THOMAS PAINE
WISDOM OF THE AGES
compiled by Dee Finney
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2-7-04 - VISION Perfect baby 1737 with teeth NOTE: I looked up the date 1737 and the first person mentioned was Thomas Paine.
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2-8-04 - DREAM - I and another woman were walking through the building where we worked and we came to a room where some men were pushing a huge dumpster-like cart full of books. We rushed into the room and I said to the nearest man, "You aren't throwing those books away are you?" He said, "Yes! We are." I asked him if we could have some of them, and he agreed that would be okay. so my friend and I started picking out books to take with us. They apparently were all children's books with slick shiny covers with pictures on. We could only carry a limited few books so I put mine on a counter nearby because I was already carrying books and papers. The young man who I had first spoken to was standing close to me. He turned his head away as if to be listening to someone speaking to him on the left. He turned back then and said to me, "My guide said I shouldn't get friendly with you because you are just going to turn and walk away from me." I thought to myself," I hadn't planned to get friendly with you anyway - feeling suddenly angry that a spirit was going to decide in advance what I was going to do. So I gave the guy a kiss on the cheek and turned and walked away, completely forgetting to take the books with me. I and my friend decided to stop off at the bathroom. We we went to the bathroom which was very public. I sat down and as soon as I did, I started having visions of books about the things that Thomas Paine had said. The first two books said simply, "Thomas Paine - Vol I and Vol II and were dark green. I saw others about him and they seemed to be about mind control and while I watched, the word "control' disappeared. **************************** I found this so fascinating, I knew I was going to have to write about him and quote the words he said.
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The radical propagandist and voice of the common man, Thomas Paine, was born in Thetford in Norfolk on January 29, 1737. His father, Joseph, was a poor Quaker corset maker who tried to provide his son with an education at the local grammar school but eventually was forced to apprentice him to his trade. Paine was unable to accept this occupation. After a short time at sea, Paine returned to his trade in Kent, but then served as an exciseman in Lincolnshire, followed by a stint as a school teacher in London, before he again settled down in 1768 as an excise officer in Lewes in East Sussex. For the next six years he combined his duties as excise officer with managing a small shop. His first wife had died in 1760, within a year of their marriage. In 1771 he married again. Both marriages were childless and neither brought Paine much in the way of happiness. He was legally separated from his second wife in 1774, just as he was about to embark for the American colonies. At Lewes, Paine was active in local affairs, serving on the town council and establishing a debating club at a local tavern. As a shopkeeper, however, he was a failure. In April 1774, Paine was discharged from his duties for having absented himself from his post without leave. He published the pamphlet The Case of the Officers of Excise (London, 1772), and had devoted too much time campaigning in London on behalf of the excise officers. In London he met Benjamin Franklin who helped him to emigrate to America in October 1774. From: http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/paine.html During the course of the revolution, he dedicated his pen to proclaiming the American cause throughout Europe and to keeping spirits high at home. When a subsequent revolution broke out in France, he used in its behalf principles identical to those in his American writings, becoming an international spokesman for political equality, natural rights, and civil liberties. Inspired by events in France, he applied to religion the principles of natural reason that formed the basis of his political works, developing a system of deism based on science and abstract morality. With a letter of recommendation from Benjamin Franklin, who at the time was an agent for the colonies in England, Paine was employed for six months as managing editor of a new periodical, the Pennsylvania Magazine, to which he contributed miscellaneous poems and essays to America on the recommendation of Benjamin Franklin. In Philadelphia from 1774, Paine became a journalist and essayist. After the publication of "Common Sense", which sold 100,000 copies in 3 months, he continued to inspire and encourage the patriots during the Revolutionary War in the series of pamphlets called "The Crisis" (1776-83). "These are the times that try men's souls." This simple quotation from Thomas Paine's The Crisis not only describes the beginnings of the American Revolution, but also the life of Paine himself. Throughout most of his life, he was a failure, living off the gratitude and generosity of others, but his writings helped inspire a nation. He communicated the ideas of the Revolution to common farmers as