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On Thomas Paine

Robert Green Ingersoll

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The Works of ROBERT G. INGERSOLL

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THOMAS PAINE

1870

WITH HIS NAME LEFT OUT, THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY
CANNOT BE WRITTEN.

To speak the praises of the brave and thoughtful dead, is to
me a labor of gratitude and love.

Through all the centuries gone, the mind of man has been
beleaguered by the mailed hosts of superstition. Slowly and
painfully has advanced the army of deliverance. Hated by those they
wished to rescue, despised by those they were dying to save, these
grand soldiers, these immortal deliverers, have fought without
thanks, labored without applause, suffered without pity, and they
have died execrated and abhorred. For the good of mankind they
accepted isolation, poverty, and calumny. They gave up all,
sacrificed all, lost all but truth and self-respect.

One of the bravest soldiers in this army was Thomas Paine; and
for one, I feel indebted to him for the liberty we are enjoying
this day. Born among the poor, where children are burdens; in a
country where real liberty was unknown; where the privileges of
class were guarded with infinite jealousy, and the rights of the
individual trampled beneath the feet of priests and nobles; where
to advocate justice was treason; where intellectual freedom was
Infidelity. It is wonderful that the idea of true liberty ever
entered his brain.

Poverty was his mother -- Necessity his master.

He had more brains than books; more sense than education; more
courage than politeness; more strength than polish. He had no
veneration for old mistakes -- no admiration for ancient lies. He
loved the truth for the truth's sake, and for man's sake. He saw
oppression on every hand; injustice everywhere; hypocrisy at the
altar, venality on the bench, tyranny on the throne; and with a
splendid courage he espoused the cause of the weak against the
strong, of the enslaved many against the titled few.

In England he was nothing. He belonged to the lower classes.
There was no avenue open for him. The people hugged their chains,
and the whole power of the government was ready to crush any man
who endeavored to strike a blow for the right.

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At the age of thirty-seven, Thomas Paine left England for
America, with the high hope of being instrumental in the
establishment of a free government. In his own country he could
accomplish nothing. Those two vultures Church and State -- were
ready to tear in pieces and devour the heart of any one who might
deny their divine right to enslave the world.

Upon his arrival in this country, he found himself possessed
of a letter of introduction, signed by another Infidel the
illustrious Franklin. this, and his native genius, constituted his
entire capital; and he needed no more. He found the colonies
clamoring for justice; whining about their grievances; upon their
knees at the foot of the throne, imploring that mixture of idiocy
and insanity, George the III., by the grace of God, for a
restoration of their ancient privileges. They were not endeavoring
to become free men but were trying to soften the heart of their
master. They were perfectly willing to make brick if Pharaoh would
furnish the straw. The colonists wished for, hoped for, and prayed
for reconciliation. They did not dream of independence.

Paine gave to the world his "Common Sense" It was the first
argument for separation, the first assault upon the British form of
government, the first blow for a republic, and it aroused our
fathers like a trumpet's blast.

He was the first to perceive the destiny of the New World.

No other pamphlet ever accomplished such wonderful results. It
was filled with argument, reason, persuasion, and unanswerable
logic. It opened a new world. It filled the present with hope and
the future with honor. Everywhere the people responded, and in a
few months the Continental Congress declared the colonies free and
independent States.

A new nation was born. It is simple justice to say that Paine
did more to cause the Declaration of Independence than any other
man. Neither should it be forgotten that his attacks upon Great
Britain were also attacks upon monarchy; and while he convinced the
people that the colonies ought to separate from the mother country,
he also proved to them that a free government is the best that can
be instituted among men.

In my judgment, Thomas Paine was the best political writer
that ever lived. "What he wrote was pure nature, and his soul and
his pen ever went together." Ceremony, pageantry, and all the
paraphernalia of power, had no effect upon him. He examined into
the why and wherefore of things. He was perfectly radical in his
mode of thought. Nothing short of the bed-rock satisfied him. His
enthusiasm for what he believed to be right knew no bounds. During
all the dark scenes of the Revolution, never for one moment did he
despair. Year after year his brave words were ringing through the
land, and by the bivouac fires the weary soldiers read the
inspiring words of "Common Sense," filled with ideas sharper than
their swords, and consecrated themselves anew to the cause of
Freedom.

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Paine was not content with having aroused the spirit of
independence, but he gave every energy of his soul to keep that
spirit alive. He was with the army. He shared its defeats, its
dangers, and its glory. When the situation became desperate, when
gloom settled upon all, he gave them the "CRISIS." It was a cloud
by day and a pillar of fire by night, leading the way to freedom,
honor, and glory. He shouted to them, "These are the times that try
men souls. The summer soldier, and the sunshine patriot, will, in
this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that
stands it now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman."

To those who wished to put the war off to some future day,
with a lofty and touching spirit of self-sacrifice he said: "Every
generous parent should say, 'If there must be war let it be in my
day, that my child may have peace --' To the cry that Americans
were rebels, he replied: "He that rebels against reason is a real
rebel; but he that in defence of reason rebels against tyranny, has
a better title to 'Defender of the Faith' than George the Third."

Some said it was not to the interest of the colonies to be
free. Paine answered this by saying, "To know whether it be the
interest of the continent to be independent, we need ask only this
simple, easy question: 'Is it the interest of a man to be a boy all
his life?'" He found many who would listen to nothing, and to them
he said, "That to argue with a man who has renounced his reason is
like giving medicine to the dead." This sentiment ought to adorn
the walls of every orthodox church.

There is a world of political wisdom in this: "England lost
her liberty in a long chain of right reasoning from wrong
principles"; and there is real discrimination in saying' "The
Greeks and Romans were strongly possessed of the spirit of liberty,
but not the principles, for at the time that they were determined
not to be slaves themselves, they employed their power to enslave
the rest of mankind."

In his letter to the British people, in which he tried to
convince them that war was not to their interest, occurs the
following passage brimful of common sense: "War never can be the
interest of a trading nation any more than quarreling can be
profitable to a man in business. But to make war with those who
trade with us is like setting a bull-dog upon a customer at the
shop-door."

The writings of Paine fairly glitter with simple, compact,
logical statements, that carry conviction to the dullest and most
prejudiced. He had the happiest possible way of putting the case;
in asking questions in such a way that they answer themselves, and
in stating his premises so clearly that the deduction could not be
avoided.

Day and night he labored for America; month after month, year
after year, he gave himself to the Great Cause, until there was "a
government of the people and for the people," and until the banner
of the stars floated over a continent redeemed, and consecrated to
the happiness of mankind.

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At the close of the Revolution, no one stood higher in America
than Thomas Paine. The best, the wisest, the most patriotic, were
his friends and admirers; and had he been thinking only of his own
good he might have rested from his toils and spent the remainder of
his life in comfort and in ease. He could have been what the world
is pleased to call "respectable". He could have died surrounded by
clergymen, warriors and statesmen. At his death there would have
been an imposing funeral, miles of carriages, civic societies,
salvos of artillery, a nation in mourning, and, above all, a
splendid monument covered with lies.

He chose rather to benefit mankind.

At that time the seeds sown by the great Infidels were
beginning to bear fruit in France. The people were beginning to
think.

The Eighteenth Century was crowning its gray hairs with the
wreath of Progress.

On every hand Science was bearing testimony against the
Church. Voltaire had filled Europe with light; D'Holbach was giving
to the elite of Paris the principles contained in his "System of
Nature." The Encyclopedists had attacked superstition with
information for the masses. The foundation of things began to be
examined. A few had the courage to keep their shoes on and let the
bush burn. Miracles began to get scarce. Everywhere the people
began to inquire. America had set an example to the world. The word
Liberty was in the mouths of men, and they began to wipe the dust
from their knees.

The dawn of a new day had appeared.

Thomas Paine went to France. Into the new movement he threw
all his energies. His fame had gone before him, and he was welcomed
as a friend of the human race, and as a champion of free
government.

He had never relinquished his intention of pointing out to his
countrymen the defects, absurdities and abuses of the English
government. For this purpose he composed and published his greatest
political work, "The Rights of Man." This work should be read by
every man and woman. It is concise, accurate, natural, convincing,
and unanswerable. It shows great thought; an intimate knowledge of
the various forms of government; deep insight into the very springs
of human action, and a courage that compels respect and admiration.
The most difficult political problems are solved in a few
sentences. The venerable arguments in favor of wrong are refuted
with a question -- answered with a word. For forcible illustration,
apt comparison, accuracy and clearness of statement, and absolute
thoroughness, it has never been excelled.

The fears of the administration were aroused, and Paine was
prosecuted for libel and found guilty; and yet there is not a
sentiment in the entire work that will not challenge the admiration
of every civilized man. It is a magazine of political wisdom, an
arsenal of ideas, and an honor, not only to Thomas Paine, but to

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human nature itself. It could have been written only by the man who
had the generosity, the exalted patriotism, the goodness to say,
"The world is my country, and to do good my religion."

There is in all the utterances of the world no grander, no
sublimer sentiment. There is no creed that can be compared with it
for a moment. It should be wrought in gold, adorned with jewels,
and impressed upon every human heart: "The world is my country, and
to do good my religion."

In 1792, Paine was elected by the department of Calais as
their representative in the National Assembly. So great was his
popularity in France that he was selected about the same time by
the people of no less than four departments.

Upon taking his place in the Assembly he was appointed as one
of a committee to draft a constitution for France. Had the French
people taken the advice of Thomas Paine there would have been no
"reign of terror." The streets of Paris would not have been filled
with blood. The Revolution would have been the grandest success of
the world. The truth is that Paine was too conservative to suit the
leaders of the French Revolution. They, to a great extent, were
carried away by hatred and a desire to destroy. They had suffered
so long, they had borne so much, that it was impossible for them to
be moderate in the hour of victory.

Besides all this, the French people had been so robbed by the
government, so degraded by the church, that they were not fit
material with which to construct a republic. Many of the leaders
longed to establish a beneficent and just government, but the
people asked for revenge.

Paine was filled with a real love for mankind. His
philanthropy was boundless. He wished to destroy monarchy -- not
the monarch. He voted for the destruction of tyranny, and against
the death of the king. He wished to establish a government on a new
basis; one that would forget the past; one that would give
privileges to none and protection to all.

