Benefices being thus endowed, and re cognised as a species of private property, their number gradually multiplied during the ages succeeding that of Charlemagne. In England especially several causes con tributed to the rise of parochial churches. " Sometimes" (says Dr. Burn, Eccles. Law, title "Appropriation") "the itinerant preachers found encouragement to settle amongst a liberal people, and by their assistance to raise up a church and a little adjoining manse. Sometimes the kings, iu their country wills and seats of plea sure or retirement, ordered a place of worship for their court and retinue, which was the original of royal free chapels. Very often the bishops, commiserating the ignorance of the country people, took care for building churches as the only way of planting or keeping up Christi anity among them. But the more ordi. nary method of augmenting the number of churches depended on the piety of the greater lords, who, having large fees and territories in the country, founded churches for the service of their families and tenants within their dominion. It was this that gave a primary title to the patronage of laymen ; it was this made the bounds of a parish commensurate to those of a manor ; and it was this distinct property of lords and tenants that by de gives allotted new parochial bounds, by the adding of new auxiliary churches." [AuvowsoN..] It appears, however from the last mentioned author, that if there were any new fee erected within a lordship, or there were any people within the pre cinct not dependent on the patron, they were at liberty to choose any neighbouring church or religious house, and to pay their tithes and make their offerings wherever they received the benefits. of religion. This by degrees gave rise to the arbitrary appropriation of tithes, which, in spite of positive enactment,continued to prevail till the end of the twelfth century, when Pope Innocent HI. by a decretal epistle to the archbishop of Canterbury, enjoined the payment of tithes to the ministers of the respective parishes where every man dwelt. This injunction, though not having the force of a law, has been complied with ever since, so that it is now a universal rale of law in England, that tithes are due of com mon right to the parson of the parish, unless there be a special exemption. [Thins.] The twelfth century was also the sera of an important change in the manner of investiture of ecclesiastical benefices in England. (Blackstone, vol. ii. p. 23 ; Father Paul, c. 24.) Up to this time the simple donation of the patron was suf ficient to confer a legal title to a benefice, provided the person to whom it was given was in holy orders, for otherwise he must be first presented to the bishop, who had power to reject him in case of unfitness; but the popes, who had in the eleventh and twelfth centuries successfully contended against every other species of ecclesiastical Investiture being exercised by laymen, now procured that the presentation of the patron should not be of itself sufficient to confer an ecclesiastical benefice, even though qualified by the discretionary power of rejection (in case the benefice was given to a layman) which was al ready vested in the bishop. This was the origin of the ceremonies of institution, which is the mode of investiture of the spiritualities ; and induction, which is the mode of investiture of the temporalities of a benefice. Where the bishop was the patron of the benefice, the two forms of presentation and institution were united is that of collation.
For the origin and nature of ecclesias tical patronage in England as a subject of property, the rules of law which apply to it as such, the limitations within which and the forms according to which it must be exercised, and the mode by which it may be vindicated, together with the respective rights of the bishop or ordinary, the archbishop, and the crown, in the case of lapse, see ADVOWSON ; and also Burn's Ecclesiastical Law, arts. " Advowson," " Benefice." The statute 3 & 4 Will. IV. c. 27, made some important altera tions in the law on this subject. 1. By the old law, suits for recovery of ad vowsons were not within the statutes of limitations; but § 30 of the above-men tioned act subjects them to a period of limitation of three successive incumben cies, or sixty years, during which the en joyment of the benefice has been by virtue of a title adverse to that of the person in stituting the suit. By § 33 the utmost
period within which an advowson can be recovered is limited to a hundred years from the time of an adverse presentation, without any intermediate exercise of the right of patronage by the person insti tuting the suit, or by any persons from whom he derives his title. The act abo lishes certain ancient remedies for the dis turbance of the right of patronage, (§ 36); so that except in -certain cases, specified in §§ 87, 38 of the act, the sole method of vindicating the right now is by writ of Quare impedit. [Quaim IMPEDIT.] Although the popes, in denying to lay men the right of ecclesiastical investiture, had still left them in possession of the substantial part of the patronage of bene fices, even this privilege was for some centuries not only very much questioned, but in many instances entirely wrested from them by papal encroachment. (Father Paul, c. 30, et seq.; Hallam's Middle Ages, vol. ii. c. 7.) The first attacks by the popes upon the rights of private patrons (which took place towards the latter end of the twelfth cen tury) assumed the form of letters of request called "mandates" or " expecte fives," praying that benefices might be conferred on particular individuals. What was first asked as a favour was soon after claimed as a right,. and rules were laid down as to grants and revocations of ex pectatives. The popes next proceeded to claim the patronage of all benefices va cantia in curia, i. e. which fell vacant by the incumbents dying at the court of Rome. The number of these, through the management of that court, which con trived on various pretences to draw eccle siastics of all ranks to Rome from different parts of Europe, became by degrees very considerable. But Clement V. in the beginning of the fourteenth century went beyond all his predecessors, by laying it down broadly as a maxim, that the full and free disposition of all ecclesiastical benefices belonged to the pope. (Cle mentines, lib. ii. tit. 5. c. 1 ; F. Paul, c. 35.) It followed as a consequence from this principle, that the pope could make reversionary grants, or provisions, as they were called, during the lives of the in cumbents ; and that he could reserve such benefices as he thought fit for his own peculiar At the same time, dispensations from the canons against non residence and pluralities, and permissions to hold benefices in commendam, were freely granted, so that by these and similar means m some instances fifty or sixty pre ferments were held by the same person at once. The evils of this system were felt all over Europe. The best benefices were everywhere filled with Italian priests, ignorant alike of the language and habits of the people to whose spiritual wants they were bound to minister. England in particular suffered so much from papal encroachments during the reign of Henry III., that the English deputies at the Council of Lyon (about A.D. 1245) com plained to the pope that the foreign clergy drew annually from England up wards of 70,000 marks. This remon strance produced no effect, but the system at length became so intolerable, that a determined plan of opposition to it was gradually formed in the principal nations of Western Europe. In this opposition our own ancestors took the lead, and their efforts were in the end completely suc cessful. The parliament assembled at Carlisle in the 35th year of Edward 1. wrote a strong remonstrance to Pope Clement V. against the papal encroach ments on the rights of patronage and the numerous extortions of the court of Rome. This remonstrance appears to have pro duced no effect, but it may be cited as a proof of the spirit of the times. The go vernment of Edward II. was too feeble to act upon this spirit. The first prince who was bold enough to assert the power of the legislature to restrain the papal en croachments was Edward III. After complaining ineffectually to Clement VI. of the abuse of papal reservations, he (A.D. 1350) procured the famous Statute of Provisors (25 Edw. III. stat. 6) to be passed. This act provided that all elec tions and collations should be free ac cording to law, and that in case any pro vision, collation, or reservation should be made by the court of Rome of any arch bishopric, bishopric, dignity, or other benefice, the king should for that turn have the collation of such archbishopric or other dignities elective, &c.