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Advowson

Rights to appoint a priest vicar or reverend on a Fief Seignory, Manor or Baronnie

The Grand Chaplain for the Fief is Anglican Lord Chancellor Dr.Jur. George Mentz, JD, MBA, DSS, The Seigneur of Blondel et Eperons

Advowson (or "patronage"; / ə d ˈ v aʊ z ən/^[1]) is the right in English law of a patron (avowee) to present to the diocesan bishop (or in some cases the ordinary if not the same person) a nominee for appointment to a vacant ecclesiastical benefice or church living, a process known as presentation (jus praesentandi, Latin: "the right of presenting").

The word derives, via French, from the Latin advocare, from vocare "to call" plus ad, "to, towards", thus a "summoning".^[2] It is the right to nominate a person to be parish priest (subject to episcopal that is, specifically, one bishop's approval), and each such right in each parish was mainly first held by the lord of the manor of the principal manor. Many small parishes only had one manor of the same name.^[3]

The rights of seigneurs to direct religious life in their jurisdictions was recognized by the Crown. The edict of Saint-Germain of 1562 stated that preaching was not to take place in parishes without the will and consent of seigneurs, rectors, vicars, and churchwardens. ⁴² In the edict of Amboise of 1563, Protestant seigneurs with higher jurisdictions were granted the freedom of worship on their estates; other lords, without jurisdictions, could hold reformed worship in their houses, so long as the higher seigneur did not object. ⁴³ These rights were maintained in most of the edicts of the religious wars, including that of Nantes of 1598; there remained Protestant lords in rural Brittany even during the League wars. ⁴⁴ The legal position continued until 1666, after which it was eroded. ⁴⁵ Seigneurs expected, by custom and law, to have a predominant influence on the religious life of their lands and parishes. Citation

1. Advowson is the right of presentation to a church, or ecclesiastical benefice. Advowson, advocatio, signifies in clientelam recipere, the taking into protection; and therefore is synonymous with patronage, patronatus: and he who has the right of advowson is called the patron of the church. For, when lords of manors first built churches on their own demesnes, and appointed the tithes of those manors to be paid to the officiating ministers, which before were given to the clergy in common (from whence, as was formerly mentioned,2 arose the division of parishes) the lord, who thus built a church, and endowed it with glebe or land, had of common right a power annexed o nominating such minister as he pleased (provided he were canonically qualified) to officiate in that church of which he was the founder, endower, maintainer, or, in one word, the patron.

This instance of an advowson will completely illustrate the nature of an incorporeal hereditament. It is not itself the bodily possession of the church and its appendages; but it is a right to give some other man a title to such bodily possession. The advowson is the object of neither the sight, nor the touch; and yet it perpetually exists in the mind’s eye, and in contemplation of law. It cannot be delivered from man to man by any visible bodily transfer, nor can corporal possession be had of it. If the patron takes corporal possession of the church, the churchyard, the glebe or the like, he intrudes on another man’s property; for to these the parson has an exclusive right. The patronage can therefore be only conveyed by operation of law, by verbal grant, either oral or written, which is a kind of invisible, mental transfer: and being so vested, it lies dormant and unnoticed, till occasion calls it forth; when it produces a visible, corporeal fruit, by entitling some clerk, whom the patron shall please to nominate, to enter and receive bodily possession of the lands and tenements of the church.

