The history of the popes, from the close of the middle ages : drawn ...

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HISTORY OF THE POPES.
Following Borromeo's example, Pius V. had taken in hand,
before everything else, the reform of his immediate entourage ;
the moral revival which was to spread from the court was to
extend, in the first place to the Cardinals, and by their example
spread to the rest of the clergy, and so to the whole of
Christendom.^ He was therefore very particular in the choice
of the pontifical household. It is true that at the beginning of
his pontificate he had, as the result of pressure put upon him
by important persons, to admit some whom he would not
himself have chosen, ^ but it very soon transpired that he had
limited his court to 500 persons, and that he did not intend to
spend more than 50,000 ducats a year upon his household.^
Anyone who wished to remain in his service had to make up
his mind to lead a strict life ; almost every day a Dominican
held a religious conference in the Apostolic Palace, at which
the Pope himself and the Cardinals assisted. When an in-
dulgence on account of the Turkish danger was published,
Pius V. insisted that the court officials must gain it, and dis-
tributed Holy Communion to them with his own hands.*
Even in the first year of his reign men wrote several times from
Rome that the Apostolic Palace was like a monastery, and
that there were no longer any traces of the old court life.^
^ Polanco, January 25, 1566, Anal. Bolland., VII. (1888), 47.
^Ilnd.
^ *" Ritenne solo cinquecento boche perche non vuole si spenda
ranno nella casa sua piu di 50,000 ducati." Cusano, January 26,
1566, State Archives. Vienna. Cf. Polanco, April 30, 1566, Anal.
Bolland., VII., 55.
^ Ihid. 51.
^ *" Nel palazzo del Papa non si vedono le gente se non in quel
modo che si va alii monasteri de frati osservanti, niuna sorta di
corte si vede." Camillo Borromeo to Cesare Borromeo, on
February 23, 1566, Trivulzi Library, Milan. Cod. 551.
*" Le
cose de la corte passano in silentio al presente, et V. S. iacia conto
che il palazzo dal' audientia in poi che da il ill. cardinale Alessan-
drino la mattina, sia un convento quietissimo et solitario de frati."
Luzzara to the Duke of Mantua, on August 10, 1566, Gonzaga
Archives, Mantua.