The Dresden Edition (1900–1902) — every lecture, essay, debate, interview, speech, tribute, and legal argument by Robert G. Ingersoll. 1877-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/ Robert Green Ingersoll https://thegreatagnostic.com/biography/ 1877-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/about-farming-in-illinois/

To Plow is to Pray — to Plant is to Prophesy, and the Harvest Answers and Fulfills., A warm, practical lecture to the farmers of Illinois on work, home, freedom, and the partnership between honest labor and intelligence.

1874-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/heretics-and-heresies/

Liberty, a Word without which all other Words are Vain, Ingersoll's 1874 lecture on the long war between intellectual freedom and religious orthodoxy — and the heretics who dared stand against it.

1869-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/humboldt/

The Universe is Governed by Law, Delivered at the Humboldt centennial in 1869 — a tribute to the great naturalist that marked the beginning of Ingersoll's public freethought career.

1873-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/individuality/

"His Soul was like a Star and dwelt apart.", A ringing defense of mental independence — the right and duty of every human being to think, doubt, and speak their own honest mind against custom, creed, and crowd.

1877-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/ghosts/

Let them cover their eyeless sockets with their fleshless hands and fade forever from the imagination of men., An examination of how fear of the unseen built the world's religions — and how science, step by step, is banishing those ghosts from the human imagination.

1872-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-gods/

An Honest God is the Noblest Work of Man, Ingersoll's landmark 1872 lecture attacking the gods fashioned by man after his own fears and ambitions — and calling for a morality built on reason rather than revelation.

1877-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/liberty-of-man-woman-and-child/

Liberty sustains the same Relation to Mind that Space does to Matter., Ingersoll's celebrated argument for the equal liberty of men, women, and children within the family and before the law — the charter of a humane home.

1870-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/thomas-paine/

With His Name Left Out, the History of Liberty Cannot be Written, The lecture that restored Thomas Paine to the pantheon of American founders — a rehabilitation of the man whose name had been erased by decades of pious slander.

1880-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/what-must-we-do-to-be-saved/

A close reading of the four gospels., A careful, close reading of the gospels asking what — if anything — Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John actually demand for the salvation of the soul.

1885-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/myth-and-miracle/

Happiness is the true end and aim of life., On the natural origin of the supernatural — how every miracle is a confession of ignorance and every god a record of what its makers did not yet understand.

1884-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/orthodoxy/

A lecture., A survey of orthodox Christianity in 1884 — its dying creeds, its surviving institutions, and the specific doctrines (depravity, atonement, hell) that no longer hold the educated mind.

1879-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/some-mistakes-of-moses/

He who endeavors to control the mind by force is a tyrant, and he who submits is a slave., A meticulous (and often hilarious) examination of the historical, scientific, and moral problems of the Pentateuch — the longest sustained piece of biblical criticism Ingersoll wrote.

1881-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/some-reasons-why/

Why religion makes enemies, why inspiration is a fiction, and why the morality of the heathen exceeded that of the prophets., Eleven reasons against the orthodox case — religion as enemy-maker, inspiration as confidence trick, and the moral superiority of pagan philosophers over the Jewish prophets.

1894-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/about-the-holy-bible/

Somebody ought to tell the truth about the Bible., A frank, systematic examination of the Bible — its origin, inspiration, the Pentateuch, the New Testament, and Jehovah's moral administration — by a man who, unlike the preachers and the politicians, had nothing to lose by speaking plainly.

1894-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/abraham-lincoln/

The grandest figure of the fiercest civil war., Ingersoll's lecture on Abraham Lincoln — born the same day as Darwin, each in his own field breaking the chains that bound human beings.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/liberty-in-literature/

A Testimonial to Walt Whitman., An address honoring Walt Whitman as the poet of liberty, democracy, and the body — a wreath placed on the living brow of the man who dared to sing America as it is.

1878-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/robert-burns/

The peasant poet of Scotland., A warm tribute to Robert Burns — peasant poet of Scotland, enemy of Calvinism, prophet of a tender, humane, democratic humanity.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/shakespeare/

The greatest genius of our world., A sweeping tribute to Shakespeare as the supreme poet of the human mind — born of common parents, untouched by royal blood, the finest flower of natural human genius.

1881-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-great-infidels/

The Infidels of one age have been the aureoled saints of the next., A roll-call of the great infidels — Bruno, Spinoza, Hume, Diderot, Voltaire — the men whose heresies became the common sense of the next generation.

