He belonged to his times and to the school of the philosophers as regarded his contempt for tradition and history; it was to natural rights alone, to the innate and primitive requirements of mankind, that he traced back his principles and referred as the basis for all his attempts.

"The rights of associated men are not founded upon their history but upon their nature," says the _Memoire au Roi sur les Municipalites,_ drawn up under the eye of Turgot.

By this time he desired no more to reform old France; he wanted a new France.

"Before ten years are over," he would say, "the nation will not be recognizable, thanks to enlightenment.

This chaos will have assumed a distinct form.