Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 6.djvu/125

 FLAGET

93

FLAGET

in the "Ilistoria Lausiaca" (c. vi), and Socrates (Hist. Eccl., IV, xxiii) tells us that, instead of being excom- municated, offending young monks were scourged. See the sLxth-century rules of St. Caesarius of Aries for nuns (P. L., LXVII, 1111), and of St. Aurelian of Aries (ibid., LXVIII, 392, 401-02). Thenceforth scourging is frequently mentioned in monastic rules and councils as a preservative of discipUne (Hefele, "Concilieng. ', II, 594, 656). Its use as a punishment was general in the seventh century in all monasteries of the severe Columban rule (St. Columbanus, in "RegulaCoenobialis", c. x, inP. L., LXXX, 215 sqq.); for later centuries of the early Middle Ages see Tho- massin, "Vet. ac nova ecc. disciplina, II (3), 107; Du Cange, " Glossar. med. et infim. latinit.", s. v. " Dis- ciphna"; Gretser, "De spontanea discipUnarum seu flagellorum crucelibri trcs" (Ingolstadt, 1603);Kober, "Die korperliche Zuchtigung als kirchliches Straf- mittel gegen Clerikcr und Monche" in Tub. "Quartal- schrift" (1875). The canon law (Decree of Gratian, Decretals of Gregory IX) recognized it as a punish- ment for ecclesiastics; even as late as the sLxteenth and seventeenth centuries, it appears in ecclesiastical legislation as a punishment for blasphemy, concu- binage, and simony. Though doubtless at an early date a private means of penance and mortification, such use is publicly exemphfied in the tenth and eleventh centuries by the lives of St. Dominic Lori- catus (P. L., CXLIV, 1017) and St. Peter Damian (d. 1072). The latter wrote a special treatise in praise of self-flagellation ; though blamed by some contempora- ries for excess of zeal, his example and the high esteem in which he was held did much to popularize the vol- imtary use of the scourge or " discipline " as a means of mortification and penance. Thenceforth it is met with in most medieval religious orders and associations. The practice was, of course, capable of abuse, and so arose in the thirteenth century the fanatical sect of the Flagellants (q. v.), though in the same period we meet with the private use of the "discipline" by such saintly persons as King Louis IX and Elizabeth of Thuringia.

Unger, Die Flagellanten (1902); Cooper (pseudonym), Flagellation and the Flagellants. A History of the Rod, etc, (new ed., London, 1896), an anti-Catholic and Biased work; Barney, CiTnimrision and Flagellation among the Filipinos (Carlisle, Pa., 1903); C.^lmet's Diet, of the Bible, s. v. Scourging; Kitto, Cy- clop, of Biblical Lit., s. v. Punishment.

John J. Tierney.

Flaget, Benedict Joseph, first Bishop of Bards- town (subsequently of Louisville), Kentucky, U. S. A., b. at Contouruat, near Billom, Auvergne, France, 7 November, 1763; d. 11 February, 1850, at Louisville, Kentucky. He was a posthumous child and was only two years old when his mother died, leaving him and two brothers to the care of an aunt; they were wel- comed at the home of Canon Benoit Flaget, their uncle, at Billom. In his seventeenth year, he went to the Sulpician seminary of Clermont to study philosophy and theology, and joining the Society of St. Sulpice, 1 November, 1783, he was ordained priest in 1787, at Issy, where Father Gabriel Richard, the future apos- tle of Michigan, was then superior. Flaget taught dogmatic theology at Nantes for two years, and filled the same chair at the seminary of Angers when that house was closed by the Revolution. He re- turned to Billom in 1791 and on the advice of the Sul- pician superior. Father Emery, determined to devote himself to the American mission. He sailed in Janu- ary, 1792, with Father J. B. M. David, his future coad- jutor, and the subdeacon Stephen Badin (q. v.), land- ing in Baltimore, 29 March, 1792. He was studying English with his Sulpician brethren, when Bishop Carroll tested his self-sacrifice by sending him to Fort Vincennes, as missionary to the Indians and pastor of the Fort. Crossing the mountains he reached Pitts- burg, where he had to tarry for six months owing to

