The Anatomy of Melancholy: Philosophy Classic. Robert Burton

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СКАЧАТЬ mind, &c.

       [Subs. 4