Clergy is the body of people devoted to God by clericature or religious profession, from which the clergy is divided into the secular and regular.

The word is derived from the Greek κλῆρος , or from the Latin clerus, which signify lot or portion; because whereas all Christians may be called God's portion, those among the Christians whom God has chosen, separated from the others and devoted to his service, are the distinguished and cherished portion of the Lord's inheritance. One can also say that the body of ecclesiastics, instituted to teach religion to the peoples, to administer sacraments, and celebrate the divine office, is so called because it has chosen the Lord for its portion, following the versicle that clerks pronounce when they are tonsured: Dominus pars heraeditatis meae & calicis mei; tu es qui restitues hereditatem meam mihi. [The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and of my cup: it is you that will restore my inheritance to me], Ps. 15.

The clergy has always been a corporation distinguished, in the state, by honors, immunities, revenues, and other honorific or useful rights, that belong to it by ecclesiastical right, or that have been attributed to it either by the concession of princes, or the piety of the faithful.

Amongst us the clergy is recognized as the first body and the first of the orders of the kingdom, and in this quality it is maintained in all the rights, honours, ranks, sessions, presidencies, and advantages that it has enjoyed or ought to have enjoyed until now: these are the terms of art. 45 of the edict of the month of April 1695 . Long before then, our kings had expressed themselves in the same vein in the declaration of 10 February 1580, and in their letters patent of the first of May 1596, of 9 December 1606, of 10 August 1615, and of 15 June 1628. See the nouveaux mém. du clergé, vol. VI. and VIII.

As for honors, the clergy regularly precedes and has precedence over laymen, the parlements, or other secular courts, in churches, processions, and in all the ceremonies of religion. Various decrees of the private council, reported in volume V of the nouveaux mémoires du clergé, resolved the disputes that had arisen on this subject between the archbishop and the parlement of Rouen, between the bishop of Metz and the parlement of that town: these decrees maintained the clergy in the right of precedence.

In political assemblies, such as were once the estates general in France, and that today are still the assemblies of estates in Languedoc, Brittany, Burgundy, Artois, the corps of the clergy precedes the nobility and the third estate, and is the first to speak in deputations to the King. The archbishop of Narbonne is always president of the estates of Languedoc; and the bishop of Autun enjoys the same prerogative in those of Burgundy. In the assemblies of the estates general the clergy followed the political order of the kingdom and, like the other corporations of the state, and named its deputies by governments and by bailiwicks. In Sweden, despite the change of religion, the clergy precedes the two other orders of the kingdom in the estates general. In Poland the bishops have their rank at the diets only in their quality as senators, except during interregna and the election diet, in which the primate of the kingdom presides by right. In France bishops who are counts or dukes and peers have a seat in the parlement of Paris. Some others are always counselors in the parlements in whose jurisdiction their bishoprics are situated. The bishops and archbishops of England are members of the upper chamber. Those in Germany have seat and voice in the imperial diet, in the college of princes. See College and Diet.

The hierarchy of the body of the clergy , the chapters and the regular communities, among one another and in relation to secular bodies, regulates itself according to ancient usages. The same is true with regard to individual ecclesiastics if they do not have a particular rank as a result of their benefices or charges. In England one distinguishes between the high and the low clergy : the high clergy is composed of archbishops and bishops; the low clergy contains all the other ecclesiastics. In France we have the same distinction, but with different names: one says the first and the second order. The expression low clergy is nevertheless in use in chapters to signify the semi-prebendaries, chaplains, precentors, musicians, or other waged officers who have no voice in the chapter. See Chapter.

The immunities or exemptions enjoyed by the clergy date from time immemorial: our kings confirmed them through their edicts. On this subject one has those of St. Louis, of Philippe le Bel, of kings John, Charles V. Charles VII. &c. See the mémoires du clergé , volume VI.

