sword of washington :: pen of paine


Tom Paine
Tom Paine
  Godfather of the American Revolution


Tom Paine


Henry Grady Weaver, the great libertarian and economic conservative

His name was Thomas Paine. He was a workman, poor and growing old. He had spent most of his childhood helping his father, an English corset maker and practicing member of the Society of Friends (a Quaker). But Thomas managed to get a few years' schooling and had learned to read and write -- a rare privilege for a working-class boy. He married a tobacconist's daughter. They inherited her father's tiny shop in Lewes, England. Paine's wife died, and the little shop was sold for debt. He struggled along at various jobs until he was nearly forty; then friends lent him money to pay for his passage to America. Benjamin Franklin gave him a letter to a Philadelphia printer, who hired him at $5.00 a month to start a little publication called the Pennsylvania Magazine.

That was the year 1775. The colonies were blockaded and could get no gunpowder. As new editor Paine launched the first copy of the Pennsylvania Magazine with a recipe for homemade gunpowder. It was a sensational success, and Americans, mixing the ingredients in their kitchens, may have noticed the name of the editor -- a name, then obscure, which was to resound down through the corridors of history.

Thomas Paine had taken up writing at middle age; and, in contrast to the pompous style of the 18th century writers, he avoided quoting the classics and wrote in the simple language of the people. He saved his money and printed a little pamphlet covering his views on freedom. The pamphlet bore the title Common Sense. It came off the press early in 1776, and in the entire history of printing, there has never been such a spontaneous sale as greeted the appearance of Common Sense. It was not copyrighted; there were no copyright laws, and anyway, Paine wanted no profit from his political writings. The first edition didn't even bear his name. In those early months of 1776 it was printed and reprinted and reprinted, successively, again and again. It has been estimated that, out of a population of 3,000,000 people, more than 300,000 bought copies.

All who could read, read it. Others listened while it was read to them. It said to Americans: do what is right in your own eyes. Cut loose from England. Set up a government of your own. "We have it in our power to begin the world over again. A situation, similar to the present, hath not happened since the days of Noah until now."

Shortly thereafter, Paine enlisted as a private in the defeated colonial army, which was falling back before the British advance - from Long Island to Manhattan, across Jersey, across the Delaware, across Pennsylvania. When Congress had taken to its heels and soldiers were deserting and cautious men were hastening to proclaim their loyalty to the King, Thomas Paine, by the light of a campfire, spread a scrap of paper on a drumhead and wrote:
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 their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated. [The Crisis. December 23, 1776]

His ringing words cut through the gloom of defeat. In every colony, courage rose to meet the challenge, and George Washington declared the Thomas Paine was worth more than an entire army. The plain-spoken man was the leader and the spirit of the new revolution. In America, England, and France, he was the greatest political influence of his century. [Henry Grady Weaver. The Mainspring of Human Progress. 1947]

John Adams said of him, "Without the pen of Paine the sword of Washington would have been wielded in vain."

Lincoln, as a lawyer in Springfield, told his partner Billy Herndon, "You know Billy, I never tire of reading Tom Paine."

Thomas Alva Edison said of Paine:
I have always regarded Paine as one of the greatest of all Americans. Never have we had a sounder intelligence in this republic… It was my good fortune to encounter Thomas Paine's works in my boyhood… it was, indeed, a revelation to me to read that great thinker's views on political and theological subjects. Paine educated me then about many matters of which I had never before thought. I remember very vividly the flash of enlightenment that shone from Paine's writings and I recall thinking at that time, 'What a pity these works are not today the schoolbooks for all children!' My interest in Paine was not satisfied by my first reading of his works. I went back to them time and again, just as I have done since my boyhood days.
Quotations from the writings of Tom Paine




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