Introduction
Both Paine and Jefferson advocated for freedom from Great Britain and for all people to have equal rights under a democratic system of government. Still, their written works express their ideals in quite different ways, even though they championed for their states to be liberated.
Discussion
In Common Sense, Thomas Paine adopted an informal tone to influence his audience; in the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson adopted a formal manner to express his thoughts. Paine is more of a salesperson who tries to persuade his audience to agree with his opinions on the British government even though he does not fully establish himself as an authority on the subject. According to (Jefferson 1), however, Jefferson is quite direct throughout, overloading his audience with instances and a vibrant tone before offering the ultimate judgment.
As a commentary, Paine provides a check on the relationship between Great Britain and the United States. He informs his fellow Americans about this issue through the paper. According to him, “a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong which gives it a superficial appearance of being right.” He refers to the relationship and describes it as abusive use of force (Paine 13). This phraseology echoes Jefferson’s claim that the king had created an unquestionable dictatorship over the states.
The bulk of the Declaration of Independence differs conceptually from the core of Common Sense. In his writing, Jefferson adopts a sloppy method, choosing to explain his thoughts in the first few lines before moving on to enumerate his complaints in the body of the essay. In contrast, Paine writes his thoughts more persuadingly throughout his writing by convincing readers across the U.S. that they needed to liberate themselves from colonialism.
Conclusion
In contrast to Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence, which sought independence alone, Thomas Paine wrote Common Sense, a book created primarily for the educated elite, where he argued that America was connected to all of Europe, not only England, and that the country needed to engage in free trade with countries like Spain and France.
Works Cited
Jefferson, Thomas. The Declaration of Independence of The United States of America. Prabhat Prakashan, 2021.
Paine, Thomas. Thomas Paine: Common Sense. epubli, 2019.