The Frankfort roundabout. [volume] (Frankfort, Ky.) 1882-1908, 1899-01-14
INdHRSOLLISM.


During the last few years Col. In
gersol has been engaged In freq uen
controversy with the defenders o.
revealed religion, and with mastery
skill he has succeeded in combining
his opponents almost exclusiv ely t.
the defensive. They have attempted
to demonstrate the verities Of re.
vealed religion to one who denies
spiritual phenomena - an attempt
about as practical as an effort to
draw straight lines on curved surfaces
or from a coordination Of optical OBJ
servations to devise a system Of
acoustics.
On the plain, however, that Col.
Ingersoll has chosen, Of common
sense and good feeling, by the laws
Of logic and philosophy, 1t is not dii-
ficult to demonstrate his letters and
whatever Christianity may
be-uncandid In premises, illogical
in deduction and inhuman in style.
Probably even he will not suspect
the author Of ala Justice Dams La
Revolution" of sitting, as he ex-
presses it, solemnly astride a dead
horse, yet PraudhOn declares "never
will express myself on the Christian
religion or any religion with an in
decency that would only dishonOr
myself. How, then. can 1 be want
ing in respect to Christianity, the
grandest monument of virtue and
genius?" Such liberality seems as un-
Ineligible to some modern sceptics
as religion itself. Let us, therefore,
ignore humanity and ethics, as well
as religion, applying to Col. Inger-
soils assertions and deductions only
statistics and the rules of logic.
He grants that belief in divinity
and Immortality are older than re-
corded history. He acknowledges
that 1t Ii impossible to eliminate this
divinity that speaks within u.s."
"This desire of the mouth for the
star" this "longing for the unknow-
able" what every priest, poet or phil
Osopher may call the instinct that
bows the knee to earth or raises the
eyes to heaven. He is guilty of self
contradiction, therefore, when he
writes:
"In my opinion the days of the
are numbered" How
can they be according to his own
postulates? Until material nature
solves every problem, answers every
the spiritual instinct
must formulate itself into creeds and !
non-material philosophy rs surely as i
protoplasm generates and acts
through cellular tissue. The decay |
of such creeds and PHILOSOPHERS de-
note social and national disease as
clearly as the unrepaired disintegra-
ton of bodily tissues denotes physi-
cal.
That material or ethical science
alone has never yet restrained or
guided the majority of moral beings
can only be denied by those who pro-
pose to evolve from their inner con-
,ciousness history as well as morality
In accordance with their ideas of
and common sense. |
We heartily concur in his admira-
ton of Epicurus, who was by long
odds the most exalted in mind and
character of all those who, from the
lawn of Greek civilization to our
own, have striven to persuade men
hat "they can not walk beyond the
lOrizon." He succeeded, and the
'esult Of his philosophy, or rather
he civilization of which that philos-
'phy became the exponent, born
lnder the later Caesars, corruption
lbnormal and vile enough to afford
tself semi-protectlon from inves-
igatiOn.
1t is true that charity-the duty of
reating ones neighbor as ones self
re embodied in pre- Christian dogmas
but it Is difficult to prove that they
'ver entered into the social, moral or
'olitical life of any people. Phys
cal defOrmity, mental or physical
vice and crime, were
lmost Transferable terms among the
most refined and gracious nations of