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
VOLUME I. (of II)
1893
PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION.
In the Preface to the first edition of this work, it was my painful duty
to remark with severity on the dissemination of libels on Paine in a
work of such importance as Mr. Leslie Stephen's "History of English
Thought in the Eighteenth Century." The necessity of doing so was
impressed on me by the repetition of some of Mr. Stephen's unfounded
disparagements in Mr. O. B. Frothingham's "Recollections and
Impressions." I have now the satisfaction of introducing this edition
with retractations by both of those authors. Mr. Frothingham, in a
letter which he authorizes me to use, says: "Your charge is true, and I
hasten to say _peccavi_ The truth is that I never made a study of Paine,
but took Stephen's estimates. Now my mistake is clear, and I am willing
to stand in the cold with nothing on but a hair shirt Your vindication
of Paine is complete." Mr. Frothingham adds that in any future edition
of his work the statements shall be altered. The note of Mr. Leslie
Stephen appeared in The National Reformer, September 11, 1892, to which
it was sent by a correspondent, at his desire; for it equally relates
to strictures in a pamphlet by the editor of that journal, Mr. John M.
Robertson.
"The account which I gave of Paine in the book upon the Eighteenth
Century was, I have no doubt, erroneous. My only excuse, if it be an
excuse, was the old one, 'pure ignorance.' I will not ask whether or how
far the ignorance was excusable.
"Mr. Conway pointed out the error in an article contributed, I think, to
the Fortnightly Review at the time. He has, no doubt, added, since then,
to his exposure of my (and other people's) blunders, and I hope to
read his book soon. Meanwhile, I must state that in consequence of the
_Fortnightly_ article, I altered the statements in the second edition
of my book. I have no copy at hand [Mr. S. writes from the country] and
cannot say what alterations precisely I made, though it is very possible
that they were inadequate, as for certain reasons I was unable to attend
properly to the revision. If a third edition should ever be required, I
would go into the question more thoroughly. I have since that time
read some letters upon Paine contributed by Mr. Conway to the _New York
Nation_. I had seen the announcement of his new publication, and had
made up my mind to take the first opportunity of going into the question
again with Mr. Conway's additional information. I hope that I may be
able to write Paine's life for the Dictionary of National Biography, and
if so, shall have the best opportunity for putting on record my final
judgment It will be a great pleasure to me if I find, as I expect to
find, that he was greatly maligned, and to make some redress for my
previous misguided remarks."
It is indeed to be hoped that Mr. Stephen will write the Life in the
Dictionary, whose list of subjects for the coming volume, inserted in
the _Athenaeum_ since his above retraction, designates Thomas Paine as
an "infidel" writer. Mr. Stephen can do much to terminate the carefully
fostered ignorance of which he has found himself a victim. In advance of
his further treatment of the subject, and with perfect confidence in his
justice, I here place by the side of my original criticism a retraction
of anything that may seem to include him among authors who have shown a
lack of magnanimity towards Paine.
The general statement (First Preface, p. xvi) must, however, remain; for
recent discussions reveal a few unorthodox writers willing to throw, or
to leave, "a traditionally hated head to the orthodox mob." On the other
hand, some apology is due for this phrase. No orthodox mob is found.
Here and there some halloo of the old Paine hunt is heard dying away
in the distance, but the conservative religious and political press,
American and English, has generally revised the traditional notions, and
estimated the evidence with substantial justice. Nearly all of the
most influential journals have dealt with the evidence submitted; their
articles have been carefully read by me, and in very few are the old
prejudices against Paine discoverable. Were these estimates of Paine
collected with those of former times the volume would measure this
century's advance in political liberty, and religious civilization.
My occasionally polemical treatment of the subject has been regretted
by several reviewers, but its necessity, I submit, is the thing to be
regretted. Being satisfied that Paine was not merely an interesting
figure, but that a faithful investigation of his life would bring to
light important facts of history, I found it impossible to deal with
him as an ordinary subject of inquiry. It were vain to try and persuade
people to take seriously a man tarred, feathered, pilloried, pelted. It
was not whitewashing Paine needed, but removal of the pitch, and release
from the pillory. There must first of all be an appeal against such
sentence. And because the wrongs represented a league of prejudices, the
pleadings had to be in several tribunals--moral, religious, political,
social,--before the man could be seen at all, much less accorded the
attention necessary for disclosure of the history suppressed through his
degradation. Paine's personal vindication would still have required only
a pamphlet, but that it was ancillary to the historic revelations which
constitute the larger part of this work. A wiser writer--unless too wise
to touch Paine at all--might have concealed such sympathies as those
pervading this biography; but where sympathies exist the reader is
entitled to know them, and the author subjects himself to a severer
self-criticism if only in view of the vigilance he must excite. I have
no feeling towards Paine inconsistent with recognition of his faults and
errors. My vindication of him has been the production of evidence that
removed my own early and baseless prejudices, and rendered it possible
for me to study his career genuinely, so that others might do the same.
The phantasmal Paine cleared away, my polemic ends. I have endeavored
to portray the real Paine, and have brought to light some things
unfavorable to him which his enemies had not discovered, and, I believe,
could never have discovered.
The _errata_ in the first edition are few and of slight importance. I
wish to retract a suggestion made in my apology for Washington which I
have discovered to be erroneous. It was suggested (vol. ii., pp. 173
and 382) that Washington's failure to answer Paine's private letter of
September 20,1795, asking an explanation of his neglect while he
(Paine) was in prison and his life in peril, may have been due to its
interception by Pickering (who had by a suppression of documents sealed
the sad fate of his predecessor in office, Edmund Randolph). I have,
however, discovered that Paine's letter did reach Washington.
