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CENTENNIAL ORATION. 1
ORGANIZED CHARITIES. 14
THE BIGOTRY OF COLLEGES. 17
**** ****
This file, its printout, or copies of either
are to be copied and given away, but NOT sold.
Bank of Wisdom, Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
The Works of ROBERT G. INGERSOLL
**** ****
CENTENNIAL ORATION.
One hundred years ago, our fathers retired the gods from
politics.
THE Declaration of Independence is the grandest, the bravest,
and the profoundest political document that was ever signed by the
representatives of a people. It is the embodiment of physical and
moral courage and of political wisdom.
I say of physical courage, because it was a declaration of war
against the most powerful nation then on the globe; a declaration
of war by thirteen weak, unorganized colonies; a declaration of war
by a few people, without military stores, without wealth, without
strength, against the most powerful kingdom on the earth; a
declaration of war made when the British navy, at that day the
mistress of every sea, was hovering along the coast of America,
looking after defenseless towns and villages to ravage and destroy.
It was made when thousands of English soldiers were upon our soil,
and when the principal cities of America were in the substantial
possession of the enemy. And so, I say, all things considered, it
was the bravest political document ever signed by man. And if it
was physically brave, the moral courage of the document is almost
infinitely beyond the physical. They had the courage not only, but
they had the almost infinite wisdom, to declare that all men are
created equal.
Such things had occasionally been said by some political
enthusiast in the olden time, but, for the first time in the
history of the world, the representatives of a nation, the
representatives of a real, living, breathing, hoping people,
declared that all men are created equal. With one blow, with one
stroke of the pen, they struck down all the cruel, heartless
barriers that aristocracy, that priestcraft, that king-craft had
raised between man and man. They struck down with one immortal blow
that infamous spirit of caste that makes a God almost a beast, and
a beast almost a god. With one word, with one blow, they wiped away
and utterly destroyed, all that had been done by centuries of war
-- centuries of hypocrisy -- centuries of injustice.
What more did they do? They then declared that each man has a
right to live. And what does that mean? It means that he has the
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
right to make his living. It means that he has the right to breathe
the air, to work the land, that he stands the equal of every other
human being beneath the shining stars; entitled to the product of
his labor -- the labor of his hand and of his brain.
What more? That every man has the right to pursue his own
happiness in his own way. Grander words than. these have never been
spoken by man.
And what more did these men say? They laid down the doctrine
that governments were instituted among men for the purpose of
preserving the rights of the people. The old idea was that people
existed solely for the benefit of the state -- that is to say, for
kings and nobles.
The old idea was that the people were the wards of king and
priest -- that their bodies belonged to one and their souls to the
other.
And what more? That the people are the source of political
power. That was not only a revelation, but it was a revolution. It
changed the ideas of people with regard to the source of political
power. For the first time it made human beings men. What was the
old idea? The old idea was that no political power came from, or in
any manner belonged to, the people. The old idea was that the
political power came from the clouds; that the political power came
in some miraculous way from heaven; that it came down to kings, and
queens, and robbers. That was the old idea. The nobles lived upon
the labor of the people; the people had no rights; the nobles stole
what they had and divided with the kings, and the kings pretended
to divide what they stole with God Almighty. The source, then, of
political power was from above. The people were responsible to the
nobles, the nobles to the king, and the people had no political
rights whatever, no more than the wild beasts of the forest. The
kings were responsible to God; not to the people. The kings were
responsible to the clouds; not to the toiling millions they robbed
and plundered.
And our forefathers, in this Declaration of Independence,
reversed this thing, and said: No; the people, they are the source
of political power, and their rulers, these presidents, these kings
are but the agents and servants of the great sublime people. For
the first time, really, in the history of the world, the king was
made to get off the throne and the people were royally seated
thereon. The people became the sovereigns, and the old sovereigns
became the servants and the agents of the people. It is hard for
you and me now to even imagine the immense results of that change.
It is hard for you and for me, at this day, to understand how
thoroughly it had been ingrained in the brain of almost every man
that the king had some wonderful right over him that in some
strange way the king owned him; that in some miraculous manner he
belonged, body and soul, to somebody who rode on a horse -- to
somebody with epaulets on his shoulders and a tinsel crown upon his
brainless head.
Our forefathers had been educated in that idea, and when they
first landed on American shores they believed it. They thought they
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
belonged to somebody, and that they must be loyal to some thief who
could trace his pedigree back to antiquity's most successful
robber.
It took a long time for them to get that idea out of their
heads and hearts. They were three thousand miles away from the
despotisms of the old world, and every wave of the sea was an
assistant to them. The distance helped to disenchant their minds of
that infamous belief, and every mile between them and the pomp and
glory of monarchy helped to put republican ideas and thoughts into
their minds. Besides that, when they came to this country, when the
savage was in the forest and three thousand miles of waves on the
other side, menaced by barbarians on the one hand and famine on the
other, they learned that a man who had courage, a man who had
thought, was as good as any other man in the world, and they built
up, as it were, in spite of themselves, little republics. And the
man that had the most nerve and heart was the best man, whether he
had any noble blood in his veins or not.
