The election of a Pope drew a momentary attention to Rome, which did not use to be forgotten because Europe was embroiled. Benedict XIV. was dead. Thirty-four Cardinals wished to raise Cardinal Cavalchini to the Tiara: but he was disagreeable to the Court of France, which endeavoured to deal with the Holy Ghost in the more decent way of intrigue, to prevent his exaltation. Lanti, who had several benefices in France, was admonished not to vote for him; but Lanti was his intimate friend, and had the promise of being Secretary of State. France applied, too, to the Cardinal of York, on whom they had lately bestowed rich Abbeys: but his obstinacy always found out some virtue to justify itself; and when they pressed his father to dissuade him from voting for Cavalchini, young Stuart replied, “He had rather lose his head than violate his conscience.” For twenty-four hours, Cavalchini’s party was inflexible. The French Cardinals endeavoured to get the nomination put off till the arrival of the German Cardinal Roolt, who was supposed to have the secret of the Court of Vienna: but all was in vain. The declaration was fixed; when the Cardinal de Luynes, finding no temperate measures would have any effect, produced a formal exclusion of Cavalchini. It occasioned great amazement and disgust. Of late years, no such step had been practised. The friends of Cavalchini let him for one night enjoy the dream of empire: it was not till next morning that his friend Lanti went to his cell and announced the fatal veto. However he received the stroke in private, his public answer was sensible: he thanked the Court of France for saving him from the tremendous station of being God’s Vicar upon earth. The ostensible reason of his exclusion was his attachment to the King of Sardinia; the true one, his being devoted to the Jesuits. In the critical situation of religious affairs in France, it was not thought proper to throw the weight of the Court of Rome into the scale of those fathers, and to suffer at the head of the Church a man who had written strongly in favour of the canonization of Cardinal Bellarmine. It was said, that the same exclusion would have been urged against Cardinal Durini, had he appeared on the lists before Cavalchini. Durini’s crime was of a less public nature, but not a more remissible one: when Nuncio in France, he had refused to visit Madame Pompadour. Rezzonico, a simple Venetian bigot, not at all less addicted to the Jesuits than Cavalchini, ascended the Papal Chair. The revolution of affairs was singular; the state of Venice had been on the point, just when the late Pope died, of incurring the penalty of excommunication for disobedience to the Holy See.