CHAPTER IV.

HOLY ORDERS.

Rites, acts of worship and sacrifices, originally performed by each individual at his own discretion, or by each household in its own way, fall (as we have seen) with advancing development into the hands of professional persons consecrated for this especial purpose. Very great importance attaches to these consecrated persons. The place they occupy in all societies above the level of barbarism is one of peculiar honor; and their influence on the course of human history has in all ages with which that history is acquainted been conspicuous and profound. Once devoted to their religious duties, they become the authorized representatives of deity on earth. In treating of their consecration, we consider them as channels of communication from earth to heaven; we have now to consider them as channels of communication from heaven to earth.

Endowed by the general wish of all human society with a special right to convey their petitions to the divine beings whom they worship, they do not fail to claim for themselves the correlative right of conveying to men the commands, the intentions, the reproofs, and the desires of these divine beings. It is the priests alone who can pretend to know their minds. It is the priests alone who can correctly interpret their often enigmatic language. It is the priests alone through whom they generally deign to converse with mortals.

Such is the ecclesiastical theory throughout the world; and it is as a general rule accepted by the communities for whose guidance it is constructed. Exceptions do indeed present themselves, above all in the case of the remarkable men whose careers we shall deal with in the ensuing chapter, who have founded new religions independently of, or even in spite of, very powerful existing priesthoods. And, speaking generally, the holy class is not always coëxtensive with the consecrated class. We shall notice further on an important order among the Jews who were universally received as holy, without being consecrated. Moreover, there has often existed a species of men who, without regular consecration, have nevertheless served as a channel of communication from God or from inferior spirits to man. Such were magicians, astrologers, "et hoc genus omne," in ancient times; such are the so-called mediums in the present day. Conversely, consecration, though by its very nature implying holiness as its correlative, implies it less and less as we rise in the scale of culture. Thus, in the more advanced forms of Protestantism, such as the Presbyterian or the Unitarian, the minister is scarcely more than a mere teacher; he has little or no more power to convey commands or intimations from God than any member of his congregation. So that we should have a rough approximation to the truth were we to say that in the lower grades of religious culture we have holy orders without consecration; while in the higher grades we have consecrated orders without holiness.

Between these extremes there lies the great body of regular and qualified priests, appointed to communicate upwards, and entitled to communicate downwards. Invasions of their authority by irregular pretenders are the exceptions, not the rule. It is the usual order of things, that the decisions of priests on matters pertaining to religion should be accepted in submissive faith, by the societies to which they belong. Where, as in the case of Jesus of Nazareth, some bold individual brushes aside successfully the pretentions of ecclesiastical castes, the theory is only modified to suit the individual instance. Ecclesiastical castes, deriving their title from the innovator himself, spring up again at once; and differ only in so far as the God whose will they expound is either another God, or a new modification of the same God.

Numerous privileges are generally accorded to priests. Sometimes they enjoy exemptions from the operation of the ordinary laws; sometimes they are permitted a disproportionate share in the government of their country; sometimes, without possessing recognized legislative powers, they control the destinies of nations by the expression of their views. Often, the whole physical force of the government is at their disposal, for the propagation and support of the system they uphold; occasionally, when their authority has reached its highest point, the mere solemn declaration of their commands is enough to ensure the acquiescence of monarchs and the obedience of their subjects. Corresponding to these considerable rights, they perform a considerable variety of functions, which are regarded by the societies who employ them as not only useful, but indispensable. We find them in all primitive communities acting as the recognized doctors of the people, treating their diseases by the method of supernatural inspiration. Rising a little higher, they predict that class of events which is so interesting to each individual, namely, the prospects of his or her life. In other words, they become fortune-tellers, astrologers, or (by whatever means) readers of the future. Or they control the weather, calling down from heaven the needful rain. They are inspired by the deity in whose service they are enrolled, and they announce his will. In his name they threaten evil-doers with punishment, and promise rewards to the faithful and obedient. Benefits from on high are declared to be the lot of those who pay them honor. They proclaim the fact that their presence is essential to the performance of important rites, and that their assistance at these must be duly rewarded. Sometimes they are in possession of knowledge which is only permitted to be imparted to their own caste. They are at all times the authorized expositors of theological dogma, and the authorized guardians of public ritual.

