The contrast between the sacerdotal pretensions and the personal immorality of the Popes was glaring; nor had the chiefs of the Church yet learned to regard the liberalism of the Renaissance with suspicion.

About the middle of the sixteenth century the Papal States had become a recognized kingdom; while the Popes of this later epoch were endeavoring by means of the inquisition and the educational orders to check the free spirit of Italy.
The history of Italy has at all times been closely bound up with that of the Papacy; but at no period has this been more the case than during these eighty years of Papal worldliness, ambition, depotism, and profligacy, which are also marked by the irruption of the European nations into Italy and by the secession of the Teutonic races from the Latin Church.

In this short space of time a succession of Popes filled the Holy Chair with such dramatic propriety--displaying a pride so regal, a cynicism so unblushing, so selfish a cupidity, and a policy so suicidal as to favor the belief that they had been placed there in the providence of God to warn the world against Babylon.

At the same time the history of the Papal Court reveals with peculiar vividness the contradictions of Renaissance morality and manners.

We find in the Popes of this period what has been already noticed in the despots--learning, the patronage of of the arts, the passion for magnificence, and the refinements of polite culture, alternating and not unfrequently combined with barbarous ferocity of temper and with savage and coarse tastes.