L I B R S Evelyn H. Sherman ' LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DJEGO THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY * f 3 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA THE GRKAT WORKS OF THOMAS PAINE. COMPLETE. POLITICAL AND THEOLOGICAL. D. M. BENNETT: LIBERAL AND SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHING HOUS1. 141 EIGHTH STREET. NEW YOBK. CONTENTS LIFE OF PAINE, COMMON SENSE, THE CRISIS, THE BIGHTS OF MAN, THE AGE OF REASON, EXAMINATION OF THE PBOPHEOTEB, BEPLY TO THE BISHOP OF LLANDAIF LETTER TO MR. ERSKINE, AN ESSAY ON DREAMS, LETTER TO CAMILLE JORDAN, THE BELIGION OF DEISM, LETTER TO SAMUEL ADAMS INTRODUCTION, A full and impartial history of THOMAS PAINE alone can supply that, the omission of which falsifies every work pretending to give an account of the war for the national independence of the United States. The American Revolution of 1776, of which THOMAS PAINE was the author-hero, was the prelude to that far more sanguinary struggle against oppression and wrong which overturned, or irre- parably shook, every throne in Western Europe ; including, in the category, even the chair of St. Peter ; and of which struggle the most prominent author-hero was JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU. This is generally understood. But a truth incalculably more important has hitherto been either wholly overlooked, or but glim- meringly perceived ; it is this : Both the American and French Revolutions were but prominent incidents, or crisis-stages, in the irrepressible struggle for human rights which commenced when na- ture implanted in her highest organism, man, that instinct which points to the goal of development ; that unconquerable desire for perfect and sufficiently-lasting or "eternal" happiness, which indi- cates the common aim and attainable end of science, of art, and of all natural, materialistic, or intelligible activities : that thirst for liberty which can be satisfied by nothing short of the revolution which will remove all constraint which will accomplish revelation and thus justify LUTHER, ROUSSEAU, PAINE, FOURIER, and all other revolutionists. Of this crowning revolution, the text-book is " The Positive Philosophy " of AUGUSTE COMTE. Had Thomas Paine beeli seconded as valiantly when he made priestcraft howl, as he was when he hurled defiance against kings, despotism by this time would really, instead of only nominally, have lain as low as did its minions at Trenton and Yorktown. The land over which the star-spangled banner waves would not have become the prey of corrupt, spoil-seeking demagogues, nor would Europa now tremble at the nod of a military dictator. Not but that priestcraft itself has a substructure, all but "supei naturally" profound, which must be sapped before justice can be more than a mockery, freedom aught but a mere abstraction, or hap- piness little else than an ignis fatuus. But man should have con- tinued the great battle for his rights when the soldiers and author- heroes of liberty were in the full flush of victory ; instead of making that vain, mischievous and ridiculous (except as provisional) com promise with the human inclinations.called duty ; and falling bach, on that miserable armistice between the wretched poor and the un- 4 INTBODUCTION. happy rich, for the conditions of which, consult that refinement of treachery, misnamed a constitution, ^and that opaque entanglement, absurdly entitled law. Can right be done and peace be maintained, under institutions whose ultimatum is to give half a breakfast to the million, and half a million or so to the 'balance of mankind, condi- tioned on such anxiety on the part of the latter, lest they be added to the million before dinner-time, that dyspepsia, rather than nu- trition, "waits on appetite ?" Is man irremediably doomed to a con- dition which, at shorter and shorter intervals, forces him to seek re- lief in one of those saturnalias of carnage and devastation which throws progress aback, menaces civilization even, and yet but par- tially and temporarily mitigates human ills ? Is this the whole sum, substance and end of revolution ? It appears to me, that they who believe this, and who admire and commend Thomas Paine from their stand-point, dishonour his memory far more than his professed enemies do or can. But to enable all to understandingly form their own conclusions, I shall give all the essential facts with respect to the history before us, with which a long and careful search, under most favourable circumstances, has made me acquainted. For, let facts be fairly stated, and truth be fully known, is the correlate of the proposition (the correctness of which I demonstrated in a former work "The Religion of Science") that nature, simple, scientific and artistic, will prove all-sufficient ; and neither needs, nor admits the possibility of, a superior: that man, therefore, requires nothing more than what nature is capable of being developed into producing ; nor can he know aught beyond nature, or form what can intelligibly be called an idea of any happiness or good, superior to that which, by means of the substantial, including of course, man himself, can be procured. There needs but to have the light of truth shine fully upon the real character of Thomas Paine, to prove him to have been a far greater man than his most ardent admirers have hitherto given him credit for being. Paine's history is so intimately connected with that of progress both before and since his time, that it will necessarily embrace a very wide range of liberal information. I am not unmindful that there have been hundreds, perhaps thousands of author-heroes and heroines. Bacon, Locke, Luther, Voltaire,* Fourier and Robert Owen were prominently of the former, and Mary Wollstonecraft and Frances Wright were decidedly among the latter. But it appears to me, that none of their writings have been quite such text-books of revolution, as those of Rousseau and Paine were, and those of Comte now are. * Schlosser, in his "History of the Eighteenth Century," whilst speaking of Voltaire, Shaftesbury, and "the numerous deists who were reproachfully called atheists," says, that they "wielded the weapons" which Locke "had forged." LIFE OP THOMAS PAINE. PERIOD FIRST. 17371774. FROM MR. PAINE'S BIRTH, TO HIS ARRIVAL IN AMERICA. THOMAS PAINE was born in Thetford, Norfolk county, England, on the 29th of January, 1737. His father was a member of the society of Friends, and a staymaker by trade ; his mother professed the faith of the church of England. At the age of about thirteen years, he left the common school, in which, in addition to the branches of education usually taught therein, he had learned the rudiments of Latin, and went to work with his father. But his school teacher, who had been chaplain on board a man-of-war, had infused into his young and ardent mind such an enthusiasm for the naval service, that after reluctantly toiling about three years at his not very lucrative or promising calling, he left home, evidently resolved to " seek the bubble reputation even in the cannon's mouth," and to pursue his fortune through such chances as the war then imminent between his country and France, might offer. Dreadful must have been the conflict between his com- passionate nature and his necessities and ambition. Arrived m London, without friends or money, he, nevertheless, strove by every means in his power to settle himself honorably in the world, without embracing the dreadful profession he had been both constituted and educated to look: upon with hor- ror : he even hesitated so far as to return to his old occupa- tion- D LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. After working a few weeks for Mr. Morris, in Hanover- street, Long Acre, he went to Dover, where he also worked a short time for a Mr Grace. War between England and France had now been de clared ; our hero was in all the buoyancy of youth, being not yet seventeen years old ; fortune and glory were possible on the one hand, poverty and toil inevitable on the other. War is murder, 'tis true ; murder, all the more heinous for being gloried in ; murder, all the more abominable for the mag- nificence of the scale on which it is perpetrated ; murder, which touches the lowest depths of cowardice, in being carried on by vast armies and immense fleets, instead of by smaller and bolder gangs of pirates, and by more venturesome banditti. But its infernal craft would sail, and its death-dealing can- non be manned, equally with or without him ; and the place which he refused would be taken, probably by some one with far less tenderness for a wounded or surrendered foe. On board the privateer " Terrible," Captain Death, en- listed, probably in the capacity of a sailor or marine, the man who was afterwards the soul of a revolution which ex-' tended elective government over the most fertile portion of the globe, including an area more than twenty times larger than that of Great Britain, and who had the unprecedented honor to be called, though a foreigner, to the legislative councils of the foremost nation in the world. For some unexplained cause, Paine left the " Terrible " almost immediately, and shipped on board the " King of Prussia." But the affectionate remonstrances of his father soon induced him to quit privateering altogether. In the year 1759, he settled at Sandwich, as a master staymaker. There he became acquainted with a young woman of considerable personal attractions, whose name was Mary Lambert, to whom he was married about the end of the same year. His success in business not answering his expectations, he, in the year 1760, removed to Margate. Here his wife died. From Margate he went to London ; thence back again to his native town ; where, through the influence of Mr. Cock- sedge, the recorder, he, towards the end of 1763, obtained a situation in the excise. Under the pretext of some trifling fault, but really, as there is every reason for supposing, because he was too con- scientious to connive at the villainies which were practiced PERIOD FIRST. 