The MS consists of five folios: the first four are in a secretarial hand (possibly that of Longchamp), and the final folio is in Voltaire’s hand. It is corrected throughout but does not correspond exactly with the printed edition of the work.

This is the first known draft of the majority of the first part of Doutes nouveaux. The present whereabouts of the MS is unknown, but Theodore Besterman owned a photocopy of it.

The text was published in the Gazette littéraire de l’Europe in January 1764. This MS features several variants compared to the text of the Gazette littéraire.

The text was published in the Gazette littéraire de l’Europe on 28 March 1764. This MS features several variants compared to the text of the Gazette littéraire.

The fragment is written on the back of the address of an autograph letter from Voltaire to Charles Augustin Feriol, comte d’ Argental, dating to c.5 March 1777 [D20594].

An accompanying note in an unidentified hand states that the MS was written for inclusion in the Dictionnaire Philosophique but was not included in the published work.

A collection of various documents, including: (I) Set of assignats comprising 16 assignats of five pounds from 1793 (Brumaire year II), 11 assignats of ten pounds from 1792, 3 assignats of fifteen sols from 1793, 2 assignats of 10 sous from the fourth year of freedom, 4 assignats of fifty sols, and 1 assignat of twenty-five sols.
(II) Set of autograph documents from Besins & Cie. including a letter from Joseph B. to Napoleon I (Madrid, 1808), a letter from Verlaine, a letter from Malherbe, a codicil from Napoleon, a testament from Racine, a note from Pierre Corneille, a letter from Voltaire to the Count of Laurencin, a letter of resignation from Cardinal de Rohan to Louis XVI, lots from the trial of the necklace (1786), last letter from Louis XVI to the National Convention, a letter from Beaumarchais to the Minister of the Interior, a letter from François I to the Empress, wife of Charles V on the subject of the interview at Aigues-mortes, a letter from Marie-Stuart to Philip II, a letter patent from Charles VII ennobling Jean d’Arc and his family (1429), a farewell letter from Charlotte Corday to her father after his arrest for the assassination of Marat, and some minutes.
(III) A set of four drypoint engravings of Versailles by Laboratoire Galbrun, ‘Bassin de Cérès’, ‘Le Tapis vert’, ‘Temple de l’Ampur'[?] and ‘Maison de la Reine’.
(IV) Les Laboratoires Carlier, ‘La cabinet de Perles’ by Thomas Lawrence, engravings, 1837.
(V) ‘Woman in French painting, 17th, 18th and 19th century’, Les Éditions Nationales, Paris.
(VI) A handwritten letter in English located in Quebec and dated 28 July 1754.
(VII) Certificate ‘To the glory of the great architect of the universe’ dated 23rd day of the 11th month of the year of true light 5826 (1817).