A measure of more general importance now occupied the attention of the Sovereign Pontiff and his Ministers. The Council of State (consulta) was established. It was a deliberative assembly. It was not sovereign, but possessed the right to advise the Sovereign. There were twenty-four councillors. The President was a Cardinal Legate. Each councillor was chosen by the Pope from a list of three candidates presented by each Province of the Pontifical States. The Council was divided into four sections, whose office it was to prepare laws relating to the Departments of Finance, Home Affairs, Public Works and Justice. It was the duty also of these four Committees to hold a general meeting on certain days, in order to take counsel together on the draughts of proposed laws which they had separately prepared. On the 25th November, 1847, the National Representatives met for the first time. Their place of meeting was the throne-room of the Quirinal Palace. Cardinal Antonelli was the first President. The proceedings were commenced, and most appropriately, by a respectful address to the Holy Father. It was well known to Pius IX. that the creation of this institution had awakened exaggerated and premature hopes in the minds of a portion of the people, and that some of the Deputies were not disinclined to encourage them. So he considered it necessary, in his reply, to define, in a very decided manner, the true character and functions of the National Representative Body. "It is chiefly," said he, "in order that I may become better acquainted with the wants of my people, and that I may better provide for the exigencies of the State, that I have called you together. I am prepared, in time, to do everything, without, however, diminishing the Sovereignty of the Pontificate. That man would be grievously mistaken who should behold in the functions which devolve on you, or in your institution itself, his own Utopias, or the commencement of anything incompatible with the Pontifical Sovereignty." In concluding, he spoke in a still more determined tone, and reproached his people with the ingratitude which they had already begun to manifest. "There are some persons who, having nothing to lose, wish for disorder and insurrection, and go so far as to make a bad use even of our concessions."