Dear Sir: I thank you for your very friendly and affectionate letter of
the 18th September which I did not receive till this morning.(1) It has
relieved my mind from a load of disquietude. You will easily suppose
that if the information I received had been exact, my situation was
without hope. I had in that case neither section, department nor
Country, to reclaim me; but that is not all, I felt a poignancy of
grief, in having the least reason to suppose that America had so soon
forgotten me who had never forgotten her.
Mr. Labonadaire, in a note of yesterday, directed me to write to the
Convention. As I suppose this measure has been taken in concert with
you, I have requested him to shew you the letter, of which he will make
a translation to accompany the original.
(I cannot see what motive can induce them to keep me in prison. It
will gratify the English Government and afflict the friends I have in
America. The supporters of the system of Terror might apprehend that if
I was in liberty and in America I should publish the history of their
crimes, but the present persons who have overset that immoral System
ought to have no such apprehension. On the contrary, they ought to
consider me as one of themselves, at least as one of their friends. Had
I been an insignificant character I had not been in arrestation. It was
the literary and philosophical reputation I had gained, in the world,
that made them my Enemies; and I am the victim of the principles, and
if I may be permitted to say it, of the talents, that procured me the
esteem of America. My character is the _secret_ of my arrestation.)
1 Printed in the letter to Washington, chap. XXII. The delay
of sixteen days in Monroe's letter was probably due to the
manouvres of Paine's enemies on the Committee of Public
Safety. He was released only after their removal from the
Committee, and the departure of Gouverneur Morris.--
_Editor._,
If the letter I have written be not covered by other authority than my
own it will have no effect, for they already know all that I can say. On
what ground do they pretend to deprive America of the service of any
of her citizens without assigning a cause, or only the flimsy one of
my being born in England? Gates, were he here, might be arrested on the
same pretence, and he and Burgoyne be confounded together.
It is difficult for me to give an opinion, but among other things
that occur to me, I think that if you were to say that, as it will be
necessary to you to inform the Government of America of my situation,
you require an explanation with the Committee upon that subject; that
you are induced to make this proposal not only out of esteem for the
character of the person who is the personal object of it, but because
you know that his arrestation will distress the Americans, and the more
so as it will appear to them to be contrary to their ideas of civil and
national justice, it might perhaps have some effect. If the Committee
[of Public Safety] will do nothing, it will be necessary to bring this
matter openly before the Convention, for I do most sincerely assure you,
from the observations that I hear, and I suppose the same are made in
other places, that the character of America lies under some reproach.
All the world knows that I have served her, and they see that I am still
in prison; and you know that when people can form a conclusion upon a
simple fact, they trouble not themselves about reasons. I had rather
that America cleared herself of all suspicion of ingratitude, though I
were to be the victim.
You advise me to have patience, but I am fully persuaded that the longer
I continue in prison the more difficult will be my liberation. There
are two reasons for this: the one is that the present Committee, by
continuing so long my imprisonment, will naturally suppose that my mind
will be soured against them, as it was against those who put me in, and
they will continue my imprisonment from the same apprehensions as the
former Committee did; the other reason is, that it is now about two
months since your arrival, and I am still in prison. They will explain
this into an indifference upon my fate that will encourage them to
continue my imprisonment. When I hear some people say that it is the
Government of America that now keeps me in prison by not reclaiming me,
and then pour forth a volley of execrations against her, I know not
how to answer them otherwise than by a direct denial which they do not
appear to believe. You will easily conclude that whatever relates to
imprisonments and liberations makes a topic of prison conversation;
and as I am now the oldest inhabitant within these walls, except two
or three, I am often the subject of their remarks, because from the
continuance of my imprisonment they auger ill to themselves. You see I
write you every thing that occurs to me, and I conclude with thanking
you again for your very friendly and affectionate letter, and am with
great respect,
Your's affectionately,
Thomas Paine.
(To day is the anniversary of the action at German Town. [October 4,
1777.] Your letter has enabled me to contradict the observations before
mentioned.)
2. Oct 13, 1794 Dear Sir: On the 28th of this Month (October) I shall
have suffered ten months imprisonment, to the dishonour of America as
well as of myself, and I speak to you very honestly when I say that my
patience is exhausted. It is only my actual liberation that can make me
believe it. Had any person told me that I should remain in prison two
months after the arrival of a new Minister, I should have supposed that
he meant to affront me as an American. By the friendship and sympathy
you express in your letter you seem to consider my imprisonment as
having connection only with myself, but I am certain that the inferences
that follow from it have relation also to the National character of
America, I already feel this in myself, for I no longer speak with pride
of being a citizen of that country. Is it possible Sir that I should,
when I am suffering unjust imprisonment under the very eye of her new
Minister?
