Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man opposes the ridiculous conservative standpoint that Edmund Burke took towards the French Revolution. Paine supported natural rights, and understood that democratic institutions must be implemented in order to guarantee those rights. Paine applied a combination of logic and common sense to discredit Burke’s opinion, thereby proving the legitimacy of the revolution. Burke understood a constitution to be an inherited system, believing that as property is passed from father …showed first 75 words of 391 total…

…showed last 75 words of 391 total…French people] did not enter into society to become worse than [they were] before, nor to have fewer rights than [they had] before, but to have those rights better secured.” He protested that the National Assembly was the means for the people of France, without noble fathers, to be delegates of the nation. At the same time, he understood that the authority of the National Assembly would be different from the authority of future assemblies.