Volume IV. by Thomas Paine]@TWC D-Link book Volume IV. 9/11 It is by his being taught to contemplate himself as an out-law, as an out-cast, as a beggar, as a mumper, as one thrown as it were on a dunghill, at an immense distance from his Creator, and who must make his approaches by creeping, and cringing to intermediate beings, that he conceives either a contemptuous disregard for everything under the name of religion, or becomes indifferent, or turns what he calls devout. In the latter case, he consumes his life in grief, or the affectation of it. He calls himself a worm, and the fertile earth a dunghill; and all the blessings of life by the thankless name of vanities. |