7 by both his superiors and his compeers in office, he was dismissed from his situation in little more than a year. It has never been publicly stated for what it was pretended that he was dismissed ; and the fact that he was recalled in eleven months thereafter, shows that whatever the charge against him was, it was not substantiated, nor probably, a very grave one. That the British government, in its subse- quent efforts to destroy his character, never made any handle of this affair, is conclusive in his favor. During his suspension from the excise, he repaired to London, where he became a teacher in an academy kept by Mr. Noble of Goodman's Fields ; and during his leisure hours he applied himself to the study of astronomy and natural phi- losophy. He availed himself of the advantages which the philosophical lectures of Martin and Ferguson afforded, and made the acquaintance of Dr. Bevis, an able astronomer of the Royal Society. On his re-appointment to the excise, Paine returned to Thetford, where he continued till the Spring of 1768, when the duties of his office called him to Lewes, in Sussex. There he boarded in the family of Mr Ollive, tobacconist ; but at the end of about twelve months, the latter died. Paine suc- ceeded him in business, and in the year 1771, married his daughter. In 1772, he wrote a small pamphlet entitled " The Case of the Excise Officers." Although this was specially intended to cover the case of a very ill paid class of government officers, it was a remarkably clear and concise showing that the only way to make people honest, is to relieve them from the necessity of being otherwise. This pamphlet excited both the alarm and hatred of his superiors in office, who were living in luxury and ease, and who, besides getting nearly all the pay for doing hardly any of the work, were becoming rich by smuggling, which their positions enabled them to carry on almost with impunity. They spared no pains to pick some flaw in the character or conduct of the author of their uneasiness, but could find nothing of which to accuse him, except that he kept a tobacco- nist's shop ; this however, under the circumstances, was suffi- cient, and the most honest, if not the only conscientious ex- ciseman in all England, was finally dismissed, in April, 1774. Paine associated with, and was highly respected by the best society in Lowes, although so poor, that in a month after 8 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. his dismissal from office, his goods had to be sold to pay hia debts ; a very strong proof that he had never abused his offi- cial trust. I have twice already so far violated my own taste, to please that of others, as to mention that the subject of these memoirs had been married. But I cannot consent to meddle further with, and assist the public to peer into affairs with which none but the parties immediately concerned have any business, except under protest. Therefore, I do now most solemnly protest, that I feel more guilty, more ashamed, and more as though I ought to have my nose rung, for writing any thing at all about Mr. and Mrs. Paine's sexual affairs, than I should, were I to enter into a serious inquiry respect- ing the manner in which they performed any of their natural functions. Still, reader, you may be sure of my fidelity ; you need not suspect that I'm going to suppress any of the facts, for if I undertake to do a thing, I'll carry it through, if it's ever so mean. To begin, then : In the flowery month of May, exactly one thousand seven hundred and seventy-four years after Jehovah had been pre- sented with a son by a woman whom he never, not even subse- quently, married, Mr. and Mrs. Paine separated ; not through the intervention of the grim tyrant who had caused the sepa- ration between Mr. Paine and his first wife, but for that most heinous of all imaginable causes, in old fogy estimation, mu- tual consent. On the fourth of June, in the year just designated, Mr. Paine signed articles of agreement, freely relinquishing to his wife all the property of which marriage had legally robbed her for his benefit. This was just ; but a Thomas Paine would blush to call it magnanimous. Behold them both, in the prime of life, in a predicament in which they were debarred, by the inscru- table wisdom of society, from the legal exercise of those func- tions on which nearly all their enjoyments, including health itself, depended. All the causes of this separation are not known. Well, I'm heartily glad of it. Yet I delight not in beholding vexa- tion and disappointment, even though the victims are the im- pertinently inquisitive. Still, I repeat, I'm most heartily glad of it That neither Mr. nor Mrs. Paine abused, or voluntarily even offended each other, is conclusive from the fact that Mr. Paine always spoke very respectfully and kindly of his wife ; and, says the veracious Clio Rickman, " frequently seat her PERIOD FIRST. 9 money, without letting her know the source whence it came ;" and Mrs. Paine always held her husband in such high esteem, though she differed widely from him in the important and complicated matter of religion, that if any one spoke disre- spectfully of him in her presence, she deigned not a word of answer, but indignantly left the room, even though she were at table. If questioned on the subject of her separation from her marital partner, she did the same. Sensible woman. " Clio Rickman asserts, and the most intimate friends 01 Mr. Paine support him," says Mr. Gilbert Vale in his excel- lent Life of Paine,* to which I here, once for all, acknowl- edge myself much indebted, " that Paine never cohabited with his second wife. Sherwin treats the subject as ridiculous ; but Clio Rickman was a man of integrity, and he asserts that he has the documents showing this strange point, together with others, proving that this arose from no physical defects in Paine." When the question was plainly put to Mr. Paine by a friend, instead of spitting in the questioner's face, or kicking him, he replied : "I had a cause ; it is no business of anybody." Oh, immortal Paine ! Did you know the feel- ings which the writing of the five last paragraphs has cost me, you would forgive ; ay, even pity me. And now, dear public, having, to please you, stepped aside from the path of legitimate history, permit me to continue the digression a little, in order to please myself. Surely you can afford some extra attention to one who has sacrificed his feelings, and, but for what I am now going to say, will have sacrificed his self-respect, even, for your accommodation. A large portion of the Christian world believes that the marriage tie, once formed, should continue till severed by death, or adultery. This is supposed to be, first, in accor- dance with scripture ; secondly, in accordance with the best interests of society. " What God hath joined, let not man put asunder," except for " cause of adultery," is the text in the first place, and the prevention of licentiousness, and regard for the interests of children, constitute the pretext in the eecond place. But society blindly jumps to the conclusion that the constantly varying decrees of legislative bodies desig- nate " what God hath joined," and that august body is equally uncritical with respect to what adultery, both according to scripture and common sense, means. When any joining be- * " This Life of Thomas Paine," by G. Vale, is published at the office of that most able advocate of free discussion, the " Boston Investigator." 10 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. comes abhorent to the feelings which almighty power has im- planted in man, to attempt to force the continuance of such joining, under the plea of authority from such power, is most atrocious ; and " Jesus," or whoever spoke in his name, thus rationally defines adultery. "Whoso looketh on a woman to lust after her." " Jesus " did not. condemn the woman, who, under pressure of legal restriction, committed the " very act " of adultery ; but he did condemn her accusers, in the severest and most cutting manner possible. We have already shown the utter disregard which the supposed almighty father of Jesus showed for monogamic marriage ; that he did not even respect vested rights in the connection ; that he who is believed to have said, " be ye perfect even as I am perfect," trampled on the marital rules according to which the poor carpenter, Joseph, had been be- trothed to his Mary. How well the son of Mary followed in the footsteps of his " Almighty " father, we have already demonstrated ; and I shall close all I have to say on the supposed divinity of this subject, by calling the attention of the reader to the high re- spect which '' Jesus " paid to the woman who had had five husbands, and who was, at the time he did her the honor to converse with her in public, and to even expound his mission to her, cohabiting with a man to whom she was not married. Nothing in scripture is plainer, than that Jesus was such an out and out free-lover in principle, as to hold that as soon as married people looked on others than each other with lust- ful eyes, they were no longer so, legally ; but that their old connections should give place to new ones. In tne perfect state which " Jesus " in his parabolical language called " Heaven," he explicitly declared, in reference to what the old fogies of his time called marriage, "that they neither marry nor are given in marriage ;" and if " the Saviour " said this in reprobation of the comparatively slight bondage which en- cumbered marriage in Judea, eighteen hundred years ago, what would he say, were he to visit Christendom at the present time ? Wouldn't he make the " whip of small cords " with which he thrashed the money changers, whiz about the ears of those legislators and judges, who dare christen their tyranni- cal and abominable inventions marriage ! who have the au- dacity to attribute their wretched expedients and stupid blun- ders to eternal wisdom ? So much as to the scriptural view of marriage. For in- PERIOD FIRST. 11 formation as to the effects of " legal marriage " in the cure of licentiousness, and in promoting the welfare of children, con- sult the records of prostitution, the alms-house registers, and the swarms of beggars, by which you are continually impor- tuned. As to the effect of the " holy bonds " on domestic feli- city, I verily believe that if they were suddenly and com- pletely severed, the dealers in arsenic who happened to have but little stock on hand, would bless their lucky stars. And I speak from a knowledge of the causes which either favorably or unfavorably affect the human organism, in say- ing, that it is perfectly certain, that if the unnatural tie which arrogates the name of marriage, was universally severed, sui- cide would diminish one half, idiocy and insanity would dis- appear, prolapsus uteri and hysteria would be almost un- known, the long catalogue of diseases consequent on hopeless despair, dreary ennui, and chronic fretfulness, would be shorn of nine tenths its present length, the makers of little shrouds and coffins would have little or nothing to do, and the busi- ness of abortionists would be ruined. In short, if matrimo- nial bondage was abolished, and our social structure reorgan- ized, so as to correspond with the change, the " broken spirit" that " drieth the bones," would so give place to " the merry heart, that doeth good like a medicine," that little of the doctor's medicine would be needed ; and human life would re- ceive an accession of at least twenty per cent, in length, and one hundred per cent, in value. But indissoluble marriage, and its correlates, adultery, fornication, prostitution, the unmentionable crime against nature, and masturbation, are part and parcel of the present imperfect condition of all things in man's connection ; of the remedy for which, I shall treat, when I come to consider the universality and thoroughness of the revolution in which Paine was, without but glimmeringly perceiving it, so efficient an actor. In 1774, Mr. Paine went again to London ; where, soon after his arrival, he made the acquaintance of Dr. Franklin, (then on an embassy to the British government, from one of her North American provinces,) who, perceiving in him abilities of no ordinary character, advised him to quit his native country, where he