AUGUSTINE
81
AUGUSTINE
say in which monasteries this was done, and whether
they were numerous. Letter ccxi, which has thus
become the Rule of St. Augustine, certainly consti-
tuted a part of the collections known under the gen-
"ral name of "Rules of the Fathers and used bj'
the founders of monasteries as a basis for the prac-
tices of the religious life. It does not seem to have
been adopted by the regular communities of canons
or of clerks which began to be organized in the eighth
and ninth centuries. The rule given them by St.
Chrodegang, Bishop of Metz (742-766), is almost
entirely drawn from that of St. Benedict, and no
more decided traces of Augustinian influence are
to be found in it than in the decisions of the Council of
.\achen (817), which may be considered the real con-
stitutions of the Canons Regular. For this influence
we must await the foundation of the clerical or
canonical communities established in the eleventh
century for the eff'ective counteracting of simony and
clerical concubinage. The Coimcil of Lateran (1059)
and another council held at Rome four years later
approved for the members of the clergj- the strict
community life of the Apostolic Age, such as the
Bishop of Hippo had caused to be practised in his
episcopal house and had taught in his two sermons
heretofore cited. The first communities of canons
adopted these sermons as their basis of organization.
This reform movement spread rapidly throughout
Latin Europe and brought about the foundation
of the regular chapters so numero\is and prosperous
during the Middle Ages. Monasteries of women or
of canonesses were formed on the same plan, but not
according to the rules laid down in the sermons " De
vita et moribus dericorum". The letter to virgins
was adopted almost immediately and became the
rule of the canons and canonesses; hence it was the
religious code of the Premonstratensians, of the
houses of Canons Regular, and of canonesses either
gathered into congregations or isolated, of the Friars
Preachers, of the Trinitarians and of the Order of
Mercy, both for the redemption of captives, of hospi-
taller communities, both men and women, dedicated
to the care of the sick in the hospitals of the Middle
Ages, and of some military orders.
AuGrsTlNl.vx ForND.A.TioN's. — See also under individual titles. C.^Noxs. Regular of the L.\TEa.\N (Austin). Hermits OF St. Augustine, Merced.vrians or Nolascans, Servites, Paulines. .-Vlexian Brothers. Hieroxvmites, Jesuats, .\mbrosians. Brotherhood of the .Aj>ostles and of Vol- untary Poverty. Brothers of Mercy, Bethlehemites. Birgittines (Brigittines). Ursulines. ,\xgelicals. St. .\UGUSTINE, £pw(.ccri in p. I... XXXIII, 958-965; Idem, Sermonts ccdv, aclvi, P. L., XXXJX, 1568-81; Idem, De opere monachorum, op. cit., XL, 547-852; Besse, Le mona- chisme Africain (Paris. 1898); Idem. Les moities de I'ancienne France, Periode galloromaine et mi'rovingUnne (Paris, 1906); H ELYOT. //ts/oire des ordres religi^iLX et militaires (Paris, 1792), III. IV; Heimbucher. DieOrden und Kongregationen der katho- litrhen Kirche (Paderborn. 1896), I. 386-540.
Hermits of St. Augustine. — Empoli, Bullarium ordini^ Eremitarum S. Augustini (Rome. 1628); Pamphilii, Chronicon ordinis fratrum Eremitarum S. Auffustini (Rome. 1681); LuBlx, Orbis Axigustinianus, give conrentuum ordinis Eremi- tarum S. Augustini descriptio (Paris, 1672); Curtics, Elogia virorum illustrium ex ordine Eremitarum S. Augustini (.\ntwerp, 16.'»8); Gratianus, Anastasis Augustiniana, in gwl scriptores ordinis Eremitarum S. Augustini . . . in seriem digesti sunt (.-Antwerp. 163G); Idem. Sacra eremus Augustiniana, siye de institutione Fratrum Eremitarum excalceatorum ordinis S. Augustini (Cambrai, 1658).
