The defeated Federalists had already prepared their batteries to assail the President for inviting Paine to return on a national ship, under escort of a Congressman. It required some skill for these adherents of John Adams, a Unitarian, to set the Inquisition in motion. It had to be done, however, as there was no chance of breaking down Jefferson but by getting preachers to sink political differences and hound the President's favorite author. Out of the North, stronghold of the "British Party," came this partisan crusade under a pious flag. In Virginia and the South the "Age of Reason" was fairly discussed, its influence being so great that Patrick Henry, as we have seen, wrote and burnt a reply. In Virginia, Deism, though largely prevailing, had not prevented its adherents from supporting the Church as an institution. It had become their habit to talk of such matters only in private. Jefferson had not ventured to express his views in public, and was troubled at finding himself mixed up with the heresies of Paine.*
* To the Rev. Dr. Waterhouse (Unitarian) who had asked
permission to publish a letter of his, Jefferson, with a
keen remembrance of Paine's fate, wrote (July 19, 1822):
"No, my dear Sir, not for the world. Into what a hornet's
nest would it thrust my head!—The genus irritabile vatmm,
on whom argument is lost, and reason is by themselves
disdained in matters of religion. Don Quixote undertook to
redress the bodily wrongs of the world, but the redressaient
of mental vagaries would be an enterprise more than Quixotic
I should as soon undertake to bring the crazy skulls of
Bedlam to sound understanding as to inculcate reason into
that of an Athanasian. I am old, and tranquillity is now my
summum bonum. Keep me therefore from the fire and faggot of
Calvin and his victim Servetus. Happy in the prospect of a
restoration of a primitive Christianity, I must leave to
younger athletes to lop off the false branches which have
been engrafted into it by the mycologists of the middle and
modern ages."—MS. belonging to Dr. Fogg of Boston.
The author on reaching Lovell's Hotel, Washington, had made known his arrival to the President, and was cordially received; but as the newspapers came in with their abuse, Jefferson may have been somewhat intimidated. At any rate Paine so thought. Eager to disembarrass the administration, Paine published a letter in the National Intelligencer which had cordially welcomed him, in which he said that he should not ask or accept any office.*
* The National Intelligencer (Nov. 3d), announcing Paine's
arrival at Baltimore, said, among other things: "Be his
religious sentiments what they may, it must be their [the
American people's] wish that he may live in the undisturbed
possession of our common blessings, and enjoy them the more
from his active participation in their attainment." The same
paper said, Nov. 10th: "Thomas Paine has arrived in this
city [Washington] and has received a cordial reception from
the Whigs of Seventy-six, and the republicans of 1800, who
have the independence to feel and avow a sentiment of
gratitude for his eminent revolutionary services."
He meant to continue writing and bring forward his mechanical projects. None the less did the "federalist" press use Paine's infidelity to belabor the President, and the author had to write defensive letters from the moment of his arrival. On October 29th, before Paine had landed, the National Intelligencer had printed (from a Lancaster, Pa., journal) a vigorous letter, signed "A Republican," showing that the denunciations of Paine were not religious, but political, as John Adams was also unorthodox. The "federalists" must often have wished that they had taken this warning, for Paine's pen was keener than ever, and the opposition had no writer to meet him. His eight "Letters to the Citizens of the United States" were scathing, eloquent, untrammelled by partisanship, and made a profound impression on the country,—for even the opposition press had to publish them as part of the news of the day.*
* They were published in the National Intelligencer of
November 15th, 22d. 29th, December 6th, January 25th, and
February 2d, 1803. Of the others one appeared in the Aurora
(Philadelphia), dated from Bordentown, N. J., March 12th,
and the last in the Trenton True American % dated April
21st.
On Christmas Day Paine wrote the President a suggestion for the purchase of Louisiana. The French, to whom Louisiana had been ceded by Spain, closed New Orleans (November 26th) against foreign ships (including American), and prohibited deposits there by way of the Mississippi. This caused much excitement, and the "federalists" showed eagerness to push the administration into a belligerent attitude toward France. Paines "common sense" again came to the front, and he sent Jefferson the following paper:
"OF LOUISIANA.
"Spain has ceded Louisiana to france, and france has excluded the Americans from N. Orleans and the navigation of the Mississippi; the people of the Western Territory have complained of it to their Government, and the governt. is of consequence involved and interested in the affair The question then is—What is the best step to be taken?
"The one is to begin by memorial and remonstrance against an infraction of a right. The other is by accommodation, still keeping the right in view, but not making it a groundwork.