"Paine who wrote in man's defense,'Rights of Man' and 'Common Sense,Let not pious virulenceStain his honest fame."
Paine has been represented by his religious enemies as the embodiment of all that is bad. He was, they assert, drunken, filthy, and immoral. Banished from respectable society, he associated, they say, only with the low and vile. The following testimony covers all the years that elapsed from the beginning of his public career to the end of his life.
Dr. Franklin, writing from England while Paine was yet a resident of that country, says: "Mr. Thomas Paine is very well recommended to me as an ingenious worthy young man."
That his previous life had been above serious reproach is shown by a letter to the Excise Office in which he says: "No complaint of the least dishonesty or intemperance has ever appeared against me."
James B. Elliot: "Paine's pamphlet ['Case of the Officers of Excise'] secured for him the acquaintance of Oliver Goldsmith, who became and remained his friend until his death, and by whom he was introduced to Benjamin Franklin."
"At a coffeehouse in London Paine met that other great thinker, Franklin. They became fast friends."—Elbert Hubbard.
"Invited by Franklin he went to America."—Encyclopedia of Social Reform.
"His associates in Philadelphia were people of the highest respectability and importance.... He was welcomed everywhere."—James B. Elliott.
Referring to his first year in America Bancroft says: "In that time he had frequented the society of Rittenhouse, Clymer and Samuel Adams." Dr. Rush says: "He visited in the families of Dr. Franklin, Mr. Rittenhouse and Mr. George Clymer." Referring to the members of the Philosophical Society, founded by Franklin, Dr. Conway says: "Paine was welcomed into their circle by Rittenhouse, Clymer, Rush, Muhlenberg, and other representatives of the scientific and literary metropolis."
Writing in his journal at a later period John Hall, the English mechanician who then resided in Philadelphia, mentions among Paine's visitors and intimate associates Franklin, Gouverneur Morris, Dr. Rush, Tench Francis, Robert Morris, Rittenhouse, etc.
The Library of the World's Best Literature alludes to scientific experiments made by Paine "for the entertainment of Washington whose guest he was for some time."
Francis Marion Lemmon: "When my father [a son of one of Washington's officers] was about twelve years of age he was employed by George Washington to carry messages from his military camp to that of his father and other military posts, and for about four years lived as one of the family of Washington. It was my father's privilege during his service with Washington to meet and become acquainted with a number of the most popular and influential men of that time—such as Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Paine, General Lafayette and General Francis Marion.... My father told me, when I was a boy, of the visits these men paid to Uncle George and Aunt Martha Washington, as he always called them, and he told me that Aunt Martha always called Paine 'Brother Tom' and always looked forward when a visit of Brother Tom was expected."
Alluding to Paine's conduct and public services during the Revolution, Dr. Conway says:
"They are best measured in the value set on them by the great leaders most cognizant of them,—by Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Adams, Madison, Robert Morris, Chancellor Livingston, R. H. Lee, Colonel Laurens, General Greene, Dickinson. Had there been anything dishonorable or mercenary in Paine's career, these are the men who would have known it; but their letters are searched in vain for even the faintest hint of anything disparaging to his patriotic self-devotion during those eight weary years."
Henry Adams: "Thomas Paine, down to the time of his departure for Europe, in 1787, was a fashionable member of society [in New York], admired and courted as the greatest literary genius of his day."
The oldest and one of the most powerful political organizations in this country, outside of the regular political parties, is the Tammany Society of New York. Whatever shortcomings may be justly charged to this society in later times it was in its earlier days, when devoted mainly to social and benevolent purposes, one of the most honorable and respectable of societies. Paine was the hero of this society.
Dr. Conway says: "At the great celebration (October 12, 1792) of the Third Centenary of the discovery of America, by the sons of St. Tammany, New York, the first man toasted after Columbus was Paine, and next to Paine 'The Rights of Man,' They were also extolled in an ode composed for the occasion, and sung." Paine was at this time a resident of France.
"Visited France in the summer of 1787, where he made the acquaintance of Buffon, Malesherbes, La Rochefoucauld, and other eminent men."—Chambers' Encyclopedia.
"Dr. Robinet, the French historian, says on this visit (1787) Paine, who had long known the 'soul of the people,' came into' relation with eminent men of all groups, philosophical and political—Condorcet, Achille Duchatelet, Cardinal De Brienne, and, he believes also Danton, who like the English republican [Paine] was a Freemason."—Dr. Conway.
Gilbert Patten Brown (in Masonic Monthly, July, 1916): "In the St. John's Regimental Lodge (the first Masonic body to be constituted among the troops) Thomas Paine (like Capt. James Monroe, Capt. John Marshall and many other of minor mention) was entered, crafted and raised a Master Mason."
