Tom Paine, A Political Life. Johne Keane. Bloomsbury, £25.00

I had heard much about this new book long before the review copy came my way. Indeed I had even read a review of it in a monthly paper in which the reviewer said it would become the definite life of Paine. All in all, then, on the basis of comments and a review it looked that at long last we would have the biography. Sadly I now have to say that I was mislead. This is unquestionably an excellent biography of the great radical, but it is far from being the definitive biography. In fact I do not think the author had in mind writing such a biography, rather it is, as its name indicates, a book which lays emphasis on Paine’s political ideas and influence, as such it is first rate. Against this, though, must be set  the fact that Professor Keane adds little to what we know of Paine’s life  before he went to America, while his treatment of it there, at least in the  case of the revolution, is at times questionable, for example, his  influence as an editor.  

Professor Keane’s curt dismissal of George Hindmarch’s argument  that Paine wrote the ‘Forester essays’ does not carry conviction, indeed  he offers no evidence of any consequence for his claim which rests, in  so far as I could see, on the questionable authority of one individual  who republished the essays and credited them to a local clergyman.  

Professor Keane has a highly readable style, reminiscent of that of  the late Audrey ‘Williamson, though certain comments he made I found  crude and irritating, as also his frequent reference to ‘Tom Paine’  rather than Thomas Paine. It would seem that he was not aware of this usage being a means to belittle Paine, a fact both the late Adrian Brunel  and his son Christopher, the founding chairman of the TPS, frequently  drew attention to. Thankfully, though, Professor Keane avoids treating  Paine as though he was some sort of superman who never made  mistakes or was never wrong. In fact there is a side to Paine’s character  which was anything but creditable, his treatment of Monroe for  example. He assesses Paine warts and all, so to speak, and his biography  is all the better for him doing so. Likewise while admitting Paine drank  he does not go out of his way, as did Professor D.F.Hawke in his  biography of Paine, which Keane thinks highly of, though why I find  quite strange considering its defects, some of which I drew attention to  in The American Rationalist a few years ago, to present Paine as a  

drunkard. Sometimes, when I read this sort of thing, I wish certain  academics would take a crash course in the history of medicine.  

On the subject of medicine, I was pleased to note that Paine’s  passionate interest in science is not ignored or passed over with barely a  comment. Paine was a keen amateur scientist with an excellent grasp of  astronomy. But his approach was essentially that of a technologist, in  that he was primarily concerned with the application of scientific  discoveries as distinct from pure research. This is very evident in the  articles he published when editing The Pennsylvania Magazine Keane,  though, does not devote enough attention, in my opinion, to this side of  Paine’s life, which is another reason why this biography cannot be  considered as the definitive work on Paine. Indeed there is a real need  for a study on Paine and science.  

All things considered, this is a competent and readable biography of  Thomas Paine. It is not without defects, and there are other matters  which could be raised, not least concerning credits, However, it is for  the most part an excellent study of Paine and one which becomes  essential reading for anyone interested in him. Unfortunately the fly in the ointment, so to speak, is the book’s high price. Perhaps the  publisher should consider a paperback edition.

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Radical And Red Poets And Poetry.  Compiled and annotated by Edmund and Ruth Frow. Salford, The Working Class Movement Library, 1994. Unpriced.  

Ever since a teacher with a fanaticism for poetry forced the subject down my throat at school I have detested the subject. I own thousands of books but until this arrived for review not one could be described as poetry.

But this book is different. Here are the thoughts, aspirations and  hopes of ordinary people; their pleasures and their sadness. It is not my attention to review the poetry, this has been around for many years and Thomas Paine has been commented upon by many others, rather it is to commend this book to Thomas Paine members who will find much in it of Paine interest, as many of the authors Society whose poems are reproduced were Paineites. In fact Paine himself was a poet, and some of his work is reproduced in Radical and Red Poets and Poetry, however, I have to admit that his efforts  at being a poet leave much to be desired.  

Edmund and Ruth Frow are to be highly commended for bringing  together this book. They supplement the poems with an extensive and  valuable series of short essays, paragraphs may be a better description of  many, as well as provide a good selection of illustrations, one showing  TPS President, Michael Foot, beside Paine’s statue in Thetford. This is a  superb book which I have no hesitation in urging all readers to purchase.

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Thomas Paine: At the Limits of Bourgeois Radicalism. By Anthony Arblaster. In SOCIALISM AND THE LIMITS OF LIBERALISM. Edited by P. Osbome. Verso, 1991. £12.95  

It is refreshing to read an essay about Thomas Paine which not only places him in his historical context but also emphasises his relevance  oday. This essay is part of a book which was compiled in 1991, when the dust created by the fall of the Berlin Wall had not yet settled, with  the aim of rescuing socialism from its many jubilant critics.  

In the introduction Peter Osborne writes: ‘To write of the future of  liberalism in Britain at the end of the nineteenth century was, of  necessity, to write also about socialism. Today, a hundred years later, the  reverse is true: it has become impossible to write off the prospects for socialism without raising once more its relation to liberalism.’ It is in  this context that Arblaster writes about the liberal radicalism of Thomas  Paine. He starts his essay by placing Paine in the context of the  radicalism of the French Revolution. He points out that the ideology of  the American and French Revolutions was a bourgeois ideology of the  most radical form. A radical ideology with its limitations and  impediments but still challenging and relevant. Arblaster argues, ‘This  radical ideology points both backwards and forwards – backwards to  pre-capitalist notions of a ‘moral economy’, forwards to socialism – but it  also intersects the central liberal ideology of the market. All three  elements are present in Paine, but also in the French and American  Revolutions of this period.’  

Arblaster then sets about explaining Paine’s liberalism by showing  that Paine does not see a political or economic cause of war but rather  its roots lie with the dominance of societies by hereditary monarchs. Get  rid of them and there would be no wars. He also shows that Paine’s  liberalism is closely linked to Adam Smith and believes that free trade  benefits all. His attack on hereditary monarchy was also for economic  reasons as monarchs put an unnecessary burden on taxation. However,  Paine was not an advocate of economic egalitarianism, as Arblaster  points out that even in Agrarian Justice Paine believes that some  economic inequalities are justified and even desirable.  

Arblaster is aware that Paine’s liberalism could easily be used by  conservatives like Margaret Thatcher, so he is keen to redress the  balance by showing Paine’s radicalism. While most of Paine’s contemporaries saw poverty as undesirable but nevertheless a natural consequence  of over-population, Paine could never bring himself to blame the poor for their condition. He clearly started to move towards a class analysis of  poverty and wealth. Arblaster points out that Paine not only goes a lot  further than most of those around him but also a lot further than many  people today in his solutions to end this problem. He does not see this  contradiction of Paine’s belief in minimalistic government while  advocating intervention to end poverty as a problem with Paine, because they are central to the bourgeois assault on feudalism and absolutism, and the liberalisation of capitalist enterprise; but also  because at this point in modern history no one… is formulating a theory  of interventionism, of positive state action.’ Therefore, ‘Paine stands at  the most radical edge of bourgeois liberalism in theory, and could even  be said to go beyond it in his detailed practical proposals.’  

Not only is an excellent essay on Thomas Paine which clearly and  concisely explains his ideas and places them in their historical context,  but Arblaster also successfully shows that Paine is still relevant today. He points out that ‘Recent vast increases in capitalist power and in the  huge wealth of a small minority, coupled with attacks on the poor and  their minimal entitlements, have returned these issues to the centre of  the political stage. With the Labour Party currently debating the future  of Clause 4 (A clause in the British Labour Party constitution) those who want to ditch it and embrace the market  economy should read Paine and this essay. This is an essay which would  be welcomed not only by scholars of Paine but also be a good  introduction to his work. We need more essays of this calibre.

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Paine, Scripture, And Authority. The Age Of Reason As Religious And  Political Idea. Edward H. Davidson and William J. Scheick. Lehigh University Press, 1994. £22.50  

I found this an important yet highly irritating book. Important in its  coverage, discussion and identification of many of the books and ideas  which had influenced Paine. Irritating in that Paine is assessed in terms  of what may be described as an academic exercise.  