While there was no Minister here (for I consider Morris as none) nobody
wondered at my imprisonment, but now everybody wonders. The continuance
of it under a change of diplomatic circumstances, subjects me to the
suspicion of having merited it, and also to the suspicion of having
forfeited my reputation with America; and it subjects her at the same
time to the suspicion of ingratitude, or to the reproach of wanting
national or diplomatic importance. The language that some Americans
have held of my not being considered as an American citizen, tho'
contradicted by yourself, proceeds, I believe, from no other motive,
than the shame and dishonour they feel at the imprisonment of a
fellow-citizen, and they adopt this apology, at my expence, to get rid
of that disgrace. Is it not enough that I suffer imprisonment, but my
mind also must be wounded and tortured with subjects of this kind? Did I
reason from personal considerations only, independent of principles and
the pride of having practiced those principles honourably, I should be
tempted to curse the day I knew America. By contributing to her liberty
I have lost my own, and yet her Government beholds my situation in
silence. Wonder not, Sir, at the ideas I express or the language in
which I express them. If I have a heart to feel for others I can feel
also for myself, and if I have anxiety for my own honour, I have it also
for a country whose suffering infancy I endeavoured to nourish and
to which I have been enthusiastically attached. As to patience I have
practiced it long--as long as it was honorable to do so, and when it
goes beyond that point it becomes meanness.
I am inclined to believe that you have attended to my imprisonment
more as a friend than as a Minister. As a friend I thank you for your
affectionate attachment. As a Minister you have to look beyond me to the
honour and reputation of your Government; and your Countrymen, who have
accustomed themselves to consider any subject in one line of thinking
only, more especially if it makes a strong [impression] upon them, as
I believe my situation has made upon you, do not immediately see the
matters that have relation to it in another line; and it is to bring
these two into one point that I offer you these observations. A citizen
and his country, in a case like mine, are so closely connected that the
case of one is the case of both.
When you first arrived the path you had to pursue with respect to my
liberation was simple. I was imprisoned as a foreigner; you knew that
foreigner to be a citizen of America, and you knew also his character,
and as such you should immediately have reclaimed him. You could lose
nothing by taking strong ground, but you might lose much by taking an
inferior one; but instead of this, which I conceive would have been the
right line of acting, you left me in their hands on the loose intimation
that my liberation would take place without your direct interference,
and you strongly recommended it to me to wait the issue. This is more
than seven weeks ago and I am still in prison. I suspect these people
are trifling with you, and if they once believe they can do that, you
will not easily get any business done except what they wish to have
done.
When I take a review of my whole situation--my circumstances ruined,
my health half destroyed, my person imprisoned, and the prospect of
imprisonment still staring me in the face, can you wonder at the
agony of my feelings? You lie down in safety and rise to plenty; it
is otherwise with me; I am deprived of more than half the common
necessaries of life; I have not a candle to burn and cannot get one.
Fuel can be procured only in small quantities and that with great
difficulty and very dear, and to add to the rest, I am fallen into a
relapse and am again on the sick list. Did you feel the whole force of
what I suffer, and the disgrace put upon America by this injustice done
to one of her best and most affectionate citizens, you would not, either
as a friend or Minister, rest a day till you had procured my liberation.
It is the work of two or three hours when you set heartily about
it, that is, when you demand me as an American citizen, or propose a
conference with the Committee upon that subject; or you may make it the
work of a twelve-month and not succeed. I know these people better than
you do.
You desire me to believe that "you are placed here on a difficult
Theatre with many important objects to attend to, and with but few to
consult with, and that it becomes you in pursuit of these to regulate
your conduct with respect to each, as to manner and time, as will in
your judgment be best calculated to accomplish the whole." As I know
not what these objects are I can say nothing to that point. But I have
always been taught to believe that the liberty of a Citizen was the
first object of all free Governments, and that it ought not to give
preference to, or be blended with, any other. It is that public object
that all the world can see, and which obtains an influence upon public
opinion more than any other. This is not the case with the objects you
allude to. But be those objects what they may, can you suppose you will
accomplish them the easier by holding me in the back-ground, or making
me only an accident in the negotiation? Those with whom you confer will
conclude from thence that you do not feel yourself very strong upon
those points, and that you politically keep me out of sight in the
meantime to make your approach the easier.
There is one part in your letter that is equally as proper should be
communicated to the Committee as to me, and which I conceive you are
under some diplomatic obligation to do. It is that part which you
conclude by saying that "_to the welfare of Thomas Paine the Americans
are not and cannot be indifferent_." As it is impossible the Americans
can preserve their esteem for me and for my oppressors at the same
time, the injustice to me strikes at the popular part of the Treaty of
Alliance. If it be the wish of the Committee to reduce the treaty to a
mere skeleton of Government forms, they are taking the right method to
do it, and it is not improbable they will blame you afterwards for not
in-forming them upon the subject. The disposition to retort has been so
notorious here, that you ought to be guarded against it at all points.