It has been a favorite idea with me that our fore-fathers were
educated by Nature, that they grew grand as the continent upon
which they landed; that the great rivers -- the wide plains -- the
splendid lakes -- the lonely forests -- the sublime mountains --
that all these things stole into and became a part of their being,
and they grew great as the country in which they lived. They began
to hate the narrow, contracted views of Europe. They were educated
by their surroundings, and every little colony had to be to a
certain extent a republic. The kings of the old world endeavored to
parcel out this land to their favorites. But there were too many
Indians. There was too much courage required for them to take and
keep it, and so men had to come here who were dissatisfied with the
old country -- who were dissatisfied with England, dissatisfied
with France, with Germany, with Ireland and Holland. The kings'
favorites stayed at home. Men came here for liberty, and on account
of certain principles they entertained and held dearer than life.
And they were willing to work, willing to fell the forests, to
fight the savages, willing to go through all the hardships, perils
and dangers of a new country, of a new land; and the consequence
was that our country was settled by brave and adventurous spirits,
by men who had opinions of their own and were willing to live in
the wild forests for the sake of expressing those opinions, even if
they expressed them only to trees, rocks, and savage men. The best
blood of the old world came to the new.
When they first came over they did not have a great deal of
political philosophy, nor the best ideas of liberty. We might as
well tell the truth. When the Puritans first came, they were
narrow. They did not understand what liberty meant -- what
religious liberty, what political liberty, was; but they found out
in a few years. There was one feeling among them that rises to
their eternal honor like a white shaft to the clouds -- they were
in favor of universal education. Wherever they went they built
schoolhouses, introduced books and ideas of literature. They
believed that every man should know how to read and how to write,
and should find out all that his capacity allowed him to
comprehend. That is the glory of the Puritan fathers.
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
They forgot in a little while what they had suffered, and they
forgot to apply the principle of universal liberty -- of
toleration. Some of the colonies did not forget it, and I want to
give credit where credit should be given. The Catholics of Maryland
were the first people on the new continent to declare universal
religious toleration. Let this be remembered to their eternal
honor. Let it be remembered to the disgrace of the Protestant
government of England, that it caused this grand law to be
repealed. And to the honor and credit of the Catholics of Maryland
let it be remembered that the moment they got back into power they
re-enacted the old law. The Baptists of Rhode Island also, led by
Roger Williams, were in favor of universal religious liberty.
No American should fail to honor Roger Williams. He was the
first grand advocate of the liberty of the soul. He was in favor of
the eternal divorce of church and state. So far as I know, he was
the only man at that time in this country who was in favor of real
religious liberty. While the Catholics of Maryland declared in
favor of religious toleration, they had no idea of religious
liberty, They would not allow anyone to call in question the
doctrine of the Trinity, or the inspiration of the Scriptures. They
stood ready with branding-iron and gallows to burn and choke out of
man the idea that, he had a fight to think and to express his
thoughts.
So many religions met in our country -- so many theories and
dogmas came in contact -- so many follies, mistakes, and
stupidities became acquainted with each other, that religion began
to fall somewhat into disrepute. Besides this, the question of a
new nation began to take precedence of all others.
The people were too much interested in this world to quarrel
about the next. The preacher was lost in the patriot. The Bible was
read to find passages against kings.
Everybody was discussing the rights of man. Farmers and
mechanics suddenly became statesmen, and in every shop and cabin
nearly every question was asked and answered.
During these years of political excitement the interest in
religion abated to that degree that a common purpose animated men
of all sects and creeds.
At last our fathers became tired of being colonists -- tired
of writing and reading and signing petitions, and presenting them
on their bended knees to an idiot king. They began to have an
aspiration to form a new nation, to be citizens of a new republic
instead of subjects of an old monarchy. They had the idea -- the
Puritans, the Catholics, the Episcopalians, the Baptists, the
Quakers, and a few Freethinkers, all had the idea -- that they
would like to form a new nation.
Now, do not understand that all of our fathers were in favor
of independence. Do not understand that they were all like
Jefferson; that they were all like Adams or Lee; that they were all
like Thomas Paine or John Hancock. There were thousands and
thousands of them who were opposed to American independence. There
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
were thousands and thousands who said: "When you say men are
created equal, it is a lie when you say the political power resides
in the great body of the people, it is false." Thousands and
thousands of them said: "We prefer Great Britain." But the men who
were in favor of independence, the men who knew that a new nation
must be born, went on full of hope and courage, and nothing could
daunt or stop or stay the heroic, fearless few.
