TITIIES aro the tenth part of the increase yearly arising and renewing from the profits of lands, the stock upon lands, and the personal industry of the inhabitants, and are offerings payable to the church, by law. Under the Jewish system, the tenth part of the yearly increase of their goods was due to the priests. (Numbers xviii. 21 ; Dent. xiv. 22 ; Levit. xxvii. 30, 32.) In the earliest ages of the Christian church, offerings were made by its members at the altar, at collections, and in other ways; and such payments were enjoined by decrees of the church, and sanctioned by general usage. For many centuries, however, they were voluntary. But when the church had increased in power, and began to number amongst its members many who adhered to It because it was the pre vailing religion, it was deemed necessary to enforce certain fixed contri butions for the support of the ministers of religion. The church relied upon the example of the Jews, and claimed a tenth. Meanwhile, the conversion of temporal princes to Christianity, and their zeal in favour of their new faith, enabled the church to obtain the enactment of laws to compel the payment of tithes. In England, the first instance of a law for the offering of tithes was that of On, king of Mercia, towards the end of the 8th century. lie first gave the church a civil right in tithes, and enabled the clergy to recover them as their legal due. The law of Offa was at a later period extended to the whole of England by King Ethelwulph. (Prideaux, On Tithes,' 167.) At first, though every man was obliged to pay tithes, the particular church or monastery to which they should be paid appears to have been left to his own option. In the year 1200, however, Pope Inno cent III. directed a decretal epistle to the archbishop of Canterbury, in which be enjoined' the payment of tithes to the parsons of the respective parishes. This parochial appropriation of tithes has ever since been the law of England. (Coke, 2 Inst.' 641.) The tithes thus payable were of three kinds--pradiat, mixed, and personal. Pradial tithes are such as arise immediately from the
ground, as grain of all sorts, fruits, and herbs. Mixed tithes arise from things nourished by the earth, as colts, calves, pigs, lambs, chickens, milk, cheese, and eggs. Personal tithes are paid from the profits arising from the labour and industry of men engaged in trades or other occupations ; being the tenth part of the clear gain, after deducting all charges. It is sometimes stated that personal tithes seem to have been generally commuted for the more moderate tribute of Easter Offerings ; unless in fishing-towns, or other places where peculiar circumstances have caused a continuance of the primitive usages.
Tithes are further divided into great and small. The great tithes consist of corn, bay, wood, &e. ; the small tithes consist of the prandial tithes of other kinds, together with mixed and personal tithes. This distinction is arbitrary, and not dependent upon the relative value of the different kinds of tithe within a particular parish. Potatoes, for instance, grown in fields, have been adjudged to be small tithes, in whatever quantities planted ; while corn and hay in the smallest por tions still continue to be treated as great tithes. The distinction is of material cousequence, as great tithes bolong, of right, to the rector of the parish, and small tithes to the vicar.
No tithes are paid for quarries or mines, bemuse their products aro not the increase, but are part of the substance of the earth. There may, however, be tithes of minerals by custom. Neither are houses, considered separately from the soil, chargeable, as having no annual increase. By the common law of England no tithe is due for wild animals such as fish, game, &c. ; but there are local customs by which tithe has been paid from such things from time immemorial, and in those places such customary tithes may be exacted. Tame animals, kept for pleasure or curiosity, are also exempt from tithes.