 Part 1 of Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Introduction. Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages are not yet sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favour. A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defence of custom, but that tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason. As a long and violent abuse of power is generally the means of calling the right a bit in question, and in matters too which might never have been thought of, had not the sufferers been aggravated into the inquiry, and as the King of England hath undertaken in his own right to support the Parliament in what he calls theirs, and as the good people of this country are grievously oppressed by the combination, they have an undoubted privilege to inquire into the pretensions of both, and equally to reject the usurpation of either. In the following sheets the author hath studiously avoided everything which is personal among ourselves, compliments as well as censure to individuals make no part thereof. The wise and the worthy need not the triumph of a pamphlet, and those whose sentiments are injudicious or unfriendly will seats of themselves unless too much pains are bestowed upon their conversion. The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind. Many circumstances hath and will arise which are not local but universal, and through which the principles of all numbers of mankind are affected, and in the event of which their affections are interested. The laying a country desolate with fire and sword, declaring war against the natural rights of all mankind, and extirpating the defenders thereof from the face of the earth, is the concern of every man to whom nature hath given the power of feeling, of which class, regardless of party censure, is the author. Post Script to the Third Edition The publication of this new edition hath been delayed, with a view of taking notice, had it been necessary, of any attempt to refute the doctrine of independence. As no answer hath yet appeared, it is now presumed that none will, the time needful for getting such a performance ready for the public being considerably passed. Who the author of this production is, is wholly unnecessary to the public, as the object for attention is the doctrine itself, not the man. Yet it may not be unnecessary to say that he is unconnected with any party, and under no sort of influence, public or private, but the influence of reason and principle. Philadelphia, February 14, 1776 Of the origin and design of government, in general, with concise remarks on the English constitution. Some writers have so confounded society with government as to leave little or no distinction between them, whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants and government by our wickedness. The former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first a patron, the last a punisher. Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil, in its worst state an intolerable one. For when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries by a government which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence. The palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform, and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver. But that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest, and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to insure it to us with the least expense and greatest benefit is preferable to all others. In order to gain a clear and just idea of the design and end of government, let us suppose a small number of persons settled in some sequestered part of the earth, unconnected with the rest. They will then represent the first peopling of any country, more of the world. In this state of natural liberty society will be their first thought. A thousand motives will excite them there too. The strength of one man is so unequal to his wants and his mind so unfitted for perpetual solitude that he is soon obliged to seek assistance and relief of another, who in his turn requires the same. Four or five, united, would be able to raise a tolerable dwelling in the midst of a wilderness, but one man might labour out of the common period of life without accomplishing anything. When he had felt his timber he could not remove it, nor erect it after it was removed. Hunger in the meantime would urge him from his work and every different wants call him a different way. Disease, nay, even misfortune would be death, for though neither might be mortal, yet either would disable him from living and reduce him to a state in which he might rather be said to perish than to die. Thus necessity, like a gravitating power, would soon form our newly arrived emigrants into society, the reciprocal blessings of which would supersede and render the obligations of law and government unnecessary, while they remained perfectly just to each other. But as nothing but heaven is impregnable to vice, it will unavoidably happen that in proportion as they surmount the first difficulties of emigration, which bound them together in a common cause, they will begin to relax in their duty and attachment to each other, and this remissness will point out the necessity of establishing some form of government to supply the defect of moral virtue. Some convenient tree will afford them a state house, under the branches of which the whole colony may assemble to deliberate on public matters. It is more than probable that their first laws will have the title only of regulations, and be enforced by no other penalty than public disesteem. In this first parliament every man, by natural right, will have a seat. But as the colony increases, the public concerns will increase likewise, and the distance at which the members may be separated will render it too inconvenient for all of them to meet on every occasion as at first, when their number was small, their habitations near, and the public concerns few and trifling. This will point out the convenience of their consenting to leave the legislative part to be managed by a select number chosen from the whole body, who are supposed to have the same concerns at stake which those who appointed them, and who will act in the same manner as the whole body would act were they present. If the colony continues increasing, it will become necessary to augment the number of the representatives, and that the interest of every part of the colony may be attended to, it will be found best to divide the whole into convenient parts, each part sending its proper number. And that the elected might never form to themselves an interest separate from the electors, prudence will point out the propriety of having elections often. Because, as the elected might by that means return and mix again with the general body of the electors in a few months, their fidelity to the public will be secured by the prudent reflection of not making a rod for themselves. And as this frequent interchange will establish a common interest with every part of the community, they will mutually and naturally support each other. And on this, not on the unmeaning name of king, depends the strength of government and the happiness of the governed. Here then is the origin and rise of government, namely a mode rendered necessary by the inability of moral virtue to govern the world. Here too is the design and end of government, that is freedom and security. And however our eyes may be dazzled with show or our ears deceived by sound, however prejudice may warp our wills or interest darken our understanding, the simple voice of nature and of reason will say, it is right. I draw my idea of the form of government from a principle in nature, which no art can overturn. That is, that the more simple anything is, the less liable it is to be disordered, and the easier repaired when disordered. And with this maximum view, I offer a few remarks on the so much boasted constitution of England. That it was noble for the dark and slavish times in which it was erected is granted. When the world is overrun with tyranny, the least removed therefrom was a glorious rescue. But that it is imperfect, subject to convulsions, and incapable of producing what it seems to promise is easily demonstrated. Absolute governments, though the disgrace of human nature, have this advantage with them, that they are simple. If the people suffer, they know the head from which their suffering springs, know likewise the remedy, and are not bewildered by a variety of causes and cures. But the constitution of England is so exceedingly complex, that the nation may suffer for years together without being able to discover in which part the fault lies. Some will say in one and some in another, and every political physician will advise a different medicine. I know it is difficult to get over local or long-standing prejudices, yet if we will suffer ourselves to examine the component parts of the English constitution, we shall find them to be the base remains of two ancient tyrannies, compounded with some new republican materials. First, the remains of monarchial tyranny in the person of the king. Secondly, the remains of aristocratical tyranny in the persons of the peers. Thirdly, the new republican materials in the persons of the commons, on whose virtue depends the freedom of England. The two first, by being hereditary, are independent of the people. Wherefore, in a constitutional sense, they contribute nothing towards the freedom of the state. To say that the constitution of England is a union of three powers reciprocally checking each other is farcical. Either the words have no meaning, or they are flat contradictions. To say that the commons is a check upon the king presupposes two things. First, that the king is not to be trusted without being looked after, or, in other words, that a thirst for absolute power is the natural disease of monarchy. Secondly, that the commons, by being appointed for that purpose, are either wiser or more worthy of confidence than the crown. But as the same constitution, which gives the commons a power to check the king by withholding the supplies, gives afterwards the king a power to check the commons by empowering him to reject their other bills, it again supposes that the king is wiser than those whom it has already supposed to be wiser than him. A mere absurdity. There is something exceedingly ridiculous in the composition of monarchy. It first excludes a man from the means of information, yet empowers him to act in cases where the highest judgment is required. The state of a king shuts him from the world, yet the business of a king requires him to know it thoroughly. Wherefore, the different parts, by unnaturally opposing and destroying each other, prove the whole character to be absurd and useless. Some writers have explained the English constitution thus. The king, say they, is one, the people another. The peers are a house in behalf of the king, the commons in behalf of the people. But this hath all the distinctions of a house divided against itself. And though the expressions be pleasantly arranged, yet when examined, they appear idle and ambiguous. And it will always happen that the nicest construction that words are capable of, when applied to the description of some thing which either cannot exist or is too incomprehensible to be within the compass of description, will be words of sound only. And though they may amuse the ear, they cannot inform the mind. For this explanation includes a previous question. That is, how came the king by a power which the people are afraid to trust and always obliged to check? Such a power could not be the gift of a wise people. Neither can any power which needs checking be from God. Yet the provision which the constitution makes supposes such a power to exist. But the provision is unequal to the task. The means either cannot or will not accomplish the end, and the whole affair is a fail-o-de-say. For as the greater weights will always carry up the less, and as all the wheels of a machine are put in motion by one, it only remains to know which power in the constitution has the most weight. For that will govern. And though the others, or a part of them, may clog, or, as the phrase is, check the rapidity of its motion, yet so long as they cannot stop it, their endeavours will be ineffectual. The first moving power will at last have its way, and what it wants in speed is supplied by time. That the crown is this overbearing part in the English constitution needs not be mentioned, and that it derives its whole consequence merely from being the giver of places and pensions is self-evident. Wherefore, though we have been wise enough to shut and lock a door against absolute monarchy, we, at the same time, have been foolish enough to put the crown in possession of the key. The prejudice of Englishmen in favour of their own government of king, lords and commons, arises as much or more from national pride than reason. Individuals are undoubtedly safer in England than in some other countries, but the will of the king is as much the law of the land in Britain as in France. With this difference, that instead of proceeding directly from his mouth, it is handed to the people under the more formidable shape of an act of parliament. For the fate of Charles I has only made kings more subtle, not more just. Wherefore, laying aside all national pride and prejudice in favour of modes and forms, the plain truth is that it is wholly owing to the constitution of the people and not to the constitution of the government that the crown is not as oppressive in England as in Turkey. An inquiry into the constitutional errors in the English form of government is at this time highly necessary, for as we are never in proper condition of doing justice to others while we continue under the influence of some leading partiality, so neither are we capable of doing it to ourselves while we remain fettered by an obstinate prejudice. And as a man who is attached to a prostitute is unfitted to choose or judge a wife, so any pre-possession in favour of a rotten constitution of government will disable us from discerning a good one. End of Part 1 Part 2 of Common Sense This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Read by Bob Neufeld. Common Sense by Thomas Paine Part 2 of Monarchy and Hereditary Succession Mankind being originally equals in the order of