Robert Ingersoll was America''s finest orator and foremost leader of freethinkers. Mark Twain, Thomas Edison, Eugene V. Debs, and Elizabeth Cady used to gather to hear the speeches of "the great agnostic."Roger E. Greeley has selected the best from speeches and essays of this iconoclastic orator who labored to destroy the superstition and hypocrisy of fundamentalism in America and who answered the Moral Majority in the last century.One hundred years after he advanced into the national spotlight, Ingersoll''s commentaries still retain their fresh, penetrating, and witty character. His pleas for civil rights, the rights of women and children, responsible and responsive government, and individual freedom of conscience and religious belief have placed him in the vanguard of enlightened thinkers.Today the legacy of Robert Ingersoll, prophet and pioneer, merits the attention of anyone who espouses humane, liberal, rational, or agnostic opinions.

The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll in twelve volumes comprises philosophical, political religious, and other literary works by American writer and orator. Table of Contents: Volume 1: The Gods Humboldt Thomas Paine Individuality Heretics and Heresies The Ghost The Liberty of Man, Woman, and Child Conclusion About Farming in Illinois What Must We do to be Saved? Volume 2: Some Mistakes of Moses Some Reasons Why Orthodoxy Myth and Miracle Volume 3: Shakespeare Robert Burns Abraham Lincoln Voltaire Liberty in Literature The Great Infidels Which Way? About the Holy Bible Volume 4: Why I am an Agnostic The Truth How to Reform Mankind A Thanksgiving Sermon A Lay Sermon The Foundations of Faith Superstition The Devil Progress What is Religion? Volume 5: Ingersoll's Interviews on Talmage The Talmagian Catechism A Vindication of Thomas Pain The Observer's Second Attack Ingersoll's Second Reply Volume 6: The Christian Religion Faith or Agnosticism The Field-Ingersoll Discussion A Reply to the Rev. Henry M. Field A Last Word to Robert G. Ingersoll Letter to Dr. Field Controversy on Christianity Col. Ingersoll to Mr. Gladston Rome or Reason The Church Its Own Witness Is Divorce Wrong? Divorce Is Corporal Punishment Degrading? Volume 7: My Reviewers Reviewed My Chicago Bible Class To the Indianapolis Clergy The Brooklyn Divines The Limitations of Toleration A Christmas Sermon Suicide of Judge Normile Is Suicide a Sin? Is Avarice Triumphant? Replies and Interviews Volume 8: The Bible and a Future Life Mrs. Van Cott, The Revivalist European Trip and Greenback Question The Pre-Millennial Conference The Solid South and Resumption The Sunday Laws of Pitsburg Political and Religious... Volume 9: Speeches and Addresses Volume 10: Address to the Jury in Various Cases Volume 11: Address on the Civil Right Act Trial of C. B. Reynolds for Blasphemy God in the Constitution A Reply to Bishop Spalding Crimes Against Criminals A Wooden God Some Interrogation Points Art and Morality The Divided Household of Faith Huxley and Agnosticism... Volume 12: Prefaces, Tributes, and Essays

Civil War veteran, successful lawyer, persuasive spokesman for the Republican Party, spellbinding orator, and controversial iconoclast, Col. Robert G. Ingersoll (1833-1899) was one of the best-known intellectuals of the 19th century. He rose to national prominence through his gift for oratory, which he publicly displayed on numerous lecture circuit tours. For almost twenty years this dedicated popularizer of progressive thinking and staunch critic of superstition would regularly address huge audiences, opening their minds to ideas that often provoked guarded whispers in private. Ingersoll was a man far ahead of his time, who advocated agnosticism, birth control, voting rights for women, the advancement of science, and civil rights for all races. Though eloquent on a wide variety of topics, he became most famous, and notorious, for his provocative lectures questioning the traditional, Bible-based Christian worldview of the age. In this volume are collected his best-known lectures on religion, the Bible, and related subjects. Included are "Why I Am an Agnostic"; "The Truth"; "What Is Religion?"; "Superstition"; "What Infidels Have Done"; "What Should You Substitute for the Bible as a Moral Guide?"; "Crumbling Creeds"; "The Liberty of Man, Woman, and Child"; and "Love." This outstanding collection is indispensable for freethinkers, humanists, and open-minded people of all persuasions. Note: This volume is available individually or as part of a two-volume set with On the Gods and Other Essays by Robert by Ingersoll: two-volume set (ISBN 1-59102-171-5): $50.

The book 'Ingersollia' is a collection of profound and thought-provoking words spoken by Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll, who was a man of his times, daring to speak out loud all the thoughts in his head without fear. His influence has been deep and wide over thoughtful minds for the last few years, sowing strange seeds in many fields. The book contains gems of wisdom on a myriad of topics, including patriotism, statesmanship, philosophy, religion, and more. Here's one of his thoughts on the matter of farmers being in debt: "Interest eats night and day, and the more it eats the hungrier it grows. The farmer in debt, lying awake at night, can, if he listens, hear it gnaw. If he owes nothing, he can hear his corn grow. Get out of debt, as soon as you possibly can. You have supported idle avarice and lazy economy long enough."

Robert Ingersoll (1833—1899) is one of the great lost figures in United States history, all but forgotten at just the time America needs him most. An outspoken and unapologetic agnostic, fervent champion of the separation of church and state, and tireless advocate of the rights of women and African Americans, he drew enormous audiences in the late nineteenth century with his lectures on “freethought.” His admirers included Mark Twain and Thomas A. Edison, who said Ingersoll had “all the attributes of a perfect man” and went so far as to make an early recording of Ingersoll’s voice. The publication of What’s God Got to Do with It? will return Robert Ingersoll and his ideas to American political discourse. Edited and with a biographical introduction by Pulitzer Prize winner Tim Page, this new popular collection of Ingersoll’s thought – distilled from the twelve-volume set of his works, his copious letters, and various newspaper interviews – promises to put Ingersoll back where he belongs, in the forefront of independent American thought.