Part 4 (1/2)
Let us dispose of this four feet and a half of wretch. In October, 1877, I received the following letter from James Parton:
”Newburyport, Ma.s.s., Oct 27, 1877.--My dear Sir: Touching Grant Thorburn, I personally knew him to have been a liar. At the age of 92 he copied with trembling hand a piece from a newspaper and brought it to the office of The Rome Journal as his own. It was I who received it and detected the deliberate forgery..... James Parton”
So much for Grant Thorburn. In my judgment, the testimony of Mr.
Thorburn should be thrown aside as utterly unworthy of belief.
The next witness is the Rev. J.D. Wickham, D.D., who tells what an elder in his church said. This elder said that Paine pa.s.sed his last days on his farm at New Roch.e.l.le, with a solitary female attendant.
This is not true. He did not pa.s.s his last days at New Roch.e.l.le, consequently, this pious elder did not see him during his last days at that place. Upon this elder we prove an alibi. Mr. Paine pa.s.sed his last days in the City of New York, in a house upon Columbia Street.
The story of the Rev. J.D. Wickham, D.D., is simply false.
The next competent false witness was the Rev. Charles Hawley, D.D., who proceeds to state that the story of the Rev. J.D. Wickham, D. D., is corroborated by older citizens of New Roch.e.l.le. The names of these ancient residents are withheld. According to these unknown witnesses, the account given by the deceased elder was entirely correct. But as the particulars of Mr. Paine's conduct ”were too loathsome to be described in print,” we are left entirely in the dark as to what he really did.
While at New Roch.e.l.le, Mr. Paine lived with Mr. Purdy, Mr. Dean, with Capt. Pelton, and with Mr. Staple. It is worthy of note that all of these gentlemen give the lie direct to the statements of ”older residents” and ancient citizens spoken of by the Rev. Charles Hawley, D.D., and leave him with the ”loathsome particulars” existing only in his own mind.
The next gentleman brought upon the stand is W.H. Ladd, who quotes from the memoirs of Stephen Grellett. This gentleman also has the misfortune to be dead. According to his account, Mr. Paige made his recantation to a servant girl of his by the name of Mary Roscoe. Mr.
Paine uttered the wish that all who read his book had burned it. I believe there is a mistake in the name of this girl. Her name was probably Mary Hinsdale, as it was once claimed that Paine made the same remark to her.
These are the witnesses of the church, and the only ones you bring forward to support your charge that Thomas Paine lived a drunken and beastly life, and died a drunken, cowardly, and beastly death. All these calumnies are found in a life of Paine by James Cheetham, the convicted libeler already referred to. Mr. Cheetham was an enemy of the man whose life he pretended to write. In order to show you the estimation in which this libeler was held by Mr. Paine, I will give you a copy of a letter that throws light upon this point:
”Oct. 27, 1807.--Mr. Cheethan: Unless you make a public apology for the abuse and falsehood in your paper of Tuesday, Oct. 27, respecting me, I will prosecute you for lying.--Thomas Paine”
In another letter, speaking of this same man, Mr. Paine says: ”If an unprincipled bully can not be reformed, he can be punished.” Cheetham has been so long in the habit of giving false information, that truth is to him like a foreign language. Mr. Cheetham wrote the life of Mr.
Paine to gratify his malice and to support religion. He was prosecuted for libel--was convicted and fined. Yet the life of Paine, written by this liar, is referred to by the Christian world as the highest authority.
As to the personal habits of Mr. Paine, we have the testimony of William Carver; with whom he lived; of Mr. Jarvis, the artist, with whom he lived; of Mr. Purdy, who was a tenant of Paine's; of Mr. Buyer, with whom he was intimate; of Thomas Nixon and Capt. Daniel Pelton, both of whom knew him well; of Amasa Woodsworth, who was with him when he died; of John Fellows, who boarded at the same house; of James Wilburn, with whom he boarded; of B.F. Haskins, a lawyer, who was well acquainted with him, and called upon him during h is last illness; of Walter Morton, President of the Phoenix Insurance Company; of Clio Rickman, who had known him for many years; of Willet and Elias Hicks, Quakers, who knew him intimately and well; of Judge Hertell, H.
Margary, Elihu Palmer and many others. All these testified to the fact that Mr. Paige was a temperate man. In those days nearly everybody used spirituous liquors. Paine was not an exception, but he did not drink to excess. Mr. Lovett, who kept the City Hotel, where Paine stopped, in a note to Caleb Bingham declared that Paine drank less than any boarder he had.
Against all this evidence Christians produce the story of Grant Thorburn, the story of the Rev. J.D. Wickham, that an elder in his church told him that Paine was a drunkard, corroborated by the Rev.
Charles Hawley, and an extract from Lossing's history to the same effect. The evidence is overwhelmingly against them. Will you have the fairness to admit it? Their witnesses are merely the repeaters of the falsehoods of James Cheetham, the convicted libeler.
After all, drinking is not as bad as lying. An honest drunkard is better than a calumniator of the dead. ”A remnant of old mortality drunk, bloated, and half-asleep,” is better than a perfectly sober defender of human slavery. To become drunk is a virtue compared with stealing a babe from the breast of its mother. Drunkenness is one of the beat.i.tudes, compared with editing a religious paper devoted to the defense of slavery upon the ground that it is a divine inst.i.tution. Do you think that Paine was a drunken beast when he wrote ”Common Sense,”
a pamphlet that aroused three millions of people, as people were never aroused by words before? Was he a drunken beast when he wrote the ”Crisis?” Was it to a drunken beast that the following letter was addressed:
”Rocky Hill, September 10, 1783.--I have learned, since I have been at this place, that you are at Bordentown. Whether for the sake of retirement or economy, I know not. Be it for either, or both, or whatever it may, if you will come to this place and partake with me, I shall be exceedingly happy to see you at it. Your presence may remind Congress of your past services to this country; and if it is in my power to impress them, command my best exertions with freedom, as they will be rendered cheerfully by one who entertains a lively sense of the importance of your works, and who, with much pleasure, subscribes himself your sincere friend.--George Was.h.i.+ngton”
Do you think that Paine was a drunken beast when the following letters were received by him:
”You express a wish in your letter to return to America in a national s.h.i.+p. Mr. Dawson, who brings over the treaty, and who will present you with this letter, is charged with orders to the Captain of the Maryland to receive and accommodate you back, if you can be ready to depart at such a short warning. You will, in general, find us returned to sentiments worthy of former times; in these it will be your glory to have steadily labored, and with as much effect as any man living. That you may live long to continue your useful labors, and reap the reward in the thankfulness of nations, is my sincere prayer. Accept the a.s.surances of my high esteem and affectionate attachment.--Thomas Jefferson”
”It has been very generally propagated through the continent that I wrote the pamphlet ”Common Sense.” I could not have written anything in so manly and striking a style.--John Adams”