"It appears as if the tide of mental faculties flowed as far as it could in certain channels, and then forsook its course, and arose in others. How irrational then is the hereditary system, which establishes channels of power, in company with which wisdom refuses to flow!"
Rights of man. Part the second. Combining Principle and Practice. 
<u>The Thomas Paine Reader</u>, ed. Michael Foot and Isaac Kramnick (New York: Penguin Books, 1987). &lt;<a href="http://find.galegroup.com/ecco/infomark.do?&contentSet=ECCOArticles&type=multipage&tabID=T001&prodId=ECCO&docId=CB127177205&source=gale&userGroupName=viva_uva&version=1.0&docLevel=FASCIMILE">Link to ECCO</a>&gt;