Part 22

Now in this year of 1893 a World's Fair answered this question in the negative, and a large majority of the citizens of the Republic say that the officers of the Fair have done right.

This marks an epoch in the history of the Sabbath. It is to be sacred in a religious sense in this country no longer. Henceforth in the United States the Sabbath is for the use of man.

Many of those who labored for the closing of the Fair on Sunday took the ground that if the gates were opened, God would visit this nation with famine, flood and fire.

It hardly seems possible that God will destroy thousands of women and children who had nothing to do with the opening of the Fair; still, if he is the same God described in the Christian Bible, he may destroy our babes as he did those of the Egyptians. It is a little hard to tell in advance what a God of that kind will do.

It was believed for many centuries that God punished the Sabbath-breaking individual and the Sabbath-breaking nation. Of course facts never had anything to do with this belief, and the prophecies of the pulpit were never fulfilled. People who were drowned on Sunday, according to the church, lost their lives by the will of God. Those drowned on other days were the victims of storm or accident. The nations that kept the Sabbath were no more prosperous than those that broke the sacred day. Certainly France is as prosperous as Scotland.

Let us hope, however, that these zealous gentlemen who have predicted calamities were mistaken; let us be glad that hundreds of thousands of workingmen and women will be delighted and refined by looking at the statues, the paintings, the machinery, and the countless articles of use and beauty gathered together at the great Fair, and let us be glad that on the one day that they can spare from toil, the gates will be open to them.

A TRIBUTE TO GEORGE JACOB HOLYOAKE.

TWO articles have recently appeared attacking the motives of George Jacob Holyoake. He is spoken of as a man governed by a desire to please the rich and powerful, as one afraid of public opinion and who in the perilous hour denies or conceals his convictions.

In these attacks there is not one word of truth. They are based upon mistakes and misconceptions.

There is not in this world a nobler, braver man. In England he has done more for the great cause of intellectual liberty than any other man of this generation. He has done more for the poor, for the children of toil, for the homeless and wretched than any other living man. He has attacked all abuses, all tyranny and all forms of hypocrisy. His weapons have been reason, logic, facts, kindness, and above all, example. He has lived his creed. He has won the admiration and respect of his bitterest antagonists. He has the simplicity of childhood, the enthusiasm of youth and the wisdom of age. He is not abusive, but he is clear and conclusive.. He is intense without violence--firm without anger. He has the strength of perfect kindness. He does not hate--he pities. He does not attack men and women, but dogmas and creeds. And he does not attack them to get the better of people, but to enable people to get the better of them. He gives the light he has. He shares his intellectual wealth with the orthodox poor. He assists without insulting, guides without arrogance, and enlightens without outrage. Besides, he is eminent for the exercise of plain common sense. He knows that there are wrongs besides those born of superstition--that people are not necessarily happy because they have renounced the Thirty-nine Articles--and that the priest is not the only enemy of mankind. He has for forty years been preaching and practicing industry, economy, self-reliance, and kindness. He has done all within his power to give the workingman a better home, better food, better wages, and better opportunities for the education of his children. He has demonstrated the success of co-operation--of intelligent combination for the common good. As a rule, his methods have been perfectly legal. In some instances he has knowingly violated the law, and did so with the intention to take the consequences. He would neither ask nor accept a pardon, because to receive a pardon carries with it the implied promise to keep the law, and an admission that you were in the wrong. He would not agree to desist from doing what he believed ought to be done, neither would he stain his past to brighten his future, nor imprison his soul to free his body. He has that happy mingling of gentleness and firmness found only in the highest type of moral heroes. He is an absolutely just man, and will never do an act that he would condemn in another. He admits that the most bigoted churchman has a perfect right to express his opinions not only, but that he must be met with argument couched in kind and candid terms. Mr. Holyoake is not only the enemy of a theological hierarchy, but he is also opposed to mental mobs. He will not use the bludgeon of epithet.

Perfect fairness is regarded by many as weakness. Some people have altogether more confidence in their beliefs than in their own arguments. They resort to assertion. If what they assert be denied, the "debate" becomes a question of veracity. On both sides of most questions there are plenty of persons who imagine that logic dwells only in adjectives, and that to speak kindly of an opponent is a virtual surrender.

Mr. Holyoake attacks the church because it has been, is, and ever will be the enemy of mental freedom, but he does not wish to deprive the church even of its freedom to express its opinion against freedom. He is true to his own creed, knowing that when we have freedom we can take care of all its enemies.

In one of the articles to which I have referred it is charged that Mr. Holyoake refused to sign a petition for the pardon of persons convicted of blasphemy. If this is true, he undoubtedly had a reason satisfactory to himself. You will find that his action, or his refusal to act, rests upon a principle that he would not violate in his own behalf.

