Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest Part 6

Think of it!

And I saw also the rack, with the windla.s.s and chains, upon which the sufferer was laid. About his ankles were fastened chains, and about his wrists also, and then priests began turning this windla.s.s, and they kept turning until the ankles, the shoulders and the wrists were all dislocated, and the sufferer was wet with the sweat of agony. And they had standing by a physician to feel his pulse. What for? To save his life? Yes. What for? In mercy? No. Simply that they might preserve his life, that they might rack him once again. And this was done--recollect it--it was done in the name of civilization, it was done in the name of law and order, it was done in the name of morality, it was done in the name of religion, it was done in the name of G.o.d.

Sometimes when I get to reading about it, and when I get to thinking about it, it seems to me that I have suffered all these horrors myself, as though I had stood upon the sh.o.r.e of exile and gazed with a tear-filled eye toward home and native land; as though my nails had been torn from my hands, and into my throat the sharp needles had been thrust; as though my feet had been crushed in iron boots; as though I had been chained in the cells of the Inquisition, and had watched and waited in the interminable darkness to hear the words of release; as though I had been taken from my fireside, from my wife and children, and taken to the public square, chained, and f.a.gots had been piled around me; as though the flames had played around my limbs, and scorched the sight from my eyes; as though my ashes had been scattered to the four winds by the hands of hatred; as though I had stood upon the scaffold and felt the glittering ax fall upon me. And while I feel and see all this, I swear that while I live I will do what little I can to augment the liberty of man, woman and child.

My friends, it is all a question of sense; it is all a question of honesty. If there is a man in this house who is not willing to give to everybody else what he claims for himself he is just so much nearer to the barbarian than I am. It is a simple question of honesty; and the man who is not willing to give to every other human being the same intellectual rights he claims himself is a rascal, and you know it. It is a simple question, I say, of intellectual development and of honesty. And I want to say it now, so you will see it. You show me the narrow, contracted man; you show me the man who claims everything for himself and leaves nothing for others, and that man has got a distorted and deformed brain. That is the matter with him. He has no sense; not a bit. Let me show you.

A little while ago I saw models of everything man has made for his use and for his convenience. I saw all the models of all the watercraft, from the dug-out, in which floated a naked savage--one of our ancestors--a naked savage, with teeth two inches long, with a spoonful of brains in the back of his head; I saw the watercraft of the world, from that dug-out up to a man-of-war that carries a hundred guns and miles of canvas; from that dug-out to the steamship that turns its brave prow from the port of New York through 3,000 miles of billows, with a compa.s.s like a conscience, that does not miss throb or beat of its mighty iron heart from one sh.o.r.e to the other. I saw at the same time the weapons that man has made, from a rude club, such as was grasped by that savage when he crawled from his den, from his hole in the ground, and hunted a snake for his dinner--from that club to the boomerang, to the sword, to the cross-bow, to the blunderbuss, to the flint-lock, to the cap-lock, to the needle-gun, up to the cannon cast by Krupp, capable of hurling a ball of 2,000 pounds through eighteen inches of solid steel. I saw, too, the armor from the turtle-sh.e.l.l that our ancestor lashed upon his skin when he went out to fight for his country, to the skin of the porcupine, with the quills all bristling, which he pulled over his orthodox head to defend himself from his enemies--I mean, of course, the orthodox head of that day--up to the shirts of mail that were worn in the middle ages, capable of resisting the edge of the sword and the point of the spear; up to the iron-clad, to the monitor completely clad in steel, capable only a few years ago of defying the navies of the globe.

I saw at the same time the musical instruments, from the tomtom, which is a hoop with a couple of strings of rawhide drawn across it--from that tomtom up to the instruments we have today, which make the common air blossom with melody. I saw, too, the paintings, from the daub of yellow mud up to the pieces which adorn the galleries of the world.

And the sculpture, from the rude G.o.ds, with six legs and a half dozen arms, and the rows of ears, up to the sculpture of now, wherein the marble is clad with such loveliness that it seems almost a sacrilege to touch it; and in addition I saw there ideas of books--books written upon skins of wild beasts, books written upon shoulder-blades of sheep; books written upon leaves, upon bark, up to the splendid volumes that adorn the libraries of our time. When I think of libraries, I think of the remark of Plato, "The house that has a library in it has a soul."

