Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable/Abbey-lubber

by Ebenezer Cobham Brewer

Abbey-lubber (An). An idle, well-fed dependent or loafer.

"It came into a common proverbe to call him an Abbay-lubber, that was idle, wel fed, a long, lewd, lither loiterer, that might worke and would not."—The Burnynge of Paules Church, 1663.

It is used also of religions in contempt; see Dryden's Spanish Friar.