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gotten, have vindicated to themselves a permanent place in history. He was a Neapolitan by birth, of the noble family of the Caraffas. He was bred to the religious profession, and early attracted notice by his diligent application and the fruits he gathered from it. His memory was prodigious. He was not only deeply read in theological science, but skilled in various languages, ancient and modern, several of which he spoke with fluency. His rank, sustained by his scholarship, raised him speedily to high preferment in the Church. In 1513, when thirty-six years of age, he went as nuncio to England. In 1525, he resigned his benefices, and, with a small number of his noble friends, he instituted a new religious order, called the Theatins.[131] The object of the society was, to combine, to some extent, the contemplative habits of the monk with the more active duties of the secular clergy. The members visited the sick, buried the dead, and preached frequently in public, thus performing the most important functions of the priesthood. For this last vocation, of public speaking, Caraffa was peculiarly qualified by a flow of natural eloquence, which, if it did not always convince, was sure to carry away the audience by its irresistible fervor.[132] The new order showed itself particularly zealous in enforcing reform in the Catholic clergy, and in stemming the tide of heresy which now threatened to inundate the Church. Caraffa and his associates were earnest to introduce the Inquisition. A life of asceticism and penance too often extinguishes sympathy with human suffering, and leads its votaries to regard the sharpest remedies as the most effectual for the cure of spiritual error. From this austere way of life Caraffa was called, in 1536, to a situation which engaged him more directly in worldly concerns. He was made cardinal by Paul the Third. He had, as far back as the time of Ferdinand the Catholic, been one of the royal council of Naples. The family of Caraffa, however, was of the Angevine party, and regarded the house of Aragon in the light of usurpers. The cardinal had been educated in this political creed, and, even after his elevation to his new dignity, he strongly urged Paul the Third to assert the claims of the holy see to the sovereignty of Naples. This conduct, which came to the ears of Charles the Fifth, so displeased that monarch that he dismissed Caraffa from the council. Afterwards, when the cardinal was named by t
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