“THE CAUSE OF AMERICA IS… THE CAUSE OF ALL MANKIND”: SCARCE 1776 FIRST LONDON EDITION OF COMMON SENSE, “THE MOST INFLUENTIAL TRACT OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION”

[PAINE, Thomas]. Common Sense; Addressed to the Inhabitants of America… A New Edition, with several Additions in the Body of the Work. To which is added an Appendix; together with an Address to the People called Quakers. Philadelphia, Printed; London, Re-Printed, for J. Almon, 1776. Slim octavo, period-style stiff marbled wrappers; pp. (4), 54. Housed in a custom clamshell box.

Rare early 1776 London edition of Paine’s Common Sense, printed within months of the first American edition. An exceptional copy with most points of the third London edition.

All 1776 editions of Common Sense are rare and desirable and are increasingly difficult to obtain. “By far the most influential tract of the American Revolution…. it remains one of the most brilliant pamphlets ever written in the English language (Covenanted People 27). This expanded edition contains Paine’s additions, increasing the work by one-third. This is an early mixed copy with most points agreeing with the third English edition (issued the same year as the first) and, like most English editions, with hiatuses deleting material critical of the English crown and government to avoid prosecution.

The 1776 American editions of Common Sense ignited the drive for independence and led directly to the ratification of the Declaration of Independence; the British editions greatly affected public opinion in England, drawing many to support the American cause. Common Sense made history as “the most discussed and most widely circulated pamphlet in America” (Gimbel, 49). “It would be difficult to name any human composition which has had an effect at once so instant, so extended and so lasting… Common Sense turned thousands to independence who before could not endure the thought. It worked nothing short of miracles and turned Tories into Whigs” (Trevelyan, History). There were four London editions of Common Sense printed by John Almon in 1776: issued in two forms—with James Chalmer’s Plain Truth, both with and without a half title. This copy of Common Sense is in the format without Plain Truth, without the half title, and is an intermediate state between the second and fourth edition. It has the hiatuses in lines 15 and 17 of the Introduction printed in, and the correct pagination of page 23. “Mixed copies are known, made up of signatures from different editions” (Gimbel, 86). Adams, American Controversy, 76-107c/d. Gimbel, Table III:86-7. Howes P17. Sabin 58214. See Church 1135; Evans 14954.

Text fresh with lightest scattered foxing, minor cosmetic repair to paper clip staining on upper margins of several leaves, not affecting text. A highly desirable near-fine copy, handsomely housed in a custom clamshell box.