edwardhowland

"It is never to be expected in a revolution that every man is to change his opinion at the same moment. There never yet was any truth or any principle so irresistibly obvious, that all men believed it at once. Time and reason must cooperate with each other to the final establishment of any principle; and therefore those who may happen to be the first convinced have not a right to persecute others, on whom conviction operates more slowly. The moral principle of revolutions is to instruct; not to destroy." -Thomas Paine 45:08 My goal in producing these audio books is to compile lesser consumed works that either don't already have a decent quality audio version, or to tie certain works together in one place that I believe are of significant importance to our collective understanding of the modern world. I didn't initially intend to produce this however, as I was reading this work to myself, I figured I may as well start recording and see how it comes out. It is the first time I've narrated anything like this in longform so there are some discrepancies in tonality here and there from stopping and starting that I will take into consideration and even out for the next ones. Thomas Paine's Dissertation on First Principles of Government is the first work in a collection I'm calling "The Perennial Wisdom Audio Book Series". These are works that have had a significant impact on me and I wish to share with others. These are designed to be fairly short and easy to consume. I believe that the only way to conceptualize our immensely complex and often unreasoned world, is to ground oneself by means of a foundation of belief based upon the collective knowledge and wisdom of those that came before us. These will be available eventually through audio book companies such as Apple Books and Google etc. and you will be able to purchase them through those avenues. That said, the intention in producing these is simply to share these ideas - thus it was important to me that they are available here at no cost and free for anyone who chooses to listen. I have a few more already chosen to produce next but if you have a solid recommendation on any works you feel are of critical importance in understanding our modern age, and can be consumed in audio format in roughly an hour or less, feel free to send recommendations via comment.