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He who would make his own
liberty secure must
guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that
will reach to himself.
Those who expect
to reap the blessings of
freedom,
must, like
men, undergo the fatigues of supporting it.
Heaven
knows how to put a proper price upon
freedom's goods, and it would be strange indeed, if so
celestial an article as
freedom should not be highly rated.
I have always strenuously supported the
right of every
man to his own
opinion, however different that
opinion might be to mine. He who denies
another this
right makes a
slave of himself to his present
opinion, because he precludes himself the
right of changing it.
- Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine was
America's most important
political thinker. There might never have been an
American Revolution without Thomas
Paine's newsprint pamphlets - 'magazines'.
Thomas Paine was largely
self-educated. Thomas Paine came
to the colonies in 1774 after meeting Benjamin Franklin
in London, who encouraged and sponsored him. Thomas Paine wrote for
Pennsylvania Magazine, later became its editor and began
working on Common Sense in
1776.
Thomas Paine opposed slavery, promoted
republicanism, - res-publica, the public affairs, or the public
good; or, literally
translated, the public
thing - abhorred the monarchy and
was the founder of human
liberalism -
George Washington and
Thomas Jefferson called the new
social order espoused by Thomas Paine - that
"liberal
experiment, the
United States of America."
These liberals -
including John Hancock, John Adams, Samuel Huntington, Benjamin Rush and
Benjamin Franklin - were
skeptical of the
institutions of
power that included the "kingly oppressions"
of monarchs, the Roman Catholic church and the
capitalist corporatism of that time
represented by the dominant predatory giant of the
day - the
British East India
Company. The Crown bureaucrats considered these
liberally
thinking men radical agitators in much the
same way the controlling interests of
America view anyone who does not adher to
corporate capitalist
philosophy of
materialistic
consumerism.
"Great part of that
order which reigns among
mankind is not the effect of
government. That
order has its origin in the
principles of
society and the
natural constitution of
man. That
order
existed prior to
government, and would continue to
exist if the formality of
government was abolished.
The
mutual dependence and
reciprocal interest which
man has upon
man, and all the parts of
civilized community upon each other,
create that great chain of
connection which holds it together.
Common interest regulates
citizen's concerns, and forms
their law;
and the
laws which common usage ordains, have a greater
influence than the
laws of government.
Society performs for itself almost everything
which is ascribed to government.
No
one man is capable, without the aid of
society, of supplying his own wants, and
those wants, acting upon every individual, impel the whole of them into
society, as
naturally as
gravitation acts.
Nature has implanted in
man a system of
social affections, which,
though not
necessary to his existence, are
essential to his
happiness.
The instant formal
government is abolished,
society begins to act:
a general
association takes place, and common
interest produces common security.
In short,
man is so
naturally a creature of
society that it is almost impossible to put
him out of it.
If we consider what the
principle are that first condense
men into society, and what are the
motives that regulate their mutual
intercourse afterwards, we shall find, by the time we arrive at what is called
government, that nearly the whole of the
business is performed by a natural
operation of the parts upon each other.
Those of trade
and commerce, whether with regard to the
intercourse of individuals or of nations, are laws of mutual and reciprocal
interest.
These laws are followed and
obeyed, because it is the
interest of the parties so to
do,
and not on account of any formal laws
their governments may impose or
interpose.
In those associations which men promiscuously form for the
purpose of trade, or of
any concern in which government is totally
out of the question, and in which they act merely on the
principles of
society, we see how
naturally the various parties unite; and
this shows, by comparison, that governments, so far from being always the
cause or means of order, are often
the destruction of it.
One of the
great advantages of the American
Revolution has been,
that it led to a discovery of the
principles, and laid open the
imposition, of governments.
All the
revolutions till then had been
worked within the atmosphere of a court, and never on the grand floor of a
nation.
The parties were always of the class of courtiers; and whatever was their rage
for reformation, they carefully preserved the fraud of the
profession, blinding the
understanding of
man, and making him
believe that government is some wonderful
mysterious
thing.
In all cases they took
care to represent government as a
thing made up of
mysteries, which only they themselves
understood; and they hid from the
understanding of the
nation the only thing that was
beneficial to know, namely, that
government is nothing more than a national
association adding on the principles of
society.
Government, on
the old system, is an assumption of power, for
the aggrandizement of
itself; on the new, a delegation of power for
the common benefit of
society. The former supports itself by
keeping up a system of war; the latter
promotes a system of peace, as the
true means of enriching a nation. The one
encourages national prejudices; the other
promotes universal society, as the means of
universal commerce. The one measures its
prosperity, by the quantity of revenue it extorts; the other proves its
excellence, by the small quantity of taxes
it requires.Though it might be proved
that the system of government now called
the new, representative government, is the
most ancient in principle of all that have existed, being founded on the original,
inherent rights of the
living
human being: yet, as
tyranny and the
sword have suspended the exercise of
those rights for many
centuries past, it serves better the
purpose of distinction to
call it the new, than to claim the right of calling it the old.