Franklin, who in 1774 introduced Paine to the New World as "an ingenious worthy young man" in 1787, after an acquaintance of thirteen years, reaffirms his former estimate of the man. In a letter of introduction to the Duke of Rochefoucauld he says: "The bearer of this is Mr. Paine, the author of a famous piece entitled 'Common Sense,' published with great effect on the minds of the people at the beginning of the Revolution. He is an ingenious, honest man; and as such I beg leave to recommend him to your civilities."
Lamb's Biographical Dictionary: "Visiting London, he at once became a social and diplomatic feature of that metropolis."
Thomas "Clio" Rickman: "Mr. Paine's life in London was a quiet round of philosophical leisure and enjoyment.... Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the French and American embassadors, Mr. Sharp, the engraver, Romney, the painter, Mrs. Wollstonecraft, Joel Barlow,... Dr. Priestley,... Mr. Horne Tooke, etc., were among the number of his friends and acquaintances."
"His manners were easy and gracious; his knowledge was universal and boundless; in private company and among his friends his conversation had every fascination that anecdote, novelty and truth could give it."
"Mr. Paine in his person was about five feet ten inches high, and rather athletic.... His eye, of which the painter could not convey the exquisite meaning, was full, brilliant and singularly piercing."
Alexander Wilson: "The penetration and intelligence of his eye bespeak the man of genius."
John Adams, in a letter to his wife, refers to Paine as "a man who, General Lee says, has genius in his eyes." Carlyle describes him as "the man with the black beaming eyes." Walter Morton, who was with him when he died, says, "His eye glistened with genius under the pangs of death."
Dr. Thomas Cooper: "I have dined with Mr. Paine in literary society, in London, at least a dozen times, when his dress, manners, and conversation were such as became the character of an unobtrusive intelligent gentleman, accustomed to good society."
Regarding Paine's associations in England his biographer, Dr. Conway, says: "There [Rotherham] and in London he was 'lionized' as Franklin had been in Paris. We find him now passing a week with Edmund Burke, now at the country seat of the Duke of Portland, or enjoying the hospitalities of Lord Fitzwilliam at Wentworth House. He is entertained and consulted on public affairs by Fox, Lord Landsdowne, Sir George Staunton, Sir Joseph Banks."
"The Americans in London—the artists West and Trumbull, the Alexanders (Franklin's connections), and others were fond of him as a friend and proud of him as a countryman."—Ibid.
"His personal acquaintance," says Dr. Conway, "included nearly every great or famous man of his time, in England, America, France."
Paine not only enjoyed the friendship and esteem of the notables of the world, he was the idol of the common people who knew him. Before the Revolution in France began he spent two years in England, engaged a part of the time perfecting his iron bridge. The leading manufacturing firm of Rotherham encouraged him and fitted up a shop for him to work in. Nearly a half century later Professor Lesley of Philadelphia, then a young man, visited Rotherham. Notwithstanding the long time that had elapsed he found Paine's memory still green and one of the cherished possessions of Yorkshire. The results of his visit are thus related by Dr. Conway:
"Professor Lesley of Philadelphia tells me that when visiting in early life the works at Rotherham, Paine's workshop and the very tools he used were pointed out. They were preserved with care. He conversed with an aged and intelligent workman who had worked under Paine as a lad. Professor Lesley, who had shared some of the prejudice against Paine, was impressed by the earnest words of the old man. Mr. Paine he said was the most honest man, and the best man he ever knew. After he had been there a little time everybody looked up to him, the Walkers and their workmen. He knew the people for miles round, and went into their homes; his benevolence, his friendliness, his knowledge, made him beloved by all, rich and poor. His memory had always lasted there."
M. and Madame de Bonneville: "Not a day [in Paris] escaped without his receiving many visits. Mr. Barlow, Mr. [Robert] Fulton, Mr. [Sir Robert] Smith, came very often to see him. Many travelers also called on him."
"Paine was, indeed, so overrun with visitors and adventurers that he appropriated two mornings of each week at the Philadelphia House for levees. These, however, became insufficient to stem the constant stream of visitors, including spies and lion-hunters, so that he had little time for consultation with the men and women whose cooperation he needed in public affairs. He therefore leased an out-of-the-way house [the old Madame Pompadour mansion], reserving knowledge of it for particular friends, while still retaining his address at the Philadelphia House, where the levees were continued."—Dr. Conway.
"Here [at Paine's house] gathered sympathetic spirits from America, England, France, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, freed from prejudices of race, rank, or nationality."—Ibid.
"And now the old hotel became the republican capitol of Europe. There sat an international Premier with his Cabinet."—Ibid.
"A grand dinner was given by Paine at the Hotel de Ville to Dumouriez, where this brilliant general met Brissot, Condorcet, Santerre, and several eminent English radicals."—Ibid.
