kiai, as belonged to any bishop of old time, should continue in his possession without molestation. And in the council of Vaison, 442, a decree was made that country parishes should have presbyters to preach in them as well as the city churches; and so the word "parochia" is often used by St. Jerome and Theodoret. So on the other hand parish churches' are sometimes called, dioceses.' These churches were a kind of smaller dioceses, and were afterwards called diocesan churches,' and the presbyters residing in them were called 'country presbyters.' Parish churches were called Tituli,' in distinction to the Bishop's Church, being such churches as had particular presbyters and deacons assigned them, who, on this account, are said to have a title.' This brings us to the origin of parish churches. They were of necessity established for the convenience of celebrating Christian offices and holding Christian communion with greater ease; and when the multitude of believers increased in large and populous cities so much, that one church could not contain them, there was a necessity for dividing the assembly, and erecting other churches, where the solemnities of Christian worship, and the usual offices of divine service, might be performed, as well as in the mother church, in order to answer the apostolic ordinance of holding Christian communion one with another, which was according to what we read, Acts ii., that men should continue steadfastly in the apostolic doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread and in prayers.' We find in very early writings that several of the Roman Tituli,' or parish churches, were erected for the conveniency of 'baptizing great multitudes that were converted from paganism, and for burying the martyrs.' Now the necessity of parishes and parish churches for these things will surely imply the necessity of them for all other spiritual uses; for in those days the whole body of the Christian church was used to communicate weekly at least; and it being impossible that one church should suffice in large cities for this purpose, there was a necessity for building more, that Christians might live in communion with one another; so parish churches were exactly coincident with the increased spiritual wants, and the application of spiritual supply to the people. Indeed there is high probability that in some cities there were several churches, even from the days of the apostles; and this is to be gathered from many passages in the Acts and in St. Paul's Epistles. Before the end of the third century there were more than thirty churches in Rome. Some smaller cities had country parishes attached to them; and there are many instances on record of such country regions having churches of their own, and presbyters and deacons residing in them. Thus parish churches had their

origin in city and country, as the wants of the people required it, of which the Bishop was always the proper and fit judge. We find country parishes spoken of in France in the beginning of the fifth century. In England we have not so early an account of them; the records which we have remaining of the ancient British Church have no mention of parishes; and after the Saxon conversions began, it was some time before our dioceses were divided into parishes; and longer still before they had appropriated incomes settled upon them. The division into parishes in England seems to have taken place in the archbishopric of Theodore, A.D. 673.

Ina, king of the West Saxons, in the council of Beccancelde settled the arrangement into parishes, by building churches and fixing presbyters in them, and settling incomes on them. These parish churches were served not by particular priests, but by the Clergy of the Bishop's church. They were sent out from the cathedral church for the day and returned. Settled presbyters were fixed in country churches much earlier than in town churches. The being settled in a parish, however, did not immediately entitle a presbyter to the income arising from his cure, whether in tithes, or oblations, or in any other kind; for anciently all Church incomes were delivered into the common stock of the Bishop's church, whence, by the direction and approbation of the Bishop, who was the chief administrator of the incomes of his diocese, a monthly or annual division was made among the Clergy under his jurisdiction. In the Western Church, until the sixth century, the Bishops and city Clergy had still all their incomes from a common fund, which was divided into four parts,-one for the Bishop, another for the Clergy, a third for the fabric and lights of the church, a fourth for the relief of the poor, to be dispensed by the Archdeacon, with the Bishop's approbation. Very soon after this the revenues of country churches were appropriated solely to themselves, with only an honorary acknowledgment to the Bishop.

To St. Augustine of Canterbury, desiring directions from Gregory the Great how the bishops ought to manage themselves with respect to their clergy, and particularly what distribution ought to be made of the effects and revenues of the Church, the Pope returns this answer,-That they were to be divided into four portions, one of which was to be distributed for the maintenance of the inferior clergy; who, as it appears from Bede, lived together with the bishop at the cathedral church. The bishops and clergy living in this manner in common was the custom of the Scotch clergy, no less than of the Roman; and thus, Aidan, bishop of the Northumbrians, lived with his clergy.

To these churches the converts, who lived remote from the

cathedral, repaired, and made their offerings. Those who were sent by the bishop to preach in the remoter parts of the diocese, were obliged, at their return, to bring the offerings made at the auxiliary churches, and put them into the bishop's hands; for at this time, as we have said, there were none but itinerant preachers, or priests, sent by the bishop from the cathedral, to administer the offices of religion in the country churches. These priests, when they had executed their commission, returned to the bishop, who sent others to perform the same functions when he thought it convenient. That the Church was thus governed, and the instruction of the people thus provided for, towards the latter end of the seventh century, is sufficiently evident from Bede, who tells us that, when a clergyman happened to come into a village, the people gathered about him immediately, to hear him preach: for, as this historian goes on, the clergy had no other business for travelling to any village excepting to preach and baptize, and discharge the functions of their character. And that the same custom was practised, at least in the northern dioceses of England, in the beginning of the eighth century, is plain from several places of the historian abovementioned.

