REFORMS AND INVENTIONS.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox: "Paine was not only a great author and statesman, but he was distinctly a pioneer, an originator, an inventor and creator. To him we are indebted for many of the world's greatest ideas and reforms."
Winwood Reade: "One of Thomas Paine's first productions was an article against slavery."
Universal Cyclopedia: "Published in Bradford's Pennsylvania Journal [Magazine] in March, 1775, an article entitled 'African Slavery in America,' which probably hastened the first American Anti-Slavery Society, April 14, 1775."
Referring to this article Dr. Conway, one of the apostles of anti-slavery, says: "It is a most remarkable article. Every argument and appeal, moral, religious, military, economic, familiar in our subsequent anti-slavery struggle is here found stated with eloquence and clearness."
In the very month that Paine lay down in his last illness there was born the man who was to complete the work he had begun. On the first of January, 1863, Abraham Lincoln pronounced the doom of slavery. In this essay of Paine and in the Emancipation Proclamation of Lincoln we have the beginning and the end—the prologue and the epilogue—of the Anti-Slavery drama in America.
"It is a significant fact that a paragraph in favor of the abolition of slavery in America, which is surmised to haye been inserted through Paine's influence, in the Declaration of Independence was struck out.... Had Paine's humane suggestion been adopted the United States would have been saved the agony and bloody sweat of the Civil. War."—Hector Macpherson, Scotland.
"In sorrow and bitterness and bloodshed Lincoln wrought the cure for the evil which Paine tried peacefully to prevent."—Mrs. Bradlaugh-Bonner, England.
George W. Foote: "In America the first to publicly demand the liberation of the slaves was Thomas Paine. Paine also partly drafted and signed the Act of Pennsylvania abolishing slavery—the first of its kind in the whole of Christendom."
Paine was not only the first to advocate the abolition of domestic slavery in America, he was also a pioneer in the movement which secured the abolition of the slave trade in America and Great Britain.
When Louisiana demanded statehood with "the right to continue the importation of slaves," from Paine came this stinging rebuke: "Dare you put up a petition to Heaven for such power, without fearing to be struck from the earth by its justice? Why, then, do you ask it of man against man? Do you want to renew in Louisiana the horrors of Domingo?"
Alfred E. Fletcher: "Paine was the first man in America to demand freedom for the slave, to urge international arbitration, justice for women and more rational ideas as to marriage and divorce."
"In his August (1775) number [Pennsylvania Magazine] is found the earliest American plea for woman."—Dr. Conway.
"His pen is unmistakable in 'Reflections on Unhappy Marriages' (June 1775)."—Ibid.
"The first man in history to speak in clear cut tones for the rights of woman."—Josephine K. Henry.
"Today we dare to affirm that women as well as men have rights. Paine was the pioneer of this thought."—Alice Hubbard.
Hon. Robert A. Dague: "If I am asked to whom are women indebted for the enlarged liberty they now enjoy, my answer is, to Thomas Paine, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony, and to the Universalists, Unitarians, Spiritualists and Agnostics."
London Daily News: "He was always a man of peace, and to him is due the first project of international arbitration. He was the first publicist in America to declare for the emancipation of slaves, the first to champion the cause of woman, to insist upon the rights of animals, and to expose the criminal folly of dueling."
"He condemned dueling, and the deliberate or thoughtless ill-treatment of animals. He spoke up against negro slavery quite as emphatically as against hereditary privileges and religious intolerance. He advocated international arbitration; international and internal copyright."—Sir George Trevelyan.
George H. Putxam: "Paine wrote on the necessity of a copyright law in 1782, a year before Noah Webster canvassed the legislatures of the New England states in behalf of such a law.... In 1792, as a member of the French Convention, Paine made a statement of the principles of international copyright of the author's right in literary work."
Nannie McCormick Coleman: "In 1783, while a member of Congress, Hamilton urgently sought to have a [Constitutional] Convention called. In the same year... Thomas Paine contributed addresses to the public to the same effect."
