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When I became convinced that the universe is natural — that all the ghosts and gods are myths, there entered into my brain, into my soul, into every drop of my blood, the sense, the feeling, the joy of freedom.
The walls of my prison crumbled and fell, the dungeon was flooded with light and all the bolts and bars and manacles became dust. I was no longer a servant, a serf or a slave.
There was for me no master in all the world — not even infinite space.
I was free:
Free to think, to express my thoughts
Free to live my own ideal
Fee to live for myself and those I loved
Free to use all my faculties, all my senses
Free to spread imagination’s wings
Free to investigate, to guess and dream and hope
Free to judge and determine for myself
Free to reject all ignorant and cruel creeds, all the “inspired” books that savages have produced, and all the barbarous legends of the past
Free from popes and priests
Free from all the “called” and “set apart”
Free from sanctified mistakes and “holy” lies
Free from the winged monsters of the night
Free from devils, ghosts and gods
For the first time I was free. There were no prohibited places in all the realms of thought — no air, no space, where fancy could not spread her painted wings; no claims for my limbs; no lashes for my back; no fires for my flesh; no following another’s steps; no need to bow, or cringe, or crawl, or utter lying words. I was free. I stood erect and fearlessly, joyously, faced all worlds.
And then my heart was filled with gratitude, with thankfulness, and went out in love:
To all the heroes, the thinkers, who gave their lives for the liberty of hand and brain
For the freedom of labor and thought
To those who fell on the fierce fields of war
To those who died in dungeons bound with chains
To those who proudly mounted scaffold’s stairs
To those by fire consumed
To all the wise, the good, the brave of every land, whose thoughts and deeds have given freedom to the sons and daughters of men and women
And then I vowed to grasp the torch that they have held, and hold it high, that light may conquer darkness still.
A few more quotes by Robert Green Ingersoll having to do with Christianity:
He who endeavors to control the mind by force is a tyrant, He who submits is a slave.
Until every soul is freely permitted to investigate every book and creed and dogma for itself, the world cannot be free. Mankind will be enslaved until there is mental grandeur enough to allow each man to have his thoughts and say.
Christians tell me that they love their enemies, and yet all I ask is-- not that they love their enemies, not that they love their friends even, but that they treat those who differ from them, with simple fairness. We do not wish to be forgiven, but we wish Christians to so act that we will not have to forgive them.
If all will admit that all have an equal right to think, then the question is forever solved; but as long as organized and powerful churches, pretending to hold the keys of heaven and hell, denounce every person as an outcast and criminal who thinks for himself and denies their authority, the world will be filled with hatred and suffering. To hate man and worship God seems to be the sum of all the creeds.
"Atheism leaves a man to sense, to philosophy, to natural piety, to laws, to reputation; all of which may be guides to an outward moral virtue, even if religion vanished; but religious superstition dismounts all these and erects an absolute monarchy in the minds of men."
– Francis Bacon
Dang, these three posts are a tough act to follow!!! Thanks folks!!
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