March 11, 2025 • 25 mins
Isn't it common sense to go wild & fight!!!
'Common Sense' by Thomas Paine is a small pamphlet distributed just before the start of the American Revolution. In it he makes arguments for why they should break away from English governance to become their own independent country and not a colony. These focus on religious views of kings, the illegitimacy of hereditary rule & why England does not have America's best interests at heart.
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(00:00:00) Intro
(00:02:23) Themes/Questions
(00:13:02) Author & Extras
(00:19:51) Summary
(00:22:44) Value 4 Value
(00:23:53) Join Live!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kyrin Down (00:00):
Isn't it common sense to go wild and fight?
Welcome everyone to another episode of the Mere Mortals book reviews. I'm your host here, Kyrin, live on the 03/12/2025.
And as you might surmise, this is the podcast where I swear and serve my allegiance to the English king, long live the king.
(00:25):
Okay. No. None of that's gonna be happening today on this podcast. And
indeed, none of it was done by this author, Thomas Paine, and his book that I've got here, Common Sense, which is a civics classics with the introduction by rich Richard Beeman.
Now this, even though is technically in a book form,
of about 73 pages for the first half of it, but it gets up into, like, a hundred and something.
(00:52):
A 12, hundred and 13.
Probably took me about three hours to get through in total.
It was originally published as a pamphlet in 1776.
And so this was distributed
right before the start of the American Revolution.
So the bulk of it is of this
pamphlet, I guess, with two little sections at the back, an appendix here, and then also
(01:15):
an introduction to the American crisis,
which was, I believe, a series of
other essays that he wrote on America and and things like this. So you get like a tiny little snippet of it. So even though the it's in book form, most of this is around the actual pamphlet titled common sense.
So in it, he makes arguments for why,
(01:37):
America and Americans should break away from the English rule,
of the time, which was the monarchy under king
someone. I can't even remember who it was, King William, maybe,
and to become their own independent country and not just a colony.
So
a lot of this focuses on the,
I guess, religious undertone,
(01:58):
arguments
of of kings and
iffiness based on the Bible, but then also on the ideas of
of freedom,
of,
the illegitimacy
of the of the rule of the kings, of the hereditary
rule, of why America is deserving of its own independence and things like this. So, he gets into all of that in his main article here, which I guess gets us on to the very first theme and the main one. What was the American Revolution based upon?
(02:29):
Now, if you're like me, this can actually be an insight into, I suppose, the start of of America
and,
particularly with a bit of more of perhaps of an objective view. I grew I'm an Australian. I grew up here.
I have no links to England. So, on either side of this, I I have no real
allegiance
to who to
(02:51):
neither the American Declaration of Independence nor to the English monarchy.
So maybe I can give you a little bit of insight into,
perhaps the the starting of America without any of the
strength of emotion, which is typically carried with it.
What I really took from this this book, and I'm gonna say book even though it was a pamphlet,
(03:12):
was
the, I guess,
real moral arguments that was coming from from what he was talking about rather than the undertones of practicality.
So even though you do get some minor insights into the
problems of the day or things that were happening in America, such as
the how they they had a strong navy. So this was an argument to of why they could actually fight for their own independence
(03:38):
of how they had no debt compared to Britain's
apparently
enormous
high debt of 140,000,000
sterling, which
low today, we would laugh at that
their access to trade.
But a lot of these were minor, he didn't really talk about the living conditions of the time. He didn't talk about
really the the boots on the ground
(03:59):
reports of why
the the rule and the English rule at the at the time was so stifling or so bad in any particular ways. And I'll touch more upon why he didn't talk about about these in the author section because it is related to him as an American.
Now,
however, most of this was actually based upon the ruling of the English government and why it was illegitimate.
(04:24):
So these moral arguments is what you really see coming through here.
What really stood out for me was right at the start of this pamphlet, this book, he he was talking about the religious side of things. And so a lot of his arguments were based on
the things that you could get from scriptures. So essentially,
(04:44):
it lists out reasons why you don't want a king. So the corruption, the bribery, the vanity of showmanship, the unearned luxury.
But of all of this was saying like, you know, this is in the Bible. It says this,
and, you know, quotes off a particular section
and was really using that as the main force of his argument at the start.
(05:05):
He does get on to another section
slightly after this,
which is talking more about, I guess, what you would call just general morals because he doesn't link them to a religious,
undertone. So this was like the ruffian origins of William the Conqueror,
the lack of reason in trusting hereditary
(05:26):
succession,
how monarchy has not prevented civil wars or rebellions.
So he was, I guess, dismantling the the standard tropes of arguments at the time of why English rule is good and why
having a king in particular is good,
even though, of course, the the English system was not only a monarchy, but it had, you know, the House of House of Commons and things like this. So they did have another form of government
(05:54):
in, I wouldn't say in opposition to the king, but there was a joint kind of rule going on.