I would be glad if my own investigations, continued while preparing
an edition of Paine's works, or any of my reviewers, had enabled me
to relieve the shades with which certain famous names are touched by
documentary facts in this history. The publication of those relating to
Gouverneur Morris, while American Minister in France, was for personal
reasons especially painful to myself. Though such publication was not
of any importance to Paine's reputation, it was essential to a fair
judgment of others--especially of Washington,--and to any clear
comprehension of the relations between France and the United States at
that period. As the correspondence between Gouverneur Morris and the
French Minister concerning Paine, after his imprisonment, is in French,
and the originals (in Paris) are not easily accessible to American and
English readers, I have concluded to copy them here.
A Paris le 14 fevrier 1794 26 pluviose.
Le Ministre plenipotentiaire des Etats Unis de l'Amerique pres la
Republique francaise au Ministre des Affaires Etrangeres.
Monsieur:
Thomas Paine vient de s'addresser a moi pour que je le reclame comme
Citoyen des Etats Unis. Voici (je crois) les Faits que le regardent. Il
est ne en Angleterre. Devenu ensuite Citoyen des Etats Unis il s'y
est acquise une grande celebrite par des Ecrits revolutionnaires. En
consequence il fut adopte Citoyen francais et ensuite elu membre de la
Convention. Sa conduite depuis cette Epoque n'est pas de mon ressort
J'ignore la cause de sa Detention actuelle dans la prison du Luxembourg,
mais je vous prie Monsieur (si des raisons qui ne me sont pas connues
s'opposent a sa liberation) de vouloir bien m'en instruire pour que je
puisse les communiquer au Gouvernement des Etats Unis.
J'ai l'honneur d'etre, Monsieur,
Votre tres humble Serviteur,
Gouv. Morris.
Paris, 1 Ventose l'An 2d. de la Republic une et indivisible.
Le ministre des Affaires Etrangeres au Ministre Plenipotentiaire
des-Etats Unis de l'Amerique pres la Republique Francaise.
Par votre lettre du 26 du mois dernier, vous reclames la liberte de
Thomas Paine, comme Citoyen americain. Ne en Angleterre, cet ex-depute
est devenu successivement Citoyen Americain et Citoyen francais. En
acceptant ce dernier titre et en remplissant une place dans le corps
legislatif, il s'est soumis aux lois de la Republique et il a renonce de
fait a la protection que le droit des gens et les traites conclus avec
les Etats Unis auraient pu lui assurer.
J'ignore les motifs de sa detention mais je dois presumer qu'ils sont
bien fondes. Je vais neanmoins soumettre au Comite de Salut public
la demande que vous m'avez adressee et je m'empresserai de vous faire
connaitre sa decision.
DEFORGES.
The translations of these letters are on page 120, vol ii., of this
work. No other letters on the subject between these Ministers are
known. The reader may judge whether there is anything in the American
Minister's application to warrant the opening assertion in that of
Deforgues. Morris forwarded the latter to his government, but withheld
his application, of which no copy exists in the State Archives at
Washington.
PREFACE.
At Hornsey, England, I saw a small square mahogany table, bearing at
its centre the following words: "This Plate is inscribed by Thos. Clio
Rickman in Remembrance of his dear friend Thomas Paine, who on this
table in the year 1792 wrote several of his invaluable Works."
The works written by Paine in Rickman's house were the second part of
"The Rights of Man," and "A Letter to the Addressers." Of these two
books vast numbers were circulated, and though the government prosecuted
them, they probably contributed largely to make political progress in
England evolutionary instead of revolutionary. On this table he set
forth constitutional reforms that might be peacefully obtained,
and which have been substantially obtained And here he warned the
"Addressers," petitioning the throne for suppression of his works:
"It is dangerous in any government to say to a nation, _Thou shalt not
read_. This is now done in Spain, and was formerly done under the old
government of France; but it served to procure the downfall of the
latter, and is subverting that of the former; and it will have the same
tendency in all countries; because Thought, by some means or other, is
got abroad in the world, and cannot be restrained, though reading may."
At this table the Quaker chieftain, whom Danton rallied for hoping to
make revolutions with rose-water, unsheathed his pen and animated his
Round Table of Reformers for a conflict free from the bloodshed he had
witnessed in America, and saw threatening France. This little table was
the field chosen for the battle of free speech; its abundant ink-spots
were the shed blood of hearts transfused with humanity. I do not wonder
that Rickman was wont to show the table to his visitors, or that
its present owner, Edward Truelove--a bookseller who has suffered
imprisonment for selling proscribed books,--should regard it with
reverence.
The table is what was once called a candle-stand, and there stood on it,
in my vision, Paine's clear, honest candle, lit from his "inner light,"
now covered by a bushel of prejudice. I myself had once supposed his
light an infernal torch; now I sat at the ink-spotted candle-stand to
write the first page of this history, for which I can invoke nothing
higher than the justice that inspired what Thomas Paine here wrote.
The educated ignorance concerning Paine is astounding. I once heard an
English prelate speak of "the vulgar atheism of Paine." Paine founded
the first theistic society in Christendom; his will closes with the
words, "I die in perfect composure, and resignation to the will of my
Creator, God." But what can be expected of an English prelate when an
historian like Jared Sparks, an old Unitarian minister, could suggest
that a letter written by Franklin, to persuade some one not to publish
a certain attack on religion, was "probably" addressed to Paine.
