Paine's decision to write of high philosophical and political issues in common speech, and of used "graphic metaphors and his simple sentence structure [to] reflect a language understood at the time by common Americans," (Moss & Wilson, ed) has much the same purpose as a translation of the Bible from Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic into Latin, which is to say the need to initiate common people into profound truths.

Paine may not have been the greatest philosopher of his day, but he was certainly the greatest rhetorician. (it is a distinction which has been open to debate since the time of Socrates and the Sophists) the needs of rhetoric, as Aristotle himself has said, demand using emotion, sentiment, self-interest, and logic together with fine and comprehensible speech to persuade an audience. Both his synthesis of modern ideals and his simple straight forward manner aided him in fulfilling these demands:

Disavowing...
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