Let us enter on a more detailed account of these several characteristics of the priestly order.

First, it has to be noted that the differentiation of this order from the rest of society is in primitive communities very incomplete. Fathers of families, or any venerable and respected men, act as priests, and perform the requirements of divine worship according to their own notions of propriety. Thus in Samoa, Mr. Turner tells us that "the father of the family was _the high-priest_, and usually offered a short prayer at the evening meal, that they might all be kept from fines, sickness, war, and death." He also directed on what occasions religious festivals should be held, and it was supposed that the god sometimes spoke through the father or another member of the family (N. Y., p. 239). So in the early period of the history of the Israelites, there was no formal and regular priesthood, and no established ritual. The Levites were not devoted to the functions they subsequently discharged, until, in the course of the Exodus, they had proved their qualification by the holy zeal with which they slaughtered their brethren. It was for the perpetration of this massacre that they were promised by Moses the blessing of God (Exod. xxxii. 25-29). With advancing culture, the necessity for separating priests from laymen is always felt. The ministrations of unskilled hands are not held to be sufficient. Ritual grows fixed; and for a fixed ritual there must be a special apprenticeship. Ceremonies multiply; and the original family prayer having grown into a more elaborate system of worship, takes more time, and demands the attention of a class who make this, and kindred matters, their exclusive occupation.

While, however, the ministers of the gods are thus differentiated from the people at large, they are not differentiated until a later stage from the ministers of the human body. Medicine and priestcraft are for a long time united arts. On this connection, Brinton very justly remarks, that "when sickness is looked upon as the effect of the anger of a god, or as the malicious infliction of a sorcerer, it is natural to seek help from those who assume to control the unseen world, and influence the fiats of the Almighty" (M. N. W., p. 264). Thus in America the native priests were called by the European colonists, "medicine men." The New Zealand priests were "expert jugglers," and when called in to the sick would ascribe some diseases to a piece of wood lodged in the stomach; this they pretended to extract, and produced it in evidence of their assertion. An acquaintance of the author from whom I borrow this fact, saw one of these doctors tear open the leg of a rheumatic patient, and (apparently) take out of it a knotted piece of wood (N. Z., p. 80). In the Fiji islands they occasionally use their medical powers malevolently, instead of benevolently. In Tanna, there was a class of men termed "disease-makers," and greatly dreaded by the people, who thought that these men could exercise the power of life and death, the calamity of death being the result of burning rubbish belonging to the sufferer. When a Tannese was ill, he believed that the disease-maker was burning his rubbish, and would send large presents to induce him to stop; for if it were all burned he would die (N. Y. p. 89-91). The Samoans believed disease to be the result of divine wrath, and sought its remedy at the hands of the high-priest of the village. Whatever he might demand was given; in some cases, however, he did not ask for anything, but merely commanded the family of the patient to "confess, and throw out." Confessing, and throwing out, consisted of a statement by each member of the family of the crimes he had committed, or of the evil he had invoked on the patient or his connections, accompanied by the ceremony of spurting out water from the mouth towards him (N. Y., p. 224). Like the Fijians, the natives of Australia employ priests to cure their illnesses. Their ecclesiastical practitioners "perform incantations over the sick," and also pretend to suck out the disease, producing a piece of bone which they assert to be its cause (S. L. A., p. 226). The Africans have an exactly similar belief in the influence of fetish over disease. Reade observes that epileptic attacks are (as is natural from their mysterious character) ascribed to demoniacal possession, and that fetish-men are called in to cure them. This they attempt to accomplish by elaborate dances and festivities, "at the expense of the next of kin," which sometimes end in driving the patient into the bush in a state of complete insanity. When cured, he "builds a little fetish-house, avoids certain kinds of food, and performs certain duties" (S. A., p. 251). The negroes on the coast of Guinea, when ill, apply to their priest, who informs them what offerings are required to ensure their recovery (D. C. G., p. 213). When an Amazulu is troubled by bad dreams, he applies to a diviner, who recommends certain ceremonies by which the spirit causing the dreams is supposed to be banished. Should he be ill, his friends apply to the diviner, who discovers the source of the illness, and probably demands the sacrifice of a bullock. A remarkable sensitiveness about the shoulders indicates the spiritual character of the doctor. If he fail to remove disease, he is said to have no "Itongo," or spirit, in him (R. S. A., pt. ii. pp. 159, 160, 172). The Fida negroes sent to consult their divine snake through a priest when ill, and the priest (unless he announced that the disease would be fatal) received a reward for indicating the remedies to be used. Moreover, the priests were the physicians of the negroes. Two theories prevailed among the people as to the origin of illnesses. Some tribes held them to be due to evil spirits, who were accordingly driven away by a prescribed system of armed pursuit. But the priests in other places regarded them as a consequence of discord between spirit and soul, and required the patient in the first instance to confess his sins. This being done, they obtain from their deity an indication of the offerings to be made, or the vows to be fulfilled, to restore mental harmony. They then undertook the treatment of the body by physical means (G. d. M., pp. 335, 336). In Sierra Leone, as in other parts of Africa, "the practice of medicine, and the art of making greegrees and fetishes, in other words, amulets ... is generally the province of the same person." Those who practice medicine are looked upon as witches, and believed not only to converse with evil spirits, but to exercise control over them (N. A., vol. i. p. 251). In New France, in the eighteenth century, the principal occupation of the native priests was medicine (N. F. vol. iii. p. 364). In Mexico, the people came from all parts to the priests to be anointed with the peculiar unguent used in the special consecration mentioned above (_Supra_, p. 116). This they termed a "divine physic," and considered as a cure for their diseases (H. I., b. 5, ch. 26).

