moreover they could hold three or four bishoprics apiece together with other places of emolument, whereas they now can only have one apiece.  The second cause is that the number of the Cardinals has been increased to seventy-five, and that the foreign powers have ceased to compliment them with large presents and Benefices, as was the wont of Charles V. and the French crown.’  In the last of these clauses we find clearly indicated one of the main results of the concordat established between the Papacy and the Catholic sovereigns by the policy of Pius IV.  It secured Papal absolutism at the expense of the college.  Soranzo proceeds to describe the changes visible in Roman society.  ’The train of life at Court is therefore mean, partly through poverty, but also owing to the good example of Cardinal Borromeo, seeing that people are wont to follow the manners of their princes.  The Cardinal holds in his hands all the threads of the administration; and living religiously in the retirement I have noticed, indulging in liberalities to none but persons of his own stamp, there is neither Cardinal nor courtier who can expect any favor from him unless he conform in fact or in appearance to his mode of life.  Consequently one observes that they have altogether withdrawn, in public at any rate, from every sort of pleasures.  One sees no longer Cardinals in masquerade or on horseback, nor driving with women about Rome for pastime, as the custom was of late; but the utmost they do is to go alone in close coaches.  Banquets, diversions, hunting parties, splendid liveries and all the other signs of outward luxury have been abolished; the more so that now there is at Court no layman of high quality, as formerly when the Pope had many of his relatives or dependents around him.  The clergy always wear their robes, so that the reform of the Church is manifested in their appearance.  This state of things, on the other hand, has been the ruin of the artisans and merchants, since no money circulates.  And while all offices and magistracies are in the hands of Milanese, grasping and illiberal persons, very few indeed can be still called satisfied with the present reign.’[60]

[Footnote 59:  Giac.  Soranzo, op. cit. pp. 131-136]

[Footnote 60:  Soranzo, op. cit. pp. 136-138.]

One chief defect of Pius IV., judged by the standard of the new party in the Church, had been his coldness in religious exercises.  Paolo Tiepolo remarks that during the last seven months of his life he never once attended service in his chapel.[61]

[Footnote 61:  Op. cit. p. 171.]