Produced by David Widger
THE LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE
WITH A HISTORY OF HIS LITERARY, POLITICAL AND RELIGIOUS CAREER IN
AMERICA FRANCE, AND ENGLAND
By Moncure Daniel Conway
To Which Is Added A Sketch Of Paine By William Cobbett
(Hitherto Unpublished)
Volume II.
1899
THE LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE.
{1793}
CHAPTER I. "KILL THE KING, BUT NOT THE MAN"
Dumas' hero, Dr. Gilbert (in "Ange Pitou "), an idealization of Paine,
interprets his hopes and horrors on the opening of the fateful year
1793. Dr. Gilbert's pamphlets had helped to found liberty in the New
World, but sees that it may prove the germ of total ruin to the Old
World.
"A new world," repeated Gilbert; "that is to say, a vast open space,
a clear table to work upon,--no laws, but no abuses; no ideas, but no
prejudices. In France, thirty thousand square leagues of territory for
thirty millions of people; that is to say, should the space be equally
divided, scarcely room for a cradle or a grave for each. Out yonder,
in America, two hundred thousand square leagues for three millions of
people; frontiers which are ideal, for they border on the desert, which
is to say, immensity. In those two hundred thousand leagues, navigable
rivers, having a course of a thousand leagues; virgin forests, of which
God alone knows the limits,--that is to say, all the elements of life,
of civilization, and of a brilliant future. Oh, how easy it is, Billot,
when a man is called Lafayette, and is accustomed to wield a sword; when
a man is called Washington, and is accustomed to reflect deeply,--how
easy is it to combat against walls of wood, of earth, of stone, of human
flesh! But when, instead of founding, it is necessary to destroy; when
we see in the old order things that we are obliged to attack,--walls of
bygone, crumbling ideas; and that behind the ruins even of these walls
crowds of people and of interests still take refuge; when, after having
found the idea, we find that in order to make the people adopt it, it
will be necessary perhaps to decimate that people, from the old who
remember to the child who has still to learn; from the recollection
which is the monument to the instinct that is its germ--then, oh then,
Billot, it is a task that will make all shudder who can see beneath the
horizon.... I shall, however, persevere, for although I see obstacles,
I can perceive the end; and that end is splendid, Billot. It is not the
liberty of France alone that I dream of; it is the liberty of the
whole world. It is not the physical equality; it is equality before
the law,--equality of rights. It is not only the fraternity of our own
citizens, but of all nations.... Forward, then, and over the heaps of
our dead bodies may one day march the generations of which this boy here
is in the advanced guard!"
Though Dr. Gilbert has been in the Bastille, though he barely escapes
the bullet of a revolutionist, he tries to unite the throne and the
people. So, as we have seen, did Paine struggle until the King took
flight, and, over his own signature, branded all his pledges as extorted
lies. Henceforth for the King personally he has no respect; yet the
whole purpose of his life is now to save that of the prisoner. Besides
his humane horror of capital punishment, especially in a case which
involves the heads of thousands, Paine foresees Nemesis fashioning her
wheels in every part of Europe, and her rudder across the ocean,--where
America beholds in Louis XVI. her deliverer.
Paine's outlawry, announced by Kersaint in Convention, January 1st,
was more eloquent for wrath than he for clemency. Under such menaces the
majority for sparing Louis shrank with the New Year; French pride arose,
and with Danton was eager to defy despots by tossing to them the head of
a king. Poor Paine found his comrades retreating. What would a knowledge
of the French tongue have been worth to this leading republican of the
world, just then the one man sleeplessly seeking to save a Kings
life! He could not plead with his enraged republicans, who at length
overpowered even Brissot, so far as to draw him into the fatal plan of
voting for the King's death, coupled with submission to the verdict of
the people. Paine saw that there was at the moment no people, but
only an infuriated clan. He was now defending a forlorn hope, but he
struggled with a heroism that would have commanded the homage of Europe
had not its courts been also clans. He hit on a scheme which he hoped
might, in that last extremity, save the real revolution from a suicidal
inhumanity. It was the one statesmanlike proposal of the time: that
the King should be held as a hostage for the peaceful behavior of other
kings, and, when their war on France had ceased, banished to the United
States.
On January 15th, before the vote on the King's punishment was put, Paine
gave his manuscript address to the president: debate closed before
it could be read, and it was printed, He argued that the Assembly, in
bringing back Louis when he had abdicated and fled, was the more guilty;
and against his transgressions it should be remembered that by his aid
the shackles of America were broken.
