Of the virtue, learning, and other qualities required in a cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, SS. Peter Damian and Bernard have written eloquently, and Honorius IV., of the great family of Savelli, once so powerful in Rome, was inexorable against unworthy subjects, saying that “he never would raise to the Roman purple any save good and wise men.” Different popes have made excellent laws on these matters and others connected with the cardinalate; but in some cases they have been disregarded, especially those about age and about there not being two near relatives in the Sacred College at the same time. The practice of the last hundred years has been above cavil, and the abuses of other ages have been exaggerated, partly through malice, and partly from not knowing the secret reasons that popes may have had for creating, for instance, mere youths—royal youths—cardinals, or conferring the high dignity upon members of their own family, or upon men who had nothing to recommend them but the importunate demands of their sovereigns. The hat bestowed upon S. Charles Borromeo was productive of more good than all the rest of “nepotism” was able to effect of evil.
The creation of cardinals is an exclusive privilege of the popes; but they have sometimes granted the prayers of the Sacred College or of sovereign princes asking to have the dignity conferred upon certain subjects. For a long time, especially during the XVIth century, the governments of France, Spain, Portugal, Poland, and the republic of Venice were favored by being permitted to name once in each pontificate a candidate for the cardinalate. This was called a crown nomination. Clement V. is said (Cancellieri, Mercato, p. 105, note 3) to have been the first to grant to princes the right of petitioning for a hat; and the sultan Bajazet II. wrote on 28th September, 1494, to Alexander VI., begging him to make a perfect cardinal of Nicholas Cibo, Archbishop of Aries, and cousin of Pope Innocent VIII. Clement XII. in 1732 tendered to James III. (the “Elder Pretender”) the nomination of some subject to the cardinalate, and he, like a true Stuart, neglecting his countrymen and those who had suffered in his cause, proposed Mgr. Rivera, whom he had taken a liking to for little courtesies shown at Urbino. It has long been a custom for the pope to promote to this dignity a member of the family or one of that religious order to which his predecessor belonged, from whom he himself received it. The Italians call this a restitution of the hat—Restituzione di capello. The number of cardinals has greatly varied at different times. It was generally smaller before than ever since the XVIth century. The cardinals could, of course, well be all Romans, as they were in the beginning; but with a change of circumstances the pontiffs have recognized the propriety of S. Bernard’s suggestive query to Eugene III.: “Annon eligendi de toto orbe, orbem judicaturi?” (De Consid., iv. 4). In 1331 John XXII. (himself a Frenchman), being asked by the king to create a couple of French cardinals, replied that two were too many, and he would make but one, because there were only twenty cardinals in all, and seventeen of them were Frenchmen. In 1352, after the death of Clement VI., the cardinals attempted to restrict the Sacred College to twenty members, on the principle that a dignity profusely conferred is despised—communia vilescunt; but Urban VI. found himself constrained, by the course of events at the schism, to create a large number of cardinals, in order to oppose them to the pseudo-cardinals of Clement VII., and at one creation he made twenty-nine, all except three being his own countrymen, Neapolitans; so that the French of another generation were richly paid back for their former preponderance. From this time the membership of the Sacred College gradually increased up to the middle of the XVIth century. It is much to the credit of Pius II. that when the Sacred College in 1458 remonstrated with him on the number of cardinals, saying that the cardinalate was going down, and begged him not to increase its membership to any considerable extent, he told the fathers that as head of the church he could not refuse the reasonable requests of kings and governments in such a matter, but that, apart from this, his honor forbade him to neglect the subjects of other countries than Italy in the distribution of the highest favors in his gift (Comment. Pii II., lib. ii. pp. 129, 130). Leo X., believing himself disliked by many cardinals, added thirty-one to their number at a single creation on July 1, 1517, the like of which the court has never seen before or after; but it had the desired effect. The Council of Trent ordained (Sess. 24, De Ref., c. i.) concerning the subjects of the cardinalate that “the Most Holy Roman Pontiff shall, as far as it can be conveniently done, select (them) out of all the nations of Christendom, as he shall find persons suitable.” This is not to be understood, however worded, as more than a recommendation to the pope. Paul IV. (Caraffa, 1555-59), a great reformer, after consulting the Sacred College and long discussions, issued a bull called the Compact—Compactum—in which he decreed that the cardinals should not be more than forty; but his immediate successor, Pius IV. (Medici), acting on the principle that one pope cannot bind another in disciplinary matters, created forty-six. Sixtus V. in 1585 fixed the number at seventy in imitation of the seventy elders chosen to assist Moses; and since then all the popes have respected this precedent. During the long reign of Pius VII., although, on account of the times, unable to hold a consistory for many years, he created in all ninety-eight cardinals, and when he died left ten in petto. Although, on the one hand, an excessive number of cardinals would lessen the importance and lower the dignity of the office, yet a very small number has occasioned long and disedifying conclaves, whereby for months, and even years, the Holy See has been vacant, to the great detriment of the church. This was the case four times during the XIIIth century, and by a coincidence, each time it was after a pope who was the fourth of his name, viz., Celestine (1241), Alexander (1261), Clement (1268), and Nicholas (1292).
