AN EXAMINATION OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.
It is with painful feelings I now call your attention to the famous document which sets forth the political creed of the United States. More than once my pen has refused to set about this work, but I now ask: Who wrote the original Declaration of Independence? I answer boldly, Thomas Paine. To prove this, my method is the same as with Junius, and the prejudices of the united world shall not intimidate me.
It is not my purpose to revive the old and long-forgotten controversy about the authorship of this document. Enough to say, volumes have been written to prove that it was not Jefferson's. But the method and object of a negative criticism I scorn. If it can not be shown to be some other man's, then let the claimant wear his honors; he certainly did not come by them meanly or dishonorably; they were forced upon him.
My evidence will be such as to exclude the possibility of even literary theft in Jefferson, and that it is, as a whole, the work of the author of Common Sense, and can not possibly be the work of any body else. This is a bold assertion, and a little out of my turn, but my object is to raise the strongest doubt of the truth of what I assert in the mind of my reader, so as to enlist his attention, and hold me to the proof.
The method of my argument is as follows:
First, to show wherein this document is exactly like Mr. Paine; and,
Secondly, wherein it is entirely unlike Mr. Jefferson.
The points wherein they would agree are necessarily thrown out, and count nothing on either side. For example, the principles therein contained may be common to both, and can have no weight in an argument. It is said, in defense of this paper being Mr. Jefferson's, that the "Summary View" of his submitted to, but not passed by the Virginia Delegate Convention in 1774, contained the "germs" of the Declaration. This I do not admit, but if it did, it would prove nothing, for so did the writings of John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin, and Samuel Adams, and especially of James Otis. A thousand men in America had, perhaps, expressed the cardinal doctrine of equal rights, and that the British Parliament had usurped them. There is nothing peculiar nor individual in this; but when we find one man only who makes a specialty of the Declaration, it attracts attention, and must have great weight when supported by a multitude of other special facts, all pointing in the same direction. I, therefore, go to show:
First, Common Sense was written by Mr. Paine for the sole purpose of declaring independence, and, with this document in view. I have heretofore reviewed Common Sense, beginning on page 156 of this book. If it were practicable for the reader to read the whole of Common Sense at this time, it would render my labor much less; but as this may not be the case, I will now give the whole of the third division of that paper, being: