The authority
and influence of the emperors reached their culmination during the reign
of the Hohenstauffens (1138 to 1254). For a few centuries afterwards the
title represented an empire which was but a quarter fact, three-quarters
tradition, the emperor being duly elected by the diet of German princes,
but by no means submissively obeyed. The fraction of fact which remained
of the old empire perished in the Thirty Years' War. After that date the
title continued in existence, being held by the Hapsburgs of Austria as
an hereditary dignity, but the empire had vanished except as a tradition
or superstition. Finally, on the 6th of August, 1806, Francis II., at
the absolute dictum of Napoleon, laid down the title of "Emperor of the
Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation," and the long defunct empire was
finally buried.
The shadow which remained of the empire of Charlemagne had vanished
before the rise of a greater and more vital thing, the empire of France,
brought into existence by the genius of Napoleon Bonaparte, the
successor of Charles the Great as a mighty conqueror.
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