Stories
the narratives it tells itself
The Age of Reason went to prison with its author.
Paine was writing it in Paris as the Terror closed on him. The standard account has him handing the finished first part to Joel Barlow on the way to the Luxembourg prison in December 1793.
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The Scriptures
the texts that carry the stories — and everything elseThomas Paine, The Age of Reason (1794-1807)
Elihu Palmer, Principles of Nature (1801)
Edward Herbert, De Veritate (1624)