_The fondness of people for flagellations, gives rise to a number
of incredible stories on that subject._
The supporters of the practice of flagellation did not confine their
endeavours in recommending it, to setting the example of it, like
Rodolph of Eugubio, or Dominic the Cuirassed, or to supporting it by
arguments and voluminous writings, like Cardinal Damian; but they
mixed their accounts with numbers of stories of an extravagant kind;
whether their enthusiasm in favour of the practice in question,
induced them to believe such stories to be true, or they thought that
their very incredibility would be extremely fit to bring into credit
with the vulgar, a doctrine in favour of which they were themselves
so prepossessed.
Thus, flagellations were given out by some, as having the power of
rescuing souls from Hell itself; a thing which even Masses, though
constantly used to draw them out of Purgatory, were not thought to be
able to perform. As an instance of the stories that were circulated
on that account, may be produced the following, related by one
_Vincent_, who lived in the year 1256.
‘Archbishop Umbert (says Vincent) recited, that in the Monastery of
St. Sylvester, in the duchy of Urbino, in Italy, a certain Monk died;
and the Brothers continued singing Psalms by his body, from the first
evening crowing of the Cock, till two o’clock in the morning, and as
soon as they began, in the Mass they celebrated for his sake, to sing
the _Agnus Dei_, behold! the dead Man suddenly rose. The Brothers,
greatly astonished, came near him, to hear what he had to say; when
he began to throw forth abuses and curses against God; he spit on the
Cross that was offered him to kiss; he uttered the most opprobrious
expressions against the immaculate Mother of God, and said, Of what
service to me is your singing psalms, and offering sacrifices? I
have been in the flames of Hell, where my Lord and Master Lucifer
placed a brass crown, glowing with inextinguishable heat, on my
head, and laid a coat of the same metal, with which himself was
covered, on my shoulders: this coat was not long enough to reach
down to my heels, but it was so violently heated, that drops seemed
to fall from it to the ground. The Brothers having then continued to
exhort him to repent of his sins, he anathemised them, and denied,
in a sacrilegious manner, all the mysteries of our Redeemer. The
Monks thereupon prayed for him heartily, and after stripping off
their clothes, flagellated themselves, uttering every manner of
supplication in his behalf; when behold! that desperate Man recovered
the use of his reason; he confessed the omnipotence of our Saviour;
he renounced the errors of Satan, adored the Cross, and intreated
to be admitted to the Sacrament of Confession and Penitence. Now,
the crime of which he accused himself was that of having committed
fornication, after he had renounced the world; a thing which he had
kept secret to his death. He thus continued to live, praising and
blessing God, to the next day, when he again gave up the ghost.’
Besides stories of the same kind with that above, which were
contrived to heighten the merit of flagellations, the admirers of
that practice have excogitated others, in order to terrify those
who declined adopting it, or attempted to confute it by arguments.
As a specimen of this, we may quote the report that was circulated
concerning Cardinal Stephen, which hath been mentioned in a former
place (p. 214) that he had died suddenly, for having despised the
exercise in question.
Another story, contrived in the same view we speak of, is to be
found in Thomas _de Chantpré’s_ Book, in which it is related of a
certain Hugh, a Canon of St. Victor, that, having on account of his
weak state of health, constantly forbore, during his life-time, the
use of flagellations, he paid dearly afterwards for this tender care
he had taken of his skin; for at his passage into Purgatory, the
whole tribe of Devils lashed him with scourges. ‘Hugh (says Thomas
de Chantpré) was one of the Regular Monks in the Monastery of St.
Victor, in Paris. He was called the second St. Austin, that is to
say, the second Man in point of learning since St. Austin; but though
he deserved much praise in that respect, yet, the same cannot be said
of his constant refusal to practice flagellations and disciplines,
for his quotidian misdeeds, either in private, or in the Chapter,
in company with the Brothers: he was, as I have been informed, of a
tender frame of body, and had, besides, been too much indulged in
his childhood. Now, because he took no pains to overcome by exercise
the defect of his nature, or rather his bad habit, very fatal
consequences ensued to him, as I am going to relate. Being near his
death, a brother Canon, who was his intimate friend, intreated him
to shew himself again to him, after he was dead. I will, says he, if
the Master of life and death consents to it. As Hugh was making this
promise, he died; nor was it long before he returned to his friend,
who was still in expectation of him, and said, Here I am; make haste
to ask what question you intend to ask, for I cannot stay. The
other, who, though he was exceedingly pleased, yet was not a little
frighted, said, How is it with you, my dear friend? It is well with
me, said Hugh; but because I have refused, while I was alive, to
receive discipline, there has hardly been a single Devil in the whole
infernal empire, but who gave me a smart lash, as I was in my way to
Purgatory.’
Others, in order to bring flagellations into still greater credit,
have supposed that the Devils themselves were so sensible of the
merit that was in them, that they would occasionally practise them
upon each other. Thus, St. Allen relates that the Holy Virgin Mary
having resolved to rescue a certain James Hall, an Usurer, from the
claws of the Dæmons, these unclean spirits, a great number of whom
were present, no sooner saw her make her appearance, than they took
to blaspheming, flagellated each other, and ran away.
