Bible were used through the next centuries--in the North, Alcuin's revision, in the South, the revision made by Theodulf. [Illustration: PLATE IX--ALCUIN'S BIBLE (Brit. Mus. add. 10546) Written at Tours, soon after Alcuin's death: a very good example of fine Carolingian minuscule. The lines are of equal length. From F. G. Kenyon, "Fac-similes of Biblical Manuscripts." By permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.] Charlemagne would not have cared so much for the text of the Bible had he not esteemed the Bible to be the one great text-book for his people. He himself was filled with Biblical notions. In his private circle, a club for promoting classical reading, he was called David. And it was, indeed, the Old Testament idea of the theocratic king which governed his mind. The king chosen by God and elected by the people, the king a representative of God and the head of the people, the king a valiant warrior and a royal psalmist at the same time, this was his ideal, in which old German notions were combined with Old Testament views. While revering the priest, he always felt himself superior even to the bishop of Rome. He willingly accepted the rôle of a defender, of a protector; he never would have accepted his crown from the hand of a priest. Nothing is so alien to Charlemagne as the later mediæval theory of the two swords, both given by God to Saint Peter, the one spiritual, kept by himself and his successors, the other worldly, given by them to the emperor. No, he had his sword from God directly, and his royalty included the power and the duty of looking after the church's affairs as well. The Bible tells of a king of Judah, called Josiah, who, on being informed that the book of the Law given by Moses and hidden for a long time had been rediscovered, forthwith ordered everything to be reformed and restored according to this law. That served as the model for Charlemagne's own ecclesiastical work. Being the king, he felt responsible for the purity of worship and of doctrine. Therefore, when the question arose in the East if worship was due to the pictures of Christ and the saints, and the bishop of Rome did not please him in his answer, Charlemagne himself, assisted by Alcuin and other theologians of his staff, wrote a treatise on the subject, which he himself thought to be decisive, the so-called _Libri Carolini_, a document of a rather Puritan character, showing the austere spirit of early Western theology. When in Spain a discussion began about the divine nature of Christ, he again interfered, sending his theologians to discuss the matter according to the true teaching of the Bible--as is said expressly in their instructions--and after they had decided he even took political measures against those whom he believed to be heretics. We can scarcely understand his attitude in those cases without keeping in mind that he felt himself a new David and a new Josiah. [Illustration: PLATE X--THEODULF'S BIBLE