"In the beautiful courtyard of the Palais Royal, I saw today for the first time the statue of Camille Desmoulins, one of the most heroic figures of the French Revolution.... He was one of Paine's warmest friends in Paris. Desmoulins had known Paine when the latter was a member of the Convention and doubtless was one of the interesting coterie that met at Paine's house in the Faubourg St. Denis."—William M. van der Weyde.
"When Bonaparte returned from Italy he called on Paine and invited him to dinner."—Clio Rickman.
"Among the persons I was in the habit of receiving Paine deserves to be mentioned."—Madame Roland.
Among Paine's most intimate French friends, besides the Bonnevilles with whom he lived for several years, were the Rolands, the Brissots, the Condorcets, and the Lafayettes, France's purest and noblest souls.
Baron Pichon: "Paine lived in Monroe's house at Paris."
While James Monroe was minister to France Paine was for a year and a half a member of his household, enjoying in the highest degree the esteem of both Mr. and Mrs. Monroe.
Paine was one of the most amiable of men and possessed a most charming personality. Nicolas and Margaret Bonneville, with whom he resided in Paris, in a biographical sketch of him, written after his death and revised by Cobbett, bear this testimony: "Thomas Paine loved his friends with sincere and tender affection. His simplicity of heart and that happy kind of openness, or rather, carelessness, which charms our hearts in reading the fables of the good Lafontaine, made him extremely amiable. If little children were near him he patted them, searched his pockets for the store of cakes, biscuits, sugar-plums, pieces of sugar, of which he used to take possession as of a treasure belonging to them, and the distribution of which belonged to him."
"He was always gentle to children and to animals."—Ellery Sedgwick.
The deep affection entertained for Paine by his Parisian friends was shown when, grievously ill and believed to be dying, he was carried from his cot in the Luxembourg to the home of the Monroes. I quote again from Dr. Conway: "Paine had been restored by the tenderness and devotion of friends. Had it not been for friendship he could hardly have been saved. We are little able, in the present day, to appreciate the reverence and affection with which Thomas Paine was regarded by those who saw in him the greatest apostle of liberty in the world.... In Paris there were ladies and gentlemen who had known something of the cost of liberty—Col. and Mrs. Monroe, Sir Robert and Lady Smith, Madame Lafayette, Mr. and Mrs. Barlow, M. and Madame de Bonneville. They had known what it was to watch through anxious nights with terrors surrounding them. He who % had suffered most was to them a sacred person. He had come out of the succession of ordeals, so weak in body, so wounded by American ingratitude, so sore at heart, that no delicate child needed more tender care.... Men say their Arthur is dead, but their love is stronger than death. And though the service of these friends might at first have been reverential, it ended with attachment, so great was Paine's power, so wonderful and pathetic his memories, so charming the play of his wit, so full his response to kindness."
"In Luxembourg prison," says Conway, "he won all hearts."
Augustus C. Buel: "Jones [John Paul] liked Tom Paine and Paine almost worshiped Jones [they were in Paris]. All through the American Revolution they had been fast friends, familiarly calling each other 'Tom' and 'Paul.'"
Joseph Mazzini Wheeler: "Landor [Walter Savage] told my friend Mr. Birch of Florence that he particularly admired Paine, and that he visited him, having first obtained an interview at the house of General Dumouriez [the most famous general of the Revolution]. Landor declared that Paine was always called 'Tom,' not out of disrespect, but because he was a jolly good fellow."
Lord Edward Fitzgerald (to his mother): "I lodge with my friend Paine [in Paris]; we breakfast, dine, and sup together. The more I see of his interior the more I like and respect him. I cannot express how kind he is to me. There is a simplicity of manner, a goodness of heart, and a strength of mind in him that I never knew a man before to possess."
Lady Lucy Fitzgerald: "Although he [Lord Edward] was unsuccessful in the glorious attempt of liberating his country [Ireland] from slavery, still he was not unmindful of the lessons you taught him. Accept, then, his picture from his unhappy sister. Its place is in your house; my heart will be satisfied with such a Pantheon: it knows no consolation but the approbation of such men as you, and the soothing recollection that he did his duty and died faithful to the cause of liberty."
Zachariah Wilkes: "Let me tell you what he did for me. I was arrested in Paris and condemned to die. I had no friend here; and it was at a time when no friend would have served me: Robespierre ruled. 'I am innocent!' I cried in desperation. 'I am innocent, so help me God! I am condemned for the offense of another.' I wrote a statement of my case with a pencil; thinking at first of addressing it to my judge, then of directing it to the president of the Convention."
[Wilkes, who was an Englishman, had important business to transact which involved his honor and he could not bear the thought of dying with it unperformed. The jailer referred him to Paine, who, though a prisoner, had much influence with the authorities.]
"He [Paine] examined me closer than my judge had done; he required my proofs. After a long time I satisfied him. He then said: 'The leaders of the Convention would rather have my life than yours. If by any means I can obtain your release on my own security, will you promise me to return in twenty days?'"