Advowsons are either advowsons appendant, or advowsons in gross. Lords of manors being originally the only founders, and of course the only patrons, of churches,4 the right of patronage or presentation, so long as it continues annexed to the possession of the manor, as some have done from the foundation of the church to this day, is called an advowson appendant:5 and it will pass, or be conveyed, together with the manor, as incident and appendant thereto, by a grant of the manor only, without adding any other words.6 But where the property of the advowson has been once separated from the property of the manor, by legal conveyance, it is called an advowson in gross, or at large, and never can be appendant any more; but is for the future annexed to the person of its owner, and not to his manor of lands.7
Advowsons are also either presentative, collative, or donative.8 An advowson presentative is where the patron has a right of presentation to the bishop or ordinary, and moreover to demand of him to institute his clerk, if he find him canonically qualified: and this is the most usual advowson. An advowson collative is where the bishop and patron are one and the same person: in which case the bishop cannot present to himself; but he does, by the one act of collation, or conferring the benefice, the whole that is done in common cases, by both presentation and institution. An advowson donative is when the king, or any subject by his license, does found a church or chapel, and ordains that it shall be merely in the gift or disposal of the patron; subject to his visitation only, and not to that of the ordinary; and vested absolutely in the clerk by the patron’s deed of donation, without presentation, institution, or induction.9 This is said to have been anciently the only way of conferring ecclesiastical benefices in England; the method of institution by the bishop not being established more early than the time of arch-bishop Becket in the reign of Henry II.10 And therefore though pope Alexander III,11 in a letter to Becket, severely inveighs against the prava consuetudo [erroneous practice], as he calls it, of investiture conferred by the patron only, this however shows what was then the common usage. Others contend, that the claim of the bishops to institution is as old as the first planting of Christianity in this island; and in proof of it they allege a letter from the English nobility, to the pope in the reign of Henry the third, recorded by Matthew Paris,12 which speaks of presentation to the bishop as a thing immemorial. The truth seems to be, that, where the benefice was to be conferred on a mere layman, he was first presented to the bishop, in order to receive ordination, who was at liberty to examine and refuse him: but where the clerk was already in orders, the living was usually vested in him by the sole donation of the patron; till about the middle of the twelfth century, when the pope and his bishops endeavored to introduce a kind of feudal dominion over ecclesiastical benefices, and, in consequence of that, began to claim and exercise the right of institution universally, as a species of spiritual investiture.
However this may be, if, as the law now stands, the true patron once waives this privilege of donation, and presents to the bishop, and his clerk is admitted and instituted, the advowson is now become for ever presentative, and shall never be donative any more. For these exceptions to general rules, and common right, are ever looked upon by the law in an unfavorable view, and construed as strictly as possible. If therefore the patron, in whom such peculiar right resides, does once give up that right, the law, which loves uniformity, will interpret it to be done with an intention of giving it up for ever; and will thereupon reduce it to the standard of other ecclesiastical livings.
https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/b/blackstone/william/comment/complete.html

II. A second species of incorporeal hereditaments is that of tithes; which are defined to be the tenth part of the increase, yearly arising and renewing from the profits of lands, the stock upon lands, and the personal industry of the inhabitants: the first species being usually called predial, as of corn, grass, hops, and wood;13 the second mixed, as of wool, milk, pigs, etc,14 consisting of natural products, but nurtured and preserved in part in gross: the third personal, as of manual occupations, trades, fisheries, and the like; and of these only the tenth part of the clear gains and profits is due.15

Value

Advowsons were valuable assets for a number of reasons, principally as a means for the patron to exert moral influence on the parishioners, who were his manorial tenants, through the teaching and sermons of the parish priest. The manor was a business enterprise, and it was important for its commercial success that all who lived there should live and work in harmony for a common purpose, and should obey the law of the land and of the manorial court. Such a law-abiding attitude could be fostered by a suitable parish priest, and clearly the appointment of a priest who preached against this would be a disaster for the interests of the lord of the manor. An appointment could also be used to provide an income for a valued servant in holy orders (such as a chaplain or secretary), or as a reward for past services rendered to the patron by the appointee.

A benefice generally included use of a house, i.e. a vicarage, parsonage or rectory, as well as the income from the glebe and tithes, which would provide for the living expenses of the incumbent, and the value of the advowson would thus vary according to how richly endowed the glebe had been out of the lord of the manor's manorial lands. For example: the advowson of the parish of Paulerspury in Northamptonshire (Peterborough diocese) was bought by New College, Oxford, in 1750 for the sum of £1,300.^[13]

Advowsons were frequently used by lords and landowners as a means of providing a career and income for a younger son who, due to the custom of primogeniture, would not inherit any of the paternal lands. If the father did not already own a suitable advowson, he might purchase one for this purpose.

ADVOWSON I.

For the law relating to appropriation and impropriations of ||

benefices, see tit. Appropriation.

