3 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



maintained. A parallel genesis is shown us by ancient historic peo- 

 ples. Among the Greeks " the remains of the sacrifice are the priests' 

 fees," and "all that served the gods were maintained by the sacrifices 

 and other holy offerings." Nor was it otherwise with the Hebrews. 

 In Leviticus ii. 10 we read, " And that which is left of the meat-offer- 

 ing shall be Aaron's and his sons' " (the appointed priests) ; and other 

 passages entitle the priest to the skin of the offering, and to the whole 

 of the baked and fried offering. Neither does the history of early 

 Christianity fail to exhibit the like development. " In the first ages of 

 the Church, those deposita pietatis which are mentioned by Tertullian 

 were all voluntary oblations." Afterward "a more fixed maintenance 

 was necessary for the clergy; but still oblations were made by the 

 people. . . . These oblations [defined as ' whatever religious Christians 

 offered to God and the Church '], which were at first voluntary, became 

 afterward, by continual payment, due by custom." In mediaeval times 

 a further stage in the transition is shown us : " Besides what was 

 necessary for the communion of priests and laymen, and that which 

 was intended for eulogies, it was at first the usage to offer all sorts of 

 presents, which at a later date were taken to the bishop's house and 

 ceased to be brought to the church." And then by continuation and 

 enlargement of such donations, growing into bequests, nominally to 

 God and practically to the Church, there grew up ecclesiastical revenues. 



Doubtless sundry readers have made on the foregoing statements 

 the running criticism that they represent all presents as made by infe- 

 riors to propitiate superiors ; and that they ignore the presents having 

 no such purpose, which are made by superiors to inferiors. These, 

 though they do not enter into what can be called ceremonial govern- 

 ment, must be noticed. The contrast between the two kinds of pres- 

 ents, in meaning, is well recognized where present-making is much 

 elaborated, as in China. " At or after the customary visits between 

 superiors and inferiors, an interchange of presents takes place : but 

 those from the former are bestowed as donations, while the latter are 

 received as offerings ; these being the Chinese terms for such presents 

 as pass between the emperor and foreign princes." 



Naturally it happens that as the power of the political head de- 

 velops, until at length, with little or no check, he assumes universal 

 ownership, there results a state in which he finds it needful to give back 

 to his dependents and subjects part of that which he has monopolized. 

 And having been originally subordinated by giving, these are now, to a 

 .certain extent, further subordinated by receiving. People of whom it 

 can be said, as of the Kukis, that "all the property they possess is by 

 simple sufferance of the rajah," or people who, like the Dahomans, are 

 owned in body and estate by their king, are obviously so conditioned 

 that property having flowed in excess to the political centre must flow 

 down again from lack of other use; and hence in Dahomey, though no 