Wilkes promised to return. Paine then obtained permission for him to leave the prison, guaranteeing his return and agreeing to take his place at the guillotine if he failed to do so. Wilkes kept his word. He returned to the prison, drawing from Paine the exclamation, "There is yet English blood in England!" Wilkes had been opposed to Paine both in politics and religion.
Another instance of Paine's noble magnanimity is related by Dr. Conway: "This personage [Captain Grimstone, R. A.], during a dinner party at the Palais Egalité, got into a controversy with Paine, and, forgetting that the English Jove could not in Paris answer argument with thunder, called Paine a traitor to his country and struck him a violent blow. Death was the penalty for striking a deputy and Paine's friends were not unwilling to see the penalty inflicted on this stout young captain who had struck a man of fifty-six. Paine had much trouble in obtaining from Barrere, of the Committee of Public Safety, a passport out of the country for Captain Grimstone, whose traveling expenses were supplied by the man he had struck."
Lady Smith: "If the usual style of gallantry was as clever as your 'New Covenant' [a beautiful poem by Paine addressed to Lady Smith] many a fair lady's heart would be in danger; but the Little Corner of the World [Lady Smith] receives it from the Castle in the Air [Paine]; it is agreeable to her as being the elegant fancy of a friend."
Sir Robert and Lady Smith were Paine's most devoted English friends in Paris. When Paine was languishing in prison Lady Smith wrote him letters of cheer and comfort, signing herself "Little Corner of the World."
Frederick Freeman: "He [Captain Rowland Crocker] had taken the great Napoleon by the hand; he had familiarly known Paine.... He remembered Paine as a well-dressed and most gentlemanly man, of sound and orthodox republican principles, of a good heart, a strong intellect, and a fascinating address."
Among the many calumnies circulated against Paine is the charge that during his later years, after he wrote the "Age of Reason," he was, both in France and in America, a drunkard. This charge is false. Paine was one of the most temperate men of his time. Concerning his use of intoxicants in France his old friend Clio Rickman, who visited him in Paris, who was with him during his last day in that city, and who accompanied him to Havre when he sailed for America, says: "He did not drink spirits, and wine he took moderately; he even objected to any spirits being laid in as a part of his sea-stock."
Hon. E. B. Washburne, who made a thorough investigation of Paine's career in France, bears the following testimony: "A somewhat extended study of the French Revolution during the extraordinary period in which Paine was so intimately connected with it, fails to show anything to the prejudice of his personal or political character."
"Returned to the United States on the invitation of Jefferson in 1802."—Library of World's Best Literature.
Charles T. Sprading: "Jefferson offered him return passage from Europe on a United States man-of-war."
National Intelligencer (Washington, Nov. 10, 1802): "Thomas Paine has arrived in this city and has received a cordial reception from the Whigs of Seventy-six and the Republicans of 1800."
"He was cordially received by the President, Thomas Jefferson. He also visited the heads of the departments."—Boston Post.
Philadelphia Aurora, Washington Correspondent of (November 26, 1802): "His address is unaffected and unceremonious. He neither shuns nor courts observation. At table he enjoys what is good with the appetite of temperance and vigor, and puts to shame his calumniators by the moderation with which he partakes of the common beverage of the boarders.... I am proud to find a man whose political writings upon the whole have never been equaled, and whom I have admired on that account, free from the contamination of debauchery and habits of inebriety which have been so grossly and falsely sent abroad concerning him."
Dr. Samuel Latham Mitchell, M. C. (Washington, Dec. 11, 1802): "At Mr. Gallatin's I saw for the first time the celebrated Thomas Paine. We had some conversation before dinner and we sat side by side at the table.... This extraordinary man contributed exceedingly much to entertain the company."
Albert Gallatin was at this time Secretary of the Treasury. Referring to this period, including all the remaining years of his life, Conway says: "Paine's defamers have manifested an eagerness to ascribe his maltreatment to personal faults. This is not the case.... He was neat in his attire. In all portraits, French and American, his dress is in accordance with the fashion. There was not, so far as I can discover, a suggestion while he was at Washington, that he was not a suitable guest for any drawing-room in the capital."
Gilbert Vale, next to Dr. Conway, one of Paine's best biographers, says: "Mr. Paine was as much esteemed in his private life as in his public. He was a welcome visitor to the tables of the most distinguished citizens.... He possessed every prominent virtue in large proportions, and to these he added the most social qualities."
Annie Cary Morris: "Mr. Jefferson, it was said, received him warmly, dined him at the White House, and could be seen walking arm in arm with him on the street any fine afternoon."
"The author [Paine] was for some days a guest in the President's family."—Dr. Conway.
In his old age Paine received the following, one of many similar assurances of Jefferson's affection: "That you may live long to continue your useful labors, and reap the reward in the thankfulness of nations, is my sincere prayer. Accept the assurances of my high esteem and affectionate attachment."