1894-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/voltaire/

The infidels of one age have often been the aureoled saints of the next., A tribute to Voltaire — the man who, more than any other, laughed superstition out of Europe and carried the torch of reason past rack, stake, dungeon, altar, and throne.

1884-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/which-way/

The natural and the supernatural., A stark choice between the two roads open to humanity: reason, investigation, and this life — or prayer, ceremony, and a world to come. Two ways; one leads forward, one back.

1885-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-lay-sermon/

Delivered before the American Secular Union., Addressing the American Secular Union in 1885, Ingersoll offers a sermon without supernaturalism — on the prayer in King Lear and the human duty to comfort the suffering here and now.

1897-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-thanksgiving-sermon/

Many ages ago our fathers were living in dens and caves., A Thanksgiving meditation on how far the human race has actually climbed — from caves and terror to science, art, and liberty — and whom to thank for the ascent.

1896-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/how-to-reform-mankind/

There is no darkness but ignorance., An address to the Militant Church of Chicago on the actual, material conditions that must change before mankind can be reformed — not more sermons, but more houses, better wages, and schools.

1860-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/progress/

Ingersoll's earliest surviving lecture (1860)., The earliest surviving lecture — delivered in Pekin, Illinois, in 1860. Fragmentary in places (the editor's asterisks show where the manuscript was lost), but recognizably the voice that would soon become the most famous in America.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/superstition/

To believe in spite of evidence or without evidence., A systematic definition and dissection of superstition — what it is, where it comes from, and the permanent war between it and the patient, cumulative work of science.

1899-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-devil/

If the Devil should die would God make another?, On the indispensability of the Devil to Christian theology — if you take him away the plot collapses, yet no modern clergyman dares to assert his existence in plain English.

1895-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-foundations-of-faith/

A systematic examination of the creed., A point-by-point examination of the stones on which Christian orthodoxy rests: the Old Testament, the New Testament, Jehovah, the Trinity, the theological Christ, belief, and inspiration.

1897-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-truth/

Through millions of ages man slowly developed his brain., A survey of the human mind's long escape from priestcraft — from fear and ignorance toward honest investigation, intellectual freedom, and the candid love of truth.

1899-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/what-is-religion/

Ingersoll's last public address., Ingersoll's last public address, delivered in Boston in June 1899, six weeks before his death — a summing up, in unsparing language, of what religion has actually been, and what a humane religion of this world might yet become.

1896-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/why-i-am-an-agnostic/

For the most part we inherit our opinions., Ingersoll's clearest personal statement — why, after reading, thinking, and looking honestly at the evidence, he settled on agnosticism as the only intellectually decent position for a human being.

1877-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-vindication-of-thomas-paine/

Reply to the New York Observer., Ingersoll's public demolition of the New York Observer's hundred-year slander of Thomas Paine — the claim that Paine had recanted on his deathbed — with affidavits, letters, and the record set straight.

1882-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/six-interviews-on-talmage/

A reply to the Reverend Thomas De Witt Talmage of Brooklyn., Ingersoll's longest single work of religious polemic — six newspaper interviews methodically dismantling the sermons that the Reverend T. DeWitt Talmage of Brooklyn had preached against him.

1882-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-talmagian-catechism/

A shorter catechism, drawn from the sermons of Mr. Talmage., A mock-catechism — question and answer in the manner of Westminster — distilling Talmage's sermons into their essence, and showing just how strange the orthodox position actually is when stated plainly.

1889-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/divorce/

Replies to Cardinal Gibbons, Bishop Potter, and others., Ingersoll's symposium contribution on divorce — the principle, the practice, and the replies of Cardinal Gibbons, Bishop Potter, Justice Bradley, and Senator Dolph.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/reply-to-archdeacon-farrar/

"A Few Words on Col. Ingersoll" answered., A fragmentary draft reply — found among Ingersoll's papers — to Archdeacon F. W. Farrar's article 'A Few Words on Col. Ingersoll' in the North American Review.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/reply-to-dr-lyman-abbott/

An answer to "Flaws in Ingersollism.", An unfinished answer to the Reverend Lyman Abbott's article 'Flaws in Ingersollism' in the North American Review — broken off when Ingersoll was called to Montana on a law case.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/rome-or-reason/

A reply to Cardinal Manning., Henry Edward, Cardinal Manning, defends the Church as its own divine witness; Ingersoll replies that authority, not reason, is what this argument actually demands of the listener.

