It is without validity.
It is all things to all people, and is as meaningless as it is indefinable.
It is the most dangerous in the hands of the unscrupulous, and is the joker that trumps the ace.
It is the poisoned word that has paralyzed the brain of man.
"The fear of the Lord" is not the beginning of wisdom; on the contrary, it has made man a groveling slave; it has made raving lunatics of those who have attempted to interpret what God "is" and what is supposed to be our "duty" to God.
It has made man prostitute the most precious things of life—it has made him sacrifice wife, and child, and home.
"In the name of God" means in the name of nothing—it has caused man to be a wastrel with the precious elixir of life, because there is no God.
Ingersoll could not understand the mind of those who, once having been told the truth, preferred to remain under the spell of superstition and in ignorance. He could not understand why people would not accept "new truths with gladness."
He also knew, however, that once a person's mind had been poisoned with religious superstition, it was almost impossible to free it from the paralyzing fear which destroyed its ability to think.