Chapter VI: Part 6

So much were flagellations grown into fashion in the days we mention, such attractions did they even seem to possess, that Ladies of high rank would also inlist among the abovementioned Whippers, and almost vied with Dominic the _Cuirassed_, Rodolph _de Eugubio_, St. Anthelm, and Abbot Poppo, in regard to the regularity with which they performed such meritorious exercises. Among those Ladies, particular mention is made of St. Maria of Ognia, of St. Hardwigge, Dutchess of Poland, of St. Hildegarde, and above all of the Widow Cechald, who lived in the very times of Cardinal Damian, and performed wonderful feats in the same career, as we are informed by St. Antonius, in the second Volume of his History. The following is the account given by St. Antonius, upon the authority of Cardinal Damian himself. ‘Not only Men, but also Women of noble birth eagerly sought after that kind of Purgatory; and the Widow of Cechaldus, a Woman of great birth and dignity, gave an account, that in consequence of an obligation she had previously imposed upon herself, she had gone through the hundred years penance, three thousand lashes being the number allotted for every year[87].’

FOOTNOTES:

[83] The abovementioned Anthelm, I think I have read, lived to a very great age. The famous self-flagellator Dominic the _Cuirassed_, lived eighty-four years; St. Romuald, notwithstanding the flagellations he received from himself and his Monks, attained, it is said, the age of an hundred and twenty years; and Leon of _Preza_, another illustrious self-flagellator, lived, according to some accounts, to the age of an hundred and forty. If so, it would thence result, that self-flagellations, besides the other great advantages they possess, are also attended with that of being conducive to health.

[84] ... _Jocando ridendo hoc alteri Confessori suo humiliter recognovit._

[85] ... _Après, prist discipline d’eux; moult doucement la reçut. Imprimé à Paris, par A. Gerard, le 1. Juillet, 1494._ This must have been one of the first books that were printed.

[86] ... _ubi sancta & secreta orationum aromata Deo assiduè accenderent; frequentibus metanœis vel genufluxionibus pio conditori supplicarent; à tribus sæpè flagellis, vel ad pœnitentiam, vel ad augendum meritum, corpus attererent._

I will take this occasion to inform the Reader, that Monks, or persons of religious dispositions, do not always mean, in the penances they impose on themselves, to atone for their sins, which they do not by any means consider as being in proportion to the number of their flagellations. They practise mortifications of this kind, either for the good of other persons, or for delivering souls from Purgatory, or in order (as the Reader may see from the words above quoted) to increase their own merit, and, like the Fakir mentioned in a former place, go of course to the thirty-fifth Heaven.

[87] Tit. 16. Cap. VIII. fol. 102.--_Ut non solùm viri sed & mulieres nobiles hoc purgatorii genus inhianter acciperent; relictamque Cechaledi, mulierem magni generis & magnæ dignitatis, retulisse se, per præfixam hujus regulæ disciplinam, pœnitentiam centum annorum peregisse, tribus disciplinarum millibus pro uno computatis anno._

The Widow Cechald, in her account of the wonderful penance she performed after the example of Dominic the _Cuirassed_, has neglected to inform us in what manner she performed it, and whether she imitated that holy Man in every respect, and used, for instance, both her hands at once in the operation. Be it as it may; three hundred thousand lashes, the total amount of the hundred years penance she went through, were certainly a very hard penance. However, as we are not to doubt either the account which the above Widow gave in that respect, or the declaration Cardinal Damian made after her, the wonder is to be explained another way, and perhaps by the nature of the instruments she made use of: they possibly were of much the same kind as those used by a certain Lady, who was likewise much celebrated on account of the frequent disciplines she bestowed upon herself, and who was at last found out to use no other weapons for performing them, than a bunch of feathers, or, as others have said, a fox’s tail.

CHAP. XV.

_Another difficulty. Which is the best plight to be in, for
receiving a discipline?_

Eminent persons, in the times we speak of, did not differ from one another only in their opinions concerning the advantages of religious flagellations; but they also dissented with respect to the manner of performing them, as we may likewise conclude from the Writings and Ordinances of those times. Cardinal Damian, the great Patron of Flagellators, prescribed to them to strip themselves naked, and when thus perfectly free from every obstruction and impediment, to flog themselves in company with one another: this we learn from his xliid _Opusculum_, which he wrote to the Fathers of Mount Cassin, who were not intirely reconciled to the thought of those flagellations. On the other hand, an Ordinance which had been framed in the Assembly which was held at Aix-la-Chapelle, so early as the year 817, under the reign of Lewis _le Débonnaire_, forbad the above manner of flagellating Monks, because it did more harm than good. ‘Let the Monks (it is said in the 16th Canon) never be lashed naked, in the presence of the other Monks; let them not be whipped naked, for every trifling fault, in sight of the Brothers.’

Several religious Orders submitted to the directions of the above Canon; St. Lanfranc, among others, ordered, in his Statutes, ‘That Monks, guilty of offences, should be beaten with a thick rod, or wand, over their gowns.’ The Monks of Affligen, in the Netherlands, adopted the same Canon; and it was settled in their Ritual, as Haeftenus informs us, that the Monks should have their gowns on, when they were to be cudgelled.