They met in Philadelphia; and the resolution was moved by Lee
of Virginia, that the colonies ought to be independent states, and
ought to dissolve their political connection with Great Britain.
They made up their minds that a new nation must be formed. All
nations had been, so to speak, the wards of some church. The
religious idea as to the source of power had been at the foundation
of all governments, and had been the bane and curse of man.
Happily for us, there was no church strong enough to dictate
to the rest. Fortunately for us, the colonists not only, but the
colonies differed widely in their religious views. There were the
Puritans who hated the Episcopalians, and Episcopalians who hated
the Catholics, and the Catholics who hated both, while the Quakers
held them all in contempt. There they were, of every sort, and
color and kind, and how was it that they came together? They had a
common aspiration. They wanted to form a new nation. More than
that, most of them cordially hated Great Britain; and they pledged
each other to forget these religious prejudices, for a time at
least, and agreed that there should be only one religion until they
got through, and that was the religion of patriotism. They solemnly
agreed that the new nation should not belong to any particular
church, but that it should secure the rights of all.
Our fathers founded the first secular government that was ever
founded in this world. Recollect that. The first secular
government; the first government that said every church has exactly
the same rights and no more; every religion has the same rights,
and no more. In other words, our fathers were the first men who had
the sense, had the genius, to know that no church should be allowed
to have a sword; thai it should be allowed only to exert its moral
influence.
You might as well have a government united by force with Art,
or with Poetry, or with Oratory, as with Religion. Religion should
have the influence upon mankind that its goodness, that its
morality, its justice, its charity, its reason, and its argument
give it, and no more. Religion should have the effect upon mankind
that it necessarily has, and no more. The religion that has to be
supported by law is. without value, not only, but a fraud and
curse. The religious argument that has to be supported by a musket,
is hardly worth making. A prayer that must have a cannon behind it,
better never be uttered. Forgiveness ought not to go in partnership
with shot and shell. Love need not carry knives and revolvers.
So our fathers said: "We will form a secular government, and
under the flag with which we are going to enrich the air, we will
allow every man to worship God as he thinks best." They said:
"Religion is an individual thing between each man and his creator,
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
and he can worship as he pleases and as he desires." And why did
they do this? The history of the world warned them that the liberty
of man was not safe in the clutch and grasp of any church. They had
read of and seen the thumb-screws, the racks, and the dungeons of
the Inquisition. They knew all about the hypocrisy of the olden
time. They knew that the church had stood side by side with the
throne; that the high priests were hypocrites, and that the kings
were robbers. They also knew that if they gave power to any church,
it would corrupt the best church in the world. And so they said
that power must not reside in a church, or in a sect, but power
must be wherever humanity is -- in the great body of the people.
And the officers and servants of the people must be responsible to
them. And so I say again, as I said in the commencement, this is
the wisest, the profoundest, the bravest political document that
ever was written and signed by man.
They turned, as I tell you, everything squarely about. They
derived all their authority from the people. They did away forever
with the theological idea of government.
And what more did they say? They said that whenever the rulers
abused this authority, this power, incapable of destruction,
returned to the people. How did they come to say this? I will tell
you. They were pushed into it. How? They felt that they were
oppressed; and whenever a man feels that he is the subject of
injustice, his perception of right and wrong is wonderfully
quickened.
Nobody was ever in prison wrongfully who did not believe in
the writ of habeas corpus. Nobody ever suffered wrongfully without
instantly having ideas of justice.
And they began to inquire what rights the king of Great
Britain had. They began to search for the charter of his authority.
They began to investigate and dig down to the bed-rock upon which,
society must be founded, and when the got down there, forced there,
too, by their oppressors, forced against their own prejudices and
education, they found at the bottom of things, not lords, not
nobles, not pulpits, not thrones, but humanity and the rights of
men.
And so they said, We are men; we are men. They found out they
were men. And the next thing they said, was, "We will be free men;
we are weary of being colonists; we are tired of being subjects; we
are men; and these colonies ought to be states; and these states
ought to be a nation and that nation ought to drive the last
British soldier into the sea." And so they signed that brave
Declaration of Independence.
I thank every one of them from the bottom of my heart for
signing that sublime declaration. I thank them for their courage --
for their patriotism -- for their wisdom -- for the splendid
confidence in themselves and in the human race. I thank them for
what they were, and for what we are -- for what they did, and for
what we have received -- for what they suffered, and for what we
enjoy.
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
What would we have been if we had remained colonists and
subjects? What would we have been to-day? Nobodies -- ready to get
down on our knees and crawl in the very dust at the sight of
somebody that was supposed to have in him some drop of blood that
flowed in the veins of that mailed marauder -- that royal robber,
William the Conqueror.
