The French Revolution appears to have been a search for liberty, equality and fraternity. In reality it had been an interlude caused by the failures of Louis XVI and his ministers, the outbreak of war, and the radicalism of the assemblies. Far from diminishing appetite for monarchy and court life, the revolution had increased it.
Bonaparte fulfilled the prophecy of the great counter-revolutionary writer Rivarol: “Either the king will have an army or the army will have a king.” Seven years after the fall of the French monarchy in 1792, following his coup d'etat of November 1799 [which overthrew the Directory – the government of France – replacing it with the French Consulate and bringing Napoleon to power as First Consul of France], Bonaparte relaunched monarchy in the heart of the French Republic.
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