INTEBDICT. 695 INTEREST. tion, penance, and the Eucharist in all cases of urgency; privately to confess and absolve all vho were not personally the fruilty participators in the crime which the interdict was meant to punish; to celebrate niarriaf;e, with only the wit- nesses present ; and to confer orders in cases of necessity. Gregory IX. allowed mass to be said once a week, behind closed doors, in order to consecrate the host for the use of the sick ; Boniface VI H. permitted the oBices to be said in the churches, but the laity were to be ex- cluded; public celebration of services were al- lowed on Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, the As- sumption of the Blessed ^'irgin, the festival of Corpus Christi, the festival of the Conception, and a few other occasions. The Council of Basel enacted very stringent rules as to the use of this penalty, and in later times the general interdict has been entirely disused. The interdict on 'enice in 1006 is often cited as the last one pronounced, but occasionally, in very special cir- cumstances, and to mark the horror of the Church fur some enormous crime, instances are still recorded in which a particular place or church has been visited with the penalty of a local interdict. Interdict differs frum excom- •niunirntion, in that those under the censure are not given over to eternal damnation. It differs also from suspension, which applies only to ec- clesiastics. Consult the existing regulations on the subject in Aiclincr, Compendium Juris Ecclesiastici (Brixen, 1900) ; Laemmer, InsHluiioncn des Icatholischcn KircJienrechts (Freiburg, 2d ed. 1802). Also: De Ligorio, Theloffia Moralis, vol. vii., 251 (Paris, 18.34); Ducange, Glossarium, under "Interdictum." INTERDICT. In the civil law, a judicial process analogous to the injunction of English and American law. In its earliest form in Boman law it was a peremptory decree of the prirtor, restraining any interference with prop- erty the right to the possession whereof was in dispute. It seems still, in the modern civil law, to be restricted to prohibitions as to tlie po.s- session of property, though in Scotland the term is applied to any process of the Court of Session restraining the performance of any inlawful act. .
interdict is not. however, limited to the pro-
hibition of contemplated acts, but may also be employed to compel the restitution of property of which a person entitled to possession has been forcibly deprived, and to compel the presentation, or 'exhibit ion,' of an account. Interdicts are acconlingly classified, according to the purpose sought In be effected, as proliil)itnry. restitutory, and cxhiliitory. Consult the authorities referred to under Civil Law; and Erskine, Institute of tlw Ldip of Scolldnd. INTERDICTION. A process of the civil law employed for the i)urpose of depriving a person who is lion compos nirntis of the control of his property, and. on occasion, of other civil rights. The process is analogous to the inquisition in lunacy (q.v.) of English and American law, whereby the incapacit}- of a person to manage his own affairs may l)e inquired into, and the man agement of his interests committed to a guardian or trustee. The jurisdiction thus exercised is as old as the Twelve Tables, but it was origi- nally employed only to restrain prodigals from dissipating their estates. By modern codes, it is generally confined to cases of imbecility and lunacy; but this is not the case in the French code. In the case of imbecility and lunacy inter- diction may be only partial, the interdicted per- son being forbidden to sue, to borrow, to pledge or hypothecate his property, or to make any con- veyances, without the consent of the court; or it may be complete, in which case a guardian or curator is appointed, and the management of the affairs of the interdicted person committed to him. The practice in Scotland, Louisiani, and tjuebeo is substantially the same as in the Con- tinental States, whose legal systems are borrowed from that of Rome. Consult the authorities re- ferred to under Civil Law; also Erskine, Insti- tutes of tl(c Lutes 'j/ Hcollund. IN'TERES'SE TER'MINI iML., interest in a term). At the common law, the interest which a tenant for years lias in the lands leased to him, before he has entered upon them. The lease is re- garded as conferring only an inchoate title or estate, which requires an entry by the tenant to perfect it. But though the interesse termini falls short of being a complete leasehold estate, it is yet more than a mere chose in action (q.v.) or right of entry (q'.v. ), It is a true interest or estate, a right in rem (q.v.), capable of aliena- tion and of transmission upon the death of the tenant to his personal representatives, and gen- erally in the United States the same statutory remedies are available as in ease of the perfected estate. See Lease; LEASEiiOLn. INTEREST (OF. interest, Fr. intfrH, in- terest, from Lat. interest, it concerns, 3d pers. sg, pres. ind. of interesse, to concern, from inter, between -)- esse, to be). A certain profit or premium for the use, forbearance, or detention of money. In S])ite of the natural feeling that the payment of interest was a hardship, and that to exact interest from a borrower was to take an unfair advantage of his necessities, all the chief peoples of antiquity recogni/ed that interest might lawfully lx« stipulated in con- nection with a loan, and might be awarded in the discretion of the court even when no such stipu- lation had been made. Babvhmian tablets show ordinary loans at mcnlerate interest, and also iriaritime loans, in which the chiim of the credi- tor for his principal was extinguished liy the loss of the ship, and on which a much higher rate of interest was exacted. It was very coninmn among the ancient Hebrews, and the Mosaic law cont.ains a prohibition against the taking of usury (or interest, as it should have l)een trans- lated) from the Jews, but permitted it as to all other races. The Cireek and the Roman laws recognized interest. The Romans colled it pay- ment for use iusurce). and assimilated it to the natural yield or increase derived from organic nature by classing it. with rent, among civil or legal fruits if met us civiles). They did not limit it to the loan of money exclusively: any generic or 'fungible' things, like wheat, wine, or oil. could he stipulated. Aristotle speaks of it. hut condemns it as vicious, holding that money is 'niiturally barren,' and that to make it 'breed money' is preposterous and a perversion of the end of its institution, which, he declared, was to serve as a medium of exchange and not for purposes of increase. Through a misconstruction of the real intent and purpo.se of the law of Closes, which was clearly
