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All the books in this 'Squashed Philosophers' series are impressive. But few of their author's lives are as impressive as that of Thomas Pain. Born in Thetford, Norfolk, in 1737, he achieved little at school and left aged 12. He was apprenticed to his father, a corset-maker, but failed to take up the trade. He briefly went to sea, and then worked as an excise officer until he was dismissed for agitating for improved pay. In 1774, a chance meeting with Benjamin Franklin in London led him to part from his wife and travel to America, where he added the 'e' to his surname and established his fame by writing the pamphlet Common Sense (1776), an explanation of the war with England. He was appointed secretary to the Committee of Foreign Affairs in 1777, but lost his post two years later after making indiscreet revelations about the French alliance.
In 1776 he returned to England to promote new ideas about ironfounding, and there wrote Rights of Man, proposing that the democratic reforms so recently introduced into France and America must soon be implemented in England. So enthusiastically was it received by supporters of the French Revolution, and so fanatically despised by the English establishment, that he fled to France. He was elected to the French Convention in 1792, but his opposition to the execution of Louis XVI led to his arrest. He wrote much of The Age of Reason, a biting criticism of the Bible and religion, in prison, and on the fall of Robespierre, returned to America in 1802. But times and politics had changed, he found strong opposition to his religious views, was shunned by society and died in near-poverty six years later in New York. Some biographies describe him as a drunkard in his last years, but, then, Thomas Paine made as many bitter enemies as he continues to make grateful friends.