The subject of this article has grown so much under our hands that we are reluctantly compelled to defer a description of the ceremonies attendant on the election of cardinals, etc., till the July number of The Catholic World.
ON THE WAY TO LOURDES.
“Quacumque ingredimur, in aliquam historiam vestigium ponimus.”—Cicero.
The most direct route from Paris to Notre Dame de Lourdes crosses the Bordeaux and Toulouse Railway at Agen, where the pilgrim leaves the more frequented thoroughfares for an obscurer route, though one by no means devoid of interest, especially to the Catholic of English origin; for the country we are now entering was once tributary to England, and at every step we come, not only upon the traces it has left behind, but across some unknown saint of bygone times, like a fossil of some rare flower with lines of beauty and grace that ages have not been able to efface.
Approaching Agen, we imagined ourselves coming to some large city, so imposing are the environs. The broad Garonne is flowing oceanward, its shores bordered by poplars, and overlooked by hills whose sunny slopes are covered with vineyards and plum-trees. Boats from Provence and Languedoc are gliding along the canal, whose massive bridge, with its gigantic arches, harmonizes with the landscape, and reminds one of the Roman Campagna. The plain is vast, fertile, and smiling; the heavens glowing and without a cloud. Every hill, like Bacchus, has its flowing locks wreathed with vines of wonderful luxuriance, and is garlanded with clusters of grapes, under which it reels with joyous intoxication. Everywhere are white houses, fair villas, pleasant gardens, and all the indications of a prosperous country.
The town does not correspond with its surroundings. It is damp and said to be unhealthy. The streets are narrow and winding, the houses without expression. The population is mostly made up of merchants, mechanics, and gens de robe. Here and there we find a noble mansion, a few great families, and a time-honored name; but the true lords of the place are the public functionaries, worthy and grave, and clad in solemn black, quite in contrast with the joyous character of the people. The local peculiarities of the latter may be studied to advantage in an irregular square bordered with low arcades—the centre of traffic for all the villages eight or ten leagues around. Famous fairs are held here three or four times a year, one for the sale of prunes—and the Agen prunes are famous—but the most important one is the lively, bustling fair of the Gravier, which brings together all the blooming grisettes of the region, who, in festive mood and holiday attire, gather around the tempting booths. The Gravier was formerly a magnificent promenade of fine old elms, which Jasmin loved to frequent, and where he found inspiration for many of his charming poems in the Gascon language—one of the Romance tongues; for the so-called patois of this part of the country is by no means a corruption of the French, but a genuine language, flexible, poetic, and wonderfully expressive of every sweet and tender emotion. Some of Jasmin’s poems have been translated by our own poet Longfellow with much of the graceful simplicity of the original. Most of the fine elms of the Gravier have been cut down within a few years, to the great regret of the people.
One of the most striking features of the landscape in approaching Agen is a mount at the north with a picturesque church and spire. This is the church of the Spanish Carmelites, who, driven some years ago from their native country, came to take refuge among the caves of the early martyrs beside the remains of an old Roman castrum called Pompeiacum. Here is the cavern, hewn centuries ago out of the solid rock, where S. Caprais, the bishop, concealed himself in the time of the Emperor Diocletian to escape from his persecutors. And here is the miraculous fountain that sprang up to quench his thirst; sung by the celebrated Hildebert in the XIth century