Who Said the Lesson to America Are Clear as Day We Must Not Again Be Caught
Advisor: Robert A. Ferguson, George Edward Woodberry Professor in Law, Literature and Criticism, Columbia University, National Humanities Center Young man.
Copyright National Humanities Center, 2014
How did Thomas Paine's pamphlet Mutual Sense convince reluctant Americans to abandon the goal of reconciliation with Britain and have that separation from Britain — independence — was the but option for preserving their liberty?
Understanding
By January 1776, the American colonies were in open rebellion confronting United kingdom. Their soldiers had captured Fort Ticonderoga, besieged Boston, fortified New York City, and invaded Canada. Yet few dared vocalisation what about knew was true — they were no longer fighting for their rights as British subjects. They weren't fighting for self-defense force, or protection of their property, or to force Britain to the negotiating table. They were fighting for independence. It took a hard jolt to move Americans from professed loyalty to declared rebellion, and information technology came in large part from Thomas Paine's Common Sense. Not a dumbed-downwards bluster for the masses, as often described, Mutual Sense is a masterful piece of argument and rhetoric that proved the ability of words.
Text
Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776 
[Find more chief sources related to Common Sense in Making the Revolution from the National Humanities Center.]
Text Type
Literary nonfiction; persuasive essay. In the Text Analysis section, Tier 2 vocabulary words are defined in pop-ups, and Tier 3 words are explained in brackets.
Text Complication
Grades ix-10 complexity band.
For more information on text complexity see these resource from achievethecore.org.
Click hither for standards and skills for this lesson.
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Common Core State Standards
- ELA-Literacy.RI.9-10.6 (Determine an author'southward bespeak of view or purpose in a text and analyze how an author uses rhetoric to advance that point of view or purpose.)
Advanced Placement US History
- 3.2 (IB) (Republican forms of regime found expression in Thomas Paine'southward Common Sense.)
Avant-garde Placement English Linguistic communication and Composition
- Reading nonfiction
- Analyzing and identifying and author'southward employ of rhetorical strategies
Teacher's Note
This lesson focuses on the sections fundamental to Paine'due south statement in Common Sense — Section III and the Appendix to the 3rd Edition, published a month after the first edition. We do not recommend assigning the full essay (Sections I, Ii, and IV crave advanced background in British history that Paine's readers would have known well). However, students should exist led through an overview of the essay to empathise how Paine congenital his arguments to a "self-evident" decision (See Background: Message, below.)
Pb students through an initial overview of the essay (encounter Background). To begin, they could skim the full text and read the pull-quotes (separated quotes in large bold text). What impression of Mutual Sense do the quotes provide? What questions do they prompt? Then guide students as they read (possibly aloud) Section Iii of Common Sense and the Appendix to the Tertiary Edition (pp. 10-19 and 25-29 in the full text provided with this lesson).
Proceed to the shut reading of three excerpts in the Text Analysis below. (Annotation that function of Excerpt #3 is a Common Core exemplar text.)
This lesson is divided into two parts, both accessible beneath. The teacher's guide includes a groundwork note, the text analysis with responses to the close reading questions, admission to the interactive exercises, and a follow-up assignment. The student's version, an interactive worksheet that tin can be e-mailed, contains all of the in a higher place except the responses to the close reading questions.
Teacher's Guide (continues below)
| Student Version (click to open)
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Teacher's Guide
Groundwork
The man at right does non look angry. To u.s., he projects the typical effigy of a "Founding Father" — composed, elite, and empowered. And to united states his famous essays are brimful in powdered-wig prose. But the portrait and the prose belie the reality. Thomas Paine was a firebrand, and his most influential essay — Common Sense — was a fevered no-holds-barred phone call for independence. He is credited with turning the tide of public opinion at a crucial juncture, convincing many Americans that war for independence was the simply option to accept, and they had to take information technology now, or else.
