The inhabitants of every country, under the civilisation of laws, easily civilise together, but governments being yet in an uncivilised state, and almost continually at war, they pervert the abundance which civilised life produces to carry on the uncivilised part to a greater extent.
In "Rights of Man," Paine argues that while people can civilize, governments remain uncivilized and use resources for war.
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The object is not so much the produce of the tax as the justice of the measure.
But the spirit of the nation was not to be overcome, and it was so fully sensible of the strong ground it had taken--that of withholding taxes--that it contented itself with keeping up a sort of quiet resistance, which effectually…
The meaning, then, good people, of all this, is: That government is governed by no principle whatever; that it can make evil good, or good evil, just as it pleases.
Nothing can be more terrible to a Court or Courtier than the Revolution of France.