1881-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-christian-religion/

A discussion with Jeremiah S. Black., The famous three-part exchange with Judge Jeremiah S. Black in the North American Review (1881) — Ingersoll's opening case against Christianity, Black's reply, Ingersoll's rejoinder.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-field-ingersoll-discussion/

Faith or Agnosticism., The 1887–1888 exchange with the Reverend Henry M. Field of the Evangelist — an open and courteous debate on whether Christianity or agnosticism better serves the human race.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/ingersoll-gladstone-controversy/

Colonel Ingersoll on Christianity., William Ewart Gladstone — four-time Prime Minister of Britain — weighs in on the Ingersoll-Field debate, and Ingersoll replies across the Atlantic.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-christmas-sermon/

Published in the Evening Telegram, December 19, 1891., The famous Christmas essay — denounced from every pulpit in New York — on what Christmas, stripped of superstition, might actually mean for human beings living together on this earth.

1882-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-reply-to-rev-drs-thomas-and-lorimer/

McVicker's Theatre, Chicago, Nov. 26, 1882., Preface to a Chicago lecture — Ingersoll's rebuttal to two prominent Chicago ministers who had been preaching against his Talmage interviews from their pulpits.

1894-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-reply-to-rev-john-hall-and-warner-van-norden/

On hungry cloakmakers and the Christianity of capital., An answer to the pious Dr. Hall and the rich Mr. Van Norden — on striking cloakmakers in New York, the prayers of employers, and the Christianity that starves its neighbors and builds churches.

1878-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-reply-to-the-cincinnati-gazette/

An interview in the Cincinnati Gazette, 1878., An answer to both the secular and the Catholic press of Cincinnati, taken up together in one interview.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-reply-to-the-new-york-clergy-on-superstition/

New York Journal, 1898., Ingersoll's answer to the various New York clergymen who responded in the pages of the Journal to his 1898 Superstition lecture.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-reply-to-the-rev-dr-plumb/

Boston, 1898., A 1898 Boston interview answering the Reverend Dr. Plumb's attack on Ingersoll and on the Reverend Mr. Mills.

1881-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/interview-on-chief-justice-comegys/

On the Delaware blasphemy indictment., Two interviews — one in the Brooklyn Eagle, one in the Chicago Times — on the Delaware Chief Justice who, in a charge to the grand jury, all but commanded Ingersoll's indictment for blasphemy.

1879-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/my-chicago-bible-class/

A reply published in the Chicago Times, 1879., A Chicago Times article addressing each of the clergymen who, in turn, had taken offense at Ingersoll's earlier lectures on the Bible and its God.

1877-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/my-reviewers-reviewed/

A reply to the clergymen of San Francisco., A point-by-point reply to the assembled clergy of San Francisco — on slavery, witchcraft, inspiration, miracles, Canaanite genocide, the plan of salvation, and every other orthodox charge brought against his lectures.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/suicide-of-judge-normile/

Reply to the Western Watchman., A public reply to a St. Louis Catholic paper's attack on Ingersoll over the suicide of Judge Normile — and a sober, humane discussion of the ethics of suicide itself.

1883-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-brooklyn-divines/

Replies to clergy interviewed by the Brooklyn Union., A response to a Brooklyn Union symposium in which local clergy were asked whether skepticism was hurting the church, and how it should be answered.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-limitations-of-toleration/

Debate before the Nineteenth Century Club, New York, 1888., A three-cornered debate at the Metropolitan Opera House between Ingersoll, Frederic Coudert, and Governor Woodford — on whether toleration has, or ought to have, any limits at all.

1883-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/to-the-indianapolis-clergy/

Answers to the ministers of Indianapolis., Answers to a set of questions submitted by the Reverends Walk, Taylor, Reed, and O'Donaghue of Indianapolis — on the character of Jesus, the inspiration of the Bible, and the morality of the Old Testament God.

1899-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/interviews/

More than one hundred newspaper interviews, 1878–1899.,

1866-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/address-to-the-86th-illinois-regiment/

Peoria, Illinois, 1866., A fragment of Ingersoll's 1866 address to the 86th Illinois Regiment at their anniversary meeting in Peoria — a reflection on the meaning of the war just ended.