You say in your letter that you doubt whether the gentleman who informed
me of the language held by some Americans respecting my citizenship of
America conveyed even his own ideas clearly upon the subject.(1) I know
not how this may be, but I believe he told me the truth. I received a
letter a few days ago from a friend and former comrade of mine in which
he tells me, that all the Americans he converses with, say, that
I should have been in liberty long ago if the Minister could have
reclaimed me as an American citizen. When I compare this with the
counter-declarations in your letter I can explain the case no otherwise
than I have already done, that it is an apology to get rid of the shame
and dishonour they feel at the imprisonment of an American citizen,
and because they are not willing it should be supposed there is want
of influence in the American Embassy. But they ought to see that this
language is injurious to me.
On the 2d of this month Vendemaire I received a line from Mr. Beresford
in which he tells me I shall be in liberty in two or three days, and
that he has this from good authority. On the 12th I received a note from
Mr. Labonadaire, written at the Bureau of the Concierge, in which he
tells me of the interest you take in procuring my liberation, and that
after the steps that had been already taken that I ought to write to the
Convention to demand my liberty _purely and simply_ as a citizen of the
United States of America. He advised me to send the letter to him, and
he would translate it. I sent the letter inclosing at the same time
a letter to you. I have heard nothing since of the letter to the
Convention. On the 17th I received a letter from my former comrade
Vanhuele, in which he says "I am just come from Mr. Russell who had
yesterday a conversation with your Minister and your liberation is
certain--you will be in liberty to-morrow." Vanhuele also adds, "I find
the advice of Mr. Labonadaire good, for tho' you have some enemies in
the Convention, the strongest and best part are in your favour." But
the case is, and I felt it whilst I was writing the letter to the
Convention, that there is an awkwardness in my appearing, you being
present; for every foreigner should apply thro' his Minister, or rather
his Minister for him.
1 The letter of Peter Whiteside, quoted at the beginning of
the Memorial. See introduction to the Memorial. It would
seem from this whole letter that it was not known by
Americans in Paris that Monroe had been kept ont of his
office by Morris for nearly a month after his arrival in
Paris.--_Editor._
When I thus see day after day and month after month, and promise after
promise, pass away without effect, what can I conclude but that either
the Committees are secretly determined not to let me go, or that the
measures you take are not pursued with the vigor necessary to give them
effect; or that the American National character is without sufficient
importance in the French Republic? The latter will be gratifying to
the English Government. In short, Sir, the case is now arrived to that
crisis, that for the sake of your own reputation as a Minister you ought
to require a positive answer from the Committee. As to myself, it is
more agreeable to me now to contemplate an honourable destruction, and
to perish in the act of protesting against the injustice I suffer,
and to caution the people of America against confiding too much in the
Treaty of Alliance, violated as it has been in every principle, and in
my imprisonment though an American Citizen, than remain in the wretched
condition I am. I am no longer of any use to the world or to myself.
There was a time when I beheld the Revolution of the 10th. Thermidor
[the fall of Robespierre] with enthusiasm. It was the first news
my comrade Vanhuele communicated to me during my illness, and it
contributed to my recovery. But there is still something rotten at the
Center, and the Enemies that I have, though perhaps not numerous, are
more active than my friends. If I form a wrong opinion of men or things
it is to you I must look to set me right. You are in possession of the
secret. I know nothing of it. But that I may be guarded against as many
wants as possible I shall set about writing a memorial to Congress,
another to the State of Pennsylvania, and an address to the people of
America; but it will be difficult for me to finish these until I know
from yourself what applications you have made for my liberation, and
what answers you have received.
Ah, Sir, you would have gotten a load of trouble and difficulties off
your hands that I fear will multiply every day, had you made it a point
to procure my liberty when you first arrived, and not left me floating
on the promises of men whom you did not know. You were then a new
character. You had come in consequence of their own request that Morris
should be recalled; and had you then, before you opened any subject
of negociation that might arise into controversy, demanded my liberty
either as a Civility or as a Right I see not how they could have refused
it.
I have already said that after all the promises that have been made I
am still in prison. I am in the dark upon all the matters that relate
to myself. I know not if it be to the Convention, to the Committee of
Public Safety, of General Surety, or to the deputies who come
sometimes to the Luxembourg to examine and put persons in liberty, that
applications have been made for my liberation. But be it to whom it
may, my earnest and pressing request to you as Minister is that you
will bring this matter to a conclusion by reclaiming me as an American
citizen imprisoned in France under the plea of being a foreigner born in
England; that I may know the result, and how to prepare the Memorials
I have mentioned, should there be occasion for them. The right of
determining who are American citizens can belong only to America. The
Convention have declared I am not a French Citizen because she has
declared me to be a foreigner, and have by that declaration cancelled
and annulled the vote of the former assembly that conferred the Title
of Citizen upon Citizens or subjects of other Countries. I should not be
honest to you nor to myself were I not to express myself as I have done
in this letter, and I confide and request you will accept it in that
sense and in no other.