(Franklin's "Writings," vol. x., p. 281.) Paine never wrote a page that
Franklin could have so regarded, nor anything in the way of religious
controversy until three years after Franklin's death. "The remarks
in the above letter," says Sparks, "are strictly applicable to the
deistical writings which Paine afterwards published." On the contrary,
they are strictly inapplicable. They imply that the writer had denied a
"particular providence," which Paine never denied, and it is asked, "If
men are so wicked with religion, what would they be without it?" Paine's
"deism" differed from Franklin's only in being more fervently religious.
No one who had really read Paine could imagine the above question
addressed to the author to whom the Bishop of Llandaff wrote: "There
is a philosophical sublimity in some of your ideas when speaking of
the Creator of the Universe." The reader may observe at work, in this
example, the tiny builder, prejudice, which has produced the large
formation of Paine mythology. Sparks, having got his notion of Paine's
religion at secondhand, becomes unwittingly a weighty authority for
those who have a case to make out. The American Tract Society published
a tract entitled "Don't Unchain the Tiger," in which it is said: "When
an infidel production was submitted--probably by Paine--to Benjamin
Franklin, in manuscript, he returned it to the author, with a letter
from which the following is extracted: 'I would advise you not to
attempt unchaining the Tiger, but to burn this piece before it is seen
by any other person.'" Thus our Homer of American history nods, and a
tract floats through the world misrepresenting both Paine and Franklin,
whose rebuke is turned from some anti-religious essay against his own
convictions. Having enjoyed the personal friendship of Mr. Sparks, while
at college, and known his charity to all opinions, I feel certain that
he was an unconscious victim of the Paine mythology to which he added.
His own creed was, in essence, little different from Paine's. But how
many good, and even liberal, people will find by the facts disclosed
in this volume that they have been accepting the Paine mythology
and contributing to it? It is a notable fact that the most effective
distortions of Paine's character and work have proceeded from unorthodox
writers--some of whom seem not above throwing a traditionally hated head
to the orthodox mob. A recent instance is the account given of Paine in
Leslie Stephen's "History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century."
On its appearance I recognized the old effigy of Paine elaborately
constructed by Oldys and Cheetham, and while writing a paper on the
subject (Fortnightly Review, March, 1879) discovered that those libels
were the only "biographies" of Paine in the London Library, which (as I
knew) was used by Mr. Stephen. The result was a serious miscarriage of
historical and literary justice. In his second edition Mr. Stephen adds
that the portrait presented "is drawn by an enemy," but on this Mr.
Robertson pertinently asks why it was allowed to stand? ("Thomas Paine:
an Investigation," by John M. Robertson, London, 1888). Mr. Stephen,
eminent as an agnostic and editor of a biographical dictionary, is
assumed to be competent, and his disparagements of a fellow heretic
necessitated by verified facts. His scholarly style has given new lease
to vulgar slanders. Some who had discovered their untruth, as uttered
by Paine's personal enemies, have taken them back on Mr. Stephen's
authority. Even brave O. B. Frothingham, in his high estimate of Paine,
introduces one or two of Mr. Stephen's depreciations (Frothingham's
"Recollection and Impressions," 1891).
There has been a sad absence of magnanimity among eminent historians and
scholars in dealing with Paine. The vignette in Oldys--Paine with his
"Rights of Man" preaching to apes;--the Tract Society's picture of
Paine's death-bed--hair on end, grasping a bottle,--might have excited
their inquiry. Goethe, seeing Spinoza's face de-monized on a tract, was
moved to studies of that philosopher which ended in recognition of
his greatness. The chivalry of Goethe is indeed almost as rare as his
genius, but one might have expected in students of history an historic
instinct keen enough to suspect in the real Paine some proportion to
his monumental mythology, and the pyramidal cairn of curses covering his
grave. What other last-century writer on political and religious issues
survives in the hatred and devotion of a time engaged with new problems?
What power is confessed in that writer who was set in the place of
a decadent Satan, hostility to him being a sort of sixth point of
Calvinism, and fortieth article of the Church? Large indeed must have
been the influence of a man still perennially denounced by sectarians
after heretical progress has left him comparatively orthodox, and
retained as the figure-head of "Freethought" after his theism has been
abandoned by its leaders. "Religion," said Paine, "has two principal
enemies, Fanaticism and Infidelity." It was his strange destiny to be
made a battle-field between these enemies. In the smoke of the conflict
the man has been hidden. In the catalogue of the British Museum Library
I counted 327 entries of books by or concerning Thomas Paine, who in
most of them is a man-shaped or devil-shaped shuttlecock tossed between
fanatical and "infidel" rackets.
Here surely were phenomena enough to attract the historic sense of a
scientific age, yet they are counterpart of an historic suppression of
the most famous author of his time. The meagre references to Paine by
other than controversial writers are perfunctory; by most historians he
is either wronged or ignored. Before me are two histories of "American
Slavery" by eminent members of Congress; neither mentions that Paine
was the first political writer who advocated and devised a scheme of
emancipation. Here is the latest "Life of Washington" (1889), by another
member of Congress, who manages to exclude even the name of the man
who, as we shall see, chiefly converted Washington to the cause of
independence. And here is a history of the "American Revolution" (1891),
by John Fiske, who, while recognizing the effect of "Common Sense,"
reveals his ignorance of that pamphlet, and of all Paine's works, by
describing it as full of scurrilous abuse of the English people,--whom
Paine regarded as fellow-sufferers with the Americans under royal
despotism.