"Let then those United States be the guard and the asylum of Louis
Capet. There, in the future, remote from the miseries and crimes of
royalty, he may learn from, the constant presence of public prosperity,
that the true system of government consists not in monarchs, but
in fair, equal, and honorable representation. In recalling this
circumstance, and submitting this proposal, I consider myself a citizen
of both countries. I submit it as an American who feels the debt of
gratitude he owes to every Frenchman. I submit it as a man, who, albeit
an adversary of kings, forgets not that they are subject to human
frailties. I support my proposal as a citizen of the French Republic,
because it appears to me the best and most politic measure that can be
adopted. As far as my experience in public life extends, I have ever
observed that the great mass of people are always just, both in their
intentions and their object; but the true method of attaining such
purpose does not always appear at once. The English nation had groaned
under the Stuart despotism. Hence Charles I. was executed; but Charles
II. was restored to all the powers his father had lost. Forty years
later the same family tried to re-establish their oppression; the nation
banished the whole race from its territories. The remedy was effectual;
the Stuart family sank into obscurity, merged itself in the masses, and
is now extinct."
He reminds the Convention that the king had two brothers out of the
country who might naturally desire his death: the execution of the king
might make them presently plausible pretenders to the throne, around
whom their foreign enemies would rally: while the man recognized by
foreign powers as the rightful monarch of France was living there could
be no such pretender.
"It has already been proposed to abolish the penalty of death, and it
is with infinite satisfaction that I recollect the humane and excellent
oration pronounced by Robespierre on the subject, in the constituent
Assembly. Monarchical governments have trained the human race to
sanguinary punishments, but the people should not follow the examples
of their oppressors in such vengeance. As France has been the first
of European nations to abolish royalty, let her also be the first to
abolish the punishment of death, and to find out a milder and more
effectual substitute."
This was admirable art. Under shelter of Robespierre's appeal against
the death penalty, the "Mountain"* could not at the moment break
the force of Paine's plea by reminding the Convention of his Quaker
sentiments. It will be borne in mind that up to this time Robespierre
was not impressed, nor Marat possessed, by the homicidal demon.
Marat had felt for Paine a sort of contemptuous kindness, and one day
privately said to him: "It is you, then, who believe in a republic; you
have too much sense to believe in such a dream." Robespierre, according
to Lamartine, "affected for the cosmopolitan radicalism of Paine the
respect of a neophite for ideas not understood." Both leaders now
suspected that Paine had gone over to the "Brissotins," as the
Girondists were beginning to be called. However, the Brissotins, though
a majority, had quailed before the ferocity with which the Jacobins had
determined on the king's death. M. Taine declares that the victory of
the minority in this case was the familiar one of reckless violence over
the more civilized--the wild beast over the tame. Louis Blanc denies
that the Convention voted, as one of them said, under poignards; but the
signs of fear are unmistakeable.
* So called from the high benches on which these members
sat. The seats of the Girondists on the floor were called
the "Plain," and after their over-throw the "Marsh."
Vergniaud had declared it an insult for any one to suppose he would vote
for the king's death, but he voted for it. Villette was threatened with
death if he did not vote for that of the king. Sieves, who had attacked
Paine for republicanism, voted death. "What," he afterward said--"what
were the tribute of my glass of wine in that torrent of brandy?" But
Paine did not withhold his cup of cold water. When his name was called
he cried out: "I vote for the detention of Louis till the end of
the war, and after that his perpetual banishment." He spoke his well
prepared vote in French, and may have given courage to others. For even
under poignards--the most formidable being liability to a charge of
royalism--the vote had barely gone in favor of death.*
The fire-breathing Mountain felt now that its supremacy was settled.
It had learned its deadly art of conquering a thinking majority
by recklessness. But suddenly another question was sprung upon the
Convention: Shall the execution be immediate, or shall there be delay?
The Mountain groans and hisses as the question is raised, but the
dictation had not extended to this point, and the question must be
discussed. Here is one more small chance for Paine's poor royal client.
Can the execution only be postponed it will probably never be executed.
* Upwards of three hundred voted with Paine, who says that
the majority by which death was carried, unconditionally,
was twenty-five. As a witness who had watched the case, his
testimony may correct the estimate of Carlyle:
"Death by a small majority of Fifty-three. Nay, if we deduct
from the one side, and add to the other, a certain Twenty-
six who said Death but coupled some faintest ineffectual
surmise of mercy with it, the majority will be but One."
See also Paine's "Memoire, etc.. a Monroe."
