Charlemagne aspired to and attained to every sort of greatness, military greatness, political greatness, and intellectual greatness; he was an able warrior, an energetic legislator, a hero of poetry.

And he united, he displayed all these merits in a time of general and monotonous barbarism, when, save in the Church, the minds of men were dull and barren.

Those men, few in number, who made themselves a name at that epoch, rallied round Charlemagne and were developed under his patronage.

To know him well and appreciate him justly, he must be examined under those various grand aspects, abroad and at home, in his wars and in his government.
In Guizot's _History of Civilization in France_ is to be found a complete table of the wars of Charlemagne, of his many different expeditions in Germany, Italy, Spain, all the countries, in fact, that became his dominion.

A summary will here suffice.