The position of the Doge was now clearly defined. Under no circumstances could he any longer exercise absolute authority; and if he desired any reform, or had any law to propose, he was constrained to obtain, before acting, the approbation of his counsellors and of the Pregadi in the first place, and afterwards to get his measure accepted by the Forty, which then had to obtain the sanction of the Great Council, which, in its turn, if the matter were important, was bound to bring the bill before the General Assembly, to be voted on by the clergy and the people. In time the custom was introduced according to which the Doge took an oath before the people on [Sidenote: _Rom. ii. 244._] the day of his coronation, called the ‘promission ducale,’ the ‘ducal promise.’ At first this oath was simply a promise to obey scrupulously the laws of the Republic, but little by little clauses were added to it which went so far as to deprive the Doge even of certain rights common to all other citizens of Venice. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the ‘ducal promise’ reached a stage of development at which it destroyed the liberty of the chief of the state, and became almost an insult to his dignity. During the interregnum between the death of each doge and the coronation of his successor, three grave magistrates were chosen by the Great Council, called the ‘Inquisitors upon the deceased Doge,’ who held a solemn trial of the dead man’s actions and of his whole life; at the same time five other personages studied the wording of the next ‘ducal promise,’ of which they were termed the ‘Correctors,’ their business being to examine the situation, and to ascertain how it might be possible for the future sovereign to advance his own fortunes at the expense of the public interests; to judge, or merely guess, what matters he might be able to influence too much, and thereby to decide in what way his actions and powers could be still further restrained and limited by introducing new clauses into the promise. The first law which was elaborated and passed by the Great Council was one which reformed the election of the doges. The Council wished to reserve the electoral right to eleven of its own members, but the people protested against this encroachment on ancient traditions. The legislators then went to work to prove, with all the eloquence at their command, that the law they wished to pass did not in any way infringe the rights of the national assembly, but that it was simply a wise and paternal effort on the part of the Council to help the people in their choice; for the law provided that eleven electors were to appear before the assembly and present their candidate with the words, ‘Here is your Doge, if this choice pleases you.’ [Sidenote: _Rom. ii. 95._]