The more aristocracy appeared, the more it was despised; there was a visible imbecility and want of intellects in the majority, a sort of je ne sais quoi, that while it affected to be more than citizen, was less than man.
From his work on the French Revolution, Paine critiques the inherent weakness and intellectual deficiency of the aristocratic class.
Share
More from Thomas Paine
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.
It was become evident, that no constitution, worthy of being called by that name, could be established on anything less than a national ground.
The object is not so much the produce of the tax as the justice of the measure.
But from such opposition the French Revolution, instead of suffering, receives an homage.