BENEFICE, ben'e-fis (Lat. beneficium), an ecclesiastical living, originally including every species of preferment, as well as those to which dignities and offices were attached, namely, bishoprics, deaconries and prebends, as the lesser sort, namely, rectories, vicarages, per petual curacies and endowed chaplaincies ; but in its popular acceptation it includes only the latter class, and the distinction is recognized in recent acts of Parliament. A benefice now de notes the beneficial property right or usufruct enjoyed by the clerical incumbent ex officio, but without regard to his dignity. The name is derived from the beneficium of the Romans, a grant of any ldnd to a subject by the sovereign. It was afterward the designation of a grant of land by any large proprietor to a retainer or follower as a reward of services, being the same that later was denominated a fief or fee, the essential incident of which was perpetuity; that is to say, it was a permanent stipendiary estate held of a superior and usually subject to some condition indicating vassalage. The
principle of the feudal tenure was applied, in the Middle Ages, to ecclesiastical benefices to this extent, that they were held of the Pope, as a superior lord, though these benefices had not the hereditary character of a fee, so far as respected the office or dignity connected therewith, and the lands or emoluments con ferred by a grant were usually attached to such office or dignity, and on the death of the in cumbent, reverted to the ecclesiastical superior who was entitled to appoint a successor. This, at all events, was the claim of the Popes, though it was the subject of contest between them and the principal European sovereigns. Consult Phillimore 'Ecclesiastical Law of the Church of England) (2d ed., London 1895).