2. College of Cardinals.— ^^ The college of Cardinals, in its origin, was nothing else than the council which, according to the canons, every metropolitan was obliged to consult, and in which, during a vacancy, all the metropolitan powers resided, viz., the synod of pro- vincial bishops, and the cliapter of the metropolitan church ; and it is not difficult to see that this college would share in the supreme glory of the see of Rome, in the same proportion as every other church partici- pated in the honor of its particular metropolitan. It was not, however, for a long time that the cardinalate attained to its present excessive and usurped degree of power and dignity. In the Synod of Rome, under Benedict YIII, in 1015, the cardinals, priests, and dea- ^ cons still signed after the bishops, and the cardinal- bishops after other bishops of older standing in the order than themselves; but in 1050 wo find a vast change, for Humbertus, bishop of Silva Candida, who was a cardinal-bishop of the see of Rome, took prece- dence at Constantinople of the archbishop of Amalfl ; and frvm that time we perceive the cardinal-bishops, and soon even the priests and deacons,. arrogating to themselves that precedence over all other ecclesiastical dignitaries which they now possess. This, however, was not done without resistance. Thus, in 1440, the archbishop of Canterbury refused to allow to the car- dinal-archbishop of York the precedence which he claimed; whereupon Pope Eugenius IV wrote to the former, reprehending him for his conduct, and declar- ing that the cardinalate had been instituted by St. Peter himself, and that the dignity of the cardinals, who, with the pope, governed the Universal Church, and sat in judgment upon bishops, Iras, past all doubt, greater than that of even patriarchs, who had jurisdic- tion over only a port of the Church, and fh)m whom there lay an appeal to the see of Rome. The same dispute occurred between the cardinal-bishop of Cra- « cow and the primate of Gnesna in 1449. As time went on, these arrogant pretensions of the college in- creased : we find the cardinals saying to Pope Pius, Cardinales pares RegHms haberi; so the cardinal of Pa- via, in several places, CardinaUm . . . cujus digmtas anteferiw RegUms. In 1561 the cardinals of Lorraine and Guise refused to give precedence to the princes of the blood royal. To such an excess had this arro- gance and graspihg at dignity attained in the sixteenth century, that the bishops at the Council of Lateran, under Leo X, in 1512, came to the resolution either to keep away altogether, or to negative every proposi- tion, until their grievances were redressed.
"The Council of Rome, under Nicolas II, 1059, grants to the college of Cardinals, or rather (can. i) to the cardinal-bishops, the principal voice in the election of the pope ; and, according to Peter Damianus, the
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election of a pope contrary to the opinion of the cardi- nal-biflhopB was null. Pandulphas remarks, with re- gard to the election of Gelasiua II, that although all the cardinals, clergy, and people had a voice in the election, the cardinal-bishope alone had the right of approving or disapproving the election, and consecrat- ing the elect. None but cardinals are now eligible to the papacy. Pius IV seems to have been the first who restricted the election to the cardinals only" (Landon, EccL Dictionary^ s. v.).
8. Numb&r of Cardinais, — In 1381 there were twen- ty, and after the death of Clement VI, in 1852, the cardinals resolved that that number should not be ex- ceeded. In 1878, at the election of Urban VI, there were twenty-three. The Council of Basle fixed the number at twenty-four, and the college itself appears to have been all along very jealous of an increase to its numbers. However, Leo X set the example of a large increase, creating in one day thirty-one new car- dinals, in order to neutralize the opposition made to him by a cardinal who had formed a party in the col- lege. The bull Comp<Kii, in 1556, fixed the number at forty, and forbade to create more. But the college h^ since been enlarged to seventy members, the num- ber at which it was finally fixed by the bull of Pope Sixtus V in 1586: six of these are bishops, fifty priests, and fourteen deacons. The number of cardi- nal-bishops was at first seven, but it was shortly after- ward altered to six, at which it has ever since remain- ed. These bishops, on Sundays and festivals, officiate as the pope's vicars at the altar of St. Saviour, in the church of Lateran, or assist the pontiff when he offici- ates in person. The cardinal-bishops in 1867 were Mario Mattel, bishop of Ostia and Velletri, July 2, 1882 ; Constantino Patrizi, bishop of Porto and St Ru- fina, June 28, 1884 ; Luigi Amat, bishop of Palestrina, May 19, 1887 ; Anthony Cagiano de Azevedo, bishop of Frascati, Jan. 22, 1844; Girolamo d' Andrea, March 15, 1852 ; Ludovico Alfieri, bishop of Albano, April 21, 1845. A list of the cardinal-priests and cardinal-dea- oons is given in the Altnctnac de Gotha and in the Bo- man Catholic almanacs annually.
4. Costume, — ^The dress of a cardinal is a red sou- tane, a rochet, a short purple mantie, and a red hat The cardinals began to wear the red hat at the Coun-