creation, the equality could only be destroyed by some subsequent circumstance. The distinctions of rich and poor may in the great measure be accounted for, and that without having recourse to the harsh, ill-sounding names of oppression and avarice. Oppression is often the consequence, but seldom or never the means of riches, and though avarice will preserve a man from being necessitously poor, it generally makes him too timorous to be wealthy. But there is another and greater distinction, for which no truly natural or religious reason can be assigned, and that is the distinction of man into kings and subjects. Male and female are the distinctions of nature, good and bad the distinctions of heaven. But how a race of men came into the world so exalted above the rest, which, like some new species, is worth inquiring into, and whether they are the means of happiness or of misery to mankind. In the early ages of the world, according to the scripture chronology, there were no kings, the consequence of which was there were no wars. It is the pride of kings which throw mankind into confusion. Holland, without a king, hath enjoyed more peace for this last century than any of the monarchial governments in Europe. Antiquity favours the same remark, for the quiet and rural lives of the first patriarchs have a happy something in them, which banishes away when we come to the history of Jewish royalty. Government by kings was first introduced into the world by the heathens, from whom the children of Israel copied the custom. It was the most prosperous invention the devil ever set on foot for the promotion of idolatry. The heathens paid divine honors to their deceased kings, and the Christian world hath improved on the plan by doing the same to their living ones. How impious is the title of sacred majesty applied to the worm, who, in the midst of his splendor, is crumbling into dust. As the exalting one man so greatly above the rest cannot be justified on the equal rights of nature, so neither can it be defended on the authority of scripture. For the will of the Almighty, as declared by Gideon and the prophet Samuel, expressly disapproves of government by kings. All anti-monarchical parts of scripture have been very smoothly glossed over in monarchical governments, but they undoubtedly merit the attention of countries which have their governments yet to form. Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's is the scripture doctrine of courts, yet it is no support of monarchical government, for the Jews at that time were without a king and in a state of vassalage to the Romans. Now three thousand years passed away from the mosaic account of the creation till the Jews under the national delusion requested a king. Till then, their form of government, except in extraordinary cases where the Almighty interposed, was a kind of republic administered by a judge in the elders of the tribes. Kings they had none, and it was held sinful to acknowledge any being under that title but the Lord of Hosts, and when a man seriously reflects on the idolatrous homage which is paid at the persons of kings, he need not wonder that the Almighty, ever jealous of his honor, should disapprove of a form of government which so impiously invades the prerogative of heaven. Monarchy is ranked in scripture as one of the sins of the Jews for which a curse in reserve is denounced against them. The history of that transaction is worth attending to. The children of Israel, being oppressed by the Midianites, the Midian marched against them with a small army, and victory through the divine interposition decided in his favor. The Jews, elate with success and attributing it to the generalship of Gideon, propose making him a king, saying, Ruh thou over us, thou and thy son and thy son's son. Here was temptation in its fullest extent, not a kingdom only, but an hereditary one. But Gideon in the piety of his soul implied, I will not rule over you. Neither shall my son rule over you. The Lord shall rule over you. Words need not be more explicit. Gideon doth not decline the honor, but denyeth their right to give it. Neither doth he compliment them with invented declarations of their thanks, but in the positive style of a prophet, charges them with disaffection to their proper sovereign, the King of Heaven. About 130 years after this they fell again into the same error. The hankering which the Jews had for the idolatrous customs of the heathens is something exceedingly unaccountable. But so it was that laying hold of the misconduct of Samuel's two sons, who were entrusted with some secular concerns, they came in an abrupt and clamorous manateous Samuel, saying, Behold, thou art old and thy sons walk not in thy ways. Now make us a king to judges, like all other nations. And here we cannot but observe that their motives were bad. That is, that they might be like unto other nations. In other words, the heathens, whereas their true glory laid in being as much unlike them as possible. But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, Give us a king to judge us, and Samuel prayed unto the Lord. And the Lord said unto Samuel, Harken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee, for they have not rejected thee, for they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them. According to all the works which they have, since the day that I brought them out of Egypt, even unto this day, wherewith they have forsaken me and served other gods, so do they also unto thee. Now therefore Harken unto their voice, albeit protest solemnly unto them and show them the manner of the king that shall reign over them, not of any particular king, but the general manner of the kings of the earth, that was so eagerly copying after. And notwithstanding the great distance of time and difference of manners, the character is still in fashion. And Samuel told all the words of the Lord unto the people that asked of him a king. And he said, This shall be the manner of the king that shall reign over you. He will take your sons and appoint them for himself, for his chariot, and be his horsemen. And some shall run before his chariot. This description agrees with the present mode of impressing men. And he will appoint him captains over thousands and captains over fifties, and will set them to ear his ground and reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war and instruments of his chariots. And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries and to be cooks and to be bakers. This describes the expense and luxury as well as the oppression of kings. And he will take your fields and your olive-yards, even the best of them, and to his servants. And he will take the tenth of your seed and of your vineyards, and give them to his officers and to his servants. By which we see that bribery, corruption, and favoritism are the standing vices of kings. And he will take the tenth of your men servants and your maid servants and your goodliest young men and your asses, and put them to his work. And he will take the tenth of your sheep and ye shall be his servants in that day because of your king, which ye shall have chosen, and the Lord will not hear you in that day. This accounts for the continuation of monarchy. Neither do the characters of the few good kings which have lived since either sanctify the title or blot out the sinfulness of the origin. The High Encomion, given of David, takes no notice of him officially as a king, but only as a man after God's own heart. Nevertheless, the people refuse to obey the voice of Samuel. And they said, Nay, but we will have a king over us that we may be like all other nations that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles. Samuel continued to reason with them but to no purpose. He set before them their ingratitude but all would not avail and seeing them bent fully on their folly, he cried out, I will call unto the Lord and he shall send thunder and rain which then was a punishment being in the time of wheat harvest that ye may perceive and see that your wickedness is great which ye have done in the sight of the Lord. And the Lord sent thunder and rain that day and all the people greatly feared the Lord and Samuel and all the people said unto Samuel pray for thy servants unto the Lord thy God that we die not for we have added unto our sins and sin. These portions of Scripture are direct and positive. They admit of no equivocal construction that the Almighty hath here entered his protest against monarchical government is true or the Scripture is false and a man hath good reason to believe that there is as much of kingcraft as priestcraft withholding the Scripture from the public in popish countries. For monarchy in every instance for the evil of monarchy we have added that of hereditary succession and as the first is a degradation and lessening of ourselves so the second, claimed as a matter of right is an insult and an imposition on posterity for all men being originally equals no one by birth could have a right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others forever and though himself might deserve some decent degree of honors of his contemporaries yet his descendants might be far too unworthy to inherit them. One of the strongest natural proofs of the folly of hereditary right in kings is that nature disapproves it otherwise she would not so frequently turn it into ridicule by giving mankind an ass for a lion. Secondly, as no man at first could possess any other public honors than were bestowed upon him so the givers of those honors could have no power to give away the right of posterity and though they might say we choose you for our head they could not without manifest injustice to their children say that your children and your children's children shall reign over ours forever because such an unwise, unjust unnatural combat might perhaps in the next succession put them under the government of a rogue or a fool most wise men in their private sentiments have ever treated hereditary right with contempt yet it is one of those evils which when once established is not easily removed many submit from fear others from superstition and the more powerful part shares with the king the plunder of the rest this is supposing the present race of kings in the world to have had an honorable origin whereas it is more than probable that could we take off the dark covering of antiquities and trace them to their first rise that we should find the first of them nothing better than the principal ruffian of some restless gang whose savage manners or preeminence in subtly obtained the title of chief among plunderers and who by increasing in power and extending his depredations overawed the quiet and defenseless to purchase their safety by frequent contributions yet his electors could have no idea of giving hereditary right to his descendants because such a perpetual exclusion of themselves was incompatible with the free and unrestrained principles they professed to live by wherefore hereditary succession in the early ages of monarchy could not take place as a matter of name but as something casual or complemental but as few or no records were extant in those days and traditional history stuffed with fables it was very easy after the lapse of a few generations to trump up some superstitious tale conveniently timed, Muhammad-like to crime hereditary rights down the throats of the vulgar perhaps the disorders which threatened or seemed to threaten on the decease of a leader and the choice of a new one for elections among Ruffians could not be very orderly induced many at first to favour hereditary pretensions by which means it happened as it hath happened since that what at first was submitted to as a convenience was afterwards claimed as a right England since the conquest hath known some few good monarchs but grown beneath a much larger number of bad ones yet no man in his senses can say that their claim under William the Conqueror is a very honourable one a French bastard landing with an armed bandit and establishing himself king of England against the consent of the natives is in plain terms a very paltry rascally original it certainly hath no divinity in it however it is needless to spend much time following the folly of hereditary right if there are any so weak as to believe it let them promiscuously worship the ass and lion and welcome I shall neither copy their humility nor disturb their devotion the most plausible plea which hath ever been offered in favour of hereditary succession is that it preserves a nation from civil wars and were this true it would be weighty whereas it is the most bare faced falsity ever imposed upon mankind the whole history of England disowns the fact 30 kings and 2 miners have reigned in that distracted kingdom since the conquest in which time there have been including the revolution no less than 8 civil wars and 19 rebellions wherefore instead of making for peace it makes against it and destroys the very foundation it seems to stand on the contest for monarchy and succession between the houses of the York and Lancaster laid England in a scene of blood for many years 12 pitched battles besides skirmishes and seizures were fought between Henry and Edward twice was Henry prisoner to Edward who in his turn was prisoner to Henry and so uncertain is the fate of war and the temper of a nation when nothing but personal matters are the ground of the quarrel that Henry was taken in triumph from a prison to a palace to a foreign land yet as sudden transitions of temper are seldom lasting Henry in his turn was driven from the throne and Edward recalled to succeed him the parliament always following the strongest side this contest began in the reign of Henry the 6th and was not entirely extinguished till Henry the 7th in whom the families were united including a period of 67 years that is from 1422 to 1489 in short monarchy and succession have laid not this or that kingdom only but the world in blood and ashes to the form of government which the word of God bears testimony against and blood will attend it if we inquire into the business of a king we shall find that in some countries they have none and after sauntering away their lives without pleasure to themselves or advantage to the nation withdraw from the scene their successors to tread the same idle ground in absolute monarchies the whole weight of business civil and military