Soon after the introduction of Christianity, St. Mark is said to have
founded a society called Therapeutes, who dwelt by the lake Moeris in
Egypt, and devoted themselves to solitude and religious offices. About
the year 305 of the christian computation, St. Anthony being persecuted
by Dioclesian, retired into the desert near the lake Moeris; numbers of
people soon followed his example, joined themselves to the Therapeutes;
St. Anthony being placed at their head, and improving upon their rules,
first formed them into regular monasteries, and enjoined them to live
in mortification and chastity. About the same time, or soon after,
St. Synclitica, resolving not to be behind St. Anthony in her zeal for
chastity, is generally believed to have collected together a number of
enthusiastic females, and to have founded the first nunnery for their
reception. Some imagine the scheme of celibacy was concerted between
St. Anthony and St. Synclitica, as St. Anthony, on his first retiring
into solitude, is said to have put his sister into a nunnery, which must
have been that of St. Synclitica; but however this be, from their
institution, monks and nuns increased so fast, that in the city of
Orixa, about seventeen years after the death of St. Anthony, there were
twenty thousand virgins devoted to celibacy.
Such at this time was the rage of celibacy; a rage which, however
unnatural, will cease to excite our wonder, when we consider, that it
was accounted by both sexes the sure and only infallible road to heaven
and eternal happiness; and as such, it behoved the church vigorously to
maintain and countenance it, which she did by beginning about this time
to deny the liberty of marriage to her sons. In the first council of
Nice, held soon after the introduction of christianity, the celibacy of
the clergy was strenuously argued for, and some think that even in an
earlier period it had been the subject of debate; however this be, it
was not agreed to in the council of Nice, though at the end of the
fourth century it is said that Syricus, bishop of Rome, enacted the
first decree against the marriage of monks; a decree which was not
universally received: for several centuries after, we find that it was
not uncommon for clergymen to have wives; even the popes were allowed
this liberty, as it is said in some of the old statutes of the church,
that it was lawful for the pope to marry a virgin for the sake of
having children. So exceedingly difficult is it to combat against
nature, that little regard seems to have been paid to this decree of
Syricus; for we are informed, that several centuries after, it was no
uncommon thing for the clergy to have wives, and perhaps even a
plurality of them; as we find it among the ordonnances of pope
Sylvester, that every priest should be the husband of one wife only; and
Pius the Second affirmed, that though many strong reasons might be
adduced in support of the celibacy of the clergy, there were still
stronger reasons against it.