The Tenth Amendment Center is holding a radio marathon in celebration of the publication of Common Sense by Thomas Paine on this day, January 10, 1776.
SPECIAL ONLINE EVENT: JANUARY 10, 2011
The event features Charles Goyette, Anthony Gregory, David Theroux, and Tom Woods, among others.
In Common Sense, Paine appealed to the Christian heart of the emerging nation, quoting the Bible to attack monarchy. But in Age of Reason, Paine attacked Christianity, and all of America's Founding Fathers abandoned him.
2 comments:
Kevin
Jefferson didn't abandon him - invited him to White House dinners. His over-the-top attacks against Washington, whom he thought abandoned him for political expediency, was his main problem. Ministers used him for their scapegoat attacks & this has been played up too much in my opinion.
Good points, anon. I should have said "most" rather than "all" the Founding Fathers....
Political and clerical power-grabbing was probably the most toxic element in America at that time, and the quest for political and ecclesiastical power still affects us today. (I'm thinking about quotes from clergy that some Founder [like Jefferson] was an atheist, or quotes by Founders against clergy, which are used by infidels today to prop up the myth of "separation of church and state.") It was federalist clergy who viciously accused Jefferson of being an atheist, even though those federalists might have been as much atheist as Jefferson. Jefferson in turn got his digs at the federalists by inviting Paine to the White House.
When Jefferson’s daughters Mary and Martha made clear they would rather not associate with Paine, Jefferson replied that Paine “is too well entitled to the hospitality of every American, not to cheerfully receive mine.”
But that was probably deserved more for Common Sense than Age of Reason, which ultimately led to secularism, statism, and mass death in the 20th century. Jefferson didn't foresee the results of deism as well as people like Solzhenitsyn would later experience it and diagnose it.
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