BARRENNESS OF INFIDELITY.
In a lecture in Chicago, Mr. Ingersoll boastingly said: “What would the world be if infidels had never been? They have been the flower of all the world; the proud victors on the battle-field of thought; the creditors of all the years to be.” To which a correspondent in the Inter-Ocean very pointedly replied: “The next time the colonel lectures in Chicago, we would like him to name the generous infidels who have founded a hospital for the sick, endowed an asylum for orphans, built a widow’s home, or started a rescue work among fallen women. We would like him to name all the brave and thoughtful infidels who have been generals in the first rank; poets of the first magnitude; painters, explorers, philanthropists. We would like him to name all the great chivalric souls of infidels who have established a waif’s mission, penetrated dark continents to elevate savage tribes, traveled in voluntary exile to ameliorate the wretched condition of prisoners in foreign jails, or changed cannibal isles into a civilized commonwealth.”—Selected.