In the Assembly, where nearly all were demanding the execution
of the king -- where to differ from the majority was to be
suspected, and, where to be suspected was almost certain death,
Thomas Paine had the courage, the goodness and the justice to vote
against death. To vote against the execution of the king was a vote
against his own life. This was the sublimity of devotion to
principle. For this he was arrested, imprisoned, and doomed to
death.

Search the records of the world and you will find but few
sublimer acts than that of Thomas Paine voting against the king's
death. He, the hater of despotism, the abhorrer of monarchy, the
champion of the rights of man, the republican, accepting death to
save the life of a deposed tyrant -- of a throneless king. This was
the last grand act of his political life -- the sublime conclusion
of his political career.

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All his life he had been the disinterested friend of man. He
had labored -- not for money, not for fame, but for the general
good. He had aspired to no office; had asked no recognition of his
services, but had ever been content to labor as a common soldier in
the army of Progress. Confining his efforts to no country, looking
upon the world as his field of action, filled with a genuine love
for the right, he found himself imprisoned by the very people he
had striven to save.

Had his enemies succeeded in bringing him to the block, he
would have escaped the calumnies and the hatred of the Christian
world. In this country, at least, he would have ranked with the
proudest names. On the anniversary of the Declaration his name
would have been upon the lips of all the orators, and his memory in
the hearts of all the people.

Thomas Paine had not finished his career.

He had spent his life thus far in destroying the power of
kings, and now he turned his attention to the priests. He knew that
every abuse had been embalmed in Scripture -- that every outrage
was in partnership with some holy text. He knew that the throne
skulked behind the altar, and both behind a pretended revelation
from God. By this time he had found that it was of little use to
free the body and leave the mind in chains. He had explored the
foundations of despotism, and had found them infinitely rotten. He
had dug under the throne, and it occurred to him that he would take
a look behind the altar.

The result of his investigations was given to the world in the
"Age of Reason" From the moment of its publication he became
infamous. He was calumniated beyond measure. To slander him was to
secure the thanks of the church. All his services were instantly
forgotten, disparaged or denied. He was shunned as though he had
been a pestilence. Most of his old friends forsook him. He was
regarded as a moral plague, and at the bare mention of his name the
bloody hands of the church were raised in horror. He was denounced
as the most despicable of men.

Not content with following him to his grave, they pursued him
after death with redoubled fury. and recounted with infinite gusto
and satisfaction the supposed horrors of his death-bed; gloried in
the fact that he was forlorn and friendless, and gloated like
fiends over what they supposed to be the agonizing remorse of his
lonely death.

It is wonderful that all his services were thus forgotten. It
is amazing that one kind word did not fall from some pulpit; that
some one did not accord to him, at least honesty. Strange, that in
the general denunciation some one did not remember his labor for
liberty, his devotion to principle. his zeal for the rights of his
fellow-men. He had, by brave and splendid effort, associated his
name with the cause of Progress. He had made it impossible to write
the history of political freedom with his name left out. He was one
of the creators of light; one of the heralds of the dawn. He hated
tyranny in the name of kings, and in the name of God, with every
drop of his noble blood. He believed in liberty and justice, and in

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the sacred doctrine of human equality. Under these divine banners
he fought the battle of his life. In both worlds he offered his
blood for the good of man. In the wilderness of America, in the
French Assembly, in the somber cell waiting for death, he was the
same unflinching, unwavering friend of his race; the same undaunted
champion of universal freedom. And for this he has been hated; for
this the church has violated even his grave.

This is enough to make one believe that nothing is more
natural than for men to devour their benefactors. The people in all
ages have crucified and glorified. Whoever lifts his voice against
abuses, whoever arraigns the past at the bar of the present,
whoever asks the king to show his commission, or questions the
authority of the priest, will be denounced as the enemy of man and
God. In all ages reason has been regarded as the enemy of religion.
Nothing has been considered so pleasing to the Deity as a total
denial of the authority of your own mind. Self-reliance has been
thought a deadly sin; and the idea of living and dying without the
aid and consolation of superstition has always horrified the
church. By some unaccountable infatuation, belief has been and
still is considered of immense importance. All religions have been
based upon the idea that God will forever reward the true believer,
and eternally damn the man who doubts or denies. Belief is regarded
as the one essential thing. To practice justice, to love mercy, is
not enough. You must believe in some incomprehensible creed. You
must say, "Once one is three, and three times one is one." The man
who practiced every virtue, but failed to believe, was execrated.
Nothing so outrages the feelings of the church as a moral
unbeliever -- nothing so horrible as a charitable Atheist.

When Paine was born, the world was religious, the pulpit was
the real throne, and the churches were making every effort to crush
out of the brain the idea that it had the right to think.

The splendid saying of Lord Bacon, that "the inquiry of truth
which is the love-making or wooing of it, the knowledge of truth,
which is the presence of it, and the belief of truth, which is the
enjoying of it, are the sovereign good of human nature," has been,
and ever will be, rejected by religionists. Intellectual liberty,
as a matter of necessity, forever destroys the idea that belief is
either praise or blame-worthy, and is wholly inconsistent with
every creed in Christendom. Paine recognized this truth. He also
saw that as long as the Bible was considered inspired, this
infamous doctrine of the virtue of belief would be believed and
preached. He examined the Scriptures for himself, and found them
filled with cruelty, absurdity and immorality.

