"It was," he writes to a friend, "the boast an Englishman was wont to make that he could think, speak, and write whatever he thought proper, provided he violated no law, nor injured any individual. But now an absolute controul exists, not indeed over the imperceptible operations of the mind, for those no power of man can controul; but, what is the same thing, over the effects of those operations, and if among these effects, that of speaking is to be checked, the soul is as much enslaved as the body in a cell of the Bastille. The man who once feels, nay fancies, this, is a slave. It shows as if the suspicious secret government of an Italian Republic had replaced the open, candid government of the English laws."

As Thomas Poole well represents the serious and cultured thought of young England in that time, it is interesting to read his judgment on the king's execution and the imminent war.

"Many thousands of human beings will be sacrificed in the ensuing contest, and for what? To support three or four individuals, called arbitrary kings, in the situation which they have usurped. I consider every Briton who loses his life in the war us much murdered as the King of France, and every one who approves the war, as signing the death-warrant of each soldier or sailor that falls.... The excesses in France are great; but who are the authors of them? The Emperor of Germany, the King of Prussia, and Mr. Burke. Had it not been for their impertinent interference, I firmly believe the King of France would be at this moment a happy monarch, and that people would be enjoying every advantage of political liberty.... The slave-trade, you will see, will not be abolished, because to be humane and honest now is to be a traitor to the constitution, a lover of sedition and licentiousness! But this universal depression of the human mind cannot last long."

It was in this spirit that the defence of a free press was undertaken in England. That thirty years' war was fought and won on the works of Paine. There were some "Lost Leaders": the kings execution, the reign of terror, caused reaction in many a fine spirit; but the rank and file followed their Thomas Paine with a faith that crowned heads might envy. The London men knew Paine thoroughly. The treasures of the world would not draw him, nor any terrors drive him, to the side of cruelty and inhumanity. Their eye was upon him. Had Paine, after the king's execution, despaired of the republic there might have ensued some demoralization among his followers in London. But they saw him by the side of the delivered prisoner of the Bastille, Brissot, an author well known in England, by the side of Condorcet and others of Franklin's honored circle, engaged in death-struggle with the fire-breathing dragon called "The Mountain." That was the same unswerving man they had been following, and to all accusations against the revolution their answer was—Paine is still there! A reign of terror in England followed the outlawry of Paine. Twenty-four men, at one time or another, were imprisoned, fined, or transported for uttering words concerning abuses such as now every Englishman would use concerning the same. Some who sold Paine's works were imprisoned before Paine's trial, while the seditious character of the books was not yet legally settled. Many were punished after the trial, by both fine and imprisonment. Newspapers were punished for printing extracts, and for having printed them before the trial.* For this kind of work old statutes passed for other purposes were impressed, new statutes framed, until Fox declared the Bill of Rights repealed, the constitution cut up by the roots, and the obedience of the people to such "despotism" no longer "a question of moral obligation and duty, but of prudence."*

* The first trial after Paine's, that of Thomas Spence
(February 26, 1793), for selling "The Rights of Man," failed
through a flaw in the indictment, but the mistake did not
occur again. At the same time William Holland was awarded a
year's imprisonment and £100 fine for selling "Letter to the
Addressers." H. D. Symonds, for publishing "Rights of Man,"
£20 fine and two years; f or "Letter to the Addressers,"
one year, £100 fine, with sureties in £1,000 for three
years, and imprisonment till the fine be paid and sureties
given. April 17, 1793, Richard Phillips, printer, Leicester,
eighteen months. May 8th, J. Ridgway, London, selling
"Rights of Man," £100 and one year; "Letter to the
Addressers," one year, £100 fine; in each case sureties in
£1,000, with imprisonment until fines paid and sureties
given. Richard Peart, "Rights" and "Letter," three months.
William Belcher, "Rights" and "Letter," three months. Daniel
Holt, £50, four years. Messrs. Robinson, £200. Eaton and
Thompson, the latter in Birmingham, were acquitted. Clio
Rickman escaped punishment by running over to Paris. Dr.
Currie (1793) writes: "The prosecutions that are commenced
all over England against printers, publishers, etc., would
astonish you; and most of these are for offences committed
many months ago. The printer of the Manchester Herald has
had seven different indictments preferred against him for
paragraphs in his paper; and six different indictments for
selling or disposing of six different copies of Paine,—all
previous to the trial of Paine. The man was opulent,
supposed worth ment by running over to Paris. Dr. Currie
(1793) writes: *' The prosecutions that are commenced all
over England against printers, publishers, etc., would
astonish you; and most of these are for offences committed
many months ago. The printer of the Manchester Herald has
had seven different indictments preferred against him for
paragraphs in his paper; and six different indictments for
selling or disposing of six different copies of Paine,—all
previous to the trial of Paine. The man was opulent,
supposed worth ment by running over to Paris. Dr. Currie
(1793) writes: "The prosecutions that are commenced all
over England against printers, publishers, etc., would
astonish you; and most of these are for offences committed
many months ago. The printer of the Manchester Herald has
had seven different indictments preferred against him for
paragraphs in his paper; and six different indictments for
selling or disposing of six different copies of Paine,—all
previous to the trial of Paine. The man was opulent,
supposed worth £20,000; but these different actions will
ruin him, as they were intended to do."—"Currie's Life,"
i., p. 185. See Buckle's "History of Civilization," etc.,
American éd., p. 352. In the cases where "gentlemen" were
found distributing the works the penalties were ferocious.
Fische Palmer was sentenced to seven years' transportation.
Thomas Muir, for advising persons to read "the works of that
wretched outcast Paine" (the Lord Advocate's words) was
sentenced to fourteen years' transportation. This sentence
was hissed. The tipstaff being ordered to take those who
hissed into custody, replied: "My lord, they 're all
hissing."

From his safe retreat in Paris bookseller Rickman wrote his impromptu:

"Hail Briton's land!
Hail freedom's shore!
Far happier than of old;
For in thy blessed realms no more
The Rights of Man are sold!"

The famous town-crier of Bolton, who reported to his masters that he had been round that place "and found in it neither the rights of man nor common sense," made a statement characteristic of the time. The aristocracy and gentry had indeed lost their humanity and their sense under a disgraceful panic. Their serfs, unable to read, were fairly represented by those who, having burned Paine in effigy, asked their employer if there was "any other gemman he would like burnt, for a glass o' beer."

* "Pari. Hist.," xxxii., p. 383.

The White Bear (now replaced by the Criterion Restaurant) no longer knew its little circle of radicals. A symbol of how they were trampled out is discoverable in the "T. P." shoe-nails. These nails, with heads so lettered, were in great request among the gentry, who had only to hold up their boot-soles to show how they were trampling on Tom Paine and his principles. This at any rate was accurate. Manufacturers of vases also devised ceramic anathemas.*