Paine proposed a constitutional government and a constitutional convention as early as 1776.
Referring to our Constitutional Convention Prof. Alexander Johnston of Princeton University says: "Thomas Paine had suggested it as long ago as his 'Common Sense' pamphlet: 'Let a continental conference to be held to frame a continental charter.'"
Not only was Paine the first to propose a constitutional government for the United States, the framers of the Constitution adopted to a large extent his political ideas. Referring to the principles advocated in his "Dissertation on Government" Dr. Conways says: "In the next year those principles were embodied in the Constitution; and in 1792, when a State pleaded its sovereign right to repudiate a contract the Supreme Court affirmed every contention of Paine's pamphlet, using his ideas and sometimes his very phrases."
Bankers' Magazine: "The Bank of North America, at Philadelphia, organized to assist the government during the War of Independence, is admitted to be the first bank in the United States, but it is not generally known that Thomas Paine was the man in whose brain the bank was born and who was the first subscriber to its stock."
Columbia Encyclopedia: "Paine was chosen by Napoleon to introduce a popular form of government into Britain after the Frenchman should have invaded and conquered the island."
William Milligan Sloane, LL. D.: "Thomas Paine exercised his power as a pamphleteer on the theme of England's approaching bankruptcy, while the public crowded one of the theatres [in Paris] to stare at stage pictures representing the invasion of England."
Paine prepared plans for this invasion which were adopted by the French Directory. Two hundred and fifty gun-boats were speedily built for the purpose. Then Napoleon abandoned the expedition against England for the one against Egypt.
Paine's approval of this proposed invasion of England was not inspired by a spirit of revenge because of his persecution by the English Government, but by a sincere love of its people, seeing in it the only means of delivering them from the intolerable tyranny of George III. and his Ministry. Napoleon at this time had not manifested that insatiable thirst for blood which at a later period made him the scourge of Europe.
James A. Edgerton, A. M.: "Thomas Paine first suggested American Independence. He first suggested the Federal Union of the States. He first proposed the abolition of negro slavery. He first suggested [in Christendom] protection for dumb animals. He first suggested equal rights for women. He first proposed old age pensions. He first suggested the education of poor children at public expense. He first proposed arbitration and international peace. He suggested a great republic of all the nations of the world."
To the claims made in behalf of Paine by Mr. Edgerton and others the following may be added: He was one of the founders, if not the real founder, of modern journalism. He labored to provide better facilities for the education of young women. His contributions to hygienic science were invaluable. His knowledge of astronomy was profound; he affirmed the belief that the fixed stars were suns twenty years before Herschel. His views regarding taxation were wise and just. He was an advocate of land reform. He was recognized as the ablest authority of his time on paper money. He was one of the framers of the Constitution of Pennsylvania.
Not only was Paine the real founder of our Republic; he was largely instrumental in securing for it the greatest of its subsequent acquisitions of territory. He shares with Jefferson the honor of being the first to propose the purchase from Napoleon of the province of Louisiana, an empire in extent—reaching from Florida to the Pacific and to what is now British Columbia, a distance of three thousand miles—a territory three times as large as the original United States of America and from which have been formed, wholly or in part, eighteen of the most important states in the Union.
Nearly half a century before Comte, Paine taught the Religion of Humanity.
"In 1778 he wrote his sublime sentence about the 'Religion of Humanity.'"—Dr. Conway.
"I have discovered that Paine not only wrote those words, 'the Religion of Humanity,'... but he was the real author by this discovery of all laws of social science which is called sociology, now the queen of the sciences.... If Paine was the real leader in that discovery he stands by the side of Copernicus, Newton, Darwin, Comte, Spencer and Ward, and the beneficent results and glory of this discovery, and its discoverer, are beyond the words of any mind at present to describe."—Prof. T. B. Wakeman.
