a certain amount of power, which is even greatly increased when it is applied to a corporate body. But it breaks down under the strain of the temptations to which those are exposed to whom so great a business as the election of a Pope is entrusted. Given the necessity of having a Pope, it would probably be impossible to devise a better means of getting one than that which the Church has gradually perfected. But she attempts the impossible; and her efforts to secure her aim, though they have been to a great degree successful, have resulted in an amount of false pretence, solemn sham, hypocrisy, and substitution of pompous appearance for reality, the long story of which makes the account of these Conclaves somewhat humiliating reading for the believer in human perfectibility. INDEX. A. Barberini Family, downfall of the, 324. Benedict XIV., character of, 338. Berettina, the, 36, 42. Bitter dissensions in the Sacred College Bull of Sixtus V., finally regulating the Bulls of Gregory XV. forming the Pius VI., promulgated in 1782 and 1798, 407. Burial of Alexander VI., extraordinary, that elected 333, 334. of Innocent VI., 98. of John XXII., 95. of Julius III., 213, 221. of Leo XI., 262-292. - of Pius III., 178. of Pius IV., 245–257. passes at, 414, 415. regulations, futility of, 427. 389. Confusion in Christendom after the Congregation of Rites, the, 37. Conspiracy to assassinate Pius IV., 243. Gregory XI., 105. Innocent VIII., 170. Paul III., 204. Paul V., 297. Pius II., 154. Pius III., 174. Pius IV., 241. Pius V., 259. Sixtus IV., 164. Olympia Maidalchini, Inno- cent X.'s sister-in-law, from the De Brosses's Letters from Italy (1739), Decadence of the despotic power of the Decree of Nicholas II. on Papal elec- St. Hilarius (461), 8. St. Symmachus (499), 8. Democratic professions of the Catholic Deposition of Cardinal de Coligny, by Difference between Cardinals and Car- dinal deacons, 21. Different classes of Popes, 78. |