I saw there all these things, and also the implements of agriculture, from a crooked stick up to the plow which makes it possible for a man to cultivate the soil without being an ignoramus. I saw at the same time a row of skulls, from the lowest skull that has ever been found; skulls from the central portion of Africa, skulls from the bushmen of Australia, up to the best skulls of the last generation.

And I notice that there was the same difference between those skulls that there is between the products of those skulls. And I said to myself: "It is all a question of intellectual development. It is a question of brain and sinew." I noticed that there was the same difference between those skulls that there was between that dug-out, and that man-of-war and that steamship. That skull was low. It had not a forehead a quarter of an inch high. But shortly after, the skulls became doming and crowning, and getting higher and grander.

That skull was a den in which crawled the base and meaner instincts of mankind, and this skull was a temple in which dwelt joy, liberty and love. So said I: "This is all a question of brain, and anything that tends to develop, intellectually, mankind, is the gospel we want."

Now I want to be honest with you. Honor bright! Nothing like it in the world! No matter what I believe. Now, let us be honest. Suppose a king, if there was a king at the time this gentleman floated in the dugout and charmed his ears with the music of the tomtom; suppose the king at that time, if there was one, and the priest, if there was one, had said: "That dug-out is the best boat that ever can be built. The pattern of that came from on high, and any man who says he can improve it, by putting a log or a stick in the bottom of it, with a rag on the end, is an infidel." Honor bright, what, in your judgment, would have been the effect upon the circ.u.mnavigation of the globe? That is the question. Suppose the king, if there was one, and the priest, if there was one--and I presume there was, because it was a very ignorant age--suppose they had said: "That tomtom is the most miraculous instrument of music that any man can conceive of; that is the kind of music they have in heaven. An angel, sitting upon the golden edge of a fleecy cloud, playing upon that tomtom became so enraptured, so entranced with her own music, that she dropped it, and that is how we got it--and any man that says that it can be improved by putting a back and front to it, and four strings and a bridge on it, and getting some horsehair and resin, is no better than one of the weak and unregenerate."

I ask you what effect would that have had upon music? I ask you, honor bright, if that course had been pursued, would the human ears ever have been enriched with the divine symphonies of Beethoven? That is the question. And suppose the king, if there was one, and the priest had said: "That crooked stick is the best plow we can ever have invented.

The pattern of that plow was given to a pious farmer in a holy dream, and that twisted straw is the ne plus ultra of all twisted things; and any man who says he can make an improvement, we will twist him." Honor bright, what, in your judgment, would have been the effect upon the agricultural world?

Now, you see, the people said, "We want better weapons with which to kill our enemies;" so the people said, "we want better plows;" the people said, "we want better music;" the people said, "we want better paintings;" and they said, "whoever will give us better plows, and better arms, and better paintings, and better music, we will give him honor; we will crown him with glory; we will robe him in the garments of wealth;" and every incentive has been held out to every human being to improve something in every direction. And that is the reason the club is a cannon; that the reason the dugout is a steamship; that the reason the daub is a painting, and that is the reason that that piece of stone has finally become a glorified statue.

Now, then, this fellow in the dug-out had a religion. That fellow was orthodox. He had no doubt; he was settled in his mind. He did not wish to be insulted. He wanted the bark of his soul to lie at the wharf of orthodoxy, and rot in the sun. He wanted to hear the sails of old opinions flap against the mast of old creeds. He wanted to see the joints in the sides open and gape, as though thirsty for water, and he said: "Now don't disturb my opinions; you'll get my mind unsettled; I have got it all made up, and I don't want to hear any infidelity, either." As far as I am concerned, I want to be out on the high sea; I Want to take my chance with wind and wave and star; and I had rather go down in the glory and grandeur of the storm than to rot at any orthodox wharf. Of course I mean by orthodoxy all that don't agree with my doxy. Do you understand?