"Jefferson's dearest friend," says Albert Payson Terhune, "was Thomas Paine."
Albert Badeau: "My mother [in whose mother's family, prominent and wealthy residents of New Rochelle, Paine boarded for a time during his later years] would never tolerate the aspersions on Mr. Paine. She declared steadfastly to the end of her life that he was a perfect gentleman, and a most faithful friend, amiable, gentle, never intemperate in eating or drinking. My mother declared that my grandmother equally pronounced the disparaging reports about Mr. Paine slanders. I never remembered to have seen my mother angry except when she heard such calumnies of Mr. Paine, when she would almost insult those who uttered them. My mother and grandmother were very religious, members of the Episcopal church."
The handsome monument erected to Paine at New Rochelle is said to have been suggested by Mrs. Badeau.
D. Burger (one of Paine's acquaintances at New Rochelle, who often took him out riding): "Mr. Paine was really abstemious, and when pressed to drink by those on whom he called during his rides he usually refused with great firmness, but politely."
D. M. Bennett of New York, writing forty years ago, says: "I have conversed with Major A. Coutant and Mr. Barker of New Rochelle, now very far advanced in life, but who distinctly remember Mr. Paine. They remember him as a pleasant, genial man, who lived on good terms with his neighbors and was not known to ever have been intoxicated." Judge J. B. Stallo, Minister to Italy during President Cleveland's administration, told Dr. Conway "that in early life he visited the place [New Rochelle] and saw persons who had known Paine, and who declared that Paine resided there without fault."
Judge Tabor: "I was an associate editor of the New YorkBeaconwith Col. John Fellows, then (1836) advanced in years but retaining all the vigor and fire of his manhood. He was a ripe scholar, a most agreeable companion, and had been the correspondent and friend of Jefferson, Madison, Monroe and John Quincy Adams, under all of whom he held a responsible office. One of his productions was dedicated, by permission, to Adams and was republished and favorably received in England. Colonel Fellows was the soul of honor and inflexible in his adhesion to truth. He was intimate with Paine during the whole time he lived after returning to this country, and boarded for a year in the same house with him. I also was acquainted with Judge Herttell of New York city, a man of wealth and position, being a member of the New York Legislature, both in the Senate and Assembly, and serving likewise on the judicial bench. Like Colonel Fellows he was an author and a man of unblemished life and irreproachable character. These men assured me of their own knowledge derived from constant personal intercourse during the last seven years of Paine's life that he never kept any company but what was entirely respectable, and that all accusations of drunkenness were grossly untrue. They saw him under all circumstances andknewthat he was never intoxicated. Nay, more, they said for that day he was even abstemious."
W. J. Hilton (1877): "It is over twenty years ago that professionally I made the acquaintance of John Hogeboom, a justice of the peace of Rensselaer county, New York. He was then over seventy years of age and had the reputation of being a man of candor and integrity. He was a great admirer of Paine. He told me that he was personally acquainted with him and used to see him frequently during the last years of his life in the city of New York, where Hogeboom then resided. I asked him if there was any truth in the charge that Paine was in the habit of getting drunk. He said that it was utterly false; that he never heard of such a thing during the lifetime cf Mr. Paine and did not believe anyone else did."
Mr. Lovet (Proprietor of City Hotel, New York): "Paine boarded for a time at my hotel. He drank the least of all my boarders."
Gilbert Vale says: "We know more than twenty persons who were more or less acquainted with Mr. Paine, and not one of whom ever saw him in liquor." "We know that he was not only temperate in after life, but even abstemious."
"He was accused of offenses he had never committed and of conduct impossible to him."—Library of the World's Best Literature.
"That he was a very likeable man is shown... by the prediction of the brilliant Home Tooke that whoever should be at a certain dinner party, Paine would be sure to say the best things said; and by the friendships he made so easily. In middle age, at least, he was fastidious in his dress, inclined to elegance in his manners, and attractive in looks."—Ibid.
"There are eleven original portraits of Thomas Paine, besides a death mask, a bust, and the profile copied in this [Conway's] work.... In all of the original portraits of Paine his dress is neat and in accordance with fashion."—Dr. Conway.
The foregoing testimonials regarding Paine's personal appearance and dress are equally true of his old age. The Jarvis painting, executed when he was an old man of sixty-seven, is a mute witness to this. This portrait is that of a handsome, temperate, well-preserved man. It is of itself a standing refutation of the slanders of his defamers, and especially of the charge that he was addicted to drunkenness in his old age.
Aaron Burr: "I always considered Mr. Paine a gentleman, a pleasant companion, and a good-natured and intelligent man,decidedly temperate."