Such rude notions as these, implying a supernatural as opposed to a natural theory of the physical conditions of the body, are not wholly extinct even among ourselves. They exist, like so many of the crude conceptions of the savage, in the form of respected survivals wholly inconsistent with our practical habits. True, we do not call in the clergyman to assist or to direct at the sick-bed. But we do ask him to put up prayers for the recovery of the sick; and in the case of royal princes, the clergy throughout the land are set to work to induce the divine Being to give their illnesses a favorable turn. Now, this proceeding, however disguised under refined and imposing forms, is practically on a level with that of the Amazulu, who seeks to pacify the offended spirit that has attacked him with pain by the sacrifice of a bullock; or with that of the Fijian who, when his friend is ill, blows a shell for hours as a call to the disease-maker to stop burning the sick man's rubbish, and as a sign that presents will speedily reach his hands. Nay, the very missionary who relates this Fiji custom gives at least one proof of his fitness to understand the native mind, in a passage showing that in reference to beliefs like these his own was almost on a par with it. A war, of which the missionaries disapproved, had been going on for four months, "and the end of it was, the war was raised against ourselves. After they had been fighting for months among themselves, contrary to all our entreaties, God commenced to punish them with a deadly epidemic in the form of dysentery." Now, the conviction that diseases are punishments sent by some god, or at any rate direct results of an intention on the part of some god to harm the sufferer, is at the root of the priestly, as opposed to the scientific, treatment. For if God punishes with a deadly epidemic, it is an obvious inference that the mode of cure and of prevention is not to take physical remedies, and observe physical precautions, but to avoid the sin for which the punishment is given. And this is the common conclusion of the savage and the Christian, though the superior information of the Christian renders his conduct self-contradictory and confused, where that of the savage is logical and simple.

