“I trouble myself not with the manner of future existence. I content myself with believing, even to positive conviction, that the power that gave me existence is able to continue it, in any form and manner he pleases, either with or wihtout this body”
The closing words from Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason hint at his views toward God and the afterlife. Paine was a spokesman for his time - the Enlightenment - and throughout his writings expressed his contempt for monarchial rule and, especially in Age of Reason, for the priestly class and organized religion. He had no patience for those that claimed authority or holiness over others in the name of God. As a deist, Paine found God in the natural world and in the true nature of all people. God was the force behind all creation, and that power was imbued in all life. Now and hereafter.
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