Part 22

It is true that the clergy are apt to lose the distinction between offences and virtues, to regard the little as the important--that is to say, to invert the pyramid.

It is true that the Indians have been badly treated. It is true that the fringe of civilization has been composed of many low and cruel men. It is true that the red man has been demoralized by the vices of the white. It is a frightful fact that, when a superior race meets an inferior, the inferior imitates only the vices of the superior, and the superior those of the inferior. They exchange faults and failings. This is one of the most terrible facts in the history of the human race.

Nothing can be said to justify our treatment of the Indians. There is, however, this shadow of an excuse: In the old times, when we lived along the Atlantic, it hardly occurred to our ancestors that they could ever go beyond the Ohio; so the first treaty with the Indians drove them back but a few miles. In a little while, through immigration, the white race passed the line, and another treaty was made, forcing the Indians still further west; yet the tide of immigration kept on, and in a little while again the line was passed, the treaty violated. Another treaty was made, pushing the Indians still farther toward the Pacific, across the Illinois, across the Mississippi, across the Missouri, violating at every step some treaty made; and each treaty born of the incapacity of the white men who made it to foretell the growth of the Republic.

But the author of "Brutality and Avarice Triumphant" made a great mistake when he selected the last thirty years of our national life as the period within which the Americans have made a change of the national motto appropriate, and asserted that now there should be in place of the old motto the words, "Plundering Made Easy."

Most men believe in a sensible and manly patriotism. No one should be blind to the defects in the laws and institutions of his country. He should call attention to abuses, not for the purpose of bringing his country into disrepute, but that the abuses may cease and the defects be corrected. He should do what he can to make his country great, prosperous, just, and free. But it is hardly fair to exaggerate the faults of your country for the purpose of calling attention to your own virtues, or to earn the praise of a nation that hates your own. This is what might be called wallowing in the gutter of reform.

The thirty years chosen as the time in which we as a nation have passed from virtue to the lowest depths of brutality and avarice are, in fact, the most glorious years in the life of this or of any other nation.

In 1861 slavery was, in a legal sense at least, a national institution. It was firmly imbedded in the Federal Constitution. The Fugitive Slave Law was in full force and effect. In all the Southern and in nearly all of the Northern States it was a crime to give food, shelter, or raiment to a man or woman seeking liberty by flight. Humanity was illegal, hospitality a misdemeanor, and charity a crime. Men and women were sold like beasts. Mothers were robbed of their babes while they stood under our flag. All the sacred relations of life were trampled beneath the bloody feet of brutality and avarice. Besides, so firmly was slavery fixed in law and creed, in statute and Scripture, that the tongues of honest men were imprisoned. Those who spoke for the slave were mobbed by Northern lovers of the "Union."

Now, it seems to me that those were the days when the motto could properly have been, "Plundering Made Easy." Those were the days of brutality, and the brutality was practiced to the end that we might make money out of the unpaid labor of others.

It is not necessary to go into details as to the cause of the then condition; it is enough to say that the whole nation, North and South, was responsible. There were many years of compromise, and thousands of statesmen, so-called, through conventions and platforms, did what they could to preserve slavery and keep the Union. These efforts corrupted politics, demoralized our statesmen, polluted our courts, and poisoned our literature. The Websters, Bentons, and Clays mistook temporary expedients for principles, and really thought that the progress of the world could be stopped by the resolutions of a packed political convention. Yet these men, mistaken as they really were, worked and wrought unconsciously in the cause of human freedom. They believed that the preservation of the Union was the one important thing, and that it could not be preserved unless slavery was protected--unless the North would be faithful to the bargain as written in the Constitution. For the purpose of keeping the nation true to the Union and false to itself, these men exerted every faculty and all their strength. They exhausted their genius in showing that slavery was not, after all, very bad, and that disunion was the most terrible calamity that could by any possibility befall the nation, and that the Union, even at the price of slavery, was the greatest possible blessing. They did not suspect that slavery would finally strike the blow for disunion. But when the time came and the South unsheathed the sword, the teachings of these men as to the infinite value of the Union gave to our flag millions of brave defenders.

Now, let us see what has been accomplished during the thirty years of "Brutality and Avarice."

The Republic has been rebuilt and reunited, and we shall remain one people for many centuries to come. The Mississippi is nature's protest against disunion. The Constitution of the United States is now the charter of human freedom, and all laws inconsistent with the idea that all men are entitled to liberty have been repealed. The black man knows that the Constitution is his shield, that the laws protect him, that our flag is his, and the black mother feels that her babe belongs to her. Where the slave-pen used to be you will find the schoolhouse. The dealer in human flesh is now a teacher; instead of lacerating the back of a child, he develops and illumines the mind of a pupil.