They signed that Declaration of Independence, although they
knew that it would produce a long, terrible, and bloody war. They
looked forward and saw poverty, deprivation, gloom, and death. But
they also saw, on the wrecked clouds of war, the beautiful bow of
freedom.
These grand men were enthusiasts; and the world has been
raised only by enthusiasts. In every country there have been a few
who have given a national aspiration to the people. The enthusiasts
of 1776 were the builders and framers of this great and splendid
Government; and they were the men who saw, although others did not,
the golden fringe of the mantle of glory that will finally cover
this world. They knew, they felt, they believed that they would
give a new constellation to the political heavens -- that they
would make the Americans a grand people -- grand as the continent
upon which they lived.
The war commenced. There was little money, and less credit.
The new nation had but few friends. To a great extent each soldier
of freedom had to clothe and feed himself. He was poor and pure,
brave and good, and so he went to the fields of death to fight for
the rights of man.
What did the soldier leave when he went?
He left his wife and children,
Did he leave them in a beautiful home, surrounded by
civilization, in the repose of law, in the security of a great and
powerful republic?
No. He left his wife and children on the edge, on the fringe
of the boundless forest, in which crouched and crept the red
savage, who was at that time the ally of the still more savage
Briton. He left his wife to defend herself, and he left the
prattling babes to be defended by their mother and by nature. The
mother made the living; she planted the corn and the potatoes, and
hoed them in the sun, raised the children, and, in the darkness of
night, told them about their brave father and the "sacred cause"
She told them that in a little while the war would be over and
father would come back covered with honor and glory.
Think of the women, of the sweet children who listened for the
footsteps of the dead -- who waited through the sad and desolate
years for the dear ones I who never came.
The soldiers of 1776 did not march away with music and
banners. They went in silence, looked at and gazed after by eyes
filled with tears. They went to meet, not an equal, but a superior
-- to fight five times their number -- to make a desperate stand to
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
stop the advance of the enemy, and then, when their ammunition gave
out, seek the protection of rocks, of rivers, and of hills.
Let me say here: The greatest test of courage on the earth is
to bear defeat without losing heart. That army is the bravest that
can be whipped the greatest number of times and fight again.
Over the entire territory, so to speak, then settled by our
forefathers, they were driven again and again. Now and then they
would meet the English with something like equal numbers, and then
the eagle of victory would proudly perch upon the stripes and
stars. And so they went on as best they could, hoping and fighting
until they came to the dark and somber gloom of Valley Forge.
There were very few hearts then beneath that flag that did not
bean to think that the struggle was useless; that all the blood and
treasure had been shed and spent in vain. But there were some men
gifted with that wonderful prophecy that fulfills itself, and with
that wonderful magnetic power that makes heroes of everybody they
come in contact with.
And so our fathers went through the gloom of that terrible
time, and still fought on. Brave men wrote grand words, cheering
the despondent; brave men did brave deeds, the rich man gave his
wealth, the poor man gave his life, until at last, by the victory
of Yorktown, the old banner won its place in the air, and became
glorious forever.
Seven long years of war -- fighting for what? For the
principle that all men are created equal -- a truth that nobody
ever disputed except a scoundrel; nobody, nobody in the entire
history of this world. No man ever denied that truth who was not a
rascal, and at heart a thief; never, never, and never will. What
else were they fighting for? Simply that in America every man
should have a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Nobody ever denied that except a villain; never, never. It has been
denied by kings -- they were thieves. It has been denied by
statesmen -- they were liars. It has been denied by priests, by
clergymen, by cardinals, by bishops, and by popes -- they were
hypocrites.
What else were they fighting for? For the idea that all
political power is vested in the great body of the people. The
great body of the people make all the money; do all the work. They
plow the land, cut down the forests; they produce everything that
is produced. Then who shall say what shall be done with what is
produced except the producer?
Is it the non-producing thief, sitting on a throne, surrounded
by vermin?
Those were the things they were fighting for; and that is all
they were fighting for. They fought to build up a new, a great
nation to establish an asylum for the oppressed of the world
everywhere. They knew the history of this world. They knew the
history of human slavery.
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
The history of civilization is the history of the slow and
painful enfranchisement of the human race. In the olden times the
family was a monarchy, the father being the monarch. The mother and
children were the veriest slaves. The will of the father was the
supreme law. He had the power of life and death. It took thousands
of years to civilize this father, thousands of years to make the
condition of wife and mother and child even tolerable. A few
families constituted a tribe; the tribe had a chief; the chief was
a tyrant; a few tribes formed a nation; the nation was governed by
a king, who was also a tyrant. A strong nation robbed, plundered,
and took captive the weaker ones. This was the commencement of
human slavery.
