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Benefice   Listen
noun
Benefice  n.  
1.
A favor or benefit. (Obs.)
2.
(Feudal Law) An estate in lands; a fief. Note: Such an estate was granted at first for life only, and held on the mere good pleasure of the donor; but afterward, becoming hereditary, it received the appellation of fief, and the term benefice became appropriated to church livings.
3.
An ecclesiastical living and church preferment, as in the Church of England; a church endowed with a revenue for the maintenance of divine service. See Advowson. Note: All church preferments are called benefices, except bishoprics, which are called dignities. But, ordinarily, the term dignity is applied to bishoprics, deaneries, archdeaconries, and prebendaryships; benefice to parsonages, vicarages, and donatives.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Benefice" Quotes from Famous Books



... is much difference between me and this Dante. He fled from country because he had one bad tongue which he shook at his betters. I fly because benefice gone, and head going; not on account of the badness of ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow

... being at the same time named by the pope, he had refused to admit this person, whose title was not legal, till he made a composition with his son, and agreed to pay him a hundred pounds a year from the income of the benefice; that he had purchased, from one Tydeman, of Limborch, an old and forfeited annuity of fifty pounds a year upon the crown, and had engaged the king to admit that bad debt; and that, when created earl of Suffolk, he had obtained a grant of ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume

... request your attention to the following passage, cited by Diana from Gaspar Hurtado (De Sub. Pecc., diff. 9; Diana, p. 5; tr. 14, r. 99), one of Escobar's four-and-twenty fathers: 'An incumbent may, without any mortal sin, desire the decease of a life-renter on his benefice, and a son that of his father, and rejoice when it happens; provided always it is for the sake of the profit that is to accrue from the event, and not from ...
— Classic French Course in English • William Cleaver Wilkinson

... The reform of clerical abuses was advanced by an act to prevent non-residence, and by another to obviate the delay in instituting to benefices practised by bishops with a view to (p. 349) keeping the tithes of the vacant benefice in their own hands. The breach with Rome was widened still further by a statute, declaring all who extolled the Pope's authority to be guilty of praemunire, imposing an oath of renunciation on all lay and clerical officers, and making the refusal of that oath high treason. Thus the ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard

... terrors of the law were now put in force. A new Act of Uniformity was passed, and armed with this, the bishops with Bramhall, the Primate, at their head, insisted upon an acceptance of the Prayer-book being enforced upon all who were permitted to hold any benefice, or to teach or preach in any church ...
— The Story Of Ireland • Emily Lawless

... raised the funds necessary for his campaign to reestablish and support the papal authority. This simony of his, says Dr. Jacob Burckhardt, "grew to unheard-of proportions, and extended from the appointment of cardinals down to the sale of the smallest benefice." ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini

... fained ought more warie bee. There thou must walke in sober gravitee, And seeme as Saintlike as Sainte Radegund: Fast much, pray oft, looke lowly on the ground, And unto everie one doo curtesie meeke: These lookes (nought saying) doo a benefice seeke, And be thou sure one not to ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church

... successful. From whom, then, came the attempt to change? Why, from those only who had an alien interest, an indirect interest, an interest of ambition in its subversion. As matters stood in the spring of 1834, the patron of each benefice, acting under the severest restraints—restraints which (if the church courts did their duty) left no room or possibility for an unfit man to creep in, nominated the incumbent. In a spiritual sense, the church had all power: by refusing, first of all, to "license" unqualified persons; secondly, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various

... mother the daughter of a preacher. The father's people dwelt in the province of Smland and the mother's ancestors had lived in the picturesque province of Vrmland. The future poet was born on the 13 of November, 1782, at Kyrkerud, Vrmland, his father holding a benefice in that province. While he was yet a mere child of nine the father died and the family was left in poverty. A friend of the Tegnr family, the judicial officer Branting, gave the young Esaias a home in his house. ...
— Fritiofs Saga • Esaias Tegner

... house; but it was one of those houses that had suffered sorely in the recent strife, and whose members had been scattered and cut off. He had no powerful relatives and friends to turn to now for promotion to rich benefice or high ecclesiastical preferment, and he had certainly never lamented this fact. In heart and soul he was a follower of the rules of poverty laid down by the founder of his order, and would have thought ...
— The Secret Chamber at Chad • Evelyn Everett-Green

... but yet I hope just, And with good conscience too, although I am restrained from my lust. But this is it, Cousin Simplicity, I would request you to do for me, Which is to get Lady Love and Lady Conscience' hand to a letter, That by their means I may get some benefice, to make ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley

... gradually broken and dissolved. They were even broken and dissolved sooner than those which bound the same ranks of people to the great barons; because the benefices of the church being, the greater part of them, much smaller than the estates of the great barons, the possessor of each benefice was much sooner able to spend the whole of its revenue upon his own person. During the greater part of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the power of the great barons was, through the greater part of ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith

... commissioners, called Triers. Most of these persons were Independent divines; but a few Presbyterian ministers and a few laymen had seats. The certificate of the Triers stood in the place both of institution and of induction; and without such a certificate no person could hold a benefice. This was undoubtedly one of the most despotic acts ever done by any English ruler. Yet, as it was generally felt that, without some such precaution, the country would be overrun by ignorant and drunken reprobates, bearing the name and receiving the pay of ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... effort seems to have been spared by the beneficiaries to enlarge the tenure, and to continue their lands in their family after death. Through the feebleness of Charlemagne's successors these attempts were universally successful, and the Benefice gradually transformed itself into the hereditary Fief. But, though the fiefs were hereditary, they did not necessarily descend to the eldest son. The rules of succession which they followed were entirely determined by the terms agreed upon between ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine

... against such frauds, it is farther provided, 5. That every voter shall have been in the actual possession, or receipt of the profits, of his freehold to his own use for twelve calendar months before; except it came to him by descent, marriage, marriage settlement, will, or promotion to a benefice or office. 6. That no person shall vote in respect of an annuity or rentcharge, unless registered with the clerk of the peace twelve calendar months before. 7. That in mortgaged or trust-estates, the person in possession, ...
— Commentaries on the Laws of England - Book the First • William Blackstone

... estate by seeking the Lord during the reign of the saints, contrived to keep what he had got by persecuting the saints during the reign of the strumpets, and more than one priest who, during repeated changes in the discipline and doctrines of the Church, had remained constant to nothing but his benefice. ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... made a good beginning. Besides his regular income, moreover, he had handsome receipts from that simony which was reduced to a system, and which gave him a liberal profit, generally in the shape of an annuity, upon every benefice which he conferred. He was, however, by no means satisfied. His appetite was as boundless as the sea; he was still a shameless mendicant of pecuniary favors and lucrative offices. Already, in 1552, the Emperor had roundly rebuked his greediness. "As ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... rigid subscription, abjuring the lawfulness of resistance and the Solemn League and Covenant, was imposed upon every holder of a benefice, or of an office in a University. This created bitter opposition when the Bill was sent back to the Lords, and the discussion mainly turned upon the express repudiation of the Covenant, to which many laymen had already sworn. These, while they consented to its ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... the angry Mab with blisters plagues, because their breath with Sweet meats tainted are. Sometime she gallops ore a Courtiers nose, & then dreames he of smelling out a sute: & somtime comes she with Tith pigs tale, tickling a Parsons nose as a lies asleepe, then he dreames of another Benefice. Sometime she driueth ore a Souldiers necke, & then dreames he of cutting Forraine throats, of Breaches, Ambuscados, Spanish Blades: Of Healths fiue Fadome deepe, and then anon drums in his eares, at which he startes and wakes; and being ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... patcht on Pauls Church door To seek some vacant vicarage before? Who wants a churchman that can service say, Read fast and fair his monthly homily? And wed and bury and make Christen-souls?[160] Come to the left-side alley of St. Paules. Thou servile fool, why could'st thou not repair To buy a benefice at Steeple-Fair? There moughtest thou, for but a slendid price, Advowson thee with some fat benefice: Or if thee list not wait for dead mens shoon, Nor pray each morn the incumbents days were doone: A thousand patrons ...
— English Satires • Various

... them who then had authority, that they appointed him to read a divinity lecture in the college of Fothringham. The college of Fothringham being dissolved, he was placed to be a reader in the minster at Litchfield. After a certain space, he departed from Litchfield to a benefice in Leicestershire, called Church-langton, where he held a residence, taught diligently, and kept a liberal house. Thence he was orderly called to take a benefice in the city of London, namely, All-hallows ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... The poet's hell, its tortures, fiends, and flames, To this were trifles, toys, and empty names. With foolish pride my heart was never fired, Nor the vain itch to admire, or be admired; I hoped for no commission from his Grace; I bought no benefice, I begged no place; Had no new verses, nor new suit to show; Yet went to Court!—the Devil would have it so. But, as the fool that in reforming days Would go to Mass in jest (as story says) Could not but think, to pay his fine was ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope

... the offer of another benefice [The Rectory of Wansted in Essex, to which he was presented.] by Sir Robert Brookes, who was his tutor, he by my Lord Barkeley is made one of the Duke's Chaplains, which qualifies him for two livings. But to see how ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... who was of equal force; they are therefore called by Salvio the light and glory of chess. He was the favorite of many Italian Princes, and particularly of the Duke of Urbino, and of several Cardinals, and even of Pope Pius V. himself, who would have given him a considerable benefice, if he would have become a clergyman; but this he declined, that he might follow his own inclinations. He afterward went to Venice, where a circumstance happened which had never occurred before: he played with a person and lost. Having ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... another foreign senator of his appointing, and also allowed him to fortify the castle of Saint Angelo: having returned upon these conditions, in order to enrich the church, he ordained that everyone, upon vacating a benefice, should pay a year's value of it to the ...
— History Of Florence And Of The Affairs Of Italy - From The Earliest Times To The Death Of Lorenzo The Magnificent • Niccolo Machiavelli

... niece of Archbishop Laud, was invited to perform the ceremony;—"A man," says Dr Whitaker, "of very different principles from his patron; for he complied with all changes but the last, and retained his benefice till August 24, 1662, when he went out on the Bartholomew Act, and retired to a small house at Deepleach Hill, near Rochdale, where he frequently preached ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby

... yourselves, like those poor youths who enter the seminaries, believing that a mitre awaits them or a fat benefice on the other side of the door. It is the influence and attraction still exercised by the great things that have been. Let us see—apart from the material result of the profession—why do you ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... gloomy philosopher here, some theological bear, forever taking occasion to growl down the stock of human nature (with ulterior views, d'ye see, to a fat benefice in the gift of the worshipers of Ariamius), he would pronounce that the sign of a hardening heart and a softening brain. Yes, that would be his sinister construction. But it's nothing more than the oddity of a genial humor—genial but dry. Confess ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville

