The age of reason
Response to Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason
The First Part of Paines Age of Reason, which was written while Paine was imprisoned in France during their revolution, is the more famous part. How does Paine try to balance a positive assessment of nature with his negative assessment of human religious traditions? How does he define religion both negatively and positively? It is clear what he is against, but what is he for? How does Paine appeal to the reader, and keep his text accessible to everyday readers? These questions can be unified in a thesis. This paper should be 4-6 pages in length, with internal citations from the book. You should not use outside sources for this paper, which is intended to gauge your close reading skills and response to the book.
