the avoidance[1]. But, if the biſhop be both patron and ordinary, he ſhall not have a double time allowed him to collate in[2]; for the forfeiture accrues by law, whenever the negligence has continued ſix months in the ſame perſon. And alſo, if the biſhop doth not collate his own clerk immediately to the living, and the patron preſents, though after the ſix months are lapſed, yet his preſentation is good, and the biſhop is bound to inſtitute the patron's clerk[3]. For as the law only gives the biſhop this title by lapſe, to puniſh the patron's negligence, there is no reaſon that, if the biſhop himſelf be guilty of equal or greater negligence, the patron ſhould be deprived of his turn. If the biſhop ſuffer the preſentation to lapſe to the metropolitan, the patron alſo has the ſame advantage if he preſents before the arch-biſhop has filled up the benefice; and that for the ſame reaſon. Yet the ordinary cannot, after lapſe to the metropolitan, collate his own clerk to the prejudice of the arch-biſhop[4]. For he had no permanent right and intereſt in the advowſon, as the patron hath, but merely a temporary one; which having neglected to make uſe of during the time, he cannot afterwards retrieve it. But if the preſentation lapſes to the king, prerogative here intervenes and makes a difference; and the patron ſhall never recover his right, till the king has ſatisfied his turn by preſentation: for nullum tempus occurrit regi[5]. And therefore it may ſeem, as if the church might continue void for ever, unleſs the king ſhall be pleaſed to preſent; and a patron thereby be abſolutely defeated of his advowſon. But to prevent this inconvenience, the law has lodged a power, in the patron's hands, of as it were compelling the king to preſent. For if, during the delay of the crown, the patron himſelf preſents, and his clerk is inſtituted, the king indeed by preſenting another may turn out the patron's clerk; but if he does not, and the patron's clerk dies incumbent, or is canonically deprived, the king hath loſt his right, which was only to the next or firſt preſentation[6].