He again made up his mind to sacrifice himself for the good of
his fellow-men.

He commenced with the assertion, "That any system of religion
that has anything in it that shocks the mind of a child cannot be
a true system." What a beautiful, what a tender sentiment! No
wonder the church began to hate him. He believed in one God, and no
more. After this life he hoped for happiness. He believed that true
religion consisted in doing justice, loving mercy, in endeavoring
to make our fellow-creatures happy, and in offering to God the

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fruit of the heart. He denied the inspiration of the Scriptures.
This was his crime.

He contended that it is a contradiction in terms to call
anything a revelation that comes to us second-hand, either verbally
or in writing. He asserted that revelation is necessarily limited
to the first communication, and that after that it is only an
account of something which another person says was a revelation to
him. We have only his word for it, as it was never made to us. This
argument never has been and probably never will be answered. He
denied the divine origin of Christ, and showed conclusively that
the pretended prophecies of the Old Testament had no reference to
him whatever; and yet he believed that Christ was a virtuous and
amiable man; that the morality he taught and practiced was of the
most benevolent and elevated character, and that it had not been
exceeded by any. Upon this point he entertained the same sentiments
now held by the Unitarians, and in fact by all the most enlightened
Christians.

In his time the church believed and taught that every word in
the Bible was absolutely true. Since his day it has been proven
false in its cosmogony, false in its astronomy, false in its
chronology, false in its history, and so far as the Old Testament
is concerned, false in almost everything. There are but few, if
any, scientific men who apprehend that the Bible is literally true.
Who on earth at this day would pretend to settle any scientific
question by a text from the Bible? The old belief is confined to
the ignorant and zealous. The church itself will before long be
driven to occupy the position of Thomas Paine. The best minds of
the orthodox world, to-day, are endeavoring to prove the existence
of a personal Deity. All other questions occupy a minor place. You
are no longer asked to swallow the Bible whole, whale, Jonah and
all; you are simply required to believe in God, and pay your pew-
rent. There is not now an enlightened minister in the world who
will seriously contend that Samson's strength was in his hair, or
that the necromancers of Egypt could turn water into blood, and
pieces of wood into serpents. These follies have passed away, and
the only reason that the religious world can now have for disliking
Paine is that they have been forced to adopt so many of his
opinions.

Paine thought the barbarities of the Old Testament
inconsistent with what he deemed the real character of God. He
believed that murder, massacre and indiscriminate slaughter had
never been commanded by the Deity. He regarded much of the Bible as
childish, unimportant and foolish. The scientific world entertains
the same opinion. Paine attacked the Bible precisely in the same
spirit in which he had attacked the pretensions of kings. He used
the same weapons. All the pomp in the world could not make him
cower. His reason knew no "Holy of Holies," except the abode of
Truth. The sciences were then in their infancy. The attention of
the really learned had not been directed to an impartial
examination of our pretended revelation. It was accepted by most as
a matter of course. The church was all-powerful, and no one, unless
thoroughly imbued with the spirit of self-sacrifice, thought for a
moment of disputing the fundamental doctrines of Christianity. The
infamous doctrines that salvation depends upon belief -- upon a

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mere intellectual conviction -- was then believed and preached. To
doubt was to secure the damnation of your soul. This absurd and
devilish doctrine shocked the common sense of Thomas Paine, and he
denounced it with the fervor of honest indignation. This doctrine,
although infinitely ridiculous, has been nearly universal, and has
been as hurtful as senseless. For the overthrow of this infamous
tenet, Paine exerted all his strength. He left few arguments to be
used by those who should come after him, and he used none that have
been refuted. The combined wisdom and genius of all mankind cannot
possibly conceive of an argument against liberty of thought.
Neither can they show why any one should be punished, either in
this world or another, for acting honestly in accordance with
reason; and yet a doctrine with every possible argument against it
has been, and still is, believed and defended by the entire
orthodox world. Can it be possible that we have been endowed with
reason simply that our souls may be caught in its toils and snares,
that we may be led by its false and delusive glare out of the
narrow path that leads to joy into the broad way of everlasting
death? Is it possible that we have been given reason simply that we
may through faith ignore its deductions, and avoid its conclusions?
Ought the sailor to throw away his compass and depend entirely upon
the fog? If reason is not to be depended upon in matters of
religion, that is to say, in respect of our duties to the Deity,
why should it be relied upon in matters respecting the rights of
our fellows? Why should we throw away the laws given to Moses by
God himself, and have the audacity to make some of our own? How
dare we drown the thunders of Sinai by calling the ayes and noes in
a petty legislature? If reason can determine what is merciful, what
is just, the duties of man to man, what more do we want either in
time or in eternity?

Down, forever down, with any religion that requires upon its
ignorant altar the sacrifice of the goddess Reason, that compels
her to abdicate forever the shining throne of the soul, strips from
her form the imperial purple, snatches from her hand the scepter of
thought and makes her the bond-woman of a senseless faith!

