Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - LatestIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
Did Julius Caesar send the following report to the Roman Senate? "And
we took all his cities at that time, there was not a city which we took
not from them, three-score city, all the region of Argob, the kingdom
of Og, in Bashan. All these cities were fenced with high walls, gates
and bars; besides unwalled towns a great many. And we utterly
destroyed them, as we did unto Sihon, king of Heshbon, utterly
destroying the men, women, and children of every city."
Did Caesar take the city of Jericho "and utterly destroy all that was
in the city, both man and woman, young and old?" Did he smite "all the
country of the hills, and of the south, and of the vale, and of the
springs, and all their kings, and leave none remaining that breathed,
as the Lord God had commanded?"
Search the records of the whole world, find out the history of every
barbarous tribe, and you can find no crime that touched a lower depth
of infamy than those the bible's God commanded and approved. For such
a God I have no words to express my loathing and contempt, and all the
words in all the languages of man would scarcely be sufficient. Away
with such a God! Give me Jupiter rather, with Io and Europa, or even
Siva with his skulls and snakes, or give me none.
Tenth. With having repudiated the doctrines of total depravity.
What a precious doctrine is that of the total depravity of the human
heart! How sweet it is to believe that the lives of all the good and
great were continual sins and perpetual crimes; that the love a mother
bears her child is, in the sight of God, a sin; that the gratitude of
the natural heart is simple meanness; that the tears of pity are
impure; that for the unconverted to live and labor for others is an
offense to heaven; that the noblest aspirations of the soul are low and
groveling in the sight of God; that man should fall upon his knees and
ask forgiveness, simply for loving his wife and child, and that even
the act of asking forgiveness is in fact a crime.
Surely it is a kind of bliss to feel that every woman and child in the
wide world, with the exception of those who believe the five points, or
some other equally cruel creed, and such children as have been
baptized, ought at this very moment to be dashed down to the lowest
glowing gulf of the hell!
Take from the Christian the history of his own church; leave that
entirely out of the question, and he has no argument left with which to
substantiate the total depravity of man.
A minister once asked an old lady, a member of his church, what she
thought of the doctrine of total depravity, and the dear old soul
replied that she thought it a mighty good doctrine if the Lord would
only give the people grace enough to live up to it?
Eleventh. With having doubted the "perseverance of the saints."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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