Thus we see the bishops had then their clergy about them, whom they sent abroad, as they saw cause, to those places where they had the best prospect of success; but as yet there was no such thing as fixed cures or titles, all the first titles being nothing else than an entry of the clergy upon the bishop's register; and when the priest stood upon the record, and the relation was thus fixed, he had not the liberty of discharging himself, and removing to another diocese, without the bishop's consent.

The rural churches in England were not thrown into any parochial distinction for some time, but served only for the convenience of the neighbouring converts, who lived at too great a distance from the cathedral. To speak strictly, therefore, these country churches were no more than chapels-of-ease to the cathedral church. We may observe, further, that, in the first foundations of bishoprics among the Saxons, the dioceses, excepting in Kent, had the same limits with the kingdoms. As kings founded cathedrals for the benefit of their whole dominions, so, afterwards, great men founded parochial churches for the convenience of themselves and their dependents; for at that time the great men held large proportions in the country, within the compass of which the bulk of the people were little better than their servants. Upon the spreading of Christianity, therefore, many laymen of great estates provided for the constant residence of some priest among them; that, by this means, the devotion of the neighbourhood might be encouraged, and them

selves and their tenants assisted. To this purpose chapels and churches were erected, and a maintenance settled for the incumbent; the bounds of the parochial division being commonly the same with those of the founder's jurisdiction. Some foundations of this kind were as early as Justinian. They are likewise mentioned by Bede about the year 700. The distinction of parishes, as they now stand, appears to have been settled before the Norman conquest; for, in several charters of the latter Saxon kings, the villages of Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Lincolnshire, &c., are set down under the same names by which they go at present, in Doomsday Book.

This historical sketch of parishes and their arrangements will, perhaps, show this fact, that the whole parochial arrangement was made simply to expedite the intercourse of the Bishop or Priest with the people; that as this became difficult, from the spread of the Church, or the increased population of dioceses, parishes were formed; and that where parishes were not formed till later, it was only because the people were still in connexion with the Bishop and a cathedral church. This was the case in England until a very late date, as we find that for very long in this country, the Bishop's cathedral was the only church in a diocese, from whence itinerant preachers were sent to convert the country people, who for some time resorted to the cathedral for divine worship. Private oratories were first built for the conveniency of those who could not reach the cathedral; but these were within parish bounds.

All this brings before us strongly the fact, that the position of a Priest placed in a parish, with respect to the Catholic Church, is that of one who has a mission to carry out effectually the spiritual discipline of the Church; that the parochial arrangement is merely one accidentally resorted to by the Church to effect more easily this discipline, and that the secular business of parishes, in which Priests become often wholly absorbed, is not their high and paramount duty; and that when they view themselves in the light of men chiefly called to make secular arrangements, they are untrue to their high and holy office, and unfaithful to the call and commission of the Church, whose Priests they are. Many now-a-days really seem to look at the position of a Priest in a parish as that of a man who is to attend and manage a parish vestry, and that his highest office lies in being a sharp ready chairman of various committees and institutions. How little is it remembered, that the application of the discipline of the Church, calling men to confession and preparation for Holy Communion, are the works to which the Priest is called, and for which the parochial arrangement was made; in fact, the carrying out, by a certain number of

individuals, the arrangement and discipline of the Church universal. The fact is, that now men either wholly lose sight of the strictly spiritual calling of the Priesthood in a parish, or they seek to fulfil it by means which are uncatholic and untrue; while, still more perversely, others consider their highest spiritual calling to be to men beyond the limits of their flock, and while the very smallest number which may be committed to their parochial charge are, alas! too many for them to find time and strength to subdue to the full teaching and treatment of the Church; satisfied with having given them a dry statement of doctrine, they seek on some distant platform or pulpit, to bring the same hollow system to bear on others. All this is bad. Man has a moral nature, which requires a close and intricate management. The discipline and treatment of that nature is the work which the Church is commissioned to undertake, and she has willingly done so. For ease and convenience she has appointed her people to different shepherds, and this work to which she has called and ordained them is the work of their lives-the one absorbing point and object of their existence. There are wants in man which her system can meet; wants which are known to exist by any Clergyman who watches with the slightest degree of interest the people committed to his charge: but men will adopt systems of their own, and not that of the Church,-and the wants are not supplied.

A Clergyman enters on a parish, and finds a number of souls gathered into a community employed in different works and trades, and he sees too plainly that though baptized and instructed to a certain degree in religious truth, they are forgetful, and are living for this world, and, in some respects, are leading lives as careless as heathens. He sees it with pain. It is a fearful state of things. He feels that he is the shepherd to whom their souls are committed, and that he must give account of their state; that he is responsible for their condition to a great degree, or at least that he is bound to do his best to bring them out of it. What is to be done? He begins the work perhaps by preaching earnest and lively sermons to arouse them: at first the work seems to succeed, and numbers come to listen. But it does not tell in the end. The novelty wears away. The same spirit of worldliness exists; and, by degrees, he finds that those who fall under the constant influence of this mode of teaching, are not those who require rousing. What is to be done? He resorts to individual teaching, to reading, and direct instruction in high and holy truths, equally for those who are inclined for it, as for those who are not,-and presses these means continually upon them, by the mere force of repetition calling back forgotten truths, and striving to arouse the almost dead con