Common Sense appeared as a pamphlet for auction in Philadelphia on January 10, 1776, and, as we say today, it went viral. The kickoff printing sold out in two weeks and over 150,000 copies were sold throughout America and Europe. It is estimated that i fifth of Americans read the pamphlet or heard it read aloud in public. General Washington ordered it read to his troops. Within weeks, it seemed, reconciliation with Britain had gone from an honorable goal to a cowardly betrayal, while independence became the rallying weep of united Patriots. How did Paine reach this?
1. Timing.
Over a twelvemonth elapsed betwixt the outbreak of armed conflict and the Declaration of Independence. During these 15 months, many bemoaned the reluctance of Americans to renounce their ties with Britain despite the escalating warfare around them. "When we are no longer fascinated with the Idea of a speedy Reconciliation," wrote Benjamin Franklin in mid-1775, "we shall exert ourselves to some purpose. Till then Things will be done by Halves."1 In add-on, there remained much discord amidst the colonies near their shared future. "Some timid minds are terrified at the word independence," wrote Elbridge Gerry in March 1776, referring to the colonial legislatures. "America has gone such lengths she cannot recede, and I am convinced a few weeks or months at furthest will convince her of the fact, just the fruit must have time to ripen in some of the other Colonies."two In this environment, Common Sense appeared like a "falling star," wrote John Adams,3 and propelled many to back up independence. Many noted it at the time with anaesthesia.
"Old past the thought [of independence] would have struck me with horror. I at present see no culling;… Can whatever virtuous and brave American hesitate 1 moment in the choice?"
The Pennsylvania Evening Mail service, 13 Feb 1776
"We were blind, but on reading these enlightening works the scales have fallen from our optics…. The doctrine of Independence hath been in times past greatly disgustful; nosotros abhorred the principle. It is now become our delightful theme and commands our purest affections. We revere the author and highly prize and admire his works."
The New-London [Connecticut] Gazette, 22 March 1776
2. Message.
What fabricated Common Sense so esteemed and "enlightening"? Some argue that Mutual Sense said zip new, that it just put the call-to-war in fiery street language that rallied the common people. But this trivializes Paine's accomplishment. He did take a new message in Common Sense — an ultimatum. Give up reconciliation at present, or forever lose the hazard for independence. If we fail to human action, we're self-deceiving cowards condemning our children to tyranny and cheating the world of a beacon of liberty. It is our calling to model cocky-actualized nationhood for the world. "The cause of America is in a slap-up measure the crusade of all mankind."
Paine divided Common Sense into iv sections with deceptively mundane titles, mimicking the erudite political pamphlets of the day. Merely his essay did not offer the same-old-same-old treatise on British heritage and American rights. Hither's what he says in Common Sense:
Introduction: The ideas I present hither are so new that many people volition reject them. Readers must articulate their minds of long-held notions, utilize mutual sense, and adopt the cause of America as the "cause of all mankind." How we respond to tyranny today volition affair for all time.
Section One: The English government you worship? It's a sham. Man may need authorities to protect him from his flawed nature, but that doesn't mean he must suffocate under brute tyranny. Just as you would cut ties with abusive parents, yous must suspension from U.k..
Section Two: The monarchy you lot revere? It's not our protector; it'south our enemy. It doesn't care about united states; it cares about Uk'due south wealth. Information technology has brought misery to people all over the world. And the very idea of monarchy is absurd. Why should someone rule over the states merely considering he (or she) is someone'southward child? So evil is monarchy by its very nature that God condemns it in the Bible.
Section Three: Our crisis today? Information technology's folly to recollect we should maintain loyalty to a distant tyrant. It's cocky-demolition to pursue reconciliation. For united states of america, right here, right now, reconciliation means ruin. America must separate from Great britain. We tin can't become back to the cozy days before the Stamp Act. You know that'southward true; it's time to acknowledge it. For heaven'south sake, we're already at war!
Section Four: Can we win this war? Absolutely! Ignore the naysayers who tremble at the idea of British might. Let's build a Continental Navy as nosotros have built our Continental Army. Let united states of america declare independence. If we delay, it will be that much harder to win. I know the prospect is daunting, only the prospect of inaction is terrifying.
