Pain vs Burke

Please, read the info attatched and decide which is Dickens' possition in his novel "A Tale of Two Cities", then write an essay justifying your possition.

Edmund Burke





Edmund Burke (January 12, 1729[1] – July 9, 1797) was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist, and philosopher, who served for many years in the British House of Commons as a member of the Whig party. He is mainly remembered for his support of the American colonies in the dispute with King George III and Great Britain that led to the American Revolution and for his strong opposition to the French Revolution. The latter made Burke one of the leading figures within the conservative faction of the Whig party (which he dubbed the "Old Whigs"), in opposition to the pro-revolutionary "New Whigs", led by Charles James Fox. Burke also published philosophical works on aesthetics and founded the Annual Register, a political review. HResponse to the French Revolution
Although Burke had supported the American Revolution, which he saw as legitimate assertion of the rights of the American colonists, he repudiated the French Revolution in his Reflections on the Revolution in France in November 1790.[3] With it, Burke became one of the earliest and fiercest British critics of the French Revolution. He saw it, not as movement towards a representative, constitutional democracy, but rather as a violent rebellion against tradition and proper authority and as an experiment disconnected from the complex realities of human society. As such, he predicted, it would end in disaster. Former admirers of Burke, such as Thomas Jefferson, Sheridan, and fellow Whig politician Charles James Fox, proceeded to denounce Burke as a reactionary and an enemy of democracy. Thomas Paine penned The Rights of Man in 1791 as a response to Burke. However, other pro-democratic politicians, such as the American John Adams, agreed with Burke's assessment of the French situation.
These events, and the disagreements which arose regarding them within the Whig party, led to its breakup and to the rupture of Burke's friendship with Fox. In 1791 Burke published his Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs, in which he renewed his criticism of the radical revolutionary programmes inspired by the French Revolution and attacked the Whigs who supported them. Eventually most of the Whigs sided with Burke and voted their support for the conservative government of Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger, which declared war on the revolutionary government of France in 1793.
In 1794 a terrible blow fell upon Burke in the loss of his son Richard, to whom he was tenderly attached, and in whom he saw signs of promise. In the same year the Hastings trial came to an end. Burke felt that his work was done and indeed that he was worn out; he soon took leave of Parliament. The King, whose favour he had gained by his attitude on the French Revolution, wished to make him Lord Beaconsfield, but the death of his son had deprived such an honour of all its attractions, and the only reward he would accept was a pension of £2,500. This pension was attacked by the Duke of Bedford and the Earl of Lauderdale, to whom Burke replied in the Letter to a Noble Lord (1796). His last publications were the Letters on a Regicide Peace (1796), called forth by negotiations for peace with France. he spent his final years in a strong support of the war against France.
After a prolonged illness Burke died in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire on July 9, 1797 and six days later was buried there alongside his son and brother. His wife survived him by nearly fifteen years.
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Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France was extremely controversial at the time of its publication. Its intemperate language and factual inaccuracies even convinced many readers that Burke had lost his judgement. But it grew to become his best-known and most influential work. In the English-speaking world, Burke is often regarded as one of the fathers of modern conservatism, and his thinking has exerted considerable influence over the political philosophy of such classical liberals as Friedrich Hayek and Karl Popper. Burke's 'liberal' conservatism, which claimed to oppose the implementation of governing based on abstract ideas and supported 'organic' reform, can be contrasted with the autocratic conservatism of such Continental figures as Joseph de Maistre.
Burke had a strong influence on economic thought of the time. He was a strong supporter of free trade and the free market system. He felt the principles of the market were violated if the government attempted to manipulate the market in any way. In fact, Burke took a strong "laissez-faire" approach to government. Burke lays out many of his economic thoughts in his Thoughts and Details on Scarcity. Adam Smith remarked that "Burke is the only man I ever knew who thinks on economic subjects exactly as I do without any previous communication having passed between us".[2] The Liberal historian Lord Acton considered Burke as one of the three greatest liberals, along with William Ewart Gladstone and Thomas Babington Macaulay.[3]
He is often regarded by conservatives as the Father of Anglo-American conservatism.[2]



