A radical conspirator, in 1838 he fled to France where he joined the Polish Democratic Society. Under the influence of conservatives from Greater Poland, he abandoned his radical positions, and after 1848 settled in Kraków, where he became associated with the conservative circles focused around the Czas [“Time”] and Przegląd Polski [“Polish Review”] magazines. In his columns, he criticised Enlightenment libertinism and rehabilitated the “classic camp” represented by Kajetan Koźmian and Franciszek Morawski.