# Rights of Man explained — The Rights of Man > Chapter companion for The Rights of Man by Thomas Paine. ## What happens Paine launches a vigorous defense of the French Revolution against Edmund Burke's attack, arguing that natural rights reside in the whole nation and cannot be bound by past generations. He contrasts the French Constitution's rational principles—universal suffrage, proportional representation, and economic freedom—with the corrupt, hereditary system in England, and defends the National Assembly against Burke's theatrical exaggerations. ## Themes in this chapter ### Natural Rights of Man Paine asserts that the right to choose governors, cashier them for misconduct, and frame a government resides in the whole nation, not in any particular person or generation. ### Popular Sovereignty Paine argues that the nation has an original right to reform its government through a general convention, and that no generation can bind another. ### Critique of Hereditary Government Paine condemns the hereditary system exemplified by William the Conqueror's charters and the capricious election qualifications in England. ### Representative Government Paine contrasts the French Constitution's proportional representation with the English system where large towns like Manchester have no representation. ## Character check-ins ### Edmund Burke Paine criticizes Burke's unprovoked pamphlet attacking the French Revolution and his denial of the nation's right to choose its own governors. ### Thomas Paine Paine writes the chapter as a direct response to Burke, defending the principles of the French Revolution and natural rights. ### Richard Price Burke abuses Dr. Price in his pamphlet; Price had preached a sermon asserting the people's right to choose and cashier governors. ### William Pitt Paine references Pitt's bill to reform Parliament as being based on the erroneous principle that reform can come from a corrupted body. ### William the Conqueror Paine cites William the Conqueror and his descendants as the source of the capricious election charters in England. ### Louis XVI The King's delay in sanctioning the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the decrees of August 4 caused uneasiness in Paris. ## Key lines > That men should take up arms and spend their lives and fortunes, not to maintain their rights, but to maintain they have not rights, is an entirely new species of discovery, and suited to the paradoxical genius of Mr. Burke. It is absurd for people to fight and sacrifice everything to prove that they have no rights at all. _Paine mocks Burke's claim that the English people disclaim the right to choose their governors._ > The county of York, which contains nearly a million of souls, sends two county members; and so does the county of Rutland, which contains not a hundredth part of that number. Yorkshire with a million people and Rutland with fewer than ten thousand each elect the same number of representatives. _Paine highlights the inequality of English representation compared to the French system._ > These outrages were not the effect of the principles of the Revolution, but of the degraded mind that existed before the Revolution, and which the Revolution is calculated to reform. The violence during the Revolution came from pre-existing social degradation, not from revolutionary ideals. _Paine defends the Revolution against Burke's accusations of mob violence._ ## Links - HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/the_rights_of_man_se/chapters/rights-of-man - Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/the_rights_of_man_se - All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/the_rights_of_man_se/chapters