ABBEYS.—In a society of religious persons, whether male or female, where an abbot or abbess presided, it was styled an abbey. The governor had the sole power over the convent, could appoint or discharge any officer at pleasure, and prescribe what rules the monks or nuns should be obliged to observe. The abbots have enjoyed the privilege of conferring the lower orders of priesthood, but in the essential points of jurisdiction they were everywhere subject to the diocesan bishop. The consequence of the abbots grew with the wealth of their monasteries, several received episcopal titles and privileges, all held rank next to that of a bishop, and had a vote in the ecclesiastical councils. Equal privileges and rights appertained to the abbesses, as the superior of the nunneries, except that they were not allowed to vote at synods. When the society of religious persons consisted of men, it was called a monastery. There is reason to believe that there were monasteries in Britain before the end of the 4th century. In the course of the 7th century many monasteries were founded in all parts of England. These monasteries were designed in some places for the seats of the bishops and their clergy; in others, for their secular priests, who preached and administered the sacraments over the neighbouring country, and in most instances, they were seminaries of learning for the education of youth. If a monastery or nunnery was subject to another, it was called a CELL. The great English abbeys had many such cells in distant places. PRIORIES.—When the chief person in a Monastery bore the name of Prior, it was styled a Priory. These religious houses were of two sorts—either they were such whose prior was independent, or they were such as depended upon some great abbey, from which they received their Prior, and to which they were often obliged to pay a small pension or annual acknowledgment. Whenever the Convent to which they belonged was beyond the seas, then it was styled an alien Priory. These last transmitted their revenues to their foreign superior, for which reason their estates were generally seized to carry on the wars between England and France.