Poems Around the Civil War Pt I: Centre College
Guest blog post by Wendy Chapin Ford ’77. In a three part series, she shares poetry based on her relatives’ experiences during the Civil War and the Clements provides illustrations.
Black History in the Clements Digital Collections
The Clements Library’s digitization efforts help make our collections available for research anywhere you have an internet connection. If you’re looking to honor Black History Month with a deep dive into the archives that reflect this rich past, let us draw your attention to several online options.
A Day in the Life at The Clements Library: Emma Schneider
Welcome to “A Day in the Life at The Clements Library!” On the second edition of this series, we meet with Emma Schneider, an Information Resources Assistant.
New Manuscripts Finding Aids, February 2026
The Manuscripts Division has made a dozen collections available for research this past month, including a pocket diary kept during Cornelius D. Bowers’ service in the 84th Pennsylvania Volunteer Regiment and a manuscript journal penned by a currently unidentified supercargo while aboard two smuggling expeditions between August 1808 and March 1809.
Mapping Michigan
On this day in history, in 1837, Michigan was admitted as the 26th state. A map of Michigan is easily at hand for most people, whether it is on the phone in their pocket or demonstrated by simply holding up their hand! It wasn’t always that simple. The shape of the...
New Additions to the Thomas Gage Papers Digital Collection
The Clements Library Digitization Team invites you to discover additional snapshots of history in this new selection of eighteenth century manuscripts, now accessible online through our Digitized Archival Collections.
Additional Resources
Contents Introduction Going Viral in 1776 Audi et Alteram Partem: Listen to the Other Side Revolution, Reaction, and the Rights of Man An Uncommon Conclusion Additional Resources Additional Resources American Revolution in the Clements Collections Thomas Paine papers,...
An Uncommon Conclusion
Paine’s revolutionary temperament was not restricted to matters of politics. His 1794 book The Age of Reason: Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology extended his critique to theology and religion, questioning key tenets of the Christian faith, criticizing the institutional dimensions of religion more generally, and espousing Deism as the only faith compatible with human reason.
Revolution, Reaction, and the Rights of Man
Fifteen years after the publication of Common Sense, Paine published the first part of his Rights of Man, a defense of the French Revolution. Rights of Man celebrated the French Revolution as heralding a new dawn of liberty and reason, and critiqued Edmund Burke’s 1790 Reflections on the Revolution in France, which had criticized the French revolutionaries, defended traditional, established political norms and institutions, and endorsed gradual reform over wholescale political change.