What I actually found a little bit disappointing
from this was that he he started off with the religious undertone. It was almost like the the qualities,
the moral arguments of of fairness, of of what is just, of what is right,
(06:15):
were
needed to be couched in in this religious
section. And I get it. The
at the time, religion was everywhere,
and you couldn't escape it. So you had to talk about it. And, you know, likely, he was very religious himself, although some of his later works would also indicate that perhaps he wasn't.
(06:37):
It was yeah. For me, it was, it was just interesting that they couldn't stand on their own ground that, you know,
the
the qualities that you might think were
important to human beings had to be couched in in moral reasons
rather than for them standing on their own. But, you know, that's that's just me.
And I guess what actually also stood out was that he was using these,
(07:03):
and it wasn't even though he was calling for a revolution in a certain sense, he wasn't
calling
for it just because America was in a position where they could, I. E. They had the force to actually be able to do it and have a, you know, a decent crack at it. It certainly wasn't certain at the time. That was probably another thing, which was,
the timing of it
(07:24):
was discussed frequently in the book where he was like, you know, we probably should have done this a little bit earlier, but, you know, now's a good time as ever. And
it needs to be done. And
a lot of people were saying, Oh, we'll leave it for our kids to do, or if we just leave it a bit longer, it'll be easier, things like this. And he was he was kind of arguing, no. Like, the time is now.
(07:45):
The, you know, to take a a painful break is is what we need to do.
And it's better that we do it so that we can save our children from having to do it, which I, I thought was actually rather,
a moral, a noble thing to to be arguing for.
And that that might have actually had quite a bit of weight because apparently this book was,
(08:07):
in terms of the historical context.
All of the patriots and the revolutionists
actually read this pamphlet, and it was quite influential.
So
with all of that being said, there actually wasn't that much about the good things in terms
of independence
and why it would be good. He focused
pretty much exclusively on the negative things
(08:29):
happening at the time. So in the second paragraph, for example, of the of the actual common sense, he, he writes this.
Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil, in its worst state, an intolerable one. For when we suffer or are exposed to the same miseries by government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamities is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer.
(08:57):
And then goes on to talk more about government. And that's pretty interesting because it pretty much follows follows my general thought, which is, yeah, governments are a necessary evil. Even the necessary part of that
I question sometimes.
But
he
he views them as as a
it's not utopic.
(09:17):
His his pamphlet, he's not saying, you know, we're gonna gain independence. And,
you know, let's first of all, let's fight. We need to do this revolution now.
And then in the aftermath, we're gonna have a utopia or anything like that. No, he pretty much is just circling. We need to fight and let's do it now. So
he doesn't talk about, you know, what kind of rule will come afterwards. He touches very briefly upon,
(09:43):
you know, the type maybe of of a republic that they could form.
But it's more about escaping the clutches of a shitty government
rather than moving towards a better one.
And so there are some points on why they they need to make sure another monarchy doesn't appear, for example, in The US. And,
(10:03):
this comes, I guess, more as a whole as an impression and passion call to arms
rather than a well out thought out the idea of
why
a new government would make America any better than it currently is.
Pretty lucky, to be honest, because usually revolutions like this, I've if I had to, you know, I don't have the data in front of me, but I would argue
(10:28):
probably
just based on my understanding of history that most revolutions just end up with
another despot, another king who can be quite worse
than than the one you've just gotten rid of. So I think in some extent, they're rather lucky that they not only had the
the person like Thomas Paine, the revolutionists,
(10:49):
then people who are willing to fight, but also the, you know, the George Washingtons, the,
the people,
writing the Declaration of Independence who they had something to fill the gap afterwards. So
the last little section, I guess, was there was a couple of minor high,
hypotheticals
in
that appeared in the book. So for example, he was asking,
(11:12):
when where does society stop and the government start? So, you know, he starts self listing
a little tribe or, sorry, not even that, one
person. And then you get two people and you may be making a log cabin, then you get a couple more and you're making, like, a little,
a band, I guess you'd call it. And then you have a little more and it's becoming more into, like, a little commune, then a little more, and there's coming to a village. And at what point does
(11:37):
government actually
become a thing versus just interpersonal relations? And I I thought that was kind of interesting. I've never actually seen the build up in that, extent, especially
when it's related to,
you know, the American style of of government.
Probably a question deserving of its own book.
There was a couple of other things, you know, he
(11:58):
he was talking about they were calling themselves Americans and not Britons.
What would have changed if they had viewed themselves as Britons? And I imagine
when they first arrived there in,
I'm not sure, sixteen hundreds maybe.
