Chapter I - The Old Testament
Chapter II - The New Testament
Chapter III - Conclusion

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EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION
WITH SOME RESULTS OF RECENT RESEARCHES.

IN the opening year, 1793, when revolutionary France had beheaded its
king, the wrath turned next upon the King of kings, by whose grace
every tyrant claimed to reign. But eventualities had brought among
them a great English and American heart -- Thomas Paine. He had
pleaded for Louis Caper -- "Kill the king but spare the man." Now he
pleaded, -- "Disbelieve in the King of kings, but do not confuse with
that idol the Father of Mankind!"

In Paine's Preface to the Second Part of "The Age of Reason" he
describes himself as writing the First Part near the close of the
year 1793. "I had not finished it more than six hours, in the state
it has since appeared, before a guard came about three in the
morning, with an order signed by the two Committees of Public Safety
and Surety General, for putting me in arrestation." This was on the
morning of December 28. But it is necessary to weigh the words just
quoted -- "in the state it has since appeared." For on August 5,
1794, Francois Lanthenas, in an appeal for Paine's liberation, wrote
as follows: "I deliver to Merlin de Thionville a copy of the last
work of T. Payne [The Age of Reason], formerly our colleague, and in
custody since the decree excluding foreigners from the national