It is not possible for the human imagination to conceive of
the horrors of slavery. It has left no possible crime uncommitted,
no possible cruelty un-perpetrated. It has been practiced and
defended by all nations in some form. It has been upheld by all
religions. It has been defended by nearly every pulpit. From the
profits derived from the slave trade churches have been built,
cathedrals reared and priests paid. Slavery has been blessed by
bishop, by cardinal, and by pope. It has received the sanction of
statesmen, of kings, and of queens. It has been defended by the
throne, the pulpit and the bench. "Monarchs have shared in the
profits. Clergymen have taken their part of the spoils, reciting
passages of Scripture in its defence at the same time, and judges
have taken their portion in the name of equity and law.
Only a few years ago our ancestors were slaves.
Only a few years ago they passed with and belonged to the soil,
like the coal under it and rocks on it.
Only a few years ago they were treated like beasts of
burden, worse far than we treat our animals at the present day.
Only a few years ago it was a crime in England for a man to have
a Bible in his house, a crime for which men were hanged, and
their bodies afterward burned. Only a few years ago fathers could
and did sell their children. Only few years ago our ancestors
were not allowed to write their thoughts -- that being a crime.
Only a few years ago to be honest, at least in the expression of
your ideas, was a felony. To do right was a capital offence; and
in those days chains and whips were the incentives to labor, and
the preventives of thought. Honesty was a vagrant, justice a
fugitive, and liberty in chains. Only a few years ago men were
denounced because they doubted the inspiration of the Bible --
because they denied miracles, and laughed at the wonders
recounted by the ancient Jews.
Only a few years ago a man had to believe in the total
depravity of the human heart in order to be respectable. Only a
few years ago, people who thought God too good to punish in
eternal flames an unbaptized child were considered infamous.
As soon as our ancestors began to get free they began to
enslave others. With an inconsistency that defies explanation,
they practiced upon others the same outrages that had been
perpetrated upon them. As soon as white slavery began to be
abolished, black slavery commenced. In this infamous traffic
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CENTENNIAL ORATION.
nearly every nation of Europe embarked. Fortunes were quickly
realized; the avarice and cupidity of Europe were excited; all
ideas of justice were discarded; pity fled from the human breast
a few good, brave men recited the horrors of the trade; avarice
was deaf; religion refused to hear; the trade went on; the
governments of Europe upheld it in the name of commerce -- in the
name of civilization and religion.
Our fathers knew the history of caste. They knew that in the
despotisms of the Old World it a was disgrace to be useful. They
knew that a mechanic was esteemed as hardly the equal of a hound,
and far below a blooded horse. They knew that a nobleman held a
son of labor in contempt -- that he had no rights the royal
loafers were bound to respect.
The world has changed.
The other day there came shoemakers, potters, workers in wood
and iron, from Europe, and they were received in the city of New
York as though they had been princes. They had been sent by the
great republic of France to examine into the arts and manufactures
of the great republic of America. They looked a thousand times
better to me than the Edward Alberts and Albert Edwards -- the
royal vermin, that live on the body politic. And I would think much
more of our Government if it would fete and feast them, instead of
wining and dining the imbeciles of a royal line.
Our fathers devoted their lives and fortunes to the grand work
of founding a government for the protection of the rights of man.
The theological idea as to the source of political power had
poisoned the web and woof of every government in the world, and our
fathers banished it from this continent forever.
What we want to-day is what our fathers wrote down. They did
not attain to their ideal; we approach it nearer, but have not
reached it yet. We want, not only the independence of a State, not
only the independence of a nation, but something far more glorious
-- the absolute independence of the individual. That is what we
want. I want it so that I, one of the children of Nature, can stand
on an equality with the rest; that I can say this is MY air, MY
sunshine, MY earth, and I have a right to live, and hope and
aspire, and labor, and enjoy the fruit of that labor, as much as
any individual or any nation on the face of the globe.
We want every American to make to-day, on this hundredth
anniversary, a declaration of individual independence. Let each man
enjoy his liberty to the utmost enjoy all he can; but be sure it is
not at the expense of another. The French Convention gave the best
definition of liberty I have ever read: "The liberty of one citizen
ceases only where the liberty of another citizen commences." I know
of no better definition. I ask you to-day to make a declaration of
individual independence. And if you are independent be just. Allow
everybody else to make his declaration of individual independence
Allow your wife, allow your husband, allow your children to make
theirs. Let everybody be absolutely free and independent, knowing
only the sacred obligations of honesty and affection. Let us be
independent of party, independent of everybody and everything
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except our own consciences and our own brains. Do not belong to any
clique. Have clear title-deeds in fee simple to yourselves, without
any mortgages on the premises to anybody in the world.
It is a grand thing to be the owner of yourself. It is a grand
thing to protect the rights of others. It is a sublime thing to be
free and just.