I. Advowsons are of two kinds; appendant, and in gross: Appendant, is a right of presentation dependant upon a manor, lands, &c. and passes in a grant of the manor as incident to the same; and when manors were first created, and lands set apart to build a church on some part thereof, the advowson or right to present to that church became appendant to the manor. Advowson in gross is a right subsisting by itself, belonging to a person, and not to a manor, lands, &c. So that when an advowson appendant is severed by deed or grant from the corporeal inheritance to which it was appendant, then it becomes an advowson in gross. Co. Lit. 121, 122. If he that is seised of a manor, to which an advowson is appendant, grants one or two acres of the manor, together with the advowson; the advowson is appendant to such acre; especially after the grantee hath presented. Watson's Complete Incumbent, c. 7. - But this feoffment of the acre with the advowson ought to be by deed, to make the advowson appendant; and the acre of land and the advowson ought to be granted by the same clause in the deed; for if one, having a manor with an advowson appendant, grant an acre parcel of the said manor, and by another clause in the same deed grant the advowson; the advowson in such case shall not pass as appendant to the acre; but if the grant had been of the entire manor, the advowson would have passed as appendant. So if a husband, seised in right of his wife of a manor to which an advowson is appendant, doth alien the manor by acres to divers persons, saving one acre; the advowson shall be appendant to that acre. Or if a lessee for life of a manor to which an advowson belongs, alien one acre, with the advowson appendant, the advowson is thereby appendant to that acre. Wats. c. 7. The right of advowson, though appendant to a manor, castle, or the like, may be severed from it in other ways, and being severed, becomes an advowson in gross; and this may be effected divers ways: as, 1. If a manor or other thing to which it is appendant is granted, and the advowson excepted. 2. If the advowson is granted alone, without the thing to which it was appendant. 3. If an advowson appendant is presented to by the patron, as an advowson in gross. Gibs. 757. A disappendancy may also be temporary; that is, the appendancy, though turned into gross, may return; as, 1. If the advowson is excepted in a lease of a manor for life; during the lease it is in gross, but when the lease expires it is appendant again. 2. If the advowson is granted for life and another enfeoffed of the manor with the appurtenances; in such case, at the expiration of the grant, it shall be appendant; and so in other cases. But with respect to the king, by the statute of praerogativa regis, 17 Ed. 2. c. 15. When the king giveth or granteth land, or a manor, with appurtenances; without he make express mention in his deed or writing, of advowson, the king reserveth to himself such advowsons, albeit that among other persons it hath been observed otherwise. Yet when he restoreth, as in case of the restitution of a bishop's temporalties; then advowsons pass without express whention, or any words equivalent thereto, 10 Co, 64.

The law, in the case of a common person, is thus set down by Rolle, out of the ancient books: if a man, seised of a manor to which an advowson is appendant, aliens that manor, without saying with the appurtenances (and even without naming the advowson) yet the advowson shall pass, for it is parcel of the manor. 2 Roll. Abr. 60. An advowson being an inheritance incorporeal, and not lying in manual occupation, cannot pass by livery; but may be granted by deed, or by will, either for the inheritance, or for the right of one or more turns, or for as many as shall happen within a time limited. But this general rule, with regard to advowsons in gross, next avoidances, and the like, is to be understood with two limitations. First, That it extends not to ecclesiastical persons of any kind or degree, who are seised of advowsons in the right of their churches; nor to masters, and fellows of colleges, nor to guardians of hospitals, who are seised in right of their houses; all these being restrained (the bishops by the 1 Eliz. cap. 19. and the rest by the 13 Eliz. cap. 10.) from making any grants but of things corporeal, of which a rent or annual profit may be j; and advowsons and next avoidances, which are incorporeal and lie in grant, cannot be of that sort; and therefore such grants, however confirmed, are void against the successor; though they have been adjudged to be good against the grantors (as bishop, dean, master, or guardian) during their own times. See 45 Geo.3 c. 101. Secondly, A grant of the next avoidance may be assigned before the avoidance happens. 2 Rol. Abr. 45, &c. But an avoidance cannot be granted by a common person after it is fallen: while the church is absolutely void. Mo. 89, Dy. 129 b. 26 a. 283 a. & see 2 Wils. 197; and a grant of the advowson made after the church is actually fallen vacant is equally void; not as is said in the old books, because it is a chose in action; but because such grants might (indeed inevitably would) encourage simony. 2 Burr. 1510, 11. See tit. Simony, and see Kyd's Com. Dig. tit. Advowson. If two have a grant of the next avoidance, and one releaseth all right and title to the other while the church is void: such release is void. But the king’s grant of a void turn hath been adjudged to be good. 3 Leon. 196, Dy, 283 a. Hob. 140, If one be seised of an advowson in fee, and the church doth become void, the void turn is a chattel; and if the patron heir, but to his executor. Wats, c. 9.

