In this article, an analysis is conducted of the concept "revolution" and to what extent it ceased to have a descriptive meaning that was either derived from an astronomical metaphor or from the Greek political doctrine of anakyklosis. Instead, it became a concept with a powerful normative character throughout the 18th Century, particularly during the French Revolution. Taking Sieyes as an example of a liberal thinker, our aim is to show how far this author links the concept of revolution to the question of historical time. Although the concept of revolution has been endowed with a powerful normative connotation, it can be seen that through Sieyes, the concept still had to be upheld by the notion of time. And it is through this conscious link with "time" that Sieyes defines the limits of the revolutionary process which initially took shape through a social revolution being driven by a political revolution.
Revolution; History; French Revolution; Liberalism; Conservatism