Page:William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (3rd ed, 1768, vol I).djvu/498

 482 decended to the viitor himelf: but, if the founder has appointed and aigned any other peron to be viitor, then his aignee o appointed is inverted with all the founder's power, in excluion of his heir. Eleemoynary corporations are chiefly hopitals, or colleges in the univerity. Thee were all of them conidered by the popih clergy, as of mere eccleiatical juridiction: however, the law of the land judged otherwie; and, with regard to hopitals, it has long been held, that if the hopital be piritual, the bihop hall viit; but if lay, the patron. This right of lay patrons was indeed abridged by tatute 2 Hen. V c. 1. which ordained, that the ordinary mould viit all hopitals founded by ubjects; though the king's right was reerved, to viit by his commiioners uch as were of royal foundation. But the ubject's right was in part retored by tatute 14 Eliz. c. 5. which directs the bihop to viit uch hopitals only, where no viitor is appointed by the founders thereof: and all the hopitals founded by virtue of the tatute 39 Eliz. c. 5. are to be viited by uch perons as hall be nominated by the repective founders. But till, if the founder appoints nobody, the bihop of the diocee mut viit.

in the univerities (whatever the common law may now, or might formerly, judge) were certainly conidered by the popih clergy, under whoe direction they were, as eccleiatical, or at leat as clerical, corporations; and therefore the right of viitation was claimed by the ordinary of the diocee. This is evident, becaue in many of our mot antient colleges, where the founder had a mind to ubject them to a viitor of his own nomination, he obtained for that purpoe a papal bulle to exempt them from the juridiction of the ordinary; everal of which are till preerved in the archives of the repective ocieties. And I have reaon to believe, that in one of our colleges, (wherein the bihop of that diocee, in which Oxford was formerly comprized, has immemorially exercied visitatorial authority) there is no pecial viitor appointed by the college tatutes: o that the bihop's interpoition can be acribed to nothing ele, but his up- Rh