[MR. BENMOHEL is wrong in supposing the word _Beghard_ to signify
_bekehrt_, conversus, and to be a name given to the Fratres
Conversi of monasteries, who, by the way, were not "secular
begging monks," nor necessarily monks at all. Any person, by a
donation to a convent, could be enrolled amongst its _fratres_ or
_sorores_, entitled to the prayers of the monks, and to a share of
their superabundant merits; and, being clothed at his death in the
habit of the order, was a _frater conversus_. Another class of
_conversi_ were lay monks (not necessarily _begging_ monks), who
attended on the other monks, and performed certain lay duties in
monasteries. MR. BENMOHEL will see some account of them in Dr.
Todd's _Introduction to the Book of Obits and Martyrol. of
Christ's Church Cathedral, Dublin_, p. xxvii.
The _Beghards_, on the other hand, were not, properly speaking,
monks at all, inasmuch as they were not under any monastic vow.
They professed poverty, and lived on alms generally; but in other
respects their mode of life was various, and their orthodoxy and
morality very doubtful. They are generally denounced by the
ecclesiastical authorities; and, except in some few places and
under certain regulations, were never recognised by the Church.
The best account of them will be found in Mosheim's posthumous and
unfinished treatise, _De Beghardis et Beguinis_. The name is
evidently, as Mosheim shows, a compound of _beg_ (from the old
Saxon _beggen_, mendicare) and _hard_, or _hart_, a servant,
famulus, servus: the same word which we still use in the
composition of such words as shepherd, cow-herd, swine-herd. So
that _Beghard_ is not otherwise different from our word _beggar_,
than in so far as it was formerly applied to a religious sect.
MR. BENMOHEL'S explanation of _Rehetour_ is very ingenious, and
may very possibly be true. His interpretation of _Muck_ is not so
satisfactory.]