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].’
To these instances of the holy severity with which Saints have treated such Ladies as ventured to make attempts upon their virtue, may be added that of Bernardin of Sienna, according to the account given by Surius; for the virtue of Saints has been exposed to more dangers than the vulgar think of. ‘One day (says Surius) as Bernardin was gone abroad to buy some bread, a Woman, the Wife of a Citizen of Sienna, called him to her house: as soon as he had got into it, she locked the door, and said, Unless you now let me have my wish, I declare I will cover you with shame, and say that you have offered violence to me. Bernardin, finding himself drawn into such a dangerous situation, prayed to God, within himself, not to forsake him; for he greatly detested that crime. God did not disregard his prayer; he presently suggested to him to tell the Woman, that since she would absolutely have it so, she must strip off her clothes. To this the Woman made no objection; and she had scarcely done when Bernardin exhibited his whip, which he happened to have about him, and laying fast hold of her, began to exert it vigorously; nor did he give up fustigating her, till her lustful ardour was extinguished. She loved the holy Man the better for that afterwards; and so did her Husband, when he knew how things had been transacted[102].’
Page. 264.
