The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 11 (of 12): Dresden Edition—MiscellanyIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 11 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Miscellany
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
The Improved Man will find his greatest joy in the happiness of others
and he will know that the home is the real temple. He will believe in
the democracy of the fireside, and will reap his greatest reward in
being loved by those whose lives he has enriched.
The Improved Man will be self-poised, independent, candid and free.
He will be a scientist. He will observe, investigate, experiment and
demonstrate. He will use his sense and his senses. He will keep his mind
open as the day to the hints and suggestions of nature. He will always
be a student, a learner and a listener--a believer in intellectual
hospitality. In the world of his brain there will be continuous summer,
perpetual seed-time and harvest. Facts will be the foundation of his
faith. In one hand he will carry the torch of truth, and with the other
raise the fallen.--The World, New York, February 28,1890.
EIGHT HOURS MUST COME.
I HARDLY know enough on the subject to give an opinion as to the
time when eight hours are to become a day's work, but I am perfectly
satisfied that eight hours will become a labor day.
The working people should be protected by law; if they are not, the
capitalists will require just as many hours as human nature can bear.
We have seen here in America street-car drivers working sixteen and
seventeen hours a day. It was necessary to have a strike in order to
get to fourteen, another strike to get to twelve, and nobody could blame
them for keeping on striking till they get to eight hours.
For a man to get up before daylight and work till after dark, life is
of no particular importance. He simply earns enough one day to prepare
himself to work another. His whole life is spent in want and toil, and
such a life is without value.
Of course, I cannot say that the present effort is going to succeed--all
I can say is that I hope it will. I cannot see how any man who does
nothing--who lives in idleness--can insist that others should work ten
or twelve hours a day. Neither can I see how a man who lives on the
luxuries of life can find it in his heart, or in his stomach, to say
that the poor ought to be satisfied with the crusts and crumbs they get.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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