1867-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/address-to-the-colored-people/

Galesburg, Illinois, 1867., An 1867 address to the freed colored people of Galesburg, Illinois — a survey of slavery in all its ages and forms, from Gonzales' Portuguese slave trade to the abolitionists and the Emancipation Proclamation.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/bangor-speech/

Bangor, Maine, 1876., A Hayes-campaign speech from Bangor, Maine, delivered alongside Governor Connor and Senator Blaine.

1880-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/brooklyn-speech/

Brooklyn Academy of Music, introduced by Henry Ward Beecher., The famous Brooklyn rally at which the Reverend Henry Ward Beecher presided and introduced Ingersoll to six thousand people at the Academy of Music.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/centennial-oration/

Peoria, Illinois, July 4, 1876., Ingersoll's great Fourth of July oration on the hundredth birthday of the Republic — 'our fathers retired the gods from politics' — delivered at Peoria, Illinois, 1876.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/chicago-speech/

Exposition Building, Chicago, 1876., A Hayes-campaign address at the Chicago Exposition Building to the largest single-speaker audience ever seen in the city.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/cooper-union-speech/

Cooper Union, New York, 1876., The Cooper Union speech — a major 1876 campaign address delivered to the largest single-speaker audience New York had seen in ten years.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/decoration-day-address/

Metropolitan Opera House, New York., A Decoration Day address delivered before the veterans of the Republic at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York.

1882-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/decoration-day-oration/

Academy of Music, New York — GAR Memorial Celebration., Ingersoll's oration at the Grand Army of the Republic Decoration Day celebration — Academy of Music, New York — one of the great American Memorial Day addresses.

1877-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/eight-to-seven-address/

On the Electoral Commission, Tremont Temple, Boston., A defense of the Electoral Commission's 8-to-7 decision in the Hayes-Tilden contest of 1877 — delivered at Tremont Temple, Boston, to a crowd that packed the city.

1878-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/hard-times-and-the-way-out/

Boston, October 20, 1878., A Boston speech on the economic depression of the late 1870s — hard money, honest labor, and a warning against the "fiat money" fever of the day.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/indianapolis-speech-1876/

The Journal, Indianapolis, September 21, 1876., A Hayes-campaign address delivered at Indianapolis, September 21, 1876.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/ratification-speech/

Harrison and Morton — Metropolitan Opera House, June 29, 1888., The 1888 Republican ratification speech for Harrison and Morton — Metropolitan Opera House, New York.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/reunion-address/

Elmwood Reunion of Six Regiments., An address delivered at the Elmwood Reunion of six Civil War regiments — Peoria delegation and crowd of thousands in attendance.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/speech-at-cincinnati/

The Republican National Convention, 1876., Context and background for the Blaine nomination at the 1876 Republican Convention in Cincinnati — the dramatic setting for the Plumed Knight speech that followed.

1868-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/speech-at-indianapolis-1868/

Attorney-General of Illinois, Rink, Indianapolis., Ingersoll as Attorney-General of Illinois — a full defense, before a Republican crowd in Indianapolis, of the Lincoln administration's wartime suspension of habeas corpus and of Grant as the party's candidate.

1880-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/suffrage-address/

Washington, D.C., January 24, 1880., Delivered at a suffrage meeting in Washington, D.C. — Ingersoll's case that a community which denies any adult citizen a vote is, by that fact alone, a tyranny.

1896-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/chicago-and-new-york-gold-speech/

On the monetary question, 1896., Ingersoll's last major political address — delivered in Chicago and New York on behalf of the gold standard during the Bryan-McKinley campaign of 1896.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-plumed-knight/

Speech nominating James G. Blaine, June 15, 1876., The most celebrated nomination speech in American political history — Ingersoll naming James G. Blaine as 'the plumed knight' before the Republican Convention in Cincinnati, June 15, 1876.

1880-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/wall-street-speech/

Sub-Treasury steps, Wall Street, New York., A political demonstration on Wall Street — bankers, brokers, and merchants gathered at the Sub-Treasury to hear Ingersoll speak from its steps.

1883-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/davis-will-case/

New York, 1883., An 1883 will contest — widely reported for its eloquence, compared in its day to Demosthenes and Cicero.

1876-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/munn-trial/

The United States vs. Daniel W. Munn — Chicago whiskey conspiracy, 1876., Ingersoll's jury argument in the Chicago 'whiskey conspiracy' trial — a defense of a Deputy Supervisor of Internal Revenue charged under Section 5440 of the Revised Statutes.