Now this man had a religion. That fellow believed in h.e.l.l. Yes, sir; and he thought he would be happier in heaven if he could just lean over and see certain people that he disliked, broiled. That fellow has had a great many intellectual descendents. It is an unhappy fact in nature that the ignorant multiply much faster than the intellectual. This fellow believed in the devil, and his devil had a cloven hoof. (Many people think I have the same kind of footing.) He had a long tail, armed with a fiery dart, and he breathed brimstone. And do you know there has not been a patentable improvement made on that devil for 4,000 years? That fellow believed that G.o.d was a tyrant. That fellow believed that the earth was flat. That fellow believed, as I told you, in a literal burning, seething lake of fire and brimstone. That is what he believed in. That fellow, too, had his idea of politics, and his idea was, "Might makes right." And it will take thousands of years before the world will believingly say, "Right makes might." Now all I ask is the same privilege of improving on that gentleman's theology as upon his musical instrument; the same right to improve upon his politics as upon his dug-out. That is all. I ask for the human soul the same liberty in every direction. And that is all. That is the only crime that I have committed. That is all. I say, let us have a chance. Let us think, and let each one express his thoughts. Let us become investigators, not followers; not cringers and crawlers. If there is in heaven an infinite being, he never will be satisfied with the worship of cowards and hypocrites. Honest unbelief will be a perfume in heaven when hypocrisy, no matter however religious it may be outwardly, will be a stench. That is my doctrine. That is all there is to it; give every other human being all the chance you claim for yourself. To keep your mind open to the voices of nature, to new ideas, to new thoughts, and to improve upon your doctrine whenever you can; that is my doctrine.

Do you know we are improving all the time? Do you know that the most orthodox people in this town today, three hundred years ago would have been burned for heresy? Do you know some ministers who denounce me would have been in the Inquisition themselves two hundred years ago?

Do you know where once burned and blazed the bivouac fires of the army of progress, the altars of the church glow today? Do you know that the church today occupies about the same ground that unbelievers did one hundred years ago? Do you know that while they have followed this army of progress, protesting and denouncing, they have had to keep within protesting and denouncing distance, but they have followed it? They have been the men, let me say, in the valley; the men in swamps, shouting to and cursing the pioneers on the hills; the men upon whose forehead was the light of the coming dawn, the coming day--but they have advanced. In spite of themselves, they have advanced! If they had not, I would not speak here to night. If they had not, not a solitary one of you could have expressed your real and honest thought. But we are advancing, and we are beginning to hold all kinds of slavery in utter contempt; do you know that? And we are beginning to question wealth and power; we are questioning all creeds and all dogmas; and we are not bowing down, as we used to, to a man simply because he is in the robe of a clergyman, and we are not bowing down to a man now simply because he is a king. No! We are not bowing down simply because he is rich. We used to worship the golden calves, but we do not now. The worst you can say of an American, is, he worships the gold of the calf, not the calf; and even the calves are beginning to see this distinction.

It no longer fills the ambition of a man to be emperor or king. The last Napoleon was not satisfied with being Emperor of the French; he was not satisfied with having a circlet of gold about his head; he wanted some evidence that he had something within his head, so he wrote the life of Julius Caesar, that he might become a member of the French Academy. Compare, for instance, in the German Empire, King William and Bismarck. King William is the one anointed of the most high, as they claim--the one upon whose head has been poured the divine petroleum of authority. Compare him with Bismarck, who towers, an intellectual Colossus, above this man. Go into England and compare George Eliot with Queen Victoria--Queen Victoria, clothed in the garments given to her by blind fortune and by chance. George Elliot, robed in garments of glory, woven in the loom of her own genius. Which does the world pay respect to? I tell you we are advancing! The pulpit does not do all the thinking; the pews do it; nearly all of it. The world is advancing, and we question the authority of those men who simply say "it is so." Down upon your knees and admit it! When I think of how much this world has suffered, I am amazed. When I think of how long our fathers were slaves, I am amazed. Why, just think of it! This world has only been fit for a gentleman to live in fifty years. No, it has not. It was not until the year 1808 that Great Britain abolished the slave trade. Up to that time her judge, sitting upon the bench in the name of justice; her priests, occupying the pulpit in the name of universal love, owned stock in slave ships and luxuriated in the profits of piracy and murder. It was not until the year 1808 that the United States abolished the slave trade between this and other countries, but preserved it as between the States. It was not until the 28th day of August, 1833, that Great Britain abolished human slavery in her colonies; and it was not until the 1st day of January, 1863, that Abraham Lincoln wiped from our flag the stigma of disgrace.