Why should we suspect the motives of this man who has given his life for the good of others? I know of no one who is his mental or moral superior. He is the most disinterested of men. His name is a synonym of candor. He is a natural logician--an intellectual marksman. Like an unerring arrow his thought flies to the heart and center. He is governed by principle, and makes no exception in his own favor. He is intellectually honest. He shows you the cracks and flaws in his own wares. He calls attention to the open joints and to the weakest links. He does not want a victory for himself, but for truth. He wishes to expose and oppose, not men, but error. He is blessed with that cloudless mental vision that appearances cannot deceive, that interest cannot darken, and that even ingratitude cannot blur. Friends cannot induce and enemies cannot drive this man to do an act that his heart and brain would not applaud. That such a character was formed without the aid of the church, without the hope of harp or fear of flame, is a demonstration against the necessity of superstition.

Whoever is opposed to mental bondage, to the shackles wrought by cruelty and worn by fear, should be the friend of this heroic and unselfish man.

I know something of his life--something of what he has suffered--of what he has accomplished for his fellow-men. He has been maligned, imprisoned and impoverished. "He bore the heat and burden of the unregarded day" and "remembered the misery of the many." For years his only recompense was ingratitude. At last he was understood. He was recognized as an earnest, honest, gifted, generous, sterling man, loving his country, sympathizing with the poor, honoring the useful, and holding in supreme abhorrence tyranny and falsehood in all their forms. The idea that this man could for a moment be controlled by any selfish motive, by the hope of preferment, by the fear of losing a supposed annuity, is simply absurd. The authors of these attacks are not acquainted with Mr. Holyoake. Whoever dislikes him does not know him.

Read his "Trial of Theism"--his history of "Co-operation in England"--if you wish to know his heart--to discover the motives of his life--the depth and tenderness of his sympathy--the nobleness of his nature--the subtlety of his thought--the beauty of his spirit--the force and volume of his brain--the extent of his information--his candor, his kindness, his genius, and the perfect integrity of his stainless soul.

There is no man for whom I have greater respect, greater reverence, greater love, than George Jacob Holyoake.--

August 8, 1883.

AT THE GRAVE OF BENJAMIN W. PARKER.

* This was the first tribute ever delivered by Colonel Ingersoll at a grave. Mr. Parker himself was an Agnostic, was the father of Mrs. Ingersoll, and was always a devoted friend and admirer of the Colonel even before the latter's marriage with his daughter.

Peoria, Ill., May 24, 1876.

FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS: To fulfill a promise made many years ago, I wish to say a word.

He whom we are about to lay in the earth, was gentle, kind and loving in his life. He was ambitious only to live with those he loved. He was hospitable, generous, and sincere. He loved his friends, and the friends of his friends. He returned good for good. He lived the life of a child, and died without leaving in the memory of his family the record of an unkind act. Without assurance, and without fear, we give him back to Nature, the source and mother of us all.

With morn, with noon, with night; with changing clouds and changeless stars; with grass and trees and birds, with leaf and bud, with flower and blossoming vine,--with all the sweet influences of nature, we leave our dead.

Husband, father, friend, farewell.

A TRIBUTE TO EBON C. INGERSOLL

Washington, D. C., May 31, 1879.

* The funeral of the Hon. E. C. Ingersoll took place yesterday afternoon at four o'clock, from his late residence, 1403 K Street The only ceremony at the house, other than the viewing of the remains, was a most affecting pathetic, and touching address by Col. Robert G. ingersoll, brother of the deceased. Not only the speaker, but every one of his hearers were deeply affected. When he began to read his eloquent characterization of the dead man his eyes at once filled with tears. He tried to hide them, but he could not do it, and finally he bowed his head upon the dead man's coffin in uncontrollable grief It was only after some delay, and the greatest efforts a self-mastery, that Colonel Ingersoll was able to finish reading his address. When he had ceased speaking, the members of the bereaved family approached the casket and looked upon the form which it contained, for the last time. The scene was heartrending. The devotion of all connected with the household excited the sympathy of all and there was not a dry eye to be seen. The pall-bearers--Senator William B. Allison, Senator James G. Blaine, Senator David Davis, Senator Daniel W Voorhees. Representative James A. Garfield, Senator A. S Paddock, Representative Thomas Q. Boyd of Illinois, the Hon. Ward H. Lermon, ex-Congressman Jere Wilson, and Representative Adlai E. Stevenson of Illinois--then bore the remains to the hearse, and the lengthy cortege proceeded to the Oak Hill Cemetery, where the remains were interred, in the presence of the family and friends, without further ceremony.-- National Republican, Washington, D. C., June 3, 1879.