I actually have no idea when first Americans arrived, sorry, the first Britons arrived in in America.
(12:20):
But obviously, over time, as you as you're born and raised in a different country
or a different land,
you start to view yourself as a person of that land rather than as a displaced Britain.
So would that have changed things?
How has America managed to remain as this kind of single unit,
rather than splintering off into the European style things? It's rather rather interesting. I wouldn't mind reading more about that.
(12:46):
If they had fought for independence earlier, what would have happened? If they'd fought for it later, what would have happened? These are kind of kind of hypotheticals that come up with this because it's history and it's interesting to to have a think about, oh, what would have happened if this had been different or if this had been different. So,
yeah, let's jump on to the author some extra details. Mister Thomas Paine without e was born in England in 1737.
(13:11):
And to be honest, this dude had a pretty lousy life,
especially, I guess,
up until the publishing of of this pamphlet here. So his father was a staymaker, which I learned is actually a corset maker. So you know, those bodices for women.
And he flitted between this and privateering. So jumping on ships and
(13:33):
doing what I'm being a sailor,
and being an excise officer in in England,
With
the classic things of
having a, you know, a wife and an unborn child who died in labor,
which was very, very common at the time.
And the, you know, his life just seemed pretty miserable, to be honest. He started writing when he was an excise officer and actually got in trouble because he spent more of his time petitioning and writing than actually doing his job.
(14:03):
He came across, I guess, just from my brief readings of him as a
kind of like a a wily character, a bit,
certainly independent
and probably a bit too much for his own good.
He met Benjamin Franklin at some point when he was in America and got a letter of recommendation. And so at the age of 37 was actually when he went to The United States or wasn't called The United States at that time, went to the new New England,
(14:31):
the new the new country.
And he wrote his pamphlet
there only after being there for like, half a year or something like that. So you can kind of see maybe why he wasn't making arguments based on the current situation in America because he'd just arrived there. Like he hadn't even gotten to see the lay of the land or probably even know,
(14:52):
the different
towns and Boston and Philadelphia and you know, all of these places. So
kind of interesting in that respect that the one of the most well known and call to arms for for American independence actually came from a British dude who'd only just arrived there. I didn't actually know that. So,
(15:13):
eventually,
he, you know, he became instantly famous from this. He wrote some other things on the American crisis and stuff. So,
created and crafted a name for himself,
but,
eventually led to to ruin,
because he was talking about revolutions. He was talking about governments. He was talking about religion
(15:34):
in a more atheistic manner in terms of overthrowing government. So this was around the French Revolution time as well,
which led him to prison,
bankruptcy and ultimately a rather ignominious death where no one really went to his funeral. I think maybe it's six people or something. So,
this is one of those times where I guess you can see the life of the man is reflected in his writings.
(15:56):
He certainly had strong ideas and this
moral
undercasing undertones and was a was a great writer.
And so probably maybe he was a great kind of speechmaker as well. Certainly, if he was able to become friends with Benjamin Franklin, he he most likely was a man of character.
But I think
(16:16):
the parts of his personality were probably abrasive and
led to ostracism. So he can start off some of his writings with brilliant works,
and writing such as Europe, not England is the parent country of America. I thought this was a really interesting insight.
These are the times that try men's souls. This was on page hundred three at the very start of the, I believe, the American crisis. So
(16:41):
he certainly was a great writer, but I think there was something about him misreading the room as well. So
he said stuff that probably should be worded more carefully and less,
forcefully, maybe is the better way of saying it. So there's rather strong parts in this where he's calls out Americans,
who don't
(17:02):
fight,
and who don't defect unworthy
with the heart of a coward and the spirit of a sycophant. So
you can definitely see like, okay, he's not afraid of
calling people names of being upfront in their face about
what they should
do. He's got this, in the appendix,
he's got this epistle to Quakers, which is essentially a,
(17:25):
a mini
letter that he wrote to Quakers at the time,
arguing for their why they should fight for independence as well. And
he's really reasonable,
in and kind of respectful and courteous
courteous
at the start of it. But by the end of it, he's like questioning their adherence to their own faith, calling them names.
(17:45):
It gets pretty pretty full on. So it's just like, I can see why calling out kings and leaders,
in this direct style is is asking for trouble,
which on a stylistic note, you might notice in the book is that there's certain words, nouns, which are dashed out and you'll only see the the first letter. So it might be a k, then a long dash, and then a, you know,
(18:08):
there's apostrophe,
s. And it's pretty easy to fill in. Obviously, this stands for kings.
And this happened multiple times throughout the book in terms of particular people's names,
the Kings and Britons or
whether were the main ones that you would notice.