lies on the king the children of Israel in their request for a king urge this plea that he might judge us and go out before us and fight our battles but in countries where he is neither a judge nor a general as in England a man would be puzzled to know what is his business the nearer any government approaches to a republic the less business there is for a king it is somewhat difficult to find a proper name for the government of England Sir William Meredith calls it a republic but in its present state it is unworthy of the name because the corrupt influence of the crown by having all the places in its disposal hath so effectually swallowed up the power and eaten out the virtue of the House of Commons the republican part in the constitution that the government of England is nearly as monarchical as that of France or Spain men fall out with names without understanding them but it is the republican and not the monarchical part of the constitution of England which Englishmen glory in that is the liberty of choosing and House of Commons from out of their own body and it is easy to see that when republican virtue fails slavery ensues why is the constitution of England sickly but because monarchy hath poisoned the republic the crown hath engrossed the Commons in England the king hath little more to do than to make war and give away places which in plain terms is to impoverish the nation and set it together by the ears a pretty business indeed for a man to be allowed 800,000 sterling a year for and worshipped into the bargain of more worth is one honest man in society and in the sight of God than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived in the following pages I offer nothing more than simple facts plain arguments and common sense and have no other preliminaries to settle with the reader than that he will divest himself of prejudice and prepossession and suffer his reason and his feelings to determine for themselves that he will put on or rather that he will not put off the true character of a man and generously enlarge his views beyond the present day of the conflict of the struggle between England and America men of all ranks have embarked in the controversy from different motives and with various designs but all have been ineffectual and the period of debate is closed arms as the last resource decide this contest the appeal was the choice of the king and the continent hath accepted the challenge it hath been reported of late was not without his false that on his being attacked in the House of Commons on the score that his measures were only of a temporary kind replied they will last my time the name of ancestors will be remembered by future generations with detestation the sun never shined on a cause of greater worth it is not the affair of a city or county a province or a kingdom but of a continent of at least one eighth part of the habitable globe tis not the concern of a day a year or an age posterity are virtually involved in the contest and will be more or less affected even to the end of time by the proceedings now now is the seed time of continental union faith and honor the least fractured now will be like a name engraved with the point of a pin on the tender rind of a young oak the wound will enlarge with the tree and posterity and full grown characters by referring a matter from argument to arms a new era for politics is struck a new method of thinking have arisen all plans proposals etc prior to the 19th of April that is to the commencement of hostilities are like the almanacs of the last year which though proper then are superseded and useless now whatever was advanced by the advocates on either side of the question then terminated in one and the same point that is a union with great Britain the only difference between the parties was the method of affecting it the one proposing force the other friendship but it has so far happened that the first has failed and the second has withdrawn her influence as much has been said of the advantages of reconciliation which like an agreeable dream has passed away and left us as we were it is but right that we should examine the contrary side of the argument and inquire into some of the many material injuries which these colonies sustain and will always sustain by being connected with and dependent on great Britain to examine that connection and dependence on the principles of nature and common sense to see what we have trust to if separated and what we are to expect if dependent I have heard it asserted by some that as America had flourished under her former connection with great Britain that the same connection is necessary towards her future happiness and will always have the same effect nothing can be more fallacious than this kind of argument we may as well assert that because a child has thrived upon milk that it is never to have meat or that the first 20 years of our lives is to become a precedent for the next 20 but even this is admitting more than is true for I answer roundly that America would have flourished as much and probably much more had no European power had anything to do with her the commerce by which she hath enriched herself are the necessaries of life and will always have a market while eating is the custom of Europe but she has protected us say some that she has engrossed us is true and defended the continent at our expense as well as her own is admitted and she would have defended Turkey with the same motive that is the sake of trade and Dominion alas we have been long led away by ancient prejudices and made large sacrifices to superstition we have boasted the protection of great Britain without considering that her motive was interest not attachment that she did not protect us from our enemies on our account but from her enemies on her own account from those who had no quarrel with us on any other account and who will always be our enemies on the same account let Britain wave her pretensions to the continent or the continent throw off the dependence and we should be at peace with France and Spain were they at war with Britain the miseries of Hanover last war ought to warn us against connections it has lately been asserted in parliament that the colonies have no relation to each other but through the parent country that is that Pennsylvania and the jerseys and so on for the rest are sister colonies by the way of England this is certainly a very round about way approving relationship but it is the nearest and only true way of proving enemy ship if I may so call it France and Spain never were nor perhaps ever will be our enemies as Americans but as are being the subjects of great Britain but Britain is the parent country some say than the more shame upon her conduct even brutes do not devour their young nor savages make war upon their families therefore the assertion if true turns to her reproach but it happens not to be true or only partly so and the phrase parents or mother country have been Jesuitically adopted by the king and his parasites with a low epistical design of gaining an unfair bias on the credulous weakness of our minds Europe and not England is the parent country of America this new world has 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 in this extensive quarter of the globe we forget the narrow limits of 360 miles the extent of England and carry our friendship on a larger scale we claim brotherhood with every European Christian and triumph in the generosity of the sentiment it is pleasant to observe by what regular gradations we surmount the force of local prejudice as we enlarge our acquaintance with the world a man born in any town in England divided into parishes will naturally associate most with his fellow parishioners because their interest in many cases will be common and distinguish him by the name of neighbor if he meet him but a few miles from home he drops the narrow idea of a street and salutes him by the name of townsmen if he travel out of the county and meet him in any other he forgets the minor divisions of street and town and calls him countryman that is countryman but if in their foreign excursions they should associate in France or any other part of Europe their local remembrance would be enlarged into that of Englishmen and by a just parody of reasoning all Europeans meeting in America or any other quarter of the globe are countrymen for England, Harlan, Germany or Sweden when compared with the whole stand in the same places on the larger scale which the divisions of street town and county do on the smaller ones distinctions too limited for continental mind not one third of the inhabitants even of this province are of English descent where for I reprobate the phrase of parents or mother country applied to England only as being false selfish narrow and ungenerous but admitting that we are all of English descent what does it amount to nothing Britain being now an open enemy extinguishes every other name and title and to say that reconciliation is our duty is truly farcical the first king of England of the present line William the Conqueror was a Frenchman and half the peers of England are descendants from the same country therefore by the same method of reasoning England ought to be governed by France much has been said of the united strength of Britain and the colonies that in conjunction they might bid defiance to the world but this is a mere presumption the fate of war is uncertain neither do the expressions mean anything for this continent would never suffer itself to be drain of inhabitants to support the British arms in either Asia, Africa or Europe besides what have we to do with setting the world at defiance our plan is commerce and that well attended to will secure us the peace and friendship of all Europe because it is the interest of all Europe to have America a free port her trade will always be a protection and her barrenness of gold and silver secure her from invaders I challenge the warmest advocate for reconciliation to show a single advantage that this continent can reap by being connected with Great Britain I repeat the challenge not a single advantage is derived our corn will fetch its price in any market in Europe and our imported goods must be paid for buy them where you will but the injuries and disadvantages we sustained by that connection are without number and our duty to mankind at large as well as to ourselves instruct us to renounce the alliance because any submission to or dependence on Great Britain tends directly to involve this continent in European wars and quarrels and sets us at variance with nations who would otherwise seek our friendship and against whom we have neither anger nor complaint as Europe is our market for trade we ought to form no partial connection with any part of it it is the true interest of America to steer clear of European contingents which she can never do while by her dependence on Britain she is made the make-weight in the scale of British politics Europe is too thickly planted with kingdoms to be long at peace and whenever a war breaks out between England and any foreign power the trade of America goes to ruin because of her connection with England the next war may not turn out like the last and should it not the advocates for reconciliation now will be wishing for separation then because neutrality in that case would be a safer convoy for the man of war everything that is right or natural pleads for separation the blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, tis time to part even the distance at which the Almighty has placed England and America is a strong and natural proof that the authority of the one over the other was never the design of heaven the time likewise at which the continent was discovered adds weight to the argument and the manner in which it was peopled increases the of it the reformation was preceded by the discovery of America as if the Almighty graciously meant to open a sanctuary to the persecuted in future years when home should afford neither friendship nor safety the authority of Great Britain over this continent is a form of government which sooner or later must have an end and a serious mind can draw no true pleasure by looking forward under the painful and positive conviction that what he calls the present constitution is merely temporary as parents we can have no joy knowing that this government is not sufficiently lasting to assure anything which we might 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 though I would carefully avoid giving unnecessary offense yet I am inclined to believe that all those who espouse the doctrine of reconciliation may be included within the following descriptions interested men who are not to be trusted weak men who cannot see prejudiced men who will not see and a certain set of moderate men who think better of the European world than it deserves and this last class by an ill judged deliberation will be the cause of more calamities to this continent than all the other three it is the good fortune of many to live distant from the scene of sorrow the evil is not sufficient brought to their doors to make them feel the precariousness with which all American property is possessed but let our imaginations transport us for a few moments to Boston that seat of wretchedness will teach us wisdom and instruct us forever to renounce a power in whom we can have no trust the inhabitants of that unfortunate city who but a few months ago were in ease and affluence have now no other alternative than to stay and starve or turn and beg endangered by the fire of their friends if they continue within the city and plundered by the soldiery if they leave it in their present condition they are prisoners without the hope of redemption and in a general attack for their relief they would be exposed to the fury of both armies men of passive tempers look somewhat lightly over the offenses of Britain and still hoping for the best are apt to call out come, come, we shall be friends again for all this but examine the passions and feelings of mankind bring the doctrine of reconciliation to the touchstone of nature and then tell me whether you can hear after love, honor and faithfully serve the power that have carried fire and sword into your land if you cannot do all these then are you only deceiving yourselves and by your delay bringing ruin upon posterity your future connection with Britain