easily as to intellectuals, creating prose that stirred the hearts of the fledgling United States. He had a grand vision for society: he was staunchly anti-slavery, and he was one of the first to advocate a world peace organization and social security for the poor and elderly. But his radical views on religion would destroy his success, and by the end of his life, only a handful of people attended his funeral.During the Revolution, in the bleak days following Washington's forced retreat across New Jersey and the Delaware River in December 1776, Paine's writing revived the flagging morale of the troops and the civilian population. On December 19, while serving in the Continental Army, he published the first of a series of propaganda pieces, entitled The American Crisis, which begins, “These are the times that try men's souls.” The inspiration generated by the pamphlet is credited with contributing to the American success at the Battle of Trenton. In April 1777, largely because of his writings, Paine was elected secretary of the congressional Committee of Foreign Affairs. However, he was forced to resign two years later when it was discovered that he had released in a newspaper article privileged information concerning treaty negotiations with France. After the war, Paine conducted various scientific experiments and invented a method of constructing an iron bridge. In an attempt to promote the bridge, he returned to Europe in 1787, living in England and France. In 1791, Paine published the first part of The Rights of Man—a defense of the French Revolution in reply to the attack by Edmund Burke. (The second part was issued in 1792.) As a result, Paine left England, where he was subsequently declared a traitor and outlawed, and went to France, where he was granted citizenship and, in September 1792, elected to the National Convention. In the convention, Paine associated with such moderates as Condorcet and voted against the execution of Louis XVI. He thereby aroused the suspicion of the radical majority and was arrested by the Committee of General Safety, which confined him in the Luxembourg prison from December 1793 to November 1794. While in prison, Paine worked on the statement of his religious beliefs, The Age of Reason (Part I, 1794; Part II, 1796). It opens with the words: “I believe in one God and no more, and I hope for happiness beyond this life.” For generations The Age of Reason was misunderstood and assailed as an atheistic tract, when, in fact, it is an expression of deistic principles, accepted by Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and other 18th century intellectuals. In 1796, Paine also issued a public Letter to George Washington, voicing his disillusionment with Washington's failure to have used official channels to secure his release from prison. In the following year, Paine published Agrarian Justice, a proposal for a broad government-sponsored welfare program covering youth and old age, based on notions he had set forth in Philadelphia before the American Revolution. In 1802, Paine left France and went to the United States, where he devoted his major efforts to newspaper articles jointly defending the administration of President Jefferson and the political principles espoused in 1776. During this period he advised James Monroe in his negotiations for the purchase of Louisiana and suggested to President Jefferson that the United States should serve as mediator between France and the black republic of Haiti. Paine died in poverty in New York City on June 8, 1809, and was buried on his farm in New Rochelle, N.Y. In 1819, William Cobbett, an English journalist, exhumed Paine's body for reburial in England, but all trace of it has since been lost FROM: http://www.americanrevwar.homestead.com/files/PAINE.HTM |
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A bad cause will never be supported by bad means and bad men. Age after age has passed away, for no other purpose than to behold their wretchedness.A little matter will move a party, but it must be something great that moves a nation.
Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, 1792
All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit. A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right. A nation under a well regulated government, should permit none to remain uninstructed. It is monarchical and aristocratical government only that requires ignorance for its support.
Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, 1792
Any system of religion that has anything in it that shocks the mind of a child cannot be a true system. As parents, we can have no joy, knowing that this government is not sufficiently lasting to ensure any thing which we may bequeath to posterity: And by a plain method of argument, as we are running the next generation into debt, we ought to do the work of it, otherwise we use them meanly and pitifully. In order to discover the line of our duty rightly, we should take our children in our hand, and fix our station a few years farther into life; that eminence will present a prospect, which a few present fears and prejudices conceal from our sight.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be.
Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a
vice.