Abraham Lincoln--in my judgment, the grandest man ever president of the United States, and upon whose monument these words could truthfully be written: "Here lies the only man in the history of the world who, having been clothed with almost absolute power, never abused it except on the side of mercy."

Think, I say, how long we clung to the inst.i.tution of human slavery; how long lashes upon the naked back were the legal tender for labor performed! Think of it! when the pulpit of this country deliberately and willfully changed the Cross of Christ into the whipping-post.

Think of it! And tell me then if I am right when I say this world has only been fit for a gentleman to live in fifty years. I hate with every drop of my blood every form of tyranny. I hate every form of slavery. I hate dictation--I want something like liberty; and what do I mean by that? The right to do anything that does not interfere with the happiness of another, physically. Liberty of thought includes the right to think right and the right to think wrong. Why? Because that is the means by which we arrive at truth; for if we knew the truth before, we needn't think. Those men who mistake their ignorance for facts, never do think. You may say to me, "How far is it across this room?" I say 100 feet. Suppose it is 105; have I committed any crime?

I made the best guess I could. You ask me about any thing; I examine it honestly, and when I get through, what should I tell you--what I think or what you think? What should I do?

There is a book put in my hands. They say "That is the Koran; that was written by inspiration; read it." I read it. Chapter VII, ent.i.tled "The Cow," chapter IX, ent.i.tled "The Bee," and so on. I read it. When I get through with it, suppose I think in my heart and in my brain, "I don't believe a word of it;" and you ask me, "What do you think of it?" Now, admitting that I live in Turkey, and have a chance to get an office, what should I say? Now, honor bright, should I just make a clean breast of it and say "Upon my honor, I don't believe it?" Then is it right for you to say "That fellow will steal--that fellow is a dangerous man--he is a robber?" Now, suppose I read the book called the bible (and I read it, honor bright), and when I get through with it I make up my mind that book was written by men; and along comes the preacher of my church, and he says "Did you read that book?" "I did."

"Do you think it is divinely inspired?" I say to myself, "Now if I say it is not, they will never send me to Congress from this district on earth." Now, honor bright, what ought I to do? Ought I to say, "I have read it. I have been honest about it; don't believe it?" Now, ought I to say that, if that is a real transcript of my mind, or ought I to commence hemming and hawing and pretend that I do believe it, and go away with the respect of that man, hating myself for a cringing coward? Now which? For my part I would rather a man would tell me what he honestly thinks, and he will preserve his manhood. I had rather be a manly unbeliever than an unmanly believer. I think I will stand higher at the judgment day, if there is one, and stand with as good a chance to get my case dismissed without costs as a man who sneaks through life pretending he believes what he does not. I tell you one thing; there is going to be one free fellow in this world. I am going to say my say, I tell you. I am going to do it kindly, I am going to do it distinctly, but I am going to do it.

Now, if men have been slaves, what about women? Women have been the slaves of slaves; and that's a pretty hard position to occupy for life.

They have been the slaves of slaves; and in my judgment it took millions of ages for women to come from the condition of abject slavery up to the inst.i.tution of marriage. Let me say right here, tonight, I regard marriage as the holiest inst.i.tution among men. Without the fireside there is no human advancement; without the family relation, there is no life worth living. Every good government is made up of good families. The unit of government is family, and anything that tends to destroy the family is perfectly devilish and infamous. I believe in marriage, and I hold in utter contempt the opinions of long-haired men and short-haired women who denounce the inst.i.tution of marriage. Let me say right here--and I have thought a good deal about it--let me say right here, the grandest ambition that any man can possibly have is to so live and so improve himself in heart and brain as to be worthy of the love of some splendid woman; and the grandest ambition of any girl is to make herself worthy of the love and adoration of some magnificent man. That is my idea, and there is no success in life without it. If you are the grand emperor of the world, you had better be the grand emperor of one loving and tender heart, and she the grand empress of yours. The man who has really won the love of one good woman in this world, I do not care if he dies in the ditch a beggar, his life has been a success.