whom you can neither love nor honor will be forced and unnatural and being formed only on the plan of present convenience will in a little time fall into a relapse more wretched than the first but if you say you can still pass the violations over then I ask have your house been burnt have your property been destroyed before your face are your wife and children destitute of a bed to lie on or bread to live on have you lost a parent or a child by their hands and yourself the ruined and wretched survivor if you have not then are you not a judge of those who have but if you have and still can shake hands with the murderers are you unworthy of the name of husband father friend or lover and whatever may be your rank or title in life you have the heart of a coward and the spirit of a sycophant this is not inflaming or exaggerating matters but trying them by those feelings and affections which nature justifies and without which we should be incapable of discharging the social duties of life or enjoying the felicities of it I mean not to exhibit horror for the purpose of provoking revenge but to awaken us from fatal and unmanly slumbers that we may pursue determinately some fixed object it is not in the power of Britain or of Europe to conquer America if she do not conquer herself by delay and timidity the present winter is worth an age if rightly employed but if lost or neglected the whole continent will partake of the misfortune and there is no punishment which that one will deserve be he who or what or where he will that may be the means of sacrificing a season so precious and useful it is repugnant to reason to the universal order of things to all examples from former ages to suppose that this continent can longer remain subject to an external power the most sanguine in Britain does not think so the utmost stretch of a human wisdom cannot at this time compass a plan short of separation which can promise the continent even a year's security reconciliation is now a fallacious dream nature has deserted the connection and art cannot supply her place for as Milton wisely expresses never can true reconcilment grow where wounds of deadly hate have used so deep every quiet method for peace has been ineffectual our prayers have been rejected with disdain and only tended to convince us that nothing flatters vanity or confirms obstinacy in kings more than repeated petitioning and nothing has contributed more than that very measure to make the kings of Europe absolute witness Denmark and Sweden wherefore since nothing but blows will do for God's sake let us come to a final separation and not leave the next generation to be cutting throats under the violated unmeaning names of parent and child to say they will never attempted again is idle and visionary we thought so with the repeal of the stamp act yet a year or two undeceived us as well may we suppose that nations which have been once defeated will never renew the quarrel as to government matters it is not in the power of Britain to do this continent justice the business of it will soon be too weighty and intricate to be managed with any tolerable degree of convenience by a power so distant from us and so very ignorant of us for if they cannot conquer us they cannot governs to be always running three or four thousand miles with a tail or a petition waiting four or five months for an answer which when obtained requires five or six more to explain it in will in a few years be looked upon as folly and childishness there was a time when it was proper and there is a proper time for it to cease small islands not capable of protecting themselves are the proper objects for kingdoms to take under their care but there is something very absurd in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island in no instance has nature made the satellite larger than its primary planet and as England and America with respect to each other reverses the common order of nature it is evident they belong to different systems England to Europe America to itself I am not induced by motives of pride party or resentment to espouse the doctrine of separation and independence I am clearly positively and conscientiously persuaded that it is the true interest of this continent to be so that everything short of that is mere patchwork that it can afford no lasting felicity that it is leaving the sword to our children and shrinking back at a time when a little more a little farther would have rendered this continent the glory of the earth as Britain has not manifested the least inclination towards a compromise we may be assured that no terms can be obtained worthy the acceptance of the continent or in any ways equal to the expense of blood and treasure we have already been put to the object contended for ought always to bear some just proportion to the expense the removal of north or the whole detestable junto is a matter unworthy the millions we have expended a temporary stoppage of trade was an convenience which would have sufficiently balanced the repeal of all acts complained of had such repeals been obtained but if the whole continent must take up arms if every man must be a soldier it is scarcely worth our while to fight against a contemptible ministry only dearly dearly do we pay for the repeal of the acts if that is all we fight for for in a just estimation it is as great a folly to pay a bunker hill prize for law as for land as I have always consider the independency of this continent as an event which sooner or later must arrive so from the late rapid progress of the continent to maturity the event could not be far off where for on the breaking out of hostilities it was not worthwhile to have disputed a matter which time would have finally redressed unless we meant it to be an earnest otherwise it is like wasting an estates on a suit at law to regulate the trespasses of a tenant whose lease is just expiring no man was a warmer wish for reconciliation than myself before the fatal 19 April 1775 but the moment the event of that day was made known I rejected the hardened, sullen tempered pharaoh of England forever and disdained the wretch that with the pretended title of father of his people can unfeelingly hear of their slaughter and composedly sleep with their blood upon his soul but admitting that matters were now made up what would be the event I answer the ruin of the continent and that for several reasons first the powers of governing still remaining in the hands of the king he will have a negative over the whole legislation of this continent and as he has shown himself such an inveterate enemy to liberty and discovered such a thirst for arbitrary power is he or is he not a proper man to say to these colonies you shall make no laws but what I please and is there any inhabited in America so ignorant as not to know that according to what is called the present constitution that this continent can make no laws but what the king gives leave to and is there any man so unwise as not to see that considering what has happened he will suffer no law to be made here but such as suit his purpose we may be as effectually enslaved by the want of laws in America as by submitting to laws made for us in England after matters are made up as it is called can there be any doubts but the whole power of the crown will be exerted to keep this continent as low and humble as possible instead of going forward we shall go backward or be perpetually quarreling or ridiculously petitioning we are already greater than the king wishes us to be and will he not hereafter endeavor to make us less to bring the matter to one point is the power who is jealous of our prosperity a proper power to govern us whoever says no to this question is an independent for independency means no more than whether we shall make our own laws or whether the king the greatest enemy this continent half or can have shall tell us there shall be no laws but such as I like but the king you will say has a negative in England the people there can make no laws without his consent in point of right and good order there is something very ridiculous that a youth of 21 which has often happened shall say to several millions of people older and wiser than himself I forbid this or that act of yours to be law but in this place I decline this sort of reply but in this place I decline this sort of reply though I will never cease to expose the absurdity of it and only answer that England being the king's residence and America not so makes quite another case the king's negative here is 10 times more dangerous and fatal than it can be in England for there he will scarcely refuse his consent to a bill for putting England into as strong a state of defense as possible and in America he would never suffer such a bill to be passed America is only a secondary object in the system of British politics England consults the good of this country rather than it answers her own purpose wherefore her own interest leads her to suppress the growth of ours in every case which does not promote her advantage or in the least interferes with it a pretty state we should soon be in under such a secondhand government considering what has happened men do not change from enemies to friends by the alteration of a name and in order to show that reconciliation now was a dangerous doctrine I affirm that it would be policy in the being at this time to repeal the act for the sake of reinstating himself in the government of the provinces in order that he may accomplish by craft and subtlety in the long run what he cannot do by force and violence in the short one reconciliation and ruin are nearly related secondly that has even the best terms which we can expect to obtain can amount to no more than a temporary expedient or a kind of government ownership which can last no longer than till the colonies come of age so the general face and state of things in the interim will be unsettled and unpromising emigrants of property will not choose to come to a country whose form of government hangs but by a thread and who is every day tottering on the brink of commotion and disturbance and numbers of the present inhabitants would lay hold of the interval to dispense of their effects and quit the continent arguments is that nothing but independence that is a continental form of government can keep the peace of the continent and preserve it in violet from civil wars I dread the event of a reconciliation with Britain now as it is more than probable that it will be followed by a revolt somewhere or other the consequences of which may be far more fatal than all the malice of Britain thousands are already ruined by British barbarity thousands more will suffer the same fate those men who have other feelings than us have nothing suffered all they now possess is liberty what they before enjoyed is sacrificed to its service and having nothing more to lose they disdain submission besides the general temper of the colonies towards a British government will be like that of a youth who is nearly out of his time they will care very little about her and a government which cannot preserve the peace is no government at all in this case we pay our money for nothing and pray what is it that Britain can do whose power will be wholly on paper should a civil tumult break out the very day after reconciliation I have heard some men say many of whom I believe spoke without thinking that they are dreaded and independence fearing that it would produce civil wars it is but seldom that our first thoughts are truly correct and that is the case here for there are ten times more patched up connection than from independence I make the sufferer's case my own and I protest that where I driven from house and home my property destroyed and my circumstances ruined that as man sensible of injuries I would never relish the doctrine of reconciliation or consider myself bound thereby the colonies have manifested such a spirit of good order and obedience to continental governments as is sufficient to make every reasonable person easy and happy on that head no man can assign the least pretence for his fears on any other grounds than such as truly childish and ridiculous that is that one colony will be striving for superiority over another where there are no distinctions there can be no superiority perfect equality affords no temptation the republics of Europe are all and we may say always in peace Holland and Switzerland are without wars foreign or domestic monarchical governments it is true are never long at rest the crown itself is a temptation to enterprising ruffians at home and that degree of pride and insolence ever attended on regal authority swells into a rupture with foreign powers in instances where a republican government by being formed on more natural principles would negotiate the mistake if there is any true cause of fear respecting independence it is because no plan is yet laid down men do not see their way out wherefore as an opening into that business I offer the following hints at the same time modestly affirming that I have no other opinion of them myself than that they may be the means of giving rise to something better could the straggling thoughts of individuals be collected they would frequently form materials for wise and able men to improve into useful matter let the assemblies be annual with a president only with a presentation more equal their business wholly domestic and subject to the authority of a continental congress that each colony be divided into six, eight, or ten convenient districts each district to send a proper number of delegates to congress so that each colony send at least 30 the whole number in congress will be at least 390 each congress to sit and choose a president by the following method when the delegates are met they will be placed by lot after which let the whole congress choose by ballot a president from out of the delegates of that province in the next congress let a colony be taken by lot from 12 only omitting that colony from which the president was taken in the former congress and so proceeding on till the whole 13 shall have had their proper rotation and in order that nothing may pass until law but what is satisfactorily just not less than three fifths of the congress to be called a majority that will promote discord under a government so equally formed as this would have joined Lucifer in his revolt but as there is a