The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 12 (of 12) / Dresden Edition—Miscellany

by Robert Green Ingersoll

Now, I am simply saying this to show that they were making gods for all these centuries, and making them out of something they found in nature. Then, after they got through with the beast business, they made gods after the image of man; and they are the best gods, so far as I know, that have been made.

The gods that were first made after the image of man were not made after the pattern of very good men; but they were good men according to the standard of that time, because, as I will show you in a moment, all these things are relative. The qualities or things that we call mercy, justice, charity and religion are all relative. There was a time when the victor on the field of battle was exceedingly merciful if he failed to eat his prisoner; he was regarded as a very charitable gentleman if he refused to eat the man he had captured in battle. Afterward he was regarded as an exceedingly benevolent person if he would spare a prisoner's life and make him a slave.

So that—but you all know it as well as I do or you would not be Unitarians—all this has been simply a growth from year to year, from generation to generation, from age to age. And let me tell you the first thing about these gods that they made after the image of men. After a time there were men on the earth who were better than these gods in heaven.

Then those gods began to die, one after another, and dropped from their thrones. The time will probably come in the history of this world when an insurance company can calculate the average life of gods as well as they do now of men; because all these gods have been made by folks. And, let me say right here, the folks did the best they could. I do not blame them. Everybody in the business has always done his best. I admit it. I admit that man has traveled from the first conception up to Unitarianism by a necessary road. Under the conditions he could have come up in no other way. I admit all that. I blame nobody. But I am simply trying to tell, in a very feeble manner, how it is.

Now, in a little while, I say, men got better than their gods. Then the gods began to die. Then we began to find out a few things in nature, and we found out that we were supporting more gods than were necessary—that fewer gods could do the business—and that, from an economical point of view, expenses ought to be cut down. There were too many temples, too many priests, and you always had to give tithes of something to each one, and these gods were about to eat up the substance of the world.

And there came a time when it got to that point that either the gods would eat up the people or the people must destroy some gods, and of course they destroyed the gods—one by one and in their places they put forces of nature to do the business—forces of nature that needed no church, that needed no theologians; forces of nature that you are under no obligation to; that you do not have to pay anything to keep working. We found that the attraction of gravitation would attend to its business, night and day, at its own expense. There was a great saving. I wish it were the same with all kinds of law, so that we could all go into some useful business, including myself.

So day by day, they dispensed with this expense of deities; and the world got along just as well—a good deal better. They used to think—a community thought—that if a man was allowed to say a word against a deity, the god would visit his vengeance upon the entire nation. But they found out, after a while, that no harm came of it; so they went on destroying the gods. Now, all these things are relative; and they made gods a little better all the time—I admit that—till we struck the Presbyterian, which is probably the worst ever made. The Presbyterians seem to have bred back.

But no matter. As man became more just, or nearer just, as he became more charitable, or nearer charitable, his god grew to be a little better and a little better. He was very bad in Geneva—the three that we then had. They were very bad in Scotland—horrible! Very bad in New England—infamous! I might as well tell the truth about it—very bad! And then men went to work, finally, to civilize their gods, to civilize heaven, to give heaven the benefit of the freedom of this brave world. That's what we did. We wanted to civilize religion—civilize what is known as Christianity. And nothing on earth needed civilization more; and nothing needs it more than that to-night. Civilization! I am not so much for the freedom of religion as I am for the religion of freedom.

Now, there was a time when our ancestors—good people, away back, all dead, no great regret expressed at this meeting on that account—there was a time when our ancestors were happy in their belief that nearly everybody was to be lost, and that a few, including themselves, were to be saved. That religion, I say, fitted that time. It fitted their geology. It was a very good running mate for their astronomy. It was a good match for their chemistry. In other words, they were about equal in every department of human ignorance.

And they insisted that there lived up there somewhere—generally up—exactly where nobody has, I believe, yet said—a being, an infinite person "without body, parts, or passions," and yet without passions he was angry at the wicked every day; without body he inhabited a certain place; and without parts he was, after all, in some strange and miraculous manner, organized so that he thought.