Modus, in ecclesiastical law, signifies an exemption from the payment of tithes, and is of two kinds : first, a partial exemption, when it is' called a modus deciman- di; secomlly, a total exemption, when it is called a mo- dus de nan decimando. There is a third species of ex- emption, called a real comjwsition, where an agreement is made between the owner of lands and the parson or vicar, with the consent of the patron and ordinary, that the lands' specified shall be exempt from tithes on such considerations as are contained in the stipulation, such as land or other real recompense given ui lieu and satis- faction of the tithes to be relinquished. The modus
MOEBIUS
402
MOGILAS
decimandi is that which is generally meant when the term modus is used. It is delined to be a custom of tithing in a particular manner, diflerent from that which the general law prescribes; and the custom must have existed from time immemorial. The modes of tithing established by these customs are exceedingly various: sometimes it is a compensation iu work and labor, as that the incumbent shall have only the twelfth cock of hay, and not the tenth, in consideration of the landowner making it for him ; sometimes it is a less (luaiuity of tithe in a more perfect, in lieu of a larger (luantity iu a crude and imperfect state, as a couple of fowls ill lieu of tithe eggs; sometimes, and more fre- quently, it consists in a pecuniary compensation, as two- pence an acre for the tithe of land.
The modus de non decimatulo is an absolute exemp- tion from tithes. It exists in four cases : 1. The ruler may prescribe that he and his progenitors have never paid tithes for ancient crown lands, and this prescription will be good. 2. One Clmrch officer does not pay tithes to another officer his superior, nor the superior to the inferior, according to the rule that ecclesia ecclesm deci- mus solvere non debet. 3. An ecclesiastical person, as a bishop, may prescribe to be exempt from paying tithes on the ground that the lands belong to the bishopric, and that neither he nor his predecessors have ever paid them. 4. The abbeys and monasteries at the time of their dissolution were possessed of large estates of land, a great part of which was held tithe-free, either by pre- scription or by unity of possession, which was, in fact, no more than prescription, or by the pope's bull of ex- emption, or by a real composition. Thus in England, for example, the statute of 31 Henry VIII, c. 13, which dissolved the larger abbeys, enacted that all persons who should come to tlic possession of the lands of an al)l)ey then dissolved sliould liuld them tithe-free, in as ample a manner as the abbeys themselves had formerly held them. The lands which belonged to the Order of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem and to the Order of the Cistercians are within the protection of this stat- ute ; and those of them, consequently, which were tithe- free before they came into the hands of the king still continue tithe-free, in whosesoever hands they may now be. Some lands have been made tithe-free by special legislative acts. See Blackstone, Commentaries, ii, 28 ; Selden, Jlist. of Tithes, ch. xiii; Burton, Compe7idium of the Law of Real Property, p. 3G7 sq. — Eadie, Eccles. Diet. 8. V.
Moebius (or Mobius), Georo, a Lutheran divine, was born at Laucha, Thuringia, Dec. 18, ICIG; studied at Jena and Leipsic; became rector of the gymnasium at Mercersburg in 1647 ; professor and doctor of theology at Leipsic in 16G8 ; and died Nov. 28, 1G97. lie edited and enlarged Crusius's Grammatica Grceca, and was the author of numerous essays in Latin on Biblical and theological topics, which were afterwards published in a collective edition (Leips. IGDS), 4to). ijee Jiicher, Gelehrten Lexilcon, s. v.
Moed. See Talmud.
Moedsogdir, in Norse mythology, is the name Of
the highest class of pigmies who dwell in stones.
Moehler. See Mohi.eii,
Moelait, Jacob, a Dutch painter, was born at Dort in lG4'.t. He was a pupil of Nicholas Maas, and gained an enviable reputation as a historical painter, though he is better known by his portraits. Spooner mentions two religious works by this artist — /ViamoA and his Host drowned in the lied Sea, and Moses striking the Jiocl: He died in 1727. See Spooner, Bioj. Hist, of the Fine Arts (N. Y. 18G5, 2 vols. 8vo), ii, 572.
Moeller. See MOller.
Moeso- Gothic Version. bio>-.
See Gothic Yek-
Mo'eth (MwtS, Vulg. Medius~), a Levke, "son of Sabban," who aided Ezra in conveying the bullion from Babylon (1 Esdr. viii, G3); evidently the "Noadiau (q. V.) son of Binnui" of the Ileb. text (Ezra viii, 33).
MofiFatt, JosiAir, a Presbyterian minister, was bom in Chester County, S. C, May, IK^G. His parents were godly people, and reared their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. He prosecuted his clas- sical studies privately for two years, entered Erskine College, Due West, S, C, in 18o2, and graduated with honor in 1859. The next two years he spent in general reading at the libraries of his alma mater. He was re- ceived by the Second Presbyter}' as a student of theol- ogy in April, 1861; licensed in 1864; and subsequently preached in congregations in the First and Second Pres- byteries, making Due West his home. In 1865 he re- turned to his former home in Chester County, where he remained mitil his death, March 18, 1867. IMr. ^Moffatt was a man of solid intellect. His writings were excel- lent specimens of composition, and full of the marrow of divinity. Benevolence and humility were prominent features of his character. See Wilson, Presb. Uist. A l- manac, 1868, p. 393. (J. L. S.)