It may be said for these contemporaries that the task of sifting out the
facts about Paine was formidable. The intimidated historians of the
last generation, passing by this famous figure, left an historic vacuum,
which has been filled with mingled fact and fable to an extent hardly
manageable by any not prepared to give some years to the task. Our
historians, might, however, have read Paine's works, which are rather
historical documents than literary productions. None of them seem to
have done this, and the omission appears in many a flaw in their works.
The reader of some documents in this volume, left until now to slumber
in accessible archives, will get some idea of the cost to historic truth
of this long timidity and negligence. But some of the results are more
deplorable and irreparable, and one of these must here be disclosed.
In 1802 an English friend of Paine, Redman Yorke, visited him in Paris.
In a letter written at the time Yorke states that Paine had for some
time been preparing memoirs of his own life, and his correspondence,
and showed him two volumes of the same. In a letter of Jan. 25, 1805,
to Jefferson, Paine speaks of his wish to publish his works, which will
make, with his manuscripts, five octavo volumes of four hundred pages
each. Besides which he means to publish "a miscellaneous volume of
correspondence, essays, and some pieces of poetry." He had also, he
says, prepared historical prefaces, stating the circumstances under
which each work was written. All of which confirms Yorke's statement,
and shows that Paine had prepared at least two volumes of autobiographic
matter and correspondence. Paine never carried out the design
mentioned to Jefferson, and his manuscripts passed by bequest to Madame
Bonneville. This lady, after Paine's death, published a fragment of
Paine's third part of "The Age of Reason," but it was afterwards found
that she had erased passages that might offend the orthodox.
Madame Bonneville returned to her husband in Paris, and the French
"Biographical Dictionary" states that in 1829 she, as the depositary of
Paine's papers, began "editing" his life. This, which could only have
been the autobiography, was never published. She had become a Roman
Catholic. On returning (1833) to America, where her son, General
Bonneville, also a Catholic, was in military service, she had personal
as well as religious reasons for suppressing the memoirs. She might
naturally have feared the revival of an old scandal concerning her
relations with Paine. The same motives may have prevented her son from
publishing Paine's memoirs and manuscripts. Madame Bonneville died at
the house of the General, in St. Louis. I have a note from his widow,
Mrs. Sue Bonneville, in which she says: "The papers you speak of
regarding Thomas Paine are all destroyed--at least all which the General
had in his possession. On his leaving St. Louis for an indefinite time
all his effects--a handsome library and valuable papers included--were
stored away, and during his absence the store-house burned down, and all
that the General stored away were burned."
There can be little doubt that among these papers burned in St. Louis
were the two volumes of Paine's autobiography and correspondence seen
by Redman Yorke in 1802. Even a slight acquaintance with Paine's career
would enable one to recognize this as a catastrophe. No man was more
intimately acquainted with the inside history of the revolutionary
movement, or so competent to record it. Franklin had deposited with him
his notes and papers concerning the American Revolution. He was the only
Girondist who survived the French Revolution who was able to tell their
secret history. His personal acquaintance included nearly every great or
famous man of his time, in England, America, France. From this witness
must have come testimonies, facts, anecdotes, not to be derived from
other sources, concerning Franklin, Goldsmith, Ferguson, Rittenhouse,
Rush, Fulton, Washington, Jefferson, Monroe, the Adamses, Lees,
Morrises, Condorcet, Vergennes, Sieves, Lafayette, Danton, Genet,
Brissot, Robespierre, Marat, Burke, Erskine, and a hundred others. All
this, and probably invaluable letters from these men, have been lost
through the timidity of a woman before the theological "boycott" on the
memory of a theist, and the indifference of this country to its most
important materials of History.
When I undertook the biography of Edmund Randolph I found that the great
mass of his correspondence had been similarly destroyed by fire in New
Orleans, and probably a like fate will befall the Madison papers, Monroe
papers, and others, our national neglect of which will appear criminal
to posterity. After searching through six States to gather documents
concerning Randolph which should all have been in Washington City, the
writer petitioned the Library Committee of Congress to initiate some
action towards the preservation of our historical manuscripts. The
Committee promptly and unanimously approved the proposal, a definite
scheme was reported by the Librarian of Congress, and--there the matter
rests. As the plan does not include any device for advancing partisan
interests, it stands a fair chance of remaining in our national
_oubliette_ of intellectual _desiderata_.
In writing the "Life of Paine" I have not been saved much labor by
predecessors in the same field They have all been rather controversial
pamphleteers than biographers, and I have been unable to accept any of
their statements without verification. They have been useful, however,
in pointing out regions of inquiry, and several of them--Rickman,
Sherwin, Linton--contain valuable citations from contemporary papers.
The truest delineation of Paine is the biographical sketch by his friend
Rickman. The "Life" by Vale, and sketches by Richard Carlile, Blanchard,
and others, belong to the controversial _collectanea_ in which Paine's
posthumous career is traceable. The hostile accounts of Paine, chiefly
found in tracts and encyclopaedias, are mere repetitions of those
written by George Chalmers and James Cheetham.
The first of these was published in 1791 under the title: "The Life
of Thomas Pain, Author of 'The Rights of Men,' with a Defence of his
Writings. By Francis Oldys, A.M., of the University of Pennsylvania.
