of them; if a year and a half, three quarters; and if two years, then the whole; and not otherwise (3). Likewise by the statute 27 Hen. VIII. c. 8. no tenths are to be paid for the first year, for then the first-fruits are due: and by other statutes of queen Anne, in the fifth and sixth years of her reign, if a benefice be under fifty pounds per annum clear yearly value, it shall be discharged of the payment of first-fruits and tenths (4).

THUS the richer clergy, being, by the criminal bigotry of their popish predecessors, subjected at first to a foreign exaction, were afterwards, when that yoke was shaken off, liable to a like misapplication of their revenues, through the rapacious disposition of the then reigning monarch: till at length the piety of queen Anne restored to the church what had been thus indirectly taken from it. This she did, not [286] by remitting the tenths and first-fruits entirely; but, in

a spirit of the truest equity, by applying these superfluities of the larger benefices to make up the deficiencies of the smaller. And to this end she granted her royal charter, which was confirmed by the statute 2 Ann. c. 11. whereby all the revenue of first-fruits and tenths is vested in trustees for

(3) The archbishops and bishops have four years allowed for the payment, and shall pay one quarter every year, if they live so long upon the bishoprick; but other dignitaries in the church pay theirs in the same manner as rectors and vicars.

(4) After queen Anne had appropriated the revenue arising from the payment of first-fruits and tenths to the augmentation of small livings, it was considered a proper extension of this principle to exempt the smaller livings from the incumbrance of those demands; and, for that end, the bishops of every diocese were directed to inquire and certify into the exchequer what livings did not exceed 50%. a year according to the improved value at that time; and it was further provided, that such livings should be discharged from those dues in future.

ever, to form a perpetual fund for the augmentation of poor livings. This is usually called queen Anne's bounty, which has been still farther regulated by subsequent statutes (5).

o 5 Ann. c. 24. 6 Ann. c. 27. 1 Geo. I. st. 2, c. 10. 3 Geo. I. c. 10.

(5) These trustees were erected into a corporation, and have authority to make rules and orders for the distribution of this fund. The principal rules they have established are, that the sum to be allowed for each augmentation, shall be 2007. to be laid out in land, which shall be annexed for ever to the living; and they shall make this donation, first, to all livings not exceeding 101. a year; then to all livings not above 201.; and so in order, whilst any remain under 501. a year. But when any private benefactor will advance 2007. the trustees will give another 2001. for the advancement of any living not above 451. a year, though it should not belong to that class of livings which they are then augmenting. 2 Burn. Ec. L. 260.

Though this was a splendid instance of royal munificence, yet its operation is slow and inconsiderable; for the number of livings certified to be under 507. a year, was no less than 5597. of which 2538 did not exceed 201. a year each, and 1933 between 301. and 50%. a year, and the rest between 201. and 301.; so that there were 5597 benefices in this country which had less than 237. a year each upon an average. Dr. Burn calculates that from the fund alone, it will require 339 years from the year 1714, when it commenced, before all these livings can be raised to 50%. And if private benefactors should contribute half as much as the fund, (which is very improbable,) it will require 226 years. But even taking this supposition to have been true ever since the establishment, it will follow, that the wretched pittance from each of 5597 livings, both from the royal bounty and private benefaction, cannot, upon an average, have yet been augmented 97. a year. 2 Burn. E. L. 268. Yet it must be observed, that, in this calculation, he has not taken into consideration the great increase in the rentals of all estates since the valuation of these small livings was made in the time of queen Anne. Dr. Burn computes the clear amount of the bounty to make 55 augmentations yearly, that is, at 11,000l. a year; but Sir John Sinclair, Hist. Rev. 3 part, 198. says, that "this branch of the revenue "amounted to about 14,000l. per annum; and on the 1st of January 1735, the governors of that charity possessed, besides from savings

