"Third Estate" by Abbe Sieyes:
One of the earliest papers to articulate nationalism, especially ethnic nationalism, it leaves behind the most significant legacy for succeeding generations following the French Revolution. The sentence "The Third Estate is France and France is the Third Estate" is the most significant one in the booklet. In this phrase, Sieyes describes what a contemporary nation is and what a nation is. France will no longer be defined by the monarch; instead, it will be by its common citizens. This would ultimately serve as one of the fundamental tenets of German and Italian unification and contribute to the terrible nature of the two World Wars. This is one of the documents that really represents the birth of Nationalism as an idea, one of the longest legacies of the French Revolution.