But if the incumbent of a church be also seised in fee of the advowson of the same church and die, his heir, and not his execurtors, shall present; for although the advowson doth not descend to the heir at the death of the ancestor, and by his death the church become void, so that the avoidance may be said in this case to be severed from the advowson before it descend to the heir, and vested in the executor; yet both the avoidance and descent to the heir happening at the same instant, the title of the heir shall be preferred as the more ancient and worthy. Wats. c. 9, fo. 72. See Watkins on Descents, p. 62, 3 Lev. 47.

Tenant by the courtesy may be of an advowson, when the wife dies before avoidance. l Inst. 29 a.

By last will and testament, the right of presenting to the next avoidance, or the inheritance of an advowson, may be devised to any person; and if such devise be made by the incumbent of the church, the inheritance of the advowson being in him, it is good, though he die incumbent; for although the testament hath no effect but by the death of the testator, yet it hath an inception in his lifetime. And so it is, though he appoint by his will who shall be presented by the executors, or that one executor shall present the other; or doth devise that his executors shall grant the advowson to such a man. Wats, c. 10.

dieth before he doth present, the avoidance doth not go to his

ADVOWSON I, II.

Advowsons are either presentative, collative, or donative. An advowson presentative is, where the patron does present or offer his clerk to the bishop of the diocese, to be instituted in his church. . This may be done, either by word or writing. The king may present by word, or in writing under any seal; who, otherwise, cannot do any legal act, but by matter of record, or by letters patent under the great seal. But where a corporation aggregate doth present, it must be under seal. The presentation to a vicarage doth of common right belong to the parson. If a feme covert hath title to present, the presentation must be by husband and wife, and in |. in case of the queen consort. Wood's Inst. 155, &c. An advowson collative is that advowson which is lodged in the bishop; for collation is the giving of a benefice by a bishop, when he is the original patron thereof, or he gains a right by lapse. Collation differs from institution in this; that institution is performed by the bishop upon the presentation of another, and collation is his own act of presentation; and it differeth from a common presentation, as it is the giving of the church to the parson; and presentation is the giving or offering the parson to the church. But collation supplies the place of presentation and institution; and amounts to the same as institution, where the bishop is both patron and ordinary. 1 Lil. Ab. 273. A bishop may either neglect to collate, or he may make his collation without title; but such a wrongful collation doth not put the true patron out of possession; for after the collatee of the bishop is instituted and inducted, the patron may present his clerk; collation in this case being to |. intended only as a provisional incumbency to serve the church. 1 Inst.

Where a bishop gives a benefice as patron, he collates by writ jure pleno; when by lapse, jure devoluto. The collation by lapse is in right of the patron. F. N. B. 31. See post Lapse II. An advowson donative is, when the king or other patron (in whom the advowson of the church is lodged) does, by a single donation in writing, put the clerk into possession without presentation, institution, or induction. Donatives are either of churches parochial, chapels, prebends, &c. and may be exempt from all ordinary jurisdictions, so that the ordinary cannot visit them, and consequently cannot demand procurations. If the true patron of a church or chapel donative doth once present to the ordinary, and his clerk is admitted and instituted, it becomes a church presentative, and shall never have the privilege of a donative afterwards. Yet if a stranger presents to such a donative, and institution is given, all is void. l Inst. 158. See contra 1 Salk. 541. 2 Com. 23. The right of donation descends to the heir (the ancestor dying seised, where the church became void in his lifetime) and not to the executor; which it would had it been a presentative benefice. 2 Wilson, 150, 1. There is not any case in the books to exclude the heir of a donative from his turn in this case. And a patron of a donative can never be put out of possession by an usurpation. Id. ibid. II. A Lapse is a title given to the ordinary, to collate to a church by the neglect of the patron to present to it within six months after avoidance. Or a lapse is a devolution of a right of presenting from the patron to the bishop; from the bishop to the archbishop; from the archbishop to the king. The term in which the title by lapse commences, from one to the other successively, is six months, or half a year, according to the calendar, not accounting twenty-eight days to the month, as in other cases, because this computation is by the ecclesiastical law; and because tempus semestre, in the stat, of West.

