Sore on Darwin and co.

It is not a rule that men of Ingersoll's stamp are so severe on Darwin and his disciples. Nevertheless, here is one who evidently thinks that if man had come on the scene of the world's life after the manner of the "Origin of Species," it would have been a dire calamity to all Freethought notions. It would, he maintains, have effectually prevented the existence of a single freethinker. And had we sprung from even the highest order of the brute creation, or if even Adam had chosen one of these for his page 18 companion, the inevitable consequences would have been that every man would have been orthodox. So that the existence of Freethought in the world, is proof of the separate creation of the human species. So after all Moses knew more about it than our belauded Darwinites. And because of this, Ingersoll exultingly expresses his gratification. In this I willingly join him. And it seems to me that if I were to logically extend the argument, it would come out that if both our first parents had been members of the brute creation, thought of any kind would have been denied us—that is, we would have been no better in this respect than our ancestors. Ingersoll is proud to call his ancestors to the end of reckoning "men and women." That they were all "human beings, with interests in common," and that any change of that title "belittles them." "Man is the highest; woman is the highest," and he scorns to degrade them to a lower level at any point of time.