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Every age and generation must be as free to act for itself in all cases as the ages and generations which preceded it. The vanity and presumption of governing beyond the grave is the most ridiculous and insolent of all tyrannies.
Thomas Paine
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Thomas Paine
Age: 72 †
Born: 1737
Born: January 29
Died: 1809
Died: June 8
Author
Entrepreneur
Journalist
Opinion Journalist
Philosopher
Politician
Prosaist
Writer
Thetford
Norfolk
Generations
Governing
Beyond
Grave
Cases
Ages
Age
Graves
Free
Vanity
Tyrannies
Must
Tyranny
Insolent
Every
Ridiculous
Preceded
Generation
Presumption
More quotes by Thomas Paine
Man is not the enemy of man, but through the medium of a false system of Government. Instead, therefore, of exclaiming against the ambition of kings, the exclamation should be directed against the principle of such governments and instead of seeking to reform the individual, the wisdom of a nation should apply itself to reform the system.
Thomas Paine
For all men being originally equals, no one by birth could have the right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others forever, and tho' himself might deserve some decent degree of honours of his cotemporaries, yet his descendants might be far too unworthy to inherit them.
Thomas Paine
It is the direction and not the magnitude which is to be taken into consideration.
Thomas Paine
Titles do not count with posterity.
Thomas Paine
Every proprietor owes to the community a ground-rent for the land which he holds.
Thomas Paine
It is from our enemies that we often gain excellent maxims, and are frequently surprised into reason by their mistakes.
Thomas Paine
Kill the king but spare the man.
Thomas Paine
Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe.
Thomas Paine
Persecution is not an original feature in any religion but it is always the strongly marked feature of all religions established by law.
Thomas Paine
The study of theology, as it stands in the Christian churches, is the study of nothing.
Thomas Paine
Accustom a people to believe that priests, or any other class of men can forgive sins and you will have sins in abundance.
Thomas Paine
The representative system of government is calculated to produce the wisest laws, by collecting wisdom where it can be found.
Thomas Paine
The intimacy which is contracted in infancy, and friendship which is formed in misfortune, are, of all others, the most lasting and unalterable.
Thomas Paine
My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.
Thomas Paine
The danger to which the success of revolutions is most exposed, is that of attempting them before the principles on which they proceed, and the advantages to result from them, are sufficiently seen and understood.
Thomas Paine
The more we bestow the richer we become.
Thomas Paine
Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise.
Thomas Paine
The Christian religion is a parody on the worship of the sun, in which they put a man called Christ in the place of the sun, and pay him the adoration originally payed to the sun.
Thomas Paine
Wisdom is not the purchase of a day, and it is no wonder that we should err at the first setting off.
Thomas Paine
The Vatican is a dagger in the heart of Italy.
Thomas Paine