However, the wise precautions we mention were adopted only in a few particular places; and the regard which ought to be paid to decency, as well as to the prudent Ordinance of the Assembly held at Aix-la-Chapelle, was utterly forgotten in most Monasteries; the practice recommended by Cardinal Damian being adopted in them, upon the score of more complete mortification. Nay, so cheap did the Framers of regulations, in several Monasteries, make their own nakedness, as well as that of the Brothers, that in certain cases they ordered delinquents to be stript in order to be flagellated, in sight not only of the Congregation, but even of the whole Public. In an Article of the Constitutions of the Abbey of Cluny, which Udalric has collected together, it is expressly settled that the persons guilty of the different faults enumerated therein, are ‘to be stripped naked in the middle of the next street or public place, so that every person who chooses may see them, and there tied up and lashed[88].’

Among the Promoters and Recommenders of nakedness, we must not omit to mention Cardinal Pullus, a person of no less importance than Cardinal Damian, and who, in his life-time, was high Chancellor of the Roman Church: in the Collection of Sentences with which this Cardinal has obliged the World, he gives it as his opinion, that the very nakedness of the Penitent, is a considerable increase of his merit[89].

FOOTNOTES:

[88] Pars Cap. III. p. 166.--_Cunctis enim qui videre voluerint, videntibus, & maximè in mediâ plateâ, nudatur, ligatur, & verberatur._

[89] To the above dissertation on the properest plight for receiving flagellations, another, no less interesting, might be added, viz. which are the fittest instruments for inflicting them? Indeed, an infinite variety of instruments have been used for that purpose, whether they were contrived at leisure by the ingenious persons who were to use them, or were suddenly found out, from the spur of some urgent occasion. Incensed Pedants, who could not quickly enough find their usual instrument of discipline, have frequently used their hat, their towel, or, in general, the first things they laid their hands upon. I once saw a Gentleman flagellate a saucy young fish-women, with all the flounders in her basket. Among Saints, some, like Dominic the _Cuirassed_, have used besoms: others, like St. Dominic the Founder of the Dominican Order, have used iron chains; others, like Gualbert, have employed knotted leather-thongs; others have used nettles, and others thistles. A certain Saint, as I have read in the Golden Legend, had no _discipline_ of his own, but constantly took, to discipline himself with, the very first thing that came under his hand, such as the tongs for the fire, or the like. St. Bridget, as I have read in the same book, disciplined herself with a bunch of keys; a certain Lady, who hath been mentioned in a former place, used a bunch of feathers for the same purpose; and lastly, Sancho did things with much more simplicity, and flagellated himself with the palms of his hands.

CHAP. XVI.

_Confessors at length assume to themselves a kind of flagellatory
power over their Penitents. The abuses that arise from it._

The submission of Sovereigns to receive disciplines from the hands of their Confessors, together with the accounts of such disciplines, which, though they might not always be true, were industriously circulated in Public, helped much, without doubt, to increase the good opinion which people entertained of the merit of flagellations, as well as to strengthen the power of Confessors in general. In fact the latter, from prescribing Disciplines, soon passed to inflicting them upon their penitents with their own hands; and, without loss of time, converted this newly-assumed authority into an express kind of privilege, to which it was a most meritorious act, on the part of penitents, readily to submit. On this occasion, I shall again quote the old French Book, mentioned in p. 218; which, though it be only a Romance, may serve to shew the opinions generally entertained by people, during the times in which it was written. ‘If you are estranged from our Lord’s love, you cannot be reconciled to him, unless by the three following means: First, by confession of mouth; secondly, by a contrition of heart; thirdly, by works of alms and charity. Now, go and make a confession in that manner, and receive discipline from the hands of thy Confessors; for it is the sign of merit.’

The power of Confessors of _disciplining_ their penitents, became in process of time so generally acknowledged, that it obtained even with respect to persons who made profession of the Ecclesiastical life, and superseded the laws that had been made against those who should strike an Ecclesiastic. To this an allusion is made, in the lines of that Poet of the middle age, who has put the _Summula_ of St. Raymund into Latin verses. ‘You are guilty of sacrilege if you have violated holy things, if you have struck a person in religious Orders, or of the Clergy; unless it be a holy beating, such as is performed by a Teacher with respect to his Disciple, or a Confessor with respect to a person who confesses his sins[90].’

Attempts were, however, made to put a stop to these practices of Priests and Confessors; and so early as under Pope Adrian I. who was raised to the Purple in the year 772 (which by the by shews that the power assumed by Confessors, was pretty ancient) a regulation was made to forbid Confessors to beat their Penitents. ‘The Bishop (it is said in the _Epitome_ of Maxims and Canons) the Priest, and the Deacon, must not beat those who have sinned[91].’ But this regulation proved useless: the whole tribe of Priests, as well as the first Dignitaries of the Church, nevertheless continued to preach up the prerogatives of Confessors and the merit of flagellations; and Cardinal Pullus, that Chancellor of the Roman Church who has been mentioned in the foregoing Chapter, did not scruple to declare, that the nakedness of the Penitent, and his situation at the feet of his Confessor, were additional merits in him in the eye of God, as being additional tokens of his humility[92].

All these different practices of stripping and flagellating Devotees and Penitents, at length gave rise to abuses of a very serious nature; instances of which take place, we may say, every day. Numbers of Confessors, in process of time, have made such religious acts as had been introduced with a view to mortification, serve to gratify their own lust and wantonness. They have tried to inculcate the same notions, as to the merit of flagellations, into the minds of their Devotees of the other sex, as they had brought even Kings and Princes to entertain; and at last have made it a practice to inflict such corrections on their female Penitents, and under that pretence, to take such liberties with them, as the blessed St. Benedict, St. Francis, St. Dominic, and St. Loyola, had not certainly given them the example of.

