ull.

Thus it is not as a deliberative body that the cardinals take part in
the government. Their collective functions are for the most part purely
formal, and the great wheel turns steadily on its axle without any
direct help from them. But as sole electors of the sovereign, whom they
are not only to choose, but to choose from among themselves, and as the
body from which the highest functionaries of the State are drawn, their
individual influence is always very considerable, often whatever they
have the tact and skill to make it.

Another body which shares with the "Sacred College" the privilege of
furnishing the instruments of government is the Prelacy,--a term which
must be taken in its restricted sense, of men, whether laymen or
ecclesiastics, destined by profession to various offices of dignity and
trust in the civil and ecclesiastical administration, some of which lead
directly to the cardinalate, and all of them to personal privileges and
a competent income. Their education is often less exclusive than that of
the priests, for many of them have belonged to the world before they
gave themselves up to the Church, and profane studies have employed some
of the time which might otherwise have been devoted to Bellarmino and
his brethren. In dress they are distinguished by the color of their
stockings and hat-band. When they walk out, a liveried servant follows
them a few paces in the rear; and while the cardinals, from
"Illustrious" have become "Eminent," these aspirants to the purple are
always addressed as "Monsignore," or "My Lord."

The first set of wheels in this complicated machine is composed of the
twenty-three Congregations, a kind of executive and deliberative
committees, consisting of cardinals and prelates, and first used by
Sixtus V., as a speedier and more effective method of eliciting the
opinions of his counsellors and bringing their administrative talents
into play than the deliberations in full consistory which had obtained
till his time. Sixteen of them are ecclesiastical, the remaining seven
civil, although the number may at any time be restricted or enlarged
according to the wants and the views of the reigning Pontiff. They have
their stated meetings, their regular offices and officers; and while
theoretically under the immediate direction of the sovereign, they
actually relieve him from many of the details and not a few of the
direct responsibilities of sovereignty.

The first of these Congreg