There is now freedom of speech. Men are allowed to utter their thoughts. Lips are no longer sealed by mobs. Never before in the history of our world has so much been done for education.

The amount of business done in a country on credit is the measure of confidence, and confidence is based upon honesty. So it may truthfully be said that, where a vast deal of business is done on credit, an exceedingly large per cent. of the people are regarded as honest. In our country a very large per cent. of contracts are faithfully fulfilled. Probably there is no nation in the world where so much business is done on credit as in the United States. The fact that the credit of the Republic is second to that of no other nation on the globe would seem to be at least an indication of a somewhat general diffusion of honesty.

The author of "Brutality and Avarice Triumphant" seems to be of the opinion that our country was demoralized by the war. They who fight for the right are not degraded--they are ennobled. When men face death and march to the mouths of the guns for a principle, they grow great; and if they come out of the conflict, they come with added moral grandeur; they become better men, better citizens, and they love more intensely than ever the great cause for the success of which they put their lives in pawn.

The period of the Revolution produced great men. After the great victory the sons of the heroes degenerated, and some of the greatest principles involved in the Revolution were almost forgotten.

During the Civil war the North grew great and the South was educated. Never before in the history of mankind was there such a period of moral exaltation. The names that shed the brightest, the whitest light on the pages of our history became famous then. Against the few who were actuated by base and unworthy motives let us set the great army that fought for the Republic, the millions who bared their breasts to the storm, the hundreds and hundreds of thousands who did their duty honestly, nobly, and went back to their wives and children with no thought except to preserve the liberties of themselves and their fellow-men.

Of course there were some men who did not do their duty--some men false to themselves and to their country. No one expects to find sixty-five millions of saints in America. A few years ago a lady complained to the president of a Western railroad that a brakeman had spoken to her with great rudeness. The president expressed his regret at the incident, and said among other things: "Madam, you have no idea how difficult it is for us to get gentlemen to fill all those places."

It is hardly to be expected that the American people should excel all others in the arts, in poetry, and in fiction. We have been very busy taking possession of the Republic. It is hard to overestimate the courage, the industry, the self-denial it has required to fell the forests, to subdue the fields, to construct the roads, and to build the countless homes. What has been done is a certificate of the honesty and industry of our people.

It is not true that "one of the unwritten mottoes of our business morals seem to say in the plainest phraseology possible: 'Successful wrong is right.'" Men in this country are not esteemed simply because they are rich; inquiries are made as to how they made their money, as to how they use it. The American people do not fall upon their knees before the golden calf; the worst that can be said is that they think too much of the gold of the calf--and this distinction is seen by the calves themselves.

Nowhere in the world is honesty in business esteemed more highly than here. There are millions of business men--merchants, bankers, and men engaged in all trades and professions--to whom reputation is as dear as life.

There is one thing in the article "Brutality and Avarice Triumphant" that seems even more objectionable than the rest, and that is the statement, or, rather, the insinuation, that all the crimes and the shortcomings of the American people can be accounted for by the fact that our Government is a Republic. We are told that not long ago a French official complained to a friend that he was compelled to employ twenty clerks to do the work done by four under the empire, and on being asked the reason answered: "It is the Republic." He was told that, as he was the head of the bureau, he could prevent the abuse, to which he replied: "I know I have the power; but I have been in this position for more than thirty years, and am now too old to learn another occupation, and I _must_ make places for the friends of the deputies." And then it is added by General Hawkins: "_And so it is here_."

It seems to me that it cannot be fairly urged that we have abused the Indians because we contend that all men have equal rights before the law, or because we insist that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. The probability is that a careful reading of the history of the world will show that nations under the control of kings and emperors have been guilty of some cruelty. To account for the bad we do by the good we believe, is hardly logical. Our virtues should not be made responsible for our vices.

Is it possible that free institutions tend to the demoralization of men? Is a man dishonest because he is a man and maintains the rights of men? In order to be a moral nation must we be controlled by king or emperor? Is human liberty a mistake? Is it possible that a citizen of the great Republic attacks the liberty of his fellow-citizens? Is he willing to abdicate? Is he willing to admit that his rights are not equal to the rights of others? Is he, for the sake of what he calls morality, willing to become a serf, a servant or a slave?

Is it possible that "high character is impracticable" in this Republic? Is this the experience of the author of "Brutality and Avarice Triumphant"? Is it true that "intellectual achievement pays no dividends"? Is it not a fact that America is to-day the best market in the world for books, for music, and for art?

