Antoine de Lavoisier is considered the founder of modern chemistry. In 1789, the year of the storming of the Bastille, he formulated the law of conservation of mass, after which medieval alchemy gave way to a new science - chemistry. Shortly before this, Lavoisier discovered the essential element for life - oxygen, and a few years later proposed the decimal metric system. He was not only a scientist, but also a tireless social reformer, who believed that the modern state should be governed by reason, and its wealth should be based on universal education and science. Lavoisier's government activities ended with a revolutionary tribunal, by which he was executed in the same square where Louis XVI was guillotined.