fe_.[26] But now that his plans
for the expulsion of the Spaniards had failed, and his nephews had been
hurled from their high station into the dust, there remained no other
interest to distract his mind. Every day witnessed the promulgation of
some new edict touching monastic discipline, simony, sale of offices,
collation to benefices, church ritual, performance of clerical duties,
and appointment to ecclesiastical dignities. It was his favorite boast
that there would be no need of a Council to restore the Church to
purity, since he was doing it.[27]

[Footnote 26: Pallavicini, in his history of the Council of Trent (Lib.
xiv. ix. 5), specially commends Paul's zeal for the Holy Office:--'Fra
esse d'eterna lode lo fa degno il tribunal dell'inquisizione, che dal
zelo di lui e prima in autorita di consigliero e poscia in podesta di
principe riconosce il presente suo vigor nell'Italia, e dal quale
riconosce l'Italia la sua conservata integrita della fede: e per quest'
opera salutare egli rimane ora tanto piu benemerito ed onorabile quantao
piu allora ne fu mal rimerilato e disonorato.']

[Footnote 27: See Luigi Mocenigo in _Rel. degli Amb. Veneti_, vol. x. p.
25.] And indeed his measures formed the nucleus of the Tridentine
decrees upon this topic in the final sessions of the Council. Under this
government Rome assumed an air of exemplary behavior which struck
foreigners with mute astonishment. Cardinals were compelled to preach in
their basilicas. The Pope himself, who was vain of his eloquence,
preached. Gravity of manners, external signs of piety, a composed and
contrite face, ostentation of orthodoxy by frequent confession and
attendance at the Mass, became fashionable; and the Court adopted for
its motto the _Si non caste tamen caute_ of the Counter-Reformation.[28]
Aretino, with his usual blackguardly pointedness of expression, has
given a hint of what the new _regime_ implied in the following satiric
lines:--

Carafla, ipocrita infingardo,
Che tien per coscienza spirituale
Quando si mette del pepe in sul cardo.

Paul IV. brought the first period of the transition to an end. There
were no attempts at dislodging the Spaniard, no Papal wars, no tyranny
of Papal nephews converted into feudal princes, after his days. He
stamped Roman society with his own austere and bigoted religion. That he
was in any sense a hypocrite is wholly out of the question. But he made
Rome hypocritical, and by establishing