Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/399

FLAGELLATION A HERESY. Q Peter, in Jerusalem, relating that God, incensed at the non-ob .ervance of Sundays and Fridays, had scourged Christendom and would have destroyed the world but for the intercession of the angels and the Virgin. This was accompanied by a message that general flagellation for thirty-three and a half days would cause him to lay aside his wrath. There was danger, indeed, of open antagonism and insubordination. The Mendicants, who endeav ored to discourage this independent popular penitence, incurred the bitterest hostility, which had no scruple in finding expression At Tournay the orator of the Flagellants denounced them as scor' pions and antichrists, and on the borders of Misnia two Domini cans, who endeavored to reason with a band of FlageUants were set upon with stones ; one had sufficient agility to escape, bU tl other was lapidated to death.* i- , "ui me When in Basle about a hundred of the principal citizens organ ized themselves into a confraternity, and made a flageUatingp;" grmiage to Avignon, they excited great admiration among^';t c tizens, and most of the cardinals were disposed to think hli b low r PT^'^'-^.^-Pl-- Clement YI. penetrated d fj ^ below the surface, and recognized the danger to the Church of allowing irregular and independent manifestltions of zea' a'J o permit mg unauthorized associations and congregations to form themselves. Moreover, what was to become o^f the 2 t Lvi " able and profitable function of the Holy See in admiSrLT He of worldly wisdom thisrea^oning^^ bo:?rri.riir:u^^^^ -- >348 (Mei. C.roni.(Ch.on. ae/Z;^et'2 ttTri^TT- T^^^^^^^^