Nearly related to the supposed influence of priests over physical suffering, is their supposed power to foretell the future. Here, however, a number of unauthorized and schismatic priesthoods often enter into competition with those sanctioned by the state. Technically, they would not be termed priests at all; but tested by the true mark of priesthood, the gift, alleged by themselves and admitted by others, of forming channels of communication from the celestial powers to man, they are entitled to that name, and this although they may perhaps receive no regular consecration to their office. The Roman Senate during the Empire came into frequent collision with these irregular priests. It endeavored from time to time to combat the growing belief in the unorthodox practices of astrologers and magi, by decreeing their expulsion from Italy, and occasionally by visiting some of them with severer penalties; but such endeavors to stem the tide of popular superstition are naturally useless (Tac. Ann., ii. 32; xii. 52). Magic of some description is universal. In New Zealand the priest "seems to unite in his person the offices of priest, sorcerer, juggler, and physician." He predicts the life or death of members of his tribe (N. Z., p. 80). By the Kafirs the prophet is consulted on all kinds of domestic occasions, and (while the people beat the ground in assent to what he says) he is held to see in a vision the event which has led to the consultation (K. N., p. 167 ff). The inhabitants of Sierra Leone have other methods of divining. Their diviners make dots and lines in sand spread upon a goat's skin, which dots and lines they afterwards decipher; or they place palm-nuts in heaps upon a goat's skin, and by shifting them about suppose that an answer is obtained (N. A., vol. i. p. 134). The heathen Mexican had the habit, on the birth of a child, of consulting a diviner in order to ascertain its future. The diviner, having learnt from the child's parents the hour at which it was born, turned over his books to discover the sign under which its nativity had occurred. Should that sign prove to be favorable, he would say to the parents: "Your child has been born under a good sign; it will be a senor, or senator, or rich, or brave," or will have some other distinction. In the opposite case he would say: "The child has not been born under a good sign; it has been born under a disastrous sign." In some circumstances there was hope that the evil might be remedied; but if the sign were altogether bad, they would predict that it would be vicious, carnal, and a thief; or that it would be dull and lazy; or possibly that it would be a great drunkard; or that its life would be short. A third alternative was when the sign was indifferent, and the expected fortune was therefore partly good and partly bad. The diviner, in this case and in that of a bad, but not hopelessly bad, sign, assisted the parents by pointing out an auspicious day for the baptism of the infant (A. M., vol. v. pp. 479, 480).

Prediction of coming events was practiced by the priests in North America, as it was elsewhere. They persuaded the multitude, says Charlevoix, that they suffered from ecstatic transports. During these conditions, they said that their spirits gave them a large acquaintance with remote things, and with the future (N. F., vol. iii. p. 347). Moreover, they practiced magic, and with such effect that Charlevoix felt himself compelled to ascribe their performances to their alliance with the devil. They even pretended to be born in a supernatural manner, and found believers ready to think that only by some sort of enchantment and illusion had they formerly imagined that they had come into the world like other people. When they went into the state of ecstasy, they resembled the Pythoness on the tripod; they assumed tones of voice and performed actions which seemed beyond human capacity. On these occasions they suffered so much that it was hard to induce them, even by handsome payment, thus to yield themselves to the spirit. So often did they prophesy truly, that Charlevoix can only resort again to his hypothesis of a real intercourse between them and the "father of seduction and of lies," who manifested his connection with them by telling them the truth. Thus, a lady named Madame de Marson, by no means an "esprit faible," was anxious about her husband, who was commanding at a French outpost in Acadia, and who had stayed away beyond the time fixed for his return. A native woman, having ascertained the reason of her trouble, told her not to be distressed, for that her husband would return on a certain day at a certain hour, wearing a grey hat. Seeing that the lady did not believe in her, she returned on the day and at the hour named, and asked her if she would not come to meet her husband. After much pressing, she induced the lady to accompany her to the bank of the river. Scarcely had they arrived, when M. de Marson appeared in a canoe, wearing a grey hat upon his head. The writer was informed of this fact by Madame de Marson's son-in-law, at that time Governor-General of the French dominions in America, who had heard it from herself (N. F., vol. iii. p. 359-363). The priests of the Tartars are also their diviners. They predict eclipses, and announce lucky and unlucky days for all sorts of business (Bergeron, Voyage de Rubruquis, ch. 47).