But such is the irresistable nature of truth, that all it asks, and all it wants is the liberty of appearing. But where says some is the King of America? I'll tell you Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain...let it be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarchy, that in America THE LAW IS KING.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
Character is much easier kept than recovered. Everything that is right or reasonable pleads for separation. The blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, 'tis time to part.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
For my own part, my belief in the perfection of the Deity will not permit me to believe that a book so manifestly obscure, disorderly, and contradictory can be His work. Freedom had been hunted round the globe; reason was considered as rebellion; and the slavery of fear had made men afraid to think. But such is the irresistible nature of truth, that all it asks, and all it wants, is the liberty of appearing.
Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, 1791
From such beginnings of governments, what could be expected,
but a continual system of war and extortion?
Thomas Paine, Dissertation on First Principles of Government, December 23,
1791
He who dares not offend cannot be honest.
Thomas Paine, On Financing the War, 1782
I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church,
by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the
Protestant Church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own
church.
Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, 1791
If
we do not hang together, we shall surely hang separately.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, December 19, 1776
If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, December 19, 1776
If we do not hang together, we shall surely hang separately. Independence is my happiness, and I view things as they are,
without regard to place or person; my country is the world, and my religion is
to do good.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, December 19, 1776
It is not a field of a few acres of ground, but a cause, that
we are defending, and whether we defeat the enemy in one battle, or by degrees,
the consequences will be the same.
My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, December 19, 1776
Now is the seedtime of continental union, faith and honor. The least fracture now, will be like a name engraved with the point of a pin on the tender rind of a young oak; the wound would enlarge with the tree, and posterity read in it full grown characters.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
Of all the tyrannies that affect mankind, tyranny in religion is the worst. Practical religion consists in doing good: and the only way of
serving God is that of endeavoring to make His creation happy. All preaching
that has not this for its object is nonsense and hypocrisy.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
That government is best which governs least.
The abilities of man must fall short on one side or the
other, like too scanty a blanket when you are abed. If you pull it upon your
shoulders, your feet are left bare; if you thrust it down to your feet, your
shoulders are uncovered.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
The danger to which the success of revolutions is most exposed,
is that of attempting them before the principles on which they proceed, and the
advantages to result from them, are sufficiently seen and understood.
The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 5, March 21, 1778
The harder the conflict, the more glorious
the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness
only that gives everything its value. I love the man that can smile in trouble,
that can gather strength from distress and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the
business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose
conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death. The real man smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows brave by reflection.
The Vatican is a dagger in the heart of Italy.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
These are times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. The Sun never shined on a cause of greater worth.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, December 19, 1776
The times that tried men's souls are over-and the greatest and completest revolution the world ever knew, gloriously and happily accomplished.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 13, 1783
The trade of governing has always been monopolized by the most ignorant and the most rascally individuals of mankind. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigues of supporting it.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 4, September 11, 1777
Time makes more converts than reason. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, December 19, 1776
Virtues are acquired through endeavor, Which rests wholly
upon yourself. So, to praise others for their virtues Can but encourage one's
own efforts.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 4, September 11, 1777
We have it in our power to begin the world over again.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
We have it in our power to begin the world over again.
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, December 19, 1776
When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon. When shall it be said in any country of the world, my poor are happy; neither ignorance or distress is to be found among them; my jails are empty of prisoners, my streets of beggers; the aged are not in want, the taxes are not oppressive; the rational world is my friend, becausei am friend of its happiness; when these things can be said, then may that country boast of its constitution and government. When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary.
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776
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Historical
Book The Age of Reason By Thomas Paine
Letters
Concerning "The Age of Reason" (1797-1803) Thomas Paine's influential COMMON SENSE, London, 1792
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THE
LIFE AND WORKS OF THOMAS PAINE -1925, 10Vols. THOMAS PAINE RIGHTS OF MAN&COMMON SENSE 1VOLUME! Thomas
Paine - American Patriot Hero Illustrated Cover THOMAS PAINE BOOKS FROM AMAZON.COM
DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE FOR PRSIDENT - 2004 - JOHN EDWARDS
THE PRESIDENTIAL CABINET - HILARY CLINTON VS CLONING - THE DREAM ...
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