If a man should tell you that he had the most beautiful
painting in the world, and after taking you where it was should
insist upon having your eyes shut, you would likely suspect, either
that he had no painting or that it was some pitiable daub. Should
he tell you that he was a most excellent performer on the violin,
and yet refuse to play unless your ears were stopped, you would
think, to say the least of it, that he had an odd way of convincing
you of his musical ability. But would his conduct be any more
wonderful than that of a religionist who asks that before examining
his creed you will have the kindness to throw away your reason? The
first gentleman says, "Keep your eyes shut, my picture will bear
everything but being seen;" "Keep your ears stopped. my music
objects to nothing but being heard." The last says, "Away with your
reason, my religion dreads nothing but being understood."

So far as I am concerned, I most cheerfully admit that most
Christians are honest, and most ministers sincere. We do not attack
them; we attack their creed. We accord to them the same rights that
we ask for ourselves. We believe that their doctrines are hurtful.
We believe that the frightful text, "He that believes shall be

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saved and he that believeth not shall be damned," has covered the
earth with blood. It has filled the heart with arrogance, cruelty
and murder. It has caused the religious wars; bound hundreds of
thousands to the stake; founded inquisitions; filled dungeons;
invented instruments of torture; taught the mother to hate her
child; imprisoned the mind; filled the world with ignorance;
persecuted the lovers of wisdom; built the monasteries and
convents; made happiness a crime, investigation a sin, and self-
reliance a blasphemy. It has poisoned the springs of learning;
misdirected the energies of the world; filled all countries with
want; housed the people in hovels; fed them with famine; and but
for the efforts of a few brave Infidels it would have taken the
world back to the midnight of barbarism and left the heavens
without a star.

The malingers of Paine say that he had no right to attack this
doctrine, because he was unacquainted with the dead languages; and
for this reason, it was a piece of pure impudence in him to
investigate the Scriptures.

Is it necessary to understand Hebrew in order to know that
cruelty is not a virtue, that murder is inconsistent with infinite
goodness, and that eternal punishment can be inflicted upon man
only by an eternal fiend? Is it really essential to conjugate the
Greek verbs before you can make up your mind as to the probability
of dead people getting out of their graves? Must one be versed in
Latin before he is entitled to express his opinion as to the
genuineness of a pretended revelation from God? Common sense
belongs exclusively to no tongue. Logic is not confined to, nor has
it been buried with, the dead languages. Paine attacked the Bible
as it is translated. If the translation is wrong, let its defenders
correct it.

The Christianity of Paine's day is not the Christianity of our
time. There has been a great improvement since then. One hundred
and fifty years ago the foremost preachers of our time would have
perished at the stake. A Universalist would have been torn in
pieces in England, Scotland, and America. Unitarians would have
found themselves in the stocks, pelted by the rabble with dead
cats, after which their ears would have been cut off their tongues
bored, and their foreheads branded. Less than one hundred and fifty
years ago the following law was in force in Maryland:

Be it enacted by the Right Honorable, the Lord Proprietor, by
and with the advice and consent of his lordship's governor, and the
upper and lower houses of the Assembly, and the authority of the
same:

"That if any person shall hereafter, within this province,
wittingly, maliciously, and advisedly, by writing or speaking,
blaspheme or curse God, or deny our Savior, Jesus Christ, to be the
Son of God, or shall deny the Holy Trinity, the Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost, or the Godhead of any of the three persons, or the
unity of the Godhead, or shall utter any profane words concerning
the Holy Trinity, or any of the persons thereof, and shall thereof
be convict by verdict, shall, for the last offence, be bored
through the tongue, and fined twenty pounds to be levied of his

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body. And for the second offence, the offender shall be stigmatized
by burning in the forehead with the letter B, and fined forty
pounds. And that for the third offence the offender shall suffer
death without the benefit of clergy."

The strange thing about this law is, that it has never been
repealed, and is still in force in the District of Columbia. Laws
like this were in force in most of the colonies, and in all
countries where the church had power.

In the Old Testament, the death penalty was attached to
hundreds of offenses. It has been the same in all Christian
countries. To-day, in civilized governments, the death penalty is
attached only to murder and treason: and in some it has been
entirely abolished. What a commentary upon the divine systems of
the world!

In the day of Thomas Paine, the church was ignorant, bloody
and relentless. In Scotland the "Kirk" was at the summit of its
power. It was a full sister of the Spanish Inquisition. It waged
war upon human nature. It was the enemy of happiness, the hater of
joy, and the despiser of religious liberty. It taught parents to
murder their children rather than to allow them to propagate error.
If the mother held opinions of which the infamous "Kirk"
disapproved, her children were taken from her arms, her babe from
her very bosom, and she was not allowed to see them, or to write
them a word. It would not allow shipwrecked sailors to be rescued
from drowning on Sunday. It sought to annihilate pleasure, to
pollute the heart by filling it with religious cruelty and gloom,
and to change mankind into a vast horde of pious, heartless fiends.
One of the most famous Scotch divines said: "The Kirk holds that
religious toleration is not far from blasphemy." And this same
Scotch Kirk denounced, beyond measure, the man who had the moral
grandeur to say, "The world is my country, and to do good my
religion." And this same Kirk abhorred the man who said, "Any
system of religion that shocks the mind of a child cannot be a true
system."

