When we see one of these venerable men driving slowly out of his palace in an old-fashioned carriage drawn by a single pair of horses, we know, without being told it, that he has spent three-fourths of his existence in the exercise of the most meritorious works.

He said Mass in some small village before he was made the cure of a canton.

He has preached, confessed, distributed alms to the poor, borne the viaticum to the sick, committed the dead to their last narrow home.
The Roman prelate is often a great hulking fellow who has just left college, with the tonsure for his only sacrament.

He is a Doctor of something or other, he owns some property, more or less, and he enters the Church as an amateur, to see if he can make something out of it.
The Pope gives him leave to style himself _Monsignore_, instead of _Signore_, and to wear violet-coloured stockings.

Clad in these he starts on his road, hoping it may lead him to a Cardinal's hat.