Reference no: EM133732274

Assignment:

PS: the answer's formatting could you do like the formatting should be like an essay APA style and please quote the citation for each paragraph that is used.

In 1799, the French Revolution seemed a spent force, lacking clear direction and increasingly threatened by counter-revolution. Napoleon's seizure of power late that year seemed, in the eyes of his countrymen, to breath new life and hope into the revolutionary cause. Certainly Napoleon presented himself to the French as the Revolution's great defender, a man who was extending France's "empire of liberty" across Europe. The evidence suggests that he remained popular to many, perhaps most, Frenchmen until the bitter end.

But when we look at history, we are not hostage to whatever passed as "popular" in previous eras. We cannot in any case assume that Napoleon's broad popularity in and of itself validates his claim as the Revolution's greatest hero. Certainly critics at the time challenged this notion, pointing out ways in which Napoleon betrayed some of the cherished ideals of 1789.

For this exercise, I ask that you take a side in on this debate. Was Napoleon mainly the defender of France's Revolution (however much he may have coarsened and corrupted its meanings)? Or was he chiefly a betrayer of that Revolution?

Answering this question, of course, requires that you determine just what the aims of the Revolution were. The ins and outs of the Revolutionary decade, its more radical and moderate phases, certainly complicate this task. I ask, just the same, that you decide for yourself: what did the Revolution most of all mean, and by this measure, was Napoleon mainly hero or villain?