London. Printed for John Stock-dale, Pickadilly." This writer, who
begins his vivisection of Paine by accusing him of adding "e" to his
name, assumed in his own case an imposing pseudonym. George Chalmers
never had any connection with the University of Philadelphia, nor
any such degree. Sherwin (1819) states that Chalmers admitted having
received L500 from Lord Hawksbury, in whose bureau he was a clerk,
for writing the book; but though I can find no denial of this I cannot
verify it. In his later editions the author claims that his book had
checked the influence of Paine, then in England, and his "Rights of
Man," which gave the government such alarm that subsidies were paid
several journals to counteract their effect. (See the letter of
Freching, cited from the Vansitart Papers, British Museum, by W. H.
Smith, in the _Century_, August, 1891.) It is noticeable that Oldys, in
his first edition, entitles his work a "Defence" of Paine's writings--a
trick which no doubt carried this elaborate libel into the hands of many
"Paineites." The third edition has, "With a Review of his Writings."
In a later edition we find the vignette of Paine surrounded by apes.
Cobbett's biographer, Edward Smith, describes the book as "one of the
most horrible collections of abuse which even that venal day produced."
The work was indeed so overweighted with venom that it was sinking into
oblivion when Cobbett reproduced its libels in America, for which he
did penance through many years. My reader will perceive, in the earlier
chapters of this work, that Chalmers tracked Paine in England with
enterprise, but there were few facts that he did not manage to twist
into his strand of slander.
In 1809, not long after Paine's death, James Cheetham's "Life of Thomas
Paine" appeared in New York. Cheetham had been a hatter in Manchester,
England, and would probably have continued in that respectable
occupation had it not been for Paine. When Paine visited England
and there published "The Rights of Man" Cheetham became one of his
idolaters, took to political writing, and presently emigrated to
America. He became editor of _The American Citizen_, in New York. The
cause of Cheetham's enmity to Paine was the discovery by the latter that
he was betraying the Jeffersonian party while his paper was enjoying
its official patronage. His exposure of the editor was remorseless;
the editor replied with personal vituperation; and Paine was about
instituting a suit for libel when he died. Of Cheetham's ingenuity in
falsehood one or two specimens may be given. During Paine's trial
in London, for writing "The Rights of Man," a hostile witness gave
testimony which the judge pronounced "impertinent"; Cheetham prints it
"important" He says that Madame de Bonneville accompanied Paine on his
return from France in 1802; she did not arrive until a year later.
He says that when Paine was near his end Monroe wrote asking him to
acknowledge a debt for money loaned in Paris, and that Paine made no
reply. But before me is Monroe's statement, while President, that for
his advances to Paine "no claim was ever presented on my part, nor is
any indemnity now desired." Cheetham's book is one of the most malicious
ever written, and nothing in it can be trusted.
Having proposed to myself to write a critical and impartial history
of the man and his career, I found the vast Paine literature,
however interesting as a shadow measuring him who cast it, containing
conventionalized effigies of the man as evolved by friend and foe in
their long struggle. But that war has ended among educated people.
In the laborious work of searching out the real Paine I have found
a general appreciation of its importance, and it will be seen in the
following pages that generous assistance has been rendered by English
clergymen, by official persons in Europe and America, by persons of
all beliefs and no beliefs. In no instance have I been impeded by any
prejudice, religious or political. The curators of archives, private
collectors, owners of important documents bearing on the subject, have
welcomed my effort to bring the truth to light. The mass of material
thus accumulated is great, and its compression has been a difficult
task. But the interest that led me to the subject has increased at
every step; the story has abounded in thrilling episodes and dramatic
surprises; and I have proceeded with a growing conviction that the
simple facts, dispassionately told, would prove of importance far wider
than Paine's personality, and find welcome with all students of history.
I have brought to my task a love for it, the studies of some years,
and results of personal researches made in Europe and America:
qualifications which I countless than another which I venture to
claim--the sense of responsibility, acquired by a public teacher of long
service, for his words, which, be they truths or errors, take on life,
and work their good or evil to all generations.
THE LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE.
CHAPTER I. EARLY INFLUENCES
The history here undertaken is that of an English mechanic, of Quaker
training, caught in political cyclones of the last century, and set at
the centre of its revolutions, in the old world and the new.
In the church register of Euston Parish, near Thetford, England, occurs
this entry: "1734. Joseph Pain and Frances Cocke were married June
20th." These were the parents of Thomas Paine. The present rector of
Euston Church, Lord Charles Fitz Roy, tells me that the name is there
plainly "Pain," but in the Thetford town-records of that time it is
officially entered "Joseph Paine."
Paine and Cocke are distinguished names in the history of Norfolk
County. In the sixteenth century Newhall Manor, on the road between
Thetford and Norwich, belonged to a Paine family. In 1553 Thomas Paine,
Gent., was, by license from Queen Mary, trustee for the Lady Elizabeth,
daughter of Henry VIII., by Queen Anne Bullen. In St. Thomas Church,
Norwich, stands the monument of Sir Joseph Paine, Knt, the most famous
mayor and benefactor of that city in the seventeenth century. In St.
John the Baptist Church is the memorial of Justice Francis Cocke (d.
