The Vinita daily chieftain. [volume] (Vinita, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1902-1913, 1912-03-28
WHAT GREAT MINDS HAVE
THOUGHT OF THE BIBLE.
tBy John Marcus.)

(By John Marcus)
One OF the principal arguments ad-
yanced by Vinita's champion of In
fidelity has consisted in his constantly
recurring to the boastful assumption
that the brightest minds in the intel
lectual world were in accord with the
views he holds regarding the Bible.
Like nearly all sophistical and egotisti-
cal reasoners of his type, who are
good at running bluffs and have no
seruples at all in resorting to lies
wherewith to defame the God of the
Bible, he will assert with brazen ef-
frontery that no intelligent person, un-
tinged with the spirit of superstition,
could possibly give credence to the
claims of that Book. He is but an
echo of Ingersoll, who gave utterance
in one of his addresses to the follow
ing sentiments:
IF men will read the Bible as they
read other books, they will be amazed
that they ever, for one moment, sup
posed a being of infinite wisdom to be
the author of such ignorance and of
such atrocity The Bible burned
heretics, built dungeons, founded the
Inquisition, and trampled upon all the
liberties of men. All the philosophy
of the Bible would not make one scene
in Hamlet | could write better book
than the Bible, which is full of bar
barism.
Now over against this gallish twad-
die, this consummate arrogance and
outlandish self.esteem, desire to
place the sentiments and sayings of
men whose shoes latchet" the BIAS
pheming apostle of unbelief was mot
worthy to unloose,' men who stood so
far above hi min scholarly attain
ments, that he, by honest comparison,
was but dwarfted specimen of in
sufferable ignorance and monstrous i'm
.peftinence. There was no question of
Robert Ingersolls brilliancy, and pow
ers of oratory, but any one who as
serts that he was man of depth of
intellect, does not know whereof he
afirms But the doughty Colonel had
it in for the Christian world as a re-
suit of his losing the governorship of
Illinois, all this owing to his hatred
Of the Bible. The people of his own
state were too 'superstitious' to exalt
such man to the chair of state, and
so Bob determined to get even with
the Christian public, and from that
time on he turned all the satire and
brilliant oratory he could command
against the Bible and the God of the
Bible. In the meantime he took good
care to make sure of bonanza prices
for his lectures, and he usually de-
manded and obtained s40O per night.
There was enough truth in his lectures
to sugar-coat his sophistry, for Inger-
soil, while he thought he was engaged
in demolishing the very foundations
of Christianity was only blazing away
at man of straw" Much that he
said about the protesting church and
the ministry was ironically true; but
he never once touched the heart of the
whole matter He made many just
filings against an apostate church, and
for this / am thankful; he harried and
pounded world-compromising hypo-
critical ecclesiasticism, with all its re-
ligious millinery in a most delightful
manner, and THAT did good, for our
God can even make the wrath Of man
to praise Him" But when it came
to his criticism of the Word of the
Living God,p about all that he could
do was to play the clown, and seek to
bring into ridicule a Book of which
he had mighty little honest knowledge.
Yet this writer has very little faith
in any of thes seventh-rate shallow
disciples of Infidelity ever admitting
the truth, or acknowledging that they
might possibly be wrong in their argu-
ments and fulminations against the
Bible. They are like case that comes
to mind: An eminent lawyer had in
court a very clear case After pre-
senting an array of testimony, law,
and precedents that he thought was
he submitted the case.
To his utter astonishment the judge,
who was bigoetedly and dogmatically
on the opposite side of prejudice, de-
eided every point of the case against
him After he had recovered from
his .amazement, he arose and proceed
ed to read Blackstone and leading
jurists, the statute law, and judicial
decisions, fatty contradictine the de-
cision Of the Court. The Judge pom
pously interrupted him VITA: "rhat
will do you no good; the mind of the
teontlnued on Last Page.)