At about this time in 1809, Thomas Paine passes away. Paine is best known as the author of Common Sense, a pamphlet that advocated for independence from Great Britain. Its blunt assessment of the situation rocked Revolutionary War America. The pamphlet was an instant hit. “Common Sense was the most incendiary and popular pamphlet of the entire Revolutionary era,” historian Gordon Wood explains, “it went through twenty-five editions in 1776 alone. . . . Unlike more genteel writers, Paine did not decorate his pamphlet with Latin quotations and learned references to the literature of Western culture, but instead relied on his readers knowing only the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer.” This approach, Wood concludes, brought “the common people” into the philosophical debate over whether to declare independence. Paine had come from humble beginnings, born and raised in a Quaker community in England. His family was poor and his education simple, but he would later remember reading a b...