Among the Buddhist priesthood of Thibet, there is a class of Lamas who are astrologers, distinguished by a peculiar dress, and making it their business to tell fortunes, exorcise evil spirits, and so forth. The astrologers "are considered to have intercourse with Sadag," a spirit who is supposed to be "lord of the ground," in which bodies are interred, and who, along with other spirits, requires to be pacified by charms and rites known only to these priests. To prevent them from injuring the dead, the relations offer a price in cattle or money to Sadag; and the astrologers, when satisfied with the amount, undertake the necessary conjuration (B. T., pp. 156, 271).

In the Old Testament, this class of unofficial priests is mentioned with the reprobation inspired by rivalry. The Hebrew legislator is at one with the Roman Senate in his desire to expel them from the land. "There shall not be found among you any one that ... useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consultor with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord: and because of these abominations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee" (Deut. xviii. 10-12). The very prohibition evinces the existence of the objects against whom it is aimed; and proves that, along with the recognized worship of Jehovah, there existed an unrecognized resort to practices which the sterner adherents of that worship would not permit.

In addition to their claim to be in possession of special means of ascertaining the occult causes of phenomena (as in illness), and of special contrivances for penetrating the future (as in astrology or fortune-telling), priesthoods pretend to a more direct inspiration from on high, qualifying them either to announce the will of their god on exceptional occasions, or to intimate his purpose in matters of more ordinary occurrence. This inspiration was granted to the native North American priests at the critical age of puberty, "It was revealed to its possessor by the character of the visions he perceived at the ordeal he passed through on arriving at puberty; and by the northern nations was said to be the manifestation of a more potent personal spirit than ordinary. It was not a faculty, but an inspiration; not an inborn strength, but a spiritual gift" (M. N. W., p. 279). So in India; among the several meanings of the word Brahman, is that of a person "elected by special divine favor to receive the gift of inspiration" (O. S. T., vol. i. p. 259). The missionary Turner, who has an eye for parallels, observes, among other just reflections, that "the way in which the Samoan priests declared that the gods spoke by them, strikingly reminds us of the mode by which God of old made known his will to man by the Hebrew prophets" (N. Y., p. 349). Although the Levites were said to be the Lord's, and to have been hallowed by him instead of all the first-born of Israel, yet it does not appear that they were in general endowed with any high order of inspiration. The high-priest no doubt received communications from God by the Urim and Thummim. Priests were also the judges whom the Lord chose, and whose sentence in court was to be obeyed on penalty of death; but the inspiration that was fitted to guide the Israelites was supplied not so much by them as by the prophets, a kind of supplementary priesthood of which the members, sometimes priests, sometimes consecrated by other prophets, were as a rule unconsecrated, deriving their appointment directly from Jehovah. While, therefore, it was attained in a somewhat unusual way, the general need of an inspired order was supplied no less perfectly among the Israelites than elsewhere. Christian priests enjoy two kinds of inspiration. In the first place, they are inspired specially when assembled in general councils, to declare the truth in matters of doctrine, or in other words, to issue supplementary revelations; in the second place, they are inspired generally to remit or retain offenses, their sentence being—according to the common doctrine of Catholics and Episcopalian Protestants—always ratified in the Court above.

Consistently with this exalted conception of their authority, priestly orders threaten punishment to offenders, and announce the future destiny of souls. Thus the Mexican priests warned their penitents after confession not to fall again into sin, holding out the prospect of the torments of hell if they should neglect the admonition (A. M., vol. v, p. 370). The priests in some parts of Africa know the fate of each soul after death, and can say whether it has gone to God or to the evil spirit (G. d. M., p. 335).