If Paine is taken as representative of authority, or, as the authors  often see him, as presenting himself in such a role, then so be it. But this drags him from his social and political context for what he sought to do was to prompt ordinary people to examine the basis for the claims  on which authority was supposed to rest, in short, form their own  conclusions for themselves. Thus each individual was seen as being their  own authority. Paine, then, was an inspiration but not an authority,  unless his ideas were accepted unquestionably at face value, and this he  never wanted.  

The many ‘replies’ to The Age of Reason, several of which the authors  cite, illustrate all too clearly how Paine’s rejection of authority upset  them, particularly as his ideas were addressed to ordinary people who  were expected as a matter of course to accept their humble role in  society, ‘theirs not to reason why, theirs but to do and die..’  

Paine, Scripture, and Authority is an important work, particularly as it is the first book for many years to focus on The Age of Reason. Yet for all its value it pays too much attention to what the authors see as Paine’s personal motivation and too little to actually assessing the contemporary  status of his book. This remains to be done.  

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Thomas Paine has never been forgiven by some people for having not just written The Age of Reason, but for doing so in a very readable style, this, if anything, was considered the book’s greatest danger. Although today many eminent Christians, the recently retired bishop of Durham being a good example, express opinions regarding the bible similar, if not going beyond, those of Paine, few, if any, express their very real debt to him for instituting a debate which was ultimately to give them the freedom to express their opinions, though in saying this  no one should forget the very real debt we owe to the many publishers  who risked all to keep Paine’s works in print and so in circulation.  Without the courage of these people it is to be doubted whether a 19th  century bishop of Exeter would have been able, or willing, to assert that  evolution was ‘in no sense whatever antagonistic to the teachings of  religion’.  

That an 18th century critique of the bible is still able to infuriate  contemporary Christians is testament to its lasting value, yet this  response to Paine rarely takes the form of an attempt to reply to his  ideas, rather it takes the form of attacks on him as an individual. I was  reminded of this when I was recently sent a copy of an article from an  evangelical periodical. It was anonymously sent and the name of the  journal from which the article had been photocopied, but it was dated  for 1994. The article retailed the usual lies so beloved of by Christian  critics of Paine, namely that he had benefited financially from his works,  was hated and, of course, was a drunkard. Naturally no sources were  given in support, though I suspect some of the so-called ‘facts’ were  taken from a biography of Paine by an American academic who  dredged up any report he could of Paine drinking, most of these  reports being highly questionable. Only the source of one claim was  identified by the anonymous author of the article, a claim that Paine  had converted to Christianity just before his death. This claim was taken  from a book entitled The Impossibility of Agnosticism (Inter-Varsity  Fellowship, Nd.), written by a Rev. Dr. Leith Samuel.  

It so happens that some years ago I chanced across Samuel’s book  and attacked his claim in a letter to the publisher. In this I accused him  of repeating a lie, to which Samuel responded by writing to me, my  letter having been passed to him, in which he said he had no desire to  repeat a lie and admitted he had not checked on the background of the  claim. He promised to do so, after I gave him particulars, and contacted  me again. He never did.

According to the article, or Samuel, Paine, along with Voltaire (who  was not mentioned in the article) was a most ardent pursuer of  pleasure. It almost goes without saying that neither the writer of the  article nor Samuel saw fit to identify the source, or sources, for this claim.  This was followed by a claim that Paine had disowned his opinions as  expressed in The Age of Reason and accepted Christ. Samuel says the  information came from a tale told by an itinerant evangelical preacher,  one Stephen Grellet. However, this is nothing more than a variation of a  tale concocted by a Mary Roscoe, or, in other versions, a Mary Hinsdale.  Thus it appears at first that there were two witnesses to Paine’s supposed  conversion, a fact which much influenced Samuel. But there were not  two witnesses, or claimants, for Mary Roscoe and Mary Hinsdale were  one and the same person, Hinsdale being Roscoe’s married name.  

