Loyola himself drew up these constitutions in five chapters, and had them introduced to Paul III., with the petition that they might be confirmed. This was in September 1539, and it is singular that the man selected to bring them under the Pope's notice should have been Cardinal Contarini. Paul had no difficulty in recognizing the support which this new Order would bring to the Papacy in its conflict with Reformers, and its diplomatic embarrassments with Charles V. He is even reported to have said, 'The finger of God is there!' Yet he could not confirm the constitutions without the previous approval of three Cardinals appointed to report on them. This committee condemned Loyola's scheme; and nearly a year passed in negotiations with foreign princes and powerful prelates, before a reluctant consent was yielded to the Pope's avowed inclination. At length the Bull of Sept. 27, 1540, _Regimini militantis Ecclesiae_, launched the Society of Jesus on the world. Ignatius became the first General of the Order; and the rest of his life, a period of sixteen years, was spent in perfecting the machinery and extending the growth of this institution, which in all essentials was the emanation of his own mind. It may be well at this point to sketch the organization of the Jesuits, and to describe the progress of the Society during its founder's lifetime, in order that a correct conception may be gained of Loyola's share in its creation. Many historians of eminence, and among them so acute an observer as Paolo Sarpi, have been of the opinion that Jesuitry in its later developments was a deflection from the spirit and intention of Ignatius. It is affirmed that Lainez and Salmeron, rather than Loyola, gave that complexion to the Order which has rendered it a mark for the hatred and disgust of Europe. Aquaviva, the fifth General, has been credited with its policy of interference in affairs of states and nations. Yet I think it can be shown that the Society, as it appeared in the seventeenth century, was a logical and necessary development of the Society as Ignatius framed it in the sixteenth.[160] [Footnote 160: Sarpi, though he expressed an opinion that the Jesuits of his day had departed from the spirit of their founders, spoke thus of Loyola's worldly aims (_Lettere_, vol. i. p 224): 'Even Father Ignatius, Founder of the Company, as his biography attests, based himself in such wise upon human interest as though there were none divine to think about.']