And the reason for this was
due to libel and treason laws at the time where you could get in trouble for directly naming people. And so they people who are creating pamphlets and books were would use this kind of,
(18:39):
you know, everyone knows what the word means, but you still have to do it like this. So you have an argument,
as to why. Oh, no. Maybe I was I was gonna say,
I don't know.
What's a kingfishers instead of kings?
And so
kudos to the man. He'd certainly took big risks, and they paid off for him for a short time with the renowned, and the American Revolution went well. If it didn't, man, he probably would have been right up there in terms of,
(19:06):
enemy number one for Britain's to to start putting in jail and, cutting off the heads of people for for daring to revolt against the empire.
But you best be prepared for people to attack back if you're attacking them.
And
I think he lacked the charm and wit of some of his contemporary writers at the time. So
(19:28):
this might have been the, you know, the Jonathan Swift's or the Voltaire's.
And then he found people across history who write satire or who make this public commentary on
governments or of people at the time, such as
Mark Twain or Christopher Hitchens, for example. So
he didn't really get away with, I guess, his writings in in many a sense. So let's jump on to the final summary here.
(19:54):
Look, it was refreshing to hear not only the kind of pacifist non intervention call out as an American because, good Lord, you don't really see much of that nowadays,
but also the underlying tone of being the underdog.
America
at the moment is such a big
behemoth superpower
that it's kind of fun to see it as the small underdog, you know, fighting for for what they believe is right. And,
(20:23):
he had a good list of reasons in the book for it. It's certainly more of an an incendiary
book or a pamphlet
designed to get people
motivated
and for action.
And the
even though it's political, it's kind of not political commentary in a sense. So it's it's talking more about the overarching themes
(20:45):
larger than life rather than
this person said this thing or this one particular policy of of King Charles or King William or King, whoever
is,
is is so bad and he's a bad person and things like that. So
a useful insight into the origins of of America,
as a standalone work. Look, I'm kind of writing it as as average. It's a little bit hard to read. It's it's not too bad. You can certainly get through it, but just the way he words things, the the length of sentences,
(21:15):
there's stuff in there where it's like, it's not the easiest of reads, not the worst as well.
And
it's, I guess, a bit chaotic,
usually leads to to worse outcomes if you're calling for revolt. So this is more the
the standard of like this guy got lucky that it turned out well
for his country rather than, you know, just another jackass
(21:38):
calling for destruction. And,
you know, destruction comes and
everyone's worse off for it. So an interesting insight into history. I'm gonna give it I don't know, five and a half out of 10 common sense by Thomas Paine with the additional
appendices and and stuff like that.
Similar books
are is kind of like actually
(21:58):
George Orwell's coming up for air in that
you can sense the the feeling in the air of war, of revolution, of something big is going to happen.
And coming up for air, he wrote just before World War Two,
kind of an average book as well. In essence, like I'd probably give it a very similar score, like five and a half out of 10,
(22:20):
in that it wasn't an amazing book, but it does give an insight into kind of history and feeling of the time of revolution, of warfare, of what people feel at the time.
And in terms of style of writing, you know, check out Ben Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, and you'd get a very similar style of the writing. So,
those are the kind of things I would recommend from that.
(22:43):
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Finally, I'm live. I do this live 11AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday. I see one in the chat. He was asking, do you feel like Paine was biased in that view?
(24:03):
And I'm not really sure what view he's talking about of that the English government was terrible, of that kings
and monarchies were or
were illegitimate.
Well, I'd say history speaks for itself in that. No, a lot of people agreed with them. And hence we had the American Revolution.
(24:24):
He certainly had a bias in that.
I think his time in England
and his lack of success there,
his kind of poor life,
I imagine he would have felt constrained by
perhaps the social norms of that place and
maybe even the the government itself played a role in
(24:46):
in the constructing of those social norms. So, I mean, yeah, sure. He's he's biased. But,
you know, there's a lot of terrible kings, but there were some cracking good ones, too.
And he he does mention that he says that that that is a case. You can have good kings, but man, roll of the dice and
by and large,
probably across history, you're gonna have more
(25:10):
neutral to bad ones rather than good ones. So,
it's it's certainly a risk.
And, yeah, what's coming up next? I'm reading the bilingual brain at the moment. But other than that, I don't really have a a huge selection of books. I need to get some from the library soon.
One's coming up with another book review or another something after this one, I believe, in a couple of days time. Just a prerecorded one.
(25:35):
So, yeah, plenty of still stuff still to come on the book reviews channel. I hope you're having a fantastic day wherever you are in the world, and chat for now. Karen out. Bye.
Isn't it common sense to go wild and fight?
Welcome everyone to another episode of the Mere Mortals book reviews. I'm your host here, Kyrin, live on the 03/12/2025.
