To the Chairman of the Society for Promoting Constitutional Knowledge (2)

Knowledge (2)

To the Chairman of the Society for Promoting Constitutional Knowledge

LONDON, May 12, 1792.

The honorable patronage which the Society for Constitutional Information has repeatedly given to the works entitled Rights of Man renders it incumbent on me to communicate to them whatever relates to the progress of those works.

A great number of letters from various parts of the country have come to me expressing an earnest desire that the first and second parts of Rights of Man be rendered more generally useful by printing them in a cheaper manner than they have hitherto been. As these requests were from persons to whom the purchase at the present price was inconvenient, I took the proper means for complying with their request.

I am since informed that the Ministry intends bringing a prosecution, and as a Nation (as well the poor as the rich) has a right to know what my works are that are made the subject of a prosecution, the getting out a cheap edition is, I conceive, considered more necessary than before, as a means towards supporting that right; and I have the pleasure of informing the Society that I am proceeding with the work.

I am, Sir, with great respect, Your obedient and Humble Servant,

THOMAS PAINE.

Author of Common Sense and of the Rights of Man, parts first and second.