V. THE next branch of the king's ordinary revenue (which, as well as the subsequent branches, is of a lay or temporal

"and private benefactions, the sum of 152,500. of old South Sea “annuities, and 48571. of cash in the hands of their treasurer: the "state of that fund has of late years been carefully concealed; but it "probably yields, at present, from 40 to 50 thousand pounds per “annum.” This conjecture must certainly be very wide of the truth of the case; for the source of this fund is fixed and permanent, except the variation depending upon the contingency of vacancies, which will be more or fewer in different years. And what object can the commissioners have in the accumulation of this fund? For that accumulation can only arise by depriving the poor clergy of the assistance which was intended them, and to enrich the successor at the expense of the wretched incumbent of the present day. The condition of the poor clergy in this country certainly requires some further national provi. sion. Neither learning, religion, nor good morals, can secure poverty from contempt in the minds of the vulgar. The immense inequality in the revenues of the ministers of the gospel, not always resulting from piety and merit, naturally excite discontent and prejudices against the present establishment of the church. If the whole of the profits and emoluments of every benefice for one year were appropriated to this purpose, an effect would be produced in 20 or 30 years, which will require 300 by the present plan. This was what was originally understood by the first-fruits, and what actually, within the last 300 years, was paid and carried out of the kingdom to support the superstition and folly of popery. If upon any promotion to a benefice it was provided that there should be no vacancy or cession of former preferment till the end of the year, who could complain? The person promoted would be deprived of no right or property which he had previously enjoyed and even if there were any minds so sanguine as to consider themselves certain of success, it would be but a temporary disappointment of their hopes and taxes are never paid with so much cheerfulness and alacrity as upon the accession of good fortune. It would cer tainly soon yield a supply which would communicate both comfort and respectability to the indigent clergy.

:

A great effect would be produced, if one half, or any considerable proportion, were so applied. I am happy to find that a further provision for the inferior clergy has been lately recommended by some of the leading characters in both houses of parliament. See particularly

nature) consists in the rents and profits of the demesne lands of the crown. These demesne lands, terrae dominicales regis, being either the share reserved to the crown at the original distribution of landed property, or such as came to it afterwards by forfeitures or other means, were anciently very large and extensive; comprising divers manors, honors, and lordships; the tenants of which had very peculiar privileges, as will be shewn in the second book of these commentaries, when we speak of the tenure in ancient demesne. At present they are contracted within a very narrow compass, having been almost entirely granted away to private subjects. This has occasioned the parliament frequently to interpose; and, particularly, after king William III. had greatly impoverished the crown, an act passed, whereby all future grants or leases from the crown for any longer term than thirty-one years or three lives are declared to be void; except with regard to houses, which may be granted for fifty years. And no reversionary lease can be made, so as to exceed, together with the estate in being, the same term of three lives or thirty-one years: that is, where there is a subsisting lease, of which there are twenty years still to come, the king cannot grant a future interest, to commence after the expiration of the for

mer, for any longer term than eleven years. The [287] tenant must also be made liable to be punished for

committing waste; and the usual rent must be reserved, or, where there has usually been no rent, one third of the clear yearly value. The misfortune is, that this act was made too late, after almost every valuable possession of

p 1 Ann. st. 1. c. 7.

q In like manner by the civil law, the inheritance or fundi patrimoniales of the impe

rial crown could not be alienated, but only let to farm. Cod. I. 11. t. 61.

the speech of the right honorable Sir William Scott, delivered in the

house of commons on April 7th, 1802, upon a bill relative to the nonresidence of the clergy.

the crown had been granted away for ever, or else upon very long leases; but may be of some benefit to posterity, when those leases come to expire (6).

VI. HITHER might have been referred the advantages which used to arise to the king from the profits of his military tenures, to which most lands in the kingdom were subject, till the statute 12 Car. II. c. 24. which in great measure abolished them all: the explication of the nature of which tenures must be postponed to the second book of these commentaries. Hither also might have been referred the profitable prerogative of purveyance and pre-emption: which was a right enjoyed by the crown of buying up provisions and other necessaries, by the intervention of the king's purveyors, for the use of his royal household, at an appraised valuation, in preference to all others, and even without consent of the owner: and also of forcibly impressing the carriages and horses of the subject, to do the king's business on the public roads, in the conveyance of timber, baggage, and the like, however inconvenient to the proprietor, upon paying him a settled price. A prerogative which prevailed pretty generally throughout Europe, during the scarcity of gold and silver, and the high valuation of money consequential thereupon. In those early times the king's househould (as well as those of inferior lords) were supported by specific renders of corn, and other victuals, from the tenants of the respective demesnes; and there was also a continual market kept at the palace gate to furnish viands for the royal user. And this answered all purposes, in those ages of simplicity, so long as

r 4 Inst. 273.

(6) By the 26 Geo. III. c. 87. amended by 30 Geo. III. c. 50. commissioners were appointed to inquire into the state and condition of the woods, forests, and land revenues belonging to the crown, and to sell fee-farm and other unimproveable rents.