She had been employed as a servant by a wealthy Quaker merchant,  Willett Hicks, a close friend of Paine, who had supported him in his last  months. She claimed to have been instructed by him to deliver  something to Paine and stated that when she arrived at his home she  heard him calling out with intense feeling, “Lord Jesus have mercy  upon me”. Hinsdale also said she had been asked by Paine him as to  what she thought of The Age of Reason, to which she had replied that she had burned the book. Paine is then said to have wished he had done  likewise.  

This tale in its various forms circulated among, and was actively  promoted by, 19th century Christian preachers, and, so it seems, their  20th century successors. However, they, like Samuel, took care not to  refer to William Cobbett’s investigation of the origin of the tale and his  subsequent exposure of it as being fraudulent (Samuel claimed to know  nothing of Cobbett’s investigation). In 1818 Cobbett, who had been  converted from being a bitter critic of Paine to that of ardent admirer,  even if he did not accept fully the theological criticism of The Age of  Reason, was visiting New York and while there was approached by a  Quaker named Charles Collins, who had heard that Cobbett was  planning to write a life of Paine. Collins sought to convince him that  Paine had renounced the views as set out in The Age of Reason, a fact, he  thought, which should be included in Cobbett’s book. Cobbett, though,  suspected ‘friend Charley’, as he called him, of being ‘a most  consummate hypocrite, who had a sodden face, a simper and  “manoeuvred his features, precisely like the most perfidious wretch”  and demanded from him the source of his claim. With much reluctance  this was eventually given, Collin’s informant being none other than  Mary Hinsdale, who, it transpired, was then actually living in New York.  

Posing as a Quaker, as Hinsdale claimed she belonged to that sect, Cobbett went to visit her. Employing all his skills he eventually managed  to extract from her the truth, even though she is said by him to have  ‘shuffled, evaded, equivocated, warded off’ while effecting not to  understand the content matter of a paper he had been given by Collins  on which he had written down Hinsdale’s claims concerning Paine.  Hinsdale told Cobbett that she had never given Collins the authority to  say anything about Paine in her name. ‘Oh no Friend,’ she said, ‘I tell  thee, that I have no recollection of any person or anything that I saw at  Thomas Paine’s house’.  

It was later revealed that Hinsdale had made a number of claims  concerning the supposed conversions of others. One concerned a  woman identified as Mary Lockwood. This tale is being exposed as a lie by  the family. It would seem that Hinsdale was an opium addict and  needed money to buy the drug; she had found a profitable market  amongst evangelical Christians for tales of Paine’s conversion. Willett  Hicks, when the claim was put before him, publicly branded Hinsdale’s  claims concerning Paine as “pious fraud and fabrication”, noting that  she had never been sent by him to Paine’s house, nor had she spoken to  him. Hicks also added that he had been offered many bribes to produce  a statement saying Paine had renounced his religious opinions before  he died. Paine’s physician, DrJ.R.Manley, himself a Christian who had  himself tried frequently to get Paine to renounce his religious opinions  and was anything but friendly towards him, testified he had not, despite  his pressure, changed his views. Having asked him whether he wished to  believe `that Jesus Christ is the Son of God’, Paine had thought for a few  minutes and then replied, ‘I have no wish to believe on that subject’  

It is difficult to understand what the writer of the article, Samuel and  others of that ilk gain from repeating lies about Paine, for even had he  renounced his opinions, the case advanced in The Age of Reason would  still stand. Perhaps it is a case of grasping at straws. Whatever be the  case, those who do this sort of thing only discredit the cause they claim to serve.

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Soon after becoming Honorary Secretary of the Thomas Paine Society our eminent President warned me to try to keep off the subject of religion regarding Thomas Paine. However, I would like to make a  few points which sometimes are overlooked. For many it is indeed a  hornets nest but we always have to be conscious of the fact that it is  extremely difficult to sweep away many centuries of indoctrination and  surveys show that about 70% of people still believe in god, though less  than 5% go regularly to church.  

It is a bit of a paradox that some atheists are the most ardent admirers of Thomas Paine and his many faceted life, yet he made it abundantly clear that he believed in one god and that Quakerism left an indelible mark on him in many ways, apart from being willing to  fight in a just cause.  

