Read this excerpt from Thomas Paine's famous essay "The Crisis Number One":

I have as little superstition in me as any man living, but my secret opinion has ever been, and still is, that God Almighty will not give up a people to military destruction, or leave them unsupportedly to perish, who have so earnestly and so repeatedly sought to avoid the calamities of war, by every decent method which wisdom could invent. Neither have I so much of the infidel in me, as to suppose that He has relinquished the government of the world, and given us up to the care of devils; and as I do not, I cannot see on what grounds the king of Britain can look up to heaven for help against us: a common murderer, a highwayman, or a house-breaker, has as good a pretence as he.

Which sentence best describes Paine's claim in the excerpt?

A.) God would not take sides between the British and the American colonists.
B.) It was necessary to save Americans because God did not support military destruction.
C.) It was necessary for America to fight the British to defend their religious values.
D.) God would defend the American colonists' fight because their cause was upright.
E.) It was necessary for Americans to save themselves and not wait for God to help them.