The New York Times, January 30, 1878. PAGE NUMBER 5
THOMAS PAINE GLORIFIED.
COL. INGERSOLL’S SECOND LECTURE.
THE STORY OF THOMAS PAINE—A DISCOURSE FULL OF EPIGRAM.
Col. Robert G. Ingersoll delivered another lecture last night in Chickering Hall, his subject being Thomas Paine, his life and his work. The hall was filled, and the audience listened attentively for two hours and a half. The lecturer demanded justice to the memory of Thomas Paine. He spoke in substance thus: Thomas Paine was an Englishman. He was born of poor people and ate the bread of poverty. Necessity was his schoolmaster. He never enjoyed the advantage of having the individuality crushed out of him by one of the colleges of his day. Those institutions were devoted to the diffusion of useless knowledge. He became acquainted with men. He was never satisfied unless he rested upon what he called bedrock. He had the sense to know that a man who lies has no character, and that the printing of a lie which has been written is not a proof that it is true. When he reached manhood he turned his attention to politics. He began by selling tobacco. I admit that, and I often think that while in that shop he learned that it was not necessary to sneeze because some one else had taken snuff. A rich man is generally contented. It is easy to see the wisdom of God in the punishment of your neighbors. Rich men do not want liberty. They want police to look after their treasures. It does seem to me that this world ought to be so arranged as to be an equal chance for every human being. I do not believe that it can be said forever that those who have the best do the least. Thomas Paine looked about him. He could see. He had two eyes. Those twin vultures, Church and State, were feeding on the heart of the chained Prometheus. So he came to America, and landed at Philadelphia when he was 37 years old. He had no money, no prospects; nothing but a letter signed by another man, whose name forever shines among the stars, Benjamin Franklin. But he had genius. When Paine came, the colonists were writing petitions and laying them at the feet of a man fifty long by the grace of God. They begged the Crown to let them be men. They did not object to making bricks if the Egyptians would furnish straw. Now I count it a good that Tom Paine was the first man that ever wrote these words: The free and independent States of America. He wrote a little pamphlet called Common Sense. He denounced a hereditary monarchy. He denied that all power to govern comes from on high. His intent was to retire the priests—not politics to say to the priests, “You attend to the affairs of the next world; we’ll attend to this.” Two months after his pamphlet was printed our fathers signed the immortal Declaration of Independence, and there is not a splendid statement in that document that is not found in Paine’s Common Sense. He was the best political writer this country produced in the age in which he lived; because he taught the doctrine of the absolute equality of man. He hated tyranny and slavery with every drop of blood in his noble heart. No man did more to secure the liberty which we enjoy to-night than Thomas Paine. If he had stopped there, with the work he did in the Revolution, he would have been lauded as the peer of Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, and Adams. If he had not expressed his views on religion salvos of artillery would have been fired over his grave, and ministers would have described his entrance into the heavenly kingdom, and a monument, covered, it may be, with lies, would have been erected to his memory. He wrote the Rights of Man, the best political document ever published. For it he was indicted for libel in England. He said there are hereditary monarchs, there are also hereditary subjects, hereditary thieves, and hereditary gentlemen to steal from.
Because of the Rights of Man Paine was convicted of libel in England, and a price was put on his head—because he said that all power to govern must come from the people. These day-to-day slanders are repeated by foolish people which were then invented in England. Paine relinquished the address to the Assembly—because of that the Church shut the door in his face and emptied slops from the window on his head. Some of the Episcopal slops fell on some of the religious papers in New-York. I want it understood that I do not entirely agree with Mr. Paine in his nuclear religion. He is much more orthodox than I am. Paine, an infidel compared to him. He who divides his food with famine—I don’t care what he believes—is a good man. He who loves his wife and children, and tries to fill their lives with pleasure—I don’t care whether he believes in baptism or not—is a good man. If a man or woman’s life has been pure, I don’t care whether he or she believe in predestination, foreordination, the five points of Calvin, and the thirty-nine of saints. Humanity is grander than all the creeds in this world. Humanity is a great sea, and these little creeds and religions are the waves of a day. Humanity is a great sky, and these dogmas are mists and clouds, constantly changing, that will soon pass away. I do not believe in the inspiration of the Scriptures. In his time people believed that the Bible was literally true. The idea or the Bible brought the heavenly wrath down to almost nothing, and what nothing there was left was cut up into slices and made into stars, just because the heavenly wrath lasted but one day it was. Everything that could be disproved in this book has been disproved. A minister said to me, “Mr. Ingersoll, if you don’t believe that you oughtn’t to say so.” I said, “Do you believe it?” “Yes,” he answered. I told him, “I don’t know whether I do or not. Maybe I believe everything you preach to me!” By the way, it’s awfully hard to find out what the clergy do believe. If they’re really discovering something a little strong, then we learn that the reporter made a mistake; not that I want to defend the reporters.
He believed that any system of religion that shocks the mind of a child is not a benefit to them. He believed in one God and no more. Col. Ingersoll offers $1,000 in gold to prove that Thomas Paine was ever a defaulter, or was drunk, or was ever divorced from him. He denied again that Paine recanted before he died. The foaming preachers who, Col. Ingersoll said, would have been burned at the stake if they had lived in Paine’s time. Col. Ingersoll will deliver another lecture in this hall, taking up Paine’s night upon the popular topic—hell. The audience was very enthusiastic last night, and frequently greeted the lecture with acclamations of approval.