Among the many instances that might be recited of the abuses here alluded to, it will suffice to produce that of a Man who wore a hood, and was girt with a cord (a _Cordelier_ or _Franciscan_) who lived about the year 1566. This Man’s name was Cornelius Adriasem; he was a native of Dort, and belonged to a Convent in Bruges, and was a most violent preacher against the Heretics, called _Gueux_. He had found means to persuade a certain number of Women, both married and unmarried, to promise him implicit obedience, by certain oaths he made them take for that purpose, and under the specious pretence of greater piety. These Women he did not indeed lash with harsh and knotted cords, but he used gently to rub their bare thighs and posteriors, with willow or birch rods[93].

In order to shew how common the above practices were become, as well as to entertain the Reader, I shall conclude this Chapter with the following story, which is to be found in _Scot’s_ Book, entitled, _Mensa Philosophica_. A Woman, says Scot, who was gone to make her confession, had been secretly followed by her husband, who was jealous of her; and he had hid himself in some place in the Church, whence he might spy her; but as soon as he saw her led behind the altar by the Priest, in order to be flagellated, he made his appearance, objected that she was too tender to bear a flagellation, and offered to receive it in her stead. This proposal the Wife greatly applauded; and the Man had no sooner placed himself upon his knees, than she exclaimed, ‘Now, my Father, lay on lustily, for I am a great Sinner[94].’

FOOTNOTES:

[90]

_Es vir sacrilegus si res sacras violasti,
Si percussisti personam religiosam,
Vel quem de Clero; nisi percussio sancta,
Doctor discipulum, Confessor probra fatentem._

[91] Cap. XV. _Episcopus, Presbyter & Diaconus, peccantes fideles diverberare non debeant._

[92] _Card. Pulli_ sententiarum _L. vii. Cap. 3. p. 220. Est ergo satisfactio quædam, aspera tamen, sed Deo tanto gratior quanto humilior, cum quilibet sacerdotis prostratus ad pedes, se cædendum virgis exhibet nudum._

[93] I have in the course of this Work frequently produced the original words of the Authors who are quoted therein, as I thought this precaution would not be disagreeable to the critical part of Readers. In regard to the Abbé Boileau himself, no occasion has offered of doing the same, as he seldom introduces any fact, in his Book, but in the words of the Writer from whom he borrows it: however, as in relating the above story, which he has extracted from a much longer account, he speaks for himself, I shall take this opportunity of introducing him personally to the Reader, and of transcribing his own words, in order to enable the Reader to judge of the goodness of his Latin.----‘_Inter exempla tam infaustæ notitiæ non pertimescam Historiam narrare hominis cucullati et cordigeri, Conventus Brugensis, anno circiter MDLXVI, cui nomen erat Cornelius Adriasem, origine Dordracensis, adversus hæreticos Guezios stomachosissimi concionatoris, qui puellas seu fœminas quasdam sacramento fidelitatis & obedientiæ sibi adstrictas, & specie pietatis devotas, non quidem asperatis & nodosis funibus verberabat, sed nudata earum femora & nates, inhonestis vibicibus rorantes, betuleis aut vimineis virgis, ictibus molliter inflictis, perfricabat._’

[94] ‘_Domine, tota tenera est; ego pro ipsâ recipio disciplinam: quo flectente genua dixit Mulier, Percute fortiter, Domine, quia magna peccatrix sum._’--_Men. Phil._ Lib. iv. Cap. 18.

The above story, related by Scot, together with the words he supposes to have been said by the Woman, have since been turned into a French epigram, which I have met with in the _Menagiana_, as well as in two or three different collections of French Poetry.

_Une femme se confessa,
Le Confesseur à la sourdine
Derriere l’Autel la troussa
Pour lui donner la discipline.
L’époux non loin d’elle caché
De miséricorde touché
Offrit pour elle dos & fesse.
La femme y consentit dabord,
Je sens, dit-elle, ma foiblesse,
Mon mari sans doute est plus fort;
Sus donc, mon Pere, touchez fort,
Car je suis grande pecheresse._

The abovementioned flagellating practices of Confessors, are alluded to in several Books; and Confessors are expressly charged with them by several Writers, besides what is said above. Among others, Sanlec, a _bel Esprit_ who lived under Lewis the Fourteenth, and wrote several Satires, in one of them, which he has intitled _The Directors_, has made the above practices of Confessors, or Directors, the subject of his animadversion. ‘This zealous Confessor (says Sanlec) who, for every trifling fault, with a discipline in his hand, fustigated his female Devotees.’

_Ce Confesseur zèlé, qui, pour les moindres fautes,
La discipline en main fustigeoit ses Dévotes._

Among the number of those who have administered disciplines of the kind here alluded to, a few have been so happy as to acquire much more reputation than the others. Among these must be ranked the abovementioned Cornelius Adriasem, whose case is related at length by Meteren, in his Latin History of the Netherlands, published in the year 1568, from which the Abbé Boileau has extracted it. This Cornelius Adriasem (or Adriansen) was a loud declaimer against the faction called the _Gueux_, whom the Abbé calls Hereticks, but who were, in fact, the same party who opposed the Spanish Government in those parts, and afterwards succeeded in overthrowing it, and founded the Republic of Holland. As the above Reverend Father had thus strongly opposed a powerful, numerous, as well as incensed party, in the State and the Church, the discovery that was made of his frailties, afforded matter of much triumph, as well as made a great noise, and supplied his enemies with an opportunity of inveighing afterwards against him, which they did not neglect, as we may conclude from Meteren’s account of the fact, which he relates at great length, and with much spleen and dulness. However, new names were coined to express that particular kind of discipline which Cornelius Adriansen used to serve upon his female penitents: those who loved to deduce their new appellations of things from Greek words, called it the _Gynopygian_ discipline; and others, who, proceeding upon a more liberal plan, thought that the proper appellation of any particular practice, ought to be derived from the name of some person who has eminently distinguished himself by it, called the discipline in question, from the name of the above Gentleman, the _Cornelian_ discipline: a name by which it still continues to be expressed in those quarters.

