By their special addiction to an ascetic life, indicat- ing superior sanctity and virtue, the monastics secured
great favor with the multitude, and speedily acquired for themselves such popularity and influence that the clergy could not but find in them either powerful allies or formidable rivals. When they began to form large and regular establishments, it was needful that some members of their body should be ordained, in order to secure the regular performance of divine worship ; and at length, not only was it usual for many members of a monastery to be in holy orders, but it came to be re- garded as an advantage for the clergy to possess the additional character of monastics. From the 4th cen- tury, in the West, at the request of the people or their abbot, the monks verj- frequently took orders; and in the East at the instance of the bishops, the archiman- drites being sometimes elevated to the episcopate, or acting as bishops' deputies at councils, and tlieir monks ranking after priests and deacons, they frequently went to study in the cloister. It was not until the Cth centurj' that the coenobites left the desert for tlie sub- urbs of cities and towns, but as early as the close of that century they were known as monastics, having come to be distinguished from the populace, and, en- dowed with much opulence and many houoralde priv- ileges, found themselves in a condition to claim an eminent station among the pillars and supporters of the Christian community. The fame of their \nety and sanctity was so great that bishops and presbyters were often chosen out of their order; and the passion for erecting edifices and convents, in which the monks and hoi}- virgins might serve God in the most commodious manner, was at that time carried beyond all bounds. "So much was the world infatuated by the sanctimo- nious appearance of the recluses that men thought they could not more effectually purchase heaven to them- selves than by beggaring their offspring, and giving all they had to erect or endow monasteries ; that is, to supply with all the luxuries of life those who were bound to live in abstinence, and to enrich those who had sol- emnly sworn that they would be forever poor, and who professed to consider riches as the greatest impediment in the road to heaven. Large monasteries, both commo- dious and magnificent, more resemhling the |ialaces of princes than the rude cells which the primitive nionks chose for their abode, were erected and endowed. Leg- acies and bequests from time to time flowed in upon them. Mistaken piety often contributed to the evil, but oftener superstitious profligac}-. Oppression her- self commonly judged that to devote her wealth at last, when it could be kept no longer, to a religious house, was full atonement for all the injustice and extortion by which it had been amassed. But what set in a stronger light the pitiable brutishness to which the people were reduced bj- the reigning superstition, was that men of rank and eminence, who had shown no par- tiality to anything monastical during their lives, gave express orders, when in the immediate view of death, that their friends should dress tlicm out in monkish vestments, that in these they might die and lie liuriod, thinking tliat the sanctity of their garb would prove a protection against a condemnatory sentence of the om- niscient Judge" (Cramp, Text-book of Pope ri/, p. 323). Nevertheless, although many monastics greatly dis- tinguislu'd tlieinselves, and established such a popu- lar interest in monasticism as to cause eminent eccle- siastics to adopt the monastic life, yet it was not the custom to place monks, as such, on an equal footing with the clergy. They, indeed, were not tlien reck- oned as S(rcul(ire.i, but were distinguislied by the name of reltgiosi or rer/ulures (canonici), and they were first regarded as part of the clerical bod}- in the lOth cen- tury ; but even then a distinction was carefidly made between clerici strculares, i. e. parish priests and all who were charged witii the cure of souls, and clerici reffulares, i. e. those belonging to monastic orders ; and the former vehemently protested against the riglit of the latter to interfere with their own peculiar duties. In fact, no complete amalgamation of the two bodies
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ever took place ; and all monasteries continued to in- cliide a certain number of lay brethren, or conversi, who, without discharging strictly spiritual functions, formed, as in the ancient Church, a middle order be- tween the clergy and the laity. In the 9th century there existed also the monachi sceciilares, who were members of religious fraternities, living under a cer- tain rule and presidency, but without submitting to the confinement of a cloister. They were the fore- runners of the religious fraternities which arose in France, Italy, and Germany, and greatly multiplied and extended during the 15th and 16th centuries. The members of these fraternities formed a class between the laity and clergj'. However, their licentiousness, even in the Gth centurj', became a proverb ; and they are said to have excited the most dreadful tumults and sedition in various places.