The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1906-08-17
THOMAS PAINE, THE PATRIOT.
BY Rev. Thomas g. Gregory IN the
Houston Chronicle.

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Ask the average man you meet on
the street who Thomas Paine was
and the answer will probably be:
"oh, he's the fellow that wrote that
dirty scurrilous book entitled "The
Age of Reason"
That is as much as the rank and
file of the people of this country
know about the man who was the
friend of Washington, and who. next
to Washington, was the heart and
soul Of the struggle for American in
dependence.
1t is quite true that Thomas Paine
wrote book called "The Age of
Reason" work, by the way, that
is not half SO radical as many of the
books that are being written these
days by Christian ministers.
Instead of being a dirty, scurril-
Gus book" however, "The Age Of
Reason" is a calm, dignifed, judicial
criticism upon the Bible; and its
author, in lieu of having been blat-
ant atheist and wholesale unbeliever,
declared his faith in the following
words:
Il believe in one God. and no more.
THE world is my country, and to do
good my religion"
But it is of Paine the Patriot I
wish to speak. The ordinary run of
Americans, even of native Ameri-
cans, are altogether unmindful of the
fact that Paine rendered to the cause
of the struggling colonies the services
for which we can never be too CRATE
ful-services without which possibly
the United States might never have
taken their proud place among the
nations of the earth.
Thomas Paine was born of Quaker
parents at Thetford, England, in the
year 1887, and in 1874, at the age of
81 came to America, bearing letter
of Introduction and commentator
from the great Franklin, who doubt
less saw in the man the elements of
usefulness to the colonies.
Into the struggle which soon after
began between the colonies and Great
Britain Paine threw himself heart and
soul, asking no recompense, expecting
no reward
In January, 1776, six months before
the Old Liberty Bell of Philadelphia
rang out to the world and to the in
habitants thereof the tidings Iof the
immortal declaration, Paine published
his soul-stirring book entitled Com
mon Sense" in which he showed in
plain, straightforward words the folly
of further patience with British tyr
amy and the crying necessity of an
immediate separation from the moth
er country.
In his pamphlet he told the Ameri-
can people that they were fools not
| to see that separation was foregone
conclusion by the very logic of the
situation; that it was in accordance
with the eternal fitness of things that
America should be an independent ma
ton, and that the sooner they set
about the severance of the ties that
bound them to England the better
Common Sense. was printed by
the thousands of copies, and wherever
| it went it aroused men like bugle
call, put courage into timid hearts
and woke up the colonists from Mas
sachusetts to Georgia.
Washington hailed Paine as the
stanchest friend of liberty. and to his
dying day was not slow in expressing
his profound gratitude for the power
full influence that the author of "Com-
mon Sense had brought to bear upon
the mind of the American public.
Later on, in the darkest hour of
the American cause, when about all
save Washington himself were on
the verge of despair, Paine wrote the
ringing series of pamphlets known as
1.-THE Crisis round of hot shot that
woke up the people everywhere and,
together with Washington's sublime
lpoise and faithfulness, saved the day
to Liberty and to Man!
These are the times that try
mems souls!" exclaimed Paine in the
first number of "The Crisis and then
with an eloquence that has been sell
dom equaled in this world he went on
lin pamphlet after pamphlet to show
the people how necessary it was that
they should brace themselves for the
struggle. and out of their very despair
to pluck the courage of victory.
i In 1887 Paine returned to England,
and upon the breaking out of the
French revolution went to France to
least his lot it'll the people in their
battle for liberty against Louis and
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