And as you might surmise, this is the podcast where I swear and serve my allegiance to the English king, long live the king.
(00:25):
Okay. No. None of that's gonna be happening today on this podcast. And
indeed, none of it was done by this author, Thomas Paine, and his book that I've got here, Common Sense, which is a civics classics with the introduction by rich Richard Beeman.
Now this, even though is technically in a book form,
of about 73 pages for the first half of it, but it gets up into, like, a hundred and something.
(00:52):
A 12, hundred and 13.
Probably took me about three hours to get through in total.
It was originally published as a pamphlet in 1776.
And so this was distributed
right before the start of the American Revolution.
So the bulk of it is of this
pamphlet, I guess, with two little sections at the back, an appendix here, and then also
(01:15):
an introduction to the American crisis,
which was, I believe, a series of
other essays that he wrote on America and and things like this. So you get like a tiny little snippet of it. So even though the it's in book form, most of this is around the actual pamphlet titled common sense.
So in it, he makes arguments for why,
(01:37):
America and Americans should break away from the English rule,
of the time, which was the monarchy under king
someone. I can't even remember who it was, King William, maybe,
and to become their own independent country and not just a colony.
So
a lot of this focuses on the,
I guess, religious undertone,
(01:58):
arguments
of of kings and
iffiness based on the Bible, but then also on the ideas of
of freedom,
of,
the illegitimacy
of the of the rule of the kings, of the hereditary
rule, of why America is deserving of its own independence and things like this. So, he gets into all of that in his main article here, which I guess gets us on to the very first theme and the main one. What was the American Revolution based upon?
(02:29):
Now, if you're like me, this can actually be an insight into, I suppose, the start of of America
and,
particularly with a bit of more of perhaps of an objective view. I grew I'm an Australian. I grew up here.
I have no links to England. So, on either side of this, I I have no real
allegiance
to who to
(02:51):
neither the American Declaration of Independence nor to the English monarchy.
So maybe I can give you a little bit of insight into,
perhaps the the starting of America without any of the
strength of emotion, which is typically carried with it.
What I really took from this this book, and I'm gonna say book even though it was a pamphlet,
(03:12):
was
the, I guess,
real moral arguments that was coming from from what he was talking about rather than the undertones of practicality.
So even though you do get some minor insights into the
problems of the day or things that were happening in America, such as
the how they they had a strong navy. So this was an argument to of why they could actually fight for their own independence
(03:38):
of how they had no debt compared to Britain's
apparently
enormous
high debt of 140,000,000
sterling, which
low today, we would laugh at that
their access to trade.
But a lot of these were minor, he didn't really talk about the living conditions of the time. He didn't talk about
really the the boots on the ground
(03:59):
reports of why
the the rule and the English rule at the at the time was so stifling or so bad in any particular ways. And I'll touch more upon why he didn't talk about about these in the author section because it is related to him as an American.
Now,
however, most of this was actually based upon the ruling of the English government and why it was illegitimate.
(04:24):
So these moral arguments is what you really see coming through here.
What really stood out for me was right at the start of this pamphlet, this book, he he was talking about the religious side of things. And so a lot of his arguments were based on
the things that you could get from scriptures. So essentially,
(04:44):
it lists out reasons why you don't want a king. So the corruption, the bribery, the vanity of showmanship, the unearned luxury.
But of all of this was saying like, you know, this is in the Bible. It says this,
and, you know, quotes off a particular section
and was really using that as the main force of his argument at the start.
(05:05):
He does get on to another section
slightly after this,
which is talking more about, I guess, what you would call just general morals because he doesn't link them to a religious,
undertone. So this was like the ruffian origins of William the Conqueror,
the lack of reason in trusting hereditary
(05:26):
succession,
how monarchy has not prevented civil wars or rebellions.
So he was, I guess, dismantling the the standard tropes of arguments at the time of why English rule is good and why
having a king in particular is good,
even though, of course, the the English system was not only a monarchy, but it had, you know, the House of House of Commons and things like this. So they did have another form of government
(05:54):
in, I wouldn't say in opposition to the king, but there was a joint kind of rule going on.
What I actually found a little bit disappointing
from this was that he he started off with the religious undertone. It was almost like the the qualities,
the moral arguments of of fairness, of of what is just, of what is right,
(06:15):
were
needed to be couched in in this religious
section. And I get it. The
at the time, religion was everywhere,
and you couldn't escape it. So you had to talk about it. And, you know, likely, he was very religious himself, although some of his later works would also indicate that perhaps he wasn't.
(06:37):
It was yeah. For me, it was, it was just interesting that they couldn't stand on their own ground that, you know,
the
the qualities that you might think were
important to human beings had to be couched in in moral reasons
rather than for them standing on their own. But, you know, that's that's just me.
