FOOTNOTES:
[111] ... Quæ cum recedere vellet, fixis ligno natibus, evelli non potuit, &c.—Itinerarii Cambriæ, Lib. I.
This opinion of Catholic Divines concerning the great power of flagellations to appease the wrath of female Saints, and the content which they have supposed the latter to receive from such ceremonies, after the example of the antient Goddesses, might furnish a new subject of comparison between the Catholic Religion, and that of the ancient Heathens; and if Dr. Middleton had thought of it, he might have added a new article on that head, to his Letter from Rome.
In fact, the Reader may remember the account that has been given in the sixth Chapter of this Book, of the singular ceremonies that were exhibited at Lacedæmon, before the altar of Diana. ( See [p. 79, &c.]) The same was done sometimes before the altar of Juno. Rites of much the same flagellatory kind were practised in the Temple of the Goddess of Syria. And similar ceremonies also used to be performed in honour of the great Goddess, in Egypt. ( See [p. 85, 86].)
So prevalent was become the opinion that Goddesses delighted in seeing such corrections inflicted before their altars, that several of them, among whom was Venus herself, were supposed to be supplied with the necessary implements to inflict them with their own hands, occasionally ([p. 55]). Nay, the Muses themselves had been provided with instruments of the same kind: Lucian, in his Letter or Address “to an ignorant Man who was taking much pains in collecting a Library,” says to him, that the Muses will drive him from Parnassus, with their whips of myrtle. And Bellona, the Goddess of war, has also been armed by Virgil, in the 8th Book of his Æneid, with an enormous whip.
Quem cùm sanguineo sequitur Bellona flagelio.
These notions of the Ancients, concerning the inclination they attributed to Goddesses, for corrections of the kind here alluded to, may be explained in different ways.
In the first place, they perhaps thought it was owing to the greater irascibility of temper of the Sex, which prompts them to give effectual marks of their resentment, when they have good reason to think that no resistance will be attempted. In the second place, they possibly ascribed that inclination they supposed in the female Sex, to their love of justice; which is certainly a very laudable disposition. And, thirdly, they perhaps also considered that propensity of Women, to use instruments which were, in those times, deemed to be characteristic emblems of power, as the effect of that love of dominion with which the Sex has at all times been charged, and the consequence of some ambitious wish they supposed in them, of having the uncontrouled sway of the terrible flagellum.
However, if I am allowed to deliver my opinion concerning the above inclination of the fair Sex, about which the Antients seem to have entertained so great a prepossession, I will say that I think it owing to the second of the causes abovementioned, that is to say, to their laudable love of justice, and at the same time, to the peculiar nature of the Sex, which makes them feel a great reluctance in using any instruments, either of a cruel, or an unwieldly and ungraceful kind, for instance fire-arms or javelins, swords or clubs, but prompts them to employ, when they mean to give effectual tokens of their resentment, instruments suitable to the mercifulness of their tempers, and the elegance of their manners.