1628). Whether our later Joseph and Thomas were related to these earlier
Paines has not been ascertained, but Mr. E. Chester Waters, of London,
an antiquarian especially learned in family histories, expressed to me
his belief that the Norfolk County Paines are of one stock. There is
equal probability that John Cocke, Deputy Recorder of Thetford in 1629,
pretty certainly ancestor of Thomas Paine's mother, was related to
Richard Cock, of Norwich, author of "English Law, or a Summary Survey
of the Household of God upon Earth" (London, 1651). The author of "The
Rights of Man" may therefore be a confutation of his own dictum: "An
hereditary governor is as inconsistent as an hereditary author." One
Thomas Payne, of the Norfolk County family, was awarded L20 by the
Council of State (1650) "for his sufferings by printing a book for the
cause of Parliament." Among the sequestrators of royalist church livings
was Charles George Cock, "student of Christian Law, of the Society
of the Inner Temple, now (1651) resident of Norwich." In Blomefields
"History of Norfolk County" other notes may be found suggesting that
whatever may have been our author's genealogy he was spiritually
descended from these old radicals.
At Thetford I explored a manuscript--"Freeman's Register Book"
(1610-1756)--and found that Joseph Paine (our author's father) was made
a freeman of Thetford April 18, 1737, and Henry Cock May 16,1740. The
freemen of this borough were then usually respectable tradesmen. Their
privileges amounted to little more than the right of pasturage on the
commons. The appointment did not imply high position, but popularity and
influence. Frances Cocke had no doubt resided in Euston Parish, where
she was married. She was a member of the Church of England and daughter
of an attorney of Thetford. Her husband was a Quaker and is said to have
been disowned by the Society of Friends for being married by a priest. A
search made for me by official members of that Society in Norfolk County
failed to discover either the membership or disownment of any one of the
name. Joseph's father, a farmer, was probably a Quaker. Had the son (b.
1708) been a Quaker by conversion he would hardly have defied the rules
of the Society at twenty-six.
Joseph was eleven years younger than his wife. According to Oldys he was
"a reputable citizen and though poor an honest man," but his wife was
"a woman of sour temper and an eccentric character." Thomas Paine's
writings contain several affectionate allusions to his father, but none
to his mother. "They say best men are moulded out of faults," and the
moulding begins before birth.
Thomas Paine was born January 29, 1736-7, at Thetford. The plain brick
house was in Bridge Street (now White Hart) and has recently made
way for a pretty garden. I was inclined to adopt a more picturesque
tradition that the birthplace was in old Heathen man Street, as more
appropriate for a _paien_ (no doubt the origin of Paine's name), who
also bore the name of the doubting disciple. An appeal for allowances
might be based on such a conjunction of auspices, but a manuscript of
Paine's friend Rickman, just found by Dr. Clair J. Grece, identifies
the house beyond question.
Thomas Paine is said by most of his biographers to have never been
baptized. This rests solely on a statement by Oldys:
"It arose probably from the tenets of the father, and from the
eccentricity of the mother, that our author was never baptized, though
he was privately named; and never received, like true Christians, into
the bosom of any church, though he was indeed confirmed by the bishop
of Norwich: This last circumstance was owing to the orthodox zeal of
Mistress Cocke, his aunt, a woman of such goodness, that though she
lived on a small annuity, she imparted much of this little to his
mother.
"As he was not baptized, the baptism of Thomas Pain is not entered on
the parish books of Thetford. It is a remarkable fact, that the leaves
of the two registers of the parishes of St. Cuthbert's and St. Peter's,
in Thetford, containing the marriages, births, and burials, from the end
of 1733, to the beginning of 1737, have been completely cut out. Thus,
a felony has been committed against the public, and an injury done to
individuals, by a hand very malicious and wholly unknown. Whether our
author, when he resided in Thetford in 1787, looked into these registers
for his own birth; what he saw, or what he did, we will not conjecture.
They contain the baptism of his sister Elizabeth, on the 28th of August,
1738."
This is Oldysian. Of course, if there was any mischief Paine did it,
albeit against his own interests. But a recent examination shows that
there has been no mutilation of the registers. St Peter's and St.
Cuthbert's had at the time one minister. In 1736, just before Paine's
birth, the minister (John Price) died, and his successor (Thomas
Vaughan) appears to have entered on his duties in March, 1737. A little
before and during this interregnum the registers were neglected. In St
Cuthbert's register is the entry: "Elizabeth, Daughter of Joseph Payne
and Frances his wife of this parish, was born Aug't the 29th, 1738,
baptized September ye 20, 1738." This (which Oldys has got inaccurately,
_suo more_) renders it probable that Thomas Paine was also baptized.
Indeed, he would hardly have been confirmed otherwise.
The old historian of Norfolk County, Francis Blomefield, introduces us
to Thetford (Sitomagus, Tedford, Theford, "People of the Ford") with a
strain of poetry:
"No situation but may envy thee,
Holding such intimacy with the sea,
Many do that, but my delighted muse
Says, Neptune's fairest daughter is the Little Ouse."
After reading Blomefield's history of the ancient town, and that of
Martin, and after strolling through the quaint streets, I thought some
poet should add to this praise for picturesqueness some tribute
on Thetford's historic vistas. There is indeed "a beauty buried
everywhere," as Browning says.
Evelyn, visiting his friend Lord Arlington at Euston in September, 1677,
writes:
"I went to Thetford, the Burrough Towne, where stand the ruines of a
religious house; there is a round mountaine artificially raised, either
for some castle or monument, which makes a pretty landscape. As we went
and returned, a tumbler shew'd his extraordinary addresse in the Warren.
I also saw the Decoy, much pleas'd with the stratagem."
