Pages and Common Sense Analysis and Review free essay sample

This Is greatly In part to the lascivious attempts of royal propagandists to smear Pains unblemished reputation by muddying the realities of his heritage. (pig. 24) Notwithstanding the difficulty, Lie aptly delivers valuable particulars of Pains past and associates them succinctly to the events leading up to and following the tutoring of Common Sense. Like many of his American contemporaries, Paine came from humble beginnings. His father, a corset maker from Debtors, and his mother, a woman of high-esteem and an Fenton household, made an unusual couple given their societal hereditary differences.It was this variance In heritage that nurtured both Pains familial recognition of the common mans adversity in a monarchs dominion and his natural predisposition for the written word and self-dilatation. Ell draws on this point clang Pains short lived days at a grammar school near his homeland. pig. 27) Such an opportunity was uncommon for the son of a corset maker and although it would have been more anticipated that he would simply follow his further established his kinship and compassion of the common man when he ventured out as a privateer, despite his fathers previous attempts of curtailing such adventures. Not much is known of Pains days as a privateer other than it was short lived. It is assumed that he had grown distaste for the lifestyle, perhaps because he simply found it disagreeable or found disdain for the lack of principles for which privateers stand. Nonetheless, the experience left Paine with a greater understanding of the soldier class. Not too long after his days as a privateer, Paine finds himself under the employ of the government, a peculiar position for the man who would inspire a revolution against the same government not but a few years later. Furthermore, Paine was an excise man.Not the position a man of the people would be expected to fill. However, Paine, in many ways, was an opportunist and, even after once being dismissed as an excise man for stamping the whole ride, (pig. 34) Paine was able to build such a rapport with the people in the community he revered that he became a favored citizen. It was this talent, the talent of garnering the favor of the people that was truly Pains gift. Writing, oration, and anything else were secondary components to Pains charismatic mastery and aptitude for earning the affection of the societies around him.I believe no matter where Pains endeavors had brought him he would always be of the people, so much so that he would actually become one of those people, Just as he became an American. Paine, born and raised in England, was relieved from his position as an excise man and after various unsuccessful business endeavors, Benjamin Franklin was finally able to persuade him to venture to the Americas. It is peculiar to consider that had he been allowed to retain his position as an excise man, Common Sense may have never been penned and the revolution may have never come to fruition.Benjamin Franklin saw in Paine what so many others did, a commonality to the people with whom he was surrounded. It didnt take long for Paine to ingratiate himself into the lives of the colonials. Not long after his arrival, even while recuperating from an arduous reincarnations Journey that left him in the shackles of bed rest, Paine was already reaching out to the people through his writings. Lie greatly accentuates the importance of Pains connection to the people who were in reverence and the dissension of those in disaccorded to his ideals. I think this aspect is most greatly reflected in the chapter The Devil is in the People. Pains writings were offered in such a way that made them easily digestible and comprehensible to the uneducated underclass, but he still provided poise and provocation that would entice citizens of greater status and intellect to read his pamphlet as well. Paine signed his work as the Englishman, a decision I think further solidified his position as an unbiased observer who truly was invested in providing the most honest and sensible testimony to the conflict between the oppressive English monarch and the burgeoning metropolises of America.Eventually, Pains ideologies became the basis of popular American beliefs. Prior to Common Sense there was not an utterance of independence or an American Republic. Paine was so effective in persuading the ide als of the people that the silent unspoken fear of independence was replaced with he clamor of revolutionary hordes charging congress of moving too slowly to declare it. And as one loyalist put it The Devil is in the People. (Nicholas Crewels pig. 13) of American literature was crafted not by a true blue Revolutionary, but by an unassuming English tax man. It doesnt exactly resonate with the concept of Taxation without Representation but, as Lie pointed out, that was never a fair slogan, or proper cause bellum (pig. 117), to represent the cause of liberation from the British. What Paine spoke of, and what Lie developed on, was much more armament than simple grudges over imbalanced levies and tariffs.Paine spoke of King George as an evil tyrant and of independence as not Just an American right, but as an egalitarian necessity for a new world era to begin for all mankind; an era in which no man is less than another, an era where all mens voices can be heard, and an era where no ones liberty or right to property can be taken from them. A new American country would become the template of liberty for other countries to follow. I also enjoyed Lieus final chapter where he divulges the perspective of the founding ethers on Paine and Common Sense.Benjamin Franklin seemingly surprised by the rise to fame of his fellow Whig, John Dams scorned by a lack of attention claiming Paine garnered an unfair amount of recognition, and George Washington reading Common Sense out loud to inspire and invigorate his otherwise disheartened troops are all illustrations of the monumental prominence of Pains contributions. Ultimately, despite all their efforts, none of our founding fathers had the propensity to galvanism the people for a cause as Thomas Paine did, and he did it with Just a little common sense.