Against the dark background of European history, and with the broad level of obscurity stretching over the ages at its feet, there rises one shining pinnacle. Considered as man or sovereign, Charlemagne is one of the most impressive figures in history. His seven feet of stature clad in shining steel, his masterful grasp of the forces of his time, his splendid intelligence, instinct even then with the modern spirit, all combine to elevate him in solitary grandeur.
Charlemagne found France in disorder measureless, and apparently insurmountable. Barbarian invasion without, and anarchy within; Saxon paganism pressing in upon the North, and Asiatic Islamism upon the South and West; a host of forces struggling for dominion in a nation brutish, ignorant, and without cohesion.
It is the attribute of genius to discern opportunity where others see nothing. Charlemagne saw rising out of this chaos a great resuscitated Roman empire, which should be at the same time a spiritual and Christian empire as well. Saxons, Slavs, Huns, Lombards, Arabs, came under his compelling grasp; these antagonistic races all held together by the force of one terrible will, in unnatural combination with France. No political liberties, no popular assemblies discussing public measures; it is Charlemagne alone who fills the picture; it is absolutism,—marked by prudence, ability, and grandeur, but still, absolutism.
The Pope looked approvingly upon this son of the Church by whose order 4,500 pagan heads could be cut off in one day, and a whole army compelled to baptism in an afternoon. Here was a champion to be propitiated! Charlemagne, on the other hand, saw in the Church the most compliant and effective means to empire. In the loving alliance formed, he was to be the protector, the Pope the protected. He wore the Church as a precious jewel in his crown.
It was a splendid dream, splendidly realized; the most imposing of human successes, and the most impressive of human failures. It seems designed as a lesson for the human race in the transitory nature of power applied from without.
The vast fabric passed with himself; was gone like a shadow when he was gone. The unity of the Empire was buried in the grave of its founder. In twenty-nine years (by the treaty of Verdun) three kingdoms emerged from the crumbling mass. France, Italy, Germany, already separated by race repulsions, had taken up each a distinct national existence, the Imperial crown remaining with Germany.
And France—France, the centre of this dream of unity, with her native incohesiveness, and in the irony of fate, had broken into no less than 59 fragments, loosely held together by one Carlovingian King.
CHAPTER V.
I think that it was Lincoln who said that "the Lord must like common people, because he had made so many of them." The path for the common people in France at this time led through heavy shadows. But a darker time was approaching. A system of oppression was maturing, which was soon to envelop them in the obscurity of darkest night.