The devisers of the appellation just now mentioned, did not however mean to say, that Cornelius Adriansen was the inventor of the above kind of discipline, or even the first man of note who had recourse to it: or, if such was their meaning, they were wrong. In fact, Abelard, who certainly is a well-known character, also used to administer flagellatory corrections to his pupil Heloisa, whose name is not less illustrious than that of her Master. The Canon Fulbert, as every one knows, had intrusted him with the care of her education; and as the Canon was very desirous she should become distinguished by her learning, he had permitted him to correct her, whenever she should fail in performing her duty. Abelard, in time, made an extensive use of the power that had thus been conferred upon him; though, to say the truth (and as himself confesses in one of those Latin letters he wrote to her after their separation) he, at last, did not so much use it, when she had been guilty of faults, as when she too obstinately refused to commit any.--_Sed & te nolentem (says he) sæpiùs minis atque flagellis ad consensum trahebam._

As Cornelius Adriansen was preceded in the career we mention, by a character as distinguished as himself, so has he been followed by another who was no less so, and who made no less noise in the world. The person I mean, is the celebrated Jesuit, Father Girard; and among the number of his pupils or penitents, was Miss _Cadiere_, who certainly may also be looked upon as an illustrious character. The Cornelian disciplines which the Father used to serve upon her, were one of the subjects of the public complaint she afterwards preferred against him, about the year 1730; which gave rise to a criminal lawsuit or prosecution that made a prodigious noise, as it was thought to be a kind of stroke levelled at the whole Society of the Jesuits, and was known to have been stirred up by Monks belonging to Orders who were at open enmity with them. The _Demoiselle Cadiere_ likewise brought against Father Girard a charge of sorcery, and of having bewitched her; in order, no doubt, to apologize for her having peaceably submitted to the licentious actions of which she accused the Father, as well as to those disciplines with which she reproached him, which she circumstantially described in the original complaint, or charge, which she preferred against him; for Judges are persons who will not understand things by half words; one must speak plain to them, and call every thing by its proper name.

Among those who have distinguished themselves in the same career of flagellation, Readers (I mean those who possess some patriotism and love of their Country) will, no doubt, be much pleased to find one who belonged to this Nation; I mean to speak of the Reverend Zachary Crofton, Curate of St. _Botolph’s_, _Aldgate_, who, on a certain occasion, served a Cornelian discipline upon his Chambermaid, for which she afterwards sued him at Westminster.

The aforesaid Zachary Crofton, as Bishop Kennet relates in his Chronicle, from Dr. Calamy’s notes, was formerly a Curate at Wrenbury, in Cheshire (it was a little before the Restoration) and he used to engage with much warmth in the religious and political quarrels of his times: his refusal to take the _engagement_, and endeavours to dissuade others from taking it, caused him to be dismissed from his place. He was, however, afterwards provided with the Curacy of St. Botolph’s, Aldgate; but as his turn for religious and political quarrels still prevailed, and he had written several pamphlets, both English and Latin, about the affairs of those times, he was sent to the Tower, and deprived of his Curacy: he was afterwards cast into prison likewise in his own County, and when he procured his liberty, set up a Grocer’s shop. While he was in the above Parish of St. Botolph, ‘he gave,’ as Dr. Calamy relates, ‘the correction of a school-boy to his servant-maid,’ for which she prosecuted him in Westminster-hall. This fact the Doctor relates as an instance of the many scrapes into which Zachary Crofton’s warm and zealous temper brought him; and he adds that, on the last mentioned occasion, ‘he was bold to print his defence.’----Indeed this fact of Parson Crofton’s undauntedly appealing to the Public in print concerning the lawfulness of the flagellation he had performed, places him, notwithstanding what Dr. Calamy may add as to the mediocrity of his parts, at least upon a level with the Geniuses abovementioned, as well as any other of the kind that may be named, and cannot fail for ever to secure him a place among the most illustrious Flagellators.

In fine, to this list of the persons who have distinguished themselves by the flagellations they have atchieved, I think I cannot avoid adding that Lady, mentioned by Brantôme, who (perhaps as an exercise conducive to her health) took great delight in performing corrections of this kind, with her own hands. This Lady, who was moreover a very great Lady, would often, as Brantôme relates, cause the Ladies of her Houshold to strip themselves, and then amuse herself in giving them slaps upon their posteriors, pretty lustily laid on: with respect to those Ladies who had committed faults, she made use of good rods; and in general, she used less or greater severity, according (Brantôme says) as she proposed to make them either laugh or cry. The following are Brantôme’s own words.

