But far away on the Elbe he heard of the sack and expressed his sorrow for it.
The importance of the sack of Rome, like that of other dramatic events, is apt to be exaggerated.

It has been called the end of the Renaissance and the beginning of the Catholic reaction.

It was neither the one nor the other, but only one incident in the long, stubborn process of the Hispanization of Italy and the church.

For centuries no emperor had had so much power in Italy as had Charles.

With Naples and {381} Milan were now linked Siena and Genoa under his rule; the states of the church were virtually at his disposal, and even Florence, under its hereditary duke, Alexander de' Medici, was for a while under the control of the pope and through him, of Charles.
Nor did the fall of the holy city put the fear of God into the hearts of the prelates for more than a moment.