Charles appears at this time to have been an amiable youth: he possessed good natural qualities, and his attempts in poetry (if they are his own) are not entirely unworthy of Marot, to whom they are addressed. He had in early days a fair taste for literature, and had he continued under the training of Amyot and Cipierre, he might have been worthy of the throne. With such a mother as Catherine, and such tutors as she gave him, he could hardly fail to become treacherous and cruel. We shall see at times his better nature breaking through, but the evil spirit within him was never thoroughly conquered. There exists a curious letter written about this time by Catherine to her son, giving him instructions as to the conduct of his life.[354] He is exhorted to rise early, to go to mass with his four secretaries, to dine not later than eleven o’clock, to ride or walk for three hours, to hunt, to read his letters every day and see that they are punctually answered, and to have the keys of the palace brought to him each night and placed under his pillow. There are other exhortations of a similar nature--such as would make him “the first gentleman of the day,” but would not tend to make him a good Christian. Had she wished to see her son a good man, Catherine would have given him proper tutors, and not such as Gondi, whom Brantome describes as “cunning, corrupt, false, and blasphemous.” The termination of the sittings of the Council of Trent (December, 1563), imported another element of confusion into the religious differences of the age. The council, although summoned in 1541, did not actually meet until December, 1545. It had been hoped that some means would be found of healing the divisions in the Church, but one after another every form of Protestant opinion was eliminated from the new creed, and reconciliation became impossible. The articles of the council were made compulsory in every Catholic state; but the Church of France was so far independent that the solemn consent of the crown was required to make the decrees valid. They might, indeed, be received as articles of faith, but could not be pleaded in a court of law until ratified by the sovereign. To procure that ratification, the King of Spain dispatched an embassador, accompanied by a deputation from the Dukes of Tuscany and Lorraine, inviting Charles to send commissioners to Nancy, where an assembly of princes was to meet to consult on the best measures to be adopted for the extirpation of heresy. L’Hopital, foreseeing the deadly consequences of such a step, advised the queen-mother to receive the embassy and deputation very politely, detain them at court as long as possible, and dismiss them at last with an evasive answer. “The government,” says Languet, “have no idea of taking away the liberty granted by the late edict; for (to omit other reasons) they see that it can not be done without a disturbance, as our churches are more crowded than they have ever been.”[355] Independently