Robert Ingersoll…”A most precious treasure”

Robert Ingersoll, “a glorious flame of free thought.” How can I do this genius justice in such a short space? I will try. He lived from 1833 to 1899 and was internationally known as the “Great Agnostic”, one of the most brilliant thinkers, lawyers, orators, debtors and authors of his day, or any day. Twelve volumes of his works are still available and are a collector’s treasure. He lectured all over the United States and abroad to standing-room-only audiences. He spoke on many subjects, but thousands upon thousands turned out to hear him demolish the absurdities of orthodox religious dogmas, including Christianism. He found them repugnant due to the damage they did to the human mind and spirit. And yet, on a deep and profound level he had a sense of the Mystery that was breathtaking.

I can tell you that, without exception, his funeral eulogies are the most beautiful that I have ever read in the English language.

WALT WHITMAN, the poet laureate of the universe, said that only one man could speak at his funeral and that man was Robert Ingersoll.

CARL SANDBURG, said of Ingersoll’s eulogy of Whitman: “It was a most precious treasure.”
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My hero: Mark Twain

Directly above my computer, framed, are these words about a writers “worthy calling” by Mark Twain: “ours is a useful trade…a worthy calling…and it has one serious purpose, one aim, one specialty, and it is constant to it…the deriding of shams…the exposure of pretentious falsities…the laughing of stupid superstitions out of existence…Whoso is engaged in this sort of warfare is the natural enemy of royalties…nobilities…privileges…and all kindred swindles…and is the natural friend of human rights and human liberties.”

Ken Burns, the Executive Producer of that magnificent television documentary on the “Civil War” has just finished production of what he said was the most important work of his long and distinguished career, his real “labor of love”. It was on THE LIFE AND LITERATURE OF MARK TWAIN. It was shown on PBS last Monday and Tuesday night. I ordered both the video and the book that goes with it over a month ago and have been absorbing them like a sponge, even though I was familiar with the majority of the material.

I think that I have in my personal library every book written by, or about, Twain. He is easily in the top three of my “role models”, to use a popular phrase of the day.
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The Ten Commandments psychosis

I have a new mental illness for psychiatry. I call it “The Ten Commandments Psychosis”. We all know that there are a lot of wacko’s in the world. It is safe to say that the religious wacko’s are the wackiest of all.

They want the Ten Commandments in all schools…court houses…parks…ice cream parlors…hot dog stands…stadiums…tennis clubs…golf clubs…street corners…and on and on into the dark ages of superstition. They never seem to understand that this nation guarantees freedom FROM religion as well as freedom of religion. They keep violating the Constitution by putting up Ten Commandments monuments or signs on Federal or State property. They keep getting sued and having to go to all the trouble to take the Commandments down. Which would indicate being a little shallow above the neck. The City of Milwaukee recently had to move the Ten Commandments monument off the lawn of the Municipal building after being ordered to do so by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. You can safely say that the religious wacko’s are slow learners…very slow.

The Ten Commandments are factually, and simply, a primitive cultic code of taboos written for the Hebrew cult.
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