was surrounded by so many difficulties, and try his fortune in America ; he also gave him a letter of in- troduction to one of his most intimate friends in Philadelphia. Paine left England towards the end of the year 1774. and arrived in Philadelphia about t\vo months thereafter. PERIOD SECOND, 17741787. MB. PAINE'S ARRIVAL IN AMERICA, TO HIS DEPARTURE FOR FRANCE ; EMBRACING HIS TRANSACTIONS IN THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. Shortly after the arrival of Mr. Paine in America, he was engaged as editor of the Pennsylvania Magazine, the publica- tion of which had just been commenced, by Mr. Aitkin, book- seller, of Philadelphia. This brought him acquainted with Dr. Rush. Up to this period, Paine had been a whig. But from the practical tone of much of his editorial, it is probable that he now began to suspect that that speculative abstraction, Brit- ish constitutionalism, had exhausted its usefulness in the economy of the social organism ; and that human progress could reach a higher plane than that, the foundations of which were a theological church establishment, and its correspond- ing hotch-potch of kings, lords, and commons. And here I will remark, that Paine's distinguishing characteristic the trait which constituted his greatness was his capability of being ahead of his time. Were he bodily present now, he would be as far in advance of the miserable sham of freedom to which the majorityism which he advocated, though pro- visionally necessary, has dwindled, as he was in advance of the governmental expedient, which reached the stage of effete- ness in his day. " The Crisis," instead of commencing with '' These are the times that try men's " souls," would begin with " These are the times that exhaust men's power of en- durance." Demagogism, with the whole power of the majority to enforce its tyranny, has declared that " to the victors be- long the spoils ;" that it has a right to bind the minority in all cases whatsoever. Its recklessness is in complete contrast with the regard which even Britain pays to the interests of her subjects ; and in taxation, and peculation in office, it out- does Austrian despotism itself." PERIOD SECOND 18 " Majorityisin has carried its insolence so far as to des- pise nothing so much as the name and memory of him who risked his life, his honor, his all, to protect its infancy ; it has scornfully refused his portrait a place on the walls of the very hall which once rang with popular applause of the elo- quence, which his soul-stirring pleas for elective franchise in- spired." " Yes ; the city council of Philadelphia has, in 1859, in obedience to the commands of that public opinion, which was the court of last appeal, of him who first, on this continent, dared pronounce the words American Independence, refused his portrait a place by the side of his illustrious co-workers ; thus rebuking, and most impudently insulting Washington, who in an exstacy of admiration grasped the hand of the author of " Common Sense,"and invited him to share his table ; Franklin, who invited him to our shores ; Lafayette, to whom he was dearer than a brother ; Barlow, who pro- nounced him " one of the most benevolent and disinterested of mankind ;" Thomas Jefferson, who sent a government ship to reconduct him to our shores ; and all the friends of popu- lar suffrage in France, who, at the time that tried men's souls there, elected him to their national councils." " Like the Turkish despot, who cut off the head, and blot- ted out of existence the family, of his prime minister, to whom he owed the preservation of his throne, majorityism has crowded the name of its chief apostle almost out of the his- tory of its rise. " " Freedom of speech, particularly on religious subjects, and on the government's pet project, is a myth ; every seventh day, the freedom of action is restricted to going to church, dozing away the time in the house, taking a disreputable stroll, or venturing on a not strictly legal ride. We have nothing like the amount of individual freedom which is en- joyed by the men and women of imperially governed France; and notwithstanding the muzzling of the press by Louis Na- poleon, there could be published within the very shade of the TuiUeries,a truer and more liberal history of Democracy ar her was not less than 30,000. In six weeks time, the supernaturalistically misguided duke of Alva, in- S 60 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. Paine resumed his pen. About the time when he brought out the second part of the " Age of Reason," he published several pamphlets on subjects less likely to inflame the pas- sions of we bigoted and ignorant ;. the principal of these are his " Dissertation on first Principles of Government," " Agra- rian Justice opposed to Agrarian Law," and the " Decline and Fall of the English System of Finance." The first of these is a continuation of the arguments advanced in the " Rights of Man ;" the second is a plan for creating in every country a national fund " to pay to every person when ar- rived at the age of twenty-one years, the sum of fifteen pounds sterling, to enable him or her to begin the world, and also ten Sounds sterling, per annum, during life, to every person, now ving, of the age of fifty years, and to all others, when they shall arrive at that age, to enable them to live without wretch- edness, in old age, and to go decently out of the world." In 1796, he published at Paris a " Letter to General Wash- ington." The principal subject of this letter was the treaty which had recently been concluded between the United States and Great Britain. From the articles of the treaty, Mr. Paine contends, that those who concluded it had compromised the honor of America, and the safety of her commerce, from a disposition to crouch to the British ministry. The cold neg- lect of Washington toward Mr. Paine during his imprison- ment, forms likewise a prominent subject of the letter, and but for this circumstance, it is probable that it would never have appeared. Notwithstanding the high opinion which Washington professed to entertain of his services in behalf of American independence, he abandoned him in a few years afterward to the mercy of Robespierre, and during his im- prisonment of. eleven months, he never made an effort to re- lease him. This was not the treatment which the author of " The Crisis " deserved at the hands of Washington, either as a private individual, or as president of the United States. Exclusive of Mr. Paine's being a citizen of the United States, and consequently entitled to the protection of its govern- ment, he had rendered her services which none but the un- grateful could forget ; he had therefore no reason to expect that her chief magistrate would abandon him in the hour of stigated the murder, for conscience sake, of 18,000 people, in the small king- dom of the Netherlands. IB it not time that the murderous system of blame and punishment, to gether with their correlate, principle, was superseded ? PERIOD THIRD. 61 peril. However deserving of our admiration some parts of General Washington's conduct towards Mr. Paine may be, his behaviour in this instance certainly reflects no honor upon his character ; and we are utterly at a loss for *n excuse for it, on recollecting that when the American residents of Paris demanded Paine's release, the answer of the convention mainly was, that the demand could not be listened to '* in consequence of its not being authorized by the American government" Mr. Paine regarded the United States as his home ; and although his spirit of universal philanthropy, his republican principles, and his resolution in attacking fraud in politics and superstition in religion, rendered him rather a citizen of the world, than of any particular country, he had domestic feelings and pivotal attachments. During his residence in Eu- rope, he always declared his intention of returning to America ; the following extract from a letter of his to a lady at New York, will show the affectionate regard which he cherished for the country whose affairs were the means of first launching him into public life : ' You touch me on a very tender point, when you say. that my friends on your side of tJie water cannot be reconciled to the idea of my abandoning America even for my native England. They are right. I had rather see my horse, Button, eating the grass of Bordertown, or Morrissania, than see all the pomp and show of Europe. A thousand years hence, for I must indulge a few thoughts, perhaps in less, America may be what England now is. The innocence of her character, that won the hearts of all nations in her favor, may sound like a romance, and her inimitable virtue as if it had never been. The ruins of that liberty, which thousands bled to obtain, may just furnish materials for a village tale, or extort a sigh from rustic sensibility ; while the fashionable of that day, enveloped in dissipation, shall deride the principle and deny the fact. When we contemplate the fall of empires, and the extinction of the nations of the ancient world, we see but littl^ more to excite our regret than the mouldering ruins of pompous palaces, magnificent monuments, lofty pyramids, and walls and towers of the most costly workmanship : but when the empire of America shall fall, the subject for contemplative sorrow will be infinitely greater than crumbling brass or marble can inspire. It will not then be said, Here stood a temple of vast antiquity, here rose a Babal of invisible height; 52 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. or there a palace of sumptuous extravagance ; but here, ah I painful thought ! the noblest work of human wisdom, the greatest scene of human glory, the fair cause of freedom, rose and fell ! Read this, then ask if I forgot America.' In 1797, a society was formed in Paris, under the title of " Theophilanthropists." Of this society, Mr. Paine was one of th = principal founders. More of this anon. This year Mr. Paine published a ' Letter to the People of France, on the Events of the eighteenth Fructidor.' About the middle of the same year he also wrote a letter to Camille Jordan, one of the council of five hundred, respecting his report on the priests, public worship, and bells. ' It is want of feeling,' says he, ' to talk of priests and bells, while so many infants are perishing in the hospitals, and aged and infirm poor in the streets from the want of necessaries. The abundance that France produces is sufficient for every want, if rightly applied ; but priests and bells, like articles of luxury, ought to be the least articles of consideration.' The publication of his deistical opinions lost Mr. Paine a great number of his friends, and, it is possible, that this might be one of the causes of General Washington's indifference. The clear, open, and bold manner in which he had exposed the fallacy of long established opinions, called forth the in- dignation of the whole order of priesthood both in England and America, and there was scarcely a house of devotion, in either country, which did not ring with pious execrations against the author of the " Age of Reason." The apostles of superstition witnessed with amazement and terror the im- mense circulation of the work, and trembled at the pos- sibility that men might come to think for themselves.