A month afterward, in his appendix to the third edition, Paine escalated his appeal to a utopian fervor. "We have information technology in our power to brainstorm the world over again," he insisted. "The birthday of a new world is at mitt."
3. Rhetoric.
"It is necessary to be assuming," wrote Paine years afterward on his rhetorical ability. "Some people tin be reasoned into sense, and others must exist shocked into it. Say a bold affair that volition stagger them, and they will begin to think."iv Keep this thought front end and center equally you study Common Sense.
As an experienced essayist and a contempo English immigrant with his own deep resentments against Britain, Paine was the right man at the correct time to galvanize public stance. He "understood better than anyone else in America," explains literary scholar Robert Ferguson, "that 'way and manner of thinking' might dictate the difficult shift from loyalty to rebellion."5 Before Paine, the language of political essays had been moderate. Educated men wrote civilly for publication and kept their fury for private messages and diaries. Then came Paine, cursing Britain every bit an "open up enemy," denouncing George III as the "Royal Animate being of England," and damning reconciliation equally "truly farcical" and "a fallacious dream." To think otherwise, he charged, was "absurd," "unmanly," and "repugnant to reason." As Virginian Landon Carter wrote in dismay, Paine implied that anyone who disagreed with him "is nix brusk of a coward and a sycophant [stooge/lackey], which in apparently significant must exist a damned rascal."vi Paine knew what he was doing: the pen was his weapon, and words his ammunition. He argued with ideas while convincing with raw emotion. "The signal to retrieve," writes Ferguson, "is that Paine'due south natural and intended audience is the American mob…. He uses anger, the natural emotion of the mob, to allow the most active groups observe themselves in the full general will of a republican citizenry."7 What if Paine had written the Declaration of Independence with the same hard-driving rhetoric?
Every bit JEFFERSON WROTE It: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Freedom and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted amidst Men, deriving their simply powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to change or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such class, every bit to them shall seem most likely to effect their Prophylactic and Happiness.
IF PAINE HAD WRITTEN It: NO man can deny, without abandoning his God-given ability to reason, that all men enter into existence every bit equals. No thing how lowly or majestic their origins, they enter life with three God-given RIGHTS — the right to live, to right to live free, and the right to live happily (or, at the to the lowest degree, to pursue Happiness on globe). Who would choose being on whatever other terms? So treasured are these rights that homo created authorities to protect them. And then treasured are they that human is duty-spring to destroy whatsoever government that crushes them — and start anew as men worthy of the title of Free MEN. This is the plain truth, incommunicable to abnegate.
Text Assay
Excerpt #1
Close Reading Questions
Imagine yourself sitting downwardly to read Common Sense in January 1776. How does Paine introduce his reasoning to yous?
He announces that his logic will be direct and downwardly to earth, using only "simple facts" and "obviously arguments" to explicate his position, unlike (he implies) the complex political pamphlets addressed to the educated aristocracy. His audition would understand "mutual sense" to suggest the moral sense of the yeoman farmer, whose independence and clear-headedness made him a more reliable guardian of national virtue (similar to Jefferson'south agrarian ideal).
Why does he write "I offer nothing more" instead of "I offer you many reasons" or "I offer a detailed argument"?
"Nothing more than" implies that Common Sense volition be easy to follow, presenting only what is necessary to make his argument. (Paine considered titling his essay Evidently Truth.)
How does Paine inquire you to prepare yourself for his "mutual sense" arguments?
Be willing to put aside pre-conceived notions, he says, and judge his arguments on their own merits.
What does he imply by saying a off-white reader "will put on, or rather than he volition not put off, the true character of a homo"?
He implies that any reader who would refuse to consider his arguments is narrow-minded. With the "on"–"off" contrast, he suggests that yous, the individual reader, are open-minded and thus a beau man of honor willing to consider a new indicate of view.
