It was postponed from month to month in the hope that some chance—the death of the king or of Bossuet—might relieve the pressure, and allow the papal conscience its rights as against the papal policy. As late as the autumn of 1698, a whole year after the conference of the ten “Consulters” began, five of them persisted, in defiance of every pressure that could be brought to bear upon them, in pronouncing the book to be absolutely orthodox, and so proceedings had to be begun again. The real issue of the struggle had probably never been doubtful in case the French court insisted. For, as the cardinals said: “It will not do to fire great guns at the king. Rome’s wisest course demands of her to yield to him whatever may be yielded without wounding the first principles of religion.” It is absolutely certain that, but for this unseemly influence, the decision would have been in Fénelon’s favor. As it was, the pope and his advisers struggled hard to wriggle out of their dilemma with as little violence to their feelings and their honor as they could. After it was settled that they must in some way give the decision as the king so imperatively demanded, there were a great many meetings of the Conclave to decide on the precise form it should take. This required months of wrangling and debate. It was at first intended to issue a simple brief, distinctly affirming that His Holiness did not intend to condemn the author’s explanations of his book, but giving some general disapproval of certain inferences drawn from it, and asserting the Church’s true doctrine as opposed to the Quietists, without casting any blame on the Archbishop of Cambrai. This would have been done had not Bossuet’s agents at Rome, assisted by the Cardinal Cassanata, a man of most imperious will and overbearing temper, exerted themselves to the utmost, fortified by fresh letters from the king dictated by Bossuet, insisting, with hardly veiled threats of the direful consequences that would ensue from disobedience, that the decision be “clear, precise, capable of no misinterpretation, such as is necessary to remove all doubt with regard to doctrine and eradicate the very root of the evil.” Thus badgered and driven and terrified, there seemed to be nothing to do but submit; so at length, on the 12th of March, the whole Sacred College was assembled at the palace of Monte Cavallo, where the decree was accepted by the whole body of cardinals, signed by the pope in their presence, and immediately posted in all the principal public places of Rome.