2. chap. 5. is intended of half a year, the whole year contain. ing 365 days; which being divided, the half year for the patron to present is 182 days. The day in which the church becomes void is not to be reckoned as part of the six months. Wood's Inst. 160. Hob. 30. , 4 Rep. 17, 6 Rep. 62. Where a patron presents his ...! before the bishop hath collated, the presentation is good, notwithstanding the six months are past, and shall bar the bishop, who cannot take any advantage of the lapse; and so if the patron makes his presentation before the archbishop hath collated, although twelve months are past; but if the bishop collates after twelve months, this bars not the archbishop. 2 Rol. Abr. 369. 2 Inst. 273. If a bishop doth not collate to benefices of his own gift, they lapse at the end of six months to the archbishop; and if the archbishop neglects to collate within six months to a benefice of his gift, the king shall have it by lapse. Dr. & Stud. c. 36. And if a church continues void several years by lapse, the successor of the king may present. Cro. Car. 258. But if the king hath a title to present by lapse, and he suffers the patron to present, and the presentee dies, or resigns before the king hath presented, if the presentation is real, and not by covin, he hath lost his presentation; for lapse is but for à. first and next turn, and by the death of the incumbent a new title is given to the patron; though it hath been adjudged that the king in such case may present at any time as long as that presentee is incumbent. 2 Cro. 216. Moor 244. When the patronage of the church is litigious, and one party doth recover against the other in a quare impedit, if the bishop be not named in the writ, and six months pass while the suit is depending, lapse shall incur to the bishop: if the bishop be named in the writ, then neither the bishop, archbishop, or king can take the benefice by lapse: and yet it is said, if the patron, within the six months, brings a quare impedit against the bishop, and then the six months pass without any presentation by the patron, lapse shall incur to the bishop. 2 Rol. Abr. 365. 6 Rep. 52. 1 Inst. 344. Hob. 270. Where the bishop is a disturber, or the church remains void above six months by his fault, there shall be no lapse. 1 Inst. 344. A clerk presented being refused by the bishop for any sufficient cause, as illiterature, ill life, &c. he is to give the patron notice of it, that another may be presented in due time, otherwise the bishop shall not collate by lapse; because he shall not take advantage of his own wrong, in not giving notice to the patron as he ought to do by law. Dyer 292. And if an avoidance is by resignation, which must necessarily be to the bishop, by the act of the incumbent, or by deprivation, which is the act of the law; lapse shall not incur to the bishop till six months after notice given by him to the patron: when the church becomes void by the death of the incumbent, &c. the patron must present in six months without notice from the bishop, or shall lose his presentation by lapse. Dyer 293. 327. 1 Inst. 135.4 Rep. 75. And it is expressly provided, by stat. 13 Eliz. c. 12. that no title conferred by lapse shall accrue upon any deprivation ipso facto, but after six months’ notice of such deprivation given by the ordinary to the patron. In the cases of deprivation and resignation, where the patron is to have notice before the church can lapse, the patron is not bound to take notice from any body but the bishop himself, or other ordinary, which must be personally given to the party, if he live in the same county; and such notice must express in certain the cause of deprivation, &c. If the patron | live in a foreign county, then the notice may be published in the parish church, and affixed on the church door. , Cro. Eliz. 119. , Dyer 328. , And this notice must be given, even though the patron himself prosecute the incumbent to deprivation. 6 Rep. 29. -