In the following pages I offer nothing more than than elementary facts, evidently arguments, and common sense: and accept no other preliminaries to settle with the reader than that he volition divest [rid] himself of prejudice and prepossession, and suffer [permit] his reason and his feelings to determine for themselves: that he volition put on, or rather that he will not put off, the true graphic symbol of a human, and generously enlarge his views beyond the present solar day.
PARAGRAPH 55
This paragraph begins with one of the most famous hyperboles in American writing. A hyperbole is an overstatement or exaggeration to emphasize a bespeak. What are the ii examples of hyperbole in this paragraph?
1. "the sun never shined on a cause of greater worth"
ii. "posterity… will exist more or less affected, even to the end of time"
With the hyperboles, how does Paine lead you to view the "cause" of American independence?
View information technology, he says, from an overarching global perspective, non the narrow perspective of American colonists in the belatedly 1700s. The hyperboles are ultimates — the most worthy of worthy causes, affecting the future now and forever. The American cause tin lead mankind toward enlightened cocky-determination, driving forward the progress of civilization. Paine says this direct in his introduction: "The cause of America is in a great measure the crusade of all mankind." We're not merely talking taxes and representation, people.
What tone does Paine add together with the phrases "The sun never shined" and "fifty-fifty to the end of time"?
A biblical and prophetic tone. The lord's day shining down on man endeavors suggests divine endorsement of the American cause — a crusade that volition bring light and freedom ("salvation") to the globe. Resisting the cause, Paine implies, would be resisting divine volition.
Let's consider Paine as a wordsmith. How does he use repetition to add together impact to the commencement part of the paragraph?
He includes two repetitive sets:
one. "'Tis not" to begin sentences 2 and 3 [anaphora]
2. the phrases "of a city, a country, a province, or a kingdom" and "of a 24-hour interval, a year, or an historic period" [prepositions with multiple objects].
Read the department aloud to hear the insistent rhythm that elevates Paine's prose to a rousing phone call to activeness (his goal in writing Common Sense).
Paine ends this paragraph with an illustration: What we do at present is like carving initials into the bark of a young oak tree. What does he mean with the analogy?
A. This is the time to create a new nation. Our smallest efforts at present will lead to enormous benefits in the futurity.
B. This is the time to unite for independence. Discord among us now will escalate into future crises that could ruin the young nation.
Answer: B.
The sun never shined on a crusade of greater worth. 'Tis non the affair of a city, a country, a province, or a kingdom, but of a continent – of at least i eighth part of the habitable earth. 'Tis non the business organisation of a mean solar day, a year, or an age; posterity are virtually involved in the contest and will be more than or less affected, even to the end of fourth dimension, past the proceedings at present. Now is the seed time of continental [colonies'] matrimony, organized religion and honor. The to the lowest degree fracture now will exist like a name engraved with the betoken of a pin on the tender rind of a young oak; the wound will enlarge with the tree, and posterity read it in total grown characters.
PARAGRAPH 58
Paine includes multiple repetitions in this paragraph. What word repetition exercise yous detect?
The describing word "new" in a "new area" and a "new method." [anaphora]
What sound repetitions do y'all find?
Ingemination: argument/arms/area/arisen
plans/proposals/prior/April
Consonance: politics/struck
method/thinking/hath
matter/arguchiliadent/arthousands
Read the sentences aloud. What impact does the repetition add together to Paine's delivery?
A stirring oratorical rhythm is achieved, like that of a solemn speech or sermon meant to convey the truth and gravity of an argument.
Paine compares the attempts to reconcile with Britain after the Battle of Lexington and Concur to an one-time almanac. What does he mean?
He means the idea of reconciliation is now preposterous and that no rational person could support information technology. No 1 would use last year's almanac to make plans for the electric current year! Also, every bit an almanac ceases to be useful at a specific moment (midnight of December 31), Paine implies that reconciliation ceased to be a valid goal at the moment of the first shot on April 19, 1775. (Paine often alludes to aspects of colonial life, like almanacs, that would resonate with all readers. They include references to farming, tree cutting, hunting, land buying, slavery, biblical scripture, family and neighbour bonds, maturation, and the parent-child relationship; see "The Metaphor of Youth" beneath.)