1899-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/russell-case/

Russell vs. Russell, Camden, N.J., June 21, 1899., Ingersoll's last public appearance — a chancery argument in Russell vs. Russell, delivered without notes in Camden, New Jersey, on June 21, 1899, one month before his death.

1882-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/first-star-route-trial/

Washington, D.C., 1882., Ingersoll's closing jury address in the first Star Route postal-fraud trial — for three months the central news story in Washington, D.C., and the most famous legal argument of his career.

1883-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/second-star-route-trial-closing/

Washington, D.C., 1883., Ingersoll's closing jury argument in the second Star Route trial — review of the testimony of Walsh, Rerdell, Vaile, Miner, Peck, and the Dorseys.

1882-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/second-star-route-trial-opening/

Washington, D.C., December 21, 1882., Ingersoll's opening jury address in the second Star Route trial — a methodical account of the routes, bids, contracts, partnerships, and petitions at the heart of the case.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-few-reasons-for-doubting-the-inspiration-of-the-bible/

Essay., A compact summary — fitting into a single essay — of the case against the Bible's claim to divine inspiration.

1899-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-look-backward-and-a-prophecy/

Ingersoll's last essay., An essay written in the last year of Ingersoll's life — a survey of what the nineteenth century had achieved, and a prophecy of what the twentieth might yet do.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-reply-to-bishop-spalding/

On God in the Constitution., A reply to Bishop Spalding on the question of God in the Constitution — and why the Framers deliberately declined to organize the Republic around an Attribute of the Deity.

1879-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-wooden-god/

On the deification of the Bible., A short essay on the veneration of the Bible as a substitute idol — what happens when the reverence owed to thought gets transferred to a volume.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-word-about-education/

Essay., A short essay on education — what the schools of the day were doing well, what they were doing badly, and the role of the teacher in a free society.

1896-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-young-mans-chances-today/

Essay., An essay of advice to the young — on the conditions of work, character, and opportunity in the America of the late nineteenth century.

1883-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/address-on-the-civil-rights-act/

Lincoln Hall, Washington, October 22, 1883., An address — introduced by Frederick Douglass — on the Supreme Court's 1883 ruling that the Civil Rights Act was unconstitutional, and on what the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments actually required of the States.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/an-essay-on-christmas/

Essay., An essay on the Christmas festival — its pre-Christian roots, its family meaning, and what might be kept and what let go.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/art-and-morality/

Essay., On the supposed conflict between art and morals — and the real source of both in the experience, sympathy, and imagination of human beings.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/crimes-against-criminals/

State Bar Association, Albany, N.Y., January 1, 1890., An examination of what governments have done to the criminal and the poor in the name of justice — and a plea for a more humane, intelligent, and effective reform of the prison system.

1894-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/cruelty-in-the-elmira-reformatory/

On the treatment of prisoners., A public denunciation of the abuses at the Elmira Reformatory in New York — one of the most publicized prison-reform controversies of the 1890s.

1893-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/crumbling-creeds/

On the quiet collapse of orthodoxy., Ingersoll's survey of the religious landscape in the 1890s — the denominations quietly letting go of doctrine after doctrine as the intelligent public drifted away from the old theology.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/eight-hours-must-come/

On the eight-hour working day., Ingersoll's public case for the eight-hour working day — not as a concession from the employer but as a condition of civilization itself.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/ernest-renan/

A tribute on the death of the historian of the life of Jesus., A memorial tribute on the death of Ernest Renan — the French historian whose Vie de Jésus treated the founder of Christianity as a man and a historical subject for the first time.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/fool-friends/

On the well-meaning enemies of the cause., Short essay on the supporters whose over-enthusiasm, tactlessness, or stupidity set a cause back more than its opponents ever could.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/god-in-the-constitution/

Against the proposed "Christian nation" amendment., A systematic argument against the movement to amend the United States Constitution to recognize God — and a case that the Republic was established, deliberately, as a secular government.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/governor-rollins-fast-day-proclamation/

Reply to the Governor of New Hampshire., A reply to New Hampshire Governor Frank Rollins' Fast-Day proclamation — on the propriety of a state governor issuing religious edicts in the last years of the nineteenth century.

1884-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/how-to-edit-a-liberal-paper/

Essay., Advice to the editors of freethought papers on how to run one worth reading — the responsibilities, the temptations, and the reader's time.

