being a man of low birth, would not give any cause of jealousy on that ground to his princely fellow-cardinals. It seemed as if the election was as good as made; and so it probably would have been, had not Cardinal Farnese, who, as the conclavist remarks, had been accustomed in so many Conclaves to dictate the law instead of being dictated to, suddenly taken offence at a decision having been come to, as he fancied, without due reference to his views on the matter. He immediately went into the Paoline Chapel, where the French party were assembled, very much out of heart and despairing of preventing the election of Pozzi by their adversaries, and offered to lend them his aid to elect Cardinal Fano. There were reasons, however, why the French leaders could not accept that proposition. Whereupon Farnese at once proposed to them the Cardinal of Chieti (Caraffa), who was accepted by them, and was, by a coalition of the Paolines, or creatures of Paul III., under Farnese and the cardinals in the French interest, elected Pope.

The Cardinal of Chieti (Caraffa), who became Pope under the name of Paul IV., is on the list of those who are recorded to have been elected by adoration or acclamation. And, in truth, it would seem as if their Eminences had been "inspired," or hurried into doing what they would hardly have done in a calmer manner and after more reflection. For the conclavist concludes his narrative by the remark, that "it is beyond belief what a melancholy fell, not only on all Rome, but on those who had themselves done the deed, as soon as ever it had become irrevocable!" Their "melancholy" was not perhaps wholly unreasonable, or, at least, was not unin

telligible. For this Giampietro Caraffa, who was now Paul IV., came to his high office with at least a sufficiently high conception of its importance, and a stern determination to do his duty, as he understood it, in the state of life to which God had called him! And he had, perhaps, more excuse for believing that he had been so called in a special and extraordinary manner, for he had gone into Conclave banned by the especial veto of the Emperor Charles V. Of all the cardinals composing the Sacred College, this was the one man whom the Emperor would be least willing to see Pope! The veto had not yet come to be exercised with the regular forms and in the matter-of-course manner which prevailed a few years later. It was abusively growing into an admitted custom. And the failure of the Emperor's especially urged veto on this memorable occasion is a notable proof that the growth of the thing was abusive. Very highly characteristic of the man Caraffa, too, was his reply, when it was signified to him, before the commencement of the Conclave, by the Emperor's ambassador, Mendoza, that his master could not consent to his elevation to the Papacy. "If God wills that I should be the Pope," said Caraffa, "the Emperor cannot prevent me from becoming such. And should I become such, I shall be the better pleased to have done so despite the imperial veto, because it will be the more clear that my elevation will have been the work of God alone!"

It can hardly be doubted, looking at the matter from any standpoint of merely human policy and wisdom, that the sagacious old Emperor was right in his estimate

of the character of the man, and of the results that would be likely to follow from his elevation to the Papacy. If it is not unreasonable to conjecture that a prolongation of the reign of Marcellus II. might not impossibly have healed the great schism which divided the Church, it is at the least equally permissible to hold the conviction that Caraffa's mode of wielding the power of the keys and governing the Church finally destroyed any hope of such a consummation. Ranke* says of him: "If there was a party which proposed to itself the restoration of Catholicism in all its severity, he who now mounted the Papal throne was, not a member of, but the founder of that party. Paul IV. was already seventy-nine years old; but his deep-set eyes still burned in their sockets with the fire of youth. He observed no rule in his daily life, often sleeping by day and studying all night. And woe to the servant who entered his room when he had not called him! He was very tall, very thin, and his carriage and movements were full of vivacity. He seemed to be all nerves! In everything he obeyed the impulse of the moment. But these impulses were dominated and produced by sentiments which had been developed in his mind during a long life, and which had become a part of his nature. He seemed to know no other duty, no other occupation, than the re-establishment of the ancient faith with all the absolute supremacy which it had ever enjoyed." And the means which appeared to him most fitted for the attainment of this end were always of the most violent kind, and

Ranke's description is taken mainly from the relation of the Venetian ambassador, Bernardo Navagero.

the freest use of both the spiritual and the material sword. He reigned somewhat more than four years, and died specially recommending to the assembled cardinals whom he had called about him the Inquisition, which he had re-established and armed with new and more terrible powers!

It is a noteworthy indication of the efficacy of the spirit of the time in fashioning the characters and qualifications of the Popes, thus causing that tendency observable in their history to group themselves into series, that the man who succeeded to Paul IV. also deserves to be ranked among "the zealous Popes," although it is impossible to conceive two men more completely contrasted in temperament, character, opinions, and habits. This successor to the ferocious bigot Caraffa was Giovanni Angelo Medici, no recognised relative of the great Florentine family of that name, though doubtless the unknown adventurer, Bernardino Medici, who settled in Milan, and there acquired a small fortune as a farmer of the taxes, was a member of it. This Bernardino had two sons, Giovanni Angelo, who became Pope, and Giangiacomo, who, beginning life as a "gentleman's gentleman," found means subsequently to thrust himself into positions yet more incongruous than that of own brother to a Pope! His first essay towards "bettering himself" was to become a bravo. He hired himself to certain persons of high position in Milan as an assassin to murder a certain Visconti, which he duly accomplished. Thereupon his employers, desirous of making away with him too, sent him with a letter to the governor of the castle of Mus, on the Lake of Como, the tenor of which

was an order to that functionary to put the bearer to death. But Giangiacomo, conceiving certain suspicions as to the nature of his errand, opened the letter, and having thus obtained an accurate comprehension of the nature of the position, formed his plans for making himself master of it with all promptitude. He collected a band of desperadoes like himself, presented himself at the castle, and having by means of his letter obtained admittance, overpowered the governor and his garrison, seized and held the castle for himself; and

menced life as an independent chieftain, supporting himself and his men by raids on the Milanese, the Venetians, and the Swiss in the true spirit of an old border moss-trooper! Getting tired of this after a while, he assumed the "white cross," and entered into the service of the Emperor, who made him Marquis of Marignano, and sent him to conduct the siege against Siena. In the imperial service he distinguished himself as the right man in the right place. As prudent as audacious, and as implacable as either, he was fortunate in all his undertakings, and did thoroughly the work he was sent to do. There was not a tree in the vicinity of Siena on which he had not caused some wretch, who had attempted to convey provisions into the leaguered city, to be hung; and it was calculated that five thousand persons had been put to death by his orders! Such was the worthy whose rising fortunes formed a stepping-stone for his clerical brother to the Papacy. For when the Marquis of Marignano married an Orsini, who was the sister-in-law of the infamous Pier Luigi Farnese, the connection obtained for his brother a cardinal's hat!