Ingersollia / Gems of Thought from the Lectures, Speeches, and Conversations of Col. Robert G. Ingersoll, Representative of His Opinions and Beliefs

INGERSOLL'S ORATION AT HIS BROTHER'S GRAVE

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 was 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 to-night beneath a wilderness of sweet 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.

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.

INGERSOLL'S DREAM OF THE WAR

The past, as it were, rises before me like a dream. Again we are in the great struggle for national life. We hear the sound of preparation—the music of the boisterous drums—the silver voices of heroic bugles. We see thousands of assemblages, and hear the appeals of orators; we see the pale cheeks of women, and the flushed faces of men; and in those assemblages we see all the dead whose dust we have covered with flowers. We lose sight of them no more. We are with them when they enlist in the great army of freedom. We see them part with those they love. Some are walking for the last time in quiet, woody places with the maidens they adore. We hear the whisperings and the sweet vows of eternal love as they lingeringly part forever. Others are bending over cradles kissing babes that are asleep.

Some are receiving the blessings of old men. Some are parting with mothers who hold them and press them to their hearts again and again, and say nothing; and some are talking with wives, and endeavoring with brave words spoken in the old tones to drive away the awful fear. We see them part. We see the wife standing in the door with the babe in her arms—standing in the sunlight sobbing—at the turn of the road a hand waves—she answers by holding high in her loving hands the child. He is gone, and forever.

We see them all as they march proudly away under the flaunting flags, keeping time to the wild music of war—marching down the streets of the great cities—through the towns and across the prairies—down to the fields of glory, and do and to die for the eternal right.

We go with them one and all. We are by their side on all the gory fields, in all the hospitals of pain—on all the weary marches. We stand guard with them in the wild storm and under the quiet stars. We are with them in ravines running with blood—in the furrows of old fields. We are with them between contending hosts, unable to move, wild with thirst, the life ebbing slowly away among the withered leaves. We see them pierced by balls and torn with shells in the trenches of forts, and in the whirlwind of the charge, where men become iron with nerves of steel.

We are with them in the prisons of hatred and famine, but human speech can never tell what they endured.

We are at home when the news comes that they are dead. We see the maiden in the shadow of her sorrow. We see the silvered head of the old man bowed with the last grief.

The past rises before us, and we see four millions of human beings governed by the lash—we see them bound hand and foot—we hear the strokes of cruel whips—we see the hounds tracking women through tangled swamps. We see babes sold from the breasts of mothers. Cruelty unspeakable! Outrage infinite!

Four million bodies in chains—four million souls in fetters. All the sacred relations of wife, mother, father and child trampled beneath the brutal feet of might. All this was done under our own beautiful banner of the free.

The past rises before us. We hear the roar and shriek of the bursting shell. The broken fetters fall. There heroes died. We look. Instead of slaves we see men and women and children. The wand of progress touches the auction-block, the slave-pen, and the whipping-post, and we see homes and firesides, and school-houses and books, and where all was want and crime, and cruelty and fear, we see the faces of the free.

These heroes are dead. They died for liberty—they died for us. They are at rest, They sleep in the land they made free, under the flag they rendered stainless, under the solemn pines, the sad hemlocks, the tearful willows, the embracing vines. They sleep beneath the shadows of the clouds, careless alike of sunshine or storm, each in the window-less palace of rest. Earth may run red with other wars—they are at peace. In the midst of battle, in the roar of conflict, they found the serenity of death. I have one sentiment for the soldiers living and dead—cheers for the living and tears for the dead.

EPIGRAMS.

It is not necessary to be a pig in order to raise one.

Houses makes patriots.

A blow from a parent leaves a scar on the soul of the child.

Free speech is the brain of the Republic.

A mortgage casts a shadow on the sunniest field.

Agriculture is the basis of all wealth.

Every man should endeavor to belong to himself.

It is better to be a whole farmer than part of a mechanic.

Nothing is ever made by rascality.

One good school-master is worth a thousand priests.

A lie will not fit a fact.

Out in the intellectual sea there is room for every sail.

An honest God is the noblest work of man.

To plow is to pray.

Progress is born of courage. Fear paralyzes the brain.

DEFINITIONS.

A King is a non-producing thief, sitting on a throne, surrounded by vermin.

Whiskey is the son of villainies, the father of all crimes, the mother of all abominations, the devil's best friend, and God's worst enemy.

An Orthodox Man is a gentleman petrified in his mind.

Heresy is a cradle.

Orthodoxy is a coffin.

Chicago is a marvel of energy, a miracle of nerva

The Pulpit is a pillory.

Theology is a superstition.

Humanity is the only religion.

A Republican is a man who loves something.

A Democrat is a man who hates something.

Germany is the Land of Science.

Civilization is the Child of Forethought

Prejudice is the Child of Ignorance.

Infidelity is Liberty.

Religion is Slavery.

BELIEFS.

I believe in absolute intellectual liberty. I believe in American labor. I believe in the democracy of the fireside, in the republicanism of the home.

I believe in liberty, always and everywhere. I believe in truth, in investigation, in forethought.

I believe in the gospel of education, of cheerfulness, of justice and intelligence.