* * The late Mr. George H. Evans, (one of the first movers of the land reform question) -was the first collector and publisher of Paine's Works in this country ; and the late Frances Wright D'Arusmont rendered, and Mrs. E. L. Eose is now rendering, most efficient aid in disseminating such views of these works as the popular mind is capable of taking. The constructive revolutionist must admire the stand she has so bravely and ably taken with respect to woman's rights, however exceptionable som& of the measures she has advocated may be considered. Bat there is no danger that the legitimate object of man's Adora- tion, woman, can be drawn into that maelstrom of abomination, caucus- and-ballot-boxism, and if I mistake not. Mrs. Rose does not press the extension of " elective franchise" to her sex quite as vigorously as she used to. At all events, she is doing- good service to the cause of human emanci- pation ; she has been a pioneer in a reform on which further progress im- portantly depends , for which she deserves the hearty " thanks of man and woman." PERIOD THIRD. 5S On leaving the house of Mr. Monroe, Paine boarded in the family of Nicholas Bonneville, a gentleman in good circumstances, and editor of a political paper, the <: Bouche de Fer." In 1797, the society of " Theophilanthropists" was formed in Paris ; Men capable of any reflection began to see how utterly monstrous was the attempt to dispense with religion with a universal higher law to which to appeal with something to satisfy, or at least prevent from being utterly discouraged, the instinctive aspirations of the human heart. Robespierre objected to atheism as aristocratic ; but Paine saw somewhat further than this, and Lare"villiere, a member of the Directory, was impressed with the necessity of a sys- tym which should rival the catholic church itself. The idea was supremely great, and lacked only the Comtean conception of science to make it a success. As it was, however, it proved a worse failure than has even Christianism. Pure Deism is not at all more intelligible than is that mixture of Deism, Buddhism, Judaism, and Paganism, called Christianity ; and the cold moralism which is attached to the one God system, the human heart instinctively abhors. Paine, and all the other doctors of divinity with whom he was in unison, were far behind even Mahomet, or Joe Smith, in respect to theo- Haiiy, a brother of the eminent crystallogist, assembled the first society of Theophilanthropists. They held their meet- mgs on Sunday, and had their manual of worship and hymn- book. Robespierre had, three years before, given a magnificent fete in honor of VEtre Supreme, and Paine now delivered a discourse before one of the Theophilanthropist congregations, Abner Kneeland was, I believe, the first editor of the first "openly avowed Intidel paper" in the United States, the Boston Investigator ; now edited by Horace Seaver, Esq. As to Theodore Parker, his exertions in the cause of free inquiry are of world-wide notori ty ; and I will here mention that " The Evidences against Christianity," by John S. Hittell, should be the hand-book of all those who look toreason, free discussion, and to an exposure of falsehood and error, for the salvation of the human race. The services which Mr. Joseph Barker has rendered the liberal cause will not soon be forgotten. His debate with Dr. Berg floors Christianity to the almost that argument can. But I much prefer the valedictory letter which he published in the " Investigator," previous to his departure for Europe. Evidently, the writer is beginning to see that something more than mew negativism is needed to put down superstition. 54 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. in which he attempted to blend science and " supernaturalism." That some parts of this discourse would have done honor to an Orthodox divine, the following extracts will attest : " Do we want to contemplate His [God's] power ? We see it in the immensity of the creation. Do we want to contemplate His wisdom ? We see it in the unchangeable order fty which the incomprehensible whole is governed. Do we want to contemplate His mercy ? We see it in His not withholding His abundance even from the unthankful. In fine, do we want to know what God is ? Search not written books, but the Scriptures called the Creation." The finale of the miserable political and religious farce which had been played in France, was, that, in 1799, Bona- parte sent a file of grenadiers to turn both the political and theological quacks out of their halls ; and the sooner some Bonaparte does the same thing in the United States, the sooner will the cause of liberty be at least delivered from the management of those who are insulting, disgracing, and treacherously betraying it. Whilst writing this, the two great parties of spoil-seekers in the United States, have been caucusing for, and have at length decided on, two individuals out of some thirty millions, one of whom is to be demagogism's cat's-paw general for the next four years. The qualifications of one of these candidates for the pres- idential chair, consist in his having been a " farm-laborer, a common workman in a saw-mill, and a boatman on the W abash and Mississippi rivers ;" a wood-chopper, a hunter, a soldier in the Black Hawk war, a clerk in a store, and finally a sham-law manufacturer and monger a member of a Legis- lature, and a lawyer. The qualifications of his opponent on the political race-course, are probably about as different in respect to value, from those just enumerated, as fiddlededum is from fiddlededee. Those convenient tools of both parties, those chessmen with which the political game is played The People, how- ever, have great expectations of reform from which ever candidate they vote (tJiey vote 1 do they ? Faugh /) for, pro- vided he is elected. But mark me well, my dear fellow-suffer- ers ; you, and all, except about one in fifty or a hundred of the office-seekers whose thievish fingers itch for the public treasury, are destined to utter, and most woeful dispoint- ment. Still, I neither blame the demagogues nor your- selves. In the concluding sentences of this history, I shall PERIOD THIRD. 56 tell you where the fault lies ; for I hope, that the political scamps who, iu this country, are making the name of freedom a scorn and a derision throughout the rest of the world, will be eliminated by those who will make liberty an actuality. How this may be done, I claim to have demonstrated in " Tfie Religion of Science," and " Essence of Science." Throughout Paine's political writings, notwithstanding their popularistic dressings, there runs a tone entirely con- demnatory of demagogism, and highly suggestive of social science and art. And there is no question but that the miserable abortion in which the liberty-agitation seemed to terminate in France, and the failing aspect which it took on in America, even in his day, all but " burst his mighty heart," and made him somewhat careless, though far from slovenly, with respect to his person. Paine's opposition to the atheists, on the one hand, and to the cruelty of those who, headed by Robespierre, had instituted the worship of the " Supreme Being," on the other, had gradually rendered him unpopular in France. His remittances from the United States not being very regular, M. Bonneville added generosity to the nobleness which he, considering the circumstances displayed, in opening his door to Mr. Paine, by lending him money whenever he wanted it. This kindness, Paine had soon both the opportunity and the means of reciprocating ; for majority absolutism had now become so unbearably despotic, so exceedingly morbific tc the social organism in France, that to save civilization even from destruction, Bonaparte had to be invested with supreme power in the State, and the nominally free press of M. Bon- neville was consequently stopped. Mr. Paine's liberty mission in France, having now evi- dently failed, [always remembering that nothing in nature is an absolute failure that progress is the constant rule and the seeming contrary but an aberration] he at once resolved to return to the United States, where he offered an asylum to M. Bonneville and family ; in consequence of which, Madame Bonneville and her three sons soon left Paris for New York. Owing to some cause or other, but not to the one which Paine's slanderers were afterwards mulcted in damages, even in a Christian court of Justice, for assigning, M. Bonne- ville did not accompany them. The eldest son returned to his father, in Paris ; but Mr. Paine amply provided for the maintenance of Madame Bonneville and her two sons who remained in America. 56 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. At Paris, such personages as the Earl of Lauderdale, Dr.. Moore, Brissot. the Marquis de Chatelet le Eoi, General Mi- randa, Capt. Imlay, Joel Ba^ow, Mr. and Mrs. Stone, and Mary Wollstonecraft,* sought the honor of Mr. Paine's com- pany. That Mr. Paine's eloquence and power of reasoning were unsurpassed even by Cicero. Demosthenes or Daniel Webster, his political writings fully attest. Before it became known who wrote " Common Sense," it was by some attributed to Dr. Franklin ; others insisted that it was by that elegant writer of English, John Adams.f " It has been very generally propagated through the con- tinent," says Mr. Adams, " that I wrote this pamphlet.*** I could not have written any thing in so manly and striking a style." This eulogy, be it remembered, was pronounced by one who was so jealous of Paine's credit in the matter of the Declaration of Independence, that, says Randall, in his Life of Thomas Jefferson, he " spares no occasion to underrate Paine's services, and to assault his opinions and character."^ Mr. Randall continues : " A more effective popular appeal [than ' Common Sense'] never went to the bosoms of a nation. Its tone, its manner, its biblical illusions, its avoidance of all openly impassioned appeals to feeling, and its unanswerable common sense were exquisitely adapted to the great audience to which it was * Authoress of " A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, with Stric- tures on Political and Moral Subjects." A work, the exceeding merit of which has been lost sight of, in its name, since woman's rights have been- claimed to consist in the liberty to degrade herself to the level of the politi- cian. f That that great patriot, John Adams, and many other revolutionary worthies vaguely entertained the idea of Independence before " Gomroon Sense " was published, there can be no doubt. But the question ig, who. had the courage to first propose the thing, and in a practical shape ? That Mr. Adam's prudence predominated over his courage, great as that was, is further deducible from the strung reason there was for the inference that his religious opinions, if openly expressed, would have appeared as far from the orthodox standard, as were those of Paine. See Randall's Life of Jefferson, on this point. J I have before called the attention of the reader to the fact that Rous- seau was, like Paine, an " author hero ;" his writings were prominently the text of the French Revolution. I will further remark, that whoever drew up the " Declaration of Independence," has given indisputable evidence of having well studied the " Control Social " of the author of the " world-famous" u Confessions." PERIOD THIRD. 