The bishops and councils have at all times displayed the greatest firmness in order to maintain them and conserve them. On this subject one may see the letter that the provinces of Reims and of Rouen wrote to Louis II in 858. There are even examples of interdicts and excommunications pronounced against lay judges that violate ecclesiastical immunities. In 1207, during the vacancy of the see, the chapter of Rouen placed a general interdict on all the churches of Rouen, because the mayor of this town had, on his private authority, imprisoned the domestic of a canon. In one of the registers of the parlement of Paris one reads that, in the year 1359, the bishop of Chartres and his officials placed the town of Mantes under interdict because it did not wish to return to them two clerks held prisoner. Similar interdicts are mentioned in a constitution inserted into an ancient collection of synodal statutes of the church of Reims, made by archbishop Guillaume de Tryes, around the year 1330. See the mémoires du clergé, volume VI. and VII, and customary practice.

There are two types of ecclesiastical immunity; the personal, which concerns the person of the clerks; and the real, which concerns the property or the revenues of the church. The first exists to give ecclesiastics the freedom they require to go about their duties; the second deals more with the conservation of their property.

Personal exemptions are primarily jurisdictional: normally an ecclesiastic cannot be pursued before secular tribunals; or at least, in certain cases, the ecclesiastical judge must conduct the investigation together with the secular judge. Ecclesiastics are exempt from municipal charges, from guardianship and trusteeship, if they do not voluntarily accept them. As long ago as the time of St. Cyprian the rule was already ancient that if someone named a clerk as guardian in his will, the holy sacrifice would not be offered up for him after his death. Ecclesiastics are also exempt from physical constraint for civil debts. They are dispensed from the war service that was once due because of fiefdom, and that now only occurs with the calling-up of the arrière-ban, Decl. of the King of 8 February 1637. They are not even obliged to furnish other people to do the service, or to pay any tax to that effect. They are exempt from the watch and the guard, and from lodging men of war: no tax for lodging, utensil, or whatsoever provision, may be imposed upon them. Ecclesiastics must also not be included in any imposition for the feeding of troops or fortification of towns, or generally for any excises, subsidies, or other communal loans. In regions in which the taille is assessed on personal wealth, they are exempt, both as regards their patrimony and their tithes; but they are not exempt from the taille drawn on commerce, that is to say they are taxed on the tithes that they exploit and that are not attached to their benefice. In regions in which the taille is assessed on property, property belonging to the church is exempt, like noble property. They are also exempt from duties on the wines of their vineyard, whether it is a part of the benefice or patrimony, or at least they only pay very mediocre dues. These are the principal privileges enjoyed by the clergy , as to the particular contributions that it pays to the prince called décimes, subventions, dons gratuits, &c. See Tithes.

The immunity that applies to properties given to churches, either by the munificence of kings, or the piety of the faithful, is founded on the principle that they are especially devoted and consecrated to God for the relief of the poor, for the maintenance and the decoration of temples and altars, and for the subsistence of the ministers of God. This question has recently been keenly discussed, and we will be able to enter into interesting details on this issue in the art. Immunity.

We will limit ourselves here to observing that these properties are neither as excessive nor as exempt from public charges as opponents of the clergy have maintained. Besides the rights of redemption that it has lost by withdrawing them from commerce, is it not known that the ordinary taxes known as décimes, and the extraordinary taxes or free gifts, are very high; that they habitually reach a tenth, often a seventh, sometimes even a fifth of the revenue of the benefices? it would be easy to demonstrate this if it were at issue here. Suffice to note that as religion cannot sustain itself without ministers, there must be funds in the state reserved for their subsistence; and to add with M. l'abbé Fleury, "that since the public maintains them and recompenses their work, it is fair at least that this revenue should be preserved for them, and not to retake with one hand what one gives them with the other".

The honorific rights of the clergy are the honors and prerogatives attached to the manors, lands, fiefs, &c . that certain beneficiaries, chapters or communities possess, such as the rights of high, low and middle justice, of hunting, of fishing, &c. These useful rights consist of fixed and assured revenues, attached to each benefice, chapter, or religious community, and of retributions or casual offerings. Fleury, institut. au droit ecclés. volume I. part. I. ch. xxxix. p.258. and following.

