Yet it is folly to argue against determined hardness; eloquence may strike the ear, and the language of sorrow draw forth the tear of compassion, but nothing can reach the heart that is steeled with prejudice.
Paine reflects on the difficulty of persuading those whose minds are closed by prejudice, emphasizing the limits of rhetoric.
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More from Thomas Paine
The poor, in all countries, are naturally both peaceable and grateful in all reforms in which their interest and happiness is included.
But in England there are no such occasional bodies; and as to those who are now called Representatives, a great part of them are mere machines of the court, placemen, and dependants.
But where genuine principles of liberty pervade a people, every thing is restored to order; and the soldier civilly treated, returns the civility.
By the former, freedom has a national champion in the western world; and by the latter, in Europe.