By referring the matter from argument to arms, a new area for politics is struck; a new method of thinking hath arisen. All plans, proposals, etc., prior to the nineteenth of April, i.e., to the commencement of hostilities [Lexington and Concord], are like the almanacs of the last year which, though proper [accurate] then, are superseded and useless now. Whatever was advanced by the advocates on either side of the question so, terminated in one and the same point, viz. [that is], a union with Great U.k.. The only difference between the parties was the method of effecting it — the one proposing strength, the other friendship; but it hath so far happened that the first hath failed and the second hath withdrawn her influence.
PARAGRAPH 59
Paine compares the goal of reconciliation to an "agreeable dream [that has] passed away and left united states every bit nosotros were." Why doesn't he aim harsher criticism hither at the goal of reconciling with Britain?
With this paragraph, Paine begins his argument against reconciliation and does not want to insult or alienate his readers at the outset. Everyone tin hope, he implies: there's nothing wrong with that, but we have to move on if a hope proves fruitless.
With this in mind, what tone does he pb the reader to expect: contemptuous, impatient, hopeful, reasonable, impassioned, angry?
Reasonable. The 2 sentences resemble the opening of a legal statement that promises a balanced appraisement of ii options on the ground of known evidence ("principles of nature") and honest ordinary reasoning ("common sense").
How does his tone prepare the resistant reader?
Paine means to deflect challenges of bias or extremism by inviting readers to give him a hearing. "If I'g being fair in my writing, you tin can effort to be fair in your listening."
While Paine promises a fair appraisal, look how he describes the 2 options in the final judgement.
Option i: "if separated" from Britain
Option 2: "if dependent on Britain"
Why didn't he utilize the usual terms for the two options — "independence" and "reconciliation"?
First, INDEPENDENCE and RECONCILIATION sound similar equally plausible options, just Paine wants to convince you that independence is the merely adequate option. If so, then why did he choose SEPARATION instead of INDEPENDENCE? By January 1776, INDEPENDENCE carried the desperate connotations of state of war and treason. It was an irrevocable determination with unknown consequences. In contrast, SEPARATION seems less drastic, and fifty-fifty positive. In human development, separation from 1's parents is the natural and long-sought step to full adulthood. That's the cocky-prototype Paine wants to foster in his readers. Are we adults or children? [See the activity below, "The Metaphor of Youth".]
In this vein, Paine chose DEPENDENCE instead of RECONCILIATION for Pick two (staying with U.k.). RECONCILIATION suggests the at-home and rational agreement of two grownups, but Paine wants you to view reconciliation as the defeatist choice of spineless subjects who could never take care of themselves. In other words, DEPENDENCE.
[Note: Paine does call the two options "independence" and "reconciliation" elsewhere in Common Sense, simply he meant to avoid them hither.]
As much hath been said of the advantages of reconciliation, which, like an amusing dream, hath passed away and left us equally nosotros were, it is but right that we should examine the contrary [opposing] side of the argument and inquire into some of the many material injuries which these colonies sustain, and always volition sustain, by being connected with and dependent on Bully Britain. To examine that connection and dependence, on the principles of nature and common sense, to run into what we have to trust to [expect] if separated, and what we are to expect if dependent.
PARAGRAPH threescore
Activity: The Metaphor of Youth
Study Paine's metaphors that compare the colonies' readiness for independence to a child's maturation into adulthood.
Hither Paine rebuts the starting time argument for reconciliation—that America has thrived as a British colony and would fail on her own. How does he dismiss this argument?
He slams it down hard. "NOTHING can be more FALLACIOUS," he yells. The argument is beyond misdirected or brusk-sighted, he insists; information technology's a fatal fault in reasoning. Then much for calm and reasoned argue. Only Paine is not having a temper tantrum in print. His technique was to argue with ideas while convincing with emotion.
Paine follows his utter rejection of the argument with an illustration. Complete the analogy: America staying with Britain would be like a child _______.
