49G 



BENEDICT BENEDICTINES. 



iliat respect for the papal authority could be main- 

 tained only by :i wise moderation. He constantly 

 regulated his measures by this principle, ;ind thus 

 bucceeded, e\en in difficult circumstances, in satisfy - 

 ing, uot only the Catholic, but even the Protestant 

 princes. The sciences wen a SJH rial object of his 

 He established acadrmu s at Home ; promot- 

 ed 1 1 If prosperity ol the ;;r.i,l,-i.ij ;.[ r,,.V;;n;i ; . 

 a degree of the meridian to be measured ; the obelisk 

 tn lie erected in the Campus Martius ; the church of 

 St Marcelliiio to IM- built after a plan projected by 

 himself; the beautiful pictures in St Peter's to be 

 executed in mosaic; the bi-.t Knglish and French 

 works to be translated into Italian ; and cominanded 

 a catalogue of the manuscripts contained in the Vati- 

 can library (the number of which he had enlarged to 

 3300) to be printed. His government of the papal 

 did equal honour to his wisdom. He enacted 

 laws against usury, favoured commercial 

 liberty, and diminished the number of holidays. His 

 piety was sincere, yet enlightened and forbearing. 

 He strove to maintain purity of doctrine and of 

 murals, giving, in his own character, the most praise- 

 worthy example. He died, after a painful sickness, 

 during which his cheerfulness and vivacity never 

 d him. May 3, 1758. The sole reproach 

 brought against him by the Romans was, that he 

 wrote too much, and governed too little. His works 

 compose, in the. Venice edition, sixteen vols., fol. 

 The most important of his works is that on the sy- 

 nods, in which we recognise the great canonist. 



BENEDICT, St ; the founder of the first religious 

 order in the West ; born at Norcia, in Spoleto (in the 

 present Ecclesiastical States), 480. In the fourteenth 

 year of his age, he retired to a cavern situated in the 

 desert of Subiaco, forty miles from Rome, and, in 515, 

 drew up a rule for his monks, which was first intro- 

 duced into the monastery on Monte Cassino, in the 

 neighbourhood of Naples, founded by him (529) in a 

 grove of Apollo, after the temple had been demolish- 

 ed. This gradually became the rule of all the wes- 

 tern monks. The abbots of Monte Cassino afterwards 

 acquired episcopal jurisdiction, and a certain patriar- 

 chal authority over the whole order. B., with the 

 intention of banishing idleness, prescribed, in addi- 

 tion to the work of God (as he called prayer and the 

 reading of religious writings), the instruction of youth 

 in reading, writing, and cyphering, in the doctrines 

 of Cliristianity, in manual labours (including mecha- 

 nic arts of every kind), and in the management of 

 the monastery. With regard to dress and food, the 

 rule was severe, but not extravagant. B. caused a 

 library to be founded, for which the aged and infirm 

 brethren (ordo scriptoriui) were obliged to copy 

 manuscripts. By this means, he contributed to pre- 

 serve the literary remains of antiquity from ruin ; for, 

 though he had in view only the copying of religious 

 writings, yet the practice was afterwards extended to 

 classical works of every kind ; and the learned 

 world is indebted for the preservation of great liter- 

 ary treasures to the order of St Benedict. See Bene- 

 dictines. 



BENEDICTBEURN ; formerly an abbey, situated in 

 the Bavarian circle of the Iser, about forty miles 

 distant from the city of Munich, on the descent of 

 the mountains towards the Tyrol. The convent was 

 founded as early as 740. In our days, it is only re- 

 markable for the manufactory of optical instruments 

 belonging to Reichenbach and Liebherr, who have 

 furnished instruments to almost all the observatories 

 of Europe. 



BENEDICTINES. From the sixth to the tenth century, 

 almost all the monks, in the West, might be so called, 

 because they followed the rule of St Benedict of Nor- 

 cia. (See this article, Monastery and Order.) The 



rules which, at that time, the monasteries in Spain 

 and France, received from their bishops, as well i.s 

 the rule of the Irish St Columba (born 560, died 615), 

 were essentially the same as those of St Benedict; 

 and. in the progress of his order, the monasteries, in 

 Spain and I ranee, as well as those of the order of 

 ColumUi, united themselves with it. Monte Ca-sino, 

 the magnificent primitive monastery of the Benedic- 

 tines, became the model of all others. At that time, 

 the monasteries, having no common superiors, were 

 under the immediate control of the bishops in their 

 respective dioceses, and differed from one another in 

 many qualifications of the primitive rule. Not even 

 the colour of their dress was the same. The disciples 

 of Columba wore white garments, like tire first Bene- 

 dictine nuns, who originated in France, in the sixth 

 century. After the unions which took place at a later 

 period, all the members of this order wore black, as 

 the founder is said to have done. The decline of 

 monastic discipline, after the eighth century, occa- 

 sioned the reforms of Benedict of Aniana, in France, 

 the renewed inculcation of the old rule, and the 

 adoption of new ordinances suited to the times, by 

 the council of Aix-la-Chapelle (817), as well as the 

 particular rules and fraternities of the celebrated 

 monasteries in France, Germany, and England, 

 which, in those barbarous times, became seats of 

 civilization ; and, finally, the institution of the Cluni- 

 acs, a new branch of the Benedictines, which pro- 

 ceeded from the convent of Clugny, in Burgundy, 

 founded in the year 910. The Benedictine mona- 

 steries, in the middle ages, were often asylums in 

 which science took refuge, and found protection. In 

 place of the discordant and uncertain rules which 

 had hitherto existed, the Cluniacs made fixed regu- 

 lations concerning the hours of worship, the obedi- 

 ence, discipline, and common government of all the 

 monasteries belonging to their order, which were soon 

 imitated in all Europe. In the twelfth century, their 

 order contained 2000 monasteries, whose luxury 

 frequently called for reforms, and finally became the 

 chief cause of their decline. The remains of the 

 Cluniacs united themselves, in the seventeenth cen- 

 tury, under the patronage of Richelieu, with the Be- 

 nedictine fraternities of St Vannes and St Maurus, 

 the latter of which, founded in 1618, had, in the be- 

 ginning of the eighteenth century, 180 abbeys and 

 priories in France, and acquired, by means of its 

 learned members, such as Mabillon, Montfaucon, and 

 Martene, merited distinction. To this family belong 

 those new orders, established on the foundation, and 

 observing the rule of St Benedict, which have origi- 

 nated since the llth century, and are distinguished 

 from the proper Benedictines by their dress, names, 

 and particular regulations ; e. g., the Camaldulians, 

 the monks of Vallombrosa, the Sylvestrians, the Gran- 

 dimontenses, the Carthusians, the Coelestines, the 

 Cistercians and Bernardines, the Trappists, and the 

 monks of Fontevraud. (q. v.) The Benedictine 

 monasteries never constituted one society, constitu- 

 tionally regulated and governed under an aristocra- 

 tical or monarchical form : on the contrary, a great 

 many monasteries, which descended from the old 

 Benedictines, were compelled, by the council of 

 Trent, to unite themselves gradually into particular 

 fraternities. Among these, the Benedictines of 

 Monte Cassino, of Monte Vergine, and Monte Oliveto 

 (who call themselves Olivetanians), in Italy and Sicily, 

 where they have flourished uninterruptedly even to 

 the present time ; those of Valladolid and Mont- 

 serrat, in Spain, where they are among the wealthiest 

 orders ; those of Hirschau and Fidda, together with 

 Bursfeld, which have now ceased to exist, and that 

 of Moelk, in Germany, deserve particular notice, on 

 account of the extent of their possessions, the magni- 