I say it took millions of years to come from the condition of abject slavery up to the condition of marriage. Ladies, the ornaments you bear upon your person tonight are but the souvenirs of your mothers'

bondage. The chains around your necks and the bracelets clasped upon your wrists by the thrilling hand of love, have been changed by the wand of civilization from iron to shining, glittering gold. But nearly every religion has accounted for the devilment in this world by the crime of woman. What a gallant thing that is! And if it is true, I had rather live with the woman I love in a world full of trouble, than to live in heaven with n.o.body but men.

I say that nearly every religion has accounted for all the trouble in this world by the crime of woman. I read in a book--and I will say now that I cannot give the exact language; my memory does not retain the words--but I can give the substance. I read in a book that the supreme being concluded to make a world and one man; that he took some nothing and made a world and one man, and put this man in a garden: but he noticed that he got lonesome; he wandered around as if he was waiting for a train; there was nothing to interest him; no news; no papers; no politics; no policy; and as the devil had not yet made his appearance, there was no chance for reconciliation; not even for civil service reform. Well, he would wander about this garden in this condition until finally the supreme being made up his mind to make him a companion; and having used up all the nothing he originally took in making the world and one man, he had to take a part of the man to start a woman with, and so he caused a deep sleep to fall upon this man--now, understand me. I didn't say this story is true. After the sleep fell upon this man, he took a rib, or, as the French would call it, a cutlet out of this man, and from that he made a woman; and considering the raw material, I look upon it as the most successful job ever performed.

Well, after He got the woman done, she was brought to the man; not to see how she liked him, but to see how he liked her. He liked her, and they started housekeeping; and they were told of certain things they might do, and one thing they could not do--and of course they did it.

I would have done it in fifteen minutes, and I know it. There wouldn't have been an apple on that tree half an hour from date, and the limbs could have been full of clubs. And then they were turned out of the park, and an extra force was put on to keep them from getting back.

Then devilment commenced. The mumps, and the measles, and the whooping cough and the scarlet fever started in their race for man, and they began to have the toothache, the roses began to have thorns, and snakes began to have poisoned teeth, and people began to divide about religion and politics; and the world has been full of trouble from that day to this. Now, nearly all of the religions of this world account for the existence of evil by such a story as that.

I read in another book what appeared to be an account of the same transaction. It was written about 4,000 years before the other; but all commentators agree that the one that was written last was the original, and that the one that was written first was copied from the one that was written last; but I would advise you all not to allow your creed to be disturbed by a little matter of four or five thousand years. In this other story the Supreme Brahma made up his mind to make the world and man and woman; and he made the world, and he made the man and he made the woman, and he put them on the island of Ceylon; and according to the account, it was the most beautiful island of which man can conceive. Such birds, such songs, such flowers and such verdure!

And the branches of the trees were so arranged that when the wind swept through them every tree was a thousand aeolian harps. The Supreme Brahma when he put them there said, "Let them have a period of courtship, for it is my desire and will that true love should forever precede marriage." When I read that, it was so much more beautiful and lofty than the other, that I said to myself, "If either one of these stories ever turns out to be true, I hope it will be this one."

Then they had their courtship, with the nightingales singing and the stars shining and the flowers blooming, and they fell in love. Imagine the courtship! No prospective fathers or mothers in law; no prying and gossiping neighbors, n.o.body to say, "Young man, how do you expect to support her?" Nothing of that kind. They were married by the Supreme Brahma, and he said to them: "Remain here; you must never leave this island." Well, after a little while the man--and his name was Amend, and the woman's name was Heva--and the man said to Heva: "I believe I'll look about a little;" and he went to the northern extremity of the island, where there was a little, narrow neck of land connecting it with the mainland; and the devil, who is always playing pranks with us, got up a mirage, and when he looked over to the mainland, such hills and dells, vales and dales; such mountains, crowned with silver; such cataracts, clad in robes of beauty, did he see there, that he went back and told Heva: "The country over there is a thousand times better than this; let us migrate." She, like every other woman that ever lived, said: "Let well enough alone; we have all we want; let us stay here."

But he said, "No, let us go;" so she followed him, and when they came to this narrow neck of land he took her on his back like a gentleman and carried her over. But the moment they got over they heard a crash, and, looking back, discovered that this narrow neck of land had fallen into the sea, with the exception of now and then a rock, and the mirage had disappeared and there was naught but rocks and sand; and then a voice called out, cursing them. Then it was that the man spoke up--and I have liked him ever since for it--"Curse me, but curse not her; it was not her fault, it was mine." That's the kind of man to start a world with. The Supreme Brahma said, "I will save her but not thee."