57 addressed ; and calm investigation will satisfy the historical student, that its effect in preparing the popular mind for the Declaration of Independence, exceeded that of any othei paper, speech, or document made to favor it, and it would scarcely be exaggeration to add, than all other such means put together." " No writer," says Thomas Jefferson, " has exceeded Paine in ease and familiarity of style, in perspicuity of expression, happiness of elucidation, and in simple and unassuming language." Says General Washington, in a letter to Joseph Reed, (Jan. 31, 1776) ; " A few more such flaming arguments as were exhibited at Falmouth and Norfolk, added to the sound doctrine and unanswerable reasoning contained in the pam- phlet " Common Sense,' will not leave numbers at a loss to de- cide on the propriety of a separation." That Paine possessed a very superior degree of mechanical skill, his model for iron-bridges, abundantly proves. That his genius for poetry lacked but cultivating, I think will suffi- ciently appear from the following little efifusion, extracted from his correspondence with a lady, afterwards the wife of Sir Robert Smith : FROM " THE CASTLE IN THE AIR," TO THE " LITTLE CORKER OF TH1 WORLD." IN the region of clouds where the whirlwinds arise, My castle of fancy was built ; The turrets reflected the blue of the skies, And the windows with sun-beams were gilt. The rainbow sometimes, in its beautiful state, Enamelled the mansion around, And the figures that fancy in clouds can create, Supplied me with gardens and ground. I had grottoes and fountains and orange tree groves, I had all that enchantment has told ; I had sweet shady walks for the gods and their love% I had mountains of coral and gold. 58 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. But a storm that I felt not, had risen and rolled, "While wrapt in a slumber I lay : And when I looked out in the morning, behold I My castle was carried away. It passed over rivers, and valleys, and groves The world, it was all in my view I thought of my friends, of their fates, of their lovea, And often, full often, of you. At length it came over a beautiful scene, That nature in silence had made : The place was but small but 't was sweetly serene, And chequered with sunshine and shade. I gazed and I envied with painful good will, And grew tired of my seat in the air : When all of a sudden my castle stood still. As if some attraction was there. Like a lark from the sky it came fluttering down, And placed me exactly in view When who should I meet, in this charming retreat, This corner of calmness but you. Delighted to find you in honor and ease, I felt no more sorrow nor pain ; And the wind coming fair, I ascended the breeze, And went back with my castle again.' On the subject of the simplicity of Mr. Paine's habits, and his general amiability, his friend Clio Rickman remarks : " He usually rose about seven, breakfasted with his friend Choppin, Johnson, and two or three other Englishmen, and a Monsieur La Borde, who had been an officer in the ci-devant garde du corps, an intolerable aristocrat, but whose skill in mechanics and geometry brought on a friendship between him and Paine ; for the undaunted and distinguished ability and firmness with which he ever defended his own opinions when controverted, do not reflect higher honor upon him than that unbounded liberality toward the opinion of others which con- stituted such a prominent feature in his character, and whicls PERIOD THIRD, 59 never suffered mere difference of sentiment, whether political or religious, to interrupt the harmonious intercourse of friendship, or impede the interchanges of knowledge and in- formation. After breakfast he usually strayed an hour or two in the garden, where he one morning pointed out the kind of spider whose web furnished him with the, first idea of constructing his iron bridge ; a fine model of which, in mahogany, is pre- served at Paris. The little happy circle who lived with him here will ever remember these days with delight : with these select friends he would talk of his boyish days, play at chess, whist, piquet, or cribbage, and enliven the moments by many interesting anecdotes : with these he would sport on the broad and fine gravel walk at the upper end of the garden, and then retire to his boudoir, where he was up to his knees in letters and papers of various descriptions. Here he remained till dinner- time ; and unless he visited Brissof's family, or some particu- lar friend in the evening, which was his frequent custom, he joined again the society of his favorites and fellow-boarders, with whom his conversation was often witty and cheerful, always acute and improving, but never frivolous. Incorrupt, straightforward, and sincere, he pursued his political course in France, as everywhere else, let the govern- ment or clamor or faction of the day be what it might, with firmness, with clearness, and without a " shadow of turn- ing." In all Mr. Paine's inquiries and conversations he evinced the strongest attachment to the investigation of truth, and was always for going to the fountain-head for information. He often lamented we had no good history of America, and that the letters written by Columbus, the early navigators, and others, to the Spanish court, were inaccessible, and that many valuable documents, collected by Philip II., and deposited with the national archives at Simanca, had not yet been promulga- ted. He used to speak highly of the sentimental parts of Ray- nal's History." Of course, Mr. Paine did not escape the imputation of being " immoral." The cry of " immorality " and " licen- tiousness " has been raised against every one who has ever proposed a social system different from the prevailing one, from the time of him who preferred harlotry to phariseeism, to that of Charles Fourier. Luther no more escaped the accusation of being a sensua- 60 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. list, than did Thomas Paine ; and had not Milton -written * Paradise Lost," and professed the " orthodox " religion, his " Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce " would have placed him on the same historical page with those reformers Dr. T. L. Nichols, Dr. E. Lazarus, and Stephen Pearl Andrews.* Paine did not, as we have seen, live with his wife ; but if he refrained from sexual intercourse, it must have been be- cause he was afraid of what the world might say, (a suppo- sition too absurd, in his case, to be entertained for a moment) or because he had little taste for amorous pleasures ; or, lastly, because he wanted to show the world that liberalism was such a matter of moon-shine, that it was not even mimi- * The first of these gentlemen favored mankind with " Esoteric Anthro- pology," and " Marriage : Its History," &c. The second is the author of " Love vs. Marriage ;" and the third took the free love side of the question in the famous discussion on Marriage and Divorce between himself and the Hon. Horace Greeley, and is author of " The Science of Society," and several other progressive works, and of an admirable system of instruction in the French language. It is difficult to see how a person of Mr. Greeley's understanding could have taken the side he did in the controversy just alluded to, and also in the renewal of that controversy between himself and the Hon. Robert Dale Owen. That monogamy, like polygamy, has served a useful purpose, every one capable of tracing progress, can of course see ; but how such an one can fail to perceive that these institutions have about equally become worn out, and morbific to the social organism, both in Western Europe and the United States, is to me somewhat mysterious. Are not those crowning curses, (ex- cepting, of course, demagogism) prostitution, and pauperism, alarmingly on the increase? And does not the former flourish most, where the cords of matrimony are drawn the tightest? But the fact that Mr. Greeley magnanimously opened the columns of " The Tribune " to the other side of the question, shows that he had full confi- dence in the arguments on his side, and this ought to dispel all doubts as to his sincerity, and the uprightness of his intention. It is only hypocrites or downright fools, who wish to have truth, with respect to religious or so- cial questions, suppressed. Still, I respectfully ask you, Mr. Editor of " The New York Tribune," did you during your visit to Mormondom: observe any part of Salt Lake^City, in which humanity touched a lower depth than that to which it sinks in our Five Points, and in the vicinity of the junction of Water- and Roosevelt- streets ? And do you really think, that even in the harem of Brigham Young, female degradation is greater than in the New York palaces of harlotry ? En passant, one of these has just been fitted up, the furniture alone in which cost thirty thousand dollars ! Yet New York is almost the only State in the Union, wherein exists what Mr. Greeley considers orthodox marriage- marriage, from the bonds of which there is no escape, except through the door of actual adultery, natural death, or murder ; often by poison, but generally through the infliction of mental agony ! PERIOD THIRD. 61 jal to what a religious system which upholds crucifixion and rfelf-der ial, palms of on its dupes for " virtue ;" that liberal- ism has no virtue of its own, and therefore has to borrow and adopt that the very basis of which is supernaturalistic self- enslavement ; that free-thinking is a mere speculative, im- practicable, abstract sort of freedom, which it would not be " virtuous " to accompany by free acting ; that liberty, even in the most important particular, (as all physiologists know) is but a mere figment of the imagination, over which to de- bate or hold free discussions ; or, at most, to write songs, plays, and novels about. But what is most worthy of remark in this connection is, that had the discoverer of the steam-engine, or of the electrical telegraph been a very Rochester, or Caesar Borgia, the cir- cumstance would not have been mentioned as an objection to a steam-boat passage, or to a telegraphic dispatch ; and only when sociology is rescued from the wild regions of the specu- lative and becomes an art, will it have a rule of its own ; a rule which will free att the natural passions from the shackles of ignorance of how to beneficially gratify them. For a reason which will presently appear, I shall now call the readers attention, to the letter of Joel Barlow, writ- ten in answer to one from that vilest of slanderers and rene- gados, James Cheethain. This letter was written to obtain information ; nay, not information, but what might be tor- tured into appearing such, with a view to sending forth to a prejudiced world, that tissue of falsehoods, which Cheetham had the audacity to palm off on it for the Life of Thomas Paine. To JAMES CHEETHAM. "SiR: I have received your letter