"That his Religion of Humanity took the deistical form was an evolutionary necessity."—Dr. Conway.
"The prophet of the Religion of Humanity and the precursor of our modern Monism."—Prof. Ernst Haeckel.
"How few there are who realize that Thomas Paine anticipated Spencer's thought [equal liberty] by many decades, that, more briefly and graphically, he formulated the only principle that can weave enduring order and peace into the fabric of society."—Edwin C. Walker.
Leonard Abbott: "Paine's mind was germinal: in it were the seeds of all modern religious, economical, and political movements."
William H. Maple: "The light of truth fell in such grand refulgence upon this man as to enable him to utter truisms enough to furnish texts for reformers for a thousand years to come."
"The moral originality and courage of his teaching in every direction is astonishing."—John M. Robertson.
Stephen Pearl Andrews: "The true chief-priest of humanity is the man who solves the greatest obstacles in the progress of mankind; and you must not be surprised if I rank Thomas Paine not only as a priest, but as perhaps the real chief-priest, or pontifex-maximus of his age."
Joel Barlow: "The biographer of Thomas Paine should not forget his mathematical acquirements and his mechanical genius. His invention of the iron bridge, which led him to Europe in 1787, has procured him a great reputation in that branch of science in France and England."
M. Chaptal: "They [plans for iron bridge over Seine] will be of the greatest utility to us when the new kind of construction goes to be executed for the first time.... You have rights of more than one kind to the gratitude of nations."
International Encyclopedia: "In 1787 Paine went to France, where he exhibited his bridge to the Academy of Science in Paris. He also visited England, and was lionized in London by the party of Burke and Fox. He set up the model of his bridge in Addington Green, and huge crowds went to see it."
"This [model of iron bridge] was publicly exhibited in Paris and London and attracted great crowds."—Encyclopedia Britannica.
Sir Ralph Milbank: "With respect to the bridge over the river Wear at Sunderland, it certainly is a work well deserving admiration both for its structure, durability, and utility, and I have good grounds for saying that the first idea was taken from Mr. Paine's bridge exhibited at Paddington."
Mr. Foljambe, M. P.: "I saw the rib of your [Paine's] bridge. In point of elegance and beauty it far exceeded my expectations and is certainly beyond anything I ever saw."
George Stephenson: "If we are to consider Paine as its [the iron bridge's] author, his daring in engineering certainly does full justice to the fervor of his political career."
When the building of the Brooklyn bridge was celebrated the Rev. Robert Collyer called attention to the fact that to Thomas Paine belonged the credit of inventing the iron bridge and deplored the ignorance and prejudice which had caused the speakers to ignore it.
Sir Richard Phillips: "In 1778 Thomas Paine proposed, in America, this application of steam [the steamboat]."
Watson's Annals of Philadelphia: "In June, 1785, John Fitch called on the ingenious William Henry, Esq., of Lancaster, to take his opinion of his draughts, who informed him that he (Fitch) was not the first person who had thought of applying steam to vessels, for that Thomas Paine, author of 'Common Sense,' had suggested the same to him (Henry) in the winter of 1778."
Concerning Paine's connection with this invention Dr. Conway says: "Among his intimate friends at this time [about 1796] was Robert Fulton, then residing in Paris. Paine's extensive studies of the steam engine and his early discovery of its adaptability to navigation had caused Rumsey to seek him in England and Fitch to consult him both in, America and Paris. Paine's connection with the invention of the steamboat was recognized by Fulton as, indeed, by all of his scientific contemporaries. To Fulton he freely gave his ideas" (Life of Paine, vol. ii, p. 280). "In the controversy between Rumsey and Fitch, Paine's priority to both is conceded" (Ibid).
"A machine for planing boards was his next invention."—Madame Bonneville.
James Parton: "A benefactor... who conceived the planing machine and the iron bridge. A glorious monument to his honor swells aloft in many of our great towns. The principle of his arch now sustains the marvelous railroad depots that half abolish the distinction between in-doors and out."
