Speaker 1: Chapter one of Common Sense. This is a LibriVox recording.
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Speaker 1: by Phil Shinevert. Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Introduction. Perhaps
Speaker 1: the sentiments contained in the following pages are not yet
Speaker 1: sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favor. A long habit
Speaker 1: of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial
Speaker 1: appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable
Speaker 1: outcry in defense of custom, But the tumult soon subsides
Speaker 1: time makes more converts than reason. As a long and
Speaker 1: violent abuse of power is generally the means of calling
Speaker 1: the right of it in question, and in matters to
Speaker 1: which might never have been thought of had not the
Speaker 1: sufferers been aggravated into the inquiry. And as the King
Speaker 1: of England hath undertaken in his own right to support
Speaker 1: the Parliament in what he calls theirs, and as the
Speaker 1: good people of this country are grievously oppressed by the combination,
Speaker 1: they have an undoubted privilege to inquire into the pretensions
Speaker 1: of both, and equally to reject the usurpation of either
Speaker 1: in the following sheets. The author has studiously avoided everything
Speaker 1: which is personal among ourselves. Compliments, as well as censure
Speaker 1: to individuals, make no part thereof. The wise and the
Speaker 1: worthy need not the triumph of a pamphlet, and those
Speaker 1: whose sentiments are injudicious or unfriendly will cease of themselves
Speaker 1: unless too much pains are bestowed upon their conversion. The
Speaker 1: cause of America is, in a great measure the cause
Speaker 1: of all mankind. Many circumstances hath and will arise which
Speaker 1: are not local but universal, and through which the principles
Speaker 1: of all lovers of mankind are affected, and in the
Speaker 1: event of which their affections are interested. The laying of
Speaker 1: a country desolate with fire and sword, declaring war against
Speaker 1: the natural rights of all mankind, and extirpating the defenders
Speaker 1: thereof from the face of the earth is the concern
Speaker 1: of every man, to whom nature hath given the power
Speaker 1: of feeling, of which class, regardless of party censure is
Speaker 1: the author p s. The publication of this new edition
Speaker 1: hath been delayed with a view of taking notice had
Speaker 1: it been necessary of any attempt to refute the doctrine
Speaker 1: of independence. As no answer hath yet appeared. It is
Speaker 1: now presumed that none will the time needful for getting
Speaker 1: such a performance ready, for the public being considerably passed.
Speaker 1: Who the author of this production is is wholly unnecessary
Speaker 1: to the public, as the object for attention is the
Speaker 1: doctrine itself, not the man. Yet it may not be
Speaker 1: unnecessary to say that he is unconnected with any party,
Speaker 1: and under no sort of influence public or private, but
Speaker 1: the influence of reason and principle, Philadelphia, February fourteenth, seventeen
Speaker 1: seventy six, end of the introduction