We shall have to deal with Charles in three main aspects, as conqueror, as organiser, and as the introducer of new theories of political life into the mind of Christendom. It is difficult to keep the three lines of activity clearly separate; for all through his reign, from first to last, Charles was equally busy in each of these capacities. To make clear the logical sequence of his doings it is sometimes necessary to override their chronological order. [Sidenote: Conquests of Charles.] At the first glance the most extraordinary of the achievements of Charles appear to be his huge additions to the territory of the Frankish realm by the annexation of the Lombard kingdom, the Spanish march, Saxony, and the Slavonic lands of the Elbe and the Drave to the inheritance that he had been left by his father. These conquests represent a plan of operations deliberately undertaken, carried out with an unswerving hand, and brought to a successful finish. Charles had inherited from his father and grandfather the duty, which they had undertaken, of protecting Christian Europe from the Saracen, the Slav, and the heathen Saxon, the three enemies whom his ancestors had driven back, but had not crushed. Closely connected with this duty was the obligation to convert to Christianity the new subjects whom he might subdue, to deal with Saxon and Slav as Charles Martel had already dealt with Frisian and Thuringian, and so to push the outer defences of Christendom into those parts of central Europe which had hitherto been sunk in savagery and paganism. The Saracen alone it was impossible to convert. He might be expelled, but then, as now, it was found easier to exterminate the Moslem than to make him abandon Islam. To these altogether useful and salutary tasks, which Charles inherited from the great Mayors of the Palace, another was added, the less happy plan of cementing a close union with the Papacy by crushing the nation of the Lombards. Pippin had committed the Franks to this scheme, and Charles did but carry out his father’s pledges. But by his action he destroyed a healthy and vigorous Christian state, the possible base for a strong Italian nationality, and committed the Frankish kingdom to a profitless union, which was to bring forth seven centuries of discord. What was worst of all, he firmly established the temporal power of the Papacy, a curse to blast Italy for a thousand years. The gains which he received in return,—the religious sanction bestowed on his royal power by the Pope, and the imperial title, were but doubtful boons. It was to be seen, ere the ninth century had expired, that the house of St. Arnulf, like all the dynasties that succeeded it, lost more than it gained by putting itself under obligations to the Roman See, and consenting to accept from the Pope’s hands the style of emperor, and the vague commission to protect the unity of Christendom,—a commission which to the Roman pontiff meant little more than the duty of giving the