In a letter to Jefferson, in 1801, Paine anticipates and suggests the explosive engine of today.
"The explosive engines which now drive machines over highways and waters and through the air are the perfection of Paine's explosive power."—A. Outram Sherman.
One of Paine's minor inventions which attracted the attention and received the approval of Franklin was an improved light.
Another invention, an improved carriage wheel, was greatly admired. After Paine's death Robert Fulton made a drawing of the model and deposited it at Washington.
Robert R. Livingston (to Paine in Paris): "Make your will; leave the mechanics, the iron bridge, the wheels, etc., to America."
Joseph N. Moreau: "The Archimedes of the eighteenth century."
Elihu Palmer: "Probably the most useful man that ever lived."
Refutation of Charges of Immorality.
Louis Masquerier:
"Paine who wrote in man's defense,
'Rights of Man' and 'Common Sense,
Let not pious virulence
Stain his honest fame."
Paine has been represented by his religious enemies as the embodiment of all that is bad. He was, they assert, drunken, filthy, and immoral. Banished from respectable society, he associated, they say, only with the low and vile. The following testimony covers all the years that elapsed from the beginning of his public career to the end of his life.
Dr. Franklin, writing from England while Paine was yet a resident of that country, says: "Mr. Thomas Paine is very well recommended to me as an ingenious worthy young man."
That his previous life had been above serious reproach is shown by a letter to the Excise Office in which he says: "No complaint of the least dishonesty or intemperance has ever appeared against me."
James B. Elliot: "Paine's pamphlet ['Case of the Officers of Excise'] secured for him the acquaintance of Oliver Goldsmith, who became and remained his friend until his death, and by whom he was introduced to Benjamin Franklin."
"At a coffeehouse in London Paine met that other great thinker, Franklin. They became fast friends."—Elbert Hubbard.
"Invited by Franklin he went to America."—Encyclopedia of Social Reform.
"His associates in Philadelphia were people of the highest respectability and importance.... He was welcomed everywhere."—James B. Elliott.
Referring to his first year in America Bancroft says: "In that time he had frequented the society of Rittenhouse, Clymer and Samuel Adams." Dr. Rush says: "He visited in the families of Dr. Franklin, Mr. Rittenhouse and Mr. George Clymer." Referring to the members of the Philosophical Society, founded by Franklin, Dr. Conway says: "Paine was welcomed into their circle by Rittenhouse, Clymer, Rush, Muhlenberg, and other representatives of the scientific and literary metropolis."
Writing in his journal at a later period John Hall, the English mechanician who then resided in Philadelphia, mentions among Paine's visitors and intimate associates Franklin, Gouverneur Morris, Dr. Rush, Tench Francis, Robert Morris, Rittenhouse, etc.
The Library of the World's Best Literature alludes to scientific experiments made by Paine "for the entertainment of Washington whose guest he was for some time."
