What's God Got to Do With It?: Robert Ingersoll on Free Thought, Honest Talk and the Separation of Church and State

I love a good sermon, and Bob Ingersoll's are among the best. You can hear the man stalking up and down, pausing significantly, letting the laughter rise or the silence stretch out, before thundering down his next line. I love even more how he uses the rhetorical arsenal of a skilled preacher to demolish the nonsense that a preacher delivers. And poetry!"Every creed is a rock in running water: humanity sweeps by it. Every creed cries to the universe, 'Halt!' A creed is the ignorant Past bullying the enlightened Present."Flourishes, lightning bolts, the most deadly serious mockery. It's good to know Mark Twain appreciated him, too, because they're kindred spirits. Still speaking, still muttering, accusing from beyond the grave neither one feared:"How any human being ever has had the impudence to speak against the right to speak, is beyond the power of my imagination."It's nice how an Old Atheist harmonizes so well with the maligned "New Atheists," who aren't new at all (and despite Ingersoll's claim that he was a mere agnostic, since being averse to arrogance of all types he thought it presumption to claim to know what did NOT exist outside of death). Emperors' clothing was just as transparent in the lecture halls of Ingersoll's day as it is now. On the value of hell and other useful lies:"I do not believe in the civilizing effects of falsehood."What a pleasant afternoon I spent wishing I'd had a copy of this book in ninth grade, when speech class in my Catholic high school was a droning hour of Significant Addresses, four-scores and Inaugurals, when a few lines of this icy-hot heresy would have brought the holy house down! Perhaps in that Other World of which Ingersoll claimed indifference, I can deliver a speech like "The Liberty of Man, Woman, and Child" and let the pieties scatter.

So wrote editor Tim Page of Robert G. Ingersoll in the introduction to this short, easy to read book. Ingersoll was one of the intellectual giants of the second half of the 19th century. Sadly and tragically he is now all but forgotten. Known as The Great Agnostic, he spent his life pointing out hypocrisy, railing against injustice and ridiculing superstitious beliefs. As America's foremost practitioner of rational thought, he had the ear of many a President. Yet he remained always modest and never deviated from living a life characterized by kindness, love of humanity and generosity in all things.Any writing or speech attributable to Robert Ingersoll is worth reading and rereading. And those contained in What's God Got to Do with It? are no exceptions. This collection consists of a number of short works on a wide range of subjects. Like his admiration for Robert Burns and Thomas Paine. The unfairness of tax exempt status for churches. The ugliness of corporeal punishment of children. The futility of prayer and fasting. Women's rights and much, much more.For those unfamiliar with the humanistic philosophy of Robert Ingersoll, this book would be a fine place to start. America sorely needs another Ingersoll now more than ever. He was one of the greats.

Robert Ingersoll was famous back in the day when people could make a living giving speeches. He wrote, too, and quite well, but most people who knew about him wanted to see him live in their town. So he traveled all over the country, and most of this book is composed of his speeches.He was referred to as "The Great Agnostic," although in my opinion, he was really an atheist. He was especially important to the enlightened movement to keep the wall of separation between church and state. In his mind, religion was a private thing, and government was a public thing, and there was a very good reason why the First Amendment was placed first.Ingersoll wrote and spoke in a straightforward, earnest and often amusing manner. But even if he did not, this book would still be an important part of our intellectual heritage. Read it. Read it more than once.

The book is realistic from a negative point of view but religion and life can have a more enligtened perspective. The book describes the bad aspects of religious institutions but religion also has many good ways to reinforce the quality of life. The book is true in my opinion but I would not care to live in that world of negative opinions. There are other sides to the story that would reinforce the positive things in life. A much better study of religion, if you really are intelligent, would be "The Evolution of God" by Robert Wright. If you can't read that book then you have no business evaluating another person's religion.

Some of the best short essays from the 19th century are included. Some, however, are short one-pagers that seem no more than fillers. Subtract them and you have an easy five-star rating. It's too bad we don't have an Ingersoll today. And it's too bad Mr. Ingersoll was for all intents and purposes banned from running for public office in his own lifetime. Underappreciated then, unknown now. This book, along with a visit to the museum in Dresden, NY (up in the beautiful wine country of the Finger Lakes) would serve a meaningful purpose for every American, assuming they believe free thought is a goal worthy of examination.