The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 12 (of 12): Dresden Edition—MiscellanyIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 12 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Miscellany
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: Allow me to say that the cause nearest my heart,
and to which I am willing to devote the remainder of my life, is the
absolute, the _absolute_, enfranchisement of the human mind. I believe
that the family is the unit of good government, and that every good
government is simply an aggregation of good families. I therefore not
only believe in perfect civil and religious liberty, but I believe in
the one man loving the one woman. I believe the real temple of the human
heart is the hearthstone, and that there is where the sacrifice of life
should be made; and just in proportion as we have that idea in this
country, just in that proportion we shall advance and become a great,
glorious and splendid nation. I do not want the church or the state to
come between the man and wife. I want to do what little I can while I
live to strengthen and render still more sacred the family relation. I
am also in favor of granting every right to every other human being that
I claim for myself; and when I look about upon the world and see how the
children that are born to-day, or this year, or this age, came into a
world that has nearly all been taken up before their arrival; when I see
that they have not even an opportunity to labor for bread; when I see
that in our splendid country some who do the most have the least,
and others who do the least have the most; I say to myself there is
something wrong somewhere, and I hope the time will come when every
child that nature has invited to our feast will have an equal right with
all the others. There is only one way, in my judgment, to bring that
about; and that is, first, not simply by the education of the head, but
by the universal education of the heart. The time will come when a man
with millions in his possession will not be respected unless with those
millions he improves the condition of his fellow-men.
The time will come when it will be utterly impossible for a man to go
down to death, grasping millions in the clutch of avarice. The time will
come when it will be impossible for such a man to exist, for he will be
followed by the scorn and execration of mankind. The time will come
when such a man when stricken by death, cannot purchase the favor of
posterity by leaving a portion of the gains which he has wrung from the
poor, to some church or Bible society for the glory of God.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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