Francis Marion Lemmon: "When my father Alluding to Paine's conduct and public services during the Revolution, Dr. Conway says: "They are best measured in the value set on them by the great leaders most cognizant of them,—by Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Adams, Madison, Robert Morris, Chancellor Livingston, R. H. Lee, Colonel Laurens, General Greene, Dickinson. Had there been anything dishonorable or mercenary in Paine's career, these are the men who would have known it; but their letters are searched in vain for even the faintest hint of anything disparaging to his patriotic self-devotion during those eight weary years." Henry Adams: "Thomas Paine, down to the time of his departure for Europe, in 1787, was a fashionable member of society [in New York], admired and courted as the greatest literary genius of his day." The oldest and one of the most powerful political organizations in this country, outside of the regular political parties, is the Tammany Society of New York. Whatever shortcomings may be justly charged to this society in later times it was in its earlier days, when devoted mainly to social and benevolent purposes, one of the most honorable and respectable of societies. Paine was the hero of this society. Dr. Conway says: "At the great celebration (October 12, 1792) of the Third Centenary of the discovery of America, by the sons of St. Tammany, New York, the first man toasted after Columbus was Paine, and next to Paine 'The Rights of Man,' They were also extolled in an ode composed for the occasion, and sung." Paine was at this time a resident of France. "Visited France in the summer of 1787, where he made the acquaintance of Buffon, Malesherbes, La Rochefoucauld, and other eminent men."—Chambers' Encyclopedia. "Dr. Robinet, the French historian, says on this visit (1787) Paine, who had long known the 'soul of the people,' came into' relation with eminent men of all groups, philosophical and political—Condorcet, Achille Duchatelet, Cardinal De Brienne, and, he believes also Danton, who like the English republican [Paine] was a Freemason."—Dr. Conway. Gilbert Patten Brown (in Masonic Monthly, July, 1916): "In the St. John's Regimental Lodge (the first Masonic body to be constituted among the troops) Thomas Paine (like Capt. James Monroe, Capt. John Marshall and many other of minor mention) was entered, crafted and raised a Master Mason." Franklin, who in 1774 introduced Paine to the New World as "an ingenious worthy young man" in 1787, after an acquaintance of thirteen years, reaffirms his former estimate of the man. In a letter of introduction to the Duke of Rochefoucauld he says: "The bearer of this is Mr. Paine, the author of a famous piece entitled 'Common Sense,' published with great effect on the minds of the people at the beginning of the Revolution. He is an ingenious, honest man; and as such I beg leave to recommend him to your civilities." Lamb's Biographical Dictionary: "Visiting London, he at once became a social and diplomatic feature of that metropolis." Thomas "Clio" Rickman: "Mr. Paine's life in London was a quiet round of philosophical leisure and enjoyment.... Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the French and American embassadors, Mr. Sharp, the engraver, Romney, the painter, Mrs. Wollstonecraft, Joel Barlow,... Dr. Priestley,... Mr. Horne Tooke, etc., were among the number of his friends and acquaintances." "His manners were easy and gracious; his knowledge was universal and boundless; in private company and among his friends his conversation had every fascination that anecdote, novelty and truth could give it." "Mr. Paine in his person was about five feet ten inches high, and rather athletic.... His eye, of which the painter could not convey the exquisite meaning, was full, brilliant and singularly piercing." Alexander Wilson: "The penetration and intelligence of his eye bespeak the man of genius." John Adams, in a letter to his wife, refers to Paine as "a man who, General Lee says, has genius in his eyes." Carlyle describes him as "the man with the black beaming eyes." Walter Morton, who was with him when he died, says, "His eye glistened with genius under the pangs of death." Dr. Thomas Cooper: "I have dined with Mr. Paine in literary society, in London, at least a dozen times, when his dress, manners, and conversation were such as became the character of an unobtrusive intelligent gentleman, accustomed to good society." Regarding Paine's associations in England his biographer, Dr. Conway, says: "There [Rotherham] and in London he was 'lionized' as Franklin had been in Paris. We find him now passing a week with Edmund Burke, now at the country seat of the Duke of Portland, or enjoying the hospitalities of Lord Fitzwilliam at Wentworth House. He is entertained and consulted on public affairs by Fox, Lord Landsdowne, Sir George Staunton, Sir Joseph Banks." "The Americans in London—the artists West and Trumbull, the Alexanders (Franklin's connections), and others were fond of him as a friend and proud of him as a countryman."