‘_J’ai ouï parler d’une grande Dame de par le monde, voire grandissime, qui ne se contentant pas de lasciveté naturelle, & étant mariée & étant Veuve, pour la provoquer & exciter davantage, elle faisoit depouiller ses Dames & filles, je dis les plus belles, & se delectoit fort à les voir, & puis elle les battoit du plat de la main sur les fesses, avec de grandes clacquades & blamuses assez rudes; & les filles qui avoient delinqué en quelques chose, avec de bonnes verges.----Autres fois, sans les depouiller, les faisoit trousser en robes, car pour lors elles ne portoient point de calecons, & les clacquettoit sur les fesses, selon le sujet qu’elles lui en donnoient, pour les faire ou rire, ou pleurer._’

It is no easy matter to point out what precise views the Lady in question had, when she served the abovementioned flagellations. Brantôme, who had much travelled, and was grown much acquainted with the wickedness of the world, insinuates that she was actuated by motives of rather a wanton kind; but since it is extremely difficult to believe that thoughts like those Brantôme supposes, could be entertained, I shall not say by a Lady, but by a person of the high rank of the Lady in question, I will endeavour to account for her conduct in a different manner; and I shall consider my time as exceedingly well employed, if I can clear her from the aspersion thrown upon her by the above Gentleman.

In the first place, it is very possible, that (as hath been above insinuated) she considered the flagellations in question as an exercise advantageous to her health: and Physicians have often made worse prescriptions.

In the second place, she might, without looking farther, be prompted by a desire of doing justice; for Brantôme makes express mention of Ladies who had committed faults: now, such a conduct on the part of the Lady we speak of, would reflect much honour upon her, and shew that she did not disdain to superintend her own family.

Perhaps also it might be, that the abovementioned flagellations were of the same jocular kind merely, with those which, as hath been related in the sixth Chapter of this Book, were in use in Rome, and were often practised in the presence of the Emperor Claudius, and sometimes upon that Emperor himself. Nor is the circumstance mentioned by Brantôme, of the high Lady in question sometimes using pretty great severity, contrary to this supposition: it is a well-known fact that Great people, when they do their inferiors the honour to play with them, will often carry the joke too far, farther than the latter have a liking to: jokes or tricks of this kind, gave rise to the French common saying, _Jeux de Princes, qui plaisent à ceux qui les font_. ‘Tricks of Princes, which please those (_only_) by whom they are played.’

In fine, since the flagellations in question were often carried on, as appears from the account of Brantôme himself, in a manner really very jocular, even so much so as to make the Ladies laugh, it is natural to suppose that they were then executed by the common and perfectly free consent of the whole company. The Ladies possibly proposed to represent among themselves the festival of the _Lupercalia_, which has been described in a former Chapter: intending to represent it as it was performed in the times of Pope Gelasius, they stripped themselves in the manner Brantôme has related: the great Lady, in consideration of her high birth and station, was permitted to fill the part of the _Lupercus_; the wielding of the _discipline_ was of course exclusively left to her: nor was this peculiar advantage which the other Ladies granted her, in that kind of farce they agreed to act among themselves, materially different from the favour which certain Clergymen used to grant to their Bishop, when they played at Whist with him, who allowed his Lordship the privilege of naming the trump.

In regard to the Gentlemen who have been mentioned above, it is however pretty evident that (owing, no doubt, to the good-nature inherent in their sex) they used no kind of severity in those disciplines they used to bestow; except indeed Parson Crofton, who, from the circumstance of his writing a pamphlet, and a quarto pamphlet too, in defence of the flagellation he had performed, seems really to have been in earnest, both when he planned, and when he served it.

Thus Abelard, in one of the abovementioned Letters he wrote to his Pupil, while she lived retired in the Monastery of _Paraclet_, expressly says that the blows he gave her, were such blows as friendship alone, not anger, suggested: he even adds that their sweetness surpassed that of the sweetest perfumes,----_verbera quandoque dabat amor, non furor, gratia, non ira, quæ omnium unguentorum suavitatem transcenderent_.

Father Girard, as is evident from the whole tenor of the declaration of Miss Cadiere herself, had as little intention as Abelard, to do any kind of injury to his pupil or penitent; and Cornelius Adriansen, as appears from Meteren’s account, used to proceed with the same caution and tenderness for his disciples, as the two above-mentioned gentlemen, and contented himself, as the Abbé Boileau observes, with gently rubbing them with his instruments of discipline;--_molliter perfricabat_.

That Confessors should contract sentiments of friendship for their female penitents, like those mentioned by Abelard, is however nowise surprizing. La Fontaine says, that

_Tout homme est homme, & les Moines sur tous._

“Every Man is a Man, and Monks above all others.” He might at least have said, “Every Man is a Man, and Monks as well as others;” and to this have added, that their virtue, especially that of Confessors, is exposed to dangers of a peculiar kind. In fact, the obligation which those who perform that office are under, to hear, with seeming indifference, the long confessions of Women of every age, who frequently enter into numerous particulars concerning the sins which they have either committed, or had distant wishes to commit, is no very easy talk for Men who, as hath just now been observed, are after all nothing but Men; and they are, under such circumstances, frequently agitated by thoughts not very consonant with the apparent gravity and sanctity of their looks. Nay, raising such thoughts in them, and in general creating sentiments of love in their Confessors, are designs which numbers of female penitents, who at no time entirely cease being actuated by womanish views, expressly entertain, notwithstanding the apparent ingenuity of their confessions, and in which they but too often succeed, to their own, and their frail Confessors, cost. Thus, it appears from Miss Cadiere’s declarations, that she had of herself aimed at making the conquest of Father Girard, though a Man past fifty years of age, being induced to it, by his great reputation both as a Preacher and a Man of parts; and she expressly confessed that she had for a long while been making interest to be admitted into the number of his penitents.