1889-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/huxley-and-agnosticism/

On Thomas Henry Huxley and the coinage of the word., On Thomas Henry Huxley, the English naturalist who coined the word 'agnostic' — and on the quarrels between him and the clergy of the Church of England.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/inspiration/

Essay., A short essay on the meaning and limits of the word "inspiration" — its use by the orthodox, and its proper use among human beings.

1897-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/laws-delay/

On the slowness of American justice., On the chronic slowness and expense of American civil justice — a practitioner's view from inside the profession.

1893-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/our-schools/

On the public school system., On the American public school — the institution on which, Ingersoll believed, the whole future of the Republic rested.

1899-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/political-morality/

Essay., A short essay on the morality — and amorality — of American public life at the close of the nineteenth century.

1886-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/rev-dr-newton-on-a-new-religion/

Reply to a sermon., A reply to the Reverend Dr. Heber Newton's proposed reform of the old religion, and a sketch of what a genuinely new religion would have to look like.

1895-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/science-and-sentiment/

Including "Sowing and Reaping.", On the relationship between scientific understanding and human feeling — the two great sources of the modern mind.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/secularism/

Essay., A short, clear statement of what secularism is: the doctrine that religious belief should neither be a qualification for nor a disability against citizenship.

1885-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/some-interrogation-points/

Questions for the clergy., A list of questions Ingersoll would have put to any clergyman willing to take the stand and answer under oath.

1889-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/spirituality/

What the word really means., A definition of 'spirituality' that is free of the supernatural and grounded in the finest qualities of the human being.

1893-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/sumters-gun/

On the Civil War and its consequences., A reflection on Fort Sumter — the shot that began the Civil War, and the consequences that followed for slavery, for the Republic, and for the world.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-agnostic-christmas/

On keeping Christmas without the supernatural., Ingersoll's case that the warmth and joy of Christmas do not require the supernatural — and that an agnostic may keep the day as fully as any Christian.

1897-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-bigotry-of-colleges/

On sectarianism in higher education., On the sectarian grip that still held many American colleges at the end of the nineteenth century — and its effect on the free education of the young.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-census-enumerators-catechism/

Satire., A short satirical essay on the questions a census enumerator might be made to ask if the government decided it needed to know the inner life of every citizen.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-divided-household-of-faith/

Essay., An essay on the disintegration of Christian doctrine in the latter nineteenth century — denominational quarrels, creedal revision, and the silent departure of the intelligent laity from the old faith.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-improved-man/

Essay., A sketch of the human being as he might one day be — when reason, kindness, and work have done their work upon the race.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-jews/

Against anti-Semitism., An essay — written at the height of the Russian pogroms and early in the Dreyfus era — defending the Jewish people against the religious and racial calumnies of the Christian world.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-libel-laws/

Essay., An essay on the libel laws — their purpose, their abuse by the powerful, and their effect on the freedom of the press.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-three-philanthropists/

Three sketches of the good man., Three sketches in contrasting keys — "He Was the Providence of the Poor," "He Lived for Others," and "He Allowed Others to Live for Themselves" — on what it really means to do good.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-truth-of-history/

Including "Conversion of the Arch Atheist.", An examination of the reliability of history itself — and a refutation of the perennial false claim that the 'arch atheist' has been converted on his deathbed.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/thomas-paine-magazine-article/

A magazine article., A late magazine-length tribute to Thomas Paine — a companion piece to the great 1870 lecture, written for readers who had never been permitted to hear the truth about him in church or school.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/trial-of-c-b-reynolds-for-blasphemy/

Address to the Jury, Morristown, New Jersey, 1887., Ingersoll's celebrated defense of the freethinker C. B. Reynolds before a New Jersey jury — one of the last prosecutions for blasphemy in American legal history.

1893-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/vivisection/

Against cruelty to animals in the name of science., Ingersoll's strong condemnation of vivisection — cruelty in the name of science can be no more excused than cruelty in the name of God.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/what-i-want-for-christmas/

A Christmas essay., Ingersoll's Christmas wish-list — for all the children of the earth, not for himself.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/what-infidels-have-done/

On the infidels' share in the world's progress., A roll-call of the deeds of the unbelievers — in science, statecraft, philanthropy, and art — and a challenge to Christendom to match them.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/a-few-fragments-on-expansion/

On American territorial expansion., A late essay on the expansionist temper of the United States at the end of the nineteenth century.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-anton-seidl/

Memorial tribute to the conductor., Memorial tribute to Anton Seidl — Metropolitan Opera conductor and champion of Wagner in the United States.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-courtlandt-palmer/

Memorial tribute to the founder of the Nineteenth Century Club., Memorial tribute to Courtlandt Palmer — freethinker, philanthropist, and founder of the Nineteenth Century Club of New York.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-dr-thomas-seton-robertson/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Dr. Thomas Seton Robertson.

