ecclesiastic vs friar

ecclesiastic

noun
  • A cleric. 

adj
  • Of or pertaining to the church; ecclesiastical. 

friar

noun
  • A member of a mendicant Christian order such as the Augustinians, Carmelites (white friars), Franciscans (grey friars) or the Dominicans (black friars). 

  • An American fish, the silverside. 

How often have the words ecclesiastic and friar occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )