or PACHUMIUS, the founder of the first organized monastic community, was born in the Thebaid in 292. He was educated in paganism; but the events of his early manhood began to lead him towards a new religious life. At the age of twenty he was impressed into the military service, and, in company with his fellow-recruits, was conveyed down the Nile in a transport. During a halt at Thebes some Christians, paying a kindly visit to the soldiers, explained to him their religious views and sentiments. He was converted, and forthwith made a vow to consecrate his days to the service of the true God. Accordingly, no sooner had an arduous campaign come to a close, than, hastening back to his native country, he received baptism, and began the great work of his career. It now became the aim of Pachomius to apply the principles which regulated the life of a single anchorite to the life of an organized society; or, in other words, to seek the salvation of men by withdrawing them from the depraving habits of the world, and subjecting them to a system of religious discipline. Accordingly, Tabenna, an island of the Nile in Upper Egypt, was selected for the site of the monastery; three disciples became the germ of the society; many more began to join; and the first specimen of a regular cloister was soon presented to the world. (See MONACHISM.) The founder himself, in the capacity of abbot, continued to govern and extend the influence of the rapidly-flourishing institution, till a pestilence cut him off, about 348. The extant works which pass under the name of Pachomius, and which consist of Regula Monasticae, Monita, Precepta, and Litera, are contained in Galland's Bibliotheca Patrum, vol. iv., 1768.