There is in our country no real foundation for these wide and sweeping slanders. This, in my judgment, is the best Government, the best country, in the world. The citizens of this Republic are, on the average, better clothed and fed and educated than any other people. They are fuller of life, more progressive, quicker to take advantage of the forces of nature, than any other of the children of men. Here the burdens of government are lightest, the responsibilities of the individual greatest, and here, in my judgment, are to be worked out the most important problems of social science.

Here in America is a finer sense of what is due from man to man than you will find in other lands. We do not cringe to those whom chance has crowned; we stand erect.

Our sympathies are strong and quick. Generosity is almost a national failing. The hand of honest want is rarely left unfilled. Great calamities open the hearts and hands of all.

Here you will find democracy in the family--republicanism by the fireside. Say what you will, the family is apt to be patterned after the government. If a king is at the head of the nation, the husband imagines himself the monarch of the home. In this country we have carried into the family the idea on which the Government is based. Here husbands and wives are beginning to be equals.

The highest test of civilization is the treatment of women and children. By this standard America stands first among nations.

There is a magnitude, a scope, a grandeur, about this country--an amplitude--that satisfies the heart and the imagination. We have our faults, we have our virtues, but our country is the best.

No American should ever write a line that can be sneeringly quoted by an enemy of the great Republic.

Robert G. Ingersoll.

A REPLY TO THE CINCINNATI GAZETTE AND CATHOLIC TELEGRAPH.

* The Cincinnati Gazette, 1878. An Interview.

_Question_. Colonel, have you noticed the criticisms made on your lectures by the _Cincinnati Gazette_ and the _Catholic Telegraph_?

_Answer._ I have read portions of the articles.

_Question_. What do you think of them?

_Answer._ Well, they are hardly of importance enough to form a distinct subject of thought.

_Question_. Well, what do you think of the attempted argument of the _Gazette_ against your lecture on Moses?

_Answer._ The writer endeavors to show that considering the ignorance prevalent four thousand years ago, God did as well as one could reasonably expect; that God at that time did not have the advantage of telescope, microscope, and spectrum, and that for this reason a few mistakes need not excite our special wonder. He also shows that, although God was in favor of slavery he introduced some reforms; but whether the reforms were intended to perpetuate slavery or to help the slave is not stated. The article has nothing to do with my position. I am perfectly willing to admit that there is a land called Egypt; that the Jews were once slaves; that they got away and started a little country of their own. All this may be true without proving that they were miraculously fed in the wilderness, or that water ran up hill, or that God went into partnership with hornets or snakes. There may have been a man by the name of Moses without proving that sticks were turned into snakes.

A while ago a missionary addressed a Sunday school. In the course of his remarks he said that he had been to Mount Ararat, and had brought a stone from the mountain. He requested the children to pass in line before him so that they could all get a look at this wonderful stone. After they had all seen it he said: "You will as you grow up meet people who will deny that there ever was a flood, or that God saved Noah and the animals in the ark, and then you can tell them that you know better, because you saw a stone from the very mountain where the ark rested."

That is precisely the kind of argument used in the _Gazette_. The article was written by some one who does not quite believe in the inspiration of the Scriptures himself, and were it not for the fear of hell, would probably say so.

I admit that there was such a man as Mohammed, such a city as Mecca, such a general as Omar, but I do not admit that God made known his will to Mohammed in any substantial manner. Of course the _Gazette_ would answer all this by saying that Mohammed did exist, and that therefore God must have talked with him. I admit that there was such a general as Washington, but I do not admit that God kept him from being shot. I admit that there is a portrait of the Virgin Mary in Rome, but I do not admit that it shed tears. I admit that there was such a man as Moses, but I do not admit that God hunted for him in a tavern to kill him. I admit that there was such a priest as St. Denis, but I do not admit that he carried his head in his hand, after it was cut off, and swam the river, and put his head on again and eventually recovered. I admit that the article appeared in the _Gazette_, but I do not admit that it amounted to anything whatever.

_Question_. Did you notice what the _Catholic Telegraph_ said about your lecture being ungrammatical?

_Answer._ Yes; I saw an extract from it. In the _Catholic Telegraph_ occurs the following: "The lecture was a failure as brilliant as Ingersoll's flashes of ungrammatical rhetoric." After making this statement with the hereditary arrogance of a priest, after finding fault with my "ungrammatical rhetoric" he then writes the following sentence: "It could not boast neither of novelty in argument or of attractive language." After this, nothing should be noticed that this gentleman says on the subject of grammar.

In this connection it may be proper for me to say that nothing is more remarkable than the fact that Christianity destroys manners. With one exception, no priest has ever written about me, so far as I know, except in an arrogant and insolent manner. They seem utterly devoid of the usual amenities of life. Every one who differs with them is vile, ignorant and malicious. But, after all, what can you expect of a gentleman who worships a God who will damn dimpled babes to an eternity of fire, simply because they were not baptized.

