Rights of Man
Rights of Man is a book by Thomas Paine first published in 1791, including 31 articles, positing that popular political revolution is permissible when a government does not safeguard the natural rights of its people. Using these points as a base, it defends the French Revolution against Edmund Burke's attack in Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790).
"The people of America had been bred up in the same prejudices against France, which at that time characterised the people of England; but experience and an acquaintance with the French Nation have most effectually shown to the Americans the falsehood of those prejudices; and I do not believe that a more cordial and confidential intercourse exists between any two countries than between America and France."
"When the tongue or the pen is let loose in a phrenzy of passion, it is the man, and not the subject, that becomes exhausted."
"The circumstances of the world are continually changing, and the opinions of men change also; and as government is for the living, and not for the dead, it is the living only that has any right in it."
"When it becomes necessary to do anything, the whole heart and soul should go into the measure, or not attempt it."
"The mind of the nation was acted upon by a higher stimulus than what the consideration of persons could inspire, and sought a higher conquest than could be produced by the downfall of an enemy."
"A constitution is the property of a nation, and not of those who exercise the government. All the constitutions of America are declared to be established on the authority of the people. In France, the word nation is used instead of the people; but in both cases, a constitution is a thing antecedent to the government, and always distinct therefrom."
