language. The number of copies
circulated in England, Scotland, and Ireland, besides translations
into foreign languages, was between four and five hundred thousand. The
principles of that work were the same as those in _Common Sense_, and
the effects would have been the same in England as that had produced in
America, could the vote of the nation been quietly taken, or had equal
opportunities of consulting or acting existed. The only difference
between the two works was, that the one was adapted to the local
circumstances of England, and the other to those of America. As to
myself, I acted in both cases alike; I relinquished to the people of
England, as I had done to those of America, all profits from the work.
My reward existed in the ambition to do good, and the independent
happiness of my own mind.

1 Paine here quotes a passage from his letter to Mrs. Few,
already given in the Memorial to Monroe (XXI.). The entire
letter to Mrs. Few will be printed in the Appendix to Vol.
IV. of this work.--_Editor._

2 See editorial note p. 95 in this volume.--_Editor._

But a faction, acting in disguise, was rising in America; they had lost
sight of first principles. They were beginning to contemplate government
as a profitable monopoly, and the people as hereditary property. It
is, therefore, no wonder that the _Rights of Man_ was attacked by that
faction, and its author continually abused. But let them go on; give
them rope enough and they will put an end to their own insignificance.
There is too much common sense and independence in America to be long
the dupe of any faction, foreign or domestic.

But, in the midst of the freedom we enjoy, the licentiousness of the
papers called Federal, (and I know not why they are called so, for they
are in their principles anti-federal and despotic,) is a dishonour
to the character of the country, and an injury to its reputation
and importance abroad. They represent the whole people of America as
destitute of public principle and private manners. As to any injury they
can do at home to those whom they abuse, or service they can render
to those who employ them, it is to be set down to the account of
noisy nothingness. It is on themselves the disgrace recoils, for the
reflection easily presents itself to every thinking mind, that _those
who abuse liberty when they possess it would abuse power could they
obtain it_; and, therefore, they may as well take as a gener