Fraternities of this kind obtain in most of the Catholic Countries in Europe; though with different encouragement from their different Governments.
In France they were, as hath been above said, in the greatest favour at Court, under Henry the Third: this Prince, who, before he was called to the Throne on the death of his Brother, had given every hope of an able warrior, and a great King, having inlisted in one of these Fraternities. As a powerful party was at that time set up, in France, against the authority of the Crown, and most of the people in Paris favoured that party, the King had attempted to overaw them by a display of Majesty, and being constantly accompanied when he made his appearance in public, by a numerous body of Halberdiers; but this not having succeeded, he tried to amuse the People by public shews; and in that view, as a Writer of those times says, instituted in Paris Fraternities of Penitents, in which he made himself a Brother. This expedient, however, did not succeed: these disciplining processions only served to bring sarcasms upon the Court, and the King himself; and among them that of Maurice Poncet has been recorded, who, besides other invectives he delivered from the pulpit, compared the disciplining Penitents, as hath been abovementioned, to men who should cover themselves with a wet cloth to keep off the rain. This reflection of Poncet was thought to be the more pointed, as, the very day before, the King had Walked in a procession of Penitents, during which a most heavy shower of rain had fallen, and the King with his Chancellor, and the whole train of Disciplinants, had been thoroughly soaked. The King was informed, the next day, of the jest of Poncet; and this, together no doubt with the remembrance of the rain of the day before, caused him to be much incensed against the Preacher: however, as notwithstanding his vices and weakness, he was a Man of the mildest temper, as well as of unbounded liberality, he contented himself with having the Monk sent back to his Convent.
In subsequent times, that is in the year 1601, under the reign of Henry IV. a Sentence was passed, as hath been abovementioned, by the Parliament of Paris, to abolish the Fraternity of the Blue Penitents, in the City of Bourges. The motive of the Parliament was not, however, their tender care for the skin of these Blue Penitents: but that Fraternity had been rendered a kind of political Association against the reigning King, who was during his whole life persecuted by bigotry, till he fell a victim to it at last; and they had joined several treasonable declarations and engagements, to their Statutes: for this reason the Fraternity was forbidden to meet again, under pain of being prosecuted as guilty of High Treason. From that time Brotherhoods of Penitents have been constantly discountenanced in France; and they are continued only in some Towns in the Southern Provinces, distant from the Metropolis.
But the Countries in which the processions we mention (which certainly are as extraordinary as any ceremony of which any Religion affords an instance) are most prevalent, and where they are in a manner naturalized, are, Italy, and Spain.
In the latter Country, in Spain, the flagellating Solemnities we speak of, have received a peculiar turn from the peculiar manners of the Inhabitants; and they are (which is certainly extraordinary) as well operations or scenes of gallantry, as acts of devotion. Lovers will frequently go, at the head of a procession of friends, and discipline themselves under the windows of their Mistresses: or, when they pass by chance under these windows, with a procession to which they belong, they redouble the smartness of their flagellations. All Disciplinants in general, shew attentions of the same kind to such Ladies as they meet in their way, when these Ladies appear to them possessed of some charms; and when the latter engage their attention in a peculiar manner, they never fail, especially if the procession happens to move slowly or to stop, by means of the increased briskness of their flagellations and skilful motions of their disciplines, plentifully to sprinkle them with their blood. These facts are attested by all Travellers; and Madame d’Aunoy among others, a French Lady of quality who in the last Century published a relation of her journey into Spain, a Book written with judgment, after giving an account of the same facts with those above to the friend to whom she wrote, adds that what she relates is literally true, and without any exaggeration. The Ladies who are the cause of this increased zeal of the Disciplinants, and to whom such an agreeable piece of courtship is addressed, reward the latter by raising the veil which covers their face, or even are obliged by the Bystanders to do so (destapar, as they call it) in much the same manner as the croud which stands at the door of a House where there is a masquerade, will, in this Country, oblige the masks, as they get into, or out of the House, to uncover their faces.
How the Spanish Ladies can be pleased with feats of that kind, is certainly difficult to understand; unless it be that, with Ladies, the bare intention of shewing them courtesy, is enough to procure their good-will; or perhaps also it may be, that the extreme gracefulness with which the disciplines we mention, are performed, has the power of rendering them pleasing to the Ladies. An opinion of this kind has been delivered by the Author of Hudibras:
“Why may not whipping have as good
A grace, perform’d in time and mood,
With comely movement, and by art,