They degrade him from the level of St.
Just to that of Barrere.
A sentence in one of young Robespierre's letters shows that he never felt completely sure about the young officer.

After enumerating to his brother Buonaparte's merits, he adds: "He is a Corsican, and offers only the guarantee of a man of that nation who has resisted the caresses of Paoli and whose property has been ravaged by that traitor." Evidently, then, Robespierre regarded Buonaparte with some suspicion as an insular Proteus, lacking those sureties, mental and pecuniary, which reduced a man to dog-like fidelity.
Yet, however warily Buonaparte picked his steps along the slopes of the revolutionary volcano, he was destined to feel the scorch of the central fires.

He had recently been intrusted with a mission to the Genoese Republic, which was in a most difficult position.

It was subject to pressure from three sides; from English men-of-war that had swooped down on a French frigate, the "Modeste," in Genoese waters; and from actual invasion by the French on the west and by the Austrians on the north.

Despite the great difficulties of his task, the young envoy bent the distracted Doge and Senate to his will.