DEAR FRIENDS: I am going to do that which the dead oft promised he would do for me.

The loved and loving brother, husband, father, friend, died where manhood's morning almost touches noon, and while the shadows still were falling toward the west.

He had not passed on life's highway the stone that marks the highest point; but being weary for a moment, he lay down by the wayside, and using his burden for a pillow, fell into that dreamless sleep that kisses down his eyelids still. While yet in love with life and raptured with the world, he passed to silence and pathetic dust.

Yet, after all, it may be best, just in the happiest, sunniest hour of all the voyage, while eager winds are kissing every sail, to dash against the unseen rock, and in an instant hear the billows roar above a sunken ship. For whether in mid-sea or 'mong the breakers of the farther shore, a wreck at last must mark the end of each and all. And every life, no matter if its every hour is rich with love and every moment jeweled with a joy, will, at its close, become a tragedy as sad and deep and dark as can be woven of the warp and woof of mystery and death.

This brave and tender man in every storm of life was oak and rock; but in the sunshine he was vine and flower. He was the friend of all heroic souls. He climbed the heights, and left all superstitions far below, while on his forehead fell the golden dawning of the grander day.

He loved the beautiful, and was with color, form, and music touched to tears. He sided with the weak, the poor, and wronged, and lovingly gave alms. With loyal heart and with the purest hands he faithfully discharged all public trusts.

He was a worshiper of liberty, a friend of the oppressed. A thousand times I have heard him quote these words: "_For Justice all place a temple, and all season, summer_." He believed that happiness is the only good, reason the only torch, justice the only worship, humanity the only religion, and love the only priest. He added to the sum of human joy; and were every one to whom he did some loving service to bring a blossom to his grave, he would sleep tonight beneath a wilderness of flowers.

Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities. We strive in vain to look beyond the heights. We cry aloud, and the only answer is the echo of our wailing cry. From the voiceless lips of the unreplying dead there comes no word; but in the night of death hope sees a star and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing.

He who sleeps here, when dying, mistaking the approach of death for the return of health, whispered with his latest breath, "I am better now." Let us believe, in spite of doubts and dogmas, of fears and tears, that these dear words are true of all the countless dead.

The record of a generous life runs like a vine around the memory of our dead, and every sweet, unselfish act is now a perfumed flower.

And now, to you, who have been chosen, from among the many men he loved, to do the last sad office for the dead, we give his sacred dust.

Speech cannot contain our love. There was, there is, no gentler, stronger, manlier man.

A TRIBUTE TO THE REV. ALEXANDER CLARK.

Washington, D. C. July 13, 1879.

UPON the grave of the Reverend Alexander Clark I wish to place one flower. Utterly destitute of cold, dogmatic pride, that often passes for the love of God; without the arrogance of the "elect;" simple, free, and kind--this earnest man made me his friend by being mine. I forgot that he was a Christian, and he seemed to forget that I was not, while each remembered that the other was at least a man.

Frank, candid, and sincere, he practiced what he preached, and looked with the holy eyes of charity upon the failings and mistakes of men. He believed in the power of kindness, and spanned with divine sympathy the hideous gulf that separates the fallen from the pure.

Giving freely to others the rights that he claimed for himself, it never occurred to him that his God hated a brave and honest unbeliever. He remembered that even an Infidel had rights that love respects; that hatred has no saving power, and that in order to be a Christian it is not necessary to become less than a human being. He knew that no one can be maligned into kindness; that epithets cannot convince; that curses are not arguments, and that the finger of scorn never points toward heaven. With the generosity of an honest man, he accorded to all the fullest liberty of thought, knowing, as he did, that in the realm of mind a chain is but a curse.

For this man I felt the greatest possible regard. In spite of the taunts and jeers of his brethren, he publicly proclaimed that he would treat Infidels with fairness and respect; that he would endeavor to convince them by argument and win them with love. He insisted that the God he worshiped loved the well-being even of an Atheist. In this grand position he stood almost alone. Tender, just, and loving where others were harsh, vindictive, and cruel, he challenged the admiration of every honest man. A few more such clergymen might drive calumny from the lips of faith and render the pulpit worthy of esteem.

The heartiness and kindness with which this generous man treated me can never be excelled. He admitted that I had not lost, and could not lose, a single right by the expression of my honest thought. Neither did he believe that a servant could win the respect of a generous master by persecuting and maligning those whom the master would willingly forgive.

While this good man was living, his brethren blamed him for having treated me with fairness. But, I trust, now that he has left the shore touched by the mysterious sea that never yet has borne, on any wave, the image of a homeward sail, this crime will be forgiven him by those who still remain to preach the love of God.

