The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll Dresden Memorial Edition (II,
v-270) HTML, Editing by Cliff Walker Small Caps indicated with
<B>bold</B>  Some Mistakes of Moses    FOR many years I have
regarded the Pentateuch simply as a record of a barbarous
people, in which are found a great number of the ceremonies of
savagery, many absurd and unjust laws, and thousands of ideas
inconsistent with known and demonstrated facts. To me it seemed
almost a crime to teach that this record was written by inspired
men; that slavery, polygamy, wars of conquest and extermination
were right, and that there was a time when men could win the
approbation of infinite Intelligence, Justice, and Mercy, by
violating maidens and by butchering babes. To me it seemed more
reasonable that savage men had made these laws; and I endeavored
in a lecture, entitled "Some Mistakes of Moses," to point out
some of the errors,contradictions, and impossibilities contained
in the Pentateuch. The lecture was never written and
consequently never delivered t