The Thomas Paine Reader

By Thomas Paine

This significant assortment demonstrates the level to which Thomas Paine (1737-1809) used to be an notion to the americans of their fight for independence, a passionate supporter of the French Revolution and maybe the exceptional English radical author of his age. It includes all of Paine's significant works together with "The Rights of Man", his groundbreaking defence of the innovative reason in France, "Common Sense", which received hundreds of thousands over to the facet of the yank rebels, and the 1st a part of "The Age of cause" (Part One), a ferocious assault on Christianity. The shorter items - on capital punishment, social reform and the abolition of slavery - additionally be certain the good versatility and gear of this grasp of democratic prose.

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The wailing widow, the crying orphan, and the childless dad or mum bear in mind and lament; the rival nabobs court docket his favour; the wealthy dread his strength, and the terrible his severity. worry and terror march like pioneers prior to his camp, homicide and rapine accompany it, famine and wretchedness persist with within the rear. Resolved on collecting an unbounded fortune, he enters into the entire schemes of conflict, treaty, and intrigue. The British sword is determined up on the market; the heads of contending nabobs are provided at a value, and the bribe taken from either side. millions of fellows or funds are trifles in an India cut price. the sector is an empire, and the treasure virtually endlessly. The wretched population are completely happy to compound for offences by no means devoted, and to buy at the other price the privilege to respire; whereas he, the only real lord in their lives and fortunes, disposes of both as he pleases, and prepares for Europe. 2 unusual fortunes require an unusual date of existence to get pleasure from them in. the standard interval is spent in getting ready to dwell: And until nature prolongs the time, fortune bestows her far more than favours in useless. The conqueror of the east having not anything extra to anticipate from the only, has all his courtroom to make to the opposite. nervousness for wealth offers position to nervousness for all times; and properly recollecting that the ocean isn't any respecter of folks, resolves on taking his path to Europe through land. Little beings stream unseen, or unobserved, yet he engrosses entire kingdoms in his march, and is gazed at like a comet. The burning desolate tract, the pathless mountains, and the fertile valleys, are of their turns explored and omitted. No fabric coincidence distresses his growth, and England once again gets the spoiler. How candy is leisure to the weary visitor; the retrospect heightens the joy; and if the long run prospect be serene, the times of ease and happiness are arrived. An uninquiring observer could have been prone to think about Lord Clive, less than a majority of these agreeable conditions, one whose each care was once over, and who had not anything to do yet take a seat and say, Soul, take thine ease, thou hast items laid up in shop for a few years. The reception which he met with on his moment arrival, was once in each example equivalent to, and in lots of passed, the honours of the 1st. ’Tis the strange mood of the English to applaud sooner than they believe. beneficiant in their compliment, they often bestow it unworthily: but if as soon as the reality arrives, the torrent stops, and rushes again back with an identical violence. three Scarcely had the echo of the applause ceased upon the ear, then the impolite tongue of censure took up the story. The newspapers, deadly enemies to ill-gotten wealth! started to buzz a common suspicion of his behavior, and the inquisitive public quickly sophisticated it into details. each publish gave a stab to his popularity – a wound to his peace – and a nail to his coffin. Like spectres from the grave they haunted him in each corporation, and whispered homicide in his ear. A lifestyles chequered with unusual forms is seldom a protracted one. motion and care will in time put on down the most powerful body, yet guilt and depression are poisons of fast dispatch.

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