Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1899-07-27
DECLARATION OF THE FREE.
By Robert G.. Ingersoll.
(Last poem written before his death

By Robert G. Ingersoll.
QLast poem written before his death.)
We have no f~alsehoods to defend
We want the facts; ~"
Our force. u thought, we do not spend
In vain attacks.
And we will never meanly try
To save some fair and pleasing lie.
The simple truth is what we ask,
Not the ideal; ,
We've set ourselves the noble task
To find the real.
If that is nought but dross,
we want to know and bear our loss.
We will not willingly be fooled,
BY fables nursed;
Our hearts, by earnest thought, are
schooled
To bear the worst:
And we can stand erect and dare
All things, all facts that really are.
We have no God to serve or fear,
No hell to shun,
No devil witt malicious leer,
When life is done
And endless sleep may close our eyes,
A sleep with neither dreams nor signs.
\" nave uO master OH the land
No king in air
Without manacles we stand,
Without a prayer.
without a fear of coming night,
We seek the truth. we love the light.
We do not bow before a guess,
A vague unknown;
A senseless force we do not bless
In solemn tone.
When evil ONE we do not curse,
Or thank because it is no worse.
blights,
IT'S nought but fate;
There is no God of wrath who smites
In heartless hate.
Behind the things that injure man
There ls no purpose, thought, or plan.
We waste no time in useless dread,
In trembling fear;
The present lives, the past il dead,
And we are here,
All welcome guests at life's great
We need no help from ghost or priest.
Our joy is joyous, jocund, free
Not one slave
Who bends in fear the mblj knee
And seeks to save
A coward soul from future pain;
No one will cringe or crawl for gain.
The jeweled cup Of love we drain,
And friendships wine
Now swiftly flows in every vein
With warmth divine.
And so we love and hope and dream.
That in deaths sky there is a CLEAN.
We walk according to our light,
Pursue the path
That leads to honor's stainless height.
Careless Of wrath 4
Or curse of God. or priestly spite.
Longing to know and do the right.
We love our fellow man. u kind,
Wife, child, and friend.
To phantOms we are leaf and blind.
But we extend
The helping hand to the distressed:
BY lifting others we are blessed.
Loves sacred lame within the heart
And friendships glow:
While all the miracles of art
Their wealth bestow
Upon the thrilled and joyous brain,
And present raptures Danish pain.
We love no phantoms of the skies,
But living flesh.
With passions soft and soulful eyes,
Lips warm and fresh,
And cheeks with health's red flag UNI
furled, Co.
The breathing angels of this world.
The hands that help are better far
Than lips that pray.
Love is the ever cleaning star
That leads the way.
That shines, not or vague worlds of
bliss,
But on a paradise in this.
We do not pray, or weep, or wall:
We have no dread,
No fear to pass beyond the veil
That hides the dead.
And yet W. question, dream, and guess,
But knowledge We do not possess.
We ask, yet nothing seems to know;
We cry in vain.
There is no master of the show"
Who will explain,
Or from the future tear the mask:
And vet we dream and still we ask.
Is there beyond the silent night
An endless day?
Is death a IGOR thai leads to light?
We cannot say. =
The tongueless secret locked in fate
We do not know. We hope and wait.
Truth Seeker.
A WELL KNOWN MINING BROKER
IN TROUBLE.