Ingersollia: Gems of Thought from the Lectures, Speeches, and Conversations of Col. Robert G. Ingersoll, Representative of His Opinions and BeliefsIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
Ingersollia: Gems of Thought from the Lectures, Speeches, and Conversations of Col. Robert G. Ingersoll, Representative of His Opinions and Beliefs
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Ingersoll, Robert Green, 1833-1899 -- Quotations
He was a worshiper of liberty, a friend of the oppressed. A thousand
times I have heard him quote these words: "For Justice all place a
temple, and all season, summer." He believed that happiness was the only
good, reason the only torch, justice the only worship, humanity the only
religion, and love the only priest. He added to the sum of human joy;
and were every one to whom he did some loving service to bring a blossom
to his grave, he would sleep to-night beneath a wilderness of sweet
flowers.
Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two
eternities. We strive in vain to look beyond the heights. We cry aloud,
and the only answer is the echo of our wailing cry. From the voiceless
lips of the unreplying dead there comes no word; but in the night of
death hope sees a star and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing.
He who sleeps here, when dying, mistaking the approach of death for the
return of health, whispered with his latest breath, "I am better now."
Let us believe, in spite of doubts and dogmas, of fears and tears, that
these dear words are true of all the countless dead.
And now, to you, who have been chosen, from among the many men he loved,
to do the last sad office for the dead, we give his sacred dust.
Speech cannot contain our love. There was, there is, no gentler,
stronger, manlier man.
INGERSOLL'S DREAM OF THE WAR
The Following Words of Matchless Eloquence were
Addressed by Col. Ingersoll to the Veteran
Soldiers of Indianapolis.
The past, as it were, rises before me like a dream. Again we are in the
great struggle for national life. We hear the sound of preparation--the
music of the boisterous drums--the silver voices of heroic bugles. We
see thousands of assemblages, and hear the appeals of orators; we see
the pale cheeks of women, and the flushed faces of men; and in those
assemblages we see all the dead whose dust we have covered with flowers.
We lose sight of them no more. We are with them when they enlist in the
great army of freedom. We see them part with those they love. Some are
walking for the last time in quiet, woody places with the maidens they
adore. We hear the whisperings and the sweet vows of eternal love as
they lingeringly part forever. Others are bending over cradles kissing
babes that are asleep.
Some are receiving the blessings of old men. Some are parting with
mothers who hold them and press them to their hearts again and again,
and say nothing; and some are talking with wives, and endeavoring with
brave words spoken in the old tones to drive away the awful fear. We
see them part. We see the wife standing in the door with the babe in her
arms--standing in the sunlight sobbing--at the turn of the road a hand
waves--she answers by holding high in her loving hands the child. He is
gone, and forever.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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