PROLEGOMENA. lix. 



herself conceived without sin. To a mind, there- 

 fore, endowed with the powers of conaparison or 

 capable of appreciating the beauties and the 

 powerful appeal of harmony of parts in favour of 

 the truth of the whole, it must appear that the 

 partial doubts and limited faith of protestants, 

 increases the difficulties of Christianity, and have 

 indeed been the real sources of a prevalent dis- 

 behef. But I shall now go on to describe the 

 origin and varieties of the Religious Orders, and 

 tlje characters of the founders, whose names are 

 noticed under each day in this book. Although 

 St. Paul is said to be the first hermit, while 

 St. Anthony is called the prototype of Monks, 

 nevertheless some of the Religious Orders claim 

 even a higher origin than either of them ; I shall, 

 therefore, endeavour to make an arrangement 

 for facilitating our knowledge of the principal 

 orders distinguished by the rules which they 

 followed, and of which numerous subdivisions 

 will be shown to have been made afterwards. 

 Christ is the great model of all, of which I have 

 already said enough. The life of St. John the 

 Baptist in the wilderness, see June 24 of this 

 work, and the early ascetics, St. Paul, celebrated 

 Jan. 15, St. Anthony, Jan. 17, and others, were 

 the prototypes of monachism ; while the penetential 

 lives of St. Mary Magdalen, see our 22d July, 

 of St. Martha, St. Mary of Egypt, St, Phoebe, 