Indeed, these dangers to which Confessors are exposed from their continual and confidential intercourse with the Sex, (for, to the praise of Women be it spoken, they are infinitely more exact than Men in making their confessions) are much taken notice of in the books in which directions are given to such Priests as are designed for that employment; and they are warned against nothing so much as an inclination to hear preferably the confessions of the other Sex.----St. Charles Borrommee, as I have read in one of those books, prescribed to Confessors to have all the doors wide open, when they heard the confession of a Woman; and he had supplied them with a set of passages from Psalms, such as, _Cor mundum crea in me Domine_, and the like, which he advised them to have pasted on some conspicuous place within their sight, and which were to serve them as ejaculatory exclamations by which to vent the wicked thoughts with which they might feel themselves agitated, and as kinds of _Abracadabras_, or _Retrò Satanas_, to apply to, whenever they should find themselves on the point of being overcome by some too sudden temptation.

Numbers of Confessors however, whether it was that they had forgotten to supply themselves with the passages recommended by St. Charles Borrommee, or that those passages really proved ineffectual in those instants in which they were intended to be useful, have, at different times, formed serious designs upon the chastity of their penitents; and the singular situation in which they were placed, both with respect to the Public, and to their penitents themselves, with whom, changing the grave supercilious Confessor into the wanton lover, was no easy transition, have led them to use expedients of rather singular kinds, to attain their ends. Some, like Robert d’_Arbrissel_, (and the same has been said of Adhelm, an English Saint who lived before the Conquest) have induced young Women to lie with them in the same beds, giving them to understand, that, if they could prove superior to every temptation, and rise from bed as they went to it, it would be in the highest degree meritorious. Others, Menas for instance, a Spanish Monk whose case was quoted in the proceedings against Father Girard, persuaded young Women to live with him in a kind of holy conjugal union, which he described to them, but which did not however end, at last, in that intellectual manner which the Father had promised. Others have persuaded Women that the works of matrimony were no less liable to pay tithes than the fruits of the earth, and have received these tithes accordingly. This scheme was, it is said, contrived by the Fryars of a certain Convent in a small Town in Spain, and La Fontaine has made it the subject of one of his _Tales_, which is entitled _The Cordeliers of Catalonia_, in which he describes with much humour the great punctuality of the Ladies in that Town, in discharging their debts to the Fathers, and the vast business that was, in consequence, carried on in the Convent of the latter.

Lastly, other Confessors have had recourse to their power of flagellation, as an excellent expedient for preparing the success of their schemes, and preventing the first suspicions which their penitents might entertain of their views.

In order the better to remove the scruples which the modesty of these latter caused them at first to oppose, they used to represent to them, that our first Parents were naked in the garden of Eden; they moreover asked, whether people must not be naked, when they are christened; and shall not they likewise be so, on the day of Resurrection? Nay, others have made such a state of nakedness, on the part of their penitents, a matter of express duty, and have supported this doctrine, as the Author of the _Apologie pour Hérodote_ relates, by quoting the passage of Jesus Christ, in which he says, _Go, and shew thyself to the Priest_.

However, instances of the wantonness of Priests like this latter, in which a serious use was made of passages from the Books on which Religion is grounded, in order to forward schemes of a guilty nature, certainly cannot, in whatever light the subject be considered, admit of any justification: though on the other hand, when the national calamities produced by sophisms of this kind and the arts of Men of the same cloth, are considered, one cannot help wishing that they had constantly employed both these sophisms and their artifices in pursuits like those above-mentioned, and that, ensnaring a few female penitents (who were not perhaps, after all, extremely unwilling to be ensnared) and serving flagellations, had been the worst excesses they ever had committed.

CHAP. XVII.

_The Church at large also claims a power of publicly inflicting the
discipline of flagellation. Instances of Kings and Princes who have
submitted to it._

As it was the constant practice of Priests and Confessors, to prescribe flagellation as a part of the _satisfaction_ that was owing for committed sins, the opinion became at last to be established, that, receiving this kind of correction, was not only an useful, but even an indispensable act of submission: without it penitence was thought to be a body without a soul; nor could there be any such thing as true repentance. Hence the Church itself at large, became also in time to claim a power of imposing castigations of the kind we mention, upon naked sinners; and a flagellation publicly submitted to, has been made one of the essential ceremonies to be gone through, for obtaining the inestimable advantage of the repeal of a sentence of excommunication: the Roman Ritual expressly mentioning and requiring this test of the culprit’s contrition.

These flagellatory claims and practices of the Western Christian Church, are, we may observe, one of the objections made against it by the Greek, or Eastern, Christians, as the learned M. Cotelier, a Doctor of the Sorbonne, observes in his _Monuments of the Greek Church_: ‘When they absolve a person from his excommunication (they say) he is stripped down to the waist, and they lash him with a scourge on that part which is bare, and then absolve him, as being forgiven his sin[95].’

Among the different instances of disciplines publicly inflicted by the Church, upon independent Princes, we may mention that which was imposed upon Giles, Count of the _Venaissin_ County, near Avignon. This Count having caused the Curate of a certain Parish to be buried alive, who had refused to bury the body of a poor Man, till the usual fees were paid, drew upon himself the wrath of the Pope, who fulminated against him a sentence of excommunication. And in order to procure the repeal of it, he found it necessary to submit to a flagellation, which was inflicted upon him before the gate of the Cathedral Church of Avignon.