Evelyn leaves his own figure, his princely friends, and the tumbler in
the foreground of "a pretty landscape" visible to the antiquarian all
around Thetford, whose roads, fully followed, would lead past the great
scenes of English history. In general appearance the town (population
under five thousand) conveys the pleasant impression of a fairly
composite picture of its eras and generations. There is a continuity
between the old Grammar School, occupying the site of the ancient
cathedral, and a new Mechanics' Institute in the old Guildhall. The
old churches summon their flocks from eccentric streets suggestive of
literal sheep-paths. Of the ignorance with which our democratic age
sweeps away as cobwebs fine threads woven by the past around the
present, Thetford showed few signs, but it is sad to find "Guildhall"
effacing "Heathenman" Street, which pointed across a thousand years to
the march of the "heathen men" (Danes) of Anglo-Saxon chronicles.
"A. 870. This year the [heathen] army rode across Mer-cia into East
Anglia, and took up their winter quarters in Thetford; and the same
winter King Edmund fought against them, and the Danes got the victory,
and slew the king, and subdued all the land, and destroyed all the
ministers which they came to. The names of their chiefs who slew the
king were Hingwar and Habba."
If old Heathenman Street be followed historically, it would lead to Bury
St. Edmunds, where, on the spot of his coronation, the young king "was
placed in a goodly shrine, richly adorned with jewels and precious
stones," and a royal saint added to the calendar. The blood of St.
Edmund reconsecrated Thetford.
"A. 1094. Then at Candlemas the king [William Rufus] went to Hastings,
and whilst he waited there for a fair wind he caused the monastery
on the field of battle to be consecrated; and he took the staff from
Herbert Losange, bishop of Thetford."
The letters of this Bishop Herbert, discovered at Brussels, give him an
honorable place in the list of Thetford authors; wherein also occur the
names of Richard of Thetford, author of a treatise on preaching, Jeffrey
de Rocherio, who began a history of the monarchy, and John Brame, writer
and translator of various treatises. The works of these Thetford authors
are preserved at Cambridge, England.
Thetford was, in a way, connected with the first newspaper enterprise.
Its member of Parliament, Sir Joseph Williamson, edited the _London
Gazette_, established by the Crown to support its own policy. The
Crown claimed the sole right to issue any journal, and its license was
necessary for every book. In 1674 Sir Joseph, being Secretary of State
(he bought the office for L5,000), had control of the _Gazette_ and of
literature. In that year, when Milton died, his treatise on "Christian
Doctrine" was brought to Williamson for license. He said he could
"countenance nothing of Milton's writings," and the treatise was
locked up by this first English editor, to be discovered a hundred and
forty-nine years later.
On his way to the Grammar School (founded by bequest of Sir Richard
Fulmerston, 1566) Paine might daily read an inscription set in the
Fulmerston almshouse wall: "Follow peace and holines with all men
without the which no man shall see the Lord." But many memorials would
remind him of how Williamson, a poor rector's son, had sold his talent
to a political lord and reached power to buy and sell Cabinet offices,
while suppressing Milton. Thomas Paine, with more talent than Williamson
to dispose of, was born in a time semi-barbaric at its best, and savage
at its worst. Having got in the Quaker meeting an old head on his young
shoulders, he must bear about a burden against most things around him.
The old churches were satanic steeple-houses, and if he strolled over
to that in which his parents were married, at Euston, its new splendors
were accused by surrounding squalor.
Mr. F. H. Millington of Thetford, who has told Williamson's story,* has
made for me a search into Paine's time there.
"In Paine's boyhood [says Mr. Millington in a letter I have from him]
the town (about 2,000 inhabitants) possessed a corporation with mayor,
aldermen, sword-bearers, macemen, recorder. The corporation was a
corrupt body, under the dominance of the Duke of Grafton, a prominent
member of the Whig government. Both members of Parliament (Hon. C.
Fitzroy, and Lord Augustus Fitzroy) were nominees of Grafton. The people
had no interest and no power, and I do not think politics were of any
account in Paine's childhood. From Paine's 'Rights of Man' (Part ii., p.
108) it is clear that his native town was the model in his mind when
he wrote on charters and corporations. The Lent Assizes for the Eastern
Circuit were held here, and Paine would be familiar with the procedure
and pomp of a court of justice. He would also be familiar with the sight
of men and women hung for trivial offences. Thetford was on the main
road to London, and was a posting centre.
* "Sir Joseph Williamson, Knt., A.D. 1630-1701. A Page in
the History of Thetford." A very valuable contribution to
local history.
Paine would be familiar with the faces and equipages of some of the
great Whig nobles in Norfolk. Walpole might pass through on his way to
Houghton. The river Ouse was navigable to Lynn, and Paine would probably
go on a barge to that flourishing seaport. Bury St. Edmunds was a
provincial capital for the nobility and gentry of the district. It
was twelve miles from Thetford, and in closest connection with it The
religious life of Thetford would be quiet. The churches were poor,
having been robbed at the reformation. The Quakers were the only
non-conformists in the town. There is a tradition that Wesley visited
the town; if he did Paine would no doubt be among his hearers. On the
whole, I think it easy to trace in Paine's works the influence of his
boyhood here. He would see the corrupting influence of the aristocracy,
the pomp of law, the evils of the unreformed corporations; the ruins of
great ecclesiastical establishments, much more perfect than now,
would bring to his mind what a power the church had been. Being of
a mechanical turn of mind no doubt he had often played about the
paper-mill which was, and is, worked by water-power."