Thomas Paine


Thomas Paine (Thetford, England, 29 January 1737 – 8 June 1809, New York City, USA) was a pamphleteer, revolutionary, radical, liberal and intellectual. Born in Great Britain, he lived in America, having migrated to the American colonies just in time to take part in the American Revolution, mainly as the author of the powerful, widely read pamphlet, Common Sense (1776), advocating independence for the American Colonies from the Kingdom of Great Britain and of The American Crisis, supporting the Revolution.
Later, Paine was a great influence on the French Revolution. He wrote the Rights of Man (1791) as a guide to the ideas of the Enlightenment. Despite an inability to speak French, he was elected to the French National Assembly in 1792. Regarded as an ally of the Girondists, he was seen with increasing disfavour by the Montagnards and in particular by Robespierre.
Paine was arrested in Paris and imprisoned in December 1793; he was released in 1794. He became notorious with his book, The Age of Reason (1793-94), which advocated deism and took issue with Christian doctrines. While in France, he also wrote a pamphlet titled Agrarian Justice (1795), which discussed the origins of property and introduced a concept that is similar to a guaranteed minimum income.
Paine remained in France during the early Napoleonic Era, but condemned Napoleon's moves towards dictatorship, calling him "the completest charlatan that ever existed."[1] Paine remained in France until 1802, when he returned to America on an invitation from Thomas Jefferson, who had been elected president.
Paine died at 59 Grove Street in Greenwich Village, New York City, on the morning of June 8, 1809.
American Revolution


Common Sense, published 1776
Common Sense, Paine's pro-independence monograph published anonymously on 10 January 1776, spread quickly among literate colonists. Within three months, 120,000 copies are alleged to have been distributed throughout the colonies[6], which themselves totaled only four million free inhabitants, making it the best-selling work in 18th-century America. Its total sales in both America and Europe reached 500,000 copies.[7] It convinced many colonists, including George Washington and John Adams, to seek redress in political independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain, and argued strongly against any compromise short of independence. The work was greatly influenced (including in its name – Paine had originally proposed the title Plain Truth) by the equally controversial pro-independence writer Benjamin Rush and was instrumental in bringing about the Declaration of Independence.
Loyalists attacked Common Sense with vigor. One such early attack, entitled Plain Truth, was written in 1776 by prominent loyalist James Chalmers. An expatriate of Scotland, Chalmers attacked Paine's writing as "quackery." Chalmers would serve as commander of the First Battalion of Maryland Loyalists in the war.[citation needed]
Paine's strength lay in his ability to present complex ideas in clear and concise form, as opposed to the more philosophical approaches of his Enlightenment contemporaries in Europe, and it was Paine who proposed the name United States of America for the new nation. When the war arrived, Paine published a series of important pamphlets, The Crisis, credited with inspiring the early colonists during the ordeals faced in their long struggle with the British. The first Crisis paper began with the famous words:
THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value.
– Published on 23 December 1776
In 1778, Paine alluded to the then ongoing secret negotiations with France in his pamphlets, and there was a scandal which resulted in Paine's being dropped from the Committee on Foreign Affairs. In 1781, however, he accompanied John Laurens during his mission to France. His services were eventually recognized by the state of New York by the granting of an estate at New Rochelle, New York, and he received considerable gifts of money from both Pennsylvania and – at Washington's suggestion – from Congress. Later, while in France, Thomas Paine was scathing towards Washington, writing in a letter to him, "the world will be puzzled to decide whether you are an apostate or an impostor; whether you have abandoned good principles or whether you ever had any"[8] , when he realized that the American revolution had been hijacked by an elite, as was happening in France. He was also violently opposed to Washington owning slaves.
[edit] Rights of Man
Main article: Rights of Man
Returning to Europe, Paine finished his Rights of Man on 29 January 1791 while staying with his friend Thomas 'Clio' Rickman. On January 31, he passed the manuscript to the publisher Joseph Johnson, who intended to have it ready for Washington's birthday on February 22. Johnson was visited on a number of occasions by agents of the government. Sensing that Paine's book would be controversial, he decided not to release it on the day it was due to be published. Paine quickly began to negotiate with another publisher, J.S. Jordan. Once a deal was secured, Paine left for Paris on the advice of William Blake, leaving three good friends, William Godwin, Thomas Brand Hollis and Thomas Holcroft, in charge of concluding the publication. The book appeared on March 13, three weeks later than originally scheduled. It was an abstract political tract published in support of the French Revolution, written as a reply to Reflections on the Revolution in France by Edmund Burke. The book— which was highly critical of monarchies and European social institutions— sold briskly but was so controversial that the British government put Paine on trial in absentia for seditious libel. In the summer of 1792, he answered the charges with these famous words: "If, to expose the fraud and imposition of monarchy (..), to promote universal peace, civilization, and commerce, and to break the chains of political superstition, and raise degraded man to his proper rank; if these things be libellous (...) let the name of libeller be engraved on my tomb"[9]. In a second edition of the Rights of Man in February 1792 Paine proposed a plan for the reformation of England, including one of the first proposals for a progressive income tax.