But no fact can be mentioned more striking, and more capable of having gratified the pride of the Clergy, at the time, than that of Henry II. King of England. This Prince having, by a few hasty angry words he uttered on a certain occasion, been the cause of the assassination of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, expressed afterwards the greatest sorrow for his imprudence: but neither the Priests nor the Nation would take his word on that account: they only gave credit to the reality of his repentance, when he had submitted to the all-purifying trial of a flagellation; and in order the more completely to remove all doubts in that respect, he went through it publicly. The following is the account which Matthew Paris, a Writer who lived about those times, has given of the transaction. ‘But as the slaughterers of this glorious Martyr had taken an opportunity to slay him from a few words the King had uttered rather imprudently, the King asked absolution from the Bishops who were present at the ceremony, and subjecting his bare skin to the discipline of rods, received four or five stripes from every one of the religious persons, a multitude of whom had assembled[96].’

FOOTNOTES:

[95] Ἀφορισμοῦ τινὰ λύοντες, γυμνοῦσιν αὐτὸν ἕως ὀσφύος, καὶ μαστίζοντες ἐπὶ γυμνοῦ λώροις, ἀπολύουσιν ὡς συγκεχωρημένον ἐντευθεν.

[96] ... _Carnemque suam nudam disciplinæ virgarum supponens, à singulis viris religiosis, quorum multitudo magna convenerat, ictus ternos vel quinos accepit._

Among the instances of Sovereigns who have been publickly flagellated, may also be reckoned that of Raymond, Count of Toulouse, whose Sovereignty extended over a very considerable part of the South of France. Having given protection in his dominions to the Sect called the _Albigenses_, Innocent III. the most haughty Pope that ever filled the Papal Chair, published a Croisade against him; his dominions were in consequence seized, nor could he succeed to have them restored to him, before he had submitted to receive discipline from the hands of the Legate of the Pope, who stripped him naked to the waist, at the door of the Church, and drove him up to the altar in that situation, all the while beating him with rods.

With respect to the discipline undergone by King Henry II. though he may be said to have freely submitted to it, yet it did not, at bottom, materially differ from that imposed upon Raymond, Count of Toulouse. This Prince had, no doubt, too much understanding to submit to a ceremony of this kind, out of regard for some prevailing notion of the vulgar merely, and much less out of any superstition of his own; but he thought it necessary to perform some remarkable religious act of that sort, for silencing at once the clamours of the Priests, the whole body of whom, incensed by the death of Becket, were every where endeavouring to spirit up the people to a revolt; and he may with truth be said to have submitted to being flagellated, in order to preserve his kingdom: which may serve as a proof, among others, that it is a pleasing thing to be a King.

The last instance of a Sovereign who received a correction from the Church, was that of Henry IV. of France, when he was absolved of his excommunication and heresy; and the discipline undergone by that Prince supplies the solution for an interesting question, that may be added to those above discussed; viz. Which is the most comfortable manner of receiving a flagellation?--It is by Proxy.--This was the manner in which the King we speak of, suffered the discipline which the Church inflicted upon him. His proxies were Mess. D’Ossat, and Du Perron, who were afterwards made Cardinals. During the performing of the ceremony of the King’s absolution, and while the Choristers were singing the Psalm _Miserere mei Deus_, the Pope, at every verse, beat, with a rod on the shoulders of each of the two proxies; which shews how essential a part of the ceremony of an absolution, flagellations have been thought to be; and also, how strictly the Church of Rome adheres to such forms as are prescribed by its Ritual, or, by the _Pontifical_, as it is called. Express mention was moreover made of the above beating, in the written process that was drawn of the transaction. _Dominus Papa verberabat & percutiebat humeros Procuratorum, & cujuslibet ipsorum, virgâ quam in manibus habebat._

As a farther indulgence to the King who was thus disciplined by proxy, and very likely also out of regard for the age in which the ceremony was performed, the two Gentlemen who represented him, were suffered to keep their coats on, during the operation; and the lashes seem moreover not to have been laid upon them, with any great degree of vigour. However, some persons at the Court of France, either out of envy against the two above Gentlemen, on account of the commission with which the King had honoured them, or with a view to divert themselves, had, it seems, circulated a report, that, on the day of the ceremony, the 17th of September 1595, they had been made actually to strip in the Church, and undergo a dreadful flagellation. This report M. D’Ossat contradicts in one of his Letters, the collection of which has been printed; and he says, that the discipline in question was performed to comply with the rules set down in the _Pontifical_, but that ‘they felt it no more than if it had been a fly that had passed over them, being so well coated as they were.’

Very express mention of the above discipline was nevertheless made, as hath been above observed, in the written process drawn on the occasion; though the French Ministers would not suffer it to be joined with the Bull of absolution which was sent to the King for his acceptation, and in which no such account was contained. This, another French Author observes, did not prevent the Italians from deriving triumph from the event, and saying that the King of France had been disciplined at Rome.

From the above two instances of Henry II. of England, and Henry IV. of France (the authenticity of which is beyond any doubt) we find that two crowned Heads, Kings of the two most powerful States in Europe, both of the name of Henry, have publicly submitted to the discipline of flagellation, either in their own person, or by proxy: the one, to preserve his Crown; and the other, in order to qualify himself for taking possession of it. I desire the judicious Reader to ponder well all these facts, and not to charge me with having chosen too unimportant a subject to treat in this Work.