Only a few days ago I stood in Independence Hall -- in that
little room where was signed the immortal paper. A little room,
like any other; and it did not seem possible that from that room
went forth ideas, like cherubim and seraphim, spreading heir wings
over a continent, and touching, as with holy fire, the hearts of
men.
In a few moments I was in the park, where are gathered the
accomplishment of a century. Our fathers never dreamed of the
things I saw. There were hundreds of locomotives, with their nerves
of steel and breath of flame -- every kind of machine, with
whirling wheels and curious cogs and cranks, and the myriad
thoughts of men that have been wrought in iron, brass and steel.
And going out from one little building were wires in the air,
stretching to every civilized nation, and they could send a shining
messenger in a moment to any part of the world, and it would go
sweeping under the waves of the sea with thoughts and words within
its glowing heart. I saw all that had been achieved by this nation,
and I wished that the signers of the Declaration -- the soldiers of
the Revolution -- could see what a century of freedom has produced.
I wished they could see the fields we cultivate -- the rivers we
navigate -- the railroads running over the Alleghanies, far into
what was then the unknown forest -- on over the broad prairies --
on over the vast plains -- away over the mountains of the West, to
the Golden Gate of the Pacific. All this is the result of a hundred
years of freedom.
Are you not more than glad that in 1776 was announced the
sublime principle that political power resides with the people?
That our fathers then made up their minds nevermore to be colonists
and subjects, but that they would be free and independent citizens
of America?
I will not name any of the grand men who fought for liberty.
All should be named, or none. I feel that the unknown soldier who
was shot down without even his name being remembered -- who was
included only in a report of "a hundred killed," or "a hundred
missing," nobody knowing even the number that attached to his
august corpse -- is entitled to as deep and heartfelt thanks as the
titled leader who fell at the head of the host.
Standing here amid the sacred memories of the first, on the
golden threshold of the second, I ask, Will the second century be
as grand as the first? I believe it will, because we are growing
more and humane. I believe there is more human kindness, more real,
sweet human sympathy, a greater desire to help one another, in the
United States, than in all the world besides.
Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
11
CENTENNIAL ORATION.
We must progress. We are just at the commencement of
invention. The steam engine -- the telegraph -- these are but the
toys with which science has been amused. Wait; there will be
grander things, there will be wider and higher culture -- a grander
standard of character, of literature and art.
We have now half as many millions of people as we have years,
and many of us will live until a hundred millions stand beneath the
flag. We are getting more real solid sense. The schoolhouse is the
finest building in the village. We are writing and reading more
books; we are painting and buying more pictures; we are struggling
more and more to get at the philosophy of life, of things -- trying
more and more to answer the questions of the eternal Sphinx. We are
looking in every direction -- investigating; in short, we are
thinking and working. Besides all this, I believe the people are
nearer honest than ever before. A few rears ago we were willing to
live upon the labor of four million slaves. Was that honest? At
last, we have a national conscience. At last, we have carried out
the Declaration of Independence. Our fathers wrote it -- we have
accomplished it. The black man was a slave -- we made him a
citizen. We found four million human beings in manacles, and now
the hands of a race are held up in the free air without a chain.
I have had the supreme pleasure of seeing a man -- once a
slave -- sitting in the seat of his former master in the Congress
of the United States. I have had that pleasure, and when I saw it
my eyes were filled with tears. I felt that we had carried out the
Declaration of Independence -- that we had given reality to it, and
breathed the breath of life into its every word. I felt that our
flag would float over and protect the colored man and his little
children, standing straight in the sun, just the same as though he
were white and worth a million. I would protect him more, because
the rich white man could protect himself.
All who stand beneath our banner are free. Ours is the only
flag that has in reality written upon it: Liberty, Fraternity,
Equality -- the three grandest words in all the languages of men.
Liberty: Give to every man the fruit of his own labor -- the
labor of his hands and of his brain.
Fraternity: Every man in the right is my brother.
Equality: The rights of all are equal: justice, poised and
balanced in eternal calm, will shake from the golden scales in
which are weighed the acts of men, the very dust of prejudice and
caste: No race, no color, no previous condition, can change the
rights of men.
The Declaration of Independence has at last been carried out
in letter and in spirit.
The second century will be grander than the first.
Fifty millions of people are celebrating this day. To-day, the
black man looks upon his child and says: The avenues to distinction
are open to you -- upon your brow may fall the civic wreath -- this
day belongs to you.
Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
12
CENTENNIAL ORATION.
We are celebrating the courage and wisdom of our fathers, and
the glad shout of a free people the anthem of a grand nation,
commencing at the Atlantic, is following the sun to the Pacific,
across a continent of happy homes.
We are a great people. Three millions have increased to fifty
-- thirteen States to thirty-eight. We have better homes, better
clothes, better food and more of it, and more of the conveniences
of life, than any other people upon the globe.
