Opening the new year with a new system is emphatically what Junius also did, and it is most remarkable that the appearance of Junius' first Letter had, at first, the same effect in England that Common Sense had in America. Both came like thunderbolts. "On January 10, 1776, when 'a reconciliation with the mother country was the wish of almost every American,' a pamphlet called Common Sense, advocating the establishment of a republic of free and independent states, 'burst upon the world'--in the language of Dr. Rush--'with an effect which has rarely been produced by types and paper in any age or country.' It was immediately denounced as 'one of the most artful, insidious, and pernicious of pamphlets!' John Dickinson, a staunch supporter of the American cause, and author of the 'Farmers' Letters,' opposed the idea of independence in a speech as a member of the Continental Congress. The author of 'Plain Truth,' one of the _many replies_ to Common Sense, thought that 'volumes were insufficient to describe the horror, misery, and desolation awaiting the people at large in the siren form of American independence.' Dr. William Smith, provost of the University of Pennsylvania, said, in his 'Cato's Letters,' published in March, 1776: 'Nor have many weeks yet elapsed since the first open proposition for independence was published to the world; it certainly has no countenance from congress, and is only the idol of those who wish to subvert all order among us, and rise on the ruins of their country.'"--Art. Thomas Paine, New Am. Cyc.