possible I shall set about writing a memorial to Congress,
another to the State of Pennsylvania, and an address to the people of
America; but it will be difficult for me to finish these until I know
from yourself what applications you have made for my liberation, and
what answers you have received.

Ah, Sir, you would have gotten a load of trouble and difficulties off
your hands that I fear will multiply every day, had you made it a point
to procure my liberty when you first arrived, and not left me floating
on the promises of men whom you did not know. You were then a new
character. You had come in consequence of their own request that Morris
should be recalled; and had you then, before you opened any subject
of negociation that might arise into controversy, demanded my liberty
either as a Civility or as a Right I see not how they could have refused
it.

I have already said that after all the promises that have been made I
am still in prison. I am in the dark upon all the matters that relate
to myself. I know not if it be to the Convention, to the Committee of
Public Safety, of General Surety, or to the deputies who come
sometimes to the Luxembourg to examine and put persons in liberty, that
applications have been made for my liberation. But be it to whom it
may, my earnest and pressing request to you as Minister is that you
will bring this matter to a conclusion by reclaiming me as an American
citizen imprisoned in France under the plea of being a foreigner born in
England; that I may know the result, and how to prepare the Memorials
I have mentioned, should there be occasion for them. The right of
determining who are American citizens can belong only to America. The
Convention have declared I am not a French Citizen because she has
declared me to be a foreigner, and have by that declaration cancelled
and annulled the vote of the former assembly that conferred the Title
of Citizen upon Citizens or subjects of other Countries. I should not be
honest to you nor to myself were I not to express myself as I have done
in this letter, and I confide and request you will accept it in that
sense and in no other.

I am, with great respect, your suffering fellow-citizen,

Thomas Paine.

P. S.--If my imprisonment is to continue, and I indulge very little hope
to the contrary, I shall be under the absolute necessity of applying
to you for a supply of several articles. Every person here have their
families or friends upon the