Unfortunately Marat, whose thirst for the King's blood is almost
cannibalistic, can read on Paine's face his elation. He realizes
that this American, with Washington behind him, has laid before the
Convention a clear and consistent scheme for utilizing the royal
prisoner. The king's neck under a suspended knife, it will rest with
the foreign enemies of France whether it shall fall or not; while
the magnanimity of France and its respect for American gratitude will
prevail. Paine, then, must be dealt with somehow in this new debate
about delay.
He might, indeed, have been dealt with summarily had not the _Moniteur_
done him an opportune service; on January 17th and 18th it printed
Paine's unspoken argument for mercy, along with Erskine's speech at his
trial in London, and the verdict. So on the 19th, when Paine entered the
Convention, it was with the prestige not only of one outlawed by Great
Britain for advocating the Rights of Man, but of a representative of
the best Englishmen and their principles. It would be vain to assail
the author's loyalty to the republic, That he would speak that day was
certain, for on the morrow (20th) the final vote was to be taken. The
Mountain could not use on Paine their weapon against Girondins; they
could not accuse the author of the "Rights of Man" of being royalist
When he had mounted the tribune, and the clerk (Bancal, Franklin's
friend) was beginning to read his speech, Marat cried, "I submit that
Thomas Paine is incompetent to vote on this question; being a Quaker his
religious principles are opposed to the death-penalty." There was
great confusion for a time. The anger of the Jacobins was extreme,
says Guizot, and "they refused to listen to the speech of Paine, the
American, till respect for his courage gained him a hearing."* Demands
for freedom of speech gradually subdued the interruptions, and the
secretary proceeded:
"Very sincerely do I regret the Convention's vote of yesterday for
death. I have the advantage of some experience; it is near twenty years
that I have been engaged in the cause of liberty, having contributed
something to it in the revolution of the United States of America. My
language has always been that of liberty and humanity, and I know by
experience that nothing so exalts a nation as the union of these two
principles, under all circumstances. I know that the public mind of
France, and particularly that of Paris, has been heated and irritated
by the dangers to which they have been exposed; but could we carry
our thoughts into the future, when the dangers are ended, and the
irritations forgotten, what to-day seems an act of justice may then
appear an act of vengeance. [_Murmurs_.] My anxiety for the cause of
France has become for the moment concern for its honor. If, on my
return to America, I should employ myself on a history of the French
Revolution, I had rather record a thousand errors dictated by humanity,
than one inspired by a justice too severe. I voted against an appeal to
the people, because it appeared to me that the Convention was needlessly
wearied on that point; but I so voted in the hope that this Assembly
would pronounce against death, and for the same punishment that the
nation would have voted, at least in my opinion, that is, for reclusion
during the war and banishment thereafter. That is the punishment most
efficacious, because it includes the whole family at once, and none
other can so operate. I am still against the appeal to the primary
assemblies, because there is a better method. This Convention has been
elected to form a Constitution, which will be submitted to the primary
assemblies. After its acceptance a necessary consequence will be an
election, and another Assembly.
* "History of France," vi., p. 136.
We cannot suppose that the present Convention will last more than five
or six months. The choice of new deputies will express the national
opinion on the propriety or impropriety of your sentence, with as much
efficacy as if those primary assemblies had been consulted on it. ''As
the duration of our functions here cannot be long, it is a part of our
duty to consider the interests of those who shall replace us. If by
any act of ours the number of the nation's enemies shall be needlessly
increased, and that of its friends diminished,--at a time when the
finances may be more strained than to-day,--we should not be justifiable
for having thus unnecessarily heaped obstacles in the path of our
successors. Let us therefore not be precipitate in our decisions.
"France has but one ally--the United States of America. That is the only
nation that can furnish France with naval provisions, for the kingdoms
of northern Europe are, or soon will be, at war with her. It happens,
unfortunately, that the person now under discussion is regarded in
America as a deliverer of their country. I can assure you that his
execution will there spread universal sorrow, and it is in your power
not thus to wound the feelings of your ally. Could I speak the French
language I would descend to your bar, and in their name become your
petitioner to respite the execution of the sentence on Louis."
Here were loud murmurs from the "Mountain," answered with demands for
liberty of opinion. Thuriot sprang to his feet crying, "This is not the
language of Thomas Paine." Marat mounted the tribune and asked Paine
some questions, apparently in English, then descending he said to the
Assembly in French: "I denounce the interpreter, and I maintain that
such is not the opinion of Thomas Paine. It is a wicked and faithless
translation."*
* "Venant d'un democrate tel que Thomas Paine, d'un homme
qui avait vecu parmi les Americains, d'un penseur, cette
declaration parut si dangereuse a Marat que, pour en
detruire l'effet, il n'hesita pas a s'ecrier: 'Je denonce
le truchement. Je soutiens que ce n'est point la l'opinion
do Thomas Paine. C'est une traduction infidele.'"--Louis
Blanc. See also "Histoire Parliamentaire," xxiii., p. 250.