Regarding another base calumny, Dr. Conway says: "During Paine's life the world heard no hint of sexual immorality connected with him, but after his death Cheetham published [in his 'Life of Paine'] the following: 'Paine brought with him from Paris, and from her husband in whose house he had lived, Margaret Brazier Bonneville, and her three sons. Thomas has the features, countenance, and temper of Paine.'" Madame Bonneville was a lady of unblemished character, educated, cultured and refined. For this vile insinuation its author, a disreputable publisher of New York, who boasted of having nine libel suits pending against him at one time, was pronounced guilty of slander by a jury composed mostly of Christians.
Counsellor Sampson (Cheetham's prosecutor): "It is argued that everything should be intended to favor the defendant, who has written so godly a work against the prince of deists and for the Holy Gospel.... His book, a godly book—a vile obscene, and filthy compilation, which bears throughout the character of rancorous malice!"
Commenting on this case, Ellery Sedgwick, the able editor of theAtlantic Monthly, in his Beacon biography of Paine, says: "The evidence which her (Madame Bonneville's) lawyers adduced at the trial was conclusive, and the jury found Cheetham guilty; but Judge Hoffman, with casuistry worthy of his version of Christianity, held that Mr. Cheetham, while guilty of libel, had written a very useful book in favor of religion, and fixed the damages at the modest sum of $150. Thus sheltered, Cheetham's lies grew into history."
Some years ago the evangelist, Rev. Dr. R. A. Torrey, while in England, made a brutal attack upon Paine's character, repeating the slanders that have been circulated against him. W. T. Stead, the noted editor and publisher of theReview of Reviews, London, who later perished on the ill-fated Titanic, in his magazine defended Paine and refuted the slanders of Torrey. Of the Madame Bonneville slander he says:
"The 'commonly believed outrageous action' [quoting Torrey] of Thomas Paine in living with another man's wife was shown to have been the kindly hospitality shown by an old man of sixty-seven to the refugee family of his French benefactor. The only man who had ever imputed a shadow of obloquy to Paine in this connection went into the witness-box after Paine's death and solemnly swore that there was no foundation for his calumny."
The basis of this calumny was one of the many noble acts of Paine's life. When it became known that Napoleon had designs against the liberties of France, and was planning to elevate himself to power, Paine and Bonneville opposed him. Concerning the results of this rupture Stead quotes from Conway as follows:
"In return Bonaparte suppressed Bonneville's paper, threw Bonneville into prison and placed Paine in surveillance. Afterwards by the intervention of the American minister Paine was permitted to leave the country. Bonneville was forbidden to quit France. A year after Paine crossed the Atlantic Madame Bonneville with her children escaped to America.... So far from Paine having taken Bonneville's wife away from her husband, he did everything to induce Napoleon to free Bonneville from surveillance and to allow him to rejoin his wife in New York."
Stead finally forced Torrey to eat his words and to make the following retraction: "It is the obligation of those who make the charges to prove them, and to my mind this particular charge against Paine has not been proven."
M. and Madame Bonneville had befriended Paine, had invited him to their home where for years he enjoyed their hospitality. When Bonneville was imprisoned and impoverished and his family reduced to penury, Paine would have been a base ingrate had he not befriended them.
Dr. Lucy Waite: "The one circumstance in the life of Thomas Paine that to my mind more than any other reflects credit upon him as a man, has been made the target of the most bitter attacks against him—his relations to Madame Bonneville.... His detractors would no doubt have considered it a more 'moral' act if he had sent them to the poor-farm instead of to his own farm at New Rochelle; but to the everlasting credit of this great man he defied the town gossips, and made them comfortable in his own home."
Slanders concerning Paine's marital troubles have been published. He was married twice before coming to America, in 1759 to Mary Lambert, who died, and in 1771 to Elizabeth Olive, from whom he was separated. The separation was by mutual consent and nothing discreditable to either party was alleged. As to the cause of the separation all that is known, or rather surmised, is stated in McClintock and Strong's Cyclopedia, an Orthodox authority: "His first wife had died about a year after their marriage; he lived about three years with his second, when they separated by mutual consent, it is said, on account of her physical disability."
Paine's subsequent treatment of his wife was in the highest degree honorable. He had but little property, but what he had he gave to her. Regarding his conduct in this matter Clio Rickman, his most intimate friend in England, and a highly honorable man, bears this testimony:
"This I can assert, that Mr. Paine always spoke tenderly and respectfully of his wife; and sent her several times pecuniary aid, without her knowing even whence it came."
Concerning this slander W. T. Stead says: "No one even among Paine's worst libelers suggests that she had any reason of complaint against him." One of Paine's calumniators, "Francis Oldys" (George Chalmers), a pretended biographer of Paine whose statements are nearly all false or misleading, says that while he was an excise officer he bought smuggled tobacco and was dismissed from the service for the offense. This statement is false. Dr. Conway says:
"I have before me the minutes of the Board concerning Paine, and there is no hint whatever of any such accusation."
