Cobbett’s Evening Post – Tuesday 08 February 1820
CURIOUS HISTORY OF A CALUMNY ON PAINE.
By William Cobbett
It is a part of the business of a press, sold to the CAUSE OF CORRUPTION, to calumniate those, dead or alive, who have most effectually laboured against that cause; and, as PAINE was the most powerful and effectual of those labourers, so to calumniate him has been an object of their peculiar attention. Among other things said against this famous man, is, that he recanted before he died; and, that, in his last illness, he discovered horrible fears of death. This is, to be sure, a very good answer to what these same persons say about his hardened infidelity. But, it is a pure, unadulterated falsehood. This falsehood, which I shall presently trace to its origin (the heart of a profound hypocrite) was cried about the streets of Liverpool, when I landed there in November last. Thence it found its way to the grand receptacle and distributor of falsehood and calumny, the London press, which has sent it all over this kingdom. One Country paper, however, pre-eminent in all that is foul and mean, affects to possess original matter and authentic information on the subject; and, indeed it pledges itself for the character of the “gentleman” from whom it received the pretended authentic account. The Country-paper I allude to is, the Norwich Mercury, printed and published by one BURKS; and the article on PAINE is as follows:
“The following is an extract of an American letter, the writer of which is from authority equally entitled to credit:—
The latter had resided in a family in the neighbourhood of the celebrated Thomas Paine, which, during his last illness, had contributed to his comfort by occasional [contributions] ending in food and refreshment better adapted to his situation than he usually enjoyed. Of these the informant chose to be the bearer to his bedside, although his personal circumstances were so deplorable that the air of his chamber could scarcely be endured, and in performing this humane act had the opportunities of conversation with him, which authorized the writer’s belief, that he exhibited another proof of Dr. Young’s assertion, that ‘men may live fools, but fools they cannot die.’
The letter proceeds:—
[Paine asked her] if she had ever read his writing, and on being answered in the affirmative, desired [to know if she was] but a child when she read [it, and if she would] not like to know what she thought of it: upon which he said, if old enough to read, she was capable of forming some opinion, and that from her he expected a candid statement of what that opinion had been. She then said, she thought it the most dangerous insinuating book she had ever read; that the more she read the more she wished to read, and the more she found her mind estranged from all that is good; and that from a conviction of its evil tendency she had burned it, without knowing to whom it belonged. Paine replied to this, that he wished all who had read it had been as wise as she; and added, ‘If ever the Devil had an agent on earth, I have been one.’ At another time, when she and the master of her family were sitting by his bedside, one of Paine’s further companions came to the door, and seeing them, hastily went out, drawing the door after him with violence, and saying, ‘Mr. Paine, you have lived like a man, but you will die like a dog.’ Paine, turning to his master, [said] ‘and you see what miserable comforters I have.’ [An unhappy female, who had followed] him from France, lamented for him, observing [to the] old man ‘I have given my family and friends my property and my religion; judge then of my distress, when he tells me that the principles he has taught me will not bear me out.'”
The Norwich Mercury did not imagine, that any one would take the pains to expose this tissue of falsehoods. In the first place, why does he not name his “gentleman” of such excellent character? How these informers skulk! Mr. Burks can pledge himself for the character of the “gentleman” informer, but, where are we to get a pledge for the character of Mr. Burks, who, if we are to judge from this act of his, stands in need of very good sponsors.
Let us look at the internal evidence of the falsehood of this story. Mr. Paine possessed, at his death, an unencumbered estate of two hundred and fifty acres of land, not more than twenty miles from New York. He possessed a considerable sum besides. These he left by will. Will any one believe, that he was, on his dying bed, in want of proper nourishment, and that he was in a deplorable state as to apartments and necessaries? Then, was it likely, that a neighbour’s maid servant went to carry him a little present of sweet-meats, or the like, and that he would begin a conversation on theology with her? And, is it not monstrous to suppose, that he would call himself the devil’s agent to HER?
I happen to know the origin of this story; and I possess the real, original document, whence have proceeded the divers editions of the falsehood, of the very invention of which I was, perhaps, myself, the innocent cause!
About two years ago, I, being then on Long Island, published my intention of writing an account of the life of Paine. A Quaker at New York, named Charles Collins, made many applications for an interview with me, which at last, he obtained. I found that his object was to persuade me, that Paine had recanted. I laughed at him, and sent him away. But, he returned again and again to the charge. He wanted me to promise, that I would say that if he said it, “say that you say it, and that you tell a lie, unless you prove the truth of what you say; and, if you do that, I shall gladly insert the declaration.”
