Thomas Paine – The First American Blogger
His Words in Today's Context
“It is not our belief or disbelief that can make or unmake the fact.”-Thomas Paine, Age of Reason When a belief defies readily available facts, it becomes a delusion. I may believe I have lots of money in the bank, but to hold onto that belief given the fact of my bank balance would prescribe …
Continue reading “On Convictions, Messianic Missions, Delusions, and Accepting Reality in Iraq”
“Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.” -Thomas Paine, The American Crisis On the Fourth of July it is good to remember that all we take so very much for granted was not always so. Freedom from political tyranny was very much a matter …
Continue reading “On Celebrating Thomas Paine and the Spirit of ’76”
He who dares not offend cannot be honest.
-Thomas Paine
All power exercised over a Nation must have some beginning. I must either be delegated or assumed. There are no other sources. All delegated power is turst, and all assumed power is usurpation. Time does not alter the nature and quality of either.
-Thomas Paine, Rights of Man
How nearly is human cunning allied to folly! The animals to whom nature has given the faculty we call cunning, know always when to use it, and use it wisely; but when man descends to cunning, he blunders and betrays.
-Thomas Paine
When I reflect on the pompous titles bestowed on unworthy men, I feel an indignity that instructs me to despise the absurdity.
-Thomas Paine
We sometimes experience sensations to which language is not equal. The conception is too bulky to be born alive, and in the torture of thinking, we stand dumb. Our feelings, imprisoned by their magnitude, find no way out — and, in the struggle of expression, every finger tries to be a tongue. The machinery of the body seems too little for the mind, and we look about for helps to show our thoughts by.
-Thomas Paine
“There are cases in which silence is a loud language.”-Thomas Paine It is a world of constant chatter, most of it signifying nothing. The trick then, is to turn off all the devices and contrivances of the modern world and listen to the sound of silence. The spaces in our existence that are buried beneath …
“There is something in a war carried on by invasion which makes it differ in circumstances from any other mode of war, because he who conducts it cannot tell whether the ground he gains, be for him, or against him, when he first makes it.” -Thomas Paine, The Crisis News Item: “US Forces Face Bloody …
“I have never made it a consideration whether the subject was popular or unpopular, but whether it was right or wrong; for that which is right will become popular, and that which is wrong, though by mistake it may obtain the cry or fashion of the day, will soon lose the power of delusion, and …
Continue reading “On Doing What is Right vs. Doing What is Popular”