"America staying with Uk would be similar a child remaining dependent on its parents forever and never growing up." And who would desire that, Paine implies? By writing "showtime twenty years of our lives" instead of, say, "first v years," Paine alludes to the general consensus that a xx-year-quondam is an adult.
Paine goes i pace further in the terminal sentence. What does he say about America's "childhood" equally a British colony?
He "answers roundly" (with conviction) that the colonies' growth was actually hampered by being office of a European empire. They would have been more than healthy and successful "adults," he insists, if they had not been the "children" of the British empire. This was a radical premise in 1776, but one that buttressed Paine's statement for independence
I have heard it asserted past some that as America hath flourished under her former connection with Great Great britain, that the same connectedness is necessary towards her future happiness, and will always have the aforementioned effect. Nothing can be more fallacious than this kind of argument. Nosotros may too assert that because a kid has thrived upon milk, that it is never to accept meat, or that the showtime twenty years of our lives is to get a precedent for the next twenty. But even this is admitting more is true; for I answer roundly that America would have flourished every bit much, and probably much more, had no European power had anything to do with her.
PARAGRAPH 61
Excerpt #two
Close Reading Questions
Hither Paine challenges his opponents to bring "reconciliation to the touchstone of nature." What does he mean? (A "touchstone" is a test of the quality or genuineness of something. From ancient times the purity of golden or silverish was tested with a "touchstone" of basalt rock.)
Examination the chances of reconciliation against what you know about people'due south reactions in like crises throughout history, not against your own hopes and fears during this particular crisis. In other words, utilise common sense.
At the beginning of this paragraph Paine mildly faults the supporters of reconciliation equally unrealistic optimists "still hoping for the all-time." By the end of the paragraph, however, they are cowards willing to "milk shake hands with the murderers." How did he construct the paragraph to accomplish this transition?
He poses two challenges to the supporters of reconciliation. If they can honestly respond each challenge, he asserts, and however support reconciliation, so they are selfish cowards bringing ruin to America.
Paraphrase the first challenge (sentences 2–5).
"Ask yourself if yous can remain loyal to a nation that has brought war and suffering to you. If you say you lot can, you're fooling yourself and condemning united states to a worse life nether Britain than we suffer at present."
Paraphrase the second claiming (sentences 6–xi).
"Have you been the victim of British violence? If you haven't, then you yet owe compassion to those who have. And if yous have, all the same still support reconciliation, then you have abandoned your conscience."
With what phrase does Paine condemn those who would withal hope for reconciliation even if they were victims of British violence?
They are men who "can still shake hands with the murderers," i.east., men who take betrayed their fellow Americans and thus get as evil as the British invaders. There is no nuance in this condemnation, and thus no manner for the reader to avoid its implications.
Note how Paine weaves impassioned questions through the paragraph: "Are you just deceiving yourselves?" "Have you lot lost a parent or a kid by their hands?" How practise these questions intensify his challenges?
Addressed to "you lot" directly and not a faceless "he or they," the questions deliver an in-your-confront claiming that allows no escape. Here's my question to you lot: Answer it! or your silence will reveal your cowardice.
Rewrite sentences #iv and #11 to change the second-person "y'all" to the tertiary-person "he/she/they." How does the change weaken Paine'south challenges?
The reader is off the hook. Since the challenges are deflected from "you," the reader, to the third-person "other," no immediate personal reply is demanded. The reader tin can blithely read on and avoid the aim of Paine's questions.
Worksheet: The Question as a Rhetorical Device
Utilize this worksheet to examine Paine's use of questions as persuasive devices throughout Common Sense, specifically the rhetorical question and the hypophora (questions with unsaid or stated answers, used for rhetorical impact).
