Thomas Paine Biography Quotes 56 Report mistakes

Early Life
Thomas Paine was born on January 29, 1737 (New Style), in Thetford, Norfolk, England, the son of Joseph Pain, a Quaker stay-maker (corset maker), and Frances Cocke, an Anglican. He attended Thetford Grammar School and received a modest education before apprenticing with his father. He later adopted the spelling "Paine", which became standard in his American years.

Apprenticeships, Seafaring, and the Excise
As a young man Paine tried several occupations. He briefly went to sea as a sailor on a privateer during the Seven Years' War, then returned to England to work as a stay-maker and shopkeeper. In the 1760s he took a position as an excise officer, a poorly paid and often politically sensitive job, and became active in efforts to improve conditions for excisemen. His first substantial pamphlet, The Case of the Officers of Excise (1772), was a petition to Parliament for better pay and reform. Personal life brought both joy and sorrow: he married Mary Lambert in 1759, but she died within a year; in 1771 he married Elizabeth Ollive in Lewes, where he frequented debating societies and developed his political voice. The marriage did not last, and they separated before he left for America.

Emigration to America and Magazine Work
In 1774 Paine met Benjamin Franklin in London, who encouraged him to try his fortunes in the American colonies and gave him a letter of recommendation. Paine sailed that fall and arrived in Philadelphia in November 1774. He soon became editor of the Pennsylvania Magazine (1775), writing lively essays on politics, science, and society, often under pseudonyms such as "Atlanticus". Among the pieces widely attributed to him is "African Slavery in America" (March 1775), which condemned the slave trade and called for abolition.

Common Sense and the American Revolution
Paine's breakthrough came with Common Sense (January 1776), a plainspoken, incendiary pamphlet that argued for immediate American independence and attacked monarchy as an illegitimate form of government. Its brisk, uncompromising prose made complex political ideas accessible to ordinary readers. Common Sense sold extraordinarily well and reshaped colonial debate, helping propel the Continental Congress toward the Declaration of Independence that summer.

The American Crisis and Public Service
As the Revolutionary War faltered in late 1776, Paine published the first of his American Crisis papers, opening with the now-famous line, "These are the times that try men's souls". General George Washington had Crisis No. 1 read to troops to stiffen resolve as they prepared for the Trenton campaign. Paine accompanied the Continental Army during difficult campaigns and remained an indefatigable propagandist for the cause.

In 1777 Congress appointed him secretary to the Committee for Foreign Affairs. His forthrightness, especially public charges of corruption in what became the Silas Deane affair, led to controversy and his resignation in 1779. He nonetheless continued to serve the cause, including work as secretary to John Laurens's 1781 mission to France, which helped secure loans and supplies vital to the war effort. After independence, New York State granted Paine a farm at New Rochelle (1784) in recognition of his service.

Inventions and Bridge-Building
Paine's curiosity extended to science and engineering. He promoted a design for a single-arch iron bridge and collaborated with ironmasters in Britain, including John Wilkinson, to build prototypes in the late 1780s. His writings on mechanics and materials reflected the Enlightenment ideal that practical invention and republican politics could advance together.

Rights of Man and Exile from Britain
The French Revolution stirred Paine deeply. When Edmund Burke attacked it in Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), Paine replied with Rights of Man (Part I, 1791; Part II, 1792), a ringing defense of popular sovereignty and republican government. He also proposed social reforms, progressive taxation, old-age pensions, education grants, and relief for the poor, unusually comprehensive for the period. The British government charged him with seditious libel. Warned by allies, Paine fled to France in 1792; he was tried in absentia and outlawed in Britain.

France: Revolution, Imprisonment, and The Age of Reason
Though he spoke little French, Paine was elected to the National Convention by the department of Pas-de-Calais and sat with the Girondins. He supported the republic but opposed the execution of Louis XVI, arguing for exile rather than death. This stance, combined with the fall of the Girondins, led to his arrest during the Reign of Terror. He was imprisoned in the Luxembourg (1793, 1794), narrowly escaping execution in a famous incident where a chalk mark meant to signal death was placed on the wrong side of his cell door.

