The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll Volume VI Part 21

Do you mean to say that because pa.s.sion and prejudice, the reckless "pilots 'twixt the dangerous sh.o.r.es of will and judgment," sway the mind, that the opinions which you have expressed in your Remarks to me are not your opinions? Certainly you will admit that in all probability you have prejudices and pa.s.sions, and if so, can the opinions that you have expressed, according to your argument, be honest? My lack of confidence in your argument gives me perfect confidence in your candor.

You may remember the philosopher who retained his reputation for veracity, in spite of the fact that he kept saying: "There is no truth in man."

Are only those opinions honest that are formed without any interference of pa.s.sion, affection, habit or fancy? What would the opinion of a man without pa.s.sions, affections, or fancies be worth? The alchemist gave up his search for an universal solvent upon being asked in what kind of vessel he expected to keep it when found.

It may be admitted that Biel "shows us how the life of Dante co-operated with his extraordinary natural gifts and capabilities to make him what he was," but does this tend to show that Dante changed his opinions by an act of his will, or that he reached honest opinions by knowingly using false weights and measures?

You must admit that the opinions, habits and religions of men depend, at least in some degree, on race, occupation, training and capacity. Is not every thoughtful man compelled to agree with Edgar Fawcett, in whose brain are united the beauty of the poet and the subtlety of the logician,

"Who sees how vice her venom wreaks On the frail babe before it speaks, And how heredity enslaves With ghostly hands that reach from graves"?

Why do you hold the intellect criminally responsible for opinions, when you admit that it is controlled by the will? And why do you hold the will responsible, when you insist that it is swayed by the pa.s.sions and affections? But all this has nothing to do with the fact that every opinion has been honestly formed, whether honestly expressed or not.

No one pretends that all governments have been honestly formed and honestly administered. All vices, and some virtues are represented in most nations. In my opinion a republic is far better than a monarchy.

The legally expressed will of the people is the only rightful sovereign.

This sovereignty, however, does not embrace the realm of thought or opinion. In that world, each human being is a sovereign,--throned and crowned: One is a majority. The good citizens of that realm give to others all rights that they claim for themselves, and those who appeal to force are the only traitors.

The existence of theological despotisms, of G.o.d-anointed kings, does not tend to prove that a known prejudice can determine the weight of evidence. When men were so ignorant as to suppose that G.o.d would destroy them unless they burned heretics, they lighted the f.a.gots in selfdefence.

Feeling as I do that man is not responsible for his opinions, I characterized persecution for opinion's sake as infamous. So, it is perfectly clear to me, that it would be the infamy of infamies for an infinite being to create vast numbers of men knowing that they would suffer eternal pain. If an infinite G.o.d creates a man on purpose to d.a.m.n him, or creates him knowing that he will be d.a.m.ned, is not the crime the same? We make mistakes and failures because we are finite; but can you conceive of any excuse for an infinite being who creates failures? If you had the power to change, by a wish, a statue into a human being, and you knew that this being would die without a "change of heart" and suffer endless pain, what would you do?

Can you think of any excuse for an earthly father, who, having wealth, learning and leisure, leaves his own children in ignorance and darkness?

Do you believe that a G.o.d of infinite wisdom, justice and love, called countless generations of men into being, knowing that they would be used as fuel for the eternal fire?

Many will regret that you did not give your views upon the main questions--the princ.i.p.al issues--involved, instead of calling attention, for the most part, to the unimportant. If men were discussing the causes and results of the Franco-Prussian war, it would hardly be worth while for a third person to interrupt the argument for the purpose of calling attention to a misspelled word in the terms of surrender.

If we admit that man is responsible for his opinions and his thoughts, and that his will is perfectly free, still these admissions do not even tend to prove the inspiration of the Bible, or the "divine scheme of redemption."

In my judgment, the days of the supernatural are numbered. The dogma of inspiration must be abandoned. As man advances,--as his intellect enlarges,--as his knowledge increases,--as his ideals become n.o.bler, the bibles and creeds will lose their authority--the miraculous will be cla.s.sed with the impossible, and the idea of special providence will be discarded. Thousands of religions have perished, innumerable G.o.ds have died, and why should the religion of our time be exempt from the common fate?

Creeds cannot remain permanent in a world in which knowledge increases.