(3ther Orders. — Eggerer. Fragmen panis Corvi proto- eremitici, sive reliquue annalium ordinis eremitarum S. Pauli (Vienna, 1663); Historia degli uomini illustri che fuorono Giesuati Morigia (Vienna. 1604); Hermenegildo de San- Pablo, Origen y continuacion del instituto y religion Gieroni- miana (Madrid, 1669).
J. M. Besse.
Augustine of Canterbury, ,S.\ixt, first Archbishop of Canterburj', Apostle of the English; date of birth un- known; d. 26 Slay, 604. Sj-mbols; cope, pallium, and mitre as Bi-shop of Canterbury, and pastoral staff and gospels as missionary. Nothing is known of his youth except that he was probably a Roman of the better cla.ss. and that early in life he became a monk in the fa- TL— 6
mous monasterj- of St. Andrew erected by St. Gregory
out of his own patrimony on the Caelian Hill. It was
thus amid the religious intimacies of the Benedictine
Rule and in the bracing atmosphere of a recent founda-
tion that the character of the future missionary was
formed. Chance is said to ha\'e furnished the oppor-
tunity for the enterprise which was destined to link
his name for all time with that of his friend and
patron, St. Gregon,', as the "true beginner" of one
of the most important Churches in Christendom and
the medium by which the authority of the Roman
See was established over men of the English-speaking
race. It is unnecessary to dwell here upon Bede's
well-known version of Gregory's casual encounter
with English slaves in the Roman market place (H. E.,
II, i), which is treated under Gregorj- the Great (q. v.).
Some five years after his elevation to the Roman
See (.590) Gregory began to look about him for ways
and means to carry out the dream of his earlier days.
He naturally turned to the community he had ruled
more than a decade of j'ears before in the monastery
on the Cslian Hill. Out of these he selected a com-
pany of about forty and designated Augustine, at
that time Prior of .St. Andrew's, to be their representa-
tive and spokesman. The appointment, as niU ap-
pear later on, seems to have been of a somewhat in-
determinate character; but from this time forward
until his death in 604 it is to Augustine as "strength-
ened by the confirmation of the blessed Father Greg-
ory" (roboratus confirmatione beati pairis Greqarii,
Bede, H. E., I, xxv) that English, as distinguished
from British, Christianity owes its primary inspira-
tion.
The event which afforded Pope Gregory the oppor- tunity he had so long desired of carrjing out his great missionary plan in favour of the English happened in the year 595 or 596. A rumour had reached Rome that the pagan inhabitants of Britain were ready to embrace the Faith in great numbers, if only preachers could be found to instruct them. The first plan which seems to have occurred to the pontiff was to take measures for the purchase of English captive boys of seventeen years of age and upwards. These he would have brought up in the Catholic Faith with the idea of ordaining them and sending them back in due time as apostles to their o\\ti people. He accordingly wrote to Candidus, a presbyter entrusted ■nith the adminis- tration of a small estate belonging to the patrimony of the Roman Church in Gaul, asking him to secure the revenues and set them aside for this purpose. (Greg., Epp., VI, vii in Migne, P. L., LXXVII.) It is possible, not only to determine approximately the dates of these events, but also to indicate the particu- lar quarter of Britain from which the rumour had come. ^Ethelberht became King of Kent in 559 or 560, and in less than twenty years he succeeded in establishing an overlordship that extended from the borders of the country of the West Saxons eastward to the sea and as far north as the Humber and the Trent. The Saxons of Middlesex and of Essex, to- gether ^vith the men of East Anglia and of Mercia. were thus brought to acknowledge him as Bretwalda, and he acquired a political importance which began to be felt by the Frankish princes on the other side of the Channel. Charibert of Paris gave him his daugh- ter Bertha in marriage, stipulating, as part of the nuptial agreement, that she should be allowed the free exercise of her religion. The condition was accepted (Bede, H. E.. I, xxv) and Luidhard, a Frankish bishop, accompanied the princess to her new home in Canterbury, where the ruined church of St. Martin, situated a short distance beyond the walls, and dating from Roman-British times, was set apart for her use (Bede, H. E., I, xxvi). The date of this marriage, so important in its results to the future fortunes of Western Christianity, is of course largely a matter of conjecture; but from the evidence fur-