At that time nothing so delighted the church as the beauties
of endless torment, and listening to the weak wailings of damned
infants struggling in the slimy coils and poison-folds of the worm
that never dies.

About the beginning of the nineteenth century, a boy by the
name of Thomas Aikenhead, was indicted and tried at Edinburgh for
having denied the inspiration of the Scriptures, and for having, on
several occasions, when cold, wished himself in hell that he might
get warm. Notwithstanding the poor boy recanted and begged for
mercy, he was found guilty and hanged. His body was thrown in a
hole at the foot of the scaffold and covered with stones.

Prosecutions and executions like this were common in every
Christian country, and all of them were based upon the belief that
an intellectual conviction is a crime.

Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
11

THOMAS PAINE

No wonder the church hated and traduced the author of the "Age
of Reason." England was filled with Puritan gloom and Episcopal
ceremony. All religious conceptions were of the grossest nature.
The ideas of crazy fanatics and extravagant poets were taken as
sober facts. Milton had clothed Christianity in the soiled and
faded finery of the gods -- had added to the story of Christ the
fables of Mythology. He gave to the Protestant Church the most
outrageously material ideas of the Deity. He turned all the angels
into soldiers -- made heaven a battlefield, put Christ in uniform,
and described God as a militia general. His works were considered
by the Protestants nearly as sacred as the Bible itself, and the
imagination of the people was thoroughly polluted by the horrible
imagery, the sublime absurdity of the blind Milton.

Heaven and hell were realities -- the judgment-day was
expected -- books of account would be opened. Every man would hear
the charges against him read. God was supposed to sit on a golden
throne, surrounded by the tallest angels, with harps in their hands
and crowns on their heads. The goats would be thrust into eternal
fire on the left, while the orthodox sheep, on the right, were to
gambol on sunny slopes forever and forever.

The nation was profoundly ignorant, and consequently extremely
religious, so far as belief was concerned.

In Europe, Liberty was lying chained in the Inquisition -- her
white bosom stained with blood. In the New World the Puritans had
been hanging and burning in the name of God, and selling Quaker
children into slavery in the name of Christ, who said, "Suffer
little children to come unto me."

Under such conditions progress was impossible. Some one had to
lead the way. The church is, and always has been, incapable of a
forward movement. Religion always looks back. The church has
already reduced Spain to a guitar, Italy to a hand-organ, and
Ireland to exile.

Some one not connected with the church had to attack the
monster that was eating out the heart of the world. Some one had to
sacrifice himself for the good of all. The people were in the most
abject slavery; their manhood had been taken from them by pomp, by
pageantry and power. Progress is born of doubt and inquiry.

The church never doubts -- never inquires. To doubt is heresy
-- to inquire is to admit that you do not know -- the church does
neither.

More than a century ago Catholicism, wrapped in robes red with
the innocent blood of millions, holding in her frantic clutch
crowns and scepters, honors and gold, the keys of heaven and hell,
trampling beneath her feet the liberties of nations, in the proud
moment of almost universal dominion, felt within her heartless
breast the deadly dagger of Voltaire. From that blow the church
never can recover. Livid with hatred she launched her eternal
anathema at the great destroyer, and ignorant Protestants have
echoed the curse of Rome.

Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
12

THOMAS PAINE

In our country the church was all-powerful, and although
divided into many sects, would instantly unite to repel a common
foe.

Paine struck the first grand blow.

The "Age of Reason" did more to undermine the power of the
Protestant Church than all other books then known. It furnished an
immense amount of food for thought. It was written for the average
mind, and is a straightforward, honest investigation of the Bible,
and of the Christian system.

Paine did not falter, from the first page to the last. He
gives you his candid thought, and candid thoughts are always
valuable.

The "Age of Reason" has liberalized us all. It put arguments
in the mouths of the people; it put the church on the defensive; it
enabled somebody in every village to corner the parson; it made the
world wiser, and the church better; it took power from the pulpit
and divided it among the pews.

Just in proportion that the human race has advanced, the
church has lost power. There is no exception to this rule.

No nation ever materially advanced that held strictly to the
religion of its founders.

No nation ever gave itself wholly to the control of the church
without losing its power, its honor, and existence.

Every church pretends to have found the exact truth. This is
the end of progress. Why pursue that which you have? Why
investigate when you know?

Every creed is a rock in running water: humanity sweeps by it.
Every creed cries to the universe, "Halt!" A creed is the ignorant
Past bullying the enlightened Present.

The ignorant are not satisfied with what can be demonstrated.
Science is too slow for them, and so they invent creeds. They
demand completeness. A sublime segment, a grand fragment, are of no
value to them. They demand the complete circle -- the entire
structure.

