He was proscribed on 10 August 1792, and consequently left France to travel around Europe, going to England, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Constantinople (present-day Istanbul in Turkey), and Greece.
Returning to Paris in 1797, he wrote for La Quotidienne, and after the Coup of 18 Fructidor in September, he spent two months in the Prison du Temple.
On his return from this expedition, he was put in charge of censorship in the imperial theatres, a posting he gained for being a protege of the minister of police, Anne Jean Marie René Savary.
[1] Esménard then came back to France, where he was censored of theatres and libraries and the Journal de l'Empire by the imperial government.
[1] He was exiled to Italy for a few months after publishing a satirical article against one of Napoleon's envoys to Russia in the Journal de l'Empire.