Before his arrest Paine had drafted Part I of The Age of Reason (1794), a deist critique of revealed religion that affirmed belief in a Creator but attacked scriptural authority and ecclesiastical power. He completed Part II after his release. The book sold widely but caused lasting controversy in Britain and the United States. After the Thermidorian Reaction, the new U.S. minister to France, James Monroe, obtained Paine's release in late 1794. In the mid-1790s Paine also wrote A Dissertation on First Principles of Government (1795) and Agrarian Justice (1797), the latter proposing a tax on inherited landed wealth to fund payments to young adults and pensions for the elderly, an early articulation of a social safety net.

Return to the United States
Paine returned to the United States in 1802 at the invitation of President Thomas Jefferson, whom he had long admired. He found a country transformed by party conflict. Federalist opponents denounced him for his religious views and his criticisms of George Washington in a scathing Letter to George Washington (1796), written after Paine's imprisonment when he felt the former president had failed to intercede. In America he divided his time between his New Rochelle farm and New York City, continuing to write on politics, religion, and republican principles.

Final Years and Death
Paine's final years were marked by ill health and public vilification, even as a circle of friends remained loyal. He died in New York City on June 8, 1809, at the age of 72. Only a handful of mourners attended his burial on his farm at New Rochelle after local churches refused him interment. In 1819 the English radical William Cobbett exhumed Paine's remains and transported them to Britain intending a grand reburial; the plan collapsed, and the remains were ultimately lost, an uncanny postscript to the life of a man who belonged to no single nation.

Ideas and Legacy
Paine fused clarity of language with moral urgency. He popularized the principles of natural rights and republican government in terms accessible to artisans and farmers as well as statesmen. His American Crisis papers sustained morale in the darkest days of the Revolution; Common Sense helped tip the balance toward independence; Rights of Man became a touchstone for democratic reformers in Britain and beyond; The Age of Reason sparked enduring debates on religion and free inquiry; and Agrarian Justice anticipated modern conversations about social insurance and basic income. Though his reputation suffered in his lifetime, particularly for his religious views, his influence on democratic movements, secular thought, and social reform has remained profound.

People Around Thomas Paine
- Benjamin Franklin: Encouraged Paine to emigrate to America and supplied a crucial letter of recommendation in 1774.
- George Washington: Revolutionary commander who had Crisis No. 1 read to the army; later the target of Paine's sharp public criticism for perceived neglect during Paine's French imprisonment.
- Thomas Jefferson: A longstanding admirer who invited Paine back to the United States in 1802 and supported his return.
- Marquis de Lafayette: French hero of the American Revolution; Paine helped forward Lafayette's symbolic key to the Bastille to Washington.
- James Monroe: U.S. minister to France who secured Paine's release from prison in 1794.
- Gouverneur Morris: Monroe's predecessor in Paris, criticized by Paine for failing to aid him during the Terror.
- Edmund Burke: British statesman whose Reflections provoked Paine's Rights of Man.
- Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin: British radicals who, like Paine, defended revolutionary principles and reform in the 1790s.
- Joel Barlow: American writer-diplomat and friend who assisted with Paine's affairs and publications in France.
- Nicolas de Bonneville: French journalist with whom Paine lived for a time in Paris.
- Robert Bell: Philadelphia printer who first published Common Sense.
- Silas Deane: American diplomat at the heart of the controversy that led to Paine's resignation from Congress's Committee for Foreign Affairs.
- John Adams and Samuel Adams: Revolutionary leaders who often disagreed with Paine's style and some of his positions.
- William Cobbett: English radical who exhumed Paine's remains in 1819, intending to honor him in Britain, inadvertently contributing to the mystery of their final whereabouts.

Our collection contains 56 quotes who is written by Thomas, under the main topics: Ethics & Morality - Wisdom - Truth - Leadership - Overcoming Obstacles.

Other people realated to Thomas: Benjamin Franklin (Politician), Thomas Jefferson (President), William Blake (Poet), Edmund Burke (Statesman), George Washington (President), Mary Wollstonecraft (Writer), John Adams (President), James Monroe (President), William Cobbett (Politician)

• 1797 Agrarian Justice (Pamphlet)
• 1794 The Age of Reason (Book)
• 1791 The Rights of Man (Book)
• 1776 Common Sense (Pamphlet)
• 1776 The American Crisis (Pamphlet Series)

• Wikipedia