Common Sense (Unabridged) (Thomas Paine).

Произведение американского писателя Томаса Пейна, одного из первых американских политических писателей, актуально в наши дни в первую очередь потому, что хорошо иллюстрирует типичные политические вопросы и проблемы современности. Убедительный, остроумный и страстный политик, Пей достаточно последователен, чтобы выступать против колониальных завоеваний; он отстаивает права народа и выступает за то, чтобы государственные руководители принимали решения под давлением общественного мнения. Как указывал Джеймс Гиббс (James C. Gibbs), «Ни одна книга Пейна не была так правдива, как "Здравый смысл", и ни одна из них не пользовалась такой популярностью в мире»

This, then, is the republic, if such a thing can exist, in which unlimited ambition is repressed, unlimited power is stifled, unlimited luxury is prevented. A state where ever increasing numbers of the best and most ambitious attain high rank without ever becoming masters, but where neither ambition nor luxury can find outlets. And while the rest of mankind exists by their labor under frequently bad condition -- the rich in opulence, the poor in want, and except for a very few nobles in safety -- neverthe less the misery and distress of the many are watched over by laws that will prevent the appearance of tyranny. But when the time comes when factions have arisen which base their desires upon lawful popularity rather than on commodity, laws disappear like the vaporous vapors that compose them. Then the spirit of patriotism should act upon the hearts of those still breathing to secure the common rights of all people, and to prevent that separation of power which blinds reason and feeds ambition. The spirit of wealth or pleasure or rank should never lead away from the public good; but each head should be filled with the spirit, which would originate laws -- laws founded not upon commands received, but upon the inherent feelings of all reasonable men who see equal injustice and danger in each disobedience. Let hope creeps up the social ladder to give independence to millions upon millions who could be nowhere independent in this present society, let it support with persevering energy the desirous, and lead the old, unwilling feeble, one may be sure that, at the first intimation of levying taxes for the purchase of a navy, there would be an answer to that proposition in England that all high places in Europe seldom fail to obtain, and the toll of public oppression would drop off as a disease departing from thankful hearts.\nAnd we should call that fortune, not wisdom, which made these productions necessary to be kept in the depths of ignorance. We should fall upon our knees, and weep, deploring that it should ever have happened that this wise man, this nobleman, writ with imagination, erudition, and even genius, these political speculations should long have lain buried like so many treasures, dug out but seldom by the hands of grave thinkers, studious and unwilling to march through such paths ignorant, but anxious hastily to arrive at the chief end of human history.