—Ibid. "His personal acquaintance," says Dr. Conway, "included nearly every great or famous man of his time, in England, America, France." Paine not only enjoyed the friendship and esteem of the notables of the world, he was the idol of the common people who knew him. Before the Revolution in France began he spent two years in England, engaged a part of the time perfecting his iron bridge. The leading manufacturing firm of Rotherham encouraged him and fitted up a shop for him to work in. Nearly a half century later Professor Lesley of Philadelphia, then a young man, visited Rotherham. Notwithstanding the long time that had elapsed he found Paine's memory still green and one of the cherished possessions of Yorkshire. The results of his visit are thus related by Dr. Conway: "Professor Lesley of Philadelphia tells me that when visiting in early life the works at Rotherham, Paine's workshop and the very tools he used were pointed out. They were preserved with care. He conversed with an aged and intelligent workman who had worked under Paine as a lad. Professor Lesley, who had shared some of the prejudice against Paine, was impressed by the earnest words of the old man. Mr. Paine he said was the most honest man, and the best man he ever knew. After he had been there a little time everybody looked up to him, the Walkers and their workmen. He knew the people for miles round, and went into their homes; his benevolence, his friendliness, his knowledge, made him beloved by all, rich and poor. His memory had always lasted there." M. and Madame de Bonneville: "Not a day [in Paris] escaped without his receiving many visits. Mr. Barlow, Mr. [Robert] Fulton, Mr. [Sir Robert] Smith, came very often to see him. Many travelers also called on him." "Paine was, indeed, so overrun with visitors and adventurers that he appropriated two mornings of each week at the Philadelphia House for levees. These, however, became insufficient to stem the constant stream of visitors, including spies and lion-hunters, so that he had little time for consultation with the men and women whose cooperation he needed in public affairs. He therefore leased an out-of-the-way house [the old Madame Pompadour mansion], reserving knowledge of it for particular friends, while still retaining his address at the Philadelphia House, where the levees were continued."—Dr. Conway. "Here [at Paine's house] gathered sympathetic spirits from America, England, France, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, freed from prejudices of race, rank, or nationality."—Ibid. "And now the old hotel became the republican capitol of Europe. There sat an international Premier with his Cabinet."—Ibid. "A grand dinner was given by Paine at the Hotel de Ville to Dumouriez, where this brilliant general met Brissot, Condorcet, Santerre, and several eminent English radicals."—Ibid. "In the beautiful courtyard of the Palais Royal, I saw today for the first time the statue of Camille Desmoulins, one of the most heroic figures of the French Revolution.... He was one of Paine's warmest friends in Paris. Desmoulins had known Paine when the latter was a member of the Convention and doubtless was one of the interesting coterie that met at Paine's house in the Faubourg St. Denis."—William M. van der Weyde. "When Bonaparte returned from Italy he called on Paine and invited him to dinner."—Clio Rickman. "Among the persons I was in the habit of receiving Paine deserves to be mentioned."—Madame Roland. Among Paine's most intimate French friends, besides the Bonnevilles with whom he lived for several years, were the Rolands, the Brissots, the Condorcets, and the Lafayettes, France's purest and noblest souls. Baron Pichon: "Paine lived in Monroe's house at Paris." While James Monroe was minister to France Paine was for a year and a half a member of his household, enjoying in the highest degree the esteem of both Mr. and Mrs. Monroe. Paine was one of the most amiable of men and possessed a most charming personality. Nicolas and Margaret Bonneville, with whom he resided in Paris, in a biographical sketch of him, written after his death and revised by Cobbett, bear this testimony: "Thomas Paine loved his friends with sincere and tender affection. His simplicity of heart and that happy kind of openness, or rather, carelessness, which charms our hearts in reading the fables of the good Lafontaine, made him extremely amiable. If little children were near him he patted them, searched his pockets for the store of cakes, biscuits, sugar-plums, pieces of sugar, of which he used to take possession as of a treasure belonging to them, and the distribution of which belonged to him." "He was always gentle to children and to animals."