The farmers of our country live better than did the kings and
princes two hundred years ago -- and they have twice as much sense
and heart. Liberty and labor have given us all. I want every person
here to believe in the dignity of labor -- to know that the
respectable man is the useful man -- the man who produces or helps
others to produce something of value, whether thought of the brain
or work of the hand.
I want you to go away with an eternal hatred in your breast of
injustice, of aristocracy, of caste, of the idea that one man has
more rights than another because he has better clothes, more land,
more money, because he owns a railroad, or is famous and in high
position. Remember that all men have equal rights. Remember that
the man who acts best his part -- who loves his friends the best --
is most willing to help others -- truest to the discharge of
obligation -- who has the best heart -- the most feeling -- the
deepest sympathies -- and who freely gives to others the rights
that he claims for himself is the best man. I am willing to swear
to this.
What has made this country? I say again, liberty and labor.
What would we be without labor? I want every farmer when plowing
the rustling corn of June -- while mowing in the perfumed fields --
to feel that he is adding to the wealth and glory of the United
States. I want every mechanic -- every man of toil, to know and
feel that he is keeping the cars running, the telegraph wires in
the air; that he is making the statues and painting the pictures;
that he is writing and printing the books; that he is helping to
fill the world with honor, with happiness, with love and law.
Our country is founded upon the dignity of labor -- upon the
equality of man. Ours is the first real Republic in the history of
the world. Beneath our flag the people are free. We have retired
the gods from politics. We have found that man is the only source
of political power, and that the governed should govern. We have
disfranchised the aristocrats of the air and have given one country
to mankind.
END
**** ****
Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
13
ORGANIZED CHARITIES.
I HAVE no great confidence in organized charities.
Money is left and buildings are erected and sinecures provided
for a good many worthless people. Those in immediate control are
almost, or when they were appointed were almost, in want
themselves, and they naturally hate other beggars.
They regard persons who ask assistance as their enemies. There
is an old story of a tramp who begged a breakfast. After breakfast
another tramp came to the same place to beg his breakfast, and the
first tramp with blows and curses drove him away, saying at the
same time: "I expect to get dinner here myself."
This is the general attitude of beggar toward beggar.
Another trouble with organized charities is the machinery, the
various methods they have adopted to prevent what they call fraud.
They are exceedingly anxious that the needy, that those who ask
help, who have been without fault, shall be attended to, their rule
apparently being to assist only the unfortunate perfect.
The trouble is that Nature produces very few specimens of that
kind. As a rule, men come to want on account of their
imperfections, on account of their ignorance, on account of their
vices, and their vices are born of their lack of capacity, of their
want of brain. In other words, they are failures of Nature, and the
fact that they need help is not their own fault, but the fault of
their construction, their surroundings.
Very few people have the opportunity of selecting their
parents, and it is exceedingly difficult in the matter of
grandparents. Consequently, I do not hold people responsible for
hereditary tendencies, traits and vices. Neither do I praise them
for having hereditary virtues.
A man going to one of these various charitable establishments
is cross-examined. He must give his biography. And after he has
answered all the supercilious, impudent questions, he is asked for
references.
Then the people referred to are sought out, to find whether
the statements made by the applicant are true. By the time the
thing is settled the man who asked aid has either gotten it
somewhere else or has, in the language of the Spiritualists,
"passed over to the other side."
Of course this does not trouble the persons in charge of the
organized charities, because their salaries are going on.
As a rule, these charities were commenced by the best of
people. Some generous, philanthropic man or woman gave a life to
establish a "house," it may be, for aged women, for orphans, for
the waifs of the pavements.
These generous people, filled with the spirit of charity,
raised a little money, succeeded in hiring or erecting a humble
building, and the money they collected, so honestly given, they
Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
14
ORGANIZED CHARITIES.
honestly used to bind up the wounds and wipe away the tears of the
unfortunate, and to save, if possible, some who had been wrecked on
the rocks and reefs of crime.
Then some very rich man dies who had no charity and who would
not have left a dollar could he have taken his money with him. This
rich man, who hated his relatives and the people he actually knew,
gives a large sum of money to some particular charity -- not that
he had any charity, but because he wanted to be remembered as a
philanthropist.
Then the organized charity becomes rich, and the richer the
meaner, the richer the harder of heart and the closer of fist.
Now, I believe that Trinity Church, in this city, would be
called an organized charity. The church was started to save, if
possible, a few souls from eternal torment, and on the plea of
saving these souls money was given to the church.
Finally the church became rich. It is now a landlord -- has
many buildings to rent. And if what I hear is true there is no
harder landlord in the city of New York.
So, I have heard it said of Dublin University, that it is
about the hardest landlord in Ireland.
I think you will find that all such institutions try to
collect the very last cent, and, in the name of pity, drive pity
from their hearts.
