The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 42
Creation of Man
Creation of Man.
We next have the gentleman attending to the creation of man. He says that the accounts of making of man and woman were contradictory, for this reason:
"In one place man was spoken of as the last thing made; in another as made before the beasts; in the former as being made male and female; and in the latter, only the man was made, and there was no intention of making a woman whatever. In fact, according to the second chapter, Adam was offered a beast as a helpmeet, but Adam didn't see anything he fancied. Col. Ingersoll was glad he didn't. If he had, there never would have been a free-thinker in the world, and we should have all died orthodox."
Again we are blinded by the brilliancy of oratory, and astonished at the gentleman's research and depth of knowledge in divine things. Even the Scriptures are open to his sight!
1. | There is no account of man being made before the beasts. |
2. | There is no statement of creation that indicates a want of intention to make woman. |
3. | There is no indication in the Scriptures that Adam was ever offered a beast as a helpmeet. |
4. | If there had been such a companion chosen, there might have been a race of infidels, as they delight in such genealogy. |
Here again the untruths are about equal to the number of periods. Any man who will read the Scriptures may know why the two notices of the beginning of man occur, and that the latter is an itemised account of several things, without following the order in which these things came. But why should Mr. Ingersoll be blamed? It was his purpose to find that Moses had made some mistakes. And as Moses had not made them, the gentleman was compelled to make them for him. If any clergyman in the United States should deal thus rudely and unfairly with any infidel author, I would expect him to be regarded as coarse, vulgar, and untruthful. But as this was done by Mr. Ingersoll, the orator and genius of the age, and as it was Moses, who, perhaps, had no friend in the crowd, that the gentleman was bedaubing and be-smirching, it only adds to the laurels already achieved in his benevolent calling.
Mr. Ingersoll then represents Christians as expecting to be happy because others are to be damned, and also because they believe the Bible account of woman having been made from the rib of the man. Of course this has no existence in fact; but what of that? Both the speaker and the hearer were just as merry as if there were any such beings as those whom he represented.