Having
thus glanced at a few of the defects of the old hereditary systems of
government, let us compare it with the new,
or representative system. The representative system takes
society and
civilization for its basis;
nature, reason, and experience, for its guide. The
representative system is always parallel with the order and
immutable
laws of nature. The representative
system diffuses such a body of knowledge
throughout a nation, on the subject of government, as to explode
ignorance and preclude
imposition.
Experience, in all
ages, and in all countries, has demonstrated that it is impossible to
control Nature in her distribution of
mental powers. Nature
gives them as she pleases. Whatever is the rule by which Nature, apparently to us, scatters them among
mankind, that
rule remains a
secret to
man.
It would be as ridiculous to
attempt to fix the heredity of human
beauty, as of wisdom. Whatever wisdom constituently is, it is like a seedless
plant; it may be reared when it appears, but it cannot be voluntarily
produced..
The representative system of
government is calculated to produce the
wisest laws,
by collecting wisdom from where it can be
found. Every government that does not act
on the principle of a Republic, or in other words, that does not make the res-publica its
whole and sole object, is not a good
government (not good = evil).
A republican form of
government is no other than
government established
and conducted
for the interest of the public, individually as well as collectively.
A
republican form of government is not
necessarily connected with any particular
form, but it most naturally associates
with the representative form, as being best calculated to secure the end for
which a nation is at the expense of supporting.
That which is called
government, or rather that which we ought
to conceive government to be, is no more
than some common center in which all the
parts of society unite. A nation is not a
body, the figure of which is to be represented by the
human body; but is like a body
contained within a circle, having a common center, in which every radius meets; and that
center is formed by representation.
In the representative
system, the reason for everything must
publicly appear (be
transparent).
Every man is a proprietor in
government, and considers it a necessary
part of his business to understand.
Government concerns his interest, because it
affects his property and his rights.
A
thinking man examines the cost, and
compares it with the advantages; and above all, he does not adopt the slavish
custom of following what in other governments are called
LEADERS." - Thomas Paine, The Rights of
Man
Benjamin Franklin,
Henry Clay |
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This web site is not a commercial web site and
is presented for educational purposes only.
This website defines a new religious
ideology to which its author adheres. The author feels that the falsification
of reality outside personal experience has created a populace unable to discern
propaganda from reality and that this has been done purposefully by an
international corporate cartel through their agents who wish to foist a corrupt
version of reality on the human race. Religious intolerance occurs when any
group refuses to tolerate religious practices, religious beliefs or persons due
to their religious ideology. This web site marks the founding of the religion
aptly named The Truth of the Way of Life - a rational religion based on reason
which requires no leap of faith, accepts no tithes, has no supreme leader, no
church buildings and in which each and every individual is encouraged to
develop a personal relation with God through the pursuit of the knowledge of
reality in the hope of curing the spiritual corruption that has enveloped the
human spirit. The tenets of The Truth of the Way of Life are spelled out in
detail on this web site by the author. Violent acts against individuals due to
their religious beliefs in America is considered a “hate
crime.”
This web site in no way condones violence. To the contrary
the intent here is to reduce the violence that is already occurring due to the
international corporate cartels desire to control the human race. The
international corporate cartel already controls the world central banking
system, mass media worldwide, the industrial military entertainment complex of America and is
responsible for the collapse of morals, the elevation of self-centered behavior
and the destruction of global ecosystems. Civilization is based on cooperation.
Cooperation does not occur at the point of a gun.
American social mores
and values have declined precipitously over the last century as the corrupt
international cartel has garnered more and more power. This power rests in the
ability to deceive the populace in general through mass media by pressing
emotional buttons which have been preprogrammed into the population through
prior mass media psychological operations. The results have been the
destruction of the family and the destruction of social structures that do not
adhere to the corrupt international elites vision of a perfect world. Through
distraction and coercion the direction of thought of the bulk of the population
has been directed toward solutions proposed by the corrupt international elite
that further consolidates their power and which further their purposes.
All views and opinions presented on this web site are the views and
opinions of individual human men and women that, through their writings, showed
the capacity for intelligent, reasonable, rational, insightful and unpopular
thought. All factual information presented on this web site is believed to be
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thoughts have been adapted, edited, corrected, redacted, combined, added to,
re-edited and re-corrected as nearly all opinion and thought has been
throughout time but has been done so in the spirit of the original writer with
the intent of making his or her thoughts and opinions clearer and relevant to
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