CHAP. V. On Appropriations. AT the time of the conquest, the condition of the clergy had undergone several changes. The bishop originally received all the revenues and ecclesiastical profits of the church, retaining a fourth part for himself. The clergy, from having no fixed habitation, except the episcopal college, by degrees began to settle in parishes, and to distribute the revenues of the church instead of the bishop, taking that portion themselves which the bishop had before: the remaining parts, which were properly devoted to the maintenance of the church, sick and poor, and to hospitality, were often retained by the Thanes and Lords of territories in the neighbourhood; or the Lords were enfeoffed of them, and held them in trust for the same pious Other patrons seized all the predial tithes, and gave an example of impropriations to the religious corporations in their vicinity that was not unreadily followed. For as some lords were thus enfeoffed of the revenues themselves, others had given over to the monasteries and cathedrals uses. Origin and history of ap propriations. By the Saxons and Normans. Norman monks. the rights which they enjoyed; and these monasteries, after first officiating in the churches themselves, soon began to appoint annual curates taken from their own body, either by turn or lot, who were called secular priests, and accounted for all the profits of the church, to the house from whence they were selected. Neither the lay patrons nor monasteries ever appointed without reserving all the profits, or some pension or fine for themselves, or, as it is expressed in old instruments of appropriations, that the clerk should answer to the bishop de spiritualibus vobis autem (to the monastery) de temporalibus. Although in the Saxon times eight appropriations are found, particularly to the monastery of Crowland, as appears from Ingulphus, and three churches to the abbey of Battel; the great prelates at the Norman conquest chiefly made use of this engine of oppression. In the cathedral church of Salisbury Henry the first appropriated near twenty churches in one day; and the see of Winchester had two benefices anciently annexed to the bishop's table for good eating and drinking; namely, the parsonages of Eastmean and Hambleden, in Hampshire. As the conqueror came in with the pope's banner, and under it, won the battle, the pope, taking. the opportunity to usurp on the liberties of the crown of England, readily granted this indulgence to the lay patrons and religious houses; the Norman monks on committing a church to be served by any of their body carefully reserved all the profits in proprios usus; the lords withdrew the tithes of their manors from the parochial or secular clergy who were English, and endowed those monasteries with them which they built for their religious countrymen. (') When an advowson was thus appropriated to Why so the use of a religious house, or some particular called. member of it, it was called an appropriation, and thence all advowsons in the hands of spiritual corporations were so denominated, either from the words made use of, appropriamus, consolidamus, et unimus; or because the bishop as ordinary, or the pope as supreme ordinary, gave a licence to the prior or canons of the monastery to hold them in proprios usus. (2) 496. Horn. Chron. de rebus (1) Bramhall's Works, 73. Kennet on Impr. Seld. c. 6. s. 3. ch. 12. s. 1 and 2. Kennet's Par. Antiq. 78, 79. 1 Burn's Eccl. L. 60. Gibs. Cod. 749. Domat's Supp. to the Civil Law, tit. 10. lib. 1. p. 451. Ayl. Par. Jur. Can. Ang. 13. 87. Arthington v. The Bishop of Chester, 2 Hen. Bl. R. 423. Grendon v. The Bishop of Lincoln, Plowd. R. Term appropriation confined to England. None but spiritual persons origin of an appro-. priation. The term appropriation appears to have been peculiar or principally confined to England, as it is seldom to be found in any foreign canon without reference to this country, and there is scarcely a foreign writer who does not say, quas in Anglia vocant appropriationes. (') None but spiritual persons, such as abbots, priors, prebendaries, and others, who adminisally capable tered the sacraments and performed divine service, were originally capable of receiving an appropriation, not only because glebe tithes and other profits merely spiritual, were thereby conveyed, but chiefly because the cure of souls is charged upon such ecclesiastical person or body, and they were in general considered quasi perpetual incumbents, appropriation being, in effect, an institution with this only difference, that it is perpetual (2), the church, glebe, and tithes alike passing to the religious house or person who performed the service, either, as has been observed, from one of their own body, or by some person who resided in the neighbourhood. (3) Church served by one of the spiritual body. (1) The Duke of Portland v. Bingham, 1 Haggard's R. 163. (2) Wright v. Gerrard, Hob. R. 306. Gibs. Cod. ch. 13. 752. Spelm. Apol. ch. 29. 141. Ayl. Par. Jur. Ang. 89. (3) Lind. lib. 3. tit. 9. Seld. c. 6. 94. Doctor and Student, 312. Colt v. The Bishop of Coventry, Hob. R. 148. Grendon v. The Bishop of Lincoln, Plowd. R. 496. accountable These incumbents were in fact little more than Incumbents the surveyors' stewards, or officers of the priests, for the prowhom they called secular bishops, or abbots, to fits. whom they were accountable for the profits. (') veyance The operative word of conveyance on these Operative occasions was that of parson; when that word word of conwas wanting, it was doubted whether the appro- "parson." priation was good, and it was at last declared so only because there were words of the same effect. (2) It was for this reason also, namely, Appropritheir being made parsons, and having the spiri- grantable tual functions conveyed to them, that appropri- over. ations were not regularly grantable over, nor capable of enduring longer than the bodies to which they were at first appropriate. (3) ations not ations then made to other spiritual corpo rations. Appropriations were then made to other spi- Appropriritual corporations, such as to deans and chapters, treasurers, chancellors, military and religious colleges, prioresses of nunneries and abbesses, and all bodies corporate, however in law and reason incapable of such a tenure, though this was granted on a conceit that all these were religious societies, and might receive and distribute out of the common treasures of the church, when in like manner others were deputed to perform (1) Lewis's Life of Dr. Pecock, 32. (2) Wright v. Gerrard, Hob. R. 306. (*) Gibs. Cod. ch. 13. 752. |