—Ellery Sedgwick. The deep affection entertained for Paine by his Parisian friends was shown when, grievously ill and believed to be dying, he was carried from his cot in the Luxembourg to the home of the Monroes. I quote again from Dr. Conway: "Paine had been restored by the tenderness and devotion of friends. Had it not been for friendship he could hardly have been saved. We are little able, in the present day, to appreciate the reverence and affection with which Thomas Paine was regarded by those who saw in him the greatest apostle of liberty in the world.... In Paris there were ladies and gentlemen who had known something of the cost of liberty—Col. and Mrs. Monroe, Sir Robert and Lady Smith, Madame Lafayette, Mr. and Mrs. Barlow, M. and Madame de Bonneville. They had known what it was to watch through anxious nights with terrors surrounding them. He who % had suffered most was to them a sacred person. He had come out of the succession of ordeals, so weak in body, so wounded by American ingratitude, so sore at heart, that no delicate child needed more tender care.... Men say their Arthur is dead, but their love is stronger than death. And though the service of these friends might at first have been reverential, it ended with attachment, so great was Paine's power, so wonderful and pathetic his memories, so charming the play of his wit, so full his response to kindness." "In Luxembourg prison," says Conway, "he won all hearts." Augustus C. Buel: "Jones [John Paul] liked Tom Paine and Paine almost worshiped Jones [they were in Paris]. All through the American Revolution they had been fast friends, familiarly calling each other 'Tom' and 'Paul.'" Joseph Mazzini Wheeler: "Landor [Walter Savage] told my friend Mr. Birch of Florence that he particularly admired Paine, and that he visited him, having first obtained an interview at the house of General Dumouriez [the most famous general of the Revolution]. Landor declared that Paine was always called 'Tom,' not out of disrespect, but because he was a jolly good fellow." Lord Edward Fitzgerald (to his mother): "I lodge with my friend Paine [in Paris]; we breakfast, dine, and sup together. The more I see of his interior the more I like and respect him. I cannot express how kind he is to me. There is a simplicity of manner, a goodness of heart, and a strength of mind in him that I never knew a man before to possess." Lady Lucy Fitzgerald: "Although he [Lord Edward] was unsuccessful in the glorious attempt of liberating his country [Ireland] from slavery, still he was not unmindful of the lessons you taught him. Accept, then, his picture from his unhappy sister. Its place is in your house; my heart will be satisfied with such a Pantheon: it knows no consolation but the approbation of such men as you, and the soothing recollection that he did his duty and died faithful to the cause of liberty." Zachariah Wilkes: "Let me tell you what he did for me. I was arrested in Paris and condemned to die. I had no friend here; and it was at a time when no friend would have served me: Robespierre ruled. 'I am innocent!' I cried in desperation. 'I am innocent, so help me God! I am condemned for the offense of another.' I wrote a statement of my case with a pencil; thinking at first of addressing it to my judge, then of directing it to the president of the Convention." [Wilkes, who was an Englishman, had important business to transact which involved his honor and he could not bear the thought of dying with it unperformed. The jailer referred him to Paine, who, though a prisoner, had much influence with the authorities.] "He [Paine] examined me closer than my judge had done; he required my proofs. After a long time I satisfied him. He then said: 'The leaders of the Convention would rather have my life than yours. If by any means I can obtain your release on my own security, will you promise me to return in twenty days?'" Wilkes promised to return. Paine then obtained permission for him to leave the prison, guaranteeing his return and agreeing to take his place at the guillotine if he failed to do so. Wilkes kept his word. He returned to the prison, drawing from Paine the exclamation, "There is yet English blood in England!" Wilkes had been opposed to Paine both in politics and religion. Another instance of Paine's noble magnanimity is related by Dr. Conway: "This personage [Captain Grimstone, R. A.], during a dinner party at the Palais Egalité, got into a controversy with Paine, and, forgetting that the English Jove could not in Paris answer argument with thunder, called Paine a traitor to his country and struck him a violent blow. Death was the penalty for striking a deputy and Paine's friends were not unwilling to see the penalty inflicted on this stout young captain who had struck a man of fifty-six. Paine had much trouble in obtaining from Barrere, of the Committee of Public Safety, a passport out of the country for Captain Grimstone, whose traveling expenses were supplied by the man he had struck."