僧侣
僧侣，是离开世俗生活，为了信仰而独自修行的人们，在东方指和尚僧人，在西方，则是指修道士。最初，修道院实际上是作为反教会机构而存在的。修道士们反对教会世俗化，他们认为这是违背教义的，人应该追求来世生活和精神上的拯救。他们坚持原始基督教义，以独修方式代表个人的意愿，生活俭朴、孤独。修道士最早在埃及出现，后来发展到叙利亚等地。后来，这种修行方式随着罗马的灭亡而传到欧洲西部。逐渐地，基督教会注意到修道士在宗教范围内的影响，一部分修道士也认为修道院不能脱离与世俗而存在。于是修道院与教会双方开始接近，最终，修道院被纳入教会的分支，两者形成了结合。
僧侣还是一些游戏中的职业。
僧侣属性：僧侣是直接从属与上帝的人，他们通过祈祷的方式来保护队友和打击敌人。与不同职业组合，僧侣可以提供不同的支援。僧侣拥有神恩，神给予他们超常的治疗能力，除了治疗僧侣还能给队有各种增益魔法。另一方面，僧侣也拥有重击祈祷，对敌人实施忽视防御的升怒打击，尽管僧侣并不擅长攻击。
一本歌特小说
路易斯（Lewis）的《僧侣》（The Monk）
【中文摘要】马修路易斯的小说《僧侣》中的主要情节，是叙述其主角Ambrosio，如何从一个以性道德与修养高超而出名的圣人，快速地堕落成一个令人发指的罪犯之过程。其中，在造成Ambrosio腐败的众多原因中，以宗教的禁欲生活跟人与生俱来的性欲所产生的冲突最为显注。由于长期与修道院外面的真实世界隔离，再加上天主教偶像崇拜的理念，使得Ambrosion只能认得，且只接受唯一的一种女性的特质，那就是圣母玛利亚那种无瑕完美的女性典型。因此，圣母玛利亚也就自然而然的变成他欲望的原型及对像。也就是这种对神圣的情欲化以及对女性的理想化，才造成Ambrosio最后万劫不复的结局。
路易斯透过Ambrosio这个人物，事实上是要宣扬中庸的哲理。社会制度与组织对个人欲望的压抑，及其后来欲望解放的反弹力量都是非常具有破坏性，且常常容易失控的。有鉴于此，十八世纪末爆发的法国大革命及其诉求，常常会跟同时期流行于英国的惊悚小说中的素材及表现方法产生联想，并且做比较。反教会，反特权及反压迫的革命力量，以及后来所引发的暴力，混乱与失控埸面往往会透过惊悚小说以寓言的方式程现出来。
此外，透过女性情欲在小说中的展现，路易斯把重点放在对传统的关注上。他同时认为，个人欲望的满足，跟一己幸福的追求，是有必要适度地与社会的道德规范做妥协。总得说来，社会秩序与阶级才是路易斯所支持的。不过他所支持的秩序与阶级是更开明且革新的，是经过与改革的力量和个人的诉求谈判后的结果。
最后，从小说的出版跟当时读者的反应来看，不难发现，类似的冲突也发生在作者身上。路易斯面临了如何在个人写作的理念，创作的坚持，跟社会期待与责任上来做妥协。虽然他最后做出了让步，把一些政府或批评家认为不道德或亵渎的章节删去；不过也有人指出，这些动作只不过是表面的妥协或敷衍的动作，因为路易斯一直都以写了这本小说为傲，且也很享受被称呼为“Monk Lewis”, 这外号当然来自于他的得意之作《僧侣》。
【英文摘要】 Matthew Lewis’s The Monk focuses on the process of Ambrosio’s moral and sexual fall from a holy saint of Madrid to an outrageous criminal. Among the causes of his rapid corruption, the conflict between the continent life of religion and human instinctual sexual desire is the main one. Because of the seclusion from the world outside the monastery and the Catholic idolatry, in Ambrosio’s world, there is only one type of femininity which he regards as true and acceptable, that is, the ideal type of the sacred Virgin Mary. Hence, the Virgin Mary naturally becomes the archetype or the object of his desire. It is this sexualizaion of the sacred as well as the idealization of femininity that causes Ambrosio’s final perdition.
Taking Ambrosio as an example, Lewis actually means to advocate a moderatism philosophy. The repression of desire imposed by oppressive institutions on individuals is as destructive as the unbridled release of excessive passion. In this sense, the French Revolution, which happened also in the boom times of Gothic novels at the end of eighteenth century, was usually associated with the main concern of the contemporary Gothic writing. Therefore, revolutionary forces against clericalism and corrupt social institutions and systems as well as their consequent excess and violence are often allegorized through the Gothic novels.
Moreover, through the representation of female sexuality in The Monk, Lewis also puts emphasis on the value of tradition and thinks it necessary to compromise individual pursuit for happiness with social and moral regulations. Indeed, it’s the social order and hierarchy that Lewis supports but they are the order and hierarchy with some reformation and modification after the negotiation with rebellious forces and individual struggles.
At last, in terms of the publication of The Monk and its reception, we can also see the conflict between the writer’s individual freedom and public moral concerns. Under a strict censorship, Lewis was demanded by the government to expurgate some “immoral” passages in case it should pollute the reader’s mind. As a result, not only Lewis’s characters in the book but also himself had to face the dilemma how to reconcile personal desires with social expectations or whether to recklessly pursue the self integrity even at the expense of moral values and conventions. He reconciled eventually and had the following editions published with the expurgation of the immoral paragraphs. However, some critics point out that the action is just a cynical gesture or compromise while Lewis in fact quite enjoyed being called Monk Lewis, which, of course, is in association with its putative obscene book, The Monk.