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.
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