The path that leads to the sacred college is neither a straight nor a narrow one.  There are no prescribed qualifications of age or of rank.  Leo X. was cardinal at thirteen; and although no such premature appointment to the gravest duties has been made since, or will ever, probably, be made again, yet there is always a salutary sprinkling of youth in this eminent body, if priests and prelates can ever be said to be truly young.  And although families of a certain rank are sure of the speedy promotion of any child whom they may see fit to dedicate to the Church, yet the representative of untainted blood has often found himself side by side with the son of a peasant or of an artisan.  The cardinal is not necessarily even a priest.  Adrian V. died without ordination; and Leo X. held the keys of St. Peter four days with unconsecrated hands.  He may even have been married, but must be single again when he puts on the red hat.

The appointment is made by the Pope, and, although announced to the whole body assembled in consistory, requires no confirmation to make it valid.  Certain offices lead to it, and are known as cardinalate offices.  Every prelate looks forward to it with hope, and every priest with longing; and besides the priests and prelates, the regular orders also, the monks and friars, claim a representation in the college.  But whatever the pretensions or expectations of individuals may be, the decision rests with the Pope, whose good-will, adroitly managed, has often let fall the coveted honor upon men who had little else to recommend them.  It was certainly honorable to this reverend body in our own day that they numbered Mai and Mezzofante among their brethren; but in Rome the story ran that neither the palimpsestic labors of the one nor the fifty languages of the other would have won him the well-earned promotion, if the Pope’s favorite servant had not set his heart upon making his children’s tutor assistant-librarian of the Vatican.

Although nominally the council of the Pope, the consistory or official assembly of the cardinals has few of the characteristics of a deliberative body.  The Pope addresses them from his throne; but the substance of his address is already known to most of them beforehand, and his opinion upon the subject, as well as theirs, made up before they come together.  They have no constituents to enlighten, nothing to hope and nothing to fear from public opinion.  They are all so near the topmost round that each of them is justified in feeling as if he already had his hand upon it; but to whichever of them that envied preeminence may be destined, it is neither the favor nor the gratitude of the people that can raise him to it.  What they already hold they are sure of; and it is only to the good-will of their colleagues that they are to look for more.