tain benefices, provided, however, they be not cures, nor dignities, canonries, prebends, nor monasteries in which regular observance is in force, or which are subject to general chapters, or to certain visitors. In parish churches also, the fruits of which are in like manner so small, that they are insufficient to meet the necessary charges, the bishop, if it cannot be managed by a union of benefices, not however those belonging to regulars, shall take care that, by the assignment of first fruits, or tithes, or by the contributions and collections of the parishioners, or in what other way shall seem to him more convenient, as much be amassed as may decently suffice for the necessities of the rector and of the parish. But in whatsoever unions may have to be made, whether for the aforesaid, or for other causes, parish churches shall not be limited to any monasteries soever, or abbeys, or dignities, or prebends of a cathedral or collegiate church, or to any other simple benefices, or hospitals, or military orders; and those so united shall again be taken cognizance of by the ordinaries, according to the decree elsewhere made in this same synod, under Paul III.,[1] of happy memory, which shall also be equally observed in respect to the unions [made] from that time forth to the present; notwithstanding any form soever of words which may have been used therein, which shall be accounted as being sufficiently expressed here. Furthermore, all those cathedral churches, the revenue of which, in real annual value, does not exceed the sum of one thousand ducats, and those parish churches where it does not exceed the sum of one hundred ducats, shall not for the future be burthened with any pensions, or reservations of fruits. In those cities and places, likewise, where the parish churches have no certain boundaries, neither have their rectors their own proper people to govern, but administer the sacraments to all promiscuously who seek it, the holy synod commands bishops, that for the more perfect security of the salvation of the souls committed to their charge, having divided the people into fixed and proper parishes, they shall assign to each its own perpetual and peculiar parish priest, who may know his own parishioners, and from whom alone they may law-
- ↑ See Sess, vii. de ref. c. 6.