peculiar delicacy from whom or in what manner this business must first arise and as it seems almost agreeable and consistent that it should come from some intermediate body between the governed and the governors that is between congress and the people let a continental conference be held in the following manner and for the following purpose a committee of 26 members of congress that is two for each colony two members from each house of assembly or provincial convention and five representatives of the people at large to be chosen in the capital city or town of each province four and in behalf of the whole province by as many qualified voters as shall think property would tend from all parts of the province for that purpose or if more convenient the representatives may be chosen in two or three of the most populous parts thereof in this conference thus assembled will be united the two grand principles of business knowledge and power the members of congress assemblies or conventions by having had experience in national concerns will be able and useful counsellors and the whole being empowered by the people will have a truly legal authority the conferring members being met let their business be to frame a continental charter or charter of the united colonies answering to what is called the Magna Carter of England fixing the number and manner of choosing members of congress members of assembly with their date sitting and drawing a line of business and jurisdiction between them always remembering that our strength is continental not provincial securing freedom and property to all men and above all things the free exercise of religion according to the dictates of conscience with such other matter as is necessary for a charter to contain immediately after which it is said conference to dissolve and the bodies which shall be chosen conformable to the said charter to be the legislators and governors of this continent for the time being whose peace and happiness may God preserve our men should any body of men be hereafter delegated for this or some similar purpose I offer them the following extracts from that wise observer on governments Draganeti the science says he of the politician consists in fixing the true point of happiness and freedom those men would deserve the gratitude of ages who should discover a mode of government that contain the greatest sum of individual happiness with the least national expense 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 yet that we may not appear to be defective even in earthly honors that a day for proclaiming the charter 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 in America that in America the law is king for as in absolute governments the king is law so in free countries the law ought to be king and there ought to be no other but lest any ill youth should afterwards arise let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony be demolished and scattered among the people whose right it is a government of our own is our natural right and when a man seriously reflects on the precariousness of human affairs he will become convinced that it is infinitely wiser and safer to form a constitution of our own in a cool deliberate manner while we have it in our power than to trust such an interesting event to time and chance if we omit it now Massanello may hereafter arise who laying hold of popular disquietudes may collect together the desperate and the discontented and by assuming to themselves the powers of government may sweep away the liberties of the continent like a deluge should the government of America return again into the hands of Britain the tottering situation of things will be a temptation for some disparate adventurer to try his fortune and in such a case what relief can Britain give in news the fatal business might be done and ourselves suffering like the wretched Britons under the oppression of the conqueror ye that oppose independence now ye know not what ye do ye are opening a door to eternal tyranny by keeping vacant the seat of government there are thousands and tens of thousands who would think it glorious to expel from the continent that barbarous and hellish power which hath stirred up the Indians to destroy us the cruelty hath a double guilt it is dealing brutally by us and treacherously by them to talk of friendship with those in whom our reason forbids us to have faith and our affections wounded through a thousand pours instruct us to detest is madness and folly every day wears out the little remains of kindred between us and them and can there be any reason to hope that as the relationship expires the affection will increase or that we shall agree better when we have ten times more and greater concerns to quarrel over than ever ye that tell us of harmony and reconciliation can ye restore us to the time that is past can ye give to prostitution its former innocence neither can you reconcile Britain and America the last chord now is broken the people of England are presenting addresses against us there are injuries which nature cannot forgive she would cease to be major if she did as well can the lover forgive the ravisher of his mistress as the continent forgive the murders of Britain the Almighty hath implanted in us those inextinguishable feelings for good and wise purposes they are the guardians of his image in our hearts they distinguish us from the herd of common animals the social compact would dissolve and just as be extirpated the earth or have only a casual existence where we call us to the touches of affection the robber and the murderer would often escape unpunished did not the injuries which our temper sustain provoke us into justice oh ye that love mankind ye that dare oppose not only the tyranny but the tyrant stand forth every spot of the old world is overrun with oppression freedom hath been hunted round the globe Asia and Africa have long expelled her Europe regards her like a stranger and England hath given her warning to depart oh receive the fugitive and prepare in time an asylum from mankind End of Part 3 Part 4 of Common Sense by Thomas Paine this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Read by Bob Neufeld Common Sense by Thomas Paine Part 4 of the present ability of America with some miscellaneous reflections I have never met with a man either in England or America who hath not confessed his opinion that a separation between the countries would take place at one time or another and is there no instance in which we have shown less judgment than in endeavoring to describe what we call the ripeness or fitness of the continent for independence as all men allow the measure and vary only in their opinion of the time let us, in order to remove mistakes, take a general survey of things and endeavor, if possible to find out the very time but we need not go far the inquiry ceases at once for the time hath found us the general concurrence the glorious union of all things proved the fact it is not enough it is not in numbers but in unity that our great strength lies yet our present numbers are sufficient to repel the force of all the world the continent hath at this time the largest body of armed and disciplined men of any power under heaven and is just arrived at that pitch of strength in which no single colony is able to support itself and the whole, when united, can accomplish the matter and either more or less than this in its effect our land force is already sufficient and as to naval affairs we cannot be insensible that Britain would never suffer an American man of war to be built, while the continent remained in her hands wherefore we should be no forwarder and hundred years hence in that branch than we are now but the truth is we should be less so because the timber of the country is every day diminishing and that which will remain at last far off and difficult to procure where the continent crowded with inhabitants her sufferings under the present circumstances would be intolerable the more seaport towns we had the more should we have both to defend and to lose our present numbers are so happily proportioned to our once that no man need be idle the diminution of trade affords an army and the necessities of an army create a new trade debts we have none and whatever we may contract on this account will serve as a glorious memento of our virtue can we but leave posterity with a settle form of government an independent constitution of its own the purchase at any price will be cheap but to expend millions for the sake of getting a few vile acts repealed and routing the present ministry only is unworthy the charge and is using posterity with the utmost cruelty because it is leaving them the great work to do and a debt upon their backs from which they derive no advantage such a thought is unworthy of a man of honor and is the true characteristic of a narrow heart and a peddling politician the debt we may contract does not deserve our regard if the work be but accomplished no nation ought to be without a debt a national debt is a national bond and when it bears no interest is in no case a grievance Britain is oppressed with a debt of upwards of a hundred and forty millions sterling for which she pays upwards of four millions interest and as a compensation for her debt she has a large navy America is without a debt and without a navy yet for the twentieth part of the English national debt could have a navy as large again the navy of England is not worth at this time more than three millions and a half sterling the first and second editions of this pamphlet were published without the following calculations which are now given as a proof that the above estimation of the navy is just the charge of building a ship of each rate and furnishing her with masts, yards, sails and rigging together with a proportion of eight months bosons and carpenters sea stores as calculated by Mr. Birchett secretary to the navy for a ship of a hundred guns thirty five thousand five hundred fifty three pounds sterling ninety twenty nine thousand eight hundred eighty six twenty three thousand six hundred thirty eight seventy seventeen thousand seven ninety five sixty fourteen thousand one ninety seven fifty ten thousand six oh six forty seven thousand five fifty eight thirty five thousand eight forty six twenty three thousand seven ten and from hence it is easy to sum up the value or cost rather of the whole British navy which in the year seventeen fifty seven when it was at its greatest glory consisted of the following ships and guns ships six guns a hundred cost of one thirty five thousand five hundred fifty three cost of all two hundred thirteen thousand three hundred eighteen twelve ships ninety guns twenty nine thousand eight hundred eighty six cost of all three hundred fifty eight six hundred thirty two twelve ships eighty guns twenty three thousand six hundred thirty eight cost of all two hundred eighty three thousand six hundred fifty six 43 ships, 70 guns, 17,785, cost of all, 764,755. 35 ships, 60 guns, 14,197, cost of all, 496,895. 40 ships with 50 guns, 10,606, cost of all, 424,240. 45 ships with 40 guns, 7558, cost of all, 340,110. 58 ships with 20 guns, cost of one, 3710, cost of all, 215,180. 85 sloops, bombs and fire ships, one with another, cost of one, 2000, cost of all, 170,000. Cost 3,266,786, remains for guns, 233,214, total 3,500,000 pounds sterling. No country on the globe is so happily situated or so internally capable of raising a fleet as America. Tar, timber, iron and cordage are her natural produce. We need go abroad for nothing. Whereas the Dutch, who make large profits by hiring out their ships of war to the Spaniards and Portuguese, are obliged to import most of their materials they use. We ought to view the building a fleet as an article of commerce, it being a natural manufacturing of this country. It is the best money we can lay out. A navy, when finished, is worth more than it costs. And is that nice point in national policy in which commerce and protection are united? Let us build. If we want them not, we can sell, and by that means replace our paper currency with ready gold and silver. In point of manning a fleet, people in general run into great errors. It is not necessary that one fourth part should be sailors. The terrible privateer, Captain Death, stood the hardest engagement of any ship last war, yet had not 20 sailors on board, though her complement of men was upwards of 200. A few able and social sailors will soon instruct a sufficient number of active landmen in the common work of a ship. Wherefore, we never can be more capable to begin on maritime matters than now, while our timber is standing, our fisheries blocked up, and our sailors and shipwrights out of employ. Men of war of seventy and eighty guns were built forty years ago in New England, and why not the same now? Shipbuilding is America's greatest pride, and in which she will in time excel the whole world. The great empires of the east are mostly inland, and consequently excluded from the possibility of rivaling her. Africa is an estate of barbarism, and no power in Europe hath either such an extent of coast, or such an internal supply of materials. Where nature hath given the one, she has withheld the other. To America only, hath she been liberal of both. The vast empire of Russia is almost shut out from the sea, wherefore her boundless forests, her tar, iron, and cordage are only articles of commerce. In point of safety ought we to be without a fleet. We are not the little people now, which we were sixty years ago. At that time we might have trusted our property in the streets, or fields, rather, and slept securely without locks or boats to our doors or windows. The case now is altered, and our methods of defense ought to improve with our increase of property. A common pirate, twelve months ago, might have come up the Delaware and laid the city of Philadelphia under instant contribution for what some he pleased. And the same might have happened to other places. Nay, any daring fellow, in a brig of fourteen or sixteen guns, might have robbed the whole continent and carried off half a million of money. These are circumstances which demand our attention, and point out the necessity of naval protection. Some perhaps will say that after we have made it up with Britain, she will protect us. Can we be so unwise as to mean that she shall keep a navy in our harbors