This posed “friend Charley,” whom I suspected to be a most consummate hypocrite. He had a sodden face, a simper, and manœuvred his features, precisely like the most perfidious wretch that I have known or ever read or heard of. He was precisely the reverse of my honest, open, and sincere Quaker friends, the Pauls of Pennsylvania. Friend Charley plied me with remonstrances and reasonings; but, I always answered him: “Give me proof; name persons; state times; or, I will denounce thee as a liar.” Thus put to his trumps, friend Charley resorted to the aid of a person of his own stamp; and, at last, he brought me a paper, containing matter, of which the above statement of Mr. BURKS is a garbled edition! This paper, very cautiously and craftily drawn, contained only the initials of names. This would not do. I made him, at last, put down the full name and the address of the informer, “Mary HINSDALE, No. 10, Anthony street, New York.” I got this from friend Charley some time about June last; and had opportunity of visiting the party till late in October, just before I sailed.
The informer was a Quaker woman, who, at the time of Mr. PAINE’s last illness, was a servant in the family of Mr. WILLET HICKS, an eminent merchant, a man of excellent character, a Quaker, and even, I believe, a Quaker Preacher. Mr. Hicks, a kind and liberal and rich man, visited Mr. PAINE in his illness, and, from his house, which was near that of Mr. PAINE, little nice things (as is the practice in America) were sometimes sent to him; of which this servant, friend Mary, was the bearer, and this was the way, in which the lying cant got into the room of Mr. Paine.
To “friend Mary,” therefore, I went, on the 26 of October last, with friend Charley’s paper in my pocket. I found her in a lodging in a back room up one pair of stairs. I saw that I had no common cunning to set my wit against. I began with all the art that I was master of. I had got a prodigiously broad-brimmed hat on; I patted a little child that she had sitting beside her; I called her friend; and played all the awkward tricks of an undisciplined wheedler. But, I was compelled to come quickly to business. She asked, “what’s thy name, friend?” and, the moment I said William Cobbett, up went her mouth as tight as a purse! Sack-making appeared to be her occupation; and that I might not extract through her eyes that which she was resolved I should not get out of her mouth, she went and took up a sack, and began to sew and not another look or glance could I get from her.
However, I took out my paper, read it, and, stopping at several points, asked her if it was true. Talk of the Jesuits, indeed! The whole tribe of Loyola, who have shaken so many kingdoms to their base, never possessed a millionth part of the cunning of this drab-coloured little woman, whose face simplicity and innocence seemed to have chosen as the place of their triumph! She shuffled; she evaded; she equivocated; she warded off; she affected not to understand me, not to understand the paper, not to remember and all this with so much seeming simplicity and single-heartedness, and in a voice so mild, so soft, and so sweet, that, if the Devil had been sitting where I was, he would certainly have jumped up and hugged her to his bosom!
The result was that it was so long ago, that she could not speak positively to any part of the matter—that she would not say that any part of the paper was true—that she had never seen the paper; and, that she had never given “friend Charley” (for so she called him) authority to say any thing about the matter in her name. I pushed her closely upon the subject of the “unhappy French Female.” Asked her, whether she should know her again? “Oh, no! friend: I tell thee, that I have no recollection of any person or any thing that I saw at THOMAS PAINE’s house.” The truth is, that the cunning little thing knew that the French lady was at hand; and that detection was easy, if she had said that she should know her upon sight!
I had now nothing to do but to bring friend Charley’s nose to the grindstone. But, Charley, who is a grocer, living in Cherry-street, near Pearl-street, though so pious a man, and, doubtless, in great haste to get to everlasting bliss, had moved out of the city for fear of the fever, not liking, apparently, to go off to the next world in a yellow skin. And thus he escaped me, who sailed from New York in four days afterwards: or, Charley should have found, that there was something else, on this side the grass, pretty nearly as troublesome and as dreadful as the Yellow Fever.
This is, I think, a pretty good instance of the lengths to which hypocrisy will go. The whole, as far as relates to recantation, and to the “unhappy French female,” is a lie, from the beginning to the end. Mr. PAINE declares, in his last Will, that he retains all his publicly expressed opinions as to religion. His Executors, and many other gentlemen of undoubted veracity had the same declaration from his dying lips. He left behind him no recantation at all, though he had such ample time for doing it, and though this confidant was so ready to receive it and take care of it. The story is false upon the face of it: and, nothing but a simpleton, or something a great deal worse, would believe it or aid in its circulation and affect to believe it to be true.
Mr. Willet Hicks followed him to nearly the last. This gentleman says, that there was no change of opinion intimated to him; and, will any man believe, that PAINE would have withheld from Mr. HICKS, that which he was so forward to communicate to Mr. Hicks’s servant girl?
Observe, reader, that, in this tissue of falsehoods, is included a most foul and venomous slander on a woman of virtue and of spotless honour. But, hypocrites will stick at nothing. Calumny is their weapon, and a base press is the hand to wield it. Mr. Burks will not insert this article, nor will he acknowledge his error. He knows, that the calumny, which he has circulated, has done what he intended it to do; and he and the “gentleman” for whose character he pledges himself, will wholly disregard good men’s contempt, so long as it does not diminish their gains.
This is not at all a question of religion. It is a question of moral truth. Whether MR. PAINE’s opinions were correct, or erroneous, has nothing to do with this matter.