Page:On papal conclaves (IA a549801700cartuoft).djvu/217

 Rh added to the universal surprise at the change of scene that had been happening with such extraordinary quickness. One point may be worth drawing attention to in this Conclave, as illustrative of the difficulties attending an estimate of the nature and temper of the constituency of Cardinals. If ever there was a Sacred College which would have appeared to give every guarantee for its strictly conservative composition, it might have seemed the one composed under the selecting influence, during sixteen years, of a Pope like Gregory, acting hand in hand with a minister of Lambruschini's stamp, not to speak of the no less pronounced conservative dispositions of the preceding sovereigns, Leo and Pius   Surely the door might have been deemed to have been tightly enough closed against the ingress of liberal elements under the vigilant watch of keepers of such uncompromising rigidity. Yet out of a Sacred College of such carefully exclusive construction there sprung up the element of opposition, which carried the election of Pius under the sole reaction of personal feelings against the galling ascendency of a grasping, an avid, and an imperious minister. Undoubtedly Pius has