for that purpose? Common sense will tell us that the power which hath endeavored to subdue us is of all others the most improper to defend us. Conquest may be affected under the pretense of friendship, and ourselves after a long and brave resistance be at last cheated into slavery. And if her ships are not to be admitted into our harbors, I would ask, how is she to protect us? A navy three or four thousand miles off can be of little use, and on sudden emergencies, not at all. Wherefore, if we must hereafter protect ourselves, why not do it for ourselves? The English list of ships of war is long and formidable, but not a tenth part of them are at any one time fit for service. Numbers of them not in being. Yet their names are pompously continued in the list, if only a plank be left of the ship. And not a fifth part of such as a fit for service can be spared on any one station at one time. The East and West Indies, Mediterranean, Africa, and other parts over which Britain extends her claim make large demands upon her navy. From a mixture of prejudice and inattention we have contracted a false notion respecting the navy of England, and have talked as if we should have the whole of this to encounter at once, and for that reason suppose that we must have one as large, which, not being instantly practicable, have been made use of by a set of disguised Tories to discourage our beginning thereon. Nothing can be farther from truth than this. For if America had only a twentieth part of the naval force of Britain, she would be by far an overmatch for her. Because, as we neither have nor claim any foreign dominion, our whole force would be employed on our own coast, where we should, in the long run, have two to one the advantage of those who had three or four thousand miles to sail over before they could attack us, and the same distance to return in order to refit and recruit. And although Britain, by her fleet, hath a check over our trade to Europe, we have as large a one over her trade to the West Indies, which, by laying in the neighborhood of the continent, is entirely at its mercy. Some method might be fallen on to keep up a naval force in time of peace if we should not judge it necessary to support a concert navy, if premiums were to be given to merchants, to build and employ in their service ships mounted with twenty, thirty, forty, or fifty guns, the premiums to be in proportion to the loss of bulk to the merchants, fifty or sixty of those ships, with a few guard ships on constant duty, would keep up a sufficient navy, and that without burdening ourselves with the evil so loudly complained of in England, of suffering their fleet in time of peace to lie rotting in the docks. To unite the sinews of commerce and defence is sound policy, for when our strength and our riches play into each other's hand, we need fear no external enemy. In almost every article of defence we abound, hemp flourishes even to rakeness, so that we need not want cordage, our iron is superior to that of other countries, our small arms equal to any in the world, cannon we can cast at pleasure, saltpeter and gunpowder we are every day producing. Our knowledge is hourly improving, resolution is our inherent character, and courage hath never yet forsaken us. Wherefore what is it that we want? Why is it that we hesitate? From Britain we can expect nothing but ruin. If she is once admitted to the government of America again, this continent will not be worth living in. Jealousies will be always arising, insurrections will be constantly happening, and who will go forth to quell them? Who will venture his life to reduce his own contrament to a foreign obedience? The difference between Pennsylvania and Connecticut, respecting some unlocated lands, shows the insignificance of a British government, and fully proves that nothing but continental authority can regulate continental matter. Another reason why the present time is preferable to all others, is that the fewer our numbers are, the more land there is yet unoccupied, which, instead of being lavished by the king on his worthless dependence, may be hereafter applied, not only to the discharge of the present debt, but to the constant support of government. No nation under heaven hath such an advantage as this. The infant state of the colonies, as it is called, so far from being against, is an argument in favor of independence. We are sufficiently numerous, and where we more so we might be less united. It is a matter worthy of observation that the Bohr country is peopled the smaller their armies are. In military numbers the ancients far exceeded the moderns, and the reason is evident. For trade being the consequence of population, men become too much absorbed thereby to attend to anything else. Commerce diminishes the spirit, both of patriotism and military defense, and history sufficiently informs us that the bravest achievements were always accomplished in the non-age of a nation. With the increase of commerce, England hath lost its spirit. The city of London, notwithstanding its numbers, submits to continued insults with the patience of a coward. The more men have to lose, the less willing they are to venture. The rich are, in general, slaves to fear, and submit to courtly power with the trembling duplicity of a spaniel. Youth is the seed time of good habits, as well in nations as in individuals. It might be difficult, if not impossible, to form the continent into one government half a century hence. The vast variety of interests, occasioned by an increase of trade in population, would create confusion. Colony would be against colony. Each being able might scorn each other's assistance, and while the proud and foolish gloried in their little distinctions, the wise would lament that the union had not been formed before. Wherefore, the present time is the true time for establishing it. The intimacy which is contracted in infancy, and the friendship which is formed in misfortune, are of all others the most lasting and unalterable. Our present union is marked with both these characters. We are young, and we have been distressed, but our congold hath withstood our troubles, and fixes a memorable area for posterity to glory in. The present time, likewise, is that peculiar time which never happens to a nation but once, that is, the time of forming itself into a government. Most nations have let slip the opportunity, and by that means have been compelled to receive laws from their conquerors, instead of making laws for themselves. First they had a king, and then a form of government, whereas the articles or charter of government should be formed first, and men delegated to execute them afterward. But from the errors of other nations let us learn wisdom, and lay hold of the present opportunity to begin government at the right end. When William the Conqueror subdued England, he gave them law at the point of the sword, and until we consent that the seat of government in America be legally and authoritatively occupied, we shall be in danger of having it filled by some fortunate Ruffian, who may treat us in the same manner, and then where will be our freedom, where our property? As to religion, I hold it to be the indispensable duty of all government to protect all conscientious professors thereof, and I know of no other business which government hath to do therewith, that a man throw aside that narrowness of soul, that selfishness of principle, which the niggards of all professions are so unwilling to part with, and he will be delivered of his fears on that head. Suspicion is the companion of mean souls, and the bane of all good society. For myself I fully and conscientiously believe that it is the will of the Almighty that there should be diversity of religious opinions among us. It affords a larger field for our Christian kindness. Where we all have one way of thinking, our religious dispositions would want matter for probation, and on this liberal principle I look on the various denominations among us to be like children of the same family, differing only in what is called their Christian names. In page 40 I threw out a few thoughts on the propriety of a continental charter, for I only presume to offer hints, not plans, and in this place I take the liberty of remensioning the subject by observing that a charter is to be understood as a bond of solemn obligation, which the whole enters into to support the right of every separate part, whether of religion, personal freedom, or property. A firm bargain and a right reckoning make long friends. In a former page I likewise mention the necessity of a large and equal representation, and there is no political matter which more deserves our attention. A small number of electors, or a small number of representatives, are equally dangerous. But if the number of the representatives be not only small but unequal, the danger is increased. As an instance of this, I mention the following. When the Associators' petition was before the House of Assembly of Pennsylvania, twenty-eight members only were present. All the Box County members, being eight, voted against it, and had seven of the Chester members done the same, this whole province had been governed by two counties only, and this danger it is always exposed to. The unwarrantable stretch, likewise, which that House made in their last sitting, to get an undue authority over the delegates of that province, ought to warn the people at large how they trust power out of their own hands. A set of instructions for the delegates were put together which, in point of sense and business, would have dishonored a schoolboy, and after being approved by a few, of very few, without doors, were carried into the House and there passed in behalf of the whole colony. Whereas, did the whole colony know, with what ill will, that House hath entered on some necessary public measures, they would not hesitate a moment to think them unworthy of such a trust. Immediate necessity makes many things convenient, which, if continued, would grow into oppressions. Expedience and right are different things. When the calamities of America required a consultation, there was no method so ready, or at that time so proper, as to appoint persons from the several houses of assembly for that purpose, and the wisdom with which they have proceeded hath preserved this continent from ruin. But as it is more than probable that we shall never be without a Congress, every well-wisher to good order must own that the mode for choosing members of that body deserves consideration. And I put it as a question to those who make a study of mankind, whether representation and election is not too great a power for one and the same body of men to possess. When we are plotting for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary. It is from our enemies that we often gain excellent maxims, and are frequently surprised into reason by their mistakes. Mr. Cornwall, one of the Lords of the Treasury, treated the petition of the New York Assembly with contempt, because that House, he said, consisted but of twenty-six members, which trifling number, he argued, could not with decency be put for the whole. We thank him for his involuntary honesty. To conclude, however strange it may appear to some, or however unwilling they may be to think so matters not, but many strong and striking reasons may be given to show that nothing can settle our affairs so expeditiously as an open and determined declaration for independence. Some of which are, first, it is the custom of nations, when any two are at war, for some other powers not engaged in the quarrel, to step in as mediators, and bring about the preliminaries of a peace. But while America calls herself the subject of Great Britain, no power, however well-disposed she may be, can offer her mediation. Wherefore, in our present state, we may quarrel on forever. Secondly, it is unreasonable to suppose that France or Spain will give us any kind of assistance, if we mean only, to make use of that assistance for the purpose of repairing the breach, and strengthening the connection between Britain and America, because those powers would be sufferers by the consequences. Thirdly, while we profess ourselves the subjects of Britain, we must in the I of Four Nations be considered as rebels. The present is somewhat dangerous to their peace, for men to be in arms under the name of subjects. We, on the spot, can solve the paradox, but to unite resistance and subjection requires an idea much too refined for common understanding. Fourthly, where a manifesto to be published and dispatched to foreign courts, setting forth the miseries we have endured, and the peaceable methods we have ineffectually used for redress, declaring at the same time that not being able any longer to live happily or safely under the cruel disposition of the British court, we had been driven to the necessity of breaking off all connections with her, at the same time assuring all such courts of our peaceable disposition towards them, and of our desire of entering into trade with them, such a memorial would produce more good effects to this continent than if a ship were fraiged with petitions to Britain. Under our present denomination of British subjects, we can neither be received nor heard abroad. The custom of all courts is against us, and will be so, until by an independence we take rank with other nations. These proceedings may at first appear strange and difficult, but like all other steps which we have already passed over, will in a little time become familiar and agreeable, and until an independence is declared, the continent will feel itself like a man who continues putting off some unpleasant business from day to day, yet knows it must be done, hates to set about it, wishes it over, and is continually haunted with the thoughts of its necessity. Common Sense by Thomas Paine Since the publication of the first edition of this pamphlet, or rather on the same day in which it came out, the King's speech made its appearance in this city. Had the spirit of prophecy directed the birth of this production, it could not have brought it forth at a more seasonable juncture or at a more necessary time. The bloody mindedness of the one shows the necessity of pursuing the doctrine of the other. Man read by way of revenge, and the speech, instead of terrifying, prepared away for the manly principles of