"I sent to him in August last a manuscript letter of about 70 pages, from me to Mr.Washington to be printed in a pamphlet.Mr.Barnes of Philadelphia carried the letter from me over to London to be forwarded to America.It went by the ship Hope, Cap: Harley, who since his return from America told me that he put it into the post office at New York for Bache.I have yet no certain account of its publication.I mention this that the letter may be enquired after, in case it has not been published or has not arrived to Mr.Bache.Barnes wrote to me, from London 29 August informing me that he was offered three hundred pounds sterling for the manuscript.The offer was refused because it was my intention it should not appear till it appeared in America, as that, and not England was the place for its operation.
"You ask me by your letter to Mr.Caritat for a list of my several works, in order to publish a collection of them.This is an undertaking I have always reserved for myself.It not only belongs to me of right, but nobody but myself can do it; and as every author is accountable (at least in reputation) for his works, he only is the person to do it.If he neglects it in his life-time the case is altered.It is my intention to return to America in the course of the present year.I shall then [do]
it by subscription, with historical notes.As this work will employ many persons in different parts of the Union, I will confer with you upon the subject, and such part of it as will suit you to undertake, will be at your choice.I have sustained so much loss, by disinterestedness and inattention to money matters, and by accidents, that I am obliged to look closer to my affairs than I have done.The printer (an Englishman) whom I employed here to print the second part of 'the Age of Reason' made a manuscript copy of the work while he was printing it, which he sent to London and sold.It was by this means that an edition of it came out in London.
"We are waiting here for news from America of the state of the federal elections.You will have heard long before this reaches you that the French government has refused to receive Mr.Pinckney as minister.While Mr.Monroe was minister he had the opportunity of softening matters with this government, for he was in good credit with them tho' they were in high indignation at the infidelity of the Washington Administration.It is time that Mr.
Washington retire, for he has played off so much prudent hypocrisy between France and England that neither government believes anything he says.
"Your friend, etc., "THOMAS PAINE."
It would appear that Symonds' stolen edition must have got ahead of that sent by Paine to Franklin Bache, for some of its errors continue in all modern American editions to the present day, as well as in those of England.For in England it was only the shilling edition --that revised by Paine -- which was suppressed.Symonds, who ministered to the half-crown folk, and who was also publisher of replies to Paine, was left undisturbed about his pirated edition, and the new Society for the suppression of Vice and Immorality fastened on one Thomas Williams, who sold pious tracts but was also convicted (June 24, 1797) of having sold one copy of the "Age of Reason." Erskine, who had defended Paine at his trial for the "Rights of Man," conducted the prosecution of Williams.
He gained the victory from a packed jury, but was not much elated by it, especially after a certain adventure on his way to Lincoln's Inn.He felt his coat clutched and beheld at his feet a woman bathed in tears.She led him into the small book-shop of Thomas Williams, not yet called up for judgment, and there he beheld his victim stitching tracts in a wretched little room, where there were three children, two suffering with Smallpox.
He saw that it would be ruin and even a sort of murder to take away to prison the husband, who was not a freethinker, and lamented his publication of the book, and a meeting of the Society which had retained him was summoned.
There was a full meeting, the Bishop of London (Porteus) in the chair.
Erskine reminded them that Williams was yet to be brought up for sentence, described the scene he had witnessed, and Williams' penitence, and, as the book was now suppressed, asked permission to move for a nominal sentence.
Mercy, he urged, was a part of the Christianity they were defending.Not one of the Society took his side, -- not even "philanthropic" Wilberforce -- and Erskine threw up his brief.This action of Erskine led the Judge to give Williams only a year in prison instead of the three he said had been intended.
While Williams was in prison the orthodox colporteurs were circulating Erskine's speech on Christianity, but also an anonymous sermon "On the Existence and Attributes of the Deity," all of which was from Paine's "Age of Reason," except a brief "Address to the Deity" appended.This picturesque anomaly was repeated in the circulation of Paine's "Discourse to the Theophilanthropists"(their and the author's names removed) under the title of "Atheism Refuted."Both of these pamphlets are now before me, and beside them a London tract of one page just sent for my spiritual benefit.This is headed "A Word of Caution." It begins by mentioning the "pernicious doctrines of Paine,"the first being "that there is No GOD" (sic,) then proceeds to adduce evidences of divine existence taken from Paine's works.It should be added that this one dingy page is the only "survival" of the ancient Paine effigy in the tract form which I have been able to find in recent years, and to this no Society or Publisher's name is attached.
