The Rights of Man, cartoon
TitleThe Rights of Man, cartoon
ReferenceFRAMED/110
Date
23 May 1791
Production date 1791-05-23 - 1791-05-23
Scope and ContentFull title: The Rights of Man;—Or—Tommy Paine, The Little American Taylor, Taking the Measure of the Crown, for a New Pair of Revolution-Breeches.
From Catalogue of political and personal satires preserved in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum: vol 6
"[Gillray.] Published May 23rd by H. Humphrey No 18, Old Bond Street Engraving (coloured and uncoloured impressions).
Tom Paine, lean, and grotesquely caricatured, crouches, kneeling on one knee, to apply his tape-measure to a gigantic crown standing on the ground, the greater part of which is cut off by the r. margin of the design. He is dressed as a ragged tailor, a large pair of shears attached to his waist, but wears a cocked hat of French fashion with a cockade inscribed "Vive la Liberty", his hair is in a long scraggy queue. He says, gaping with dismay at the crown, "Fathom and a half! Fathom & a half! Poor Tom!'' ah! mercy upon me! thats more by half than my poor Measure will ever be able to reach!-Lord! Lord! I wish I had a bit of the Stay-tape or Buckram which I youst to Cabbage [pilfer] when I was prentice, to lengthen it out;-well, well, who could ever have thought it, that I, who have served Seven Years as an Apprentice, & afterwards worked Four Years as a Journeyman to a Master Taylor, then followd the business of an Exciseman as much longer, should not be able to take the dimensions of this Bauble?" for what is - a Crown but a Bauble? which we may see in the Tower for Six-pence a piece? well, altho' it may be too large for a Taylor to take Measure of, there's one Comfort, he may make mouths at it, & call it as many names as he pleases!- and yet, Lord, Lord, I should like to make it a Yankee doodle Night-Cap & Breeches, if it was not so dam'nd large, or I had stuff enough Ah if I could once do that, I would soon stitch up the mouth of that Barnacled Edmund from making of any more Reflections upon the Flints - & so Flints & Liberty for ever & damn the Dungs". Four additional words have been left almost illegible but appear to be "Down with Hanover Horse". Above the design is etched: "Humbly dedicated to the Jacobine Clubs of France and England!!! by Common Sense
"These are your Gods, O, Israel!"
A satire on the first part of Paine's Rights of Man, an answer to Burke's Reflections, published on 13 Mar. 1791 and dedicated to Washington. He went to Paris immediately after publication. His Common Sense published on 10 Jan. 1776, was a leading cause of the American Declaration of Independence. Paine was successively stay-maker, exciseman, and pamphleteer. The London tailors were divided into Flints, who formed clubs and entered into strikes to obtain increased wages, and Dungs who accepted the statutory rates. "
From Catalogue of political and personal satires preserved in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum: vol 6
"[Gillray.] Published May 23rd by H. Humphrey No 18, Old Bond Street Engraving (coloured and uncoloured impressions).
Tom Paine, lean, and grotesquely caricatured, crouches, kneeling on one knee, to apply his tape-measure to a gigantic crown standing on the ground, the greater part of which is cut off by the r. margin of the design. He is dressed as a ragged tailor, a large pair of shears attached to his waist, but wears a cocked hat of French fashion with a cockade inscribed "Vive la Liberty", his hair is in a long scraggy queue. He says, gaping with dismay at the crown, "Fathom and a half! Fathom & a half! Poor Tom!'' ah! mercy upon me! thats more by half than my poor Measure will ever be able to reach!-Lord! Lord! I wish I had a bit of the Stay-tape or Buckram which I youst to Cabbage [pilfer] when I was prentice, to lengthen it out;-well, well, who could ever have thought it, that I, who have served Seven Years as an Apprentice, & afterwards worked Four Years as a Journeyman to a Master Taylor, then followd the business of an Exciseman as much longer, should not be able to take the dimensions of this Bauble?" for what is - a Crown but a Bauble? which we may see in the Tower for Six-pence a piece? well, altho' it may be too large for a Taylor to take Measure of, there's one Comfort, he may make mouths at it, & call it as many names as he pleases!- and yet, Lord, Lord, I should like to make it a Yankee doodle Night-Cap & Breeches, if it was not so dam'nd large, or I had stuff enough Ah if I could once do that, I would soon stitch up the mouth of that Barnacled Edmund from making of any more Reflections upon the Flints - & so Flints & Liberty for ever & damn the Dungs". Four additional words have been left almost illegible but appear to be "Down with Hanover Horse". Above the design is etched: "Humbly dedicated to the Jacobine Clubs of France and England!!! by Common Sense
"These are your Gods, O, Israel!"
A satire on the first part of Paine's Rights of Man, an answer to Burke's Reflections, published on 13 Mar. 1791 and dedicated to Washington. He went to Paris immediately after publication. His Common Sense published on 10 Jan. 1776, was a leading cause of the American Declaration of Independence. Paine was successively stay-maker, exciseman, and pamphleteer. The London tailors were divided into Flints, who formed clubs and entered into strikes to obtain increased wages, and Dungs who accepted the statutory rates. "
Extent1 framed item
Physical descriptionDimensions (H X W): 47cm X 36cm
Persons keywordGillray, James, Paine, Thomas, Burke, Edmund
SubjectCartoons, Revolutions, Republicanism, Parliamentary reform
Conditions governing accessOpen
Levelfile
Normal locationD Plan Chest Drawer 1 (Room 12)