the Lord, and give it to Aaron the high prieſt." But this claim of the pope met with vigorous reſiſtance from the Engliſh parliament; and a variety of acts were paſſed to prevent and reſtrain it, particularly the ſtatute 6 Hen. IV. c. 1. which calls it a horrible miſchief and damnable cuſtom. But the popiſh clergy, blindly devoted to the will of a foreign matter, ſtill kept it on foot; ſometimes more ſecretly, ſometimes more openly and avowedly: ſo that, in the reign of Henry VIII, it was computed, that, in the compaſs of fifty years 800000 ducats had been ſent to Rome for firſt-fruits only. And, as the clergy expreſſed this willingneſs to contribute ſo much of their income to the head of the church, it was thought proper (when in the ſame reign the papal power was aboliſhed, and the king was declared the head of the church of England) to annex this revenue to the crown; which was done by ſtatute 26 Hen. VIII. c. 3. (confirmed by ſtatute 1 Eliz. c. 4.) and a new valor beneficiorum was then made, by which the clergy are at preſent rated.
By theſe laſtmentioned ſtatutes all vicarages under ten pounds, a year, and all rectories under ten marks, are diſcharged from the payment of firſt-fruits: and if, in ſuch livings as continue chargeable with this payment, the incumbent lives but half a year, he ſhall pay only one quarter of his firſt-fruits; if but one whole year, then half of them; if a year and half, three quarters; and if two years, then the whole; and not otherwiſe. 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.
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 of, liable to a like miſapplication of their revenues, through the rapacious diſpoſition of the then reigning monarch: till at length the piety of queen
