`These speeches," Le Mercure de France declared, "do the greatest honour to Maitre de Robespierre, who is hardly out of adolescence". It would be six years until the Revolution, but the young provincial lawyer was already making a name for himself, before ultimately becoming the architect of that crescendo of brutality known as the Reign of Terror.
The speeches were made before a local court of appeal, the Council of Artois in northern France.
It was just 30 years since Benjamin Franklin had conducted his famous experiment with a kite, and the use of protective lightning rods had spread rapidly. A Monsieur de Vissery, a retired barrister, placed one on his dwelling at St Ouen.
His action was not appreciated by his neighbours. They were greatly agitated by the metal post, because it seemed to them to threaten the sky in an almost sacrilegious way, and would surely attract the wrath of heaven on their quiet town.
Some said the house should be blown up, but a more moderate delegation went to fetch the local bailiff.
Despite M de Vissery's explanations about the latest theories of electricity and lightning, the bailiff ordered that the "engine" be removed.
De Vissery complied, but immediately appealed, and the case, which attracted much attention, opened 218 years ago today, on May 14th, 1783.
The young Robespierre was the appellant advocate. In two brilliant speeches he recalled the persecutions of Galileo, Harvey and Rene Descartes and gave a detailed history of lightning conductors up to Franklin's kite experiments. He also provided examples of the use of the apparatus, both abroad and nearer home in France.
"A man has appeared in our time," he concluded, "who has dared to arm men against fire from heaven, and who has said to lightning `You shall go no further'."
The case was won; de Vissery was authorised to replace the lightning conductor on his roof, which, of course, he lost no time in doing.
In an interesting footnote to the outcome, it is recorded that the young Robespierre forwarded to Benjamin Franklin copies of his addresses to the court.
"I hope, Sir," said his covering letter, "that you will consent to receive this work with kindness, the object of which was to get my fellow citizens to accept one of your inventions.
"Happy as I am to have been useful to my country in persuading her chief magistrates to welcome this important discovery, I would be happier still if I might add to this advantage the approval of a man whose least worth is that of being the most brilliant scholar in the universe."