THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
BENEDICT OF NURSIA AND THE BENEDICTINE ORDER.
ii.
I. The Life of Benedict.
The Life of Benedict by Gregory
the Great (§ 1). III.
Early Life (§ 2). Monte Cassino (§ 3). The Rule of Benedict. General Characteristics (§ 1). Moderation (§ 2). IV.
Organization and Direction of the Monastic Life (§ 3).
The Earlier History of the Benedictine Order.
Period of Growth to the Time of Charlemagne (§1).
Period of Decline (§ 2).
The History of the Order since the Ninth Century.
821-1200. Ecumenical Activity.
New Congregations (§1). 1 200-1 563 . Decay and Attempts
at Reform (§ 2). 1563-1800. Tridentine Reform.
New Congregations (§ 3). The Nineteenth Century (§ 4).
1. The Life of Benedict : The only early authority on the life of Benedict, since the VitaPlacidi has been admitted to be untrustworthy ever since Mabillon, and the worthlessness of the Vita sancti Mauri has been recently demonstrated by Malnory, is practically the single biography written by Gregory the Great. But the expectations aroused by a life written only fifty years after Benedict's death by so distinguished an author are disappointed when
he is found, in the spirit of his time, 1. The Life exalting the greatness of his hero by of Benedict the number and importance of his by Gregory miracles. This tendency has gone so the Great, far that Griitzmacher is inclined to see nothing actually historical in all this mass of legendary details except the names of the places where Benedict lived and worked, and the names of his disciples. But this is going somewhat too far; Gregory expressly names four abbots, themselves among these disciples and one of them (Honoratus) still living at Subiaco, as witnesses to the truth of his story; and the tradition must have been still full and clear among the monks who had migrated from Monte Cassino to the Lateran when he wrote.
According, then, to what is left of Gregory's account after removal of the legendary halo around the saint's head, Benedict came of a considerable family in the " province of Nursia," in the Umbrian Apennines, and was born toward the end of the fifth century. He received at Rome the education of his day, which, however, did not mean much acquaintance with the Roman classical authors, and seems to have included no Greek. Shocked by the immorality around him, he left both the school and his father's house for a life of solitary mortification. His first per-
2. Early manent abode was a cave by the Anio, Life. not far from Subiaco, where a monk,
Romanus, provided him with the rough monastic garb and with scanty nourishment. Here Benedict spent three years of stubborn conflict with his lower nature, until the spreading of his fame by shepherds brought his solitude to an end. The monks of a neighboring monastery (perhaps at Vicovaro), whose head had just died, begged him to come and rule them. He accepted with reluctance, probably foreseeing what actually happened when he attempted strictly to enforce their rule. When their insubordination went as far as an attempt to poison him, he discovered the plot and gently rebuked them, then retired to his beloved cave. Here, as new disciples came around him, he established twelve small communities, each with twelve inmates and a " father " at their head. Gregory does not say how long Benedict re-
mained in the neighborhood of Subiaco as director of these pious groups; but the tradition of Monte Cassino ascribes his migration thither to the opposition of a jealous cleric named Florentius, and places it in 529. The new place was about halfway between Rome and Naples, the Castrum Casinum of the Romans, who had had a military colony there. On the summit of the mountain (now Monte San Germano), which had been 3. Monte dedicated to the worship of Apollo by Cassino. a population still largely pagan, Benedict built two chapels, under the invocation of St. John Baptist and St. Martin, and then laid the foundations of the monastery which was to have such a long and renowned history. Though Gregory does not say so definitely, the traditional view may be accepted that he soon drew up his rule, the mature outcome of his experience in guiding and governing aspirants to the monastic life of perfection. The disturbances of the time, the wars between the Goths and the Byzantine empire from 534, probably helped to increase the numbers of those who sought a peaceful shelter at Monte Cassino; and a daughter house was established at Terracina. In the summer of 542, Totila, king of the Goths, on his way through Campania, desired to see the famous abbot. Gregory relates that, to test his prophetic powers, the king sent one of his officers in royal array to Benedict, who perceived the deception instantly, and, when the young king knelt before him, told him that he should enter Rome, cross the seas, and reign nine years — which came to pass. Gregory mentions Benedict's sister, Scholastica, in connection with the last meeting between the two in a house near the monastery; she had been dedicated to the service of God from her earliest youth. The date of Benedict's death can not be determined from any of the authorities. His body was buried near Scholastica's in the chapel of St. John Baptist, and, according to Paulus Diaconus, was translated about a century later to the monastery of Fleury on the Loire.
II. The Rule of Benedict: Especially since the celebration of the fourteen-hundredth anniversary of Benedict's birth in 1880, his rule has been made the subject of thoroughgoing studies, and it is everywhere recognized as a code which corresponded admirably to its purpose of regulating the common life of the western monks. In the4 concluding passage of the prologue, probably added later by Benedict, occur the words " Constituenda est ergo a nobis dominici schola servitii." LTnder the later empire, the word schola was commonly employed to designate the body of guards in the imperial palace under the magister officii; thence the name passed to the garrisons of provincial