And I guess what actually also stood out was that he was using these,
(07:03):
and it wasn't even though he was calling for a revolution in a certain sense, he wasn't
calling
for it just because America was in a position where they could, I. E. They had the force to actually be able to do it and have a, you know, a decent crack at it. It certainly wasn't certain at the time. That was probably another thing, which was,
the timing of it
(07:24):
was discussed frequently in the book where he was like, you know, we probably should have done this a little bit earlier, but, you know, now's a good time as ever. And
it needs to be done. And
a lot of people were saying, Oh, we'll leave it for our kids to do, or if we just leave it a bit longer, it'll be easier, things like this. And he was he was kind of arguing, no. Like, the time is now.
(07:45):
The, you know, to take a a painful break is is what we need to do.
And it's better that we do it so that we can save our children from having to do it, which I, I thought was actually rather,
a moral, a noble thing to to be arguing for.
And that that might have actually had quite a bit of weight because apparently this book was,
(08:07):
in terms of the historical context.
All of the patriots and the revolutionists
actually read this pamphlet, and it was quite influential.
So
with all of that being said, there actually wasn't that much about the good things in terms
of independence
and why it would be good. He focused
pretty much exclusively on the negative things
(08:29):
happening at the time. So in the second paragraph, for example, of the of the actual common sense, he, he writes this.
Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil, in its worst state, an intolerable one. For when we suffer or are exposed to the same miseries by government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamities is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer.
(08:57):
And then goes on to talk more about government. And that's pretty interesting because it pretty much follows follows my general thought, which is, yeah, governments are a necessary evil. Even the necessary part of that
I question sometimes.
But
he
he views them as as a
it's not utopic.
(09:17):
His his pamphlet, he's not saying, you know, we're gonna gain independence. And,
you know, let's first of all, let's fight. We need to do this revolution now.
And then in the aftermath, we're gonna have a utopia or anything like that. No, he pretty much is just circling. We need to fight and let's do it now. So
he doesn't talk about, you know, what kind of rule will come afterwards. He touches very briefly upon,
(09:43):
you know, the type maybe of of a republic that they could form.
But it's more about escaping the clutches of a shitty government
rather than moving towards a better one.
And so there are some points on why they they need to make sure another monarchy doesn't appear, for example, in The US. And,
(10:03):
this comes, I guess, more as a whole as an impression and passion call to arms
rather than a well out thought out the idea of
why
a new government would make America any better than it currently is.
Pretty lucky, to be honest, because usually revolutions like this, I've if I had to, you know, I don't have the data in front of me, but I would argue
(10:28):
probably
just based on my understanding of history that most revolutions just end up with
another despot, another king who can be quite worse
than than the one you've just gotten rid of. So I think in some extent, they're rather lucky that they not only had the
the person like Thomas Paine, the revolutionists,
(10:49):
then people who are willing to fight, but also the, you know, the George Washingtons, the,
the people,
writing the Declaration of Independence who they had something to fill the gap afterwards. So
the last little section, I guess, was there was a couple of minor high,
hypotheticals
in
that appeared in the book. So for example, he was asking,
(11:12):
when where does society stop and the government start? So, you know, he starts self listing
a little tribe or, sorry, not even that, one
person. And then you get two people and you may be making a log cabin, then you get a couple more and you're making, like, a little,
a band, I guess you'd call it. And then you have a little more and it's becoming more into, like, a little commune, then a little more, and there's coming to a village. And at what point does
(11:37):
government actually
become a thing versus just interpersonal relations? And I I thought that was kind of interesting. I've never actually seen the build up in that, extent, especially
when it's related to,
you know, the American style of of government.
Probably a question deserving of its own book.
There was a couple of other things, you know, he
(11:58):
he was talking about they were calling themselves Americans and not Britons.
What would have changed if they had viewed themselves as Britons? And I imagine
when they first arrived there in,
I'm not sure, sixteen hundreds maybe.
I actually have no idea when first Americans arrived, sorry, the first Britons arrived in in America.
(12:20):
But obviously, over time, as you as you're born and raised in a different country
or a different land,
you start to view yourself as a person of that land rather than as a displaced Britain.
So would that have changed things?
How has America managed to remain as this kind of single unit,
rather than splintering off into the European style things? It's rather rather interesting. I wouldn't mind reading more about that.
(12:46):
If they had fought for independence earlier, what would have happened? If they'd fought for it later, what would have happened? These are kind of kind of hypotheticals that come up with this because it's history and it's interesting to to have a think about, oh, what would have happened if this had been different or if this had been different. So,
yeah, let's jump on to the author some extra details. Mister Thomas Paine without e was born in England in 1737.