... which. But carry the O'Rapley's theory into daily life, and test it by common observation, what do you find? Why, that this round square is by no means a modern invention. It has been worked in all periods of our history. Here is a Vicar with a rich benefice, intended by nature for a Jockey or ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris

... sette not his Benefice to hire, And lette his shepe accombred in the mire, And ran unto London, unto S. Paules To seken him a Chanterie for soules, Or with a Brotherhede to be withold But dwelt at home, ...
— Memorials of Old London - Volume I • Various

... to him, and taxed him with Disingenuity. He to clear himself made the subsequent Defence, and that in the most solemn Manner possible: That he was applied to and instigated to accept of a Benefice: That a conditional Offer thereof was indeed made him at first, but with Disdain by him rejected: That when nothing (as they easily perceived) of this Nature could bring him to their Purpose, Assurance of his being entirely ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... might laugh, the public will not. In like manner, in the controversy about Pope, he claps Mr. Bowles on the back with a coarse facetious familiarity, as if he were his chaplain whom he had invited to dine with him, or was about to present to a benefice. The reverend divine might submit to the obligation, but he has no occasion to subscribe to the jest. If it is a jest that Mr. Bowles should be a parson, and Lord Byron a peer, the world knew this before; there was no need to write a ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt

... throughout the fourteenth. This is most distinctly expressed in the statutes of 1393, which threatened with the severest penalties all participation in any attempt, to the injury of the King's supremacy, to obtain a church-benefice from Rome; and this too even where the King had given his consent to it. Clergy and laity were thus allied against the encroachments of the Roman Curia. Wolsey was now accused of having transgressed this statute:[108] he had in virtue ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke

... light for the discouery of the Westerne partes yet vnknowen: as your studie in those things is very commendable, so I thanke you much for the same; wishing you do continue, your trauell in these and like matters, which are like to turne not only to your owne good in priuate, but to the publike benefice of this Realme. And so I bid you farewell. From the Court the 11. ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of - the English Nation. Vol. XIII. America. Part II. • Richard Hakluyt

... Lusk, in the reign of Edward IV. (1465), illustrates this. An Act of Parliament was passed to declare the aforesaid "Shan O'Kerry," or "John of Kevernon," to be "English born, and of English nation," and that he might "hold and enjoy the said benefice." ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (2 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert

... rested and that was joy to him. And again, his true pastor's heart had been gladdened by the way his ministrations had been received that afternoon. A sour old man who had always scowled at him for an upstart, in his foolish old desire to be loyal to the priest who had held the benefice before him, had melted at last and asked his pardon and God's for having treated him so ill; and he had prepared the old man for death with great contentment to them both, and had left him at peace with God and man. On looking back on it all afterwards he was convinced ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson

... wretched folk do, for our knowledge and our life are less worthy than thine?" And this word of Master Gerard had so great weight that this same Peter did afterward renounce his pastoral charge and did maintain himself upon a single benefice, and that one to which no cure was attached. Gerard, moreover, wrote profitable treatises, and many letters to divers persons, and from these writings one may see readily enough how great a zeal ...
— The Chronicle of the Canons Regular of Mount St. Agnes • Thomas a Kempis

... the whole life of their son was spent out of Ireland. He was sent to school at Halifax, in Yorkshire, and thence went to Cambridge University, where he graduated in due season. Taking Anglican orders in 1738, he was immediately appointed to the benefice of Sutton-in-the-Forest, near York, and on his marriage in 1741 with Elizabeth Lumley he received the additional living of Stillington. He was also given sundry prebendal and other appointments in connection with the chapter of the archdiocese of York. He spent nearly ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox

... ecclesiastical lands applied to the military service: 1st, that the churches having the ownership of those lands should share the revenue with the lay holder; 2d, that on the death of a warrior in enjoyment of an ecclesiastical benefice, the benefice should revert to the Church; 3d, that every benefice by deprivation whereof any church would be reduced to poverty should be at once restored to her. That this capitular was carried out, or even capable of being carried out, is very doubtful; but ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... no. I make about twelve thousand francs a year, without counting a little benefice of a thousand crowns the prince ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... in Mrs. Lightfoot's lodgings, at the sign of the Wheatsheaf, or more properly starving, for he had only ten pounds a year paid to him out of the benefice that had been taken away from him; and though that went farther then than it would do now, it would not have maintained him, but that his good hostess charged him as little as she could afford, and he also had a few pupils ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Mr Bowley is altogether a new man; brisk, cheerful, and active, he has a smile for everybody, and a joke and a 'good-morning' even for the cobbler, who has the cure of soles in that very questionable benefice, the Mews. He visits his tap-room guests, and informs them of a plan which is in operation to improve the condition of the labouring-classes, of which they will hear more by and by. He is profoundly impressed ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 427 - Volume 17, New Series, March 6, 1852 • Various

... unprincipled noble, now almost fifty years old, a thorough rake, of large revenues, but deeply in debt. He was Peer of France, Archbishop of Strasburg, Grand Almoner of France, Commander of the Order of the Holy Ghost, Commendator of the benefice of St. Wast d'Arras, said to be the most wealthy in Europe, and a Cardinal. He had been ambassador at Vienna a little after Marie Antoinette was married to the Dauphin, and while there had taken advantage of his official station to do a tremendous quantity of smuggling. ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum

... heard that the pope by vertue of his prouision had giuen the archbishoprike of Yorke vnto maister Robert Halom; but the king was so offended therewith, that the said Robert might in no wise inioy that benefice, [Sidenote: Henrie Bowet archbishop of Yorke.] and so at length, to satisfie the kings pleasure, maister Henrie Bowet was translated from Bath vnto Yorke, and maister Robert Halom was made bishop of Salisburie then void by remoouing of Henrie Chichellie ...
— Chronicles (3 of 6): Historie of England (1 of 9) - Henrie IV • Raphael Holinshed

... talk about Brian Walford there followed a good deal of talk about Mr. Jardine. He was promised a living, not a big benefice by any means, but still an actual living and an actual Vicarage, in the vicinity of Salisbury Plain; and he and Bessie were to be married early in the following year, as soon as there were enough spring flowers to decorate Kingthorpe ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon

... would faine haue persuaded Anselme to haue shewed himselfe comformable to the kings pleasure, and therefore tooke paines with him earnestlie in that behalfe, but all would not serue. He answered indeed verie curteouslie, but his benefice he would not renounce, as touching the name and office, though in exterior things he were neuer so much disquieted. The king perceiuing him to stand stiffe in his opinion, said vnto his lords; "His words are euer contrarie to my mind, and I will not take him for my freend, whosoeuer dooth ...
— Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland (2 of 6): England (2 of 12) - William Rufus • Raphael Holinshed

... many such Dismal Things are sent forth thus, with very small tackling; so not a few are predestinated thither by their friends, from the foresight of a good benefice. If there be rich pasture, profitable customs, and that HENRY VIII. has taken out no toll, the Holy Land is a very good land, and affords abundance of milk and honey! Far be it from their consciences, the considering whether the lad is likely to be serviceable to the Church, or to make ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe

... Abbots, Priors, and so forth, were no longer vested in ecclesiastics, but in lay impropriators of the church revenues, or, as the Scottish lawyers called them, titulars of the temporalities of the benefice, though having no claim to the spiritual character of ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott

... or customs, or to hold any business relations with them, and what was worse, the line of division was to be recognised even within the sanctuary. No Irishman was to be admitted into cathedral or collegiate chapters or into any benefice situated in English territory, and religious houses were warned against admitting any Irish novices, although they were quite free to accept English subjects born in Ireland[3] (1367). This statute did not represent a change of policy in regard ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance • Rev. James MacCaffrey

... alday thei slepe, 310 Bot of the world is noght foryete; For wel is him that now may gete Office in Court to ben honoured. The stronge coffre hath al devoured Under the keye of avarice The tresor of the benefice, Wherof the povere schulden clothe And ete and drinke and house bothe; The charite goth al unknowe, For thei no grein of Pite sowe: 320 And slouthe kepeth the libraire Which longeth to the Saintuaire; To studie ...
— Confessio Amantis - Tales of the Seven Deadly Sins, 1330-1408 A.D. • John Gower

... he had found these portraits there, and had left them. They were priests, and probably donors—two reasons for respecting them. All that he knew about these two persons was, that they had been appointed by the king, the one to his bishopric, the other to his benefice, on the same day, the 27th of April, 1785. Madame Magloire having taken the pictures down to dust, the Bishop had discovered these particulars written in whitish ink on a little square of paper, yellowed by time, and ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... good speakers and writers in any language, or then custome hath allowed, & is the common fault of young schollers not halfe well studied before they come from the Vniuersitie or schooles, and when they come to their friends, or happen to get some benefice or other promotion in their countreys, will seeme to coigne fine wordes out of the Latin, and to vse new fangled speaches, thereby to shew thenselues among the ...
— The Arte of English Poesie • George Puttenham

... audacity. Yet nothing worse came to Knox than questions, by the Council, as to his refusal of a benefice, and his declining, as he still did, to kneel at the Communion (April 14, 1553). His answers prove that he was out of harmony with the fluctuating Anglicanism of the hour. Northumberland could not then resent the audacities of pulpiteers, ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang

... in his treatment of Wessel. 'Ask what you please as a parting gift', he said to the scholar, who was preparing to set out for Friesland. 'Give me books from your library, Greek and Hebrew', was the request. 'What? No benefice, no grant of office or fees? Why not?' 'Because I don't want them', came the quiet reply. The books were forthcoming—one, a Greek Gospels, was perhaps the parent of a copy which reached Erasmus for the second edition ...
— The Age of Erasmus - Lectures Delivered in the Universities of Oxford and London • P. S. Allen

... (annatae, annalia), originally the income which a bishop received from the vacant benefices in his diocese, usually amounting to a year's income of the benefice. By a decree of John XXII, 1317 (Extrav. Jn. XXII, Lib. I, C. 2), the annates are fixed at one-half of one year's income of the benefice reckoned on the basis of the tithes, and payable on accession of the new incumbent. Two years later (1319) ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther

... should they make the required payment, they were nevertheless to stand banished from Tuscany for two years; and for perpetual memory of their misdeeds their names were to be inscribed in the Statutes of the People, and as swindlers and barrators they were never to hold office or benefice within the city or ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... was spent in the quiet rectory of Harpsden, for her father was one of the more conscientious of the gently born clergy of that day, living entirely on his benefice, and greatly beloved in his neighbourhood as an exemplary parish-priest. 'He was one of the most contented, quiet, sweet-tempered, generous, cheerful men I ever knew,' so says the chronicler of the Leigh family, 'and his wife was his counterpart. ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh

... into the World, a good benefice befel him, added unto the estate of a Gentleman, left him by his Father; whom he succeeded in his Ministry, at the place of his Nativity: Which one would imagine Temptations enough to keep ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... representing the CHANCELLOR OF THE DUCHY OF LANCASTER," bristles with minute information respecting number of livings in gift of the Duchy in West Riding of Yorkshire, together with amount of income of each benefice and nature of the security. Equally master of intricate case of the calamity overshadowing the Pontefract Cricket Club whose playing pitch has been damaged through ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, June 24, 1914 • Various

... Bishop Peter and the legate to join together against the justiciar and the archbishop. Finding that the legate was too strong for him, Langton betook himself to Rome, and remained there nearly a year. Before he went home he persuaded Honorius to promise not to confer the same benefice twice by papal provision, and to send no further legate to England during his lifetime. Pandulf was at once recalled, and left England in July, 1221, a month before his rival's return. He was compensated for the slight put upon ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout

... completed his studies abroad. Upon a vacancy in the Abbacy of Melrose, he had sufficient interest to procure the King's letters of commendation to the Pope, in the year 1526, and notwithstanding powerful rival claims, he succeeded in the following year in obtaining the benefice. Andrew, Abbot of Melrose, was present at the trial of Sir John Borthwick, in 1540; and he appears as an Extraordinary Lord of Session on the 2d of July 1541. On the following day, he was recommended to be successor to Henry Wemyss as Bishop ...
— The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6) • John Knox

... the other, "that you should be under any such misapprehension. Let me remind you that only a year ago you yourself recommended him for an honorary benefice—a church ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman

... sequence, heredity, and such like, were the buttons of his coat and the texture of his breeches, and the warmth of his body inside them. Therefore he never could hold aloof from the Free and Frisky gatherings, and accepted the chair upon Bumper-nights, when it was a sinecure benefice. ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore

... degrees, who possess certain property," says the Oxford University Calendar, "must go out, as it is termed, Grand Compounders. The property required for this purpose may arise from two distinct sources; either from some ecclesiastical benefice or benefices, or else from some other revenue, civil or ecclesiastical. The ratio of computation in the first case is expressly limited by statute to the value of the benefice or benefices, as rated in the King's books, without regard to the actual ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall

... archbishoprics in the Church. A hundred and fifty thousand francs a year were attached to it, and it was difficult to say whether Dubois was most tempted by the title of successor to Fenelon, or by the rich benefice. ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)

... lettred that nowe is made a lorde, Nor eche a clerke that hath a benefice; They are not all lawyers that pleas do recorde, All that are promoted are not fully wise; On suche chaunce nowe fortune throwes her dice That though we knowe but the yrishe game, Yet would ...
— Bibliomania in the Middle Ages • Frederick Somner Merryweather

... for the father, Dr Pendle could never bring himself to like the son, and determined in his own mind to confer a benefice on him when possible, if only to get rid of him; but not the rich one of Heathcroft, which was the delectable land of Cargrim's desire. The bishop intended to bestow that on Gabriel; and Cargrim, ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume

... traveling, met a priest riding post. Ordering him to stop, he asked hastily, "Whence? whither? for what?" He answered, "Bruges—Paris—a benefice." ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various

... any other events in his life, nor other benefice, than that of Etrepigny. He died in the odor of sanctity in the year 1733, fifty-five years old. It is believed that, disgusted with life, he expressly refused necessary food, because during his ...
— Superstition In All Ages (1732) - Common Sense • Jean Meslier

... inclination and meek behaviour, that 'twas real principle and not a vanity or conceit that led him into these thoughts, I am resolved, in case your lordship thinks him worthy of the ministry, to procure him a benefice as soon as anything happens in my power, and in the mean time design to keep him as my chaplain ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 37. Saturday, July 13, 1850 • Various

... At the same time Clement wished to provide for him for life. He first proposed that Buonarroti should promise not to marry, and should enter into minor orders. This would have enabled him to enjoy some ecclesiastical benefice, but it would also have handed him over firmly bound to the service of the Pope. Circumstances already hampered him enough, and Michelangelo, who chose to remain his own master, refused. As Berni wrote: "Voleva far da se, non comandato." As an alternative, a pension ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds

... Head Master shall give his personal attention to the duties of the School. He shall not undertake any office or employment interfering with the proper performance of his duties as Head Master. He shall not hold any benefice having the cure of souls, nor during a school term perform for payment any ...
— A History of Giggleswick School - From its Foundation 1499 to 1912 • Edward Allen Bell

... successors, or assume the title of heir of the monarchy, or declare war without the consent of the Diet, or impose taxes of any description, or have power to appoint his ambassadors, or any foreigner to a benefice in the church; that he should convoke the Diet every two years; and that he should not marry without its permission. He also was required to furnish four thousand French troops, in case of war; to ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord

... sustain, decay through his default and fall to ruin under him, and seeth that to the amendment thereof he leaveth his own duty undone; then would I in any wise advise him to leave off that thing—be it spiritual benefice that he have, parsonage or bishopric, or temporal office and authority—and rather give it over quite and draw himself aside and serve God, than to take the worldly worship and commodity for himself, with incommodity of those whom his duty ...
— Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation - With Modifications To Obsolete Language By Monica Stevens • Thomas More

