Prefaces Summary and Analysis

Thomas Paine is one of the great political thinkers and activists of the 18th century, playing a major role in building the ideological case for the American Revolution and consoling American soldiers as they fought to secede from Britain. He also strongly favored the French Revolution. The Rights of Man was written as a response to the major British criticism of the French Revolution, written by Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France. The entire first part of the book is dedicated to correcting the factual errors in Burke's account of the revolution, as Paine was one the ground when the revolution occurred. The second part, however, is more philosophical in nature; in it, Paine outlines his theory of natural rights, just and legitimate government and various related policy proposals.

The Rights of Man has three prefaces, a preface to...