[118] In order to support his opinion concerning the dangers of
disciplines, the Abbé Boileau has quoted Bartholinus’s treatise
_De medico flagrorum usu_, and that wrote by John-Henry Meibomius,
a Professor at Lubeck, _De usu flagrorum in re venereâ_. The
singularity of these titles led me to look into both publications,
in order to be able to give my opinion about them, and also in hope
I might pick a few facts and quotations to entertain the Reader
with: but I have been disappointed; both Treatises being as dull
unconnected farragos as ever were printed. From Meibomius’s Treatise,
and also from Cœlius Rhodiginus’s Book, the Abbé had however borrowed
two stories, which I at first intended to insert in this Chapter; but
as I have found them, upon more attentive examination, to be related
in no pleasing nor even probable manner, besides being very long, I
have set them aside, contrary to the design of this Work, as I have
explained it in the _Introduction_, which was to make use of and
introduce, in the Text, all the facts and quotations scattered in
the Abbé’s Book: I therefore make my apology to the Reader, for the
omission.
To the other facts thus supplied by the Abbé’s Work, I have in this
Chapter, conformably to the promise made at p. 131, added the Abbé’s
own expressions and remarks, not only on account of their great
ingenuity, but also in order that the present final Chapter might be
a common conclusion of our respective talks, and that the Abbé and
me, joining hands again in it, might thus have an opportunity, as is
the custom at the end of Plays, to make our obeisance together, and
take a joint leave of the Public.
[119] ... _ad cujus sententiam, meam libens volensque adjungo._
[120] _Quippecum eâ de causâ Capucini, multæque Moniales, virorum
Medicorum ac piorum hominum consilio, ascesim flagellandi sursum
humeros reliquerint, ut sibi nates lumbosque strient asperatis
virgis, ac nodosis funiculis conscribillent._
[121] _Ho, ho, Monsieur l’Abbé!_ How come you to be so well
acquainted with beauties of the kind you mention here, and to speak
of them in so positive a manner? For, the Reader must not think I
here lend any expressions to the Abbé which are not his own: _Num
probrosum_ (says he), _soli ostendere lumbos & femora juvenilia,
excellenti formê, quamvis religionis honestate consecrata?_ This
_Monsieur l’Abbé_, for his excursion upon objects and beauties which,
one should have thought, lie out of his province, richly deserves
a lecture of the same kind with that which Parson Adams received
from Lady Booby, when he ventured to expatiate, in her Ladyship’s
presence, on the beauties of Fanny.
[122] These dangers arising from self-examination I do not allow
myself to call in question; since, besides the Abbé Boileau, the
Framers of Monastic Rules have taken notice of them; and indeed I
find Brantôme has entertained thoughts of the same kind; and many
facts are to be found in that Chapter of his which he has intitled
_Of Sight in Love_, that fully confirm the above observations. But
besides these serious dangers into which a too curious examination
of one’s-self may lead, there are others very well worth mentioning:
I mean to speak of the acts of pride, vanity, self-admiration and
complacency, to which the above curiosity may give rise. Vanity and a
disposition to admire one’s-self, are dispositions that are but too
general among Mankind; and there is hardly a time in life at which we
may be said to be perfectly cured of such worldly affections. On this
occasion I shall produce the following anecdote, which is related by
Brantôme.
A certain Lady, who had been very handsome, and now was somewhat
advanced in years, would no longer look at her face in the
looking-glass, for fear of discovering some new injury time might
have done to it; but she used to survey the other parts of her body,
and then, suddenly actuated by the worldly vanity we speak of, she
exclaimed, “God be thanked, here I do not grow old” (_je ne vieillis
point_.)
These dangers of a too curious examination of one’s own person, are
extremely well expressed by Ovid, in that part of his Metamorphosis
where he describes Narcissus sitting near that clear silver fountain
in which he contemplated himself:
_Fons erat illimis, nitidis argenteus undis._
And the Poet relates, in a very lively manner, the astonishment
of the Youth, at the sight of, as he thought, his own charms and
perfections.
... _visæ correptus imagine formæ
Adstupet ipse sibi._
That unexperienced Nuns should be led, by their disciplines, into
faults of a similar kind, are therefore very natural apprehensions.
Being thoroughly engaged in the contemplation of those beauties which
they expose to light, it is no wonder that all their thoughts of a
religious kind should vanish: and they even may very well in the
issue, inchanted as they are by what they are beholding, intirely
forget and neglect those pious exercises which they have purposely
retired to their cell to perform.
[123] _Quid turpius excogitari potest, sivè viro sivè fœminæ, quàm,
lumbis & femoribus ad radios Solis apertis, seipsum diverberare?...
Quis in edito & aperto loco, plenis comitiis, in conspectu hominum,
lumbos natesque virgis cædere non pertimescat?_
This exhibition of nakedness to the rays of the Sun, the Poet
Lafontaine observes, is only fit for the New World. He expresses
this opinion in that Tale which has been above quoted, _The Pair of
Spectacles_, when he attempts to express the objects which the Nuns
exhibited to the sight of each other, and of the Abbess: “Niggardly
and proud charms, which the Sun is allowed to see only in the New
World, for this does not shew them to him.”
_---- chiches & fiers appas
Que le Soleil ne voit qu’au nouveau monde,
Car celui-ci ne les lui montre pas._
However, notwithstanding the opinion of the Poet Lafontaine, it
seems that an exhibition of charms and attractions, even superior
to what takes place in the New World, is common in Russia; which is
certainly a part of our Old World: the Reader may see in the accounts
given by Travellers, that individuals of both Sexes, after some
stay in the hot-baths and stoves in use in that Country, will rush
out promiscuously together, stark-naked, playing, and delightfully
rolling themselves in the snow. If Russia had been more visited by
Travellers in the times of Cardinals Damian and Pullus, these two
great Promoters of nakedness would have been supplied with facts much
to the advantage of their doctrine.
Bartholinus too, from the accounts of the same Travellers would
have been supplied with excellent materials for composing his
abovementioned Treatise, _On the physical use of Flagellations_. The
Abbé Dauteroche, one of the latest Travellers who have published an
account of Russia, where he went to observe the transit of Venus,
gives a somewhat accurate description of the baths and stoves we
mention. The heat is commonly carried in them to so high a degree
as the fiftieth of Reaumur’s scale (which answer to the 130th of
Fahrenheit’s; the greatest summer heat in England seldom surpasses,
or even reaches, 80) a suffocating steam is raised by throwing
plenty of water upon stones kept constantly red hot; and, in order
to carry the agitation of the blood still farther, flagellations
are applied to: a bundle of birchen twigs, with the leaves on,
which being dry are soon stripped off, is as constant a part of the
bathing implements and furniture, as a handkerchief or a towel. All
these different operations being fulfilled, the bathers, as is above
said, rush out into the external air, sometimes ten, or even twenty
degrees colder than it was in this Country in the year 1740, and
roll themselves in the snow, or jump into water through holes made
in the ice. These are certainly surprising instances of what the
human body may be brought to bear; much more remarkable than those
that have been before mentioned; and the boxes of Buckhorse, the
Chinese bastinadoes, and the flagellations of the Italian and Spanish
disciplinants, are nothing in comparison to it. But, for a farther
account of the Russian stoves, and of the trial the Abbé Dauteroche
had the curiosity to make of them, as well as of the unexpected and
unwelcome entertainment he received, I must refer the Reader to the
Work itself he has published.