We know Paine had no time for religious dogmas however wrapped  up and independence of thought and action was his happiness and  many of us are thankful for his wisdom and courage shown in The Age of  Reason, bringing out the cruelties, follies, exploitation and general  misuse of power by the church and the inaccuracies and inconsistency  of it. But many atheists tend to overlook all the good that has been  done, with or without ulterior motives in education, medical and  charitable work generally throughout the world.  

I hold Thomas Paine’s values of deism but will not mock those who  find comfort and solace in church membership including Catholics and Muslims. In my experience some militant atheists (like some believers) are not particularly likeable people, often cold, cynical about everything with little or no idealism in them. Not many foundations or institutions for the betterment of the less fortunate have been promoted by atheists and they tend to be lacking in tolerance for other people’s foibles and weaknesses which we all have. Even Voltaire, who perhaps much influenced Paine, said that if god had not been invented it would have been necessary to do so in order to suppress our basest instincts and selfishness. 

It must be said, whether we like it or not, that more altruistic work has been done in the world by those who believe in god than by those who sincerely believe that the “god thing” is a complete myth. Also, however we view religion, churches are a tremendous link with our ancestors worldwide. Regarding an afterlife, if any, those who fervently believe in spiritualism, psychic powers, continuation of life through atomic particles or whatever, need to remember that Thomas Paine only said that he hoped for happiness hereafter and that the almighty can change a caterpillar into a beautiful butterfly, then it is possible there is an afterlife. Sincere believers in Jesus who want absolutes and are sure he was the son of god (unlike Paine) unless they suffer too much from hypocrisy and cant on their doorstep, are very hard to move. 

There is no denying that in many countries today christians, muslims, jews or whatever stand aside from fundamental abuses of human rights by oppressive regimes and in other countries religious believers are still persecuted. Thomas Paine said it is the scheme of invented systems of religion to hold man in ignorance of his creator, likewise of governments to hold man in ignorance of his rights. Thereby they are calculated for mutual support, and we still have not got separation of church and state. 

Thomas Paine preached tolerance, deciding that Adam, if there ever was such a man, was created a deist, stating, “let every man follow, as he has the right to do, the religion and worship he prefers”, presumably that covers rejection of any type of religion or faith. 

None of us knows for sure about the mysteries of life but we do need moral imperatives to guide us and if we try to live by the simple maxim of do unto others as we would be done by, we are less likely to land ourselves in trouble and confusion. Some may argue, perhaps with some justification, that religion, even though misused. as opium for the people, may in some cases be better than no religion at all or one based only on consumerism and to hell with the consequences for society and the planet.

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Standing at the entrance to Lympstone Harbour on the river Exe in  Devon was a pillar of red sandstone. It was known as Darling Rock, or, by older inhabitants, as Tom Paine’s Field. The effects of wind, rain and tides have eroded the pillar so that it is now a mound of sandstone hardly visible at high tide. Sheep once grazed on it when it was connected to the Cliff Field above the village.  

In 1792 the government ordered the public burning of the writings of the ‘notorious pamphleteer Tom Paine’ and, historical tradition has it that this was the site of the local burning.¹ 

On January 3, 1793, Trewman’s Exeter Flying Post² reported that on the previous Tuesday (January 1), ‘the loyal inhabitants of Exmouth  (about two miles south of Lympstone) and its environs assembled for  the purpose of hanging and burning Tom Paine. A handsome collection for that purpose having been previously made – about 12  o’clock the procession began, consisting of the trades-people of the  town, the farmers of the neighbourhood and sailors, two and two with  bands of music, banners flying etc., etc., and lastly an effigy of Tom  Paine in a cart, with the Rights of Man in one hand and a pair of stays in  the other. They paraded through every part of the town singing God  Save the King and receiving from the inhabitants every testimony of  loyalty to his Majesty, veneration for the constitution and detestation of  the principles of the miscreant they were about to burn. The procession  then went to the Point where they hung the effigy on a gibbet 50 feet high, then burnt it amid the acclamations of every individual present.’  

Robert Morrell³ has recorded three instances, one near  Nottingham, one at Titmarch and another at Thrapstone, both in  Northamptonshire, of similar hangings and burnings.  