independence. Ceremony and even silence from whatever motives they may arise have a hurtful tendency when they give the least degree of confidence to the base and wicked performances. Wherefore, if this maxim is admitted, it naturally follows that the King's speech, as being a piece of finished villainy, deserved and still deserves a general execration both by the Congress and the people. Yet, as the domestic tranquility of a nation depends greatly on the chastity of what may properly be called national manners, it is often better to pass some things over in silent disdain than to make use of such new methods of dislike as might introduce the least innovation on that guardian of our peace and safety. And, perhaps, it is chiefly owing to this prudent delicacy that the King's speech hath not before now suffered a public execution. The speech, if it may be called one, is nothing better than a willful audacious libel against the truth, the common good, and the existence of mankind, and is a formal and pompous method of offering up human sacrifices to the pride of tyrants. But this general massacre of mankind is one of the privileges and certain consequences of King's, for as nature knows them not, they know not her. And although they are beings of our own creating, they know not us, and are become gods of their creators. The speech hath one good quality, which is that it is not calculated to deceive. Neither can we, even if we would, be deceived by it. Brutality and tyranny appear on the face of it. It leaves us at no loss, and every line convinces, even in the moment of reading, that he who hunts the woods for prey, the naked and untutored Indian, is less a savage than the King of Britain. Sir John Dalrymple, the putative father of a whining Jesuitical peace, fallaciously called, the address of the people of England to the inhabitants of America hath, perhaps from a vain supposition that the people here were to be frightened at the pomp and description of a king, given, though very unwisely on his part, the real character of the present one. But, says the writer, if you are inclined to pay compliments to an administration which we do not complain of, meaning the marquee of Rockingham's at the repeal of the Stamp Act, it is very unfair in you to withhold them from that prince by whose not alone they were permitted to do anything. This is Toryism with a witness. Here is idolatry even without a mask. And he who can calmly hear and digest such doctrine hath forfeited his claim to rationality, and apostate from the order of manhood, and ought to be considered as one who hath not only given up the proper dignity of man, but sunk himself beneath the rank of animals, and contemptably crawl through the world like a worm. However, it matters very little now what the King of England either says or does. He hath wickedly broken through every moral and human obligation, trampled nature and conscience beneath his feet, and by a steady and constitutional spirit of insolence and cruelty, procured for himself and universal hatred. It is now the interest of America to provide for herself. She hath already a large and young family, whom it is more her duty to take care of than to be grating away her property to support a power who has become a reproach to the names of men and Christians. Ye who's offered it is to watch over the morals of a nation of whatsoever sect or denomination ye are of, as well as ye who are more immediately the gardens of the public liberty. If ye wish to preserve your native country uncontaminated by European corruption, ye must in secret wish a separation. But, leaving the moral part to private reflection, I shall chiefly confine my father's remarks to the following head. First, that it is in the interest of America to be separated from Britain. Secondly, which is the easiest and most practicable plan, reconciliation or independence, with some occasional remarks. In support of the first, I could, if I judged it proper, produce the opinion of some of the ablest and most experienced men on the continent, and whose sentiments on that head are not yet publicly known. It is, in reality, a self-evidence position. For no nation in a state of foreign dependence, limited in its commerce, and cramped and fettered in its legislative powers, can ever arrive at any material eminence. America does not yet know what opulence is, and although the progress which she has made stands unparalleled in the history of other nations, it is but childhood, compared with what she would be capable of arriving at, had she, as she ought to have, the legislative powers in her own hands. England is, at this time, proudly coveting what would do her no good were she to accomplish it, and the continent hesitating on a matter which will be her final ruin if neglected. It is the commerce, and not the conquest of America, by which England is to be benefited, and that would in great measure continue were the countries as independent of each other as France and Spain, because in many articles neither can go to a better market. But it is the independence of this country of Britain, or of any other, which is now the main and only object worthy of contention, and which, like all other truths discovered by necessity, will appear clearer and stronger every day. First, because it will come to that one time or other. Secondly, because the longer it is delayed, the harder it will be to accomplish. I have frequently amused myself, both in public and private companies, with silently remarking the specious errors of those who speak without reflecting, and among the many which I have heard the following seems the most general. That is, that had this rupture happened forty or fifty years hence, instead of now, the continent would have been more able to have shaken off the dependence. To which I reply that our military ability, at this time, arises from the experience gained in the last war, and which, in forty or fifty years time, would have been totally extinct. The continent would not, by that time, have had a general, or even a military officer, left. And we, or those who may succeed us, would have been as ignorant of martial matters as the ancient Indians. And this single position, closely attended to, will unanswerably prove that the present time is preferable to all others. The argument turns thus. Not the conclusion of the last war, we had experience, but wanted numbers. And forty or fifty years hence, we should have numbers without experience. Wherefore, the proper point of time must be some particular point between the two extremes, in which a sufficiency of the former remains, and a proper increase of the latter is obtained. And that point of time is the present time. The reader will pardon this discretion, as it does not properly come under the head I first set out with, and to which I again return by the following position, which is, should affairs be patched up with Britain, and she to remain the governing and sovereign power of America, which as matters are now circumstance, is giving up the point entirely, we shall deprive ourselves of the very means of sinking the debt we have, or may contract. The value of the backlands, which some of the provinces are clandestinely deprived of, by the unjust extension of the limits of Canada, valued at only five pounds sterling per hundred acres, amount to upwards of twenty-five millions, Pennsylvania currency, and the quit rents at one penny sterling per acre to two millions yearly. It is by the sale of these lands that the debt may be sunk, without burden to any, and the quit rent reserved thereon will always lessen, and in time will wholly support the yearly expanse of government. It matters not how long the debt is in paying, so that the lands, when sold, be applied to the discharge of it, and for the execution of which the Congress for the time being will be the continental trustees. I proceed now to the second head, that is, which is the easiest and most practicable plan, reconciliation, or independence, with some occasional remarks. He who takes nature for his guide is not easily beaten out of his argument, and on that ground I answer generally, that independence, being a single simple line contained within ourselves, and reconciliation, a matter exceedingly perplexed and complicated, and in which a treacherous capricious court is to interfere, gives the answer without a doubt. The present state of America is truly alarming to every man who is capable of reflection, without law, without government, without any other mode of power than what is founded on and granted by courtesy. Held together by an unexampled concurrence of sentiment, which is nevertheless subject to change, and which every secret enemy is endeavouring to dissolve. Our present condition is legislation without law, wisdom without a plan, a constitution without a name, and what is strangely astonishing, perfect independence contending for dependence. The instance is without a precedent. The case never existed before. And who can tell what may be the event? The property of no man is secure in the present unbrazed system of things. The mind of the multitude is left at random, and seeing no fixed object before them, they pursue such as fancy an opinion starts. Nothing is criminal. There is no such thing as treason. Wherefore, everyone thinks himself at liberty to act as he pleases. The Tories dared not have assembled offensively, had they known that their lives by that act were forfeited to the laws of the state. A line of distinction should be drawn between English soldiers taken in battle and inhabitants of America taken in arms. The first are prisoners, the latter, traitors. The one forfeits his liberty, the other, his head. Notwithstanding our wisdom, there is a visible feebleness in some of our proceedings which gives encouragement to dissensions. The continental belt is too loosely buckled, and if something is not done in time, it will be too late to do anything, and we shall fall into a state in which neither reconciliation nor independence will be practicable. The king and his worthless adherents are God at their old game of dividing the continent, and there are not wanting among us printers who will be busy in spreading specious falsehoods. The artful and hypocritical letter which appeared a few months ago in two of the New York papers, and likewise in two others, is an evidence that there are men who want either judgment or honesty. It is easy getting into holes and corners and talking of reconciliation, but do such men seriously consider how difficult the task is, and how dangerous it may prove, should the continent divide thereon? Do they take within their view all the various orders of men whose situation and circumstances, as well as their own, are to be considered therein? Do they put themselves in the place of the sufferer whose all is already gone, and of the soldier who had quitted all for the defense of his country? If their ill-judged moderation be suited to their own private situations only, regardless of others, the event will convince them that they are reckoning without their host. Put us, says some, on the footing we were on in sixty-three, to which I answer the request is not now in the power of Britain to comply with, neither will she propose it. But if it were, and even should be granted, I ask, as a reasonable question, by what means is such a corrupt and faithless court to be kept to its engagements? Another parliament, nay, even the present, may hereafter repeal the obligation on the pretense of its being violently obtained, or unwisely granted, and in that case, where is our redress? No going to law with nations, canon are the barristers of crowns, and the sword, not of justice but of war, decides the suit. To be on the footing of sixty-three, it is not sufficient that the laws only be put on the same state, but that our circumstances likewise be put on the same state. Our burnt and destroyed towns repaired or built up, our private losses made good, our public debts contracted for defence discharged. Otherwise, we shall be millions worse than we were at that enviable period. Such a request, had it been complied with a year ago, would have won the heart and soul of the continent. But now it is too late, the rubicon is past. Besides, the taking up arms merely to enforce the repeal of a pecuniary law seems as unwarrantable by the divine law, and as repugned into human feelings, as the taking up of arms to enforce obedience there too. The object, on either side, doth not justify the means, for the lives of men are too valuable to be cast away on such trifles. It is the violence which is done and threatened to our persons, the destruction of our property by an armed force, the invasion of our country by fire and sword which conscientiously qualifies the use of arms, and the instant in which such a mode of defence became necessary all subjections of Britain ought to have ceased, and the independency of America should have been considered as dating its era from and published by the first musket that was fired against her. This line is a line of consistency, neither drawn by caprice nor extended by ambition, but produced by a chain of events of which the colonies were not the authors. I shall conclude these remarks with the following timely and well-intended hints. We ought to reflect that there are three different ways by which an independency may hereafter be affected, and that one of those three will one day or other be the fate of America. That is, by the legal voice of the people in Congress, by military power, or by a mob. It may not always happen that our soldiers are citizens and the multitude of body of reasonable men. Virju, as I have already remarked, is not hereditary, neither is it perpetual. Should an independency be brought about by the first of these means, we have every opportunity and every encouragement before us to form the noblest, purest constitution on the face of the earth. We have it in our power to begin the world over again. A situation similar to the present has not happened since the days of Noah until now. The birthday of a new world is at hand, and a race of men, perhaps as numerous as all Europe contains, are to receive their portion of freedom from the events of a few months. The reflection is awful, and in this point of view, how trifling, how ridiculous, do the little paltry cavalings of a few weak or