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| Thomas Paine |
It is I, Thomas Paine, who prepared the American public for the notion of independence. Without my "interference" the intellects of their leaders would still be weaving fancies about having King George as their own personal monarch.
The only man who could immediately grasp my teachings was Dr. Franklin. Indeed, not only did he embrace my ideals but he had no inconsiderable share in furnishing materials for this work. In Philadelphia, during the Convention of 1776, he molded many of my thoughts into what I later named "Common Sense." Adams said he expected Common Sense to become the "common faith," and on learning that in Boston, he, Adams, was presumed to be the author, he felt flattered.
Writing to a former law clerk, he declared himself innocent, saying he could never have achieved a style of such "strength and brevity." But Adams was not without misgivings. The more he thought about it, the less he admired Common Sense. The writer, he told Abigail, "has a better hand at pulling down than building."
Dr. Franklin was made president of the convention while I, a foreigner, lurked behind the scenes and continued to refine my writings. How fertile was the soil of Pennsylvania for the seeds of revolution!
My treatises fairly wrote themselves. I could hardly keep up with the dictates of my mind as I wore out the tips of many pens. This I perceived as my payment to the citizens of this budding republic for having taken me in after such a disastrous sea voyage during which I had been racked with high fever and illness. Dr. Franklin, such a benevolent Samaritan, saw to it that my medical needs were attended to and that I had comfortable lodging and restorative food.
Oh, how the demons attacked me during the days and nights of my delirium. The succubi sat heavily on my chest, driving all rational thought away. I saw Thomas Aquinas helping me chase away the madness but it was the face of my benefactor Franklin who hovered over me urging that I sip hot broth.
When I became well again, this good man found me employment while others looked at me with suspicion. If truth be told I never possessed the means to encourage friendship, too busy I was in chasing thoughts through the alleys of my brain. Perhaps too soon I wrote about the evils of slavery and those members who came to Philadelphia from Virginia immediately became my sworn enemies. Not even their military leader Washington would look kindly on me.
I had little time to explain that I had no interest in their economic concerns but in the general wrong of enslaving human beings in deplorable conditions of servitude. These southern slave owners could not see how their quest for independence so closely correlated with the need for Africans to enjoy our freedom.
I, myself, had escaped the smallness of my world in my father's home in Norfolk County and the employment he found for me. As 1776 was coming to an end, Franklin was sent to France with the sole purpose of gaining that country's alliance against England. No better envoy could be selected. Franklin was known for his writings and inventions and was lauded throughout Europe.
Visiting England proved again to be unsatisfactory for me; although I was interested in Edmund Burke's philosophy. After all, had I not left Great Britain at Franklin's urging? One is never a prophet in one's own country. France was my goal. Although I spoke little French, I made my presence known. I lost interest in Burke when I read his simplistic analysis of the French Revolution.
My pamphlet The Rights of Man endeared me to the downtrodden people of France. I was the darling of the Girondists but suspicious to the Montagnards. I was invited to be a member of the French National Convention. At the summit of my fame among the French, having been embraced and praised for my astute understanding of the needs of revolutionary France, I instinctively knew that like The Christ on the Sunday of Palms, I would be later scorned and imprisoned by the people I had helped to liberate.
As I write these words, I am once again in America. I am once again friendless and alone. I understand now that neither the Americans nor the French could expand their understanding to see as I have seen that my writings were not meant for regional application but for all people suffering under the weight of oppression in our troubled world.
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