The Life of Thomas Paine: Author of Common Sense, Rights of Man, Age of Reason, Letter to the Addressers, Etc.

Best known for this 1819 biography of his friend Thomas Paine, Thomas Clio Rickman (1761–1834) is sometimes called Paine's Boswell. His sympathetic portrait follows Paine's progress from simple stay-maker to one of the most influential political activists in the age of revolutions. Although acknowledging Paine's egoism and penchant for drink, Rickman presents these flaws alongside the better qualities of a man who did not merely 'live amid great events … he created them'. Rickman weaves tog...