Science and superst.i.tion cannot peaceably occupy the same brain. This is an age of investigation, of discovery and thought. Science destroys the dogmas that mislead the mind and waste the energies of man. It points out the ends that can be accomplished; takes into consideration the limits of our faculties; fixes our attention on the affairs of this world, and erects beacons of warning on the dangerous sh.o.r.es. It seeks to ascertain the conditions of health, to the end that life may be enriched and lengthened, and it reads with a smile this pa.s.sage:

"And G.o.d-wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul, so that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or ap.r.o.ns, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them."

Science is the enemy of fear and credulity. It invites investigation, challenges the reason, stimulates inquiry, and welcomes the unbeliever.

It seeks to give food and shelter, and raiment, education and liberty to the human race. It welcomes every fact and every truth. It has furnished a foundation for morals, a philosophy for the guidance of man. From all books it selects the good, and from all theories, the true. It seeks to civilize the human race by the cultivation of the intellect and'

heart. It refines through art, music and the drama--giving voice and expression to every n.o.ble thought. The mysterious does not excite the feeling of wors.h.i.+p, but the ambition to understand. It does not pray--it works. It does not answer inquiry with the malicious cry of "blasphemy."

Its feelings are not hurt by contradiction, neither does it ask to be protected by law from the laughter of heretics. It has taught man that he cannot walk beyond the horizon--that the questions of origin and destiny cannot be answered--that an infinite personality cannot be comprehended by a finite being, and that the truth of any system of religion based on the supernatural cannot by any possibility be established--such a religion not being within the domain of evidence.

And, above all, it teaches that all our duties are here--that all our obligations are to sentient beings; that intelligence, guided by kindness, is the highest possible wisdom; and that "man believes not what he would, but what he can."

And after all, it may be that "to ride an unbroken horse with the reins thrown upon his neck"--as you charge me with doing--gives a greater variety of sensations, a keener delight, and a better prospect of winning the race than to sit solemnly astride of a dead one, in "a deep reverential calm," with the bridle firmly in your hand.

Again a.s.suring you of my profound respect, I remain, Sincerely yours,

Robert G. Ingersoll.

ROME OR REASON.

Col. Ingersoll and Cardinal Manning.

The Gladstone-Ingersoll Controversy.

THE CHURCH ITS OWN WITNESS, By Cardinal Manning.

THE Vatican Council, in its Decree on Faith has these words: "The Church itself, by its marvelous propagation, its eminent sanct.i.ty, its inexhaustible fruitfulness in all good things, its catholic unity and invincible stability, is a vast and perpetual motive of credibility, and an irrefragable witness of its own Divine legation."* Its Divine Founder said: "I am the light of the world;" and, to His Apostles, He said also, "Ye are the light of the world," and of His Church He added, "A city seated on a hill cannot be hid." The Vatican Council says, "The Church is its own witness." My purpose is to draw out this a.s.sertion more fully.

* "Const. Dogm. de Fide Catholica, c. iii.

These words affirm that the Church is self-evident, as light is to the eye, and through sense, to the intellect. Next to the sun at noonday, there is nothing in the world more manifest than the one visible Universal Church. Both the faith and the infidelity of the world bear witness to it. It is loved and hated, trusted and feared, served and a.s.saulted, honored and blasphemed: it is Christ or Antichrist, the Kingdom of G.o.d or the imposture of Satan. It pervades the civilized world. No man and no nation can ignore it, none can be indifferent to it. Why is all this? How is its existence to be accounted for?

Let me suppose that I am an unbeliever in Christianity, and that some friend should make me promise to examine the evidence to show that Christianity is a Divine revelation; I should then sift and test the evidence as strictly as if it were in a court of law, and in a cause of life and death; my will would be in suspense: it would in no way control the process of my intellect. If it had any inclination from the equilibrium, it would be towards mercy and hope; but this would not add a feather's weight to the evidence, nor sway the intellect a hair's breadth.

After the examination has been completed, and my intellect convinced, the evidence being sufficient to prove that Christianity is a divine revelation, nevertheless I am not yet a Christian. All this sifting brings me to the conclusion of a chain of reasoning; but I am not yet a believer. The last act of reason has brought me to the brink of the first act of faith. They are generically distinct and separable. The acts of reason are intellectual, and jealous of the interference of the will. The act of faith is an imperative act of the will, founded on and justified by the process and conviction of the intellect. Hitherto I have been a critic: henceforward, if I will, I become a disciple.

