LAY-BROTHERS

among the Romanists, are the servants of a convent. A lay-brother wears a different habit from that of the religious: he never enters into the choir, nor is present at the chapters. He is not in any orders, nor makes any vow, except of constancy and obedience. He is employed in the temporal concerns of the convent, and has the care of the kitchen, gate, . The institution of lay-brothers began in the eleventh century. The persons, on whom this title and office were conferred, were too ignorant to become clerks, and therefore applied themselves wholly to bodily work, in which they expre ed that zeal for religion, which could not exert itself in spiritual exercises. In the nunneries there are also lay-sisters , who are retained in the convents for the service of the nuns , in like manner as the lay-brothers are for that of the monks .