Sketch by Jacques-Louis David of the French National Assembly taking the Tennis Court Oath. David, like Paine, served in the 1792 National Convention.
Paine was an enthusiastic supporter of the French Revolution, and was granted, along with Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and Benjamin Franklin among others, honorary French citizenship. Despite his inability to speak French, he was elected to the National Convention, representing the district of Pas-de-Calais. He voted for the French Republic; but argued against the execution of Louis XVI, saying that he should instead be exiled to the United States of America: firstly, because of the way royalist France had come to the aid of the American Revolution; and secondly because of a moral objection to capital punishment in general and to revenge killings in particular.
Regarded as an ally of the Girondins, he was seen with increasing disfavour by the Montagnards who were now in power, and in particular by Robespierre. A decree was passed at the end of 1793 excluding foreigners from their places in the Convention (Anacharsis Cloots was also deprived of his place). Paine was arrested and imprisoned in December 1793.
Paine protested and claimed that he was a citizen of America, which was an ally of Revolutionary France, rather than of Great Britain, which was by that time at war with France. However, Gouverneur Morris, the American ambassador to France, did not press his claim, and Paine later wrote that Morris had connived at his imprisonment. Paine thought that George Washington had abandoned him, and was to quarrel with him for the rest of his life.[10]
Imprisoned and fearing that each day might be his last, Paine escaped execution apparently by chance. A guard walked through the prison placing a chalk mark on the doors of the prisoners who were due to be condemned that day. He placed one on the door of the cell that Paine shared with three other prisoners, which, because Paine was ill at the time, he had asked to be left open. The prisoners in the cell then closed the door so that the chalk mark faced into the cell when they were due to be rounded up. They were overlooked, and survived the few vital days needed to be spared by the fall of Robespierre on 9 Thermidor (27 July 1794). Paine was released in November 1794 largely because of the work of the new American Minister to France, James Monroe.
Before his arrest and imprisonment, knowing that he would likely be arrested and executed, Paine wrote the first part of The Age of Reason, an assault on organized "revealed" religion combining a compilation of inconsistencies he found in the Bible with his own advocacy of Deism. In his "Autobiographical Interlude," which is found in The Age of Reason between the first and second parts, Paine writes, "Thus far I had written on the 28th of December, 1793. In the evening I went to the Hotel Philadelphia . . . About four in the morning I was awakened by a rapping at my chamber door; when I opened it, I saw a guard and the master of the hotel with them. The guard told me they came to put me under arrestation and to demand the key of my papers. I desired them to walk in, and I would dress myself and go with them immediately."
In 1800, Paine purportedly had a meeting with Napoleon. Napoleon claimed he slept with a copy of Rights of Man under his pillow and went so far as to say to Paine that "a statue of gold should be erected to you in every city in the universe." Paine quickly moved from admiration to condemnation, however, as he saw Napoleon's moves toward dictatorship, calling him "the completest charlatan that ever existed."[11] Paine remained in France until 1802, when he returned to America on an invitation from Thomas Jefferson.