... by coach to St. James's, where by and by up to the Duke of York, where, among other things, our parson Mills having the offer of another benefice by Sir Robert Brookes, who was his pupil, he by my Lord Barkeley [of Stratton] is made one of the Duke's Chaplains, which qualifies him for two livings. But to see how slightly such things are done, the Duke of York only taking my Lord Barkeley's word upon saying, that we the officers ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... seemingly the same as to take it away from him, since "to lack little is almost the same as to lack nothing at all," as the Philosopher says (Phys. ii, 5). Now when anyone prevents a man from obtaining a benefice or the like, seemingly he is not bound to restore the benefice, since this would be sometimes impossible. Therefore it is not necessary for salvation to restore ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... Findon in 1276, Galfridus de Aspall, seems to have brought the art of pluralising to a finer point than most. In addition to being rector of Findon, he had, Mr. Lower tells us, a benefice in London, two in the diocese of Lincoln, one in Rochester, one in Hereford, one in Coventry, one in Salisbury, and seven in Norwich. He was also Canon of St. Paul's and Master of St. Leonard's ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas

... said the curate, some simple benefice or cure, or some place as sacristan which brings them a good fixed income, not counting the altar fees, which may be reckoned at ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... hand an authority of an indefinite kind, which it was presumed that his sacred office would forbid him to abuse, but which, however, if he so unfortunately pleased, he might abuse at his discretion. He had absolute power over every nomination to an English benefice; he might refuse his consent till such adequate reasons, material or spiritual, as he considered sufficient to induce him to acquiesce, had been submitted to his consideration. In the case of nominations to the religious houses, the superiors of the ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude

... Magus, Acts VIII. The crime of buying or selling ecclesiastical preferment or the corrupt presentation of any one to an ecclesiastical benefice for money or reward." ...
— Lalage's Lovers - 1911 • George A. Birmingham

... On the poore he bestoweth his paines & charges gratis: of the rich he taketh moderately, but leaues the one halfe behind, in gift amongst the houshould, if he be called abroad to visit any: The rest together with the profits of his benefice (rather charitably accepted then strictly exacted from his Parishioners) he powreth out with both hands in pios vsus, and will hardly suffer a penny to sleepe, but ...
— The Survey of Cornwall • Richard Carew

... Crawley was a strict man,—a strict, stern, unpleasant man, and one who feared God and his own conscience. We must say a word or two of Mr. Crawley and his concerns. He was now some forty years of age, but of these he had not been in possession even of his present benefice for more than four or five. The first ten years of his life as a clergyman had been passed in performing the duties and struggling through the life of a curate in a bleak, ugly, cold parish on the northern coast of Cornwall. It had been a weary life and a fearful ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope

... we call in Scripture and tradition to prove that cutting down one's enemy from behind, and in an ambush is a treacherous murder? Or that giving a present of money to secure an ecclesiastical benefice is to purchase it? Of course, there are teachings which deserve our contempt, and can only be dealt with by mockery. Are you, fathers, to be permitted to teach that it is lawful to slay in order to avoid a blow and an affront, yet are we ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various

... frequently sums up by stating that the population of the parish is very small, and so the clergyman's duty very light. I always read such a statement with great displeasure. For it seems to imply, that a clergyman's great object is, to enjoy his benefice and do as little duty as possible in return for it. I suppose it need not be proved, that if such were truly the great object of any parson, he has no business to be in the Church at all. Failing health, or ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd

... acts and conclusions of the General Assembly, kept in Glasgow 1610, did innovate and change some words of that oath of allegiance which the General Assembly, in reference to the conference kept 1751, ordained to be given to the person provided to any benefice with cure, in the time of his admission, by the ordinate. For the form of the oath, set down by the Act of the Assembly, beginneth thus: "I, A. B., now nominate and admitted to the kirk of D., utterly testify and declare in my conscience, ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie

... disturb the current of my ideas. The postulate was, in Scottish phrase, the candidate for some benefice which he had not yet attained. George Douglas, who stabbed Rizzio, was the postulate for the temporal possessions of the rich abbey ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... be pastured, not to be shaven and shorn." At the close of this reign indeed the deaneries of Lichfield, Salisbury, and York, the archdeaconry of Canterbury, which was reputed the wealthiest English benefice, together with a host of prebends and preferments, were held by Italian cardinals and priests, while the Pope's collector from his office in London sent twenty thousand marks a year to the ...
— History of the English People, Volume II (of 8) - The Charter, 1216-1307; The Parliament, 1307-1400 • John Richard Green

... delayed the preparations for departure, hoping that Calixtus would forget him. It was not so: two months after he received the letter from the pope, there arrived at Valencia a prelate from Rome, the bearer of Roderigo's nomination to a benefice worth 20,000 ducats a year, and also a positive order to the holder of the post to come and take possession of his charge as soon ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... of the priests of Paris, and he allowed himself to wear a brown frock-coat. No ambition had ever crept into that pure heart, which the angels would some day carry to God in all its pristine innocence. It required the gentle firmness of the daughter of Louis XVI. to induce him to accept a benefice in Paris, humble as it was. As he now entered the room he glanced with an uneasy eye at the magnificence before him, smiled at the three delighted people, and ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac

... some years. In the year 1576, the earl of Morton being then regent, and thinking to bring Mr. Melvil into his party, who were endeavouring to introduce episcopacy, he offered him the parsonage of Govan, a benefice of twenty-four chalders of grain, yearly, beside what he enjoyed as principal, providing he would not insist against the establishment of bishops, but Mr. Melvil rejected ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie

... resort to the solicitor for farms, for improvements, reductions, leases, to negotiate advances, to insure for the various affairs of life. The clergyman comes on questions that arise out of his benefice, the churchyard, ecclesiastical privileges, the schools, and about his own private property. The labourer comes about his cottage and garden—an estate as important to him as his three thousand acres to the squire—or as a witness. The ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies

