in church-history, an order of monks, who profess to follow the rules of St. Benedict.

The Benedictins, being those only that are properly called monks, wear a loose black gown, with large wide sleeves, and a capuche, or cowl, on their heads, ending in a point behind. In the canon law, they are styled black friers, from the colour of their habit.

The rules of St. Benedict, as observed by the English monks before the dissolution of the monasteries, were as follows: They were obliged to perform their devotions seven times in twenty-four hours, the whole circle of which devotions had a respect to the passion and death of Christ: They were obliged always to go two and two together: Every day in Lent they were obliged to fast till six in the evening, and abated of their usual time of sleeping and eating; but they were not allowed to practise any voluntary austerity without leave of their superior: They never conversed in their refectory at meals, but were obliged to attend to the reading of the scriptures: They all slept in the same dormitory, but not two in a bed; they lay in their cloaths: For small faults they were shut out from meals; for greater, they were debarred religious commerce, and excluded from the chapel; and as to incorrigible offenders, they were excluded from the monasteries. Every monk had two coats, two cowls, a table-book, a knife, a needle, and a handkerchief; and the furniture of their bed was a mat, a blanket, a rug, and a pillow.