She spoke up out of her feelings of love, out of a heart in which there was love enough to make all of her daughters rich in holy affection, and said, "If thou wilt not spare him, spare neither me; I do not wish to live without him; I love him." Then the Supreme Brahma said--and I have liked him first-rate ever since I read it--"I will spare you both and watch over you."

Honor bright, isn't that the better story?

And from that same book I want to show you what ideas some of these miserable heathen had--the heathen we are trying to convert. We send missionaries over yonder to convert heathen there, and we send soldiers out on the plains to kill heathen there. If we can convert the heathen, why not convert those nearest home? Why not convert those we can get at? Why not convert those who have the immense advantage of the example of the average pioneer? But to show you the men we are trying to convert--in this book it says: "Man is strength, woman is beauty; man is courage, woman is love. When the one man loves the one woman and the one woman loves the one man, the very angels leave heaven and come and sit in that house and sing for joy." They are the men we are converting. Think of it! I tell you when I read these things I begin to say, "Love is not of any country; n.o.bility does not belong exclusively here;" and through all the ages there have been a few great and tender souls lifted far above their fellows.

Now, my friends, it seems to me that the woman is the equal of the man.

She has all the rights I have, and one more, and that is the right to be protected. That's my doctrine. You are married; try and make the woman you love happy; try and make the man you love happy. Whoever marries simply for himself will make a mistake; but whoever loves a woman so well that he says "I will make her happy," makes no mistake; and so with the woman who says "I will make him happy." There is only one way to be happy, and that is to make somebody else so, and you can't be happy cross-lots; you have got to go the regular turnpike road.

If there is any man I detest, it is the man who thinks he is the head of the family--the man who thinks he is "boss". That fellow in the dug-out used that word "boss;" that was one of his favorite expressions--that he was "boss". Imagine a young man and a young woman courting, walking out in the moonlight, and the nightingale singing a song of pain and love, as though the thorn touched her heart--imagine them stopping there in the moonlight and starlight and song, and saying "Now here, let's settle who's boss!" I tell you it is an infamous word, and an infamous feeling--a man who is "boss," who is going to govern his family, and when he speaks let all the rest of them be still--some mighty idea is about to be launched from his mouth. Do you know I dislike this man unspeakably; and a cross man I hate above all things.

What right has he to murder the sunshine of the day? What right has he to a.s.sa.s.sinate the joy of life? Where you go home you ought to feel the light there is in the house; if it is in the night it will burst out of doors and windows and illuminate the darkness. It is just as well to go home a ray of sunshine as an old sour, cross curmudgeon, who thinks he is the head of the family. Wise men think their mighty brains have been in a turmoil; they have been thinking about who will be alderman from the fifth ward; they have been thinking about politics; great and mighty questions have been engaging their minds; they have bought calico at 8 cents, or 6, and want to sell it for 7.

Think of the intellectual strain that must have been upon a man, and when he gets home everybody else in the house must look out for his comfort. A woman who has only taken care of five or six children, and one or two of them may be sick; has been nursing them and singing to them, and taking care of them, and trying to make one yard of cloth do the work of two--she, of course, is fresh and fine, and ready to wait upon this great gentleman--the head of the family I don't like him a bit!

Do you know another thing? I despise a stingy man. I don't see how it is possible for a man to die worth fifty millions of dollars, or ten millions of dollars, in a city full of want, when he meets almost every day the withered hand of beggary and the white lips of famine. How a man can withstand all that, and hold in the clutch of his greed twenty or thirty millions of dollars, is past my comprehension. I do not see how he can do it. I should not think he could do it any more than he could keep a pile of lumber where hundreds and thousands of men were drowning in the sea. I should not think he could do it.

Do you know I have known men who would trust their wives with their hearts and their honor, but not with their pocketbook; not with a dollar. When I see a man of that kind I always think he knows which of these articles is the most valuable. Think of making your wife a beggar! Think of her having to ask you every day for a dollar, or for two dollars, or for fifty cents! "What did you do with that dollar I gave you last week?" Think of having a wife that was afraid of you!

