The Life Of Thomas Paine Volume I Part 20

In the end this theory was put to a vote of the company present, and all arose with Paine except Peter Pindar, who thereupon said, "I am the wise minority who ought, in all cases, to govern your ignorant majority."

CHAPTER XVII. A BRITISH LION WITH AN AMERICAN HEART

The influence of Paine's Quaker training has been traced in his constructive politics, but its repressive side had more perhaps to do with his career. "I had some turn," he said, "and I believe some talent, for poetry; but this I rather repressed than encouraged." It is your half-repressed poets that kindle revolutions. History might be different had Paine not been taught fear of music and poetry. He must have epical commonwealths. The American Republic having temporarily filled his ideal horizon in the political direction, the disguised Muse turned his eye upon the possibilities of nature. Morally utilitarian, he yet rarely writes about physics without betraying the poetic pa.s.sion for nature of a suppressed Wordsworth. Nature is his Aphrodite and his Madonna.

"Bred up in antediluvian notions, she has not yet acquired the European taste of receiving visitors in her dressing-room; she locks and bolts up her private recesses with extraordinary care, as if not only resolved to preserve her h.o.a.rds but conceal her age, and hide the remains of a face that was young and lovely in the days of Adam."

Defining for Jefferson the distinction between attraction and cohesion, he says:

"I recollect a scene at one of the theatres which very well explains the difference. A condemned lady wishes to see her child and the child its mother: that is Attraction. They were admitted to meet, but when ordered to part threw their arms around each other and fastened their persons together: this is Cohesion."

All the atoms or molecules are little mothers and daughters and lovers clasping each other; it is an interlocking of figures; "and if our eyes were good enough we should see how it was done." He has a transcendental perception of unity in things dissimilar. On his walks to Challiot he pa.s.ses trees and fountains, and writes a little essay, with figures, explaining to his friend that the tree is also a fountain, and that by measuring diameters of trunks and tubes, or branches, the quant.i.ty of timber thrown up by sap-fountains might be known. Some of his casual speculations he calls "conceits." They are the exuberance of a scientific imagination inspired by philanthropy and naturalistic religion. The "inner light" of man corresponds to an "inner spirit" of nature. The human mind dimmed by ignorance, perverted by pa.s.sion, turns the very gifts of nature to thorns, amid which her divine beauty sleeps until awakened by the kiss of science.

It would be difficult to find anything in the literature of mechanical invention more naively picturesque than this Quaker, pa.s.sed through furnaces of two revolutions, trying to humanize gunpowder. Here is a substance with maximum of power and minimum of bulk and weight.

"When I consider the wisdom of nature I must think that she endowed matter with this extraordinary property for other purposes than that of destruction. Poisons are capable of other uses than that of killing. If the power which an ounce of gunpowder contains could be detailed out as steam or water can be it would be a most commodious natural power."

Having failed to convert revolutions to Quakerism, Paine tries to soften the heart of gunpowder itself, and insists that its explosiveness may be restrained and detailed like strokes on a boy's top to obtain continual motion. The sleeping top, the chastened repose of perfect motion, like the quiet of the spinning worlds, is the Quaker inventor's ideal, and he begs the President of the United States to try the effect of the smallest pistol made--the size of a quill--on a wheel with peripheral cups to receive the discharges.*

* I am reluctantly compelled to give only the main ideas of several theses of this kind by Paine, found among Jefferson's papers. The portion of the "Jefferson Papers"

at Washington written by Paine would fill a good volume.

"The biographers of Paine," wrote his friend, Joel Barlow, "should not forget his mathematical acquirements and his mechanical genius." But it would require a staff of specialists, and a large volume, to deal with Paine's scientific studies and contrivances--with his planing machine, his new crane, his smokeless candle, his wheel of concentric rim, his scheme for using gunpowder as a motor, above all his iron bridge. As for the bridge, Paine feels that it is a sort of American revolution carried into mechanics; his eagle cannot help spreading a little in the wondering eyes of the Old World. "Great scenes inspire great ideas," he writes to Sir George Staunton.

"The natural mightiness of America expands the mind, and it partakes of the greatness it contemplates. Even the war, with all its evils, had some advantages. It energized invention and lessened the catalogue of impossibilities. At the conclusion of it every man returned to his home to repair the ravages it had occasioned, and to think of war no more.

As one amongst thousands who had borne a share in that memorable revolution, I returned with them to the re-enjoyment of quiet life, and, that I might not be idle, undertook to construct a single arch for this river [Schuylkill]. Our beloved General had engaged in rendering another river, the Potowmac, navigable. The quant.i.ty of iron I had allowed in my plan for this arch was five hundred and twenty tons, to be distributed into thirteen ribs, in commemoration of the Thirteen United States."

