{
  "schema": "tga.work.v1",
  "identifier": "dresden:vol-11:what-infidels-have-done",
  "slug": "what-infidels-have-done",
  "title": "What Infidels Have Done",
  "subtitle": "On the infidels' share in the world's progress.",
  "excerpt": "A roll-call of the deeds of the unbelievers — in science, statecraft, philanthropy, and art — and a challenge to Christendom to match them.",
  "year": 1892,
  "volume": 11,
  "category": "Essay",
  "author": {
    "name": "Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "wikidata": "Q360326",
    "viaf": "44331023"
  },
  "isPartOf": {
    "title": "The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "edition": "Dresden Edition",
    "publisher": "C. P. Farrell",
    "year": 1900
  },
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/",
  "url": "https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/what-infidels-have-done/",
  "wordCount": 1497,
  "body": "ONE HUNDRED years after Christ had died suppose some one had asked a\nChristian, What hospitals have you built? What asylums have you founded?\nThey would have said \"None.\" Suppose three hundred years after the death\nof Christ the same questions had been asked the Christian, he would have\nsaid \"None, not one.\" Two hundred years more and the answer would\nhave been the same. And at that time the Christian could have told the\nquestioner that the Mohammedans had built asylums before the Christians.\nHe could also have told him that there had been orphan asylums in China\nfor hundreds and hundreds of years, hospitals in India, and hospitals\nfor the sick at Athens.\n\nHere it may be well enough to say that all hospitals and asylums are\nnot built for charity. They are built because people do not want to be\nannoyed by the sick and the insane. If a sick man should come down the\nstreet and sit upon your doorstep, what would you do with him? You\nwould have to take him into your house or leave him to suffer. Private\nfamilies do not wish to take the burden of the sick. Consequently,\nin self-defence, hospitals are built so that any wanderer coming to a\nhouse, dying, or suffering from any disease, may immediately be packed\noff to a hospital and not become a burden upon private charity. The fact\nthat many diseases are contagious rendered hospitals necessary for the\npreservation of the lives of the citizens. The same thing is true of the\nasylums. People do not, as a rule, want to take into their families, all\nthe children who happen to have no fathers and mothers. So they endow\nand build an asylum where those children can be sent—and where they\ncan be whipped according to law. Nobody wants an insane stranger in\nhis house. The consequence is, that the community, to get rid of these\npeople, to get rid of the trouble, build public institutions and send\nthem there.\n\nNow, then, to come to the point, to answer the interrogatory often flung\nat us from the pulpit, What institutions have Infidels built? In the\nfirst place, there have not been many Infidels for many years and, as\na rule, a known Infidel cannot get very rich, for the reason that the\nChristians are so forgiving and loving they boycott him. If the average\nInfidel, freely stating his opinion, could get through the world\nhimself, for the last several hundred years, he has been in good luck.\nBut as a matter of fact there have been some Infidels who have done\nsome good, even from a Christian standpoint. The greatest charity ever\nestablished in the United States by a man—not by a community to get rid\nof a nuisance, but by a man who wished to do good and wished that\ngood to last after his death—is the Girard College in the city of\nPhiladelphia. Girard was an Infidel. He gained his first publicity by\ngoing like a common person into the hospitals and taking care of those\nsuffering from contagious diseases—from cholera and smallpox. So there\nis a man by the name of James Lick, an Infidel, who has given the finest\nobservatory ever given to the world. And it is a good thing for an\nInfidel to increase the sight of men. The reason people are theologians\nis because they cannot see. Mr. Lick has increased human vision, and\nI can say right here that nothing has been seen through the telescope,\ncalculated to prove the astronomy of Joshua. Neither can you see with\nthat telescope a star that bears a Christian name. The reason is\nthat Christianity was opposed to astronomy. So astronomers took their\nrevenge, and now there is not one star that glitters in all the vast\nfirmament of the boundless heavens that has a Christian name. Mr.\nCarnegie has been what they call a public-spirited man. He has given\nmillions of dollars for libraries and other institutions, and he\ncertainly is not an orthodox Christian.