Men of passive tempers [temperaments] look somewhat lightly over the offenses of Britain and, still hoping for the all-time, are apt to call out, "Come up, 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 so tell me whether you can hereafter love, award, and faithfully serve the power that hath carried fire and sword into your country? If you cannot exercise all these, then are y'all simply deceiving yourselves and by your delay bringing ruin upon posterity? Your futurity connexion with Uk, whom y'all can neither honey nor accolade, will be forced and unnatural, and being formed only on the plan of present convenience, volition in a little fourth dimension autumn into a relapse more wretched than the first. But if you say you tin can still pass the violations over [ignore or underrate them], then I enquire, Hath your house been burnt? Hath your property been destroyed before your face? Are your married woman and children destitute of [without] a bed to lie on or bread to alive on? Accept you lost a parent or a kid by their easily and yourself the ruined and wretched survivor? If you accept not, so are y'all non a judge of those who accept. But if you lot take, and tin still milk shake hands with the murderers, then are you unworthy the proper noun of hubby, father, friend, or lover, and, whatsoever may be your rank or title in life, you lot have the heart of a coward and the spirit of a sycophant.
PARAGRAPH 77
Extract #3
Close Reading Questions
At this point, Paine pleads with his readers to write the constitution for their contained nation without delay. What danger do they risk, he warns, if they exit this crucial chore to a later twenty-four hour period?
A colonial leader could grasp dictatorial power by taking advantage of the postwar disorder likely to result if the colonies have no constitution ready to implement. Fifty-fifty if Britain tried to regain control of the colonies, information technology could be too late to wrest command back from a powerful dictator. "Ye are opening a door to eternal tyranny," Paine warns, "by keeping vacant the seat of government."
What historical evidence does Paine offer to illustrate the danger?
He states that "some Massanello may hereafter arise" and grasp ability, alluding to the short-lived people's revolt led by the commoner Thomas Aniello (Masaniello) in 1647 confronting Castilian control of Naples (Italy). The Spanish ruler granted a few rights, but Masaniello was soon murdered, ending the uprising and its short-lived gains for the people.
As his plea escalates in intensity, Paine exclaims "Ye that oppose independence now, ye know not what ye exercise." To what climactic moment in the New Testament does he allude?
While suffering on the cantankerous before his death, Jesus calls out, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they practise" (Luke 23: 34); that is, his crucifiers practise not know they are killing the Son of God. With this compelling innuendo (which most readers would instantly recognize), Paine warns that opposing independence is as baleful a conclusion for Americans as killing Jesus was for his executioners and for flesh.
Paine heightens his apocalyptic tone as he appeals to "ye that honey mankind" to accept a mission of salvation (alluding to Christ's mission of conservancy). What must the lovers of flesh achieve in order to save flesh?
They must found the "gratis and independent States of America" as the sole preserve of human freedom in the world. A desperate fugitive, "liberty" has been "hunted" and "expelled" throughout the globe, and it is America'due south mission to protect and nurture her. America'south victory will be flesh's victory, not just the feat of thirteen small colonies in a distant corner of the world.
NOTE: "A government of our own is our natural right" asserts Paine at the beginning of this excerpt. Six months later Thomas Jefferson asserted the same correct in the opening of the Declaration of Independence. This Enlightenment ideal anchored revolutionary initiatives in America and Europe for decades.
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 nosotros accept it in our power, than to trust such an interesting issue to fourth dimension and gamble. If we omit it now, some Massanello* may hereafter ascend who, laying concord of popular disquietudes [grievances], may collect together the desperate and the discontented, and by assuming to themselves the powers of government, finally sweep away the liberties of the continent similar a deluge. Should the government of America return over again into the hands of Britain, the tottering state of affairs of things will be a temptation for some desperate adventurer to try his fortune; and in such a case, what relief can Britain give? Ere [before] she could hear the news, the fatal business might be washed, and ourselves suffering like the wretched Britons under the oppression of the Conquistador [William the Conqueror in 1066]. Ye that oppose independence at present, ye know not what ye exercise. Ye are opening a door to eternal tyranny by keeping vacant the seat of government….
O ye that love mankind! Ye that dare oppose non only the tyranny but the tyrant, stand forth! Every spot of the old world is overrun with oppression. Freedom hath been hunted circular the globe. Asia and Africa have long expelled her.—Europe regards her like a stranger, and England hath given her alarm to depart. O! receive the fugitive, and gear up in time an aviary for mankind.
