Thomas Paine

Q: What was Thomas Paine most known for?

Thomas Paine is most known for writing radical works like Common Sense and Rights of Man, which called for the 13 North American colonies to throw off British colonial rule and form a republic. He also wrote the Age of Reason, which attacked the role of religious institutions in state affairs.

Q: What were the main points of Thomas Paine's Common Sense?

The main points of Thomas Paine's Common Sense are that the 13 North American colonies should declare themselves independent from Britain, form their own republic, and rule themselves through a single general assembly.

Mark Cartwright

Definition

Thomas Paine (1737-1809) was an Anglo-American Enlightenment thinker whose radical ideas were taken up by revolutionaries in both the American Revolution (1765-1783) and the French Revolution (1789-1799). A Founding Father through his influence on the U.S. Declaration of Independence, Paine's most famous works include Common Sense (1776), Rights of Man (1791 and 1792), and Age of Reason (1794 and 1795).

More about: Thomas Paine

Timeline

1737 - 1809
Life of the Anglo-American Enlightenment thinker Thomas Paine.
29 Jan 1737
Thomas Paine is born in Thetford in the county of Norfolk, England.
1774
Thomas Paine leaves England for North America.
8 Mar 1775
The essay "African Slavery in America" is published anonymously in the Pennsylvania Journal and the Weekly Advertiser, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania calling for the abolition of slavery and emancipation of the slaves, among the earliest anti-slavery works published in North America. Patriot Thomas Paine is now recognized as the author of the piece.
1776
Thomas Paine publishes his revolutionary pamphlet Common Sense.
10 Jan 1776
Publication of *Common Sense* by Thomas Paine in Colonial America which became a best-seller in the British colonies of North America, then in revolt, as well as in Europe, and influenced the drafting of the Declaration of Independence.
19 Dec 1776
The first of Thomas Paine's pamphlets is published, known as *The American Crisis,* better known as *Common Sense* (the pseudonym Paine used) in support of the American Revolution and beginning with the famous line, "These are the times that try men's souls.".
1791
Thomas Paine publishes his Rights of Man part 1.
1792
Thomas Paine publishes his Rights of Man part 2.
1792
Thomas Paine moves to France.
1793 - 1794
Thomas Paine is imrpisoned in Frnace during the ongoing French Revolution.
1794
Thomas Paine publishes his Age of Reason part 1.
1795
Thomas Paine publishes his Age of Reason part 2.
1796
Thomas Paine publishes his Agrarian Justice.
1802
Thomas Paine reutrns to the United States.
8 Jun 1809
Thomas Paine dies in New York.