(13:11):
And to be honest, this dude had a pretty lousy life,
especially, I guess,
up until the publishing of of this pamphlet here. So his father was a staymaker, which I learned is actually a corset maker. So you know, those bodices for women.
And he flitted between this and privateering. So jumping on ships and
(13:33):
doing what I'm being a sailor,
and being an excise officer in in England,
With
the classic things of
having a, you know, a wife and an unborn child who died in labor,
which was very, very common at the time.
And the, you know, his life just seemed pretty miserable, to be honest. He started writing when he was an excise officer and actually got in trouble because he spent more of his time petitioning and writing than actually doing his job.
(14:03):
He came across, I guess, just from my brief readings of him as a
kind of like a a wily character, a bit,
certainly independent
and probably a bit too much for his own good.
He met Benjamin Franklin at some point when he was in America and got a letter of recommendation. And so at the age of 37 was actually when he went to The United States or wasn't called The United States at that time, went to the new New England,
(14:31):
the new the new country.
And he wrote his pamphlet
there only after being there for like, half a year or something like that. So you can kind of see maybe why he wasn't making arguments based on the current situation in America because he'd just arrived there. Like he hadn't even gotten to see the lay of the land or probably even know,
(14:52):
the different
towns and Boston and Philadelphia and you know, all of these places. So
kind of interesting in that respect that the one of the most well known and call to arms for for American independence actually came from a British dude who'd only just arrived there. I didn't actually know that. So,
(15:13):
eventually,
he, you know, he became instantly famous from this. He wrote some other things on the American crisis and stuff. So,
created and crafted a name for himself,
but,
eventually led to to ruin,
because he was talking about revolutions. He was talking about governments. He was talking about religion
(15:34):
in a more atheistic manner in terms of overthrowing government. So this was around the French Revolution time as well,
which led him to prison,
bankruptcy and ultimately a rather ignominious death where no one really went to his funeral. I think maybe it's six people or something. So,
this is one of those times where I guess you can see the life of the man is reflected in his writings.
(15:56):
He certainly had strong ideas and this
moral
undercasing undertones and was a was a great writer.
And so probably maybe he was a great kind of speechmaker as well. Certainly, if he was able to become friends with Benjamin Franklin, he he most likely was a man of character.
But I think
(16:16):
the parts of his personality were probably abrasive and
led to ostracism. So he can start off some of his writings with brilliant works,
and writing such as Europe, not England is the parent country of America. I thought this was a really interesting insight.
These are the times that try men's souls. This was on page hundred three at the very start of the, I believe, the American crisis. So
(16:41):
he certainly was a great writer, but I think there was something about him misreading the room as well. So
he said stuff that probably should be worded more carefully and less,
forcefully, maybe is the better way of saying it. So there's rather strong parts in this where he's calls out Americans,
who don't
(17:02):
fight,
and who don't defect unworthy
with the heart of a coward and the spirit of a sycophant. So
you can definitely see like, okay, he's not afraid of
calling people names of being upfront in their face about
what they should
do. He's got this, in the appendix,
he's got this epistle to Quakers, which is essentially a,
(17:25):
a mini
letter that he wrote to Quakers at the time,
arguing for their why they should fight for independence as well. And
he's really reasonable,
in and kind of respectful and courteous
courteous
at the start of it. But by the end of it, he's like questioning their adherence to their own faith, calling them names.
(17:45):
It gets pretty pretty full on. So it's just like, I can see why calling out kings and leaders,
in this direct style is is asking for trouble,
which on a stylistic note, you might notice in the book is that there's certain words, nouns, which are dashed out and you'll only see the the first letter. So it might be a k, then a long dash, and then a, you know,
(18:08):
there's apostrophe,
s. And it's pretty easy to fill in. Obviously, this stands for kings.
And this happened multiple times throughout the book in terms of particular people's names,
the Kings and Britons or
whether were the main ones that you would notice.
And the reason for this was
due to libel and treason laws at the time where you could get in trouble for directly naming people. And so they people who are creating pamphlets and books were would use this kind of,
(18:39):
you know, everyone knows what the word means, but you still have to do it like this. So you have an argument,
as to why. Oh, no. Maybe I was I was gonna say,
I don't know.
What's a kingfishers instead of kings?
And so
kudos to the man. He'd certainly took big risks, and they paid off for him for a short time with the renowned, and the American Revolution went well. If it didn't, man, he probably would have been right up there in terms of,
(19:06):
enemy number one for Britain's to to start putting in jail and, cutting off the heads of people for for daring to revolt against the empire.
But you best be prepared for people to attack back if you're attacking them.
And
I think he lacked the charm and wit of some of his contemporary writers at the time. So
(19:28):
this might have been the, you know, the Jonathan Swift's or the Voltaire's.
