Clerical training in Catholic Europe was reformed in the wake of the disastrous setbacks (or possibly ‘opportunities’) of the Protestant Reformation. The most important initiative flowed from the Council of Trent (1545–65) which provided directions aimed at professionalising the priesthood and providing uniform guidelines for seminaries for priestly training and formation. Under canon 18 of the twenty-third session of the Council, which met between 1562 and 1563, all bishops were required to create seminaries in their dioceses which would provide a course of study including grammar, humanistic studies, patristics and instructions in the liturgy and performance of the sacraments. In reality, this was practically impossible, especially in countries such as France where there were numerous dioceses and it was simply too expensive to create colleges in all of them. These colleges were intended to provide both a general education and the special theological and liturgical training required for the priesthood. However, the most prestigious seminaries were those attached to the largest and wealthiest dioceses, above all that of Rome; others were extremely poor. Bishops retained considerable discretion on the length of training, the curriculum and the basis for the selection of applicants. This was retained until 1918 when the new Code of Canon Law specified the length and courses required for training for the priesthood and specified, for the first time, that all priests had to be trained in a seminary.