Sometimes the priests are held to be protected against injury by the especial care of heaven. To take away a Brahman's wife is an offense involving terrible calamities, while kings who restore her to the Brahman enjoy "the abundance of the earth" (0. S. T., vol. i. p. 257). A king who should eat a Brahman's cow is warned in solemn language of the dreadful consequences of such conduct, both in this world and the next (Ibid., vol. i. p. 285). The sacred volumes declare that "whenever a king, fancying himself mighty, seeks to devour a Brahman, that kingdom is broken up, in which a Brahman is oppressed" (Ibid., vol. i. p. 287). "No one who has eaten a Brahman's cow continues to watch (_i.e._, to rule) over a country." The Indian gods, moreover, "do not eat the food offered by a king who has no ... Purohita," or domestic chaplain (A. B., p. 528). The murder of a king who had honored and enriched the Buddhist priesthood, is said to have entailed the destruction of the power and strength of the kingdom of Thibet, and to have extinguished the happiness and welfare of its people (G. O. M., p. 362). And Jewish history affords abundant instances of the manner in which the success or glory of the rulers was connected, by the sacerdotal class, with the respect shown towards themselves as the ministers of Jehovah, and with the rigor evinced in persecuting or putting down the ministers of every other creed. That the same bias has been betrayed by the Christian priesthood and their adherents in the interpretation of history needs no proof.

The presence of a priest or priests at important rites is held to be indispensable by all religions. With the negroes visited by Oldendorp, the priest was in requisition at burials; for he only could help the soul to get to God, and keep off the evil spirit who would seek to obtain possession of it (G. d. M., p. 327). "For most of the ceremonies" (in Thibet) "the performance by a Lama is considered indispensable to its due effect; and even where this is not so, the efficacy of the rite is increased by the Lama's assistance" (B. T., p. 247). Much the same thing may be said here. For certain ceremonies, such as confirmation, the administration of the sacrament, the conduct of divine service on Sundays, the priest is a necessary official. For others, such as marriage, the majority of the people prefer to employ him, and no doubt believe that "the efficacy of the rite is increased" by the fact that he reads the words of the service. Nor is this surprising when we consider that, until within very recent times, no legitimate child could be produced in England without the assistance of a priest.

Not only is the ecclesiastical caste required to render religious rites acceptable to the deity, but they are often endowed with the attribute of ability to modify the course of nature. Tanna, one of the Fiji group, "there are rain-makers and thunder-makers, and fly and musquito makers, and a host of other 'sacred men;'" and in another island "there is a rain-making class of priests" (N. Y., pp. 89, 428). In Christian countries all priests are rain-makers, the reading of prayers for fine or wet weather being a portion of their established duties.

Naturally, the members of a class whose functions are of this high value to the community enjoy great power, are regarded as extremely sacred, and above all, are well rewarded. First, as to the power they enjoy. This is accorded to them alike by savage tribes and by cultivated Europeans. According to Brinton, all North American tribes "appear to have been controlled" by secret societies of priests. "Withal," says the same authority, "there was no class of persons who so widely and deeply influenced the culture, and shaped the destiny of the Indian tribes, as their priests" (M. N. W., p. 285). Over the negroes of the Caribbean Islands the priests and priestesses exercised an almost unlimited dominion, being regarded with the greatest reverence. No negro would have ventured to transgress the arrangements made by a priest (G. d. M., p. 327). On the coast of Guinea there exists, or existed, an institution by which certain women became priestesses; and such women, even though slaves before, enjoyed, on receiving this dignity, a high position and even exercised absolute authority precisely in the quarter where it must have been sweetest to their minds, namely, over their husbands (D. C. G., p. 363). Writing of the Talapoins in Siam, Gervaise says, that they are exempted from all public charges; they salute nobody, while everybody prostrates himself before them; they are maintained at the public expense, and so forth (H. N. S., troisième partie, chs. 5, 6). Of the enormous power wielded by the clerical order in Europe, especially during the Middle Ages, it is unnecessary to speak. The humiliation of Theodosius by Ambrose was one of the most conspicuous, as it was one of the most beneficent, exercises of their extensive rights.

