To James Monroe October 4, 1794

From the original letter at the Library of Congress.

uxembourg 14th Vendemiaire, old stile Oct 4th

Dear Sir — I thank you for your very friendly and affectionate letter of the 18th of Sep. which I did not receive till this morning - It has relieved my mind from a load of disquietude. You will easily supposed that if the information I received had been exact, my situation was without hope. I had, in that case, neither section, department nor Country, to reclaim me; but that is not all, I felt a poignancy of grief, in having the least reason to suppose that America had so soon forgotten me who had never forgotten her.

Mr. Labonadaire in a note of yesterday directed me to write to the Convention. As I suppose this measure has been taken in Concert with you I have requested him to shew you the letter, of which he will make a translation to accompany the Original.

(I cannot see what motive can induce them to keep me in prison. It will gratify the English Government and afflict the friends I have in America. The supporters of the system of Terror might apprehend that if I was in liberty and in America I should publish the history of their Crimes, but the present persons who have overset that immoral System ought to have no such apprehension. On the contrary, they ought to consider me as one of themselves, at least as one of their friends. Had I been an insignificant character I had not been in arrestation. It was the literary and philosophical reputation I had gained in the world that made them my Enemies; and I am the victim of the principles and if I may be permitted to say it, of the talents, that procured me the esteem of America. My character is the secret of my arrestation.)

If the letter I have written be not covered by other authority than my own it will have no effect, for they already know all that I can say. On what ground do they pretend to deprive America of the service of any of her Citizens without assigning a Cause, or only the flimsy one of my being born in England? Gates, were he here, might be arrested on the same pretence, and he and Burgoyne be confounded together.

(It is difficult for me to give an opinion, but among other things that occur to me I think that if you were to say that as it will be necessary to you to inform the Government of America of my situation that you require an explanation with the Committee upon that subject, that you are induced to make this proposal not only out of esteem for the character of the person who is the personal object of it but because you know that his arrestation will distress the Americans and the more so as it will appear to them to be contrary to their Ideas of Civil and National Justice, it might perhaps have some effect. If the Committee will do nothing it will be necessary to bring this matter openly before the Convention, for I do most sincerely assure you from the observations that I hear and I suppose the same are made in other places, that the character of America lies under some reproach. All the world knows that I have served her, and they see that I am still in prison, and you know that when people can form a conclusion upon a simple fact, they trouble not themselves about reasons. I had rather that America cleared herself of all suspicion of ingratitude though I were to be the victim.

You advise me to have patience, but I am fully persuaded that the longer I continue in prison the more difficult will be my liberation. There are two reasons for this, the one is that the present Committee by continuing so long my imprisonment will naturally suppose that my mind will be soured against them, as it was against those who put me in, and they will continue my imprisonment from the same apprehensions as the former Committee did. The other reason is, that it is now about two months since your arrival and I am still in prison. They will explain this into an indifference upon my fate that will encourage them to continue my imprisonment. When I hear some people say that it is the Government of America that now keeps me in prison by not reclaiming me, and then pour forth a volley of execrations against her, I know not how to answer them otherwise than by a direct denial which they do not appear to believe. You will easily conclude that whatever relates to imprisonments and liberations makes a topic of prison conversation, and as I am now the oldest inhabitant within these walls, except two or three, I am often the subject of their remarks, because from the continuance of my imprisonment they augur ill to themselves. — You see I write you everything that occurs to me, and) I conclude with thanking you again for your very friendly and affectionate letter, and am with great respect -

your’s affectionately

THOMAS PAINE

Today is the anniversary of the action of German Town. Your letter has enabled me to contradict the observations before mentioned.