And then he found people across history who write satire or who make this public commentary on
governments or of people at the time, such as
Mark Twain or Christopher Hitchens, for example. So
he didn't really get away with, I guess, his writings in in many a sense. So let's jump on to the final summary here.
(19:54):
Look, it was refreshing to hear not only the kind of pacifist non intervention call out as an American because, good Lord, you don't really see much of that nowadays,
but also the underlying tone of being the underdog.
America
at the moment is such a big
behemoth superpower
that it's kind of fun to see it as the small underdog, you know, fighting for for what they believe is right. And,
(20:23):
he had a good list of reasons in the book for it. It's certainly more of an an incendiary
book or a pamphlet
designed to get people
motivated
and for action.
And the
even though it's political, it's kind of not political commentary in a sense. So it's it's talking more about the overarching themes
(20:45):
larger than life rather than
this person said this thing or this one particular policy of of King Charles or King William or King, whoever
is,
is is so bad and he's a bad person and things like that. So
a useful insight into the origins of of America,
as a standalone work. Look, I'm kind of writing it as as average. It's a little bit hard to read. It's it's not too bad. You can certainly get through it, but just the way he words things, the the length of sentences,
(21:15):
there's stuff in there where it's like, it's not the easiest of reads, not the worst as well.
And
it's, I guess, a bit chaotic,
usually leads to to worse outcomes if you're calling for revolt. So this is more the
the standard of like this guy got lucky that it turned out well
for his country rather than, you know, just another jackass
(21:38):
calling for destruction. And,
you know, destruction comes and
everyone's worse off for it. So an interesting insight into history. I'm gonna give it I don't know, five and a half out of 10 common sense by Thomas Paine with the additional
appendices and and stuff like that.
Similar books
are is kind of like actually
(21:58):
George Orwell's coming up for air in that
you can sense the the feeling in the air of war, of revolution, of something big is going to happen.
And coming up for air, he wrote just before World War Two,
kind of an average book as well. In essence, like I'd probably give it a very similar score, like five and a half out of 10,
(22:20):
in that it wasn't an amazing book, but it does give an insight into kind of history and feeling of the time of revolution, of warfare, of what people feel at the time.
And in terms of style of writing, you know, check out Ben Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, and you'd get a very similar style of the writing. So,
those are the kind of things I would recommend from that.
(22:43):
Value for value. There's a value for value podcast. I put all of this out there anytime for anyone, anyhow, anyplace, anywhere,
both as the video and as the audio versions.
And,
you know, for all of this value I'm providing, I just ask that you provide some back in return. And what was this podcast worth to you? Did you enjoy it? And so there's many ways you can do this time
(23:06):
sharing it with a friend. Word-of-mouth is is really big. So letting someone know of the book reviews channel of the mere mortals book reviews, what and why you enjoy them.
You can also do the like, share, subscribe, all those sorts of things. Talent, give me some book recommendations. What would you like to see covered on this channel? Give me some books that you think I would enjoy based on previous ones or ones that I would hate based on previous ones, all these sorts of things I find immensely valuable. So reaching out via,
(23:35):
a comment down below or via any of these social media channels, joining us in on our Discord, we tend to discuss books in there a little bit as well.
And then finally, Treasure. There is PayPal link down below, which you can use or if you go to meremortalspodcast.com/support,
there's a couple of other options there as well.
Finally, I'm live. I do this live 11AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday. I see one in the chat. He was asking, do you feel like Paine was biased in that view?
(24:03):
And I'm not really sure what view he's talking about of that the English government was terrible, of that kings
and monarchies were or
were illegitimate.
Well, I'd say history speaks for itself in that. No, a lot of people agreed with them. And hence we had the American Revolution.
(24:24):
He certainly had a bias in that.
I think his time in England
and his lack of success there,
his kind of poor life,
I imagine he would have felt constrained by
perhaps the social norms of that place and
maybe even the the government itself played a role in
(24:46):
in the constructing of those social norms. So, I mean, yeah, sure. He's he's biased. But,
you know, there's a lot of terrible kings, but there were some cracking good ones, too.
And he he does mention that he says that that that is a case. You can have good kings, but man, roll of the dice and
by and large,
probably across history, you're gonna have more
(25:10):
neutral to bad ones rather than good ones. So,
it's it's certainly a risk.
And, yeah, what's coming up next? I'm reading the bilingual brain at the moment. But other than that, I don't really have a a huge selection of books. I need to get some from the library soon.
One's coming up with another book review or another something after this one, I believe, in a couple of days time. Just a prerecorded one.
(25:35):
So, yeah, plenty of still stuff still to come on the book reviews channel. I hope you're having a fantastic day wherever you are in the world, and chat for now. Karen out. Bye.
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