What kind of children do you expect to have with a beggar and a coward for their mother? Oh, I tell you, if you have but a dollar in the world, and you have got to spend it, spend it like a king; spend it as though it were a dry leaf and you the owner of unbounded forests!

That's the way to spend it! I had rather be a beggar and spend my last dollar like a king, than be a king and spend my money like a beggar.

If it's got to go, let it go.

Get the best you can for your family--try to look as well as you can yourself. When you used to go courting, how nice you looked! Ah, your eye was bright, your step was light, and you just put on the very best look you could. Do you know that it is insufferable egotism in you to suppose that a woman is going to love you always looking as bad as you can? Think of it! Any woman on earth will be true to you forever when you do your level best. Some people tell me, "Your doctrine about loving, and wives, and all that is splendid for the rich, but it won't do for the poor." I tell you tonight there is on the average more love in the homes of the poor than in the palaces of the rich; and the meanest but with love in it is fit for the G.o.ds, and a palace without love is a den only fit for wild beasts. That's my doctrine!

You can't be so poor but that you can help somebody. Good nature is the cheapest commodity in the world; and love is the only thing that will pay 10 percent to borrower and lender both. Don't tell me that you have got to be rich! We have all a false standard of greatness in the United States. We think here that a man to be great, must be notorious; must be extremely wealthy, or his name must be between the lips of rumor. It is all nonsense! It is not necessary to be rich to be great, or to be powerful to be happy; and the happy man is the successful man. Happiness is the legal tender of the soul. Joy is wealth.

A little while ago I stood by the grave of the old Napoleon, a magnificent tomb, fit for a dead deity almost, and gazed into the great circle at the bottom of it. In the sarcophagus, of black Egyptian marble, at last rest the ashes of that restless man. I looked over the bal.u.s.trade, and I thought about the career of Napoleon. I could see him walking upon the banks of the Seine contemplating suicide. I saw him at Toulon. I saw him putting down the mob in the streets of Paris.

I saw him at the head of the army of Italy. I saw him crossing the bridge at Lodi. I saw him in Egypt, fighting the battle of the pyramids. I saw him cross the Alps, and mingle the eagles of France with the eagles of the crags. I saw him at Austerlitz. I saw him with his army scattered and dispersed before the blast. I saw him at Leipsic when his army was defeated and he was taken captive. I saw him escape. I saw him land again upon French soil, and retake an empire by the force of his own genius. I saw him captured once more, and again at St. Helena, with his arms behind him, gazing out upon the sad and solemn sea; and I thought of the orphans and Widows he had made.

I thought of the tears that had been shed for his glory. I thought of the only woman who ever loved him, who had been pushed from his heart by the cold hand of ambition; and as I looked at the sarcophagus, I said, "I would rather have been a French peasant and worn wooden shoes; I would rather have lived in a hut, with a vine growing over the door, and the grapes growing and ripening in the autumn sun; I would rather have been that peasant, with my wife by my side and my children upon my knees, twining their arms of affection about me; I would rather have been that poor French peasant, and gone down at last to the eternal promiscuity of the dust, followed by those who loved me; I would a thousand times rather have been that French peasant than that imperial personative of force and murder." And so I would, ten thousand times.

It is not necessary to be great to be happy; it is not necessary to be rich to be just and generous, and to have a heart filled with divine affection. No matter whether you are rich or poor, use your wife as though she were a splendid creation, and she will fill your life with perfume and joy. And do you know, it is a splendid thing for me to think that the woman you really love will never grow old to you?

Through the wrinkles of time, through the music of years, if you really love her, you will always see the face you loved and won. And a woman who really loves a man, does not see that he grows older; he is not decrepit; he does not tremble; he is not old; she always sees the same gallant gentleman who won her hand and heart. I like to think of it in that way. I like to think of all pa.s.sions; love is eternal, and, as Shakespeare says, "Although Time, with his sickle, can rob ruby lips and sparkling eyes, let him reach as far as he can, he cannot quite touch love; that reaches even to the end of the tomb." And to love in that way, and then go down the hill of life together, and as you go down hear, perhaps, the laughter of grandchildren--the birds of joy and love sing once more in the leafless branches of age. I believe in the fireside. I believe in the democracy of home. I believe in the republicanism of the family. I believe in liberty and equality with those we love.

