One is contained in the Life of St. Peter, the Hermit of the _Pont Euxin_, which was written by Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrus, who has been mentioned in a former Chapter, and lived about the year 400. This holy Hermit having found means to rescue a young Woman from the hands of a military Officer, who wanted to seduce her, was much perplexed afterwards how to prevent the effects of both the wrath and lust of that impure man; nor could he, in the issue, compass this any other way than by locking himself up, as Theodoret relates, and severely flagellating himself, in company with the Mother of the young Woman[71]. Palladius, Bishop of Hellenopolis, in his History of the Lives of several holy Solitaries, which he wrote in the year 420, and dedicated to Lausus, whence the Book was called _Lausiacum_, relates a fact which incontestably proves that flagellations voluntarily submitted to, by those persons who underwent them, were in use so early as the fourth Century. He says, in the Life of Abbot Arsisius, that on the mountain of Nitria, in Thebaid, there was a very large Church, in the vicinity of which stood three Palm-trees, on each of which hung a scourge: the one served to chastise such Monks as proved refractory against the Rule; the other to punish Thieves; and the third served to correct such _accidental comers_ as became guilty of some fault: the delinquents, according to what class they belonged, embraced one of the Palm-trees, and in this situation received a certain number of lashes with one of the above scourges. It is expressly said of St. Pardulph, a Benedictine Monk and Abbot, who lived during the time of Charles Martel, about the year 737, that he used in Lent-time to strip himself stark-naked, and order one of his disciples to lash him. The fact is related in the life of that Saint, formerly written by an Author who lived about the same time; and it was, two hundred years afterwards, put into more elegant language, by Yvus, Prior of Clugny, at the desire of the Monks of St. Martial, in the Town of Limoges: Hugh Menard, a Benedictine Father, and a very learned Man in all that relates to Ecclesiastical Antiquities, has inserted part of it in his Book, intitled, _Observations on the Benedictine Martyrology_. The following is the Passage in St. Pardulph’s Life, which is here alluded to. ‘St. Pardulph seldom went out of his cell; whenever sickness obliged him to bathe, he would previously make incisions in his own skin. During Lent, he used to strip himself intirely naked, and ordered one of his disciples to lash him with rods[72].’