low water in the Ohio, tloing such good work that he gained the lasting esteem of General Anthony Wayne. The latter recommended him to the military com- mander Colonel Clark at the Falls of the Ohio, who deemed it an honour to escort him to Fort Vincennes, where he arrived 21 December, 1792. Father Flaget stayed here two years and then, recalled by his supe- riors, he became professor at the Georgetown College under the presidency of Father Dubourg. In Novem- ber, 1798, he was .sent to Havana, whence he returned in 1801 with twcnty-tliree stutlcnts to Baltimore.

On S April, 1808, Bardstowii, Kentucky, was cre- ated a see and Flaget was named its first bishop. He refused the honour and his colleagues of St. Sulpice approved his action, but when in 1809 he went to Paris, his superior. Father Emery, received him with the greeting: "My Lord, you should be in your dio- cese! The pope commands you to accept." Leaving France with Father Simon William BrutiS, the future Bishop of Vincennes, and the subdeacon, Guy Igna- tius Chabrat, his future coadjutor in Kentucky, Flaget landed in Baltimore and was consecrated 4 November, 1810, by Archbishop Carroll. The Dio- cese of Bardstown comprised the whole North-West, bounded East and West by Louisiana and the Missis- sippi. Bishop Flaget, handicapped by poverty, did not leave Baltimore until 11 May, 1811, and reached Louisville, 4 June, whence the Rev. C. Nerinckx es- corted him to Bardstown. He arrived there 9 June. On Christmas of that year he ordained priest the Rev. Guy Ignatius Chabrat, the first priest ordained in the West. Before Easter, 1813, he had established priestly conferences, a seminary at St. Stephen's (re- moved to St. Thomas', November, 1811), and made two pastoral visits in Kentucky. That summer he visited the outlying districts of Indiana, Illinois, and Eastern Missouri, confirming 1275 people during the trip.

Bishop Flaget's great experience, absolute self-de- nial, and holy life gave him great influence in the coun- cils of the Church and at Rome. Most of the bishops appointed within the next twenty years were selected with his advice. In October, 1817, he went to St. Louis to prepare the way for Bishop Duliourg. He recommended Bishop Fenwiok for Ohio, then left on a trip through that State, Indiana, and Michigan in 1818. In the latter State he did great missionary work at Detroit and Monroe, attending also a rally of 10,000 Indians at St. Mary's. Upon his return to Kentucky in 1819 heconsecrated his newcathedral inBardstown, 8 August, and consecrated therein his first coadjutor bishop. Rev. J. B. M. David, on the loth. In 1821 he started on a visitation of Tennessee, and bought prop- erty in Nashville for the first Catholic church. The years 1819 to 1821 were devoted to missionary work among the Indians. He celebrated the first Synod of Bardstown, 8 August, 1823, and continued his labours until 1828, when he was called to Baltimore to conse- crate Archbishop Whitfield; there he attended the first Council of Baltimore in 1829. In 1830 he conse- crated one of his own priests. Rev. Richard Kenrick, as Bishop of Philadelphia. A great friend of educa- tion, he invited the Jesuits to take charge of St. Mary's College, Bardstown, in 1832. In the meantime he had resigned his see in favour of Bishop David with Bishop Chabrat as coadjutor. Both priests and people re- belled, and their representations were so instant and continued that Rome recalled its appointment and reinstated Bishop Flaget, who during all this time was, regardless of age and infirmities, attending the cholera- stricken in Louisville, Bardstown, and surrounding country during 1832 and 1833. Bishop Chabrat be- came his second coadjutor and was consecrated 20 July, 1834. Only Kentucky and Tennessee were now left under Flaget's jurisdiction, and in the former he founded various religious institutions, including four colleges, two convents, one foundation of brothers, and