VOLNEY, Constantin François Chasseboeuf, Comte de (1757-1820), was born at Craon, on February 3, 1757, of a good but not noble family, and educated first at the neighbouring provincial towns of Ancenis and Angers, then at Paris. According to the common and curious habit of the time and country he was at first surnamed Boisgirais, but afterwards assumed the name of Volney. When he was about four aud twenty he acquired some reputation by an essay on the chronology of Herodotus, and was introduced into literary and philosophical society. He then did what was at the time not common, common as it has become since. Having inherited a sum of money, he visited the East and spent some four years in Egypt and Syria, writing the history of his travels when he returned, and publishing it in 1787. He had not merely travelled but had learnt Arabic, and had studied the politics as well as the topography of the countries he visited. Of the former study he gave evidence the year before the Revolution by some Considerations on the war between Russia and Turkey. He was a member both of the States-General and of the Constituante, and distinguished himself as an ardent reformer. In 1791 appeared the book Les Ruines, by which he is known to a great many people who have never read it. It is a kind of essay on the philosophy of history written from the philosophe point of view, and of course containing some direct and much oblique manifestation of philosophe antipathy to religion. It is probable, however, that those who, after the lapse of a century, read it under the impression of the strong denunciations of it by some orthodox writers of its own and immediately succeeding times will be not a little surprised. The book, of which the full title is Les Ruines, ou Méditation sur les ...