interested men appear when weighed against the business of a world. Should we neglect the present favorable and inviting period, and an independance be hereafter affected by any other means, we must charge the consequence to ourselves, or to those, rather, whose narrow and prejudiced souls are habitually opposing the measure, without ever inquiring or reflecting. There are reasons to be given in support of independance which men should rather privately think of than be publicly told of. We ought not now to be debating whether we shall be independent or not. We ought not now to be debating whether we shall be independent or not, but anxious to accomplish it on a firm, secure, and honorable basis, and uneasy, rather, that it is not yet began upon. Every day convinces us of its necessity. Even the Tories, if such beings yet remain among us, should of all men be the most solicitous to promote it. For, as the appointment of committees at first protected them from popular rage, so a wise and well-established form of government will be the only certain means of continuing it securely to them. Wherefore, if they have not virtue enough to be wigs, they ought to have prudence enough to wish for independance. In short, independance is the only bond that can tie and keep us together. We shall then see our object, and our ears will be legally shut against the schemes of an intriguing, as well as a cruel, enemy. We shall then, too, be on a proper footing to treat with Britain, for there is reason to conclude that the pride of that court will be less hurt by treating with the American states for terms of peace than with those whom she dominates, rebellious subjects, for terms of a combination. It is our delaying it that encourages her to hope for conquest, and our backwardness tends only to prolong the war. As we have, without any good effect therefrom, withheld our trade to obtain a redress of our grievances, let us now try the alternative by independently redressing them ourselves, and then offering to open the trade. The mercantile and reasonable part of England will still be with us, because peace with trade is preferable to war without it, and if this offer be not accepted, other courts may be applied to. On these grounds I rest the matter, and as no offer has yet been made to refute the doctrine contained in the former editions of this pamphlet, it is negative proof that either the doctrine cannot be refuted, or that the party in favour of it are too numerous to be opposed. Wherefore, instead of gazing at each other with suspicious or doubtful curiosity, let each of us hold out to his neighbour the hearty hand of friendship, and unite in drawing a line, which, like an act of oblivion, shall bury in forgetfulness every former dissension. Let the names of Whig and Tory be extinct, and let none other be heard among us than those of a good citizen, an open and resolute friend, and a virtuous supporter of the rights of mankind, and of the free and independent states of America. To the representatives of the religious society of the people called Quakers, or to so many of them as were concerned in publishing the late piece entitled The Ancient Testimony and Principles of the People Called Quakers Renewed, with respect to the king and government, and touching the commotions now prevailing in these and other parts of America addressed to the people in general. The writer of this is one of those few who never dishonours religion, neither by ridiculing or caviling at any denomination whatsoever. To God and not to man are all men accountable on the score of religion. Wherefore, this epistle is not so properly addressed to you as a religious, but as a political body, dabbling in matters which the professed quietude of your principles instruct you not to meddle with. As you have, without a proper authority for doing so, put yourselves in the place of the whole body of the Quakers, so the writer of this, in order to be on an equal rank with yourselves, is under the necessity of putting himself in the place of all those who approve the very writings and principles against which your testimony is directed. And he hath chosen this singular situation in order that you might discover in him that presumption of character which you cannot see in yourselves, for neither he nor you can have any claim or title to political representation. When men have departed from the right way, it is no wonder that they stumble and fall, and it is evident from the manner in which you have managed your testimony that politics, as a religious body of men, is not your proper walk. For however well adapted it may appear to you, it is, nevertheless, a jumble of good and bad put unwisely together, and the conclusion drawn therefrom both unnatural and unjust. The two first pages, and the whole doth not make four, we give you credit for, and expect the same civility from you, because the love and desire of peace is not confined to Quakerism. It is the natural, as well as the religious wish of all denominations of men. And on this ground, as men laboring to establish an independent constitution of our own, do we exceed all others in our hope, end, and aim. Our plan is peace forever. We are tired of contention with Britain, and can see no real end to it but in a final separation. We act consistently, because for the sake of introducing an endless and uninterrupted peace, do we bear the evils and burdens of the present day. We are endeavouring, and will steadily continue to endeavour to separate and dissolve a connection which has already filled our land with blood, and which, while the name of it remains, will be the fatal cause of future mischiefs to both countries. We fight neither for revenge nor conquest, neither from pride nor passion. We are not insulting the world with our fleets and armies, nor ravishing the globe for plunder. Beneath the shade of our own vines are we attacked. In our own houses and on our own lands is the violence committed against us. We view our enemies in the character of high women and housebreakers, and having no defence for ourselves in the civil law, are obliged to punish them by the military one, and apply the sword in the very case where you have before now applied the halter. Perhaps we feel for the ruined and insulted sufferers in all and every part of the continent with a degree of tenderness which hath not yet made its way into some of your bosoms, but be ye sure that ye mistake not the cause and ground of your testimony. Call not coldness of soul religion, nor put the bigot in the place of the Christian. O ye martial ministers of your own acknowledged principles, if the bearing arms be sinful, the first going to war must be more so, by all the difference between willful attack and unavoidable defence. Wherefore, if ye really preach from conscience and mean not to make a political hobbyhorse of your religion, convince the world thereof by proclaiming your doctrine to our enemies, for they likewise bear arms. Give us proof of your sincerity by publishing it at St. James, to the commanders in chief in Boston, to the admirals and captains who are periodically ravaging our coasts, and to all the murdering miscreants who are acting in authority under him whom ye profess to serve. Had ye the honest soul of Barclay, ye would preach repentance to your king, ye would tell the royal wretch his sins, and warn him of eternal ruin, ye would not spend your partial invectives against the injured and the insulted only, but like faithful ministers, would cry aloud and spare none. Say not that ye are persecuted. Neither endeavor to make us the authors of that reproach which ye are bringing upon yourselves, for we testify unto all men that we do not complain against you because you are Quakers, but because ye pretend to be and are not Quakers. Alas, it seems by the particular tendency of some part of your testimony and other parts of your conduct, as if all sin was reduced to and comprehended in the act of bearing arms, and that by the people only. Ye appear to us to have mistaken party for conscience, because the general tenor of your actions wants uniformity, and it is exceedingly difficult to us to give credit to many of your pretended scruples, because we see them made by the same men, who in the very instant that they are exclaiming against the mammon of this world, are nevertheless hunting after it with a step as steady as time, and an appetite as keen as death. The quotation which ye have made from Proverbs, in the third page of your testimony, that, quote, when a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him, end, quote, is very unwisely chosen on your part, because it amounts to a proof that the King's ways, whom ye are desires of supporting, do not please the Lord, otherwise his rank would be in peace. I now proceed to the latter part of your testimony, and that for which all the foregoing seems only an introduction. That is, quote, it hath ever been our judgment and principle, since we are called to profess the light of Christ Jesus, manifested in our consciences unto this day, that the setting up and putting down kings and governments is God's peculiar prerogative, and for cause is best known to himself, and that it is not our business to have any hand or contrivance therein, nor to be busy bodies above our station, much less to plot and contrive the ruin or overturn of any of them, but to pray for the King and safety of our nation and good of all men, that we may live a peaceable and quiet life in all godliness and honesty, under the government which God is pleased to set over us, end, quote. If these are really your principles, why do you not abide by them? Why do you not leave that which ye call God's work to be managed by himself? These very principles instruct you to wait with patience and humility for the event of all public measures, and to receive that event as the divine will towards you. Wherefore, what occasion is there for your political testimony if you fully believe what it contains? And the very publishing of it proves that either you do not believe what ye profess, or have not virtue enough to practice what ye believe. The principles of Quakerism have a direct tendency to make a man the quiet and inoffensive subject of any and every government which is set over him, and if the setting up and putting down of kings and governments is God's peculiar prerogative, ye most certainly will not be robbed thereof by us. Wherefore, the principle itself leads you to approve of everything which ever happened or may happen to kings as being his work. Oliver Cromwell thanks you. Charles then died not by the hands of man, and should the present proud imitator of him come to the same untimely end, the writers and publishers of the testimony are bound, by the doctrine it contains, to applaud the fact. Kings are not taken away by miracles. Neither are changes in governments brought about by any other means than such as are common and human, and such as we are now using. Even the dispersion of the Jews, though foretold by our saviour, was affected by arms. Wherefore, as ye refuse to be the means on one side, ye ought not to be the meddlers on the other. But to wait the issue in silence, and unless ye can produce divine authority to prove that the Almighty, who hath created and placed this new world at the greatest distance it could possibly stand east and west from every part of the old, doth nevertheless disapprove of its being independent of the corrupt and abandoned court of Britain, unless, I say, ye can show this. How can ye, on the ground of your principles, justify the exciting and stirring up the people, quote, firmly to unite in the abhorrence of all such writings and measures as evidence of desire and design to break off the happy connection we have hitherto enjoyed, with the kingdom of Great Britain and our just and necessary subordination to the King and those who are lawfully placed in authority under him, end quote. What a slap of face is here. The men, who in the very paragraph before, have quietly and passively resigned up the ordering, authoring, and disposal of kings and governments into the hands of God, are now recalling their principles and putting in for a share of the business. Is it possible that the conclusion which is here justly quoted can anyways follow from the doctrine laid down? The inconsistency is too glaring not to be seen, the absurdity too great not to be laughed at, and such as could only have been made by those whose understandings were darkened by the narrow and crabby spirits of a despairing political party, for he are not to be considered as the whole body of the Quakers, but only as a fractional and fractional part thereof. Here ends the examination of your testimony, which I call upon no man to abhor as ye have done, but only to read and judge of fairly. To which I stop join the following remark, quote, that the setting up and putting down of kings, unquote, most certainly means the making of a king who is yet not so, and the making him no king who is already one. And pray, what hath this to do in the present case? We neither mean to set up nor to pull down, neither to make nor to unmake, but to have nothing to do with them. Wherefore your testimony in whatever light it is viewed serves only to dishonor your judgment, and for many other reasons had better have been let alone than published. First, because it tends to the decrease and reproach of all religion whatever, and is of the utmost danger to society to make it a party in political disputes. Secondly, because it exhibits a body of men, numbers of whom disavow the publishing political testimonies, as being concerned therein and approvers thereof. Thirdly, because it hath a tendency to undo that continental harmony and friendship which yourselves, by your late liberal and charitable donations, hath lent a hand to establish, and the preservation of which is of the utmost consequence to us all. And here, without anger or resentment, I bid you farewell, sincerely wishing that as men and Christians, you may always fully and uninterruptedly endure every civil and religious right, and be in your turn the means of securing it to others, but that the example which ye have unwisely set of mingling religion with politics may be disavowed and reprobated by every inhabitant of America. End of Part 5. End of Common Sense, by Thomas Paine, read by Bob Neufeld