Being an inveterate amateur politician, Tom had soon found himself in the midst of those events that were trying men’s souls. And being possessed of a singularly well-ordered mind, he had taken hold of the ill-assorted collection of American grievances and had incorporated them into a pamphlet, short but sweet, which by a thorough application of “common sense” should convince the people that the American cause was a just cause and deserved the hearty coöperation of all loyal patriots. This little book at once found its way to England and to the continent where it informed many people for the first time in their lives that there was such a thing as “an American nation” and that it had an excellent right, yea, it was its sacred duty to make war upon the mother country. As soon as the Revolution was over, Paine went back to Europe to show the English people the supposed absurdities of the government under which they lived. It was a time when terrible things were happening along the banks of the Seine and when respectable Britishers were beginning to look across the Channel with very serious misgivings. A certain Edmund Burke had just published his panic-stricken “Reflections on the French Revolution.” Paine answered with a furious counter-blast of his own called “The Rights of Man” and as a result the English government ordered him to be tried for high treason. Meanwhile his French admirers had elected him to the Convention and Paine, who did not know a word of French but was an optimist, accepted the honor and went to Paris. There he lived until he fell under the suspicion of Robespierre. Knowing that at any moment he might be arrested and decapitated, he hastily finished a book that was to contain his philosophy of life. It was called “The Age of Reason.” The first part was published just before he was taken to prison. The second part was written during the ten months he spent in jail. Paine believed that true religion, what he called “the religion of humanity,” had two enemies, atheism on the one hand and fanaticism on the other. But when he gave expression to this thought he was attacked by every one and when he returned to America in 1802 he was treated with such profound and relentless hatred that his reputation as a “dirty little atheist” has survived him by more than a century. It is true that nothing happened to him. He was not hanged or burned or broken on the wheel. He was merely shunned by all his neighbors, little boys were encouraged to stick their tongues out at him when he ventured to leave his home, and at the time of his death he was an embittered and forgotten man who found relief for his anger in writing foolish political tracts against the other heroes of the Revolution. This seems a most unfortunate sequel to a splendid beginning. But it is typical of something that has repeatedly happened during the history of the last two thousand years.