The Benedictine rule did not win its way over Europe without some checks; nor was it always able to retain its hold in an age of general disorder. Much depended upon the abbat in each particular house. In Gaul, the rule of S. Columban had made him absolute. But such a submission was never accepted in central and southern Gaul. From the end of the sixth century it is clear that monasticism was beginning to slacken its devotion. The history of the monastery of S. Radegund as given by Gregory of Tours shows this; so does the letter of Gregory the Great to Brunichild. Nor did the milder rule of S. Benedict long remain unaltered in practice. A new revival is connected with the names of Odo and Cluny. {172} [Sidenote: The decay of monasticism in the ninth century.] Saint Odo emerges from an age in which the most striking feature was the reassertion of the imperial power and the imperial idea. The ninth century, as it began, witnessed a remarkable revival, the revival of a decayed and dormant institution--the Roman Empire--in whose ashes there had yet survived the fire which had inspired the rulers of the world in the past. The great idea of imperialism was reborn in the person of a man of extraordinary physical and mental power, a sovereign who, while he had not a little of the weaknesses of his age, had also in a remarkable degree centred in himself its highest philosophic aspirations. The early ninth century is dominated by the figure of Charles the Great. The result was inevitable. Lay power, lay over-lordship or supremacy, extends everywhere, intrudes into the recesses of monastic life, and dictates even in things purely spiritual. And as the new tide of barbarian invasion, Saracen or Norman, sweeps on in Spain or Gaul, the Church, for very physical needs, seeks refuge under the protection of lay barons, princes, and kings. Feudalism is rising. The monastic houses fall often under the arrogant rule of lay abbats. And the popes, not rarely a prey themselves to the vices of the age, sink into impotence and become enmeshed in worldly, often shameful, intrigue and disorder. The canons of Church councils show that it was below as it was above. Secularity was general, vice was far from rare.