calling for information re- lative to the life of Thomas Paine. It appears to me that this is not the moment to publish the life of that man in this country. His own writings are his best life, and these are not read at present. The greatest part of the readers in the United States will not be persuaded as long as their present feelings last, to con- sider him in any other light than as a drunkard and a deist. The writer of his life who should dwell on these topics, to the exclusion of the great and estimable traits of his real char- acter, might, indeed, please the rabble of the age who do not know him ; the book might sell ; but it would only tend to 62 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. render the truth more obscure, for the future biographer that it was before. But if the present writer should give us Thomas Paine complete in all his character as one of the most benevolent and disinterested of mankind, endowed with the clearest percep- tion, an uncommon share of original genius, and the greatest breadth of thought ; if this piece of biography should analyze his literary iaoors, and rank him as he ought to be ranked among the brightest and most undeviating luminaries of the age in which he has lived yet with a mind assailable by flat- tery, and receiving through that weak side a tincture of vanity which he was too proud to conceal ; with a mind, though strong enough to bear him up, and to rise elastic under the heaviest load of oppression, yet unable to endure the contempt of his former friends and fellow-laborers, the rulers of the country that had received his first and greatest services a mind incapable of looking down with serene compassion, as it ought, on the rude scoffs of their imitators, a new genera- tion that knows him not ; a mind that shrinks from their Bociety, and unhappily seeks refuge in low company, or looks for consolation in the sordid, solitary bottle, till it sinks at last so far below its native elevation as to lose all respect for itself, and to forfeit that of his best friends, disposing these friends almost to join with his enemies, and wish, though from different motives, that he would haste to hide himself in the grave if you are disposed and prepared to write his life, thus entire, to fill up the picture to which these hasty strokes of outline give but a rude sketch with great vacuities, your book may be a useful one for another age, but it will not be relished, nor scarcely tolerated in this. The biographer of Thomas Paine should not forget his mathematical acquirements, and his mechanical genius. His invention of the iron bridge, which led him to Europe in the year 1787, has procured him a great reputation in that branch of science, in France and England, in both which countries his bridge has been adopted in many instances, and is now much in use. You ask whether he took an oath of allegiance to France. Doubtless, the qualification to be a member of the convention required an oath of fidelity to that country, but involved in ii no abjuration of his fidelity to this. He was made a French citizen by the same decree with Washington, Hamilton, Priest- ley, and Sir James Mackintosh. What Mr. M has told you relative to the circum- PERIOD THIRD. 63 stances of his arrestation by order of Robespierre, is erro- neous, at least in one point. Paine did not lodge at the house where he was arrested, but had been dining there with some Americans, of whom Mr. M - may have been one. I never heard before, that Paine was intoxicated that night. Indeed the officers brought him directly to my house, which was two miles from his lodgings, and about as much from the place where he had been dining. He was not intoxicated when they came to me. Their object was to get me to go and assist them to examine Paine's paper. It employed us the rest of that night, and the whole of the next day at Paine's lod- gings ; and he was not committed to prison till the next evening. You ask what company he kept he always frequented the best, both in England and France, till he became the ob- ject of calumny in certain American papers (echoes of the English court papers), for his adherence to what he thought the cause of liberty in France, till he conceived himself neg- lected, and despised by his former friends in the United States. From that moment he gave himself very much to drink, and. consequently, to companions less worthy of his better days. It is said he was always a peevish person this is possible. So was Lawrence Sterne, so was Torquato Tasso, so was J. J. Rousseau ;* but Thomas Paine, as a visiting acquaintance and as a literary friend, the only points of view in which I knew him, was one of the most instructive men I ever have known. He had a surprising memory and brilliant fancy ; his mind was a storehouse of facts and useful observations ; he was full of lively anecdote, and ingenious original, pertinent remark upon almost every subject. He was always charitable to the poor beyond his means, a sure protector and friend to all Americans in distress that he found in foreign countries. And he had frequent occasions to exert his influence in protecting them during the revolu- tion in France. His writings will answer for his patriotism, and his entire devotion to what he conceived to be the best interest and happiness of mankind. This, sir. is all I have to remark on the subject you mention. Now I have only one request to make, and that would doubt less seem impertinent, were you not the editor of a news- * The peevishness of the famous Dr. Samuel Johnson is notorious ; and David, the " man after God's own heart," was so inveterately peevish IK to ring, whilst he forced the sweet tones of his harp to accompany the spiteful canticle, ' All men are liars.' 64 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. paper ; it is, that you will not publish my letter, nor permit a copy of it to be taken. I am, sir, &c., JOEL BARLOW. KALORAMA, August 11, 1809." <; Mr. Barlow," says Mr. Vale, " was in France at the time of Mr. Paine's death, and knew not his habits. Cheet- ham wrote to him, informed him of his object, mentioned that Paine was drunken and low in his company towards the latter years of his life, and says he was informed that he was drunk when taken to prison in JYance. Now Mr. Barlow does not contradict Cheetham ; he could not, as Cheetham had the better opportunity of knowing facts, and Mr. Barlow does not suspect him of falsehood ; as who would ? He therefore presumes Mr. Cheetham correct in the statement, and goes on, not to excuse Paine, but to present his acknowledged good qualities as a set-off. Then Cheetham publishes this letter, and presents, to a cursory reader, Mr. Joel Barlow as acknowledging Mr. Paine's intemperance, and other infirmi- ties, which had no other foundation than Cheetham's decla- ration, given to deceive Barlow ; who afterwards, as we have seen, gives Barlow's letter to deceive the public." The late Mr. D. Burger, a respectable watch and clock maker in the city of New York, and who, when a boy, was clerk in the store which furnished Mr. Paine's groceries, person- ally assured the writer of this, that all the liquor which Mr. Paine bought, both for himself and his friends, at a time, too, when drinking was fashionable, was one quart a week. Before returning to the thread of this narrative, I will call the attention of the reader to the following letter, from Mr. Jefferson, written to Mr. Paine, in answer to one which the latter wrote to him, from Paris : " You express a wish in your letter to return to America by a national ship ; Mr. Dawson, who brings over the treaty, and who will present you with this letter, is charged with orders to the captain of the Maryland to receive and accomo- date you back, if you can be ready to depart at such a short warning. You will in general find us returned to sentiments worthy of former times ; in these it will be your glory to have steadily labored, and with as much effect as any man living. That you may live long to continue your useful labors, and reap the reward in the thankfulness of nations, is my sincere PERIOD THIRD. 65 prayer. Accept the assurances of my high esteem, and affection- ate attachment. THOMAS JEFFERSON." Mr. Jefferson had, during the election campaign which seated him in the presidential chair, been pronounced an in- fidel ; and, says Randall, in his " Life of Jefferson" " It was asserted in the Federal newspapers generally, and preaclied from a multitude of pulpits, that one of the first acts of the President, after entering office, was to send a national vessel to invite and bring ' Tom Paine ' to America." " Paine was an infidel," continues Randall. " He had written politically against Washington. He was accused of inebriety, and a want of chastity, [of the truth of both which accusations Randall strongly indicates his unbelief.] But he was the author of " Common Sense " and the " Crisis." On the occasion of Paine's writing to Jefferson, that he was coming to visit him at Monticello, Randall again re- marks : "Mrs. Randolph, and we think Mrs. Epps, both daughters of the Church of England, were not careful to conceal that they would have much preferred to have Mr. Paine stay away. Mr. Jefferson turned to the speaker with his gentlest smile, and remarked in substance : " Mr. Paine is not, I believe, a favorite among the ladies but he is too well entitled to the hospitality of every American, not to cheerfully receive mine." Paine came, and remained a day or two, **** and left Mr. Jefferson's mansion, the subject of lighter prejudices, than when he entered it." Mr. Paine was to have accompanied Mr. Monroe back to the United States, but was unable to complete his arrange- ments in time. This was fortunate ; for the vessel in which the American minister embarked was, on her passage, boarded by a British frigate, and thoroughly searched for the author of " The Rights of Man." Paine then went to Havre ; but finding that several British frigates were cruising about the port, he returned to Paris. Seeing himself thus baulked, he wrote to Mr. Jefferson, as before stated, for assistance, which produced the letter above copied. He did not, however, for some cause or other, take passage in the Maryland. He next agreed to sail with Commodore Barney, but was accidentally detained beyond the time, and the vessel in which he was to have embarked, was lost at sea. 66 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. In addition to these remarkable preservations, Paine, in 1805, was shot at through the window of his own house, at New Rochelle, and escaped unharmed ; also the privateer in which, but for the interference of his father, (as we have seen) he would, when a youth, have sailed, lost 174 out of her crew of 200 men, in a single battle ; and when he was in prison, as has already been related, he missed going to the guillotine, in consequence of the jailor, whose business it was to put the death-mark on the cell doors of the doomed, not noticing that the door of the cell which contained the author of the " Age of Reason" was open flat against the wall, so that the inside was marked for the information of Paine, in- stead of the outside for the instruction of the executioner.