[en] We study the behavior of the Pomeron (including the second component) in the framework of the core--valence quark model of hadrons. Total cross sections and particle--antiparticle total-cross-section differences, as derived from the model, are compared with the experimental data. The assumption that the two components of the Pomeron have the same ln p/sub lab/ behavior and that the Reggeon term behaves like p/sub lab//sub -0.5/ yields results which are in agreement with total-cross-section measurements for 10 < or = p/sub lab/ < or = 280 GeV. Extending quark-model sum rules to nonzero t, we determine the Pomeron trajectory from πp and Kp elastic-scattering measurements. This is found to agree with the effective trajectory α/sub eff/(t) = (0.84 +- 0.11) + (0.47 +- 0.21) t which we derive from the reaction γp → phip