In France the clergy assembles under the King's authority, either to deal with ecclesiastical issues, or to order impositions. These assemblies are either ordinary or extraordinary. The ordinary ones are either limited to each diocese, or provincial in each ecclesiastical province, or general to the whole clergy of France. Deputations to these last assemblies are sent by metropolis, called ecclesiastical provinces. See Metropolis.

There are two types of general assemblies of the clergy ; the great ones, to which each ecclesiastical province sends two deputies of the first order and two of the second; they are called the contract assemblies ; and the small assemblies, to which the provinces only depute one ecclesiastic of the first order and one of the second; they are called the accounts assemblies. Those that are called contract, or the great assemblies, are held every ten years; and five years after the convocation of the contract assembly, a smaller assembly is convened, in which the accounts of the receiver general are audited. All the ordinary assemblies are customarily held on 25 May; but they have occasionally been brought forward, and occasionally postponed, according to circumstances. Art. 24 . of the code of 1625 states that the great assemblies will not last longer than six months, and the accounts assemblies more than three months. The King determines the location for each assembly, and they are ordinarily held in Paris, in the convent of the grand Augustins. In former times, however, some have been held at Melun, at S. Germain-en-Laye, and elsewhere. Mém. du clergé, volume VIII. The deputies to the assemblies must be ordained, and furnished with a benefice in the province that deputes them. An over-tunic and the cappa magna are the dress of the deputies of the first order; and those of the second assist in a long coat and a square bonnet. These deputies have the privilege of being accounted present, during the period of the assembly, in those of their benefices that require residence, and that of suspending for the same period the judicial pursuits and disputes initiated against them before the convocation or during the period of the assembly. They also receive a retribution or tax for their journey or their stay, which is paid to them by the ecclesiastical chamber of the province. The presidents are always chosen from the first order, either bishops, or archbishops. The assembly also names promoters and secretaries drawn from the deputies of the second order. Finally it is customary that at the beginning and at the end of each assembly, a deputation is named to go to compliment the King. See the mémoires du clergé, volume VIII.

One also finds extraordinary assemblies in the clergy , and there are two sorts of these; some are general, and are called according to the form used for the convocation of ordinary assemblies; the others, which might be called extraordinary particular assemblies, occur without ceremony; the provinces do not send their deputies, and the prelates that compose them often have neither order nor permission from the King to assemble. The convocation of extraordinary particular assemblies takes place like this: when an extraordinary case arises that is of interest to the Church, the agents advise the bishops who are in Paris or at court of it; the oldest of the archbishops, or bishops, if there are no archbishops, orders the agents to send notes of convocation to all these prelates. This form is explained in the minutes of the assembly of 1650. That of 1655 determined that bishops in partibus would not be called to these types of assemblies, but only the coadjutors of bishops, and ancient bishops that have retired. They can send deputations to the King, and be extremely useful, despite being unable to statute on a great many matters with the same authority or the same plenitude of power as the ordinary assemblies of the clergy. See Agents of the Clergy. See also the mém. du clergé, volume VIII. Et M. Fleury, mém. des affaires du clergé de France, inserted after l'instit. au droit ecclés. volume II. p. 264. & suiv. (G)

Reflections on ecclesiastical power drawn from l'esprit des lois. 1. Just as the power of the clergy is dangerous in a republic, so it is suitable in a monarchy, particularly if it tends towards despotism. Where would Spain and Portugal be since the loss of their laws without this power that alone stops arbitrary power? a barrier that is always good when there are no other ones: because just as despotism causes nature terrible evils, the very evil that would limit it would be a benefit.

2. From the beginning of the first race, one sees the heads of the Church arbitrating judgments; they assist at the assemblies of the nation; they have a powerful influence on the resolutions of kings; they were given privileges; they were showered with property. The author we are citing justifies this authority.

3. The clergy has received so much during the three races, that it has even been said that it has been given the value of all the property in the kingdom: but if the nation gave it too much at the time, she has since found ways to take it back. The clergy has always acquired; it has always returned; it acquires again. See l'esprit des lois.