There are avoidances by act of parliament, wherein there must be a judicial sentence pronounced to make the living void : if a man hath one benefice with cure, &c. and take another with cure, without any dispensation to hold two benefices, in such case the first is void by the statute 21. H. 8. c. 13. if it was above the value of 8l. During an avoidance, it is said that the house and glebe of the benefice are in abeyance; but by the stat. 28 H. 8. c. 11. the profits arising during the Ajo. are given to the next incumbent towards payment of the first fruits; though the ordinary may receive the profits to provide for the service of the church, and shall be allowed the charges of supplying the cure, &c. for which purpose the churchwardens of the parish are usually appointed. If a clerk is instituted to a benefice of the yearly value of 8l. and, before induction, accepts another benefice with cure, and is instituted, the first benefice is void by the stat. 21 H.8. c. 13.: for he who is instituted only, is properly said to have accepted a benefice within the words of the act. 4 Rep. 78. See title Cession. But if he is inducted into a second benefice, the first is void in facto & jure, and not voidable only, quoad the patron, and until he presents another; and in such case the patron ought to take notice of the avoidance at his peril, and present within the six months. Cro. Car. 258. In cases where there ought to be notice, if none is given by the bishop or archbishop in a year and a half, whereby lapse would come to the king if it had been given: here the lapse arises not to the king, where no title arose to the inferior ordinary. Dyer 340. And it has been adjudged, that ‘lapse is not an interest, like the patronage, but an office of trust reposed by law in the ordinary; and the end of it is, to provide the church a rector, in default of the patron; and it cannot be granted over; for the grant of the next lapse of a church, either before it falls, or after, is void. F. N. B. 34. Also if lapse incurs, and then the ordinary dies, the king shall present, and not the ordinary’s executors, because it is rather an administration than an interest. 25 E. 3, 4. . A lapse may incur against an infant or feme covert, if they do not present within six months. l Inst. 246. But there is no lapse against the king, who may take his own time; and plenarty shall be no bar against the king's title, because nullum tempus occurrit regi. 2 Inst. 273. Dyer 351 By presentation and institution a lapse is prevented; though the clerk is never inducted: and a donative cannot lapse either to the ordinary or the king. 2 Inst. 273. See 2 Comm. 276, and 4 Comm. 106.

ADVOWSON II, III, IV.

III. The usurpation of a church benefice is when one that hath no right presents to the church; and his clerk is admitted and instituted into it, and hath quiet possession six months after institution before a quare impedit brought. It must commence upon a presentation, not a collation, because by collation the church is not full; but the right patron may bring his writ at any time to remove the usurper. l Inst. 227. 6 Rep. 30. No one can usurp upon the king; but an usurpation may dispossess him of his presentation, so as he shall be obliged to bring a quare impedit. 3 Salk. 389. One comparcener or jointtenant cannot usurp upon the other; but where there are two patrons of churches united, if one presents in the other’s turn, it is an usurpation. Dy. 259. A presentation which is void in law, as in case of simony, or to a church that is full, makes no usurpation. 2 Rep. 93. In this case of usurpation the patron lost, by the common | law, not only his turn of presentment, but also the perpetual inheritance of the advowson; so that he could not present again upon the next avoidance, unless, in the mean time, he recovered his right by a real action, viz. a writ of right of advowson. 3 Comm. 243. See further tit. Darrein Presentment. Quare impedit.

But bishops in ancient times, either by carelessness or collusion, frequently instituting clerks upon the presentation of usurpers, and thereby defrauding the real patrons of their right of possession; it was in substance enacted by stat. Westm. 2. (13 E. 1.) c. 5, § 2. “that if a possessory action be brought within six months after the avoidance, the patron shall (notwithstanding such usurpation and institution) recover that very presentation;” which gives back to him the seisin of the advowson. Yet still, if the true patron omitted to bring his action within six months, the seisin was gained by the usurper, and the patron, to recover it, was driven to the long and hazardous process of a writ of right. To remedy which it was farther enacted by statute 7 Anne, c. 18. “that no usurpation shall displace the estate or interest of the patron, or turn it to a mere right; but that the true patron may present upon the mext avoidance, as if no such usurpation had happened.” So that the title of usurpation is now much narrowed, and the law stands upon this reasonable foundation: that if a stranger usurps my presentation, and I do not pursue my right within six months, I shall lose that turn without remedy, for the peace of the church, and as a punishment for my own negligence; but that turn is the only one I shall lose thereby. Usurpation now gains no right to the usurper, with regard to any future avoidance, but only to the present vacancy; it cannot indeed be remedied after six months are past; but during those six months it is only a species of disturbance. 3 Comm. 244.

