CHANTRY: A chapel or an aisle in a church endowed for the purpose of having masses said for the soul of the founder; or of others nominated by him; also the money left for such purposes. The chantry priest was one employed on such a foundation. There were 1,000 chantries in England when Henry VIII., in 1545, issued his order for their suppression (37 Hen. VIII., cap. 4), on 'the ground that their possessions were generally misapplied. The death of the king soon ensuing, their suppression was apparently not carried out. At all events, in the first year of Edward VI. (1 Edward VI., cap. 14, 1547) a very long act was passed dissolving the chantries, along with free chapels, hospitals, fraternities, brotherhoods, gilds, and other promotions, and devoting their revenues to charitable and educational purposes. The reason given for such appropriation was the alleged maintenance of superstition and ignorance by these foundations. The text of this article is in Gee and Hardy, Documents, pp. 328-357.

CHAPEL: A small building used for divine worship. It may be entirely detached; to supply the needs of people at a distance from the parish church; or form a separate apartment in a large building, such as a convent or a nobleman's house; or run out of and form part of a large church, with an altar of its own. In this last sense some of the largest Gothic churches have small chapels entirely surrounding the east end or choir, the " Lady Chapel," dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, being usually directly behind the high altar (see Architecture, Ecclesiastical). In modern English usage the word chapel is commonly applied to non-conformist places of worship, those of the Establishment alone being known as churches; but the term " chapel of ease " is occasionally applied to Established places of worship coming under the meaning first given above, and without parochial boundaries.

CHA'PIN, EDWIN HUBBELL: American Universalist; b. at Union Village, Washington County, N. Y., Dec. 29, 1814; d. in New York Dec. 28, 1880. He studied four years at the Bennington (Vermont) Academy, began the study of law, but abandoned it in 1837 to become assistant editor of the Evangelical Magazine and Gospel Advocate, a Universalist paper published at Utica, N. Y. He was ordained in 1838. He was pastor at Richmond, Va., 1838-39; at Charlestown, Mass., 1840-45; and assistant to Hosea Ballou in Boston, 1845-48. In 1848 he went to the Fourth Universalist Church, New York, and remained there till death. During his pastorate the society moved from Murray Street to new and more commodious church buildings on Broadway near Spring Street (1852), and then to the corner of Fifth Avenue and Forty-fifth Street (1888), and adopted the name " Church of the Divine Paternity." He was one of the prominent clergymen of New York, and his services were much in demand as lecturer and on special occasions. His sympathies and creed were broad, his preaching was eloquent and popular. He possessed a ready wit and no slight poetical talent; an admirable ordination-hymn, " Father, at this altar bending," is from his pen. His publications, chiefly sermons, include Discourses on the Lord's Prayer (Boston, 1850); Moral Aspects of City Life (New York, 1853); Lessons of Faith and Life (1877); The Church of the Living God (1881).

BIBLIOGRAPHY: S. Ellis, Life of Edwin H. Chapin, Boston, 1882.