This ever-increasing stream of new evidence aroused curiosity, gave rise to pregnant comparisons, developed and sharpened the critical sense, but further led to a more and more urgent need for exact information. The Academie des Inscriptions brought out its _Histoire de l'Academie avec les memoires de litterature tires de ses registres_ (vol. i. 1717; 51 vols. appeared before the Revolution, with five indexes; _vide_ the _Bibliographie_ of Lasteyrie, vol. iii. pp. 256 et seq.). Other collections, mostly of the nature of bibliographies, were the _Journal des savants_ (111 vols., from 1665 to 1792; _vide_ the _Table methodique_ by H. Cocheris, 1860); the _Journal de Trevoux_, or _Memoires pour l'histoire des sciences et des beaux-arts_, edited by Jesuits (265 vols., 1701-1790); the _Mercure de France_ (977 vols., from 1724 to 1791). To these must be added the dictionaries and encyclopaedias: the _Dictionnaire de Moreri_, the last edition of which numbers 10 vols. (1759); the _Dictionnaire geographique, historique et politique des Gaules et de la France_, by the abbe J.J. Expilly (6 vols., 1762-1770; unfinished); the _Repertoire universel et raisonne de jurisprudence civile, criminelle, canonique et beneficiale_, by Guyot (64 vols., 1775-1786; supplement in 17 vols., 1784-1785), reorganized and continued by Merlin de Douai, who was afterwards one of the _Montagnards_, a member of the Directory, and a count under the Empire. The historians did not use to the greatest advantage the treasures of learning provided for them; they were for the most part superficial, and dominated by their political or religious prejudices. Thus works like that of Pere Gabriel Daniel (_Histoire de France_, 3 vols., 1713), of President Henault (_Abrege chronologique_, 1744; 25 editions between 1770 and 1834), of the abbe Paul Francois Velly and those who completed his work (_Histoire de France_, 33 vols., 1765 to 1783), of G.H. Gaillard (_Histoire de la rivalite de la France et de l'Angleterre_, 11 vols., 1771-1777), and of L.P. Anquetil (1805), in spite of the brilliant success with which they met at first, have fallen into a just oblivion. A separate place must be given to the works of the theorists and philosophers: _Histoire de l'ancien gouvernement de la France_, by the Comte de Boulainvilliers (1727), _Histoire critique de l'etablissement de la monarchie francoise dans les deux Gaules_, by the abbe J.B. Dubos (1734); _L'Esprit des lois_, by the president de Montesquieu (1748); the _Observations sur l'histoire de France_, by the abbe de Mably (1765); the _Theorie de la politique de la monarchie francaise_, by Marie Pauline de Lezardiere (1792). These works have, if nothing else, the merit of provoking reflection.