ive in missions--more active, indeed, than the
eastern Catholics. The Nestorians, in particular, made great numbers of
converts in Persia (where the heathen kings would allow no other kind of
Christianity than Nestorianism), in India, and in other parts of Asia.
And in the seventh century (which is somewhat beyond the bounds of this
little book) their missionaries made their way even to China, where they
preached with great success.

CHAPTER XXIX.

ST. BENEDICT.

PART I. A.D. 480-529.

Let us now look again at the monks. Their way of life was at first
devised as a means of either practising repentance for sin, or rising to
such a height of holiness as was supposed to be beyond the reach of
persons busied in the affairs of this world. But in course of time a
change took place. As the life of monks grew more common, it grew less
strict; indeed, it would seem that whenever any way of life which
professes to be very strict becomes common, its strictness will pretty
surely be lessened, or given up altogether. People at first turned monks
because they felt that such means of holy living as they had been used
to did not make them so good as they ought to be, and because they hoped
to do better in this new kind of life. But when the monkish life was no
longer new, monks neglected its rules, just as those before them had
neglected the rules which holy Scripture and the Church had laid down
for all Christians.

In the unhappy days which had now come on, the monasteries of the west
had in great measure escaped the evils of war and conquest which laid
waste everything around them. The barbarians, who overwhelmed the
empire, generally respected them; and now the life of monks, instead of
being chosen for its hardships, as it had been at first, came to be
regarded as the easiest and the safest life of all. It was sought after
as one which would free people from the dangers to which they would be
liable if they remained in the world, and took the common share in the
world's risks and troubles.

Another important matter was this--that monkery had taken its rise in
Egypt and in Syria, where the climate and the habits of the people were
very different from those of the western countries. And a great part of
the monkish rules were fitted only for the particular circumstances and
character of the eastern nations;--for instance, they could do with less
food than the people of the west, so that a writer of the fifth century
s