But by associating those precedents with a superstitious reverence for ancient things, as monks show relics and call them holy, the generality of mankind are deceived into the design.
Paine explains that governments use a "superstitious reverence for ancient things" to make people accept flawed precedents.
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It is a great standing which they have now universally obtained; and we may hereafter hope to see revolutions, or changes in governments, produced with the same quiet operation by which any measure, determinable by reason and discussion…
As to what are called national religions, we may, with as much propriety, talk of national Gods.
I do not believe that any two men, on what are called doctrinal points, think alike who think at all.
With how much more glory, and advantage to itself, does a nation act, when it exerts its powers to rescue the world from bondage, and to create itself friends, than when it employs those powers to increase ruin, desolation, and misery.