were ipso facto operative (ex opère operato), drove many of the prelates to advocate their recognition. Finally, however, they were, by 133 votes to 59, declared invalid. The work of reform was also continued. The Legates brought forward a series of decrees for the reform of the morals and discipline of the clergy. They involved the abandonment by the Curia of many valuable privileges, but at the same time they entrenched upon the rights of the State. To ecclesiastical tribunals powers were assigned which no government could afford to tolerate; the rights of patrons were interfered with; and immunities of the clergy, which had long been abandoned in practice, were again claimed. The Catholic Powers for once united in their protests, and the more extravagant claims were withdrawn in consequence. The conduct of the Cardinal of Lorraine in this matter shows how completely he had thrown in his lot with the Holy See. He had visited Rome in September, and his head was completely turned by the flattery which he received. He went so far as to advise the French government to submit to some of the extravagant claims put forth on behalf of the clergy; but his advice was not followed. The Council now resolved itself into chaos. The control of the Legates became little more than nominal. Pius himself had consented to a reform of the Cardinals being included in the general reform of the clergy; but the Italian Episcopate were not willing to see what they regarded as the privileges of their nation swept away. They succeeded in reducing the proposed reforms of the Sacred College to a mere shadow. The French ambassadors withdrew to Venice, hopeless of any good coming out of such an assembly. The firmness of the Spanish Bishops, however, prevented the scheme of reform being completely nullified by reservations and exceptions; and on November 11, 1563, the Twenty-fourth public Session was held, and the decree on matrimony and twenty-one out of the forty-two decrees on reform proposed by the Legates were promulgated, the remaining decrees being deferred to a later Session.
Everything was now subordinated to bringing the Council to an end. The Papacy ordered the Legates to withdraw the proposals which infringed the rights of the State; and canons dealing with the remaining matters under discussion were drawn up with feverish haste. Purgatory, the Invocation of Saints, and Indulgences were hastily defined; and twenty more decrees of reformation were prepared. The Spanish ambassador and the Spanish Bishops maintained their protests to the end, but with no avail. A rumour that the Pope was dying hastened matters still faster. The Twenty-fifth Session was opened on December 3, 1563; and on December 4 the Council was brought to an end amid the acclamations of the assembled Fathers. £55 members of the Council signed its decrees, the four Legates, Cardinal Madruzzo and the Cardinal of Lorraine, 3 Patriarchs, 25 Archbishops, 168 Bishops, 7 Abbots, 7 Generals of Orders, and 39 who were absent represented by their proctors.
