approaching a fall and destruction.” And the letter concludes with these remarkable words—“I eagerly call all to witness and proclaim to them, that with Bernard I expect an answer to this epistle, but an answer of _deeds_, not words.”[307] “So that,” says Gioberti, “during Vitelleschi’s government, the spirit of the Constitution was quite changed: the politicians prevailed over the saints, and a worldly spirit over that of mysticism.”[308] The evil increased under Caraffa, who succeeded Vitelleschi in 1646, and who was still less able than his predecessor to govern the Society. Caraffa was a simple and innocent bigot, not altogether unworthy of commendation. He was remarkable for his humility: he would have no carriage, no servant, no mark of distinction, as to food or raiment, from the humblest of the brethren.[309] He repeatedly begged his disciples to lay aside all political and temporal concerns, and to live a religious and pious life. He was shocked and grieved at heart on account of the pervading spirit of licentiousness and avarice, and predicted that it would be the ruin of the order. In fact, the Society was continually departing more and more from the principles on which Loyola had established it. The rule, that all who entered the order should abandon every temporal possession, had been strictly enforced in former times, but now the act of renunciation was either delayed, or performed under conditions, and that under different pretences, and especially on the ground that any Jesuit was liable at any time to be expelled from the Society. So when a novice now made the transfer of his property to the order, he clearly specified that it was in favour of such and such a college to which he was attached, and often with the reservation of himself administering the property he bequeathed; so that, even when the property remained in the order, it was no more unconditionally at the disposal of the General representing the entire community, but of an individual, who, in a certain measure, still considered it as his own. Nay, many of the Jesuits, having more leisure and skill than their relations, undertook the management of their affairs.