His sympathies were not confined within the prison, of a creed, but ran out and over the walls like vines, hiding the cruel rocks and rusted bars with leaf and flower. He could not echo with his heart the fiendish sentence of eternal fire. In spite of book and creed, he read "between the lines" the words of tenderness and love, with promises for all the world.. Above, beyond, the dogmas of his church--humane even to the verge of heresy--causing some to doubt his love of God because he failed to hate his unbelieving fellow-men, he labored for the welfare of mankind and to his work gave up his life with all his heart.

AT A CHILD'S GRAVE.

Washington, D. C., January 8, 1882.

MY FRIENDS: I know how vain it is to gild a grief with words, and yet I wish to take from every grave its fear. Here in this world, where life and death are equal kings, all should be brave enough to meet what all the dead have met. The future has been filled with fear, stained and polluted by the heartless past. From the wondrous tree of life the buds and blossoms fall with ripened fruit, and in the common bed of earth, patriarchs and babes sleep side by side.

Why should we fear that which will come to all that is? We cannot tell, we do not know, which is the greater blessing--life or death. We cannot say that death is not a good. We do not know whether the grave is the end of this life, or the door of another, or whether the night here is not somewhere else a dawn. Neither can we tell which is the more fortunate--the child dying in its mother's arms, before its lips have learned to form a word, or he who journeys all the length of life's uneven road, painfully taking the last slow steps with staff and crutch.

Every cradle asks us "Whence?" and every coffin "Whither?" The poor barbarian, weeping above his dead, can answer these questions just as well as the robed priest of the most authentic creed. The tearful ignorance of the one, is as consoling as the learned and unmeaning words of the other. No man, standing where the horizon of a life has touched a grave, has any right to prophesy a future filled with pain and tears.

May be that death gives all there is of worth to life. If those we press and strain within our arms could never die, perhaps that love would wither from the earth. May be this common fate treads from out the paths between our hearts the weeds of selfishness and hate. And I had rather live and love where death is king, than have eternal life where love is not. Another life is nought, unless we know and love again the ones who love us here.

They who stand with breaking hearts around this little grave, need have no fear. The larger and the nobler faith in all that is, and is to be, tells us that death, even at its worst, is only perfect rest. We know that through the common wants of life--the needs and duties of each hour--their grief will lessen day by day, until at last this grave will be to them a place of rest and peace--almost of joy. There is for them this consolation: The dead do not suffer. If they live again, their lives will surely be as good as ours. We have no fear. We are all children of the same mother, and the same fate awaits us all. We, too, have our religion, and it is this: Help for the living--Hope for the dead.

A TRIBUTE TO JOHN G. MILLS.

Washington, D. C., April 15, 1883.

MY FRIENDS: Again we are face to face with the great mystery that shrouds this world. We question, but there is no reply. Out on the wide waste seas, there drifts no spar. Over the desert of death the sphinx gazes forever, but never speaks.

In the very May of life another heart has ceased to beat. Night has fallen upon noon. But he lived, he loved, he was loved. Wife and children pressed their kisses on his lips. This is enough. The longest life contains no more. This fills the vase of joy.

He who lies here, clothed with the perfect peace of death, was a kind and loving husband, a good father, a generous neighbor, an honest man,--and these words build a monument of glory above the humblest grave. He was always a child, sincere and frank, as full of hope as Spring. He divided all time into to-day and to-morrow. To-morrow was without a cloud, and of to-morrow he borrowed sunshine for to-day. He was my friend. He will remain so. The living oft become estranged; the dead are true. He was not a Christian. In the Eden of his hope there did not crawl and coil the serpent of eternal pain. In many languages he sought the thoughts of men, and for himself he solved the problems of the world. He accepted the philosophy of Auguste Comte. Humanity was his God; the human race was his Supreme Being. In that Supreme Being he put his trust. He believed that we are indebted for what we enjoy to the labor, the self-denial, the heroism of the human race, and that as we have plucked the fruit of what others planted, we in thankfulness should plant for others yet to be.

With him immortality was the eternal consequences of his own acts. He believed that every pure thought, every disinterested deed, hastens the harvest of universal good. This is a religion that enriches poverty; that enables us to bear the sorrows of the saddest life; that peoples even solitude with the happy millions yet to live,--a religion born not of selfishness and fear, but of love, of gratitude, and hope,--a religion that digs wells to slake the thirst of others, and gladly bears the burdens of the unborn.

But in the presence of death, how beliefs and dogmas wither and decay! How loving words and deeds burst into blossom! Pluck from the tree of any life these flowers, and there remain but the barren thorns of bigotry and creed.