The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 06 (of 12): Dresden Edition—DiscussionsIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 06 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Discussions
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
the Popish plot? Were the opinions formed by the English Parliament on
the Treaty of Limerick formed without the intervention of the will? Did
Napoleon judge according to the evidence when he acquitted himself in
the matter of the Due d' Enghien? Does the intellect sit in a solitary
chamber, like Galileo in the palace of the Vatican, and pursue celestial
observation all untouched, while the turmoil of earthly business is
raging everywhere around? According to the Reply, it must be a mistake
to suppose that there is anywhere in the world such a thing as bias, or
prejudice, or prepossession: they are words without meaning in regard to
our judgments, for even if they could raise a clamor from without, the
intellect sits within, in an atmosphere of serenity, and, like Justice,
is deaf and blind, as well as calm.
In addition to all other faults, I hold that this philosophy, or
phantasm of philosophy, is eminently retrogressive. Human nature, in its
compound of flesh and spirit, becomes more complex with the progress of
civilization; with the steady multiplication of wants, and of means for
their supply. With complication, introspection has largely extended, and
I believe that, as observation extends its field, so far from isolating
the intelligence and making it autocratic, it tends more and more to
enhance and multiply the infinitely subtle, as well as the broader and
more palpable modes, in which the interaction of the human faculties is
carried on. Who among us has not had occasion to observe, in the course
of his experience, how largely the intellectual power of a man is
affected by the demands of life on his moral powers, and how they open
and grow, or dry up and dwindle, according to the manner in which those
demands are met.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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