The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 07 (of 12): Dresden Edition—DiscussionsIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 07 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Discussions
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
My good friend General Woodford--and he is a good man telling the best
he knows--says that I will be accountable at the bar up yonder. I am
ready to settle that account now, and expect to be, every moment of my
life--and when that settlement comes, if it does come, I do not believe
that a solitary being can rise and say that I ever injured him or her.
But no matter what they say. Let me tell you a story, how we will settle
if we do get there.
You remember the story told about the Mexican who believed that his
country was the only one in the world, and said so. The priest told
him that there was another country where a man lived who was eleven or
twelve feet high, that made the whole world, and if he denied it, when
that man got hold of him he would not leave a whole bone in his body.
But he denied it. He was one of those men who would not believe further
than his vision extended.
So one day in his boat, he was rocking away when the wind suddenly arose
and he was blown out of sight of his home. After several days he was
blown so far that he saw the shores of another country. Then he said,
"My Lord; I am gone! I have been swearing all my life that there was no
other country, and here it is!" So he did his best--paddled with what
little strength he had left, reached the shore, and got out of his boat.
Sure enough, there came down a man to meet him about twelve feet high.
The poor little wretch was frightened almost to death, so he said to the
tall man as he saw him coming down: "Mister, whoever you are, I denied
your existence--I did not believe you lived; I swore there was no such
country as this; but I see I was mistaken, and I am gone. You are going
to kill me, and the quicker you do it the better and get me out of my
misery. Do it now!"
The great man just looked at the little fellow, and said nothing, till
he asked, "What are you going to do with me, because over in that other
country I denied your existence?" "What am I going to do with you?" said
the supposed God. "Now that you have got here, if you behave yourself I
am going to treat you well."
A CHRISTMAS SERMON.
* This is the famous Christmas Sermon written by Colonel
Ingersoll and printed in the Evening Telegram, on December
19,1891.
I.
THE good part of Christmas is not always Christian--it is generally
Pagan; that is to say, human, natural.
Christianity did not come with tidings of great joy, but with a message
of eternal grief. It came with the threat of everlasting torture on its
lips. It meant war on earth and perdition hereafter.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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