... he indignantly disclaimed all part in the transaction, and it is said that he added, "Sir, I know what is due to private regard as a man—and as a minister what must be yielded to parliamentary influence; but I never could have advised the bestowing ecclesiastical benefice and dignity upon any one whose conduct was ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth

... scales in favour of the students. There were no buildings and no endowments to render a migration difficult, and migration did from time to time take place. The masters themselves were dependent upon fees for their livelihood; they were, at Bologna, frequently laymen with no benefice to fall back upon, and with wives and children to maintain. As time went on and the teaching masters became a limited number of professors, they were given salaries, at first by the student-universities themselves and afterwards by the city, which feared to offend the student-universities. ...
— Life in the Medieval University • Robert S. Rait

... naturally looked at the property attached to a benefice as a mere incident and considered the spiritual prerogatives the main thing. And since the clergy alone could rightly confer these, it was natural that they should claim the right to bestow ecclesiastical ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson

... to say the office? Must every holder of a benefice read the office? What sin is committed by the omission of a notable part? What sins are committed by the omission of the whole office? What must a person do who has a doubt about omissions? Does a person, who recites by mistake, an office other than that prescribed ...
— The Divine Office • Rev. E. J. Quigley

... his appeal to his wealthy and powerful relative, Sir Samuel, and his final nomination to a country benefice, for in the country the doctor said that he must live—unless he wished to die. Convinced though he was of the enormous advantages of Heaven over an earth which he knew to be extremely sinful, the Rev. Mr. Knight, like the rest of the world, shrank from the second alternative, ...
— Love Eternal • H. Rider Haggard

... Mirabelle had told him more than once, and in plain English, that she planned to divide with him—not equally, but equitably. She had said that she would give him a third of her own inheritance. Hm ... a hundred and fifty to three hundred thousand, say. And what couldn't he do with such a benefice? Of course, he would have to profess some slight interest in the League for awhile, but gradually he could slide out of it—and he hoped that he could engineer Mirabelle out of it. Mirabelle made herself too conspicuous. But even if Mirabelle stuck to her colours, ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall

... a sect and heresy by the Church. The priest of Inverkeithing presented before the bishop in 1282 for leading a fertility dance at Easter round the phallic figure of a god; he was allowed to retain his benefice.[18] ...
— The Witch-cult in Western Europe - A Study in Anthropology • Margaret Alice Murray

... Majesty could entrust to some of these fathers the affair of these Indians against the fathers of the Society. They tell me even that one of the Jesuit fathers, who went from here as their procurator, is about to claim on their behalf, the donation of the benefice and doctrina of the said village of Quiapo. The name of this procurator is Father Chirinos. They do not make this claim for the sake of the mission or benefice, for it is a very small hamlet; but only because, if they hold the said village as a mission, the Indians will not dare to make any ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XII, 1601-1604 • Edited by Blair and Robertson

... complaining that while the duties of teaching and catechising were laid on them, a man who had held one of the law or medical fellowships sometimes took orders late in life and then claimed presentation to a College benefice in virtue of his seniority as a Fellow, having in the meantime escaped the drudgery to which the Fellow in ...
— St. John's College, Cambridge • Robert Forsyth Scott

... in England, I believe; somebody set them on foot for the benefice of the poorer classes, or work people; and Dane has imported them. He receives the employes of the mills,' said Prudentia, chuckling,—'whoever will come and pay a penny; his own workmen and the others. The levee ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner

... when a child, and the great fortune which she would have inherited was diverted in another direction. Indeed through a singular combination of circumstances, the detective himself became heir to a portion of the great estate. He did not feel disposed, however, to accept the benefice, and made up his mind that there were actual heirs living who were through kinship entitled to the fortune. He had started out on a former "shadow" without a clue, and in his resolve to find the collateral heirs he also started out minus a single clue, but he was a man, as our readers ...
— A Successful Shadow - A Detective's Successful Quest • Harlan Page Halsey

... dressed in a black cloak of very coarse materials, nor were his other garments of superior quality. This plainness, however, in the appearance of his outward man was by no means the result of poverty; quite the contrary. The benefice was a very plentiful one, and placed at his disposal annually a sum of at least eight hundred dollars, of which the eighth part was more than sufficient to defray the expenses of his house and himself; the rest was devoted entirely to the purest acts of charity. He fed the hungry wanderer, and ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow

... disengaged person he could find, but it was only the young Abbe de Mericour, who had been newly brought up from Dauphine by his elder brother to solicit a benefice, and who knew nobody. To him ladies were only bright phantoms such as his books had taught him to regard like the temptations of St. Anthony, but whom he actually saw treated with as free admiration by the ecclesiastic as ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge

... hospitable plenty of Clovis and his successors; and to reward the fidelity of their brave companions who, both in peace and war, were devoted to their persona service. Instead of a horse, or a suit of armor, each companion, according to his rank, or merit, or favor, was invested with a benefice, the primitive name, and most simple form, of the feudal possessions. These gifts might be resumed at the pleasure of the sovereign; and his feeble prerogative derived some support from the influence of his liberality. [881] But this ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon

... and excellent friend the Rev. William Harness refused from conscientious motives to hold more than one Church benefice, though repeated offers of livings were made to him by various of his influential friends. Lord Lansdowne, who had a very affectionate esteem for him, gave him the civil office I have alluded to in this letter, and this not being open to Mr. Harness's scruples with ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble

