At the age of twenty he saw his father kill his adversary in a duel; and, smitten with remorse, imagined that he must expiate the crime by doing penance in his own person. He accordingly retired to a Benedictine convent in the neighborhood of Ravenna, and became a monk. At the end of seven years, scandalized with the irregular lives of the brotherhood, and their disregard of the rules of the Order, he undertook the difficult task of bringing them back to the austere life of their founder. After a conflict of many years, during which he encountered and overcame the usual perils that beset the path of a reformer, he succeeded in winning over some hundreds of his brethren, and established his new Order of Reformed Benedictines.