" In the following pages I offered nothing more than simple facts, plain arguments, and common sense; and have no other preliminaries to settle with the reader, then that he will divest himself of prejudice and preposession, and suffer his reason and his feelings to determine for themselves; but he will put on, or rather that he will not put off the true character of a man, and generously in enlarge his views beyond the present day. "

― Thomas Paine , Common Sense