... sette not his benefice to huyre, And lefte his scheep encombred in the myre; * * * * * But dwelte at hoom and kepte ...
— Notes and Queries, 1850.12.21 - A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, - Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc. • Various

... his flock. In some parishes, where the reputation of the curate in this respect stood higher than that of his rector, the relations between the two have been so strained in consequence that the bishop has had to translate the rector to another benefice. Again, Gascon peasants believe that to revenge themselves on their enemies bad men will sometimes induce a priest to say a mass called the Mass of Saint Scaire. Very few priests know this mass, and three-fourths of those who do know it would ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer

... the said spiritual ordinaries do daily confer and give sundry benefices unto certain young folks, calling them their nephews or kinsfolk, being in their minority and within age, not apt ne able to serve the cure of any such benefice: whereby the said ordinaries do keep and detain the fruits and profits of the same benefices in their own hands, and thereby accumulate to themselves right great and large sums of money and yearly profits, to the most pernicious example of your said lay subjects—and so the cures and promotions ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude

... of the Uniformity Act(1252) which condemned every minister to lose his benefice unless he signified his assent to everything contained in the book of common prayer by the 24th August (1662) caused great dissatisfaction in the city—always a stronghold of Presbyterianism—and many a sad scene was witnessed in city churches on Sunday the ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume II • Reginald R. Sharpe

... therefore, be not afraid if revealed truths be likewise beyond the compass of the understanding"; but this seems to me a meagre meaning.' Such considerations could hold him no longer, and Manning executed the resignation of his office and benefice before a public notary. Soon afterwards, in the little Chapel off Buckingham Palace Road, kneeling beside Mr. Gladstone, he worshipped for the last time as an Anglican. Thirty years later the Cardinal told how, just before the Communion ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey

... the Roman clientship. The German comitatus, which seems to have ultimately merged its existence in one or other of these developments, is of course to be carefully distinguished in its origin from them. The tie of the benefice or of commendation could be formed between any two persons whatever; none but the king could have antrustions. But the comitatus of Anglo-Saxon history preserved a more distinct existence, and this perhaps was one of the causes that distinguished the later Anglo-Saxon ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various

... phase in one of the king's own subdevils soon fell under the notice of his Majesty, who asked George one day if he would like to have an easy benefice in the church where he could meditate on his past ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major

... filled were emptied. His judgments were reversed, as founded on insufficient and frivolous grounds. But alas! what was this to the hundreds he had consigned to the stake, and the thousands he had plunged in misery? He was in the end sentenced,—not to be roasted alive,—but to retire to his own benefice, and confine himself to the duties of a Christian minister! Gomez, De Rebus Gestis, fol. 77.—Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist, 333, 334, et al.—Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. chap. 10, art. 3, 4.—Oviedo, Quincuagenas, ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott

... between Robert Browne and Henry Barrowe, was another Cambridge student, John Greenwood. He was graduated in 1581, the year that Browne removed to Middelburg. Greenwood had become so enamored with Separatist doctrines, that within five years of his graduation he was deprived of his benefice, in 1586, and sent to prison. While there, he was visited by his friend, Henry Barrowe, a young London lawyer, who, through the chance words of a London preacher, had been converted from a wild, gay life to one devout ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.

... the only son of a clergyman, who was in possession of a valuable benefice in a midland county. His father intended him for orders, and sent him at a proper age to a public school. He had long revolved in his mind the respective advantages and disadvantages of public and private education, and ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman

... the possession that had made him dangerous, the priory of St. Victor, having been wrested from him, there was little harm that he could do. His immediate successor in the priory, good Abbot de Montheron, had not indeed long enjoyed the benefice. He had gone on business to Rome, where certain Churchmen who admired his new benefice invited him (so Bonivard tells the story) to a banquet more Romano, and gave him a dose of the "cardinal powder," ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various

... had declared the Colonna who adhered to the emperor Frederic I. incapable of holding any ecclesiastical benefice, (Villani, l. v. c. 1;) and the last stains of annual excommunication were purified by Sixtus V., (Vita di Sisto V. tom. iii. p. 416.) Treason, sacrilege, and proscription are often the best ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon

... But others said he was a clever fellow, and long-headed enough to know that that sort of thing attracted attention, and might open the way to a benefice, or at least an engagement in London, where eloquence was of more account than in a dead-and-alive country place like Glaston, from which the tide of grace had ebbed, leaving that great ship of the church, the Abbey, high ...
— Thomas Wingfold, Curate • George MacDonald

... of moral philosophy in Koenigsberg, when a young man, was presented by William I. of Prussia with a small benefice in the interior of the country, at a considerable distance from Koenigsberg. On taking possession of the parsonage, he slept in the bedroom which had been occupied by his predecessor, then dead. While lying awake in bed one morning, the ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... the Conquest the advowson had become far more valuable than the manor, and the lords, who were also patrons, saw the advantage and convenience of qualifying themselves by inferior orders for holding so rich a benefice; and thus the manor itself in time ceased to be considered as a lay fee, and became confounded with the ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby

... the important service he had rendered the Christian religion, and he received another appointment[1] which augmented his income by thirty thousand maravedis yearly. Having taken holy orders about this time and the dignity of prior of the cathedral chapter of Granada falling vacant, this benefice was also given to him, regis et ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt



Words linked to "Benefice" :   beneficiary, church property, spirituality, ecclesiastical benefice, endow, sinecure, dower



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