It is amusing after this to find Paine, in his patent, declaring his special license from "His Most Excellent Majesty King George the Third."* Had poor George been in his right senses, or ever heard of the invention, he might have suspected some connection between this insurrection of the iron age and the American "rebellion." However, Paine is successful in keeping America out of his specification, albeit a poetic touch appears.

* "No. 1667. Specification of Thomas Paine. Constructing Arches. Vaulted Roofs, and Ceilings." The specification, dated August 28, 1788, declares his invention to be "on principles new and different to anything hitherto practised." The patents for England, Scotland, and Ireland were granted in September. An iron arch of one hundred feet was designed by Pritchard and erected by Darby at Coalbrook Dale, Shropshire, in 1779, but it did not antic.i.p.ate the invention of Paine, as may be seen by the article on "Iron Bridges" in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, which also well remarks that Paine's "daring in engineering does full justice to the fervour of his political career." (Eighth edition; it is omitted in the ninth.)

"The idea and construction of this arch is taken from the figure of a spider's circular web, of which it resembles a section, and from a conviction that when nature empowered this insect to make a web she also instructed her in the strongest mechanical method of constructing it.

Another idea, taken from nature in the construction of this arch, is that of increasing the strength of matter by dividing and combining it, and thereby causing it to act over a larger s.p.a.ce than it would occupy in a solid state, as is seen in the quills of birds, bones of animals, reeds, canes, &c. The curved bars of the arch are composed of pieces of any length joined together to the whole extent of the arch, and take curvature by bending."

Paine and his bridge came to England at a fortunate moment. Blackfriars Bridge had just given way, and two over the Tyne, one built by Smeaton, had collapsed by reason of quicksands under their piers. And similarly Pitt's policy was collapsing through the treacherous quicksands on which it was based. Paper money and a "sinking fund" at home, and foreign alliances that disregarded the really controlling interests of nations, Paine saw as piers set in the Channel.* He at once took his place in England as a sort of inst.i.tution. While the engineers beheld with admiration his iron arch clearing the treacherous river-beds, statesmen saw with delight his prospective bridges spanning the political "Rubicon." Nothing could be more felicitous than the t.i.tle of his inaugural pamphlet, "Prospects on the Rubicon." It remembered an expression in Parliament at the beginning of the war on America. "'The Rubicon is pa.s.sed,' was once given as a reason for prosecuting the most expensive war that England ever knew. Sore with the event, and groaning beneath a galling yoke of taxes, she has again been led ministerially on to the sh.o.r.e of the same delusive and fatal river." The bridge-builder stretches his shining arches to France, Holland, Germany,--free commerce and friendship with all peoples, but no leagues with the sinking piers called thrones.

* It is droll to find even Paine's iron bridge resting somewhat on a "paper "pier. "Perhaps," he writes Jefferson, "the excess of paper currency, and the wish to find objects for realizing it, is one of the motives for promoting the plan of the Bridge."

At Rotherham, in Yorkshire, where Messrs. Walker fitted up a workshop for Paine, he was visited by famous engineers and political personages.

There and in London he was "lionized," as Franklin had been in Paris. We find him now pa.s.sing a week with Edmund Burke, now at the country-seat of the Duke of Portland, or enjoying the hospitalities of Lord Fitzwilliam at Wentworth House. He is entertained and consulted on public affairs by Fox, Lord Lansdowne, Sir George Staunton, Sir Joseph Banks; and many an effort is made to enlist his pen. Lord Lansdowne, it appears, had a notion of Paine's powers of political engineering so sublime that he thought he might bridge the Atlantic, and re-connect England and America! All of this may be gathered from the Jefferson papers, as we shall presently see; but it should be remarked here that Paine's head was not turned by his a.s.sociation with the gentry and aristocracy. The impression he made on these eminent gentlemen was largely due to his freedom from airs. They found him in his workshop, hammer in hand, proud only of free America and of his beautiful arch.

Professor Peter Lesley of Philadelphia tells me that when visiting in early life the works at Rotherham, Paine's workshop and the very tools he used were pointed out. They were preserved with care. He conversed with an aged and intelligent workman who had worked under Paine as a lad. Professor Lesley, who had shared some of the prejudice against Paine, was impressed by the earnest words of this old man. Mr. Paine, he said, was the most honest man, and the best man he ever knew. After he had been there a little time everybody looked up to him, the Walkers and their workmen. He knew the people for miles round, and went into their homes; his benevolence, his friendliness, his knowledge, made him beloved by all, rich and poor. His memory had always lasted there.