* * " But in this set of ; Tumbrils [the dung-carts in which the victims of the Reign of Terror were dragged to execution] there are two other things notable : one notable person ; and one want of a notable person . The no- table person is Lieutenant-General Loiserolles. a nobleman by birth, and by nature ; laying down his life here for his son. In the prison of Saint-Lazare, the night before last, hurrying to the gate to hear the death-list read, he caught the name of his son. The son was asleep at the moment. " I am Loiserolles," cried the old man ; at Tinville's bar, an error in the Christian name is little ; small objection was made. The want of the notable person, again, is that of Deputy Paine ! Paine has sat in the Luxembourg since January ; and seemed forgotten ; but Fouquier had pricked him at last. The Turnkey, list in hand, is marking with chalk the outer doors of to-mor- row's Fournee. Paine's outer door happened to be open, turned back on the wall ; the Turnkey marked it on the side next him, and hurried on ; an- other Turnkey came, and shut it ; no chalk-mark now visible, the Fournee went without Paine. Paine's life lay not there." Carlyle. Fouquier Tinville, above alluded to, was the head juryman of the Revo- lutionary Tribunal. He was far more blood-thirsty than was Robespierre himself. Was not the proof of his atrocities indubitable, it would be impos- sible to believe that such horrors ever took place. Yet such a " man of principle," and so incorruptible was this horrible wretch, that, says Allison, "women, the pleasures of the table, or of the theatre, were alike indifferent to him.*** He might during the period of his power, have amassed an im- mense fortune ; he remained to the last poor, and his wife is said to have died of famine. His lodgings were destitute of every comfort ; their whole furniture, after his death, did not sell for twenty pounds. No seduction could influence him." I will add, so muck for principle. FOUQUIER TIN- VILLE WAS, PAST ALL QUESTION, VIRTUOUS, HONEST, SINCERE, CONSCIEN- TIOUS. Had this miserable victim of the crudest and hardest to be got rid of delusion that mankind were ever infatuated with, been as destitute of all "virtuous" qualities as was Alexander VI., he could, at worst, have been bought off, and would probably not have perpetrated a tithe of the evil he did. He at last, like Robespierre, " sealed his testimon) ' on the scaffold. The French, like ourselves, had been taught to venerate a religious sys- tem whi ?h deifies that crowning atrocity, crucifixion to satisfy justice ! and PERIOD THIBD. 67 Had a missionary of superstition been thus preserved, how the hand of " God " would have been seen in the matter. He at last sailed from Havre, on the 1st of September, 1802, and arrived at Baltimore, on the 30th of October, fol- lowing. From Baltimore he went to Washington, where he was kindly received by the President, Thomas Jefferson. This gentleman thought so highly of him, that a few days before MB arrival, he remarked to a friend, " If there be an office in my gift, suitable for him to fill, I will give it to him ; I will never abandon old friends to make room for new ones." Jefferson was one of the few among Paine's illustrious friends, who never joined the priest ridden multitude against him. He corresponded with him up to the time of his death. Mr. Paine was now between sixty and seventy years of age, yet vigorous in body, and with a mind not at all im- paired. Of the manner in which he was generally received on his return to the United States, we can form a very fair judg- which consequently canonizes daily and hourly self-crucifixion. In all can- dour I ask, was not practical faith in the guillotine the natural result ? and are not war, duelling, torturing, hanging, imprisoning : together with blam- ing and despising our unfortunate fellow creatures as vicious, as less holy than our stupid selves, the practical logic of " virtue " and " principle ?" And were not Marat, Joseph Lebon, St. Just, Robespierre, Tinville, and the rest of that ilk, the tools the agents the faithful servants, and finally the victims of the supernaturalistically educated and virtuously inclined majority! The arch tyrant who was at the bottom of all this. I shall take in hand presently, and show how to conquer ; ay, annihilate him. If the grand truth was taught us from our cradles, that we can no more expect weil-doing without the requisite materialistic conditions, than we can expect a watch to keep time except on condition that every wheel and spring shall be in artistic harmony with each other, where would be malice ! And if we practiced in accordance with this grand truth, where would be either wholesale or retail murder ? where would be wrong of any description ? " I don't know about that," methinks I hear the mildest of the old fogiei exclaim. Well, my dear fellow biped, I'll tell you one thing you do most assuredly feel to be true ; and you know it to be true, as sure as you are ca- pable of the slightest connection of ideas. It is this. The present method of reforming the world, has, since the most barbarous age, never done aught but make it a great deal worse. Are people more honest or less gallant now than they ever were ? And if civilized nations are not quite so cruel, especially in war time, as are savages, is not that clearly traceable to science and art? Show me where man is least cruel, and I will show you where " suptfrnaturalism." the synonym for ignorance, and the very basis of " vir- tue," principle, and moralism, has lost the most ground, and where science anf had declared " Liars shall have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone ?" Mark this "probably" well. There is in it such an ex- quisiteness of all that is mean, cowardly, mendacious, and con- temptible. If the writer of " Don't Unchain the Tiger " ever saw any letter from which he extracted what he pretends he has, did not that letter inform him, past all " probably," and before he made the first part of the extract, BY whom, and TO whom, it was written ? Oh, ye priests ! How low are ye fallen ! What lower depths can human degradation touch ? How much smaller can you, your own contemptible selves, suppose the intellect- ual calibre of your poor dupes to be ? What satisfaction can you feel in the reverence of those whose understandings you thus estimate ? Compare the present position, in the social organism, of your sincere disciples, with that which they occupied when what you teach was the highest which man was prepared to receive. But unless my memory serves me very badly, this "Tiger" tract was originally published without the " probably ;" and unequivocally named the " Age of Reason." I recollect well r that about twenty-five years ago, a committee, one of whom was the famous infidel lecturer, the late Mr. Benjamin Offen, called at the Tract Society's agency, and pointed out how impossible it was that this " Tiger" publication which hailed from thence, could be true ; and I am strongly impressed that this miserable "probably " has been the result. Clergymen, it is neither in malice nor anger, but with feelings of unfeigned sorrow and pity, that I use such lan- guage to and respecting you. I have not a wish that would not be gratified, were you at this moment at the head of man- kind, teaching the Jcnowable ; and until you are worthily rein- stated in youi -rightful your natural position in the social organism, violence, fraud, humbug in fine, demagogism, will there revel, and you will be its degraded purveyor. How do you relish the impudence with which demagogism now snubs you back to the " supernatural," whenever you dare utter a practical word ? I could fill twenty pages or more with extracts, many of them documentary, from previous histories of Paine, going to prove that the author of " The Age of Reason " never recanted. PERIOD THIRD. 75 But can it be possible that those who possess a spark of rea- son, even, can consider the matter of the slightest consequence? The question of the truth or falsehood of a proposition is a matter for the judgment to decide. Is the judgment of a dying man more clear than that of a perfectly healthy one ? Was there ever an instance known, of a human biped being so big a fool, as to go to a dying man for advice in preference to going to him for it when he was in health, where any Itnoivn value was concerned ? The thing is too absurd to waste an- other word upon ; and I have noticed it at all, only to show to what meanness* modern priests will stoop ; to what miser- able shifts the corrupt hangers on to the superanuated and effete, are at length reduced. At this day the wretched for- tune-teller who deals out supernaturalism by the fifty cents worth, may justly feel proud by the side of the archbishop by the side of the successors of those who, before the dawn of science, taught the highest which man was capable of receiv- ing, thus starting civilization into existence, and justly be- coming mightier than kings. But the time is fast approach- ing when they will teach the knowable and efficient, and re- sume their natural position, that of the head of the social or- ganism. Till when, confusion will keep high holiday, folly be rampant, ignorance supreme, and superstition and dema- gogism will be rife. The case is as clear as this : Man comes into the world ignorant, and of course needs teaching. Yet what has been palmed off on man for elective govern- ment, confessedly but represents him. The clergy professedly teach him ; and of course, when they teach him right, as they will soon find out that it is immeasurably more for their own advantage to do, than it is to teach him wrong, all will be well. The human race will, from that point in teaching, rapidly develop into a harmoniously regulated organism ; a grand being, or God, to whom all the conceivable and de- sirable will be possible. Each individual will act as freely as do the wheels and springs of a perfect, because scientifically and artistically, and harmoniously regulated time-keeper. At whatever stage of development caucus-and-ballot-box- ism takes charge of man, it assumes that he is, in the main, wise enough already ; that the majority is the fountain-head of both wisdom and power ; that rulers are legitimately but the servants of the ruled. What balderdash. The only government, except that of despotism or hum- bug, that man ever has had, now has, or ever can have, was, 76 LIFE OP THOMAS PAINE. is, and must be, under simple nature, that of science and art that of teaching. "Let me make the people's songs, and I care not who makes their laws," said Napoleon. " Let me make the peo- ple's cradle-hymns and Sunday-school catechisms," say I, " and I will defy all the power which can be brought against me to supplant me in their government, except by adopting my method." And when the people's cradle-hymns and Sunday school catechisms are composed by those who qualify themselves to lead, direct, or govern mankind by science " and art, and who derive human law from the whole body of the knowable, in- stead of from the wild ' regions of the speculative, and from the arbitrary subjective, the world will be