Thomas Paine's Age of Reason

Finally got around to reading a falling apart hardback copy of Paine's Age of Reason (published as three pamphlets in 1794, 1795, 1807) found at a Little Free Library long ago.  It's a very modern book and Paine is very clear as a writer.

Paine deconstructs and demolishes the Bible but believes instead that 

"The creation is the Bible of the Deist.  He there reads, in the handwriting of the Creator himself, the certainty of his existence and the immutability of his power, and all other Bibles and Testaments are to him forgeries."

Sounds like an ecological world view to me.

Reading Age of Reason led me to his pamphlet "Agrarian Justice" (1797) where he argued that the Earth itself belongs to all of us and that we are entitled to a just portion of that.  The sums would be "fifteen pounds sterling, as a compensation in part, for the loss of his or her natural inheritance, by the introduction of the system of landed property: £1,599.00 ($1955.98)

"And also, the sum of ten pounds per annum:  £1,066.00 ($1303.98)"

I like Tom Paine and grew up with people who liked him too.  After I read the book, I found my grandmother's paperback copy among my books.  I gave both copies to the various Little Free Libraries around town after I finished my notes.

Now Paine's Rights of Man goes on the reading list.

 Age of Reason by Thomas Paine

(2)  I believe in one God, and no more;  and I hope for happiness beyond this life.

I believe in the equality of man;  and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy.

(30)  If I owe a person money, and cannot pay him, and he threatens to put me in prison, another person can take the debt upon himself, and pay it for me;  but if I have committed a crime, every circumstance of the case is changed;  moral justice cannot take the innocent for the guilty, even if the innocent would offer itself.  To suppose justice to do this, is to destroy the principle of its existence, which is the thing itself;  it is then no longer justice, it is indiscriminate revenge.

Editorial Comment:  The plot of A Tale of Two Cities

(32)  The word of God is the creation we behold and it is in _this world_, which no human can counterfeit or alter, that God speaketh universally to man.

(36)  Almost the only parts in the book called the Bible that convey to us any idea of God, are some chapters in Job and the 19th Psalm;  I recollect no other.  Those parts are true deistical compositions, for they treat the Deity through his works.  They take the book of Creation as the word of God, they refer to no other book, and all the inferences they make are drawn from that volume.

(40)  That which is now called natural philosophy, embracing the whole circle of science, of which astronomy occupies the chief place, is the study of the works of God, and of the power and wisdom of God in his works, and is the true theology.

(58)  … and I moreover believe, that any system of religion that has anything in it that shocks the mind of a child, cannot be a true system.

(73)  Religion, therefore, being the belief of a God and the practice of moral truth, cannot have connection with mystery.  The belief of a God, so far from having anything of mystery in it, is of all beliefs the most easy, because it arises to us, as is before observed, out of necessity.  And the practice of moral truth, or, in other words, a practical imitation of the moral goodness of God, is no other than our acting toward each other as he acts benignly toward all.  We cannot _serve_ God in the manner we serve those who cannot do without such service;  and, therefore, the only idea we can have of serving God, is that of contributing to the happiness of the living creation that God had made.  This cannot be done by retiring ourselves from the society of the world and spending a recluse life in selfish devotion.

(101)  It is a duty incumbent on every true Deist, that he vindicate the moral justice of God against the calumnies of the Bible.

(133)  … to priests and commentators, who are very learned in little things,…

(204)  I am not one of those who are fond of believing there is much of that which is called willful lying, or lying originally, except in the case of men setting up to be prophets, as in the the Old Testament, for prophesying is lying professionally.

(219)  A very numerous part of the animal creation preaches to us, far better than Paul, the belief of a life hereafter.

(229)  The maxim of doing as we would be done unto does not include this strange doctrine of loving enemies;  for no man expects to be loved himself for his crime or for his enmity.

NB:  The Catalans by Patrick O’Brian

 Love your neighbor as yourself is not enough, nothing like enough, if you have a deep, well-founded dislike of yourself.
and
I will tell you what I mean by the death of the soul.  When you no longer have the power to love, when there is no stir of affection anywhere in your being, then your soul is dead.  That is the death of your soul.  Your soul is dead, and you are damned:  you are dead walking, and you are in hell in your own body.

These two quotes explain much of the state of humanity, such as it is, these days.

(231)  The creation is the Bible of the Deist.  He there reads, in the handwriting of the Creator himself, the certainty of his existence and the immutability of his power, and all other Bibles and Testaments are to him forgeries.