Abstract

According to Paine, the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America gives birth to a new world, determined by the people's sovereignty, in which a new mode of writing is necessarily required, namely a mode of writing that displays a new form of authority, the authority of freedom. Primary example fo this new writing is, according to Paine - clearly influenced by the theological tradition of a free interpretation of the Scriptures - the American Constitution. In this essay the author shows that it is actually Paine's works - from the "Rights of Man" to "The Age of Reason" - that become models for the 'new' authority of American writing.