1879-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-ebon-c-ingersoll/

Washington, D.C., May 31, 1879., The most famous of Ingersoll's grave-side addresses — his tribute at the funeral of his brother Ebon in Washington, May 1879. 'Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities.'

1885-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-elizur-wright/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Elizur Wright — abolitionist, actuary, and father of the American life-insurance reform.

1884-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-george-jacob-holyoake/

English freethinker and coiner of the word "secularism.", Tribute to George Jacob Holyoake — the English freethinker, cooperator, and the man who coined the word 'secularism.'

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-henry-ward-beecher/

Memorial tribute to the great American preacher., Memorial tribute to the Reverend Henry Ward Beecher — among the most liberal of America's great Protestant preachers, and a public friend of Ingersoll's in later life.

1889-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-horace-seaver/

Memorial tribute to the editor of the Boston Investigator., Memorial tribute to Horace Seaver — for decades the editor of the Boston Investigator, the oldest freethought journal in America.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-isaac-h-bailey/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Isaac H. Bailey.

1884-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-john-g-mills/

Grave-side tribute., Grave-side tribute to John G. Mills.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-lawrence-barrett/

Memorial tribute to the actor., Memorial tribute to the Shakespearean actor Lawrence Barrett.

1886-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-ida-whiting-knowles/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Mrs. Ida Whiting Knowles.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-mrs-mary-h-fiske/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Mrs. Mary H. Fiske.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-philo-d-beckwith/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Philo D. Beckwith.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-richard-h-whiting/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Richard H. Whiting.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-roscoe-conkling/

Memorial address to the New York legislature, May 9, 1888., The great memorial address to the New York State Legislature on the death of Roscoe Conkling — one of Ingersoll's longest and most celebrated eulogies.

1879-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-alexander-clark/

Grave-side tribute., Tribute at the grave of the Reverend Alexander Clark.

1897-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-thomas-corwin/

Memorial tribute., Memorial tribute to Thomas Corwin.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-walt-whitman/

Grave-side address at Whitman's burial, Camden, N.J., March 30, 1892., Ingersoll's grave-side address at the burial of Walt Whitman in Camden, New Jersey, March 30, 1892 — delivered four days after the poet's death.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/address-to-the-actors-fund/

New York, June 5, 1888., Address to the Actors' Fund of America — a tribute to the stage and to the artists whose profession the Church had for so long refused to bury in consecrated ground.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/address-to-the-press-club/

New Orleans, February 1, 1898., Address to the New Orleans Press Club on the press as the great civilizer and breaker of provincialism.

1882-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/at-a-childs-grave/

Washington, D.C., January 8, 1882., Ingersoll's short grave-side address for a dead child — one of the most widely reprinted pieces of American funeral oratory.

1895-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-benjamin-w-parker/

Grave-side tribute., Grave-side tribute to Benjamin W. Parker.

1885-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/american-secular-union-convention/

Albany, N.Y., September 13, 1885 — presidential address., Ingersoll's presidential address to the American Secular Union, accepting the office of president.

1878-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/national-liberal-league-convention/

Cincinnati, September 14, 1878., Address to the National Liberal League convention in Cincinnati — on the enfranchisement of the human mind, religious liberty, and the family as the unit of good government.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/death-of-the-aged/

Letter of condolence., A short letter of condolence — on the death of the old as a serene and rightful thing.

1893-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/effect-of-worlds-fair/

On the 1893 Chicago Columbian Exposition., On the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago — what world's fairs are for, and what they can do for the progress of the human race.

1895-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/fragments/

Short letters, fragments, and occasional pieces., A collection of short letters and fragments — on clover, on the Clover Club, and on various occasional themes.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/general-grants-birthday-dinner/

Tribute to Ulysses S. Grant., Ingersoll's birthday tribute to Ulysses S. Grant at a memorial dinner of the Army of the Tennessee.

1899-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/jesus-christ/

An unfinished lecture, begun a few days before Ingersoll's death., The unfinished lecture Ingersoll began a few days before his death in July 1899 — a close examination of the man Jesus, stripped of the centuries of praise that had eulogized him into unreality.

