GSG 



PRIESTS. 



will always ensure attention. Asa theologian, doctor 

 Priestley, who followed his convictions wherever they 

 led him, passed through all changes, from Calvinism 

 to a Unitarian system, in some measure his own; 

 but, to the last, remained a zealous opposer of infide- 

 lity. Of his theological and controversial produc- 

 tions, those most generally esteemed are his Institutes 

 of Natural and Revealed Religion, and Letters to a 

 philosophical Unbeliever. He also wrote many 

 works of practical divinity. His works amount to 

 about seventy volumes, or tracts, in octavo. (See 

 his Lift, by himself and his son.) 



PRIESTS; officers called by choice or birth to 

 perform religious rites, and to inculcate and expound 

 religious dogmas. Among the ancient pagan nations, 

 all that was dignified and venerable, that deserved 

 respect and obedience, that stood nearer to the 

 Divinity than the common mass of mortals, was 

 associated with the idea of the priestly office. The 

 patriarch of the primitive world was at once the 

 king and the priest of his family ; and when the 

 state was developed from the family, the royal and 

 priestly dignity still continued, for a long time, to 

 be united in the same person. (See Melchisedek, 

 and Patriarchs.) But these offices became sepa- 

 rated in those states of antiquity which owed their 

 existence to the ascendency of single heroes or con- 

 quering tribes; and by the side of the regal dignity 

 and sovereignty a sacerdotal order, which in some 

 countries was elective, in others hereditary, grew 

 up, and by the reputation of superior wisdom, and 

 secret communion with the gods (whence the priests 

 were also honoured as magicians and physicians), 

 inspired the mind with awe. In the states of Wes- 

 tern Asia, in Egypt, Greece, and Rome, the priests 

 were therefore public councillors, and instruments 

 of government. Their original office was to bring 

 down divine things to the conception of men (the 

 origin of most of the mythuses may therefore be 

 referred to their explanations of symbols and em- 

 blems), and to solemnize the public worship of the 

 gods by sacrifices, prayers, and religious pomp 

 (mysteries). Instruction and the interpretation of 

 symbolical doctrines ceased to be a part of their 

 office when the mythical religious system came to 

 an end; and when the poets, rhetoricians, and philo- 

 sophers assumed the office of interpreters of the 

 mythuses, the sole business of the priests became 

 the performance of the religious rites. The Mosaic 

 constitution exhibits them in this stage of develop- 

 ment, and, while it clothes them with great power, 

 reserves the spiritual part of religion to the prophets, j 

 (See High Priest, and Theocracy.} The posterity | 

 of Aaron, the hereditary priests of the Hebrews, ! 

 became, therefore, mere mechanical agents in the j 

 daily repetition of the temple service. It fared no 

 better with the Roman Catholic clergy when they | 

 adopted the rigour and formalities of the Jewish j 

 priesthood, with the view of obtaining the same j 

 privileges, and exacting from the Christian laity : 

 the same contributions (e.g. tithes) which the Levites 

 had enjoyed. Such a tendency was altogether foreign 

 from the Founder of Christianity and its apostles. 

 The primitive Christian communities had, indeed, 

 teachers, whose duty it was to expound the divine 

 word, and to exercise a paternal care over their dis- 

 ciples; but not to perform pompous ceremonies, nor 

 to rule over the conscience. Some of these teachers 

 were called presbyters, whence the term priest, in 

 our language, is derived (see Presbyterians}; but 

 they were by no means priests in the sense of the 

 word which prevails at present. In the Catholic 

 church, priests are that order of the clergy who 

 perform the holy office of the mass, and in some of 

 the Protestant churches, those who administer the 



sacraments, preach, &c. (See Hierarchy, and Ordi- 

 nation) Among^ the Hindoos, the sacerdotal caste 

 sty led Bramins form the highest caste. (See lira- 

 mins,aiid Caste.) In the systems of Lamaism and Mo- 

 hammedanism, the dulai-lama and the caliph are the 

 heads of the priesthood. (See Lama, mid Caliph.) 

 Priests, Non-Juring, or Pretres Insermentcs. The 

 schism in the French church, produced by the con- 

 stitution civile du clerge of the 12th of July, 1790, 

 was connected with the old relations of that church 

 with the Roman see and the French government, 

 and of these latter with each other. Louis IX., by 

 his pragmatic sanction (I2b'8), defended the rights 

 of election against the see of Rome, and restricted 

 the pecuniary exactions of the latter. By the con- 

 cordate of Leo X. with Francis I. (1516), the right 

 of appointing the bishops and prelates was secured 

 to the king, and that of receiving the annates, to 

 the pope; at the same time, an opportunity was 

 afforded to the nobles, by requiring of them a shorter 

 period of preparation, to exclude the learned class, 

 who were really the clergy, from the higher and 

 more profitable ecclesiastical offices. By a royal 

 edict of 1606, this exclusion of the learned was 

 completed, and those abuses introduced, which, in 

 connexion with the licentiousness and immorality 

 of some of the higher clergy, contributed to produce 

 the revolution. The immense revenues of the Gal- 

 lican church were not applied to spiritual purposes, 

 but merely to supply to the younger sons of nobles 

 the means of leading dissipated and dissolute lives, 

 while the real labourers in the church the priests 

 were obliged to live, for the most part, on very 

 moderate, and often scanty incomes. The declara- 

 tion of the French clergy of 1682 (denying the per- 

 sonal infallibility of the pope and his power to inter- 

 fere in secular affairs), the Jansenist controversy, 

 and the bull Unigenitus (1713), had introduced divi- 

 sions into the church. It was no wonder, then, that 

 when, in 1788, the government itself called the 

 people to a great political reform, the church should 

 have been one of the first objects of attention. The 

 first step was to declare the possessions of the church 

 national property, which after supplying the neces- 

 sary wants of the church, was to be employed for 

 purposes of state. The relations of the state to the 

 Catholic church were afterwards entirely changed 

 by the civil constitution of the clergy above men- 

 tioned. The 135 bishoprics, which were of very 

 unequal extent, were reduced to eighty-three, one 

 for each department, and the whole country was 

 divided into ten archbishoprics. The ten arch- 

 bishops were to have their seats at Rouen, Rheims, 

 Besangon, Rennes, Paris, Bourges, Bordeaux, Tou- 

 louse, Aix, and Lyons. The bishops were to officiate 

 as the curates of their sees; the priests and bishops 

 were to be chosen by the people; the canonical 

 consecration was to be performed by the bishop or 

 archbishop (the archbishop being consecrated by 

 the oldest bishop in the archbishopric). The pope, 

 as the visible head of the church, was merely to be 

 informed after the choice had taken place, without 

 any confirmation from him being necessary; and all 

 the bishops, both those in office at the time and 

 those who should thereafter be chosen, were to take 

 an oath " to watch over the congregations commit- 

 ted to them, to be faithful to the nation, the law, 

 and the. king, and to support the constitution, which 

 should be framed by the national assembly and ac- 

 cepted by the king." Most of the old prelates and 

 many of the priests refused to take this oath. Such 

 refusal was declared equivalent to a resignation, 

 and others were chosen to supply their places. The 

 non-juring clergy formed one of the most powerful 

 means of opposing republicanism in France ; they 