If women have been slaves, what shall I say of children; of the little children in the alleys and sub-cellars; the little children who turn pale when they hear their father's footsteps; little children who run away when they only hear their names called by the lips of another; little children--the children of poverty, the children of crime, the children of brutality wherever you are--flotsam and jetsam upon the wild, mad sea of life, my heart goes out to you, one and all. I tell you the children have the same rights that we have, and we ought to treat them as though they were human beings; and they should be reared by love, by kindness, by tenderness, and not by brutality. That is my idea of children. When your little child tells a lie, don't rush at him as though the world were about to go into bankruptcy. Be honest with him. A tyrant father will have liars for children; do you know that? A lie is born of tyranny upon the one hand and weakness upon the other, and when you rush at a poor little boy with a club in your hand, of course he lies. I thank Mother Nature that she has put ingenuity enough in the breast of a child, when attacked by a brutal parent, to throw up a little breastwork in the shape of a lie. When one of your children tells a lie, be honest with him; tell him you have told hundreds of them yourself. Tell him it is not the best way; you have tried it. Tell him, as the man did in Maine when his boy left home: "John, honesty is the best policy; I have tried both." Just be honest with him. Imagine now; you are about to whip a child five years of age. What is the child to do? Suppose a man, as much larger than you are larger than a child five years old, should come at you with liberty-pole in hand, and in a voice of thunder shout, "Who broke the plate?" There is not a solitary one of you who wouldn't swear you never saw it, or that it was cracked when you found it. Why not be honest with these children? Just imagine a man who deals in stocks putting false rumors afloat!

Think of a lawyer beating his own flesh and blood for evading the truth, when he makes half of his own living that way! Think of a minister punishing his child for not telling all he thinks! Just think of it! When your child commits a wrong, take it in your arms; let it feel your heart beat against its heart; let the child know that you really and truly and sincerely love it. Yet some Christians, good Christians, when a child commits a fault, drive it from the door, and say, "Never do you darken this house again." Think of that! And then these same people will get down on their knees and ask G.o.d to take care of the child they have driven from home. I will never ask G.o.d to take care of my children unless I am doing my level best in that same direction. But I will tell you what I say to my children: "Go where you will; commit what crime you may; fall to what depth of degradation you may; you can never commit any crime that will shut my door, my arms, my heart to you; as long as I live you shall have no more sincere friend."

Do you know, I have seen some people who acted as though they thought when the Savior said, "Suffer little children to come unto me, for such is the Kingdom of Heaven," that he had a rawhide under his mantle and made that remark to get the children within striking distance. I don't believe in the government of the lash. If any one of you ever expect to whip your children again after you hear me, I want you to have a photograph taken of yourself when you are in the act, with your face red with vulgar anger; and then the face of the little child, with eyes swimming in tears, and the little chin dimpled with fear, like a piece of water struck by a sudden, cold wind. Have the picture taken. If that little child should die, I cannot find a sweeter way to spend an autumn afternoon than to go out to the cemetery, when the maples are clad in bright colors, and little scarlet runners are coming, like poems of regret, from the sad heart of the earth--than to go out to the cemetery and sit down upon the grave and look at this photograph, and think of the flesh, now dust, that you beat.

I tell you it is wrong; it is no way to raise children! Make your home happy. Be honest with them, divide fairly with them in everything.

Give them a little liberty, and you cannot drive them out of the house.

They will want to stay there. Make home pleasant. Let them play any game they want to. Don't be so foolish as to say: "You may roll b.a.l.l.s on the ground, but you must not roll them on green cloth. You may knock them with a mallet, but you must not push them with a cue. You may play with little pieces of paper which have 'Authors' written on them, but you must not have 'keerds.'" Think of it! "You may go to a minstrel show, where people blacken themselves up and degrade themselves, and imitate humanity below themselves, but you must not go to the theater and see the characters of immortal genius put upon the stage." Why? Well, I can't think of any reason in the world except "minstrel" is a word of two syllables and theater has three. Let children have some daylight at home if you want to keep them there, and don't commence at the cradle and yell, "Don't!" "Don't!" "Stop!"