_Question_. This Catholic writer says that the oldest page of history and the newest page of science are nothing more than commentaries on the Mosaic Record. He says the Cosmogony of Moses has been believed in, and has been received as the highest truth by the very brightest names in science. What do you think of that statement?

_Answer._ I think it is without the least foundation in fact, and is substantially like the gentleman's theology, depending simply upon persistent assertion.

I see he quotes Cuvier as great authority. Cuvier denied that the fossil animals were in any way related to the animals now living, and believed that God had frequently destroyed all life upon the earth and then produced other forms. Agassiz was the last scientist of any standing who ventured to throw a crumb of comfort to this idea.

_Question_. Do you mean to say that all the great living scientists regard the Cosmogony of Moses as a myth?

_Answer._ I do. I say this: All men of science and men of sense look upon the Mosaic account as a simple myth. Humboldt, who stands in the same relation to science that Shakespeare did to the drama, held this opinion. The same is held by the best minds in Germany, by Huxley, Tyndall and Herbert Spencer in England, by John W. Draper and others in the United States. Whoever agrees with Moses is some poor frightened orthodox gentleman afraid of losing his soul or his salary, and as a rule, both are exceedingly small.

_Question_. Some people say that you slander the Bible in saying that God went into partnership with hornets, and declare that there is no such passage in the Bible.

_Answer._ Well, let them read the twenty-eighth verse of the twenty-third chapter of Exodus, "And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite and the Hittite from before thee."

_Question_. Do you find in lecturing through the country that your ideas are generally received with favor?

_Answer._ Astonishingly so. There are ten times as many freethinkers as there were five years ago. In five years more we will be in the majority.

_Question_. Is it true that the churches, as a general thing, make strong efforts, as I have seen it stated, to prevent people from going to hear you?

_Answer._ Yes; in many places ministers have advised their congregations to keep away, telling them I was an exceedingly dangerous man. The result has generally been a full house, and I have hardly ever failed to publicly return my thanks to the clergy for acting as my advance agents.

_Question_. Do you ever meet Christian people who try to convert you?

_Answer._ Not often. But I do receive a great many anonymous letters, threatening me with the wrath of God, and calling my attention to the uncertainty of life and the certainty of damnation. These letters are nearly all written in the ordinary Christian spirit; that is to say, full of hatred and impertinence.

_Question_. Don't you think it remarkable that the _Telegraph_, a Catholic paper, should quote with extravagant praise, an article from such an orthodox sheet as the _Gazette_?

_Answer._ I do not. All the churches must make common cause. All superstitions lead to Rome; all facts lead to science. In a few years all the churches will be united. This will unite all forms of liberalism. When that is done the days of superstition, of arrogance, of theology, will be numbered. It is very laughable to see a Catholic quoting scientific men in favor of Moses, when the same men would have taken great pleasure in swearing that the Catholic Church was the worst possible organization. That church should forever hold its peace. Wherever it has had authority it has destroyed human liberty. It reduced Italy to a hand organ, Spain to a guitar, Ireland to exile, Portugal to contempt. Catholicism is the upas tree in whose shade the intellect of man has withered. The recollection of the massacre of St. Bartholomew should make a priest silent, and the recollection of the same massacre should make a Protestant careful.

I can afford to be maligned by a priest, when the same party denounces Garibaldi, the hero of Italy, as a "pet tiger" to Victor Emmanuel. I could not afford to be praised by such a man. I thank him for his abuse.

_Question_. What do you think of the point that no one is able to judge of these things unless he is a Hebrew scholar?

_Answer._ I do not think it is necessary to understand Hebrew to decide as to the probability of springs gushing out of dead bones, or of the dead getting out of their graves, or of the probability of ravens keeping a hotel for wandering prophets. I hardly think it is necessary even to be a Greek scholar to make up my mind as to whether devils actually left a person and took refuge in the bodies of swine. Besides, if the Bible is not properly translated, the circulation ought to stop until the corrections are made. I am not accountable if God made a revelation to me in a language that he knew I never would understand. If he wishes to convey any information to my mind, he certainly should do it in English before he eternally damns me for paying no attention to it.

_Question_. Are not many of the contradictions in the Bible owing to mistranslations?

_Answer._ No. Nearly all of the mistranslations have been made to help out the text. It would be much worse, much more contradictory had it been correctly translated. Nearly all of the _mistakes_, as Mr. Weller would say, have been made for the purposes of harmony.

_Question_. How many errors do you suppose there are?