These words, audacious as mendacious, caused a tremendous uproar. Garran
came to the rescue of the frightened clerk, declaring that he had read
the original, and the translation was correct. Paine stood silent and
calm during the storm. The clerk proceeded:
"Your Executive Committee will nominate an ambassador to Philadelphia;
my sincere wish is that he may announce to America that the National
Convention of France, out of pure friendship to America, has consented
to respite Louis. That people, your only ally, have asked you by my vote
to delay the execution.
"Ah, citizens, give not the tyrant of England the triumph of seeing the
man perish on a scaffold who helped my dear brothers of America to break
his chains!"
At the conclusion of this speech Marat "launched himself into the middle
of the hall" and cried out that Paine had "voted against the punishment
of death because he was a Quaker." Paine replied, "I voted against it
both morally and politically."
Had the vote been taken that day perhaps Louis might have escaped.
Brissot, shielded from charges of royalism by Paine's republican fame,
now strongly supported his cause. "A cruel precipitation," he cried,
"may alienate our friends in England, Ireland, America. Take care! The
opinion of European peoples is worth to you armies!" But all this only
brought out the Mountain's particular kind of courage; they were ready
to defy the world--Washington included--in order to prove that a King's
neck was no more than any other man's. Marat's clan--the "Nihilists"
of the time, whose strength was that they stopped at nothing--had
twenty-four hours to work in; they surrounded the Convention next day
with a mob howling for "justice!" Fifty-five members were absent; of
the 690 present a majority of seventy decided that Louis XVI. should die
within twenty-four hours.
A hundred years have passed since that tragedy of poor Louis; graves
have given up their dead; secrets of the hearts that then played their
part are known. The world can now judge between England's Outlaw and
England's King of that day. For it is established, as we have seen,
both by English and French archives, that while Thomas Paine was toiling
night and day to save the life of Louis that life lay in the hand of the
British Ministry. Some writers question the historic truth of the offer
made by Danton, but none can question the refusal of intercession, urged
by Fox and others at a time when (as Count d'Estaing told Morris) the
Convention was ready to give Pitt the whole French West Indies to keep
him quiet. It was no doubt with this knowledge that Paine declared from
the tribune that George III. would triumph in the execution of the King
who helped America to break England's chains. Brissot also knew it when
with weighed words he reported for his Committee (January 12th): "The
grievance of the British Cabinet against France is not that Louis is in
judgment, but that Thomas Paine wrote 'The Rights of Man.'" "The militia
were armed," says Louis Blanc, "in the south-east of England troops
received order to march to London, the meeting of Parliament was
advanced forty days, the Tower was reinforced by a new garrison, in
fine there was unrolled a formidable preparation of war against--Thomas
Paine's book on the Rights of Man!"* Incredible as this may appear the
debates in the House of Commons, on which it is fairly founded, would
be more incredible were they not duly reported in the "Parliamentary
History."** In the debates on the Alien Bill, permitting the King
to order any foreigner out of the country at will, on making
representations to the French Convention in behalf of the life of Louis,
on augmenting the military forces with direct reference to France, the
recent trial of Paine was rehearsed, and it was plainly shown that the
object of the government was to suppress freedom of the press by Terror.
Erskine was denounced for defending Paine and for afterwards attending
a meeting of the "Society of Friends of the Liberty of the Press," to
whose resolutions on Paine's case his name was attached. Erskine found
gallant defenders in the House, among them Fox, who demanded of Pitt:
"Can you not prosecute Paine without an army?" Burke at this time
enacted a dramatic scene. Having stated that three thousand daggers had
been ordered at Birmingham by an Englishman, he drew from his pocket a
dagger, cast it on the floor of the House of Commons, and cried:
"That is what we are to get from an alliance with France!"
Paine--Paine--Paine--was the burden laid on Pitt, who had said to Lady
Hester Stanhope: "Tom Paine is quite right."
* "Histoire de la Revolution," vol. viii., p. 96.
