He does not lend
himself, like lesser historical figures, to continuous or
disinterested narrative. The authors who have been rash enough to try
to tell something about him can no more pick and choose the incidents
of his career that will make the most effective "stuff" than they
could reduce the phenomena of a cyclone or the aurora borealis to a
consistent narrative form.
Thus: One starts to speak of Paine's experiences in Paris, and brings
up in New Rochelle; one endeavours to anchor him in Greenwich, only to
find oneself trailing his weary but stubborn footsteps in the war! And
always and forever, Paine himself persists in crowding out the
legitimate sequence of his adventures. No one can soberly write the
story of his life; one can, at best, only achieve a diatribe or an
apotheosis!
Said he:
"The sun needs no inscription to distinguish him from
darkness."
This quotation might almost serve as a text for the life of Paine,
might it not? And yet--there are people in the world who wear smoked
glasses, through which, I imagine, the sun himself looks not unlike a
muddy splash of yellow paint upon the heavens!
This is a book about Greenwich Village and not a defence of Thomas
Paine.
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