upon the dry stone of a stream, with her two cubs sucking at her dry and
empty dugs, this Boodh took pity upon this wild and famishing beast,
and, throwing from himself the Yellowrobe of his order, and stepping
naked before this tigress, said: "Here is meat for you and your cubs."
In one moment the crooked daggers of her claws ran riot in his flesh,
and in another he was devoured. Such, during nearly all the history of
this world, has been the history of every man who has stood in front of
superstition.

Thomas Paine, as has been so eloquently said by the gentleman who
introduced me, was a friend of man, and whoever is a friend of man is
also a friend of God--if there is one. But God has had many friends who
were the enemies of their fellow-men. There is but one test by which to
measure any man who has lived. Did he leave this world better than he
found it? Did he leave in this world more liberty? Did he leave in
this world more goodness, more humanity, than when he was born? That is
the test. And whatever may have been the faults of Thomas Paine, no
American who appreciates liberty, no American who believes in true
democracy and pure republicanism, should ever breathe one word against
his name. Every American, with the divine mantle of charity, should
cover all his faults, and with a never-tiring tongue should recount his
virtues.

He was a common man. He did not belong to the aristocracy. Upon the
head of his father God had never poured the divine petroleum of
authority. He had not the misfortune to belong to the upper classes.
He had the fortune to be born among the poor and to feel against his
great heart the throb of the toiling and suffering masses. Neither was
it his misfortune to have been educated at Oxford. What little sense he
had was not squeezed out at Westminster. He got his education from