These notions of the usefulness of self-flagellations, were carried to a most extravagant pitch by a Sect formed of those itinerant Disciplinants, accounts of whom have been above given. Proud of the cruel disciplines they inflicted upon themselves, they looked upon them as being of far greater merit than the practice of any Christian virtue; and they at last formed among themselves a particular Sect of Heretics, who were called _Flagellants_. The title of _History of the Flagellants_, which the Abbé Boileau has given to his Work, might seem to indicate that he intended to write an History of that Sect, and of those public processions of Disciplinants which have succeeded it: yet, he only mentions that Sect and those Processions in his usual loose manner, in his ninth Chapter, without even distinguishing the one from the other. The proper title of his book (and of this, which is imitated from it) should be, _The History of religious Flagellations among different Nations, and especially among Christians_. Among the different tenets of the Hereticks we speak of, were the following. They pretended that the blood they shed, during their flagellations, was mixed with that of Jesus Christ;--that self-flagellations made confession useless;--that they were more meritorious than martyrdom, for they were voluntary, which martyrdom was not;--that baptism by water was of no use, as every true Christian must be baptized in his own blood;--that flagellation could atone for all past and future offences, and supplied the want of all other good works. To these tenets, and to several others of the same sort, they added Stories of different kinds; such as that of the abovementioned letter brought from Heaven by an Angel, to order self-flagellations; they gave out that a certain Brother of their Sect, who lived at Erford in Thuringe, was Elias; and that another, whose name was Conrad Smith, was Enoch, &c. &c. As the principles maintained by these Hereticks, were destructive of most of the essential tenets received by the Church, this reason, together with the cruelties they practised upon themselves, and in general their fanaticism, which really was of a despicable kind, caused Pope Clement IV. to issue a Bull against them, in the year 1350; and several Princes expressly prohibited that Sect, in the places under their dominion.