IV. Advowsons were formerly most of them appendant to manors, and the patrons parochial barons; the lordship of the manor, and patronage of the church, were seldom in different hands till advowsons were given to religious houses; but of late times the lordship of the manor and the advowson of the church have been divided; and now not only lords of manors but mean persons have, by purchase, the dignity of patrons of churches, to the great prejudice thereof. By the common law the right of patronage is a real right fixed in the patrons or founders, and their heirs, wherein they have as absolute a property as any other man hath in his lands and tenements: for advowsons are a temporal inheritance, and lay fee; they may be granted by deed or will, and are assets in the hands of heirs or executors. Co. Lit. I 19. A recovery may be suffered of an advowson; a wife may be endowed of it; a husband tenant by the courtesy; and it may be forfeited by treason or felony. I Rep. 56. 10 Rep. 55. If an advowson descends to coparceners, and the church after the death of their ancestors becomes void, (by stat. Westm. 2. (13 E. 1.) stat. 1. c. 5.) the eldest sister shall first present. And when coparceners, joint-tenants, &c. are seised of an advowson and artition is made, to present by turns; by stat. 7 Anne, c. 18. each shall be seised of their separate estate. Presentation is properly the act of a patron offering his clerk to the bishop of the diocese, to be instituted in a church or benefice of his gift, which is void. 2 Lil. Abr. 351. An alien born cannot present to a benefice in his own right; for if he purchases an advowson, and the church becomes void, the king shall present after office found that the patron is an alien. 2 Nels. 1290. And by stat. 7 R. 2. c. 12. no alien shall purchase a benefice in this realm, nor occupy the same, without the king's licence, on pain of a praemunire. Papists are disabled to present to benefices, and the universities are to present, &c. But a popish recusant may grant away his patronage to another, who may make presentation, where there is no fraud. See stat. 3 Jac. 1. c. 5. § 18, 19. 1 W. & M. c. 26. 12 Anne, c. 14. & 1 Jon. 19. But by stat. 11 Geo. 2. c. 17. § 5, grants of advowsons by papists are void, unless made for a valuable consideration to a protestant purchaser, and only for the benefit of protestants; and devises of advowsons by papists are also void.

ADVOWSON IV.

