Morning appeal. [volume] (Carson City, Nev.) 1877-1906, 1880-05-16
IS INGERSOLL A PLAGIARISM

Is lNGERSOLL A ILAGlAh1SIf
A few days ago dsvout Christian took US
70 task for printing some extracts from Bob
Ingersoll in the Sunday APPEAL We con-
fsss, that although running q strictly religions
newspaper. We have a genuine admiration for
Bob's terse and lively styls Of putting things.
If he blasphemes, he does it in an entertaining
manner, and a more brilliant and eloquent
man We never listened to. The Chicago Trib-
Us1s, however, classes him ~ fraud, and We
print the following for the benefit ofthe church
gOers who also think he is: A small but re-
speotabls audience gathered at the Centenary
Church on West Monroe street to listen to
Lecture by Mr.. Frank Jervis, we'll known 10
cal journalist, entitled "Col. Ingersoll, the
Champion Plagiarist of the Nineteenth Gen.
fury" Among the audience we're quite
number Of well.known clergymen, who listen
I'd with attention to the account of how and
where Ingersoll got portion at least of his
ammunition. The lecturer was introduced by
the Rev. Dr. Thomas, pastor of the church.
The following synopsis of his remarks il given.
He began by stating that he should not ask
the indulgence Of his hearers in regard to the
matters embraced in his lecture, as he Thought
it was tho business of every man to do what he
could, when the very foundations of civic and
religious liberty were endangered. In6dehty
cropped out at stated periods exactly like
mushrooms. Ingersoil, the great iconoclast
Of the aye, had been collecting the accnmula-
ted fungus Of in6delity for years, and was now
affecting the world with his stolen eloquence.
The speaker quoted from the RAns5Ier, John
sons definition of the word plagiarism, and
proceeded to score Col. lngersoll numerically.
If lngersol's mouthings We're to perish, every
word he had spoken aud every idea advanced
BY him could be easily replaced BY careful
search among the works of the in6del writer's
Of the past 200 years. .......
The speaker then proceeded to read extracts
from Ingersoll's various lectures, aud to sub
stantiate his charge that he was guilty of pla-
giArism, read extracts from Holyoke's discus
sions with Grant in London during 1858. He
claimed that lngersoll's saying that she would
rather 60 to He'll with his reason, than to
Heaven without it," was stolen bodily from
the writings of Baron Holbach, famous
French free thinker of the last century. the
System Of Nature" appeared to be a favo-
rite hunting ground for the successoro of Thou-
- Paine, and from that book he cribbed two
thirds of his lecture on Ghosts. His famous
aphorism, can honest God is the neblest work
Of man." was stolen from work by Charles
Blount, and some of his most pungent and
foul illusions to Christianity were taken from
. book entitled "The Life of the Gods" by
Eugene Parry, Frenchman. "The Mis-
1.-THE Donbts Of Infdels," published in Lon
don in 1883 bv James Watson Ingersoll dis
played in all his writings considerable ingenu-
ity in the way in which he pulled, twisted and
entangled the language of the writer's from
whom he culled, but not particle of original
ity. In all his writings the speaker traced the
thoughts of some writer of the past, aud said
he: HE never makes an epigram or advances
an idea, but that still hunt among the works
of these old writer's on kindred subjects will
discover its progsnitor. Dean Swfr's aphor-
ism that the less q bottle has in it, tho more
Of row it makes in pouring it out, would ap
tly apply to Ingersoll, and yet he had the ada.
mAntine cheek to assert that any man who did
not do bis own thinking was slave" :.
He concluded by saying that the church was
in no danger of disruption from lngersolls Of
forts to overthrow it, and that such religion
~ he advocated could never obtain foot
hold among people who believed in the purity
Of home and future existence beyond the
grave. a-.r.