it by an estimate of the portion belonging to the clergy. Its
possessions, capitalized, amount to nearly 4,000,000,000 francs.[5]
Income from this amounts to 80 or 100 millions. To this must be added
the dime (or tithes), 123 millions per annum, in all 200 millions, a
sum which must be doubled to show its equivalent at the present day.
We must also add the chance contributions and the usual church
collections.[6] To fully realize the breadth of this golden stream let
us look at some of its affluents. 399 monks at Prémontré estimate
their revenue at more than 1,000,000 livres, and their capital at
45,000,000. The Provincial of the Dominicans of Toulouse admits, for
his two hundred and thirty-six monks, "more than 200,000 livres net
revenue, not including the convent and its enclosure; also, in the
colonies, real estate, Negroes and other effects, valued at several
millions." The Benedictines of Cluny, numbering 298, enjoy an income
of 1,800,000 livres. Those of Saint-Maur, numbering 1672, estimate the
movable property of their churches and houses at 24,000,000, and their
net revenue at 8 millions, "without including that which accrues to
Messieurs the abbots and priors commendatory," which means as much and
perhaps more. Dom Rocourt, abbot of Clairvaux, has from 300,000 to
400,000 livres income; the Cardinal de Rohan, archbishop of
Strasbourg, more than 1,000,000.[7] In Franche-Comté, Alsace and
Roussillon the clergy own one-half of the territory, in Hainaut and
Artois, three-quarters, in Cambrésis fourteen hundred plow-areas out
of seventeen hundred.[8] Almost the whole of Le Velay belongs to the
Bishop of Puy, the abbot of La Chaise-Dieu, the noble chapter of
Brionde, and to the seigniors of Polignac. The canons of St. Claude,
in the Jura, are the proprietors of 12,000 serfs or 'mainmorts.'[9] -
Through fortunes of the first class we can imagine those of the
second. As along with the noble it comprises the ennobled. As the
magistrates for two centuries, and the financiers for one century had