s, both in the East and West. Books were copied in the
ancient monasteries of Egypt, (Cassian. Institut. l. iv. c. 12,) and
by the disciples of St. Martin, (Sulp. Sever. in Vit. Martin. c. 7,
p. 473.) Cassiodorus has allowed an ample scope for the studies of the
monks; and we shall not be scandalized, if their pens sometimes wandered
from Chrysostom and Augustin to Homer and Virgil.] But the necessity of
manual labor was insensibly superseded.

The novice was tempted to bestow his fortune on the saints, in whose
society he was resolved to spend the remainder of his life; and the
pernicious indulgence of the laws permitted him to receive, for their
use, any future accessions of legacy or inheritance. [53] Melania
contributed her plate, three hundred pounds weight of silver; and Paula
contracted an immense debt, for the relief of their favorite monks; who
kindly imparted the merits of their prayers and penance to a rich and
liberal sinner. [54] Time continually increased, and accidents could
seldom diminish, the estates of the popular monasteries, which spread
over the adjacent country and cities: and, in the first century of their
institution, the infidel Zosimus has maliciously observed, that, for
the benefit of the poor, the Christian monks had reduced a great part
of mankind to a state of beggary. [55] As long as they maintained their
original fervor, they approved themselves, however, the faithful and
benevolent stewards of the charity, which was entrusted to their care.
But their discipline was corrupted by prosperity: they gradually assumed
the pride of wealth, and at last indulged the luxury of expense. Their
public luxury might be excused by the magnificence of religious worship,
and the decent motive of erecting durable habitations for an immortal
society. But every age of the church has accused the licentiousness
of the degenerate monks; who no longer remembered the object of their
institution, embraced the vain and sensual pleasures of the world, which
they had renounced, [56] and scandalously abused the riches which had
been acquired by the austere virtues of their founders. [57] Their
natural descent, from such painful and dangerous virtue, to the common
vices of humanity, will not, perhaps, excite much grief or indignation
in the mind of a philosopher.

[Footnote 53: Thomassin (Discipline de l'Eglise, tom. iii. p. 118,
145, 146, 171-179) has examined the revolution of the civil, canon, and
common law. Mode