It may be added, that an instance of a Sovereign submitting to a flagellation, may be seen in our days, at every vacancy of the See of Wurtzburgh; a sovereign Bishoprick in Germany. It is an antient custom in the Chapter of that Church, that the person who has been elected to fill the place of the late Bishop, must, before he can obtain his installation, run the gantlope, naked to the waist, between the Canons, who are formed in two rows, and supplied with rods. Some say this custom was established in order to discourage the German Princes from being Candidates for the above Bishoprick; but perhaps also the Canons who established the same, had no other design than procuring the pleasure to themselves and successors, when they should afterwards see their equal become their Sovereign, of remembering that they had cudgelled him.

Other facts, besides that of Henry the Second, shew that the power of the Clergy was carried as far, at least, in England, as in any other Country. Bishop Goodwin relates, that in the reign of Edward I. Sir Osborn Gifford, of Wiltshire, having assisted in the escape of two Nuns from the Convent of Wilton, John Peckham, who was then Archbishop of Canterbury, made him submit, before he absolved him of his excommunication, to be publicly whipped, on three successive Sundays, in the Parish Church of Wilton, and also in the Market and Church of Shaftsbury[97].

[97] See Dr. Berkenhout’s _Biographia Litteraria_, Art. _John Peckham_.

CHAP. XVIII.

_The glory of flagellations completed: they are made use of for
curing heresy._

Among all the instances contained in this Book, of the extensive advantages of flagellations, we certainly ought not to omit mentioning the application that has been made of them to the information of Heretics; the holy personages whose office it was to convert them, having frequently recurred to them as an excellent expedient, either for opening the eyes of such as absolutely refused to believe, or for confirming the faith of those who did as yet believe but imperfectly. As one instance of that use of flagellations we speak of, we may mention that of Bonner, Bishop of London, who, though he had, under the reign of Henry VIII. consented to the schism which then took place in the Church, made it his constant practice, under Queen Mary, to fustigate the Protestants with rods with his own hands, at least if we are to credit the account given by Bishop Burnet, in his History of the Reformation, in England[98].

FOOTNOTES:

[98] I do not remember to have met with the above fact in Burnet: Mr. Hume, who also mentions it, quotes, it seems, another Author: however, Bishop Burnet relates a fact of much the same nature, which is that of Mr. James Bainham, a Gentleman of the Temple, who was accused of favouring the new opinions: Chancellor More caused him to be fustigated in his own (More’s) house, and thence sent him to the Tower. The Abbé Boileau, from whose text I have really borrowed the instance of Bishop Bonner, had however no occasion to look out of his own Country, for instances of Heretics who have been reformed by flagellations: though, to say the truth, that instance, together with that of Chancellor More, which is here added to it, are the more interesting, in that they evince the great merit of flagellations, since the Divines of all Countries have alike resorted to them.

CHAP. XIX.

_The subject of the merit of flagellations, continued. Holy
persons, though without any public authority, have used them
occasionally, in order to give weight to their admonitions._

The general esteem for flagellations, which had led people to consider them as an infallible method of atoning for past sins, also induced them to think they would be extremely useful to strengthen those admonitions with which it is the duty of good Christians to assist each other. Hence we find that Saints, who, like other persons, have been pretty free with their advices to other men, have frequently assumed a power to corroborate them by flagellations.

Among those instances of corrections bestowed by Saints upon persons who did not ask them for their advice, none can be quoted more remarkable than that of St. Romuald, who, on a certain occasion, severely flagellated his very Father, whose conduct he disapproved, as Cardinal Damian relates, who, we may observe, greatly approves the action of the Saint. The following is the account given by the Cardinal. ‘After he had received permission for that purpose from his Superiors, he set out upon his intended journey, without either horse or cart, but only with a stick in his hand, and with his feet bare; and, from the remotest borders of France, at last reached Ravenna. There finding his Father determined to return to the World, he put him in the stocks; he tied him with heavy chains, dealt hard blows to him, and continued using him with this pious severity, till, by the favour of God, he had brought his soul back to a state of salvation[99].’

To those flagellations bestowed by Saints upon persons who did not ask for them, we may safely add those with which they have, at different times, served such Ladies, as, smitten with their charms (with the Saints charms, I mean) have ventured to make them proposals totally inconsistent with their virtue. These proposals the Saints not only constantly rejected magnanimously, but moreover seldom dismissed the Ladies who attempted them, without making them feel the points of their disciplines. This was the manner in which St. Edmund, who was afterwards Bishop of Canterbury, behaved on an occasion like those we mention, as the learned Claude Despence, a Parisian Theologian, relates in his Book on _Continence_. St. Edmund, the above Writer says, during the time he was pursuing his studies in Paris, was solicited by a young Woman to commit with her the sin of fornication; he thereupon bade her come to his study, where, after tearing off her clothes, he flagellated her naked, so severely, that he covered her whole body with stripes[100].

Brother Mathew, of Avignon, a Capuchin Friar who lived about the year 1540, and spent many years in Corsica with a reputation of sanctity, gave just such another capital instance of virtue as that exhibited by St. Edmund. The Saint having been charitably received in a certain Castle in Piedmont, where he was then begging about the Country, a young Lady, extremely handsome, and of noble birth, came during the night, stripped to her shift, to visit him, in the room that had been assigned to him, and approaching the bed in which he was asleep, solicited him to commit the carnal sin. But the holy Friar, instead of answering her, ‘took up his discipline, made with sound and well-knotted Spanish small cords, and flagellated her so briskly upon her thighs, her posteriors, and back, that he not only made her blush with shame, but moreover left upon her skin numberless visible marks of the lecture he gave her[101].’