Year: 1878

Some Mistakes of Moses" at Pixies
Opera House, and the Enquirer of the
18th gives the following report:


THE LECTURE.


Mr.. Ingersoll began by regretting
that ministers did not appreciate him
more and come to hear him criticise
Moses. He would be glad to see them
seated around in his audience listen
ing to him, as he was in the habit of
going to hear them. He next referred
to newspapers that stigmatized him as
q bad man, whom people should fear
and avoid as they would avoid the
devil. Yet he assured them he was
gentle, harmless, and wouldn't hurt
any one for the world. He was CALL
ed an atheist, but why he was called
an atheist he knew not probably be-
cause he declared himself unable to
understand some things contained in
the Bible. But he said he was honest
with his fellow-men. What he could
understand he was frank to admit, but
there were many things which his
mind couldn't grasp, and he thought
he had an intellect on an average with
ordinary men, and particularly with
Moses. After quite q delightful in.
troductory, Mr.. Ingersoll took hold of
his lecture proper, and got down to
the Lawgiver of the Bible. No one
better than the writer realizes how
foolish . thing it is to try to report q
lecture from the lips of this modern
Demosthenes. It can not be done.
The writer's efforts will be confined
herein to an attempt at an abridgment
of the lecture, whereby the lecturers
words shall be shadOwed but not re-
produced.


LOOK OUT, MOSES!


He said: In what am saying do
not want to be considered irreverent
or blashemous, and desire to explain
right here that whenever I speak of
God make no illusions to the Inf
mite Being which you believe in and
reverence; but l mean by God tho
God which Moses worshiped and
wrote about-a God that hate, and a
God that know you will detest be-
fore 1 have done. This Moses was
considered very great man in his
day, though in the enlightened age of
the nineteenth century he would be
ranked as monstrous ignoramus. He
was writer, and is the author of the
first account of tho creation ever PEN
ned. A very bad account it was, too |!
All, you cry infidelity. Why? Be-
cause I doubt the stories told by this
man Moses. Aye, not only doubt him,
but can prove that he was a most ig-
norsnt man and knew nothing of what
he wrote. But then they say all that
he wrote was inspired. Inspired by
what? Inspired by whom2 by God !?
by an Infinite Being? I'll not belieye
1t. You can't make me belieYe an In
finite creature could be such an igno-
ramus as Moses shows himself to be.
But for the sake of argument, I'll ad-
NIT that the writings Of Moses were
inspired, though l don't believe it.
But admit that they were inspired, I'll
prove they weren't true. Truth needs
no inspiration. It was not necessary
that the man who wrote the multiple
cation tables was first inspired. Ten
times ten is one hundred, inspiration or
no inspiration. You may declare that
Moses was inspired when he declared
that the


WORLD WAS MADE OUT OF NOTHING,
And I'll tell you don't believe any
such preposterous theory. We who
live in enlightened ages know better.
But Moses was not to be blamed. He
lived in an age of ignorance. At that
day a man who stood great among his
fellow-men could write any thing about
something no one knew any thing
about, and nobody could say him nay,
because nobody could prove it other
wise. When Moses declared the world
was made out of nothing, who was
there to prove that it was made out OF
something? In those days a great man
could stand upon the earth, look up at
q star and declare that it was made
ont of granite. People must believe
him because he had said it, and no.
body could prove he was mistaken


But to day, three rays from the spec.


trum analysis would show that he


lied, as plainly as two times two are
four,


LIGHT AND DARKNESS.


This Moses goes ON to say that Goo


saw that the light was good and Goo