delivered from religious, political, social, and moral quackery ; but not till then. And to whomsoever says " lo here," " lo there," or lo any where except to the science of sciences and art of arts ol how to be free, I say, and appeal for my justification, to the entire past, you are deceived or a deceiver. If the world was not deluded with the idea that reason and free discussion are the only means that are available against priestcraft and statecraft, it would long since have discovered and applied the true remedy, viz : to seize the citadel of the infant mind of education ; and thus institute a religion and government of science and art, in place of a religion of mystery and a government of despotism and hum- bug. False religion and its correlate bad government, must be prevented. Whatever religious or governmental no- tions are bred into man, can never to any efficient extent, be got out of him. Priestcraft and statecraft, in England and the United States, would like nothing better than an assurance, that mankind's reformers would henceforth confine their efforts to reason and free discussion, and to the furtherance of educa- tion on its present plan in all our schools and colleges. Priest- craft and statecraft would then forever be as safe as would a well regulated army among undisciplined savages, who did nothing but find fault with their oppressors ; and to the va- rious cliques of which savages, the regulars would suggest as many various plans for their own -(the' regular's) overthrow, for them, (the savages) to discuss over and divide upon. In one of the most purely monarchical countries in all Europe (Germany) common school and collegiate education prominently form one of the government's pet projects. PERIOD THIRD. 77 In England, where the wheels of the state machinery mutually neutralize each other's action, neither monarchs nor ecclesiastics can do aught but keep themselves miserably rich, and the great body of the people wretchedly poor. Free discussion and reason have done what little good in church and state affairs it was their function to do, except as will be hereinafter mentioned ; anfl they are now in both Eng- land and the United States, but the safety-valve which pre- Tents the boiler of the ecclesiastical steam-engine from burst- ing ; and secures political despotism, swindling, and corrup- tio*n, from having to do any thing but change hands. Reason and free discussion are now the fifth wheel of the car of progress, whose useless noise and comparatively singu- lar appearance diverts attention from the slow ; nay, back- ward movement, of the other four wheels, and thus prevents any change for the better being made. If, on the continent of Europe, monarchs and the Pope forbid political and religious free discussion, it is not because they are afraid that the first will lead to liberty, or the sec- ond to practical wisdom. They are perfectly aware that/ree talking but disturbs political and religious affairs ; and would only displace themselves who are well seated in, and have grown fat on, religious and political abuse, to make way for an ungorged shoal of political and ecclesiastical leeches. Passing lightly over the pitiable trash which in the United States more than in any other country is palmed off on the multitude for knowledge, look at our higher litera- ture. See how it truckles to the low, and narrow, and un- scientific views which confessedly had their rise when man was a mere savage. Where, throughout the United States, is the magazine which has the liberal and independent tone of the Westminster Review, which hails from the capital of mon- archy- governed and confessedly church-taxed England ? The most independent magazine of which the United States can boast, is the " Atlantic Monthly ;" but I have strong misgiv- ings as to whether they whose monied interests are staked in it will thank me, or would thank any one, for such praise. But the orthodox clergy are already, owing almost whol- ly to what mere fractional science and art have done, the laugh- ing-stock of nearly the entire scientific world, and the head- clergy are writhing under the tortures of self-contempt, in such agony, that the main drift of their preaching is to try, without arousing their dupes, to let the knowing ones (whom t 78 LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE. curiosity, interest, or a desperate attempt to dispel Sabbatical ennui may have brought into their congregations) see that they are not the fools which they, for bread and butter's sake, pretend to be. The following extract from a letter of Baron Humboldt to his friend Varnhagen Yon Ense, is a fair sample of the con- tempt in which the apostles* of mystery are held by men of science : " BERLIN, March 21, 1842. " My dear friend, so happily restored to me ! It is a source of infinite joy to me to learn, from your exquisite let- ter, that the really very delightful society of the Princess's has benefited you physically, and, therefore, as I should say, in my criminal materialism, mentally also. Such a society, blown together chiefly from the same fashionable world of Berlin (somewhat flat and stale), immediately takes a new shape in the house of Princess Pueckler. It -is like the spi- rit which should breathe life into the state ; the material seems ennobled. " I still retain your " Christliche Glaubenslehre," [a cel- ebrated work on the Christian Dogma, by Dr. David Fried- rich Strauss] I who long ago in Potsdam, was so delighted with Strauss's Life of the Saviour.* One learns from it not only what he does not believe, which is less new to me, but rather what kind of things have been believed and taught by those black coats (parsons) who know how to enslave mankind anew, yea, who are putting on the armour of their former adversaries." But a still more encouraging aspect of the case is, that a knowledge of the great truth is rapidly spreading, that all in the human connection is a vast material organism, the possible modifications of which are indicated by the organ of its high- est consciousness, man ; and that the whole family of man is a grand social organism, (however, as yet, unjointed) the well-being of every part of which, is indispensable to that of every other part. But more of this, shortly. Mr. Paine suffered greatly during his last illness, (his dis- ease being dropsy, attended with cough and constant vomit- * Humboldt's Letters to Varnhagen Von Ense, have just been published by Messrs. Rudd & Carleton : and Strauss' Life of the Saviour, or, to give the work its full title, " The Life of Jesus Critically Examined," is published by Calvin Blanchard. The translation is by Marian Evans, the accomplished authoress; of Adam Bede, and is pronounced by Strauss himself to be moet elegantly done and perfectly correct PERIOD THIRD. 79 ing), yet his mental faculties remained unimpaired to the last. On the 8th of June. 1809, about nine o'clock in the forenoon, he expired, almost without a struggle. I have, as the reader has seen, noticed some of the little foibles and excentricities of Mr. Paine ; not, however, that they were of any account, but simply because they attest that he was not superhumanly perfect* that he was not that ridi- culous cross between man and " God/ 7 which the biographers of Washington have placed him in the position of appearing to be. Lovers are sure to have their petty quarrels, else, they would be indifferent to each other ; and when prejudice shall be done away with, mankind will love Thomas Paine none the less for the human frailties which were just sufficient to show that he belonged to human nature. The day after Mr. Paine's death, his remains were taken to New Rochelle, attended by a few friends, and there buried on his farm ; and a plain stone was erected, with the follow- ing inscription : THOMAS PAINE, AUTHOR OP " COMMON SENSE." Died June 8, 1809, aged seventy-two years and jive, months. Mr. William Cobbett afterward removed the bones of Mr. Paine to England. In 1839, through the exertions of a few friends of the lib- eral cause, among whom Mr. G. Vale was very active, a neat monument, was erected over the grave of Mr. Paine. Mr. Frazee, an eminent artist, generously volunteered to do the sculpture. This monument cost about thirteen hundred dol- lars. On it is carved a representation of the head of Mr. Paine, underneath which, is this inscription THOMAS PAINE, AUTHOR OP COMMON SENSE. Reader, did it ever occur to you, that all the crimes which an individmal can commit, are in reality, summed up in the word misfortune? Such is the fact. Society, therefore, not altogether without reason, however regardless of justice, con- siders nothing more disgraceful than misfortune ; and hence it 80 LIFE OP THOMAS PAINE is, that of all the slanders got up to injure the reputation of Mr. Paine, and thus prevent his influence, none have been more industriously circulated, and none have proved more successful, than those which represented him as being in ex- treme poverty. Without further remark, therefore, I shall call your attention to THE WILL OF THOMAS PAINE. " The People of the State of New York, by the Grace of God. Free and Independent, to all to whom these presents shall come or may concern, Send Greeting : Know ye that the annexed is a true copy of the will of Thomas Paine, deceased, as recorded in the office of our sur- rogate, in and for the city and county of New York. In tes- timony whereof, we have caused the seal of office of our said surrogate to be hereunto affixed. Witness, Silvanus Miller, Esq., surrogate of said county, at the city of New York, the twelfth day of July, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and nine, and of our independence the thirty- fourth. SILVANUS MILLER. The last will and testament of me, the subscriber, Thomas Paine, reposing confidence in my Creator God, and in no other being, for I know of no other, nor believe in any other, I, Thomas Paine, of the State of New York, author of the work entitled ' Common Sense,' written in Philadelphia, in 1775, and published in that city the beginning of January, 1776, which awaked America to a Declaration of Indepen- dence, on the fourth of July following, which was as fast as the work could spread through such an extensive country ; author also of the several numbers of the ' American Crisis ' thirteen in all/ published occasionally during the progress of the revolutionary war the last is on the peace ; author also of the ' Rights of Man/ parts the first and second, written and published in London, in 1791, and '92 ; author also of a work on religion, ' Age of Reason/ parts the first and second. ' N. B. I have a third part by me in manuscript and an an- swer to the Bishop of Landaff ;' author also of a work, lately published, entitled ' Examination of the passages in the New Testament quoted from the Old, and called prophesies con- cerning Jesus Christ/ and showing there are no prophecies of any such person ; author also of several other works not here enumerated, ' Dissertations on the first Principles of Go- vernment/ ' Decline and Fall of the English System of Fi- nance ' ' Agrarian Justice" etc., etc., make this my last will PERIOD THIRD. 81 and testament,