I am the friend of every one who preaches the gospel of absolute intellectual liberty, and that man is my friend.

Is there a G.o.d who says that if man does so and so He will d.a.m.n him?

Can there be such a fiend? I am not responsible to man unless I injure him; nor to G.o.d unless I injure Him, but one cannot injure G.o.d, for "He is infinite."

When I was young I was told that the bible was inspired, written by G.o.d, that even the lids of the book were inspired. They say He is a personal G.o.d; if so, He has not revealed Himself to me. There may be many G.o.ds. As I look around I see that justice does not prevail, that innocence is not always effectual and a perfect s.h.i.+eld. If there be a G.o.d these things could not be. If G.o.d made us all, why did He not make us all equally well. He had the power of an infinite G.o.d. Why did G.o.d people the earth with so many idiots? I admit that orthodoxy could not exist without them, but why did G.o.d make them? If we believe the bible then He should have made us all idiots, for the orthodox Christian says the idiots will not be d.a.m.ned, simply transplanted, while the sensible man, who believeth not, will be sent to eternal d.a.m.nation? If there is any G.o.d that made us, what right had He to make idiots? Is a man with a head like a pin under any obligation to thank G.o.d? Is the black man, born in slavery, under any obligation to thank G.o.d for his badge of servitude?

What kind of a G.o.d is it that will allow men and women to be put in dungeons and chains simply because they loved Him and prayed to Him?

And what kind of a G.o.d is it that will allow such men and women to be burned at the stake? If G.o.d won't love such men and women, then under what circ.u.mstances will he love?

Famine stalks over the land and millions die, not only the bad but the good, and there in the heavens above sits an infinite G.o.d who can do anything, can change the rocks and the stones, and yet these millions die. I do not say there is no G.o.d, but I do ask, what is G.o.d doing?

Look at the agony, and wretchedness and woe all over the land. Is there goodness, is there mercy in this? I do not say there is not, but I want to know, and I want to know if a man is to be d.a.m.ned for asking the question?

(He eloquently recited the agonies that cl.u.s.tered around the French Bastille, where great men and heroic women suffered and died for loving liberty, and said: If there is a G.o.d, I think that one word, Bastille, would bring the blush of shame to His face.)

I find that the men who have received revelation are the worst; and that where the bible goes there go the sword and the f.a.got. If an infinite G.o.d makes a revelation to me He knows how I will understand it. If G.o.d wrote the bible he knew that no two people would understand it alike.

When I read the bible I found that G.o.d in His infinite wisdom couldn't control the people He had created and that He had to drown them. If I had infinite power and couldn't make a people that I could control and had to drown them, why I'd resign.

Then I read in the bible such cruel things, and I do not believe that G.o.d can be cruel. Such cruelty may make one afraid, but cannot inspire love. I can't love a G.o.d that will inflict pain and sorrow, and I won't.

The preachers say all unbelievers will go to h.e.l.l--tidings of great joy. When I confront them they--say I'm taking away their consolation.

The old bible does not mention h.e.l.l or heaven. Now G.o.d should have notified Adam and Cain of h.e.l.l, but He didn't. When He came to drown all those people He didn't tell a single one that He would drown him.

He talked all about water--nothing about fire. When He came down on Mount Sinai, and told Moses how to cut out clothes for a priest, He never said one word on the subject. When G.o.d gave Moses the ten commandments, engraved on stone, there He said not one word about h.e.l.l.

There was plenty of room on the stone; why did He not add: "If you don't keep these commandments you will be d.a.m.ned." Through all these ages, when G.o.d was talking all the time, and when every howling prophet had His ear, not one word did He utter of h.e.l.l or heaven. For 4,000 years G.o.d got along without mentioning those places or even hinting of them. It seems to me that we ought to have been notified by Him.

(Here the orator recalled many stories from the old bible and subjected them to keen irony and ridicule. Reciting the story wherein the she bears came out of the woods and tore to pieces the forty children who mocked the prophet, he asked: If G.o.d did that, what would the devil have done under the same circ.u.mstances? Why; he said, did not G.o.d give a sure cure for leprosy, unless He wanted to have His chosen people to have that frightful disease?)

Do you believe that G.o.d ever told a widow if her brother-in-law refused to marry her to spit in his face? Do you believe any such nonsense from a G.o.d? I call that courting under difficulties. (Then Colonel Ingersoll dwelt pathetically on the sweet, innocent babes eaten up by the lions in the den, after Daniel was rescued from their jaws, and asked the question, what kind of a G.o.d was it that allowed such horrible deeds?)

They say that I pick out all the bad things in the bible. Well, G.o.d ought not to have put bad things in the book. If you only read the bible you will not believe it. Why, it is such a bad book that it has to be supported by legislation. In Maine and elsewhere they will send you to jail for two years if you deny the bible or the judgment day.

No, we are told we must not only believe in the G.o.d we have been talking about, but must also believe in another one.

Let us look at the church today. The orthodox church--that is, all but the Universalist. He is trying to be orthodox, but he can't get in.

The G.o.d of the Universalists, to say the least, is a gentleman.

Now, what is this religion? To believe certain things that we may be saved, that we won't be d.a.m.ned. What are they? First, that the old and new testament are inspired. No matter how kind, how just a man may be, unless he believes in the inspiration, he will be d.a.m.ned.

Second, he must believe in the trinity. That there are three in one.

That father and son are precisely of the same age, the son, possibly, a little mite older; that three times one is one, and that once one is three. It is a mercy you don't know how to understand it, but you must believe it or be d.a.m.ned. Therein you see the mercy of the Lord. This trinity doctrine was announced several hundred years after Christ was born: Do you believe such a doctrine will make a man good or honest?

Will it make him more just? Is the man that believes any better than the man who does not believe? How is it with nations? Look at Spain, the last slave-holder in the civilized world; she's christian, she believes in the trinity! And Italy, the beggar of the world. Under the rule of priestcraft money streamed in from every land and yet she did not advance. Today she is reduced to a hand-organ. Take poor Ireland, groaning under the heel of British oppression; could she cast off her priests she would soon be one with America in freedom.