The Devil himself has also, on certain occasions, prescribed
flagellations, as an atonement for sins; which is certainly wonderful
enough. It is related in the Life of St. Virgil, that a Man possessed
by the Devil, was fustigated with four rods, by the Devil’s
prescription, for having stolen four wax-candles from the Saint’s
altar. ‘I am not come (said the possessed Man) of my own accord;
but I have been compelled to it: I have carried off the wax-candles
and offerings that were on the tomb of the Man of God; and if they
are not speedily returned, my Master will come with seven spirits
worse than himself, and will for ever continue in me. However, when
the candles, of which they had been a long while in search, were
found again, by the Devil’s assistance, and brought back, the Devil
directed them to fustigate the unhappy Man with as many besoms as
there were candles.’
To these instances of flagellations voluntarily practiced among
Devils, we ought not to omit to add one, in which the Devil was
smartly flagellated in spite of his teeth, by a Saint, and a female
Saint too; a fact which cannot fail to give the greatest pleasure
to the Reader, who remembers the deplorable accounts that have been
given in a former Chapter, of the wanton flagellations he has himself
inflicted upon Saints. The name of the female Saint who thus gave
the Devil his due, was _Cornelia Juliana_, as the Reverend Father
Jesuit, Bartholomew Fisen, relates, in his book on the _Ancient
Origin of the Festival of the body of Christ_. ‘One day (says he) the
other Nuns heard a prodigious noise in the room of Cornelia Juliana,
which turned out to be a strife she had with the Devil, whom, after
having laid hold of him, she fustigated unmercifully; then, having
thrown him upon the ground, she trampled him under her foot, and
continued ridiculing him in the most bitter manner[108].’ The above
Reverend Father has neglected to inform us, how the Devil came to be
in Juliana’s room; but it is most likely he was come upon his usual
antic errand of flagellating Saints, and meant to serve Juliana in
the same manner: fortunately she was upon the watch, and proved too
many for him. As for the dreadful noise that was to be heard in the
Saint’s room, it was the natural consequence of the hard struggle
that took place between her and the Devil, while they were thus
striving who should flog the other.
The Saints who inhabit Paradise have also been supposed to have
occasionally recourse to flagellations; not, to be sure, to inflict
them any longer upon themselves; but to chastise, at the request of
their friends, those who persecuted them. This misfortune happened
to a certain Servant of the Emperor Nicephorus, who, not satisfied
with exacting unjust tributes from the common people with great
rigour, offered afterwards to use Monasteries in the same manner.
‘The Emperor (says the Author from whom this fact is extracted) sent
one of the Grooms of his bed-chamber to receive the usual tribute.
As he was a Man exceedingly eager after money and unlawful gain, he
committed great oppressions both on the common citizens, and the
inhabitants of the Monastery of St. Nicon; for the government of
cities, and the care of levying duties, are usually intrusted, not
to the just and mild, but to hard-hearted and inhuman persons. The
Monks, who were possessed of no money, endeavoured to sooth the above
cruel unmerciful Man by their discourses; but he, thirsty after gold,
was as deaf to their prayers, as the asp to conjurations, and made no
more account of their remonstrances, than, to use the words of the
Scripture, of _the crackling of thorns under a pot_. On the contrary,
his wrath and insolence increasing farther, he caused several of them
to be thrown into a jail, and prepared to plunder the Monastery.
The remaining Monks then applied to their Saint for assistance, who
presently made them experience the happy effects of it; for during
the following night, he appeared to the Groom, with a threatening
indignant aspect, and lashed him severely; then speaking to him,
told him, for his words ought to be recorded, _Thou hast thrown the
Heads of the Monastery into chains; if thou dost not release them
instantly, thy death shall be the consequence_.’
The Virgin Mary herself, has also been said to have applied to
corrections of the same kind as those here alluded to, in order to
avenge the injustices done to those whom she protected; and she,
for instance, caused a certain Bishop to be flagellated in her
presence, who had taken his prebend from a Canon, who was indeed, but
an indifferent person to fill his office, but who paid much devotion
to her, and with his eyes cast down, sung every day before her Altar
certain words contained in the _Angelic salutation_. The illustrious
Cardinal Damian informs us of this fact, in his _Opusc._ xxxiii.
_Cap._ iii. which is entitled, _The blessed Virgin directs that his
prebend should be returned to a Clergyman who used to pay devotion
to her_. ‘The same Stephanus (says Cardinal Damian) related to me
another fact of much the same kind. I remember, he said, that there
was a certain Clergyman, who was a dunce, an idle man, a dullard; to
this add that he was endowed with no religious gift, and possessed
no canonical gravity. Yet, amidst the dead ashes of his useless
life, some small particles of pious fire continued to subsist, so
that he would every day approach the altar of the holy Mother, and,
inclining his head with reverence, sing the following both _angelic_
and _evangelic_ line, _Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with
thee; blessed art thou among Women_. The new Bishop, however, who
soon discovered the incapacity of the Man, thought it wrong that an
useful office should be left to an useless person, and he took from
him the prebend he had obtained from the preceding Bishop. But as the
Canon was thereby reduced to great poverty, having no other means
of supporting himself, the blessed Virgin interfered in his behalf.
During the dead of night she appeared to the Bishop, preceded by a
Man who carried a discipline in one of his hands, and a burning torch
in the other, and ordered him to chastise the Bishop by some lashes
of it; then addressing this latter,--Why, said she, did you take from
a Man who used to pay daily homages to me, a clerical advantage it
was not you who had conferred on him? The Bishop, filled with terror,
and soon awaking from his sleep, presently returned the prebend to
the Clergyman, and afterwards greatly honoured as a Man whom God
loved, a person who, he thought, was unknown to him.’