music, had resolved to abolish everything but the simple Gregorian
chants, but the remonstrances of the Emperor Ferdinand and the Roman
cardinals stayed the austere fiat. The final decision was made to rest
on a new composition of Palestrina, who was permitted to demonstrate
that the higher forms of musical art were consistent with the
solemnities of church worship.

All eyes were directed to the young musician, for the very existence
of his art was at stake. The motto of his first mass, "Illumina oculos
meos," shows the pious enthusiasm with which he undertook his labors.
Instead of one, he composed three six-part masses. The third of these
excited such admiration that the pope exclaimed in raptures, "It is John
who gives us here in this earthly Jerusalem a foretaste of that new song
which the holy Apostle John realized in the heavenly Jerusalem in his
prophetic trance." This is now known as the "mass of Pope Marcel," in
honor of a former patron of Palestrina.

A new pope, Paul IV., on ascending the pontifical throne, carried his
desire of reforming abuses to fanaticism. He insisted on all the papal
choristers being clerical. Palestrina had married early in life a Roman
lady, of whom all we know is that her name was Lucretia. Four children
had blessed the union, and the composer's domestic happiness became a
bar to his temporal preferment. With two others he was dismissed from
the chapel because he was a layman, and a trifling pension allowed him.
Two months afterward, though, he was appointed chapel-master of St.
John Lateran. His works now succeeded each other rapidly, and different
collections of his masses were dedicated to the crowned heads of Europe.
In 1571 he was appointed chapel-master of the Vatican, and Pope Gregory
XIII. gave special charge of the reform of sacred music to Palestrina.