Secondly, the sanctity attached to their persons is usually considerable, and may often, to ambitious minds, afford a large compensation for the loss (if such be required) of some kinds of secular enjoyment. The African priestesses just mentioned are "as much respected as the priest, or rather more," and call themselves by the appellation of "God's children." When certain Buddhist ecclesiastics were executed for rebellion in Ceylon, the utmost astonishment was expressed by the people at the temerity of the king in so treating "such holy and reverend persons. And none heretofore," adds the reporter of the fact, "have been so served; being reputed and called _sons of Boddon_" (H. R. C., p. 75), or Buddha; a title exactly corresponding to that of God's children bestowed upon the priestesses. In Siam the "Talapoins," or priests, are of two kinds: secular, living in the world; and regular, living in the forest without intercourse with men. There is no limit to the veneration given by the Siamese to these last, whom they look upon as demigods (H. N. S., troisième partie, p. 184). "The Brahman caste," according to the sacred books of the Hindus, "is sprung from the gods" (O. S. T., vol. i. p. 21); and the exceptional honor always accorded to them is in harmony with this theory of their origin. The title "Reverend," man to be revered, given to the clergy in Europe, implies the existence, at least originally, of a similar sentiment of respect.

Lastly, the services of priests are generally well rewarded, and they themselves take every care to encourage liberality towards their order. Payment is made to them either in the shape of direct remuneration, or in that of exceptional pecuniary privileges, or in that of exemptions from burdens. Direct remuneration may be, and often is, given in the shape of a fixed portion abstracted from the property of the laity for the benefit of the clergy. Such are the tithes bestowed by law upon the latter among the Jews, the Parsees, and the Christians. Or, direct remuneration may consist in fees for services rendered, and in voluntary gifts. Such fees and gifts are always represented by the priesthood as highly advantageous to the givers. If the relatives of a deceased Parsee do not give the priest who officiates at the funeral four new robes, the dead will appear naked before the throne of God at the resurrection, and will be put to shame before the whole assembly (Av., vol. ii. p. xli.; iii. p. xliv). Moreover, those Parsees who wish to live happily, and have children who will do them honor, must pay four priests, who during three days and three nights perform the Yasna for them (Z. A., vol. ii. p. 564). In Thibet there is great merit in consecrating a domestic animal to a certain god, the animal being after a certain time "delivered to the Lamas, who may eat it" (B. T., p. 158). Giving alms to the monks is a duty most sedulously inculcated by Buddhism, and the Buddhist writings abound in illustrations of the advantages derived from the practice. Similar benefits accrue to the clergy from the custom, prevailing in Ceylon, of making offerings in the temples for recovery from sickness; for when the Singhalese have left their gift on the altar, "the priest presents it with all due ceremony to the god; and after its purpose is thus served, very prudently converts it to his own use" (A I. C., p. 205). Of the Levites it is solemnly declared in Deuteronomy that they have "no part nor inheritance with Israel," and that "the Lord is their inheritance." But "the Lord" is soon seen to be a very substantial inheritance indeed. From those that offer an ox or a sheep the priests are to receive "the shoulder, the two cheeks, and the maw;" while the first-fruits of corn, wine, and oil, and the first of the sheep's fleeces are to be given to them (Deut. xviii. 1-5). Moreover, giving to the priest is declared to be the same thing as giving to the Lord (Num. v. 8). A similar notion, always fostered by ecclesiastical influence, has led to the vast endowments bestowed by pious monarchs and wealthy individuals upon the Christian clergy.

Occasionally, the priests enjoy exemptions from the taxes, or other burdens levied upon ordinary people. A singular instance of this is found in the privilege of the Parsee priests, of not paying their doctors (J. A., vol. ii. p. 555). Large immunities used to be enjoyed by ecclesiastics among ourselves, especially that of exemption from the jurisdiction of the ordinary courts of law.

While the life of a priest often entails certain privations, he is nevertheless frequently sustained by the thought that there is merit in the sacrifices he makes. Thus, it is held by a Buddhist authority, that the merit obtained by entering the spiritual order is very great; and that his merit is immeasurable who either permits a son, a daughter, or a slave, to enter it, or enters it himself (W. u. T., p. 107).

