Source?
Source?
A source is easily enough provided. Yet the problem for you is that you have very obviously been taking on ‘absolute faith’ the claims made by fallible men, so very many of whom have dark motives. Perhaps because, like Paine, their claims appeal to pride.
The point is this: If you sincerely seek truth, then go in search of it, for you will definitely find what you seek by doing a search on the internet. And it is ——>you who needs to do this work. If however, truth is offensive to you, you’ll choose to reject it and continue to attack the bearers of it.
If Benjamin Franklin's (who we might charitably call one of the more, ah, libertarian of the Founders) letter to Thomas Paine is any indication, even the more liberal of the Founders didn't care for Paine anti-religious diatribes. Here is Franklin's summation to Paine in a letter, responding to a manuscript Paine (whom Franklin counted as a friend) had sent him challenging the idea of a providential God,
I would advise you, therefore, not to attempt unchaining the tiger, but to burn this piece before it is seen by any other person; whereby you will save yourself a great deal of mortification by the enemies it may raise against you, and perhaps a good deal of regret and repentance. If men are so wicked with religion, what would they be if without it.
The further discussion and footnotes at the page are intriguing, too. Directly from them, we can ascertain that in addition to Franklin's opposition, there was also that of Charles Carroll, Benjamin Rush, John Adams, Samuel Adams, Patrick Henry, William Paterson, and John Jay, just to name some of the more well-known Founders.
You might say that Thomas Paine was sort of an 18th century version of Richard Dawkins - a single-minded ideologue who was an embarrassment to fellow-travellers who might otherwise incline towards him, if it weren't for his ridiculous peculiarities.