In music they want a melody with a recurring accent at
measured periods. In religion they insist upon immediate answers to
the questions of creation and destiny. The alpha and omega of all
things must be in the alphabet of their superstition. A religion
that cannot answer every question, and guess every conundrum is, in
their estimation, worse than worthless. They desire a kind of
theological dictionary -- a religious ready reckoner, together with
guide-boards at all crossings and turns. They mistake impudence for
authority, solemnity for wisdom, and bathos for inspiration. The
beginning and the end are what they demand. The grand flight of the
eagle is nothing to them. They want the nest in which he was
hatched, and especially the dry limb upon which he roosts. Anything

Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
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THOMAS PAINE

that can be learned is hardly worth knowing. The present is
considered of no value in itself. Happiness must not be expected
this side of the clouds, and can only be attained by self-denial
and faith; not self-denial for the good of others, but for the
salvation of your own sweet self.

Paine denied the authority of bibles and creeds; this was his
crime, and for this the world shut the door in his face, and
emptied its slops upon him from the windows.

I challenge the world to show that Thomas Paine ever wrote one
line, one word in favor of tyranny -- in favor of immorality; one
line, one word against what he believed to be for the highest and
best interest of mankind; one line, one word against justice,
charity, or liberty, and yet he has been pursued as though he had
been a fiend from hell. His memory has been execrated as though he
had murdered some Uriah for his wife; driven some Hagar into the
desert to starve with his child upon her bosom; defiled his own
daughters; ripped open with the sword the sweet bodies of loving
and innocent women; advised one brother to assassinate another;
kept a harem with seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines,
or had persecuted Christians even unto strange cities.

The church has pursued Paine to deter others. No effort has
been in any age of the world spared to crush out opposition. The
church used painting, music and architecture, simply to degrade
mankind. But there are men that nothing can awe. There have been at
all times brave spirits that dared even the gods. Some proud head
has always been above the waves. In every age some Diogenes has
sacrificed to all the gods. True genius never cowers, and there is
always some Samson feeling for the pillars of authority.

Cathedrals and domes, and chimes and chants -- temples
frescoer and groined and carved, and gilded with gold -- altars and
tapers, and paintings of virgin and babe -- censer and chalice --
chasuble, paten and alb -- organs, and anthems and incense rising
to the winged and blest -- maniple, amice and stole -- crosses and
crosiers, tiaras and crowns -- miters and missals and masses --
rosaries, relics and robes -- martyrs and saints, and windows
stained as with the blood of Christ -- never, never for one moment
awed the brave, proud spirit of the Infidel. He knew that all the
pomp and glitter had been purchased with Liberty -- that priceless
jewel of the soul, in looking at the cathedral he remembered the
dungeon. The music of the organ was not loud enough to drown the
clank of fetters. He could not forget that the taper had lighted
the fagot. He knew that the cross adorned the hilt of the sword,
and so where others worshiped, he wept and scorned.

The doubter, the investigator, the Infidel, have been the
saviors of liberty. This truth is beginning to be realized, and the
truly intellectual are honoring the brave thinkers of the past.

But the church is as unforgiving as ever, and still wonders
why any Infidel should be wicked enough to endeavor to destroy her
power.

I will tell the church why.

Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
14

THOMAS PAINE

You have imprisoned the human mind; you have been the enemy of
liberty; you have burned us at the stake -- wasted us upon slow
fires -- torn our flesh with iron; you have covered us with chains
-- treated us as outcasts; you have filled the world with fear; you
have taken our wives and children from our arms; you have
confiscated our property; you have denied us the right to testify
in courts of justice; you have branded us with infamy; you have
torn out our tongues; you have refused us burial. In the name of
your religion, you have robbed us of every right; and after having
inflicted upon us every evil that can be inflicted in this world,
you have fallen upon your knees, and with clasped hands implored
your God to torment us forever.

Can you wonder that we hate your doctrines -- that we despise
your creeds -- that we feel proud to know that we are beyond your
power -- that we are free in spite of you -- that we can express
our honest thought, and that the whole world is grandly rising into
the blessed light?

Can you wonder that we point with pride to the fact that
Infidelity has ever been found battling for the rights of man, for
the liberty of conscience, and for the happiness of all?

Can you wonder that we are proud to know that we have always
been disciples of Reason, and soldiers of Freedom; that we have
denounced tyranny and superstition, and have kept our hands
unstained with human blood?

We deny that religion is the end or object of this life. When
it is so considered it becomes destructive of happiness -- the real
end of life. It becomes a hydra-headed monster, reaching in
terrible coils from the heavens, and thrusting its thousand fangs
into the bleeding, quivering hearts of men. It devours their
substance, builds palaces for God, (who dwells not in temples made
with hands,) and allows his children to die in huts and hovels. It
fills the earth with mourning, heaven with hatred, the present with
fear, and all the future with despair.

Virtue is a subordination of the passions to the intellect. It
is to act in accordance with your highest convictions. It does not
consist in believing, but in doing. This is the sublime truth that
the Infidels in all ages have uttered. They have handed the torch
from one to the other through all the years that have fled. Upon
the altar of Reason they have kept the sacred fire, and through the
long midnight of faith they fed the divine flame.

Infidelity is liberty; all religion is slavery. In every creed
man is the slave of God, woman is the slave of man and the sweet
children are the slaves of all.

We do not want creeds; we want knowledge -- we want happiness.

And yet we are told by the church that we have accomplished
nothing; that we are simply destroyers; that we tear down without
building again.

Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
15

THOMAS PAINE

Is it nothing to free the mind? Is it nothing to civilize
mankind? Is it nothing to fill the world with light, with
discovery, with science? Is it nothing to dignify man and exalt the
intellect? Is it nothing to grope your way into the dreary prisons,
the damp and dropping dungeons, the dark and silent cells of
superstition, where the souls of men are chained to floors of
stone; to greet them like a ray of light, like the song of a bird,
the murmur of a stream; to see the dull eyes open and grow slowly
bright; to feel yourself grasped by the shrunken and unused hands,
and hear yourself thanked by a strange and hollow voice?

Is it nothing to conduct these souls gradually into the
blessed light of day -- to let them see again the happy fields, the
sweet, green earth, and hear the everlasting music of the waves? Is
it nothing to make men wipe the dust from their swollen knees, the
tears from their blanched and furrowed cheeks? Is it a small thing
to relieve the heavens of an insatiate monster and write upon the
eternal dome, glittering with stars, the grand word FREEDOM? Is it
a small thing to quench the flames of hell with the holy tears of
pity -- to unbind the martyr from the stake -- break all the chains
-- put out the fires of civil war -- stay the sword of the fanatic,
and tear the bloody hands of the Church from the white throat of
Science?

Is it a small thing to make men truly free -- to destroy the
dogmas of ignorance, prejudice and power -- the poisoned fables of
superstition, and drive from the beautiful face of the earth the
fiend of Fear?

It does seem as though the most zealous Christian must at
times entertain some doubt as to the divine origin of his religion.
For eighteen hundred years the doctrine has been preached. For more
than a thousand years the church had, to a great extent, the
control of the civilized world, and what has been the result? Are
the Christian nations patterns of charity and forbearance? On the
contrary, their principal business is to destroy each other. More
than five millions of Christians are trained, educated, and drilled
to murder their fellow-Christians. Every nation is groaning under
a vast debt incurred in carrying on war against other Christians,
or defending itself from Christian assault. The world is covered
with forts to protect Christians from Christians, and every sea is
covered with iron monsters ready to blow Christian brains into
eternal froth. Millions upon millions are annually expended in the
effort to construct still more deadly and terrible engines of
death. Industry is crippled, honest toil is robbed, and even
beggary (except churches) is taxed to defray the expenses of
Christian warfare. There must be some other way to reform this
world. We have tried creed, and dogma and fable, and they have
failed; and they have failed in all the nations dead.

The people perish for the lack of knowledge.

Nothing but education -- scientific education -- can benefit
mankind. We must find out the laws of nature and conform to them.

We need free bodies and free minds, -- free labor and free-
thought, -- chainless hands and fetterless brains. Free labor will
give us wealth. Free thought will give us truth.

Bank of Wisdom
Box 926, Louisville, KY 40201
16
THOMAS PAINE

We need men with moral courage to speak and write their real
thoughts, and to stand by their convictions, even to the very
death. We need have no fear of being too radical. The future will
verify all grand and brave predictions. Paine was splendidly in
advance of his time; but he was orthodox compared with the Infidels
of to-day.

the highway of Progress are the broken images of the Past.

On every hand the people advance. The Vicar of God has been
pushed from the throne of the Caesars, and upon the roofs of the
Eternal City falls once more the shadow of the Eagle.

All has been accomplished by the heroic few. The men of
science have explored heaven and earth, and with infinite patience
have furnished the facts. The brave thinkers have used them. The
gloomy caverns of superstition have been transformed into temples
of thought, and the demons of the past are the angels of to-day.

Science took a handful of sand, constructed a telescope, and
with it explored the starry depths of heaven. Science wrested from
the gods their thunderbolts; and now, the electric spark, freighted
with thought and love, flashes under all the waves of the sea.
Science took a tear from the cheek of unpaid labor, converted it
into steam, created a giant that turns with tireless arm, the
countless wheels of toil.

Thomas Paine was one of the intellectual heroes -- one of the
men to whom we are indebted. His name is associated forever with
the Great Republic. As long as free government exists he will be
remembered, admired and honored.

He lived a long, laborious and useful life. The world is
better for his having lived. For the sake of truth he accepted
hatred and reproach for his portion. He ate the bitter bread of
sorrow. His friends were untrue to him because he was true to
himself, and true to them. He lost the respect of what is called
society, but kept his own. His life is what the world calls failure
and what history calls success.

If to love your fellow-men more than self is goodness, Thomas
Paine was good.

If to be in advance of your time -- to be a pioneer in the
direction of right -- is greatness, Thomas Paine was great.

If to avow your principles and discharge your duty in the
presence of death is heroic, Thomas Paine was a hero.

At the age of seventy-three, death touched his tired heart. He
died in the land his genius defended -- under the flag he gave to
the skies. Slander cannot touch him now -- hatred cannot reach him
more. He sleeps in the sanctuary of the tomb, beneath the quiet of
the stars.

A few more years -- a few more brave men -- a few more rays of
light, and mankind will venerate the memory of him who said:

"ANY SYSTEM OF RELIGION THAT SHOCKS THE
MIND OF A CHILD CANNOT BE A TRUE SYSTEM;"

"THE WORLD IS MY COUNTRY, AND TO DO GOOD MY RELIGION."
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