During the few short years which elapsed for him between his leaving the keep of Vincennes and the tribune of the National Assembly, he employed himself with polemic labours, which would have weighed down another man, but which only kept him in health.

The Bank of Saint Charles, the Institutions of Holland, the books on Prussia, the skirmish with Beaumarchais, his style and character, his lengthened pleadings on questions of warfare, the balance of European power, finance, those biting invectives, that war of words with the ministers or men of the hour, resembled the Roman forum in the days of Clodius and Cicero.

We discern the men of antiquity in even his most modern controversies.

We may fancy that we hear the first roarings of those popular tumults which were so soon to burst forth, and which his voice was destined to control.

At the first election of Aix, rejected with contempt by the _noblesse_, he cast himself into the arms of the people, certain of making the balance incline to the side on which he should cast the weight of his daring and his genius.