When Paine was a lad the grand gentlemen who purloined parks and
mansions from the Treasury were sending children to the gallows for
small thefts instigated by hunger. In his thirteenth year he might have
seen under the shadow of Ely Minster, in that region, the execution of
Amy Hutchinson, aged seventeen, for poisoning her husband. "Her face
and hands were smeared with tar, and having a garment daubed with pitch,
after a short prayer the executioner strangled her, and twenty minutes
after the fire was kindled and burnt half an hour." (Notes and Queries,
27 September, 1873.) Against the prevailing savagery a human protest
was rarely heard outside the Quaker meeting. Whether disowned or not,
Paine's father remained a Quaker, and is so registered at burial;
and his eminent son has repeatedly mentioned his own training in the
principles of that Society. Remembering the extent to which Paine's
Quakerism had influenced his political theories, and instances of their
bearing on great events, I found something impressive in the little
meeting-house in Cage Lane, Thetford. This was his more important
birthplace. Its small windows and one door open on the tombless
graveyard at the back,--perhaps that they might not be smashed by the
mob, or admit the ribaldry of the street. The interior is hardly large
enough to seat fifty people. Plymouth Brethren have for some years
occupied the place, but I was told that the congregation, reduced
to four or five, would soon cease to gather there. Adjoining the
meeting-house, and in contact with it, stands the ancient Cage, which
still remains to explain the name "Cage Lane." In its front are two
arches, once iron-grated; at one stood the pillory, at the other the
stocks,--the latter remembered by some now living.
On "first day," when his schoolmates went in fine clothes to grand
churches, to see gay people, and hear fine music, little Thomas, dressed
in drab, crept affrighted past the stocks to his childhood's pillory in
the dismal meeting-house. For him no beauty or mirth, no music but the
oaths of the pilloried, or shrieks of those awaiting the gallows, There
could be no silent meeting in Cage Lane. Testimonies of the "Spirit"
against inhumanity, delivered beside instruments of legal torture, bred
pity in the child, who had a poetic temperament. The earliest glimpses
we have of his childhood are in lines written on a fly caught in a
spider's web, and an epitaph for a crow which he buried in the garden:
"Here lies the body of John Crow,
Who once was high, but now is low;
Ye brother Crows take warning all,
For as you rise, so must you fall."
This was when he was eight years of age. It seems doubtful whether the
child was weeping or smiling, but the humor, if it be such, is grim, and
did not last long. He had even then already, as we shall see, gained in
the Quaker meeting a feeling that "God was too good" to redeem man
by his son's death, as his Aunt Cocke instructed him, and a heart so
precocious was a sad birthright in the Thetford of that day. We look in
vain for anything that can be described as true boyhood in Paine. Oldys
was informed, no doubt rightly, that "he was deemed a sharp boy, of
unsettled application; but he left no performances which denote juvenile
vigour or uncommon attainments." There are, indeed, various indications
that, in one way and another, Thetford and Quakerism together managed
to make the early years of their famous son miserable. Had there been
no Quakerism there had been no Thomas Paine; his consciousness of this
finds full recognition in his works; yet he says:
"Though I reverence their philanthropy, I cannot help smiling at
the conceit, that if the taste of a Quaker had been consulted at the
creation, what a silent and drab-coloured creation it would have
been! Not a flower would have blossomed its gaieties, nor a bird been
permitted to sing."
There is a pathos under his smile at this conceit. Paine wrote it in
later life, amid the flowers and birds of his garden, which he loved,
but whose gaieties he could never imitate. He with difficulty freed
himself from his early addiction to an unfashionable garb; he rarely
entered a theatre, and could never enjoy cards.
By the light of the foregoing facts we may appreciate the few casual
reminiscences of his school-days found in Paine's writings:
"My parents were not able to give me a shilling, beyond what they gave
me in education; and to do this they distressed themselves.
"My father being of the Quaker profession, it was my good fortune to
have an exceeding good moral education, and a tolerable stock of useful
learning. Though I went to the grammar school (the same school, Thetford
in Norfolk, that the present counsellor Mingay went to, and under
the same master), I did not learn Latin, not only because I had no
inclination to learn languages, but because of the objection the Quakers
have against the books in which the language is taught. But this did
not prevent me from being acquainted with the subjects of all the Latin
books used in the school The natural bent of my mind was to science. I
had some turn, and I believe some talent, for poetry; but this I
rather repressed than encouraged, as leading too much into the field of
imagination.
"I happened, when a schoolboy, to pick up a pleasing natural history of
Virginia, and my inclination from that day of seeing the western side of
the Atlantic never left me."
Paine does not mention his proficiency in mathematics, for which he was
always distinguished. To my own mind his "turn" for poetry possesses
much significance in the light of his career. In excluding poets from
his "Republic" Plato may have had more reasons than he has assigned.
The poetic temperament and power, repressed in the purely literary
direction, are apt to break out in glowing visions of ideal society and
fiery denunciations of the unlovely world.
Paine was not under the master of Thetford School (Colman), who taught
Latin, but under the usher, Mr. William Knowler, who admitted the Quaker
lad to some intimacy, and related to him his adventures while serving on
a man-of-war. Paine's father had a small farm, but he also carried on a
stay-making business in Thetford, and his son was removed from school,
at the age of thirteen, to be taught the art and mystery of making
stays. To that he stuck for nearly five years. But his father became
poorer, his mother probably more discontented, and the boy began to
dream over the adventures of Master Knowler on a man-of-war.