RATIO OF CLERGY AND PEOPLE. 



133 



In 1844, — and we may consider it nearly the same in 1850, — 

 the church property was calculated as follows : 



Real estate — urban and rural, .... $18,000,000 

 Churches, houses, convents, curates' dwellings, furniture, 



jewels, sacred vessels and other personalities, . 52.000,000 

 Floating capital, various funds in ecclesiastical treasuries, 

 and the capital required to produce the sum annually 

 received by the Mexican clergy in alms, diezmos, 

 dues, &c. &c, 20,000,000 



Total, . . . . . . $90,000,000 



The real estate of the church is estimated by Senor Otero, — 

 from whose work on the social and political condition of Mexico, 

 this calculation is taken, — to have been worth at least 25 per cent, 

 more before the revolution ; and, to this increased value must be 

 added about $115,000,000 of capital founded on contribuciones, 

 derechos reales, and other imposts which were laid on the property 

 of the country for the benefit of the clergy. 1 



It is not to be supposed that the 2,000 nuns are of ecclesiastical 

 importance except for charitable and educational purposes ; — if we 

 deduct their number, therefore, from the 1,700 monks and 3,500 

 secular clergy, we shall have only 3,200 men devoted to the spi- 

 ritual wants of more than seven and a half millions or, 2,383 in- 

 dividuals assigned to the ecclesiastical charge of each priest, monk 

 or curate. And yet, among these men, chiefly, the avails of pro- 

 bably more than $90,000,000 of property are to be annually dis- 

 tributed or consolidated in a country from which they are constantly 

 asking alms instead of bestowing them. 



The value of their churches, the extent of their city property, the 

 power they possess as lenders and mortgagees in Mexico, where 

 there are no banks, and the enormous masses of church plate, 

 golden ornaments and jewels, will swell the above statements and 

 estimates of the church's wealth to nearer one hundred millions than 

 ninety, or to about $88,000,000 less than it was before the rebellion 

 against Spain ; at which period the number of ecclesiastics was 

 about 10,000; or 13,000, if the lay brethren and subordinates are 

 included in the ecclesiastical census. 2 



1 See Otero Cuestion Social y Politica de Mejico, pp. 38, 39, 43. 



2 Mexico as it Was and Is, p. 329. 



