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‘The Crisis’
I re-posted this Twitter thread on my Facebook page which was a description of some correspondence the author had recently received about the state of cities across the nation with all the recent unrest. My comment accompanying the Facebook post was “Rather depressing thread.” A well-meaning friend replied:
Jess, you should avoid depressing threads. I have read more good books — mostly history — in 2020 than in any previous year (retirement helps, but it’s not the sole cause). I also avoid MSM outlets like the plague, at least for national news. Good for my mental health!”
I understand where he is coming from. It’s probably good advice. But I’m not going to take it. Here was my response to my friend:
You’re certainly right on a personal level. If I paid less attention to the state of the country, my mental health would improve. But you know what happens if everyone in the country collectively takes that advice? Apathy. Ignorance. Ennui. In other words, America 2020! That’s what happens. In drafting this response, I was inspired to read “The Crisis”. I wanted to quote the opening lines correctly. Thomas Paine wrote this first portion of “The Crisis” (there were several more to follow) in December 1776, describing the orderly retreat of Washington’s forces out of New Jersey and across the Delaware. His pamphlet was credited, in part, with inspiring the soldiers who several days later on Christmas 1776 would recross the Delaware and attack the Hessians at Trenton. And the rest, as they say, is history! Paine writes,
“THESE are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.”
I read the rest of the pamphlet as well, which I had never done. That was 10 minutes well spent. (I read it carefully, for meaning!)
“Yet panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt. Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before.”
And there is this sentiment at the end of Pg 7,
“I once felt all that kind of anger, which a man ought to feel, against the mean principles that are held by the Tories: a noted one, who kept a tavern at Amboy, was standing at his door, with as pretty a child in his hand, about eight or nine years old, as I ever saw, and after speaking his mind as freely as he thought was prudent, finished with this unfatherly expression, “Well! Give me peace in my day.” Not a man lives on the continent but fully believes that a separation must some time or other finally take place, and a generous parent should have said, “If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace;”and this single reflection, well applied, is sufficient to awaken every man to duty.”
There’s plenty more in here to inspire one to action, certainly enough to urge one to bother oneself to pen the occasional Facebook post, don’t you think?
The Crisis I Pages 5-10. Well worth the ten minutes.
It is worth the read
I keep coming back to this in my thoughts: this battle cannot be won without sacrifice. We shouldn’t expect to keep (regain?) our liberty if we’re not willing to get out into the streets ourselves.
I think we are face-to-face with the greatest crisis of my lifetime.
We are facing subversives in the public square. But that is not all, they have populated our federal bureaucracy and attempted to undo the last Presidential election. Maybe the coronavirus pandemic was not initiated deliberately but the timing could not have been planned to provide a greater opportunity for a national crisis within which to conduct our federal elections. What disruptive actions have been initiated as we approach this election?
Lockdowns that have decimated our economy
So-called protests that turn into looting and riots within our largest cities while elected Democrat governors, mayors, and prosecutors observe without acting to enforce laws
Large scale moves within states to initiate new untested mail-in voting for elections less than 90 days away
Federal investigations into alleged crimes committed by federal officials in the law enforcement and intelligence agencies will deliver indictments and more controversy
We can anticipate extreme disruption from now until the election with an outcome that will be impossible to determine with accustomed confidence. What will we be faced with after Election Day? I’m already hearing suggestions that the House of Representatives will determine who is President. Recall what went on during the 2016 transition. This could be much worse.
When you finished writing this piece, you deserved to let the mic drop!
This is what will happen. They have already told us.