BENEFICE, a term first applied under the Roman empire to portions of land, the usufruct of which was granted by the em perors to their soldiers or others for life, as a reward or beneficium for past services, and as a retainer for future services.
The term benefice, according to the canon law, implies always an ecclesiastical office, propter quod beneficium datur, but it does not always imply a cure of souls. It has been defined to be the right which a clerk has to enjoy certain ecclesiastical revenues on condition of discharging certain services prescribed by the canons, or by usage, or by the conditions under which his office has been founded. These services might be those of a secular priest with cure of souls, or they might be those of a regular priest, a member of a religious order, without cure of souls; but in every case a benefice implied three things : (1) An obligation to discharge the duties of an office, which is altogether spiritual. (2) The right to enjoy the fruits attached to that office, which is the benefice itself. (3) The fruits themselves, which are the temporalities. By keeping these distinctions in view, the right of patronage in the case of secular benefices becomes intelligible, being in fact the right, which was originally vested in the donor of the tempo ralities, to present to the bishop a clerk to be admitted, if found fit by the bishop, to the office to which those temporalities are annexed. Secular or parochial benefices are of three kinds—rec tories, vicarages, or perpetual curacies (see ADvowsoN) . Presen tation on the part of the patron of the benefice is the first requisite in order that a clerk should become legally entitled to a benefice. The next requisite is that he should be admitted by the bishop as a fit person for the spiritual office to which the benefice is an nexed. By the early constitutions of the Church of England, a bishop was allowed a space of two months to enquire and inform himself of the sufficiency of every presentee, but by the 95th of the canons of 1604, that interval has been abridged to 28 days, within which the bishop must admit or reject the clerk. If the bishop rejects the clerk within that time he is liable to a duplex querela in the courts of the metropolitan, or to a quare impedit in the high court of justice, or there may be an appeal under the Benefices Act 1898. Upon the bishop having satisfied himself of the sufficiency of the clerk, he proceeds to institute him to the spiritual office to which the benefice is annexed, but before such institution can take place, the clerk is required to make a declara tion of assent to the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion and to the Book of Common Prayer according to a form prescribed in the Clerical Subscription Act, 1865, to make a declaration against simony in accordance with that act, and to take and subscribe the oath of allegiance according to the form in the Promissory Oaths Act 1868. The bishop, by the act of institution, commits to the clerk the cure of souls attached to the office to which the benefice is annexed. In cases where the bishop himself is patron of the ben efice, the bishop collates the clerk to the benefice and office. It is not necessary that the bishop should personally institute or col late a clerk; he may issue a fiat to his vicar-general, or to a special commissary for that purpose. After the bishop or his commissary has instituted or collated the presentee, he issues a mandate under seal, addressed to the archdeacon or some other neighbouring clergyman, authorizing him to induct the clerk into his benefice- in other words, to put him into legal possession of the temporali ties, which is done by some outward form, and for the most part by delivery of the bell-rope to the clerk, who thereupon tolls the bell. This form of induction is required to give the clerk a legal title to his beneficium, although his admission to the office by in stitution is sufficient to vacate any other benefice which he may already possess. What has been said above applies to rectories and vicarages. A perpetual curate is put in possession of his benefice by the licence of the bishop without institution, collation or induc tion; the patron is said to "nominate." The final duty of a new incumbent is on the first Sunday on which he officiates to "read himself in," i.e., read the Thirty-nine Articles in the presence of the congregation and declare his assent thereto.
By a decree of the Lateran council of 1215, which was enforced in England, no clerk can hold two benefices with cure of souls, and if a beneficed clerk shall take a second benefice with cure of souls, he vacates ipso facto his first benefice. Dispensations, however, could be easily obtained from Rome, before the reformation of the Church of England, to enable a clerk to hold several ecclesiastical dignities or benefices at the same time, and by the Peterpence, Dispensations, etc., Act 1534, the power to grant such dispensa tions, which had been exercised by the Court of Rome, was trans ferred to the archbishop of Canterbury, certain ecclesiastical per sons having been declared by a previous statute (15 29) to be en titled to such dispensations. The system of pluralities carried with it, as a necessary consequence, systematic non-residence on the part of many incumbents, and delegation of their spiritual duties in respect of their cure of souls to assistant curates. The evils at tendant on this system were found to be so great that the Plurali ties Act 1838 was passed to abridge the holding of benefices in plurality, and it was enacted that no person should hold, under any circumstances more than two benefices, and this privilege was made subject to the restriction that his benefices were within ten statute miles of each other. By the Pluralities Act 1850 the re striction was further narrowed, so that no spiritual person could hold two benefices except the churches of such benefices were within three miles of each other by the nearest road, and the annual value of one of such benefices did not exceed Imo. The Pluralities Acts Amendment Act 1885, however, enacted that two benefices could be held together, the churches of which are within four miles of each other, and the annual value of one of which does not exceed £200.
Benefices used to pay their first fruits (one year's profits) and tenths (of yearly profits) to Queen Anne's Bounty; but by a series of enactments of which the last is the First Fruits and Tenths Measure 1926, this liability has been taken away. Their profits during vacation belong to the next incumbent. Tithe rent charge attached to a benefice is relieved from payment of one-half of the agricultural rates assessed thereon. An incumbent has to reside on his benefice nine months in the year, unless he gets leave for a longer absence from the bishop, and he has to maintain the house and other buildings in repair (see DILAPIDATION ). Benefices may be exchanged by agreement between incumbents with the consent of the ordinary and of the patrons, and they may, with the con sent of the patron and ordinary, be united or dissolved after being united. They may also be charged with the repayment of money laid out for their permanent advantage, and be augmented by the medium of Queen Anne's Bounty.
A benefice is avoided or vacated—(I) By death. (2) By res ignation, if the bishop is willing to accept resignation. By the In cumbents' Resignation Acts, any clergyman who has been an in cumbent of one benefice continuously for seven years, and is incapacitated by permanent mental or bodily infirmities from ful filling his duties, may have assigned to him out of the benefice, a retiring pension, not exceeding one-third of its annual value. These provisions, however, are much modified by the Clergy Pen sions Measure, 1926, and will, when that measure comes into full operation, disappear. (3) By cession, upon the clerk being insti tuted to another benefice or some other preferment incompatible with it. (4) By deprivation by an ecclesiastical court or by declara tion of voidance (a) under the Clergy Discipline Act, 1892, (b) under the Public Worship Regulation Act 1874 (but this latter procedure is out of use), (c) under the Benefices Act 1898 if the living is under sequestration for a year, (d) under the Benefices (Ecclesiastical Duties) Measure Io26, if the inhibition of an in cumbent for neglect of duties prescribed by the measure continues undetermined for five years. (5) By act of law in consequence of simony. (6) By default of the clerk to read himself in. Two or more benefices may be united. There have been several statutes on this subject but except for the City of London all the present law is contained in the Union of Benefices Measure 1923. For the city of London the provisions are contained in the Act 23 and 24 Vict. c. 142.
See also ADVOWSON ; CURATE ; GLEBE ; INCUMBENT ; RECTOR ; VICAR. Also Phillimore, Eccles. Law; Cripps, Law of Church and Clergy.