some call providential, and others organic, that at this conjuncture the destinies of the Church were lodged in the bands of men, and especially of one man, pre-eminently endowed with the instincts demanded by the moment. The commanding figure of Hildebrand looms before us grandly as the over-shadowing genius of the Papacy during the eventful reigns of six Popes, by whose sides he stands as the unfailing counsellor and prompter, until at the culminating hour of time he chooses to seat himself upon that episcopal chair, which, mainly through his own fostering efforts, had meantime become actually transformed into a throne of might. It was Hildebrand who, taking advantage of public discussions in Rome, secured by adroit management the sudden nomination of Nicolas II. at Florence in 1059, and then induced his nominee to issue the Bull which must be regarded as the original charter of the College of Cardinals—the Magna Charta on which reposes the existing structure of that body—a deed of abiding importance for the constitution of the Roman See. By it the College of Cardinals was called into creation as an Ecclesiastical Senate, invested organically with the elective franchise which
