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Considering Burke correctly predicted the course of the French Revolution, including the rise of a Napoleon like figure, and Paine would end up jailed by the very revolutionaries he once supported, I believe it's safe to say Burke had a more realistic world view.
Radicals typically come from the upper middle class. They love to pretend they’re for the common people. All while really despising and denigrating them at every turn when they don’t follow them and do their bidding.
We are blessed with a beautiful Burke Statue at Trinity College Dublin and having read about both men,l believe Paine inspires me more than Burke,his adventures in Colonial America have to be read about to be believed,ln fact one can honestly say that the "American Crisis" pamphlet saved the United States itself. Paine's immortal opening line "These are the times that try men's souls" is just Incredible, incendiary stuff, read out aloud by encamped troops in the week of the most important battle of the Revolution,Trenton in 1776,Washington's army was starving with no supplies, shelter,encamped in subzero conditions and had one last shot at taking out the British,Paine's pamphlet was devoured by nervous,discouraged Colonials who were hours away from deserting but found in it's words a special power to carry on against all the odds. With it's encouragement the Hessians (German mercenary troops in the pay of the King) were defeated,none of this could have happened without Paine's incredible writing. Burke was an unapologetic Royalist who witnessed butchery and the massaccre of men,women and children by the mobs of Paris and "Reflections..." nearly gave Paine a hernia when he read it,he had to make a riposte and thank God he did or we would have no "Rights of Man". Ironically too,Paine was nearly eaten by the Revolution,nearly becoming fodder for the Guillotine. Two great men,full of wisdom and integrity but for me Paine pips Burke at the post for his incredible life lived and his amazing ability to capture by quill,explosive,radical and profound thought in a few sentences,Burke could only dream of Paine's brevity. A Great video.
@@IRISHguitarist777 It must have helped having prominent English philosophers supporting the Amercians against the king, helps get legitimacy when you win over your 'enemies'!
Love the video, can't believe you don't have more subs considering how factual and entertaining your videos are. Do you think that left/ right politics is still necessary today or is more of a hindrance to any progress? Are the two sides more ideologically divided or are they more ambiguous and meaningless than before?
Interesting questions indeed Stanley! I do think there's a lot of evidence that people are dividing on multiple different spectra (!?) at the moment and it's not clear to me that this is a simple matter of left and right economically as it might have seemed in previous years (Brexit is a classic example). This 'liberalism' and small-c conservatism split - including this Paine/Burke debate between whether to throw out the old system, or hold on to the old - I still think is very relevant, but it gets confusing when conservatives want to 'abolish' things that have perhaps been established for decades, and liberals want to 'hold on' to established rights and freedoms.
Ha! We should have said "has a claim to being" the Father (due to his Common Sense pamphlets) but you're quite right, many others have a claim to that title too!