I think it is Shakespeare who says, "Pity drives out pity,"
and he must have had organized charities in his mind when he
uttered this remark. Of course a great many really good and
philanthropic people leave vast sums of money to charities.
I find that it is sometimes very difficult to get an injured
man, or one seized with some sudden illness, taken into a city
hospital. There are so many rules and so many regulations, so many
things necessary to be done, that while the rules are being
complied with the soul of the sick or injured man, weary of the
waiting, takes its flight. And after the man is dead, the doctors
are kind enough to certify that he died of heart failure.
So -- in a general way -- I speak of all the asylums, of all
the homes for orphans. When I see one of those buildings I feel
that it is full of petty tyranny, of what might be called pious
meanness, devout deviltry, where the object is to break the will of
every recipient of public favor.
I may be all wrong. I hope I am. At the same time I fear that
I am somewhere near right.
You may take our prisons; the treatment of prisoners is often
infamous. The Elmira Reformatory is a worthy successor of the
Inquisition, a disgrace, in my judgment, to the State of New York,
to the civilization of our day. Every little while something comes
to light showing the cruelty, the tyranny, the meanness, of these
Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
15
ORGANIZED CHARITIES.
professional distributors of public charity -- of these professed
reformers.
I know that they are visited now and then by committees from
the Legislature, and I know that the keepers of these places know
when the "committee" may be expected.
I know that everything is scoured and swept and burnished for
the occasion; and I know that the poor devils that have been abused
or whipped or starved, fear to open their mouths, knowing that if
they do they may not be believed and that they will be treated
afterward as though they were wild beasts,
I think these public institutions ought to be open to
inspection at all times. I think the very best men ought to be put
in control of them. I think only those doctors who have passed, and
recently passed, examinations as to their fitness, as to their
intelligence and professional acquirements, ought to be put in
charge,
I do not think that hospitals should be places for young
doctors to practice sawing off the arms and legs of paupers or
hunting in the stomachs of old women for tumors. I think only the
skillful, the experienced, should be employed in such places.
Neither do I think hospitals should be places where medicine is
distributed by students to the poor.
Ignorance is a poor doctor, even for the poor, and if we
pretend to be charitable we ought to carry it out.
I would like to see tyranny done away with in prisons, in the
reformatories, and in all places under the government or
supervision of the State.
I would like to have all corporal punishment abolished, and I
would also like to see the money that is given to charity
distributed by charity and by intelligence. I hope all these
institutions will be overhauled.
I hope all places where people are pretending to take care of
the poor and for which they collect money from the public, will be
visited, and will be visited unexpectedly and the truth told.
In my judgment there is some better way. I think every
hospital, every asylum, every house for waifs and orphans should be
supported by taxation, not by charity; should be under the care and
control of the State absolutely.
I do not believe in these institutions being managed by any
individual or by any society, religious or secular, but by the
State. I would no more have hospitals and asylums depend on charity
than I would have the public school depend on voluntary
contributions.
I want the schools supported by taxation and to be controlled
by the State, and I want the hospitals and asylums and charitable
institutions founded and controlled and carried on in the same way.
Let the property of the State do it.
Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
16
ORGANIZED CHARITIES.
Let those pay the taxes who are able. And let us do away
forever with the idea that to take care of the sick of the
helpless, is a charity. It is not a charity. It is a duty. It is
something to be done for our own sakes. It is no more a charity
than it is to pave or light the streets, no more a charity than it
is to have a system of sewers.
It is all for the purpose of protecting society and of
civilizing ourselves.
END
**** ****
THE BIGOTRY OF COLLEGES.
UNIVERSITIES are naturally conservative. They know that if
suspected of being really scientific, orthodox Christians will keep
their sons away, so they pander to the superstitions of the times.
Most of the universities are exceedingly poor, and poverty is
the enemy of independence. Universities, like people, have the
instinct of self-preservation. The University of Kansas is like the
rest.
The faculty of Cornell, upon precisely the same question, took
exactly the same action, and the faculty of the University of
Missouri did the same. These institutions must be the friends and
defenders of superstition.
The Vanderbilt College, or University of Tennessee, discharged
Professor Winchell because he differed with the author of Genesis
on geology.
There colleges act as they must, and we should blame nobody.
If Humboldt and Darwin were now alive they would not be allowed to
teach in these institutions of learning."
We need not find fault with the president and professors. They
want to keep their places. The probability is that they would like
to do better -- that they desire to be free, and, if free, would,
with all their hearts, welcome the truth. Still, these universities
seem to do good. The minds of their students are developed to that
degree, that they naturally turn to me as the defender of their
thoughts.
This gives me great hope for the future. The young, the
growing, the enthusiastic, are on my side. All the students who
have selected me are my friends, and I thank them with all my
heart.
**** ****
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