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In both, that they might not seem to have been convoked without motive, there were submitted to the examination and deliberation of the grandees.

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and by virtue of orders from the king, the fragments of law called _capitula,_ which the king himself had drawn up under the inspiration of God or the necessity for which had been made manifest to him in the intervals between the meetings." Two striking facts are to be gathered from these words: the first, that the majority of the members composing these assemblies probably regarded as a burden the necessity for being present at them, since Charlemagne took care to explain their convocation by declaring to them the motive for it and by always giving them something to do; the second, that the proposal of the capitularies, or, in modern phrase, the initiative, proceeded from the emperor.

The initiative is naturally exercised by him who wishes to regulate or reform, and in his time it was especially Charlemagne who conceived this design.