Falsehoods generally grow rather than diminish with age, and now we are told that Paine himself was a smuggler and was dismissed for smuggling. The Excise laws were the most odious laws in England, odious alike to the people and to the excise officers, who were underpaid (fifty pounds a year) and otherwise mistreated. Paine espoused the cause of his fellow excisemen and in a memorial addressed to Parliament pleaded for a redress of their grievances. His activity in this matter offended the Government and a trivial irregularity commonly practiced by the excisemen was made a pretext for his dismissal.
The Everyman Encyclopedia: "Became an excise officer, but agitating for the removal of grievances, was dismissed from the service."
Had Paine been discharged for any dishonest or immoral act Franklin would have known it and would not have recommended him as "a worthy young man."
Paine's dismissal was for him, for England, for America and for the world one of the most fortunate things that ever occurred. His loss of the excise office which occurred in April, 1774, took him to America in November of the same year. The independence of the United States and the agitation in behalf of popular government throughout the civilized world followed as a result.
Rev. Willet Hicks, a Quaker minister, who was with Paine when he died, testified that emissaries of the church tried to bribe him to slander Paine. He says: "I could have had any sums if I would have said anything against Thomas Paine, or if even I would have consented to remain silent. They informed me that the doctor was willing to say something that would satisfy them if I would engage to be silent. Mr. Paine was a good man—an honest man."
Rev. G. H. Humphrey: "He was honest. Nor was he uncharitable. He abstained from profanity and rebuked it in others."
Boston Post (Jan. 29, 1856): "Calumny has blistered her relentless hand in trying to stamp him as profane, intemperate and mendacious. The real truth appears to be that he was never habituated to profanity, to drunkenness, nor to falsehood; and that his calumniators are unconsciously his eulogists."
The ManchesterGuardian, probably the most influential journal in the British empire, outside of London, says that while the popular conception of Paine is that of a blatant and immoral demagogue he was noted by his companions "for his shyness, his benevolence, and his gentleness." Joel Barlow, who saw much of him, both in London and Paris, as well as in America, says: "He was one of the most benevolent and disinterested of mankind." "He was always charitable to the poor beyond his means." Clio Rickman, most intimate of all his associates, says: "He was mild, unoffending, sincere, gentle, humble and unassuming." Dr. Bond, who was imprisoned with him in the Luxembourg, says: "He was the most conscientious man I ever knew." James Parton says: "He loved the truth for its own sake; and he stood by what he conceived to be the truth when all around him reviled it." Ellery Sedgwick says: "The goal which he sought was the happiness of his fellow-men."
Hon. George W. Julian, the first Antislavery nominee for Vice-President, one of the founders of the Republican party, and for many years a distinguished leader in Congress, says: "Paine was a perfectly unselfish and incorruptible patriot; he was a philanthropist in the best sense of the word; he was a man of the rarest intelligence and moral courage."
Charles Watts of England says: "Thomas Paine had a generous and affectionate nature, a mind superior to fear and selfish interests; a mind governed by the principles of uniform rectitude and integrity; a mind the same in prosperity and adversity; a mind which no bribe could seduce and no terror overawe."
Eva Ingersoll Brown: "Thomas Paine was one of the mental and moral giants of his time. He ranked among the foremost of his age. He was royal in rectitude, kingly in compassion, sovereign in sympathy. His reverence for truth and justice was sublime; his love of mercy and his ardor for liberty were unsurpassed.... His was a religion untainted by touch of dogma or of sect; a thing stainless and pure; of wondrous beauty and grandeur."
While the orthodox clergy, with a few noble exceptions, have been, to their overlasting shame, mainly responsible for the ignorance and prejudice that have prevailed concerning Thomas Paine, Liberal ministers, many of them, to their eternal honor, have braved public sentiment and dared to do him justice. In an address more than fifty years ago the Rev. Moncure D. Conway paid this tribute to the moral character of Thomas Paine: "In his life, in his justice, in his truth, in his adherence to high principles, I look in vain for a parallel in those times and in these times. I am selecting my words. I know I am to be held accountable for them." Rev. Theodore Parker says: "I think he did more to promote piety and morality among men than a hundred ministers of that age in America."
Prof. L. F. Laybarger: "Great was Thomas Paine intellectually, morally he was greater."
Col. E. A. Stevens: "May Americans long appreciate the genius and reverence the virtues of their noble benefactor, for he left them a legacy greater than his works—the contemplation of his high-souled, unselfish character."