\n\nInfidels, however, have done much better even than that. They have\nincreased the sum of human knowledge. John W. Draper, in his work on\n\"The Intellectual Development of Europe,\" has done more good to the\nAmerican people and to the civilized world than all the priests in it.\nHe was an Infidel. Buckle is another who has added to the sum of human\nknowledge. Thomas Paine, an Infidel, did more for this country than any\nother man who ever lived in it.\n\nMost of the colleges in this country have, I admit, been founded\nby Christians, and the money for their support has been donated by\nChristians, but most of the colleges of this country have simply\nclassified ignorance, and I think the United States would be more\nlearned than it is to-day if there never had been a Christian college in\nit. But whether Christians gave or Infidels gave has nothing to do with\nthe probability of the Jonah story or with the probability that the mark\non the dial went back ten degrees to prove that a little Jewish king was\nnot going to die of a boil. And if the Infidels are all stingy and the\nChristians are all generous it does not even tend to prove that three\nmen were in a fiery furnace heated seven times hotter than was its wont\nwithout even scorching their clothes.\n\nThe best college in this country—or, at least, for a long time the\nbest—was the institution founded by Ezra Cornell. That is a school\nwhere people try to teach what they know instead of what they guess. Yet\nCornell University was attacked by every orthodox college in the United\nStates at the time it was founded, because they said it was without\nreligion.\n\nEverybody knows that Christianity does not tend to generosity.\nChristianity says: \"Save your own soul, whether anybody else saves his\nor not.\" Christianity says: \"Let the great ship go down. You get into\nthe little life-boat of the gospel and paddle ashore, no matter what\nbecomes of the rest.\" Christianity says you must love God, or something\nin the sky, better than you love your wife and children. And the\nChristian, even when giving, expects to get a very large compound\ninterest in another world. The Infidel who gives, asks no return except\nthe joy that comes from relieving the wants of another.\n\nAgain the Christians, although they have built colleges, have built them\nfor the purpose of spreading their superstitions, and have poisoned the\nminds of the world, while the Infidel teachers have filled the world\nwith light. Darwin did more for mankind than if he had built a thousand\nhospitals. Voltaire did more than if he had built a thousand asylums for\nthe insane. He will prevent thousands from going insane that otherwise\nmight be driven into insanity by the \"glad tidings of great joy.\"\nHaeckel is filling the world with light.\n\nI am perfectly willing that the results of the labors of Christians and\nthe labors of Infidels should be compared. Then let it be understood\nthat Infidels have been in this world but a very short time. A few years\nago there were hardly any. I can remember when I was the only Infidel in\nthe town where I lived. Give us time and we will build colleges in which\nsomething will be taught that is of use. We hope to build temples that\nwill be dedicated to reason and common sense, and where every effort\nwill be made to reform mankind and make them better and better in this\nworld.\n\nI am saying nothing against the charity of Christians; nothing against\nany kindness or goodness. But I say the Christians, in my judgment, have\ndone more harm than they have done good. They may talk of the asylums\nthey have built, but they have not built asylums enough to hold the\npeople who have been driven insane by their teachings. Orthodox religion\nhas opposed liberty. It has opposed investigation and free thought. If\nall the churches in Europe had been observatories, if the cathedrals had\nbeen universities where facts were taught and where nature was studied,\nif all the priests had been real teachers, this world would have been\nfar, far beyond what it is to-day.\n\nThere is an idea that Christianity is positive, and Infidelity is\nnegative. If this be so, then falsehood is positive and truth is\nnegative. What I contend is that Infidelity is a positive religion; that\nChristianity is a negative religion. Christianity denies and Infidelity\nadmits. Infidelity stands by facts; it demonstrates by the conclusions\nof the reason. Infidelity does all it can to develop the brain and the\nheart of man. That is positive. Religion asks man to give up this\nworld for one he knows nothing about. That is negative. I stand by the\nreligion of reason. I stand by the dogmas of demonstration.\n"
}