'" Had
he been a man of fortune or American-born, he might have reached a
place in the foremost rank of the Fathers of the Country. But nativism
was powerful, and position important at that time, as Lee and Gates and
even Hamilton himself experienced. The signature, "Common Sense," Paine
preserved through life. It became what our authorlings, who ought to
know better, will persist in calling a _nom [1] de plume_--a Yankee
affectation, unknown to French idioms.
[Footnote 1: They generally spell it "_nomme_."]
In the autumn of 1776, Paine joined the army as volunteer aide-de-camp
to General Greene, and served through the gloomy campaign which opened
with the loss of New York in September. He remained in the field until
the army went into winter-quarters after the battles of Trenton and
Princeton. It was not as a combatant that Paine did the States good
service. He played the part of Tyraetus in prose,--an adaptation of the
old Greek lyrist to the eighteenth century and to British America,--and
cheered the soldiers, not with songs, but with essays, continuations of
"Common Sense." The first one was written on the retreat from Fort Lee,
and published under the name of "The Crisis," on the 23d of December,
when misfortune and severe weather had cast down the stoutest hearts.
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