to the general misery which the ambitious war-policy of that sovran brought both upon France and upon her enemies.

His Annales politiques are a useful correction to the Siecle de Louis Quatorze.

It was in the course of the great struggle of the Spanish Succession that he turned his attention to war and came to the conclusion that it is an unnecessary evil and even an absurdity.

In 1712 he attended the congress at Utrecht in the capacity of secretary to Cardinal de Polignac, one of the French delegates.

His experiences there confirmed his optimistic mind in the persuasion that perpetual peace was an aim which might readily be realised; and in the following year he published the memoir which he had been preparing, in two volumes, to which he added a third four years later.
Though he appears not to have known the work of Cruce he did not claim originality.