Need we any other proof of their wretched management, than the excess of debts and taxes with which every nation groans, and the quarrels into which they have precipitated the world?
Paine uses a rhetorical question in "Rights of Man" to highlight the failures of traditional governments, citing national debt and international conflict.
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It was Government dethroning Government; and the old one, by attempting to make a new one, made a chasm.
A knowledge of the practice was then joined to the theory; and all that was wanting to give it real existence was opportunity.
It was become evident, that no constitution, worthy of being called by that name, could be established on anything less than a national ground.