1886-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/life/

New York Dramatic Mirror, December 18, 1886., Ingersoll's famous prose-poem on the whole span of a human life — written for the New York Dramatic Mirror, December 1886.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/lotos-club-anniversary-dinner/

New York literary and theatrical club., After-dinner address at the twentieth-anniversary banquet of the Lotos Club in New York — the literary and theatrical society of Whitelaw Reid, Mark Twain, and their circle.

1893-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/lotos-club-anton-seidl/

After-dinner tribute to the conductor., Lotos Club tribute to the German-American conductor Anton Seidl — champion of Wagner and the Metropolitan Opera's leading baton of the 1890s.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/lotos-club-admiral-schley/

After-dinner tribute to the hero of Santiago., Lotos Club tribute to Rear Admiral Winfield Scott Schley, fresh from his victory over the Spanish fleet at Santiago de Cuba.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/manhattan-athletic-club-dinner/

After-dinner speech., After-dinner address to the Manhattan Athletic Club of New York.

1897-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/organized-charities/

Essay., A pointed short essay on organized charity and its institutional failures.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/our-new-possessions/

On Cuba, the Philippines, and the territorial gains of 1898., Ingersoll's view on what the United States should do with Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines after the Spanish-American War.

1880-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/modern-thinkers/

Introduction to Denslow's biographical study of Swedenborg, Adam Smith, Bentham, Paine, Fourier, Comte, Haeckel, and Spencer., Ingersoll's long introduction to Prof. Van Buren Denslow's 'Modern Thinkers' — a running commentary on Swedenborg, Adam Smith, Bentham, Paine, Fourier, Comte, Haeckel, and Spencer.

1893-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/professor-briggs/

On the Presbyterian heresy trial of Charles A. Briggs., On the Presbyterian heresy trial of Professor Charles A. Briggs of Union Theological Seminary — the most famous doctrinal dispute in American Protestantism of the 1890s.

1889-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/robson-and-crane-dinner/

In honor of the actors Stuart Robson and William H. Crane., After-dinner speech in honor of the comic actors Stuart Robson and William H. Crane.

1894-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/sabbath-superstition/

On the Sunday laws., An attack on the Sunday laws still in force in most American states — a case for a civil society in which no day is set apart by statute for religious observance.

1898-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/spain-and-the-spaniards/

On the Spanish-American War., Ingersoll's short, unsparing history of Spain — its Inquisition, its empire, and its defeat in 1898.

1888-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/the-children-of-the-stage/

On the stage and its people., A defense of the stage and the people who live by it — their humanity, their craft, and their contribution to civilization.

1879-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/circulation-of-obscene-literature/

Defense in the Bennett-Comstock prosecution., Ingersoll's involvement in the Bennett-Comstock obscenity prosecution — the most famous test of the federal obscenity statute of the 1870s.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/frank-b-carpenter-dinner/

Tribute to the painter Frank B. Carpenter., After-dinner tribute to Frank B. Carpenter — the painter of Lincoln's Cabinet deliberating over the Emancipation Proclamation.

1879-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/grant-banquet/

Twelfth toast, Chicago, November 13, 1879., Ingersoll's after-dinner address at the banquet of the Army of the Tennessee in Chicago, November 13, 1879 — one of the most celebrated pieces of American impromptu oratory.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/liederkranz-club-banquet/

In honor of Anton Seidl and Theodore Stanton., After-dinner tribute at the Liederkranz Club banquet honoring conductor Anton Seidl and Theodore Stanton.

1890-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/police-captains-dinner/

After-dinner speech., After-dinner address to the New York City police captains.

1896-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/religious-belief-of-abraham-lincoln/

Letter to Mr. Seip, New York, May 28, 1896., Ingersoll's considered opinion, with the evidence, that Abraham Lincoln was not a Christian in any orthodox sense — a letter written in reply to a defender of the contrary view.

1887-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/thirteen-club-dinner/

On the superstitions of public men., After-dinner address at the Thirteen Club — the anti-superstition society that deliberately broke every lucky taboo on record.

1891-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/unitarian-club-dinner/

After-dinner address., After-dinner address to the Unitarian Club — the audience closest in spirit to Ingersoll within organized Christianity.

1892-01-01T00:00:00.000Z https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/western-society-army-of-the-potomac/

Civil War veterans reunion., Civil War reunion address at the Western Society of the Army of the Potomac banquet.