The form of government established under Louis XIV. was preserved without any fundamental modification under Louis XV. After the death of Louis XIV., however, the regent, under the inspiration of the duc de St Simon, made trial of a system of which the latter had made a study while in a close correspondence with the duke of Burgundy. It consisted in substituting for the authority of the ministers, secretaries of state and controller-general councils, or governmental bodies, mainly composed of great lords and prelates. These only lasted for a few years, when a return was made to the former organization. The parlements had regained their ancient rights in consequence of the parlement of Paris having, in 1715, set aside the will of Louis XIV. as being contrary to the fundamental laws of the kingdom, in that it laid down rules for the composition of the council of regency, and limited the power of the regent. This newly revived power they exercised freely, and all the more so since they were the last surviving check on the royal authority. During this reign there were numerous conflicts between them and the government, the causes of this being primarily the innumerable incidents to which the bull _Unigenitus_ gave rise, and the increase of taxation; proceedings against Jesuits also figure conspicuously in the action of the parlements. They became at this period the avowed representatives of the nation; they contested the validity of the registration of laws in the _lits de justice_, asserting that laws could only be made obligatory when the registration had been freely endorsed by themselves. Before the registration of edicts concerning taxation they demanded a statement of the financial situation and the right of examining the accounts. Finally, by the theory of the _classes_, which considered the various parlements of France as parts of one and the same body, they established among them a political union. These pretensions the crown refused to recognize. Louis XV. solemnly condemned them in a _lit de justice_ of December 1770, and in 1771 the chancellor Maupeou took drastic measures against them. The magistrates of the parlement of Paris were removed, and a new parlement was constituted, including the members of the _grand conseil_, which had also been abolished. The _cour des aides_ of Paris, which had made common cause with the parlement, was also suppressed. Many of the provincial parlements were reorganized, and a certain number of useful reforms were carried out in the jurisdiction of the parlement of Paris; the object of these, however, was in most cases that of diminishing its importance. These actions, the _coup d'etat_ of the chancellor Maupeou, as they were called, produced an immense sensation. The repeated conflicts of the reign of Louis XV. had already given rise to a whole literature of books, pamphlets and tracts in which the rights of the crown were discussed. At the same time the political philosophy