{1789}

In truth Paine, who had represented the heart of England, in America, was now representing the heart of America to England. America was working by his hand, looking through his eyes, and silently publishing to the people from whom he sprung what the new nation could make out of a starving English staymaker. He was a living Declaration of Independence. The Americans in London--the artists West and Trumbull, the Alexanders (Franklin's connections), and others--were fond of him as a friend and proud of him as a countryman.

The subjoined letter to Benjamin West (afterwards P. R. A.) shows Paine's pleasant relations with that artist and with Trumbull. It is dated March 8, 1789.

"I have informed James of the matter which you and I talked of on Sat.u.r.day, and he is much rejoiced at an opportunity of shewing his grat.i.tude to you for the permission you indulged him with in attending Mr. Trumbull at your rooms. As I have known his parents upwards of twenty years, and the manners and habits he has been educated in, and the disposition he is of, I can with confidence to myself undertake to vouch for the faithful discharge of any trust you may repose in him; and as he is a youth of quick discernment and a great deal of silent observation he cannot be easily imposed upon, or turned aside from his attention, by any contrivance of workmen. I will put him in a way of keeping a diary of every day's work he sees done, and of any observations he may make, proper for you to be informed of, which he can send once or twice a week to you at Windsor; and any directions you may have to give him in your absence can be conveyed through Mr. Trumbull, or what other method you please, so that James is certified they come from you.

"James has made a tender of his service to Mr. Trumbull, if it should be of any use, when his picture is to be exhibited; but that will probably not be till nearly the time the impressions will be struck off. James need not entirely omit his drawing while he is attending the plates.

Some employment will, in general, fix a person to a place better than having only to stand still and look on. I suppose they strike off about three impressions in an hour, and as James is master of a watch he will find their average of works,--and also how fast they can work when they have a mind to make haste,--and he can easily number each impression, which will be a double check on any being carried off. I intend visiting him pretty often, while he is on duty, which will be an additional satisfaction to yourself for the trust you commit to him."

This chapter may well close with a letter from Paine in London (January 6, 1789) to his young friend "Kitty Nicholson,"--known at the Borden-town school, and in New York,--on the occasion of her marriage with Colonel Few.** Let those who would know the real Thomas Paine read this letter!

* I have not been able to find anything more of Paine's protege James, whose parents were known to him before his departure for American. I am indebted to Mr. W. E. Benjamin for the letter.

** To a representative of this family I am indebted for the letter. Concerning the Nicholsons, see page 212.

"I sincerely thank you for your very friendly and welcome letter. I was in the country when it arrived and did not receive it soon enough to answer it by the return of the vessel.

"I very affectionately congratulate Mr. and Mrs. Few on their happy marriage, and every branch of the families allied by that connection; and I request my fair correspondent to present me to her partner, and to say, for me, that he has obtained one of the highest Prizes on the wheel. Besides the pleasure which your letter gives me to hear you are all happy and well, it relieves me from a sensation not easy to be dismissed; and if you will excuse a few dull thoughts for obtruding themselves into a congratulatory letter I will tell you what it is. When I see my female friends drop off by matrimony I am sensible of something that affects me like a loss in spite of all the appearances of joy.

I cannot help mixing the sincere compliment of regret with that of congratulation. It appears as if I had outlived or lost a friend.

It seems to me as if the original was no more, and that which she is changed to forsakes the circle and forgets the scenes of former society.

Felicities are cares superior to those she formerly cared for, create to her a new landscape of Life that excludes the little friendships of the past. It is not every lady's mind that is sufficiently capacious to prevent those greater objects crowding out the less, or that can spare a thought to former friendships after she has given her hand and heart to the man who loves her. But the sentiment your letter contains has prevented these dull Ideas from mixing with the congratulation I present you, and is so congenial with the enlarged opinion I have always formed of you, that at the time I read your letter with pleasure I read it with pride, because it convinces me that I have some judgment in that most difficult science--a Lady's mind. Most sincerely do I wish you all the good that Heaven can bless you with, and as you have in your own family an example of domestic happiness you are already in the knowledge of obtaining it. That no condition we can enjoy is an exemption from care--that some shade will mingle itself with the brightest sunshine of Life--that even our affections may become the instruments of our sorrows--that the sweet felicities of home depend on good temper as well as on good sense, and that there is always something to forgive even in the nearest and dearest of our friends,--are truths which, tho' too obvious to be told, ought never to be forgotten; and I know you will not esteem my friendship the less for impressing them upon you.

"Though I appear a sort of wanderer, the married state has not a sincerer friend than I am. It is the harbour of human life, and is, with respect to the things of this world, what the next world is to this. It is home; and that one word conveys more than any other word can express.