A guardian by socage or by nurture cannot present to a vacant living in right of the infant heir, or in his name, because he can make no benefit of it, or account for it, though it is sometimes practised, and made good by time. Therefore the infant shall present, of whatsoever age. Wide Co. Lit. 17 b. If a common patron presents first one clerk, and then another, the bishop may institute which he pleases; unless he revokes the presentation of one of them . he is admitted by the bishop. If there is a right of nomination in one, and a right of presentation in another, to the same benefice; he that has the right of nomination is the true patron, and the other is obliged to present the clerk which is nominated. l Inst. 156. All persons who have ability to purchase or grant, have likewise ability to present to vacant benefices; but a dean and chapter cannot present the dean; nor may a clergyman who is patron {..." himself, though he may pray to be admitted by the ordinary, and the admission shall be good. Coparceners are but as one patron, and ought to agree in the presentation of one person; if they cannot agree, the eldest shall present first alone, and the bishop is obliged to admit his clerk, and afterwards the others in their order shall prefer their clerks; joint-tenants and tenants in common, must regularly join in presentation, and if either present alone, the bishop may refuse his clerk; as he may also the clerk presented by the major part of then ; but if there are two jointtenants of the next avoidance, one may present the other, and two joint-tenants may present a third, but not a stranger. If a rector is made bishop, the king shall present to the rectory unless he grant to the bishop, before he is consecrated, a dispensation to hold it with his bishoprick; but if an incumbent of a church is made a bishop, and the king presents or grants that he should hold the church in commendam, which is quasi a presentation, a grantee of the next avoidance or presentation hath lost it, the king having the next presentation. See 2 Stra. 841. that this presentation is not confined to the life-time of the bishop promoted. If the king present to a church by lapse, where he ought to present pleno jure, and as atron of the church, such a presentation is not good; for the o is deceived in his grant, by mistaking his title, which may be prejudicial to him; the presenting by lapse entitling only that presentation: the lord chancellor presents to the king’s benefices under 201. &c. 2 Rol. Ab. 354. 3 Inst. 156. Co. Lit. 186. 2 Nels. Ab. 1288. 1290. 2 Lil. 351. The king may repeal a presentation before his clerk is inducted; and this he may do by granting the presentation to another, which, without any farther signification of his mind, is a revocation of the first presentation. Dyer 290. 360. If two patrons present their clerks to a church, the bishop is to determine who shall be admitted by a jus patronatás, &c. Moor 499. A clerk may be refused by the bishop, if the patron is ercommunicate, and remains in contempt 40 days. 2 Rol. Abr. 355. As to refusal for the insufficiency of the clerk presented, see tit. Parson. If the bishop refuses to admit the clerk presented, he must give notice of his refusal, with the cause .P. forthwith; and an such notice the patron must present another clerk, within six months from the avoidance, if he thinks the objection against his first clerk contains sufficient cause of refusal; but if not, he may bring his quare impedit, against the bishop. 2 Rol. Abr. 364. See ante, Lapse II. If a defendant, or any stranger, presents a clerk pending a quare impedit, and afterwards the o obtains judgment, he cannot, by virtue of that judgment, remove him, who was thus presented; but he is to bring a scire facias against him to show cause quare executionem non habet; and then, if it be found that he had no title, he shall be amoved. The way to prevent such a presentation, is to take out a ne admittas to the bishop; and then the writ quare incumbravit lies, by virtue whereof the incumbent is. amoved, and put to his quare impedit, let his title be what it will; but if a ne admittas be not taken out, and another incumbent should come in by good title pendente lite, he shall hold it. Sid. 93. Cro. Jac. 93. When a bishop hath a presentation in right of his bishoprick, and dies, neither his executor, nor heir, shall have the void turn, but the king, in whose hands are the temporalties; and he hath a right to present on an avoidance after the seizure, on death of the bishop. Tenant in tail of an advowson, and his son and heir joined in the grant of the next presentation, tenant in tail died; this grant was held void as to the son and heir, because he had nothing in the advowson at the time he joined with his father in the grant. Hob. 45. If a presentation itself bears date while the church is full of another clerk, it is void; and where two or more have a title to present by turn, one of them presents, his clerk is admitted, instituted, and inducted, and afterwards deprived, he shall not present again, but that presentation shall serve his turn: though where the admission and institution of his clerk is void, there the turn shall not be served; as if after induction he neglects to read the thirty-nine articles, &c. his institution is void by the stat. 13 Eliz. and the patron may present again. F. N. B. 33. 5 Rep. 102. The right of presenting to a church may pass from one seised of the same by the patron's acknowledging of a statute, &c. which being extended, if the church becomes void, during the conusee’s estate, the conusee may present. Owen 49. Where a common person is patron, he may present by parol, as well as by writing, to the bishop. Co. Lit. 120. A presentation doth not o with it the formality of a deed; but it is in the nature of a letter missive by which the clerk is offered to the bishop; and it passeth no interest, as a grant doth, being no more than a recommendation of a clerk to the ordinary to be adumitted. But where a plaintiff declared upon a grant of the next presentation, and on oyer of the deed it appeared to be only a letter written by the patron to the father, of the plaintiff, that he had given his son the next presentation; adjudged that it would not pass by such letter, without a formal deed. Owen 47. Right of presentation may be forfeited in several cases; as by attainder of the patron, or by outlawry, and then the king shall present: and if the outlawry be reversed where the advowson is forfeited by the outlawry, and the church becomes void after, the presentation is vested in the crown; but if at the time of the outlawry, the church was void, then the presentation was forfeited as a chattel, and on reversing the same, the party shall be restored to it. By appropriation without licence from the crown, right of presentation may be forfeited; though the inheritance in this case is not forfeited, only the king shall have the presentation in nature of a distress, till the party hath paid a fine for his contempt. By alienation in fee of the advowson by a grantee for life of the next avoidance, a presentation is forfeited; and after such alienation the grantor may present, but then he must enter for the forfeiture of the grantee, in the life time of the incumbent, to determine his estate before the presentation vests in him on the incumbent's death. And by simony it may be likewise forfeited and lost. Moor 269. Plowd. 299. 2 Rol. Abr. 352. Stat. 31 Eliz. c. 6 & 5. See Simony, &c. ADVOWSON OF THE MOIETY OF THE CHURCH, advocatio medietatis ecclesiae..] Is where there are two several patrons and two several incumbents in one and the same church, the one of the one moiety, the other of the other moiety thereof. Co. Lit., 17 b. Medietas advocationis, a moiety of the advowson, is where two must join in the presentation, and there is but one incumbent: but see stat. 7 Anne, c. 18. mentioned in tit. Advowson IV.