This prelate, in his account of the Council of Nismes, remarks: “We have often heard the courtiers of King Charles say that this prince, who excelled all the other kings of France in knowledge of the Scriptures and of the civil and ecclesiastical law, always had at his bed’s head tablets and pens, to note down, whether by day or night, any thoughts that occurred to him that might be useful to Church or State.” He also presented to the Church of Strasburg a Psalter, in which his name was written with his own hand;[81] and it is to be presumed that he himself transcribed his numerous letters to Alcuin. Among the works of that scholar we find thirty letters addressed to the king, containing answers to his questions on theological and scientific subjects. These letters show that Alcuin had no easy task in satistying the intellectual requirements of a man who thought of everything, and busied himself equally with history, chronology, morals, astronomy, grammar, theology, and law. He took a very special delight in the study of astronomy, and on serene nights was fond of observing the stars from the roof of his palace. In the year 798 considerable anxiety was felt both by the king and his academicians, in consequence of the erratic movements of the planet Mars, whose disappearance for a whole year it passed their powers to account for. Alcuin was written to, and entreated to explain the phenomenon, and his reply shows that he had tested the statements found in his books by careful astronomical observations. “What has now happened to Mars,” he says, “is frequently observed of all the other planets, viz., that they remain longer under the horizon than is stated in the books of the ancients. The rising and setting of the stars vary from the observations of those who live in the southern and eastern parts of the world, where the masters chiefly flourished who have set forth the laws of the universe.” From these words it may be gathered that Alcuin was acquainted with the globular form of the earth, and comprehended the phenomena depending on it. Charlemagne had some claims to the reputation of a poet, and nine pieces of Latin poetry from his pen are printed in his works, which are given in the collection of the Abbé Migne.[82] One of these was an epitaph on his friend Pope Adrian I., which he desired to have placed over the tomb of that pontiff, and caused it therefore to be engraved in letters of gold on a marble tablet, and sent to Rome. These verses, thirty-eight in number, have attained a singular kind of immortality. The tablet has been preserved in the portico of St. Peter’s Basilica, where it may still be seen by the pious visitor, together with another inscription containing the ancient grant from Pope Gregory II. of a wood of olives to supply the oil for the lamps burning round the Apostle’s tomb. All ancient writers are unanimous in declaring these verses to have been the genuine composition of the emperor, and not of Alcuin, as some pretend. They bear the title, Epitaphium Adriani I., Papæ, quo Carolus Magnus sepulchrum ipsius decoravit.
But one of the most interesting features in Charlemagne’s intellectual labours was the attempt he made to perfect his native language, and give it a grammatical form. He began the composition of a German grammar, which was afterwards continued by Raban Maur; the other Palatine scholars joined him in the task, and assigned to the months and days of the week the names which they still bear in German. In pursuance of the same design, the emperor made a collection of old Tudesque songs, some of which he took down from the lips of his soldiers; but after his death Louis the Debonnaire found the manuscript, and perceiving the names of Scandinavian deities, with little appreciation of the importance of the work on which his great father had been engaged, tossed it into the fire. There was nothing which Charlemagne had more at heart than the completion of this undertaking, and he was accustomed to say that he hoped to see the day when the laws should be written in the Frankish tongue, comparing the shutting them up in a language of which the common people were ignorant to the conduct of Caligula, who caused his edicts to be written in illegible characters, and placed out of sight, that the people might unconsciously break them and so incur sentence of death. Alcuin no doubt assisted in this work, which was one that ever found favour with the English monks. Even before leaving his native country he is said to have made an Anglo-Saxon version of the Pentateuch, which was preserved and used so late as the twelfth century; and he would naturally be disposed to enter into the king’s designs, and specially to provide for the religious instruction of the people in their own language. Something in this direction had already been done in Germany by the followers of St. Boniface; and early in the eighth century we find formulas of confession, brief confessions of faith, and portions of psalms and hymns translated for popular use into the rude Tudesque dialect. Some of the early German hymns appear to have been written by the monks of St. Gall, and were used as valuable means of instructing the people in the elements of religion. Specimens of these are given by Noth in his history of the German language, and among them is a fragment of the 138th Psalm. It will of course be borne in mind that the language spoken by the people of Germany was essentially the same as that of the English missionaries, who thus possessed peculiar facilities in preaching and instructing their converts. Thus the form of abjuration and the confession of faith drawn up by St. Boniface and his followers, for the use of their German catechumens, is equally akin to the Anglo-Saxon and to the Tudesque idioms:—“Forsachister Diabolæ? Ec forsachs Diabolæ. Gelobistu in Got Almehtigan, Fadaer? Ec Gelobo in Got, Almehtigan Fadaer. Gelobistu in Crist, Godes suno? Gelobistu in Halsgan Gast?” And when we speak of Charlemagne as cultivating the Tudesque or old German dialect, it will also be remembered that the Franks were a German race, and that what we now call French is not formed from their language, but from the Romanesque, or corrupt Latin, which prevailed in the southern provinces of Gaul, as well as in Spain and the north of Italy. As in course of time the Gallo-Roman element prevailed in France, the Romance language became universally used, while the Tudesque remained, as before, the language of the Germans. Hence Verstigan was not dealing in paradox when he asserted that in old times the English people all talked French, the Frankish and Saxon dialects being substantially the same language.
