may be regarded as the beginner of a new era, while he was at the same time the last continuator of the old.

The Cardinals whom he promoted on his accession included the chief of those men who strove in vain for a concordat between Rome and Reformation; it also included the man who stamped Rome with the impress of the Counter-Reformation.

Yet Caraffa would not have had the fulcrum needed for this decisive exertion of power, had it not been for another act of Paul's reign.

This was the convening of a Council at Trent.

Paul's attitude toward the Council, which he summoned with reluctance, which he frustrated as far as in him lay, and the final outcome of which he was far from anticipating, illustrates in a most decisive manner his destiny as Pope of the transition.
The very name of a Council was an abomination to the Papacy.