Every person who has charged Paine with immorality has either invented a falsehood or repeated one. The character of Paine; was as blameless as that of Washington. Both men, in their last days, were bitterly assailed by political enemies. With their deaths political censure, for the most part, ceased. But Paine's religious opinions were not forgotten, and could not be forgiven. His "Age of Reason" continued to be read, and remained unanswered, because unanswerable. What "Common Sense" had done to kingcraft in America the "Age of Reason" promised to do to priestcraft throughout the world. In her desperation the church seized her only available weapon, slander. Every inventor of a calumny against Paine was hailed as a defender of the faith. Unscrupulous biographers and historians, like Cheetham and McMaster, to curry favor with the church, have recorded these calumnies as facts; and others, accepting these writers as reliable authorities, have innocently repeated them. Many who have acknowledged Paine's services to mankind have felt compelled to apologize for his supposed errors. Sir Leslie Stephen, who had accepted some of these charges, thus frankly admits that he had been deceived: "I regret to say that I had accepted certain charges against Paine's character, which Mr. Conway has shown to rest upon worse than suspicious evidence.... I fully admit that I was entirely misled by a hasty reliance upon worthless testimony." (History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century, 3rd ed., vol. ii, p. 261, note.)
William H. Burr: "While the corpse of the philanthropist lay cooling in the ground the English Tory Cheetham wrote a biography full of malignity and detraction."
Cheetham had a double motive in writing his Life of Paine—revenge and gain. He was an Englishman and had been an ardent Republican. But he had betrayed his party and as a result of this he and Paine became engaged in a bitter controversy. Paine's punishment of the renegade was terrible. His wounds still smarting when his adversary died, Cheetham wreaked his vengeance by writing a book in which he presented as facts all the calumnies that Paine's political and religious enemies had circulated concerning him, supplemented by all that his own malignant mind could invent. Realizing that his career in America was ended he had decided to return to England and the book, he believed, would win for him the favor and patronage of England's two most powerful institutions, the Tory Government and the Orthodox Church.
"When, therefore, a party hack, as Cheetham doubtless was, disappointed and a renegade, with talents, as he certainly possessed, but embittered in feelings and regardless of truth, as all circumstances contribute to show—what could be expected from such a man but just what he produced, a Life of Paine abounding in bold falsehoods, cunningly contrived, and addressed to a people who wished to be deceived."—Gilbert Vale.
"Cheetham's book is one of the most malicious ever written."—Dr. Conway.
"We have no hesitation in saying that we knew perfectly well at the time the motives of that author [Cheetham] for writing and publishing a work, which, we have every reason to believe, is a libel almost from beginning to end."—Rev. Solomon Southwick.
Eighteen years prior to the appearance of Cheetham's book George Chalmers, an English writer, under the pseudonymn of "Francis Oldys," backed by the friends of the English Tory government and for a consideration, it is claimed, of £500, to counteract the influence of the "Rights of Man" which was threatening to overthrow monarchy in England, wrote a pretended biography of Paine filled with slander and vituperation. Referring to this book and the corrupt English political and religious age in which it was written, Edward Smith, an English author, writing nearly a century later, characterizes it as "one of the most horrible collections of abuse which even that venal day produced."
Excepting Cheetham and Chalmers, all of the biographers of Paine—Conway, Vale, Rickman, Sedgwick, Sherwin, Blanchard, Linton and others—have endeavored to do him justice. But Cheetham's and Chalmer's books have been the arsenals where the orthodox of England and America have gone for their weapons with which to attack the author of the "Age of Reason." Not only have they tried to suppress Paine's book, they have tried to banish from the public library and book-store every work that has appeared in defense of it or its author. For three-quarters of a century the only biographies of Paine to be found in the London library were those of Cheetham and Chalmers; the only one to be found in the public libraries of America was that of Cheetham. Is it any wonder, then, that nearly all the pictures of Paine, even those drawn by friendly hands, to be found in our histories, biographical dictionaries, encyclopedias and other works, should be largely caricatures?
One of the foulest of these caricatures is that drawn by the historian John Bach McMaster. For this writer's scurrilous attack on Paine no excuse can be offered. The plea of ignorance of Paine's true character and history cannot be urged in his behalf. He had before him the authentic records of Paine's career, in America, at least. He knew that his statements were untruthful and unjust. His tirade of abuse is seemingly for the sole purpose of securing for his books the endorsement of the clerical bigots who dominate our schools and colleges.
Louisa Harding: "One would imagine that even the religious bigot would know that he [McMaster] drew for us the picture of a great man, looming up tall and wide behind the chronicler who strove to pull him down.... In the course of a careful, impartial investigation of the various lives of, and articles on, Paine, it became necessary to resort to the explanation of blinding religious prejudice; and that, too, having failed to fit the case, there seems to be no recourse save to use a shorter, uglier word—John Bach McMasterlies."
A little while ago a prominent American, misled by Paine's calumniators and too proud to retract it when the error was called to his attention, applied to the author-hero the brutal epithet "filthy little Atheist"—three falsehoods in three words, for Paine was neither filthy, little, nor an Atheist.