The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 01 (of 12): Dresden Edition—LecturesIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 01 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Lectures
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
The result of his investigations was given to the world in the "Age of
Reason." From the moment of its publication he became infamous. He was
calumniated beyond measure. To slander him was to secure the thanks of
the church. All his services were instantly forgotten, disparaged or
denied. He was shunned as though he had been a pestilence. Most of his
old friends forsook him. He was regarded as a moral plague, and at the
bare mention of his name the bloody hands of the church were raised in
horror. He was denounced as the most despicable of men.
Not content with following him to his grave, they pursued him after
death with redoubled fury, and recounted with infinite gusto and
satisfaction the supposed horrors of his death-bed; gloried in the fact
that he was forlorn and friendless, and gloated like fiends over what
they supposed to be the agonizing remorse of his lonely death.
It is wonderful that all his services were thus forgotten. It is amazing
that one kind word did not fall from some pulpit; that some one did
not accord to him, at least--honesty. Strange, that in the general
denunciation some one did not remember his labor for liberty, his
devotion to principle, his zeal for the rights of his fellow-men. He
had, by brave and splendid effort, associated his name with the cause
of Progress. He had made it impossible to write the history of political
freedom with his name left out He was one of the creators of light; one
of the heralds of the dawn. He hated tyranny in the name of kings, and
in the name of God, with every drop of his noble blood. He believed in
liberty and justice, and in the sacred doctrine of human equality. Under
these divine banners he fought the battle of his life. In both worlds he
offered his blood for the good of man. In the wilderness of America, in
the French Assembly, in the sombre cell waiting for death, he was the
same unflinching, unwavering friend of his race; the same undaunted
champion of universal freedom. And for this he has been hated; for this
the church has violated even his grave.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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