A major work of French political thought from the early years of the French Revolution, which uses an oriental dream-tale as a vehicle for discussing the rise and fall of civilisations, the progress and corruptions of the human mind, the conceptual misunderstandings which underpin superstition and the political dangers which arise from them. The book involves several dramatic scenes, including an argument between the ordinary people and the elite, and a debate among the leaders of all the world’s religions which exposes the flaws in their respective systems. Volney couches his political theory in an accessible literary form that, in translation, proved highly influential among Anglo-American radicals in the following century.