Michael Monahan: "One of the notables of history."
Rev. E. M. Frank: "Thomas Paine was, in his time, one who stood in the forefront of human progress."
Dr. Edward Bond Foote: "As Lincoln was the man for his time and place, so Paine fitted perfectly and filled remarkably the niche which history allotted to him."
Horace L. Green: "Thomas Paine, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, the glorious trinity of Independence."
Eugene V. Debs: "The revolutionary history of the United. States and France stirred me deeply and its heroes and martyrs became my idols. Thomas Paine towered above them all."
Knut Martin Teigen, M.D., Ph.D.: "Thomas Paine was, beyond all doubt, a true genius."
Dr. John Walker (with Paine in France): "There can be no question that Paine was a man of the most gigantic genius and of the soundest practical knowledge."
Joel Barlow, ambassador to France during Napoleon's reign, Paine's companion in London and Paris, and to whom he entrusted the manuscript of his "Age of Reason" when he was taken to prison, says: "Paine was endowed with the clearest perception, an uncommon share of original genius, and the greatest depth of thought.... As a visiting acquaintance and literary friend, he was one of the most instructive men I have ever known."
"He ought to be ranked among the brightest and most undeviating luminaries of the age in which he lived."—Ibid.
"To me Thomas Paine appears as one of the master spirits of the earth."—Horace Seaver.