The graver studies of the Palatine scholars were enlivened, after the fashion of the Anglo Saxon schools, by dialogues, in which enigmas and a play of words are introduced in tiresome profusion. A curious fragment exists bearing the title of a disputation between Alcuin and Pepin, wherein the wits of the pupil are stimulated by the questions of the master. These exercises, ad acuendos pueros, as they were called, were much used by the English teachers, and specimens of a similar description are to be found which appear to have been used so late as the fourteenth century. “What is writing?” asks Alcuin. “The keeper of history.” “What is speaking?” “The interpreter of the soul.” “What is the liberty of man?” “Innocence.” “What is the day?” “The call to labour.” “What is the sun?” “The splendour of the universe.” “What is winter?” “The exile of spring.” “What is spring?” “The painter of the earth.” Alcuin says, “I saw the other day a man standing, a dead man walking, a man walking who had never breathed.” Pepin. “How can that have been? explain yourself.” Alcuin. “It was my image reflected in the water.” Pepin. “How could I fail to understand you? I have often seen the same thing.”
In his letters to the young princes Alcuin freely points out their faults, and gives them excellent advice. “Seek,” he writes, “to adorn your noble rank with noble deeds; let humility be in your heart, and truth on your lips; and let your life be a pattern of integrity, that so God may be pleased to prosper your days.” The court school, however, was not intended exclusively for princes and nobles; children of an inferior rank were also admitted, in order to receive such an education as might hereafter fit them to fill various offices in church and state. Charlemagne took this charge on himself, and afterwards promoted his scholars according to their merits and ability. We learn this from the following charming narrative related by the Monk of St. Gall.
“The glorious King Charles,” he says, “returning into Gaul after a prolonged absence, ordered that all the children whom he caused to be educated should be brought before him, that they might present him their compositions in prose and verse. Those of an inferior and obscure rank had succeeded best, whereas the sons of the nobles brought nothing of any value. Then the wise prince, separating the good scholars from the negligent ones, and putting the first on his right hand, said to them, ‘My children, you may rely on my friendship and protection, since you have done your best to execute my orders, and have worked hard according to the best of your abilities. Try to do yet better, and depend upon it you will receive the most honourable offices I have to give, and that you will always be precious in my eyes.’ Then turning to those on his left hand; ‘As to you,’ he said, ‘born of noble blood, and children of the first houses in my kingdom, vainly confident in your birth and riches you have neglected to obey my orders, and have preferred play and idleness to study, which is the proper glory of your age. But I swear to you, your noble birth shall find no consideration from me; and if you do not make up for your indolence by earnest study, you will obtain no favour from Charles.’”
Some writers, and among them M. Ampère, have considered that after all that has been said and written about the Palatine school, there was in reality no school, but only a literary academy. The probability is that there was both a school and an academy, and that the two institutions, though not identical, were directed by the same masters. According to this view, the Palatine Academy was formed of the friends and courtiers of Charlemagne, while the School was for the education of youths, chiefly, if not exclusively, intended for the ecclesiastical state, and chosen from all ranks, noble and simple. The Monk of St. Gall is decisive on this last point, and mentions two scholars, the sons of millers, who, after leaving the emperor’s school, in which they do not seem greatly to have distinguished themselves, obtained admission into the monastery of Bobbio. The proofs of the actual existence of this school are in fact too overwhelming to admit of a doubt. M. Ampère appears to have been staggered at the notion of a crowd of schoolboys accompanying the emperor wherever he sojourned. However strange and inconvenient such a system appears to our notions, the historical evidence is very strong in proof that it really existed. In the life of St. Adalard, there are allusions to the turba clericorum palatii. Alcuin in his letters complains not a little of the fatigue occasioned by this constant journeying. And we know that Otho the Great, whose revival of a Palatine school was undertaken in avowed imitation of Charlemagne, always required his scholars to accompany him; and that his brother Bruno, who superintended their studies, followed the court, and carried his books with him.
It was then, as we must believe, a real school over which Alcuin presided, and most French writers claim it as the germ of the university of Paris. The court of the Frankish monarch was indeed fixed, not at Paris, but at Aix-la-Chapelle, but it seems to have been removed to Paris in the reign of Charles the Bald, and there the Palatine school continued to flourish under a succession of famous masters, and possibly formed the nucleus of that great institution which fills so large a place in the history of education.
Meanwhile, his scholastic labours did not so occupy the time of Alcuin, as to hinder him from devoting himself to the correction of manuscripts, and the multiplication of books went on apace. A staff of skilful copyists was gradually formed, and so soon as any work had been revised by Alcuin and his fellow labourers, it was delivered over to the hands of the monastic scribes. Particular abbeys, as that of Fontanelles, acquired renown for the extraordinary accuracy of their transcribers, and the beauty of their writing. At Rheims and Corby, also, the monks greatly excelled, and laying aside the corrupt character which had till then been in use, they adopted the smaller Roman letters. Rules were made forbidding any man to be employed as a copyist who had not the knowledge of grammar requisite for enabling him to avoid errors; and treatises on orthography and punctuation were drawn up by Alcuin for the special use of his scribes. Libraries were gradually collected in all the principal monasteries, including the chief works of the Fathers and the Latin classics. In the library of St. Riquier, of which abbey Angilbert became superior, we find a few years later copies of Homer, Virgil, and Cicero; in that of Rheims, Cæsar, Livy, and Lucan; Dijon possessed a Horace, and at Montierendes there were the works of Cicero and Terence. The text of the last-named author was revised and corrected by Alcuin himself, a fact which confirms what has been before said of his toleration of the poets. From this time the transcription of books came to be regarded as one of the ordinary branches of monastic manual work, in a great degree taking the place of that agricultural labour on which, in earlier ages, the monks were so generally employed. The real hard work of head, eyes, and hand, which it involved, was pithily expressed in the well-known couplet:—
Tres digiti scribunt, totum corpusque laborat,
Scribere qui nesciunt, nullum putant esse laborem.