Korais studied at the school of medicine of the University of Montpellier from 1782 to 1787. His 1786 diploma thesis was entitled Pyretologiae Synopsis, while his 1787 doctoral thesis was entitled Medicus Hippocraticus.[3] After 1788 he was to spend most of his life as an expatriate in Paris. A classical scholar, Korais was repelled by the Byzantine influence in Greek society and was a fierce critic of the ignorance of the clergy and their subservience to the Ottoman Empire, although he conceded it was the Orthodox Church that preserved the national identity of Greeks.