For a few years we may glide along the tide of youthful single life and be wonderfully delighted; but it is a tide that flows but once, and what is still worse, it ebbs faster than it flows, and leaves many a hapless voyager aground. I am one, you see that have experienced the fate, I am describing.* I have lost my tide; it pa.s.sed by while every thought of my heart was on the wing for the salvation of my dear America, and I have now as contentedly as I can, made myself a little bower of willows on the sh.o.r.e that has the solitary resemblance of a home. Should I always continue the tenant of this home, I hope my female acquaintance will ever remember that it contains not the churlish enemy of their s.e.x, not the inaccessible cold hearted mortal, nor the capricious tempered oddity, but one of the best and most affectionate of their friends.

* Paine's marriage and separation from his wife had been kept a secret in America, where the "Tories" would have used it to break the influence of his patriotic writings. It may be stated here, in addition to what is said on p. 32, that, in the absence of any divorce law in England, a separation under the Common Law was generally held as p.r.o.nouncing the marriage a nullity ab initio. According to Chalmers Paine was dissatisfied with articles of separation drawn up by an attorney, Josias Smith, May 24, 1774, and insisted on new ones, to which the clergyman was a party. The "common lawyers" regarded the marriage as completely annulled, and Paine thus free to marry again. However, he evidently never thought of doing so, and that his relations with ladies were as chaste as affectionate appears in this letter to Mrs.

Few, and in his correspondence generally.

"I did not forget the Dunstable hat, but it was not on wear here when I arrived. That I am a negligent correspondent I freely confess, and I always reproach myself for it. You mention only one letter, but I wrote twice; once by Dr. Derby, and another time by the Chevalier St.

Triss--by whom I also wrote to Gen. Morris, Col. Kirkbride, and several friends in Philadelphia, but have received no answers. I had one letter from Gen. Morris last winter, which is all I have received from New York till the arrival of yours.

"I thank you for the details of news you give. Kiss Molly Field for me and wish her joy,--and all the good girls of Borden Town. How is my favorite Sally Morris, my boy Joe, and my horse b.u.t.ton? pray let me know. Polly and Nancy Rogers,--are they married? or do they intend to build bowers as I have done? If they do, I wish they would twist their green willows somewhere near to mine.

"I am very much engaged here about my Bridge--There is one building of my Construction at Messers. Walker's Iron Works in Yorkshire, and I have direction of it. I am lately come from thence and shall return again in two or three weeks.

"As to news on this side the water, the king is mad, and there is great bustle about appointing a Regent. As it happens, I am in pretty close intimacy with the heads of the opposition--the Duke of Portland, Mr. Fox and Mr. Burke. I have sent your letter to Mrs. Burke as a specimen of the accomplishments of the American Ladies. I sent it to Miss Alexander, a lady you have heard me speak of, and I asked her to give me a few of her thoughts how to answer it. She told me to write as I felt, and I have followed her advice.

"I very kindly thank you for your friendly invitation to Georgia and if I am ever within a thousand miles of you, I will come and see you; though it be but for a day.

"You touch me on a very tender part when you say my friends on your side the water 'cannot be reconciled to the idea of my resigning my adopted America, even for my native England.' They are right. Though I am in as elegant style of acquaintance here as any American that ever came over, my heart and myself are 3000 miles apart; and I had rather see my horse b.u.t.ton in his own stable, or eating the gra.s.s of Bordentown or Morrisania, than see all the pomp and show of Europe.

"A thousand years hence (for I must indulge in a few thoughts) perhaps in less, America may be what England now is! The innocence of her character that won the hearts of all nations in her favor may sound like a romance, and her inimitable virtue as if it had never been. The ruins of that liberty which thousands bled for, or suffered to obtain, may just furnish materials for a village tale or extort a sigh from rustic sensibility, while the fashionable of that day, enveloped in dissipation, shall deride the principle and deny the fact.

"When we contemplate the fall of Empires and the extinction of nations of the ancient world, we see but little to excite our regret than the mouldering ruins of pompous palaces, magnificent monuments, lofty pyramids, and walls and towers of the most costly workmanship. But when the Empire of America shall fall, the subject for contemplative sorrow will be infinitely greater than crumbling bra.s.s or marble can inspire.

It will not then be said, here stood a temple of vast antiquity,--here rose a Babel of invisible height, or there a palace of sumptuous extravagance; but here, ah painful thought! the n.o.blest work of human wisdom, the grandest scene of human glory, the fair cause of freedom rose and fell!

"Read this and then ask if I forget America--But I 'll not be dull if I can help it, so I leave off, and close my letter tomorrow, which is the day the mail is made up for America.