Canons and Canonesses Regular

According to St. Thomas Aquinas, a canon regular is essentially a religious cleric, or, as the same doctor aptly expresses it: "The Order of Canons Regular is necessarily constituted by religious clerics, because they are essentially destined to those works which relate to the Divine mysteries, whereas it is not so with the monastic Orders." (II-II:189:8 ad 2um, and II-II:184:8). We have then here what constitutes a canon regular and what distinguishes him from a monk. The clerical state is essential to the Order of Canons Regular, whereas it is only accidental to the Monastic Order. Hence Erasmus, himself a canon regular, declared that the canons regular are a quid medium between the monks and the secular clergy. And for the same reason Nigellus Vireker, a Benedictine monk of Canterbury in the twelfth century, contrasts the life of canons regular, as he know them, with that of his own brethren and the Cistercians, pointing out the advantages of the former. The canons, he tells us, were spared the long choral duties, the sharp reproofs, the stern discipline of the Black Monks, and were not bound to the Spartan simplicity of vesture and diet of the field-working Cisterians ("Speculum Stultorum", Rolls Series: "The Anglo-Latin Satirical poets of the Twelfth Century"). The "Llanthony Chronicler" relates how the first founders of his famous Abbey, having consulted among themselves, decided to become canons regular, first, because on account of the charity they were well liked by all, and then because they were satisfied with a modest manner of living, their habit, though clean, being decent, neither too coarse, nor too rich. In this moderation of life we may say that canons regular follow the example of their lawgiver, St. Augustine, of whom St. Possidius, his biographer, relates that his habit, his furniture, his clothes were always decent, neither too showy nor too humble and shabby. +