In 529 Saint Benedict, a Roman of wealth who fled from the corruption of his city, founded the monastery of Monte Cassino, south of Rome, and established a form of government, or rule of daily life, which was gradually adopted by nearly all the monasteries of the West. In time Europe came to be dotted with thousands of these establishments, many of which were large and expensive institutions both to found and to maintain. [24] By the time the barbarian invasions were in full swing monasticism had become an established institution of the Christian Church. Nunneries for women also were established early. A letter from Saint Jerome to Marcella, a Roman matron, in 382, in which he says that "no high-born lady at Rome had made profession of the monastic life ... or had ventured ... publicly to call herself a nun," would seem to imply that such institutions had already been established in Rome. MONASTIC SCHOOLS. Poverty, chastity, obedience, labor, and religious devotion were the essential features of a monastic life. The Rule of Saint Benedict (R. 43) organized in a practical way the efforts of those who took the vows. In a series of seventy-three rules which he laid down, covering all phases of monastic life, the most important from the standpoint of posterity was the forty-eighth, prescribing at least seven hours of daily labor and two hours of reading "for all able to bear the load." From that part of the rule requiring regular manual labor the monks became the most expert farmers and craftsmen of the early Middle Ages, while to the requirement of daily reading we owe in large part the development of the school and the preservation of learning in the West during the long intellectual night of the mediaeval period (R. 44). Into these monastic institutions the _oblati_, that is, those who wished to become monks, were received as early as the age of twelve, and occasionally earlier (R. 53 a). The final vows (R. 53 b) could not be taken until eighteen, so during this period the novice was taught to work and to read and write, given instruction in church music, and taught to calculate the church festivals and to do simple reckoning. In time some condensed and carefully edited compendium of the elements of classical learning was also studied, and still later a more elaborate type of instruction was developed in some of the monasteries. This, however, belongs to a later division of this history, and further description of church and monastic education will be deferred until we study the intellectual life of the Middle Ages.