Thomas Paine Rhetorical Devices

Thomas Paine makes a statement and compares the king to a thief that stole their land. Paine states, “but if a thief breaks into my house, threatens to kill me, or those that are in it, and to “bind me in all cases whatsoever” to his absolute will, am I to suffer it?”(Paine). Trying to persuade people to join the fight, Paine is asking the colonists why they are subjecting their selves to the tyranny of the king; furthermore, Paine is explaining that the colonists have no choice, but to fight or they will forever be under the tyranny of the king. Patrick Henry makes a statement about the petition in his speech that says, “Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been lately received?”(Henry). With his rhetorical question, Patrick Henry is trying to show the colonists that the king did not care for their petition and would not settle for anything. Therefore, Henry would then go on to state why they should declare war on Britain and gain their

This rhetorical device is called logos. Logos is used in this essay to persuade the audience that they should continue to fight back, because it was clearly the best option the Americans had. Paine used common sense when he stated that, "It is the madness of folly to expect mercy from those who have refused to do justice." He was saying that if the British have refused to represent us in Parliament or negotiate, why do you think they will show us mercy in the Revolution? Paine was saying that it was madness that the colonists, especially the soldiers, should expect Britain to be kind to them in battle and should instead see how they disdain America. He was breaking down all of the complexities of war and putting them into simple and logical terms so everyone could understand that this was not going to be a war easily

In Thomas Paines excerpt describing America in 1971, he provides many key points explaining what America was then and it gives a great basis to compare to what it is now. He starts off explaining tthat America is a melting pot of people of all different nationalities and cultures, then he moves onto the civil unison of our government and people, and lastly he talks about taxes and the rich vs. the poor.

The document “Common Sense” was written in 1776 by a man named Thomas Paine. His main goal was to explain why the colonists needed independence from Great Britain. The King had refused to take actions to help the colonists. He had also imposed taxes and robbed them of their natural born rights. This angered the colonists making them want to revolt against Britain as well. The way Thomas Paine worded “Common Sense” made colonists feel that no answers but his were correct. He accomplished this by using multiple rhetorical devices. Paine often asks questions, but then quickly gave his own answer, along with asking questions that are left for speculation. The most influential devices used by Thomas Paine were hypophoras and rhetorical questions in “Common Sense” to persuade Americans into standing up to Great Britain.

One of our greatest leaders, Abraham Lincoln, once argued, “Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves” (Letter to H.L. Pierce, April 6, 1859). As Lincoln was fighting for freedom for all, he believed that it was morally wrong for one human to own another. He also thought that it was wrong to take away a chance of freedom from others. This relates to Thomas Paine's beliefs: He believed that if someone supports freedom, then they must to join the fight, and if they don’t then their children will have to suffer the consequences. On November 20, 1776, the American forces retreated from Fort Lee because the colonist were struggling to fight against the British. After the American forces retreated, Paine, a political activist and governor of Virginia, wrote a series of sixteen pamphlets called The American Crisis to lift the colonist's sagging spirits due to the devastating loss. In The Crisis No. 1, Paine implements language, a hopeful tone, and diction, to convey his purpose of persuading the men in the colonies to enlist in the war in an effort to retaliate against Great Britain, and assist the army to victory so the future generations don’t have to suffer.

In the pamphlet Common Sense, Thomas Paine manages to persuade the inhabitants into believing that American Independence was a vital decision. The use of persuasion by Thomas Paine had a positive outcome for those colonists in favor of gaining independence. He used a variety of rhetorical devices, such as: hyperboles, analogies, and tone, to state why obtaining American Independence was essential.

Rhetorical devices are devices that are used to convey a meaning to the reader and create emotions through different types of language. Elie Wiesel uses rhetorical devices such as personification, metaphors, and rhetorical questions to emphasize and establish the theme of losing faith.

Thomas Paine, in his renowned work Common Sense, unambiguously uses pathos to call the founding fathers, and the American colonies as a whole, to action against the oppression of the British government. By using explicit figurative language, passionate diction, and the persistent parallel structure used to create correlation between citizen and governing powers, Paine masterfully manipulates the rhetorical appeals and devices in this piece in order to inspire action.

Paine opens his persuasion to the nation by warning that getting their freedom from Britain will not be easy. By using the simile, "Tyranny, like hell...", he implies that Britain's control over them will not be easy to overcome. As he says in the beginning of the paragraph, "The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will...shrink from the service...but he

Proving that the liberties of the common people are something worth fighting for, Paine uses relatable figurative language in order to provide a more personal connection to the colonists in hopes of encouraging the proverbial David to stand up and wage war against Goliath. Paine pens an analogy stating that if a “child has thrived upon milk” then the child will never want “meat”. This analogy elicits a critical turning point in Paine’s pamphlet as he transitions from asking rhetorical questions to authoritative and comparative statements. Paine alludes to the overwhelming axiom that the colonies have been a baby drinking milk only satisfied by meeting the needs of Britain, instead of standing up for their individual rights and

Thomas Paine’s, American crisis, was such an inspirational essay to the soldiers and other undecided patriots. Paine reveals that, “The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.” In this quote Paine was referring to soldiers alike to myself and the group of the soldiers who quit. I believe that I am no summer soldier. I am a winter soldier and should continue to fight even considering the

You enlisted in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War nine months ago. Now it is December, nearing Christmas and you are at Valley Forge with the rest of the army. There is sickness, death and the conditions are miserable. Even though your time is up and you want to return home, your army and George Washington are counting on you to stay. Would you have returned home, or reenlisted?

The United States of America was created by people who were not afraid to stand up for what they believed in. Together they fought, died, and built a new nation of freedom for all. However, the American Revolution would not have gained such widespread support without one man who believed in the freedom of speech. Thomas Paine risked his life to fight the British's censorship of the colonists and encouraged the people to fight back against the King's opposition. Paine fought for his ideals by illegally printing his book Common Sense, giving the people morale through The American Crisis, and becoming involved in the French Revolution through Rights of Man.

Thomas Paine’s makes the most interesting argument for separation of the colonies from England when he wrote, “Can ye give to prostitution its former innocence? Neither can ye reconcile Britain and America” (Paine 997). At first, I thought Paine was merely asking a rhetorical question and using the answer to illustrate the impossibility of reconciliation between America and Great Britain. However, after more thought, I found this most interesting because I thought that it best describes the nature of the relationship between Great Britain and the American Colonies seeing as Great Britain was essentially pimping out the American colonies. Analogous to the reasons in favor of reconciliation between America and Great Britain being based on fear,

Thomas Paine manages to include all three rhetorical appeals in one paragraph. He appeals to logos (logic) by claiming he is simply stating the facts and by asking readers to not only look at the present, but the future. Paine appeals to pathos (emotion) by acknowledging the audience's preexisting beliefs and values, and by asking them to set aside their biased opinions and to let their reason and emotions decide. By acknowledging the readers' values and referring to the "true character of a man", he establishes a common ground with his audience; this appeals to ethos (ethics), which helps the author gain his/her audience's trust based on their credibility and character.