Priesthoods may either be hereditary or selected. The Brahmins in India, and the Levites in Judæa, are remarkable types of hereditary, the Buddhist and the Christian clergy of selected, sacerdotal orders. Curious modifications of the hereditary principle were found among the American Indians. Thus, "among the Nez Percés of Oregon," the priestly office "was transmitted in one family from father to son and daughter, but, always with the proviso that the children at the proper age reported dreams of a satisfactory character." The Shawnees "confined it to one _totem_:" but just as the Hebrew prophets need not be Levites, "the greatest of their prophets ... was not a member of this clan." The Cherokees "had one family set apart for the priestly office," and when they "abused their birthright" and were all massacred, another family took their places. With another tribe, the Choctaws, the office of high-priest remained in one family, passing from father to son; "and the very influential piaches of the Carib tribes very generally transmitted their rank and position to their children." A more important case of hereditary priesthood is that of the Incas of Peru, who monopolized the highest offices both in Church and State. "In ancient Anahuac" there existed a double system of inheritance and selection. The priests of Huitzilopochtli, "and perhaps a few other gods," were hereditary; and the high-priest of that god, towards whom the whole order was required to observe implicit obedience, was the "hereditary pontifex maximus." But the rest were dedicated to ecclesiastical life from early childhood, and were carefully educated for the profession (M. N. W., p. 281-291).

Christianity entirely abandoned the hereditary principle prevalent among its spiritual ancestors, the Jews, and selected for its ministers of religion those who felt, or professed to feel, an internal vocation for this career. Doubtless this is the most effectual plan for securing a powerful priesthood. Those who belong to it have their heart far more thoroughly in their work than can possibly be the case when it falls to them by right of birth. Just the most priestly-minded of the community become priests; and a far greater air of zeal and of sanctity attaches to an order thus maintained, than to one of which many of the members possess no qualification but that of family, tribe, or caste.

Nothing can be more irrational than the denunciation of priests and priestcraft which is often indulged in by Liberal writers and politicians. If it be true that priests have shown considerable cunning, it is also true that the people have fostered that cunning by credulity. And if the clergy have put forth very large pretensions to inspiration, divine authority, and hidden knowledge, it is equally the fact that the laity have demanded such qualifications at their hands. An order can scarcely be blamed if it seeks to satisfy the claims which the popular religion makes upon it. Enlightenment from heaven has in all ages and countries been positively demanded. Sacrifices have always had to be made; and when it was found more convenient to delegate the function of offering them to a class apart, that class naturally established ritualistic rules of their own, and as naturally asserted (and no doubt believed) that all sacrifices not offered according to these rules were displeasing to God. And they could not profess the inspiration which they were expected to manifest without also requiring obedience to divine commands. Priests are, in fact, the mere outcome of religious belief as it commonly exists; and partly minister to that belief by deliberate trickery, partly share it themselves, and honestly accept the accredited view of their own lofty commission.

Divine inspiration leads by a very logical process to infallibility. A Church founded on revelation needs living teachers to preserve the correct interpretation of that revelation. Without such living teachers, revealed truth itself becomes (as it always has done among Protestants) an occasion of discord and of schism. But the interpreters of revelation in their turn must be able to appeal to some sole and supreme authority, as the arbiter between varying opinions, and the guide to be followed through all the intricacies of dogma. Nowhere can such an arbiter and such a guide be found more naturally than in the head of the Church himself. If God speaks to mankind through his Church, it is only a logical conclusion that within that Church there must be one through whom he speaks with absolute certainty, and whose prophetic voice must therefore be infallible. There cannot be a more consistent application of the general theory of priesthood; and there is no more fatal sign for the prospects of Christianity than the inability of many of its supporters to accept so useful a doctrine, and the thoughtless indignation of some among them against the single Church which has had the wisdom to proclaim it.