Thus, it was thanks to his reputation as a scholar and the cultural capital of his degree in Canons that ACA entered the Academy. António M. Hespanha, referring to this decade when the Academia Real das Ciências was founded, and particularly with regard to the areas where Amaral was active, says the following: ‘In fact, it is very clear that, from the eighties of the 18 th century onwards, jus-rationalist reformism took hold as the dominant political culture in the circles of intellectual s , who occupy the new public sphere of academic literature, newspapers, academies, offices of the new ‘ reformist active administration’ ( Guiando a mão invisível …, [Guiding the invisible hand] 2004, p. 45).

In the context of this ‘jus - rationalist reformism’, which was also present in the Academia das Ciências [Academy of Sciences] , ACA situated his historical studies. We will try to understand how he interpreted jus-rationalism . In the very first year of the Academy ’ s existence, Amaral presented the Projecto de huma História civil da Monarchia Portuguesa [Project for a Civil History of the Portuguese Monarchy] at an academic session on 19 July 1780. Here, and also in the Plano da História Civil apresentado à Academia na Assembleia de 15 de Novembro de 1780 [ Civil History Plan presented to the Academy at the Assembly of 15 November 1780] , the historian sets out his conception of H istory, his objectives and his method. In his own words, he intends to ‘undertake … a History, whose object is everything that concerns the internal government of the Portuguese Monarchy … I do not say a simple History of Portuguese Law, confined to our written laws: who ignores that in Civil life there are other unwritten laws, which naturally stem from the genius of the People, I mean, customs and usages’ ( Projecto de uma historia civil …, [A Civil History Project] p. 507).

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