* Thomas Anello, otherwise Massanello, a fisherman of Naples, who after spiriting upwardly his countrymen in the public market confronting the oppression of the Spaniards, to whom the place was then subject field, prompted them to revolt, and in the space of a mean solar day become King. [footnote in Paine]
PARAGRAPHS 104, 107
Follow-Upwardly Assignment
- Write a how-to essay on persuasive writing using Common Sense equally the focus text and this statement by Thomas Paine as the core idea: "Some people can be reasoned into sense, and others must exist shocked into it. Say a bold thing that will stagger them, and they will begin to call up." –Letter to Elihu Palmer, 21 February 1802.
- Write an essay to summarize and evaluate Mutual Sense using 1 of the quotations below as the organizing concept. Use the metaphor in the quotation as a rhetorical device throughout the essay. (Paragraph numbers refer to the total text of Common Sense with this lesson.)
Quotation Para. Metaphor "The lord's day never shined on a cause of greater worth." 58 light, newness, celebrity "The blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries
"'TIS TIME TO Part."73 massacre, suffering "Reconciliation is now a fallacious dream." 79 illusion, vain hope "It is now in the interest of America to provide for herself." 144 machismo, self-reliance "Independence is the only Bail that can necktie and keep us together." 163 tying cord, unity for survival - Come across colonists' and newspapers' responses to Common Sense in the primary source collection Making the Revolution (Section: Common Sense?) to examine how Paine turned public stance in 1776. Note the critical pieces by John Adams, Hannah Griffitts, and others. What can be learned about Paine'south effectiveness by studying his critics?
Vocabulary Pop-ups
[including 18th-c. connotations]
- posterity : all future generations of mankind
- superseded : replaced something sometime or no longer useful
- precedent : an action or policy that serves as an instance or rule for the future
- touchstone : every bit a metaphor, a test of the quality or genuineness of something. (in the past, the purity of gilded or argent was tested with a "toughstone" of basalt stone.)
- relapse : a render to a previous worse condition afterwards a menstruation of comeback
- sycophant : someone who acts submissively to some other in power in order to proceeds advantage; yes-human, flatterer, bootlicker
- precariousness : dubiousness, instability; dependence on chance circumstances or unknown conditions
- deluge : a cataclysmic flood
one. Benjamin Franklin, alphabetic character to Silas Deane, 27 August 1775. Full text in Founders Online (National Archives).↩
2. Elbridge Gerry, letter of the alphabet to James Warren, 26 March 1776.↩
three. John Adams, autobiography, part 1, "John Adams," through 1776, sheet 23 of 53 [electronic edition]. Adams Family Papers: An Electronic Annal. Massachusetts Historical Club. world wide web.masshist.org/digitaladams/.↩
4. Thomas Paine, letter of the alphabet to Elihu Palmer, 21 February 1802; cited in Henry Hayden Clark, "Thomas Paine's Theories of Rhetoric," Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters, 28 (1933), 317.↩
5. Robert A. Ferguson, "The Commonalities of Common Sense," William and Mary Quarterly, 3d. Series, 57:3 (July 2000), 483.↩
6. Landon Carter, diary entry, xx February 1776, recounting content of letter written that day to George Washington. Full entry in Founders Online (National Archives).↩
seven. Robert A. Ferguson, The American Enlightenment, 1750-1820 (Harvard University Press, 1994; paper ed., 1997), 113.↩
*For a helpful discussion of Paine's response to the "horrid cruelties" of the British in India, see J.K. Opal, "Mutual Sense and Royal Atrocity: How Thomas Paine Saw South asia in Northward America," Common-Place, July 2009.
Images courtesy of the New York Public Library Digital Library.
- Portrait of Thomas Paine by John Henry Bufford (1810-1870), engraving by Bufford's Lithography, ca. 1850. Record ID 268504.
- Title page (cover) of Common Sense, 1776. Tape ID 2052092.
Source: https://americainclass.org/thomas-paine-common-sense-1776/
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