** Vol. xxv.
That Thomas Paine and his "Rights of Man" were the actual cause of the
English insults to which their declaration of war replied was so well
understood in the French Convention that its first answer to the menaces
was to appoint Paine and Condorcet to write an address to the English
people.*
It is noticeable that on the question whether the judgment on the King's
fate should be submitted to the people, Paine voted "No." His belief
in the right of all to representation implied distrust of the immediate
voice of the masses. The King had said that if his case were referred to
the people "he should be massacred." Gouverneur Morris had heard this,
and no doubt communicated it to Paine, who was in consultation with him
on his plan of sending Louis to America.** Indeed, it is probable that
popular suffrage would have ratified the decree. Nevertheless, it was a
fair "appeal to the people" which Paine made, after the fatal verdict,
in expressing to the Convention his belief that the people would not
have done so. For after the decree the helplessness of the prisoner
appealed to popular compassion, and on the fatal day the tide had
turned. Four days after the execution the American Minister writes
to Jefferson: "The greatest care was taken to prevent a concourse of
people. This proves a conviction that the majority was not favorable to
that severe measure. In fact the great mass of the people mourned the
fate of their unhappy prince."
* "Le Departement des Affaires Etrangeres pendant la
Revolution, 1787-1804." Par Frederic Masson, Bibliothecaire
da Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres. Paris, 1877, p.
273.
** Morris' "Diary," ii., pp. 19, 27. 32.
To Paine the death of an "unhappy prince" was no more a subject
for mourning than that of the humblest criminal--for, with whatever
extenuating circumstances, a criminal he was to the republic he had
sworn to administer. But the impolicy of the execution, the resentment
uselessly incurred, the loss of prestige in America, were felt by Paine
as a heavy blow to his cause--always the international republic. He was,
however, behind the scenes enough to know that the blame rested
mainly on America's old enemy and his league of foreign courts against
liberated France. The man who, when Franklin said "Where liberty is,
there is my country," answered "Where liberty is not, there is mine,"
would not despair of the infant republic because of its blunders.
Attributing these outbursts to maddening conspiracies around and within
the new-born nation, he did not believe there could be peace in Europe
so long as it was ruled by George III. He therefore set himself to
the struggle, as he had done in 1776. Moreover, Paine has faith in
Providence.*
* "The same spirit of fortitude that insured success to
America will insure it to France, for it is impossible to
conquer a nation determined to be free.... Man is ever a
stranger to the ways by which Providence regulates the order
of things. The interference of foreign despots may serve to
introduce into their own enslaved countries the principles
they come to oppose. Liberty and equality are blessings too
great to be the inheritance of France alone. It is honour to
her to be their first champion; and she may now say to her
enemies, with a mighty voice, 'O, ye Austrians, ye Prussians!
ye who now turn your bayonets against us, it is for you,
it is for all Europe, it Is for all mankind, and not for
France alone, that she raises the standard of Liberty and
Equality!'"--Paine's address to the Convention (September
25, 1792) after taking his seat.
At this time, it should be remembered, opposition to capital punishment
was confined to very few outside of the despised sect of Quakers. In the
debate three, besides Paine, gave emphatic expression to that sentiment,
Manuel, Condorcet,--Robespierre! The former, in giving his vote against
death, said: "To Nature belongs the right of death. Despotism has taken
it from her; Liberty will return it" As for Robespierre, his argument
was a very powerful reply to Paine, who had reminded him of the bill
he had introduced into the old National Assembly for the abolition of
capital punishment. He did, indeed, abhor it, he said; it was not his
fault if his views had been disregarded. But why should men who then
opposed him suddenly revive the claims of humanity when the penalty
happened to fall upon a King? Was the penalty good enough for the
people, but not for a King? If there were any exception in favor of such
a punishment, it should be for a royal criminal.
This opinion of Robespierre is held by some humane men. The present
writer heard from Professor Francis W. Newman--second to none in
philanthropy and compassionateness--a suggestion that the death penalty
should be reserved for those placed at the head of affairs who betray
their trust, or set their own above the public interests to the injury
of a Commonwealth.
The real reasons for the execution of the King closely resemble those of
Washington for the execution of Major Andre, notwithstanding the
sorrow of the country, with which the Commander sympathized. The equal
nationality of the United States, repudiated by Great Britain, was in
question. To hang spies was, however illogically, a conventional usage
among nations. Major Andre must die, therefore, and must be refused the
soldier's death for which he petitioned. For a like reason Europe
must be shown that the French Convention is peer of their scornful
Parliaments; and its fundamental principle, the equality of men, could
not admit a King's escape from the penalty which would be unhesitatingly
inflicted on a "Citizen." The King had assumed the title of Citizen,
had worn the republican cockade; the apparent concession of royal
inviolability, in the moment of his betrayal of the compromise made with
him, could be justified only on the grounds stated by Paine,--impolicy
of slaying their hostage, creating pretenders, alienating America;
and the honor of exhibiting to the world, by a salient example, the
Republic's magnanimity in contrast with the cruelty of Kings.