It would appear that then, as now, the public can be easily inflamed  and persuaded, against their own good, that their enemies are those  whom the government of the day wish them to regard as such.  

There must be many other instances of similar happenings throughout England. Readers may like to explore local libraries and historical societies for such reports.  

References

1. Devonshire Association. Reports and Transactions. 88. 1956. p.110. 8 plates.  
2. Cann, I.G. & Bush, R.J.E. Extracts from Trewman’s Exeter Flying Post from 1763. Volt. pp.51-52.  
3. Morrell, R.W. ‘Burning Paine in Effigy. TPS Bulletin.

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Bearing in mind the track record of countries called republics and  the antics of their political heads of state in recent times, I am not sure  that Thomas Paine would be against the idea of a constitutional  monarchy in Great Britain as we enter the so-called 21st century. That  is, a monarch freed from the burden of being head of the Catholic Church in England. However, there is no doubt that Thomas would be  fighting just as hard against the fact that men (not women) can actually  be born to legislate in the British Parliament. Inherited lords have more  power than the Royal Family! This is a paradox as bad as anything  invented by priests in the Dark Ages in order to keep the masses in  servitude. Surely the days are numbered for this crazy set-up called the  House of Lords.  

Perhaps today Thomas Paine would be more in line with the majority  of the members of the society that bears his name – secularists and  atheists. Thomas has been described as the most valuable Englishman  ever. The writings of Arthur Findlay, who must be a candidate for the  title of the most valuable Scotsman ever, would really appeal to arguably  the greatest enemy of tyranny who has ever lived – Thomas Paine.  Findlay says, if you must have this god dummy to suck, why not have a  whole stack of gods? Intelligent Greeks and Romans looked upon  religious mythology as a bit of fun, and could always fit in another god  here and there. As Gore Vidal says, it is monotheism that is easily the  greatest disaster ever to be inflicted on the human race. Findlay pleads  with the big daddy god merchants to put an extra “o” in this dreadful  priestly word that has caused the death of untold millions; start to move  in the paths of goodness. 

Recent revolutionary discoveries in subatomic physics, showing that  reality also exists in the invisible, vindicates Thomas Paine’s idea of a  separate mind and brain, alongside the possibility of us all surviving the  death of our physical bodies. Thomas may have more in common with  his contemporary supporters who call themselves survivalists. They part  company with their fellow secularists and atheists regarding the  immortality of the mind. An atheist is only a person who refuses to  grovel to a supreme, supernatural being invented by priests at a time  when it was thought the sun was a ball of fire going round a flat earth.  

Quantum mechanics – the study of the very small within the atom – proves that our building blocks are made of invisible stuff, therefore, it  is not so fantastic to imagine something we cannot see or sense,  containing the mind, separating from our physical bodies when they  eventually pack in.  

We have had the experimental scientific proof of survival after death  for over one hundred years. International teams of scientists carried out  repeatable experiments under laboratory conditions where people who  once lived on earth came back and showed they were still alive. In the  vanguard of these experiments were the great pioneers of radio and  television, Sir William Crookes, OM., FRS., Sir Oliver Lodge, FRS and  John Logie Baird. They argued that the so-called next world was  another wavelength like invisible radio and television signals, but at a  much higher frequency: “An possible utilisation of the ether by  discarnate intelligences must be left as a problem for the future.” (Sir  Oliver Lodge).  

Well the future is here. Bath based British scientist, Ronald Pearson,  has returned in triumph from the Sir Isaac Newton Conference in  St.Petersburg, Russia. Physicists in Russia have discarded Einstein’s  outdated Theory of Relativity and taken on Pearson’s extensions to  Newton’s laws bringing the ether theory right back into play. Now we  have the mathematical data to back up the seemingly supernatural  experiments that took place at the turn of the century. We now have a  rational explanation to account for why our ancestors invented all the  divisive religions. They thought the etheric people appearing to their  pals on earth after they had died were angels, devils, gods or big daddy  god himself. With the benefit of hindsight, we now know the people in  the “next world” are for the most part just as thick and stupid as when  they were on earth. Most definitely not to be worshipped or kowtowed to. 

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