It may here be objected that no man can so far suspend the inclination of the will when the question is, has G.o.d indeed spoken to man or no? is the revealed law of purity, generosity, perfection, divine, or only the poetry of imagination? Can a man be indifferent between two such sides of the problem? Will he not desire the higher and better side to be true? and if he desire, will he not incline to the side that he desires to find true? Can a moral being be absolutely indifferent between two such issues? and can two such issues be equally attractive to a moral agent? Can it be indifferent and all the same to us whether G.o.d has made Himself and His will known to us or not? Is there no attraction in light, no repulsion in darkness? Does not the intrinsic and eternal distinction of good and evil make itself felt in spite of the will?

Are we not responsible to "receive the truth in the love of it?"

Nevertheless, evidence has its own limits and quant.i.ties, and cannot be made more or less by any act of the will. And yet, what is good or bad, high or mean, lovely or hateful, enn.o.bling or degrading, must attract or repel men as they are better or worse in their moral sense; for an equilibrium between good and evil, to G.o.d or to man, is impossible.

The last act of my reason, then, is distinct from my first act of faith precisely in this: so long as I was uncertain I suspended the inclination of my will, as an act of fidelity to conscience and of loyalty to truth; but the process once complete, and the conviction once attained, my will imperatively constrains me to believe, and I become a disciple of a Divine revelation.

My friend next tells me that there are Christian Scriptures, and I go through precisely the same process of critical examination and final conviction, the last act of reasoning preceding, as before, the first act of faith.

He then tells me that there is a Church claiming to be divinely founded, divinely guarded, and divinely guided in its custody of Christianity and of the Christian Scriptures.

Once more I have the same twofold process of reasoning and of believing to go through.

There is, however, this difference in the subject-matter: Christianity is an order of supernatural truth appealing intellectually to my reason; the Christian Scriptures are voiceless, and need a witness. They cannot prove their own mission, much less their own authenticity or inspiration. But the Church is visible to the eye, audible to the ear, self-manifesting and self-a.s.serting: I cannot escape from it. If I go to the east, it is there; if I go to the west, it is there also. If I stay at home, it is before me, seated on the hill; if I turn away from it, I am surrounded by its light. It pursues me and calls to me. I cannot deny its existence; I cannot be indifferent to it; I must either listen to it or willfully stop my ears; I must heed it or defy it, love it or hate it. But my first att.i.tude towards it is to try it with forensic strictness, neither p.r.o.nouncing it to be Christ nor Antichrist till I have tested its origin, claim, and character. Let us take down the case in short-hand.

1. It says that it interpenetrates all the nations of the civilized world. In some it holds the whole nation in its unity, in others it holds fewer; but in all it is present, visible, audible, naturalized, and known as the one Catholic Church, a name that none can appropriate.

Though often claimed and controversially a.s.sumed, none can retain it; it falls off. The world knows only one Catholic Church, and always restores the name to the right owner.

2. It is not a national body, but extra-national, accused of its foreign relations and foreign dependence. It is international, and independent in a supernational unity.

3. In faith, divine wors.h.i.+p, sacred ceremonial, discipline, government, from the highest to the lowest, it is the same in every place.

4. It speaks all languages in the civilized world.

5. It is obedient to one Head, outside of all nations, except one only; and in that nation, his heads.h.i.+p is not national but world-wide.

6. The world-wide sympathy of the Church in all lands with its Head has been manifested in our days, and before our eyes, by a series of public a.s.semblages in Rome, of which nothing like or second to it can be found. In 1854, 350 Bishops of all nations surrounded their Head when he defined the Immaculate Conception. In 1862, 400 Bishops a.s.sembled at the canonization of the Martyrs of j.a.pan. In 1867, 500 Bishops came to keep the eighteenth centenary of St. Peter's martyrdom. In 1870, 700 Bishops a.s.sembled in the Vatican Council. On the Feast of the Epiphany, 1870, the Bishops of thirty nations during two whole hours made profession of faith in their own languages, kneeling before their head. Add to this, that in 1869, in the sacerdotal jubilee of Pius IX., Rome was filled for months by pilgrims from all lands in Europe and beyond the sea, from the Old World and from the New, bearing all manner of gifts and oblations to the Head of the Universal Church. To this, again, must be added the world-wide outcry and protest of all the Catholic unity against the seizure and sacrilege of September, 1870, when Rome was taken by the Italian Revolution.

7. All this came to pa.s.s not only by reason of the great love of the Catholic world for Pius IX., but because they revered him as the successor of St. Peter and the Vicar of Jesus Christ. For that undying reason the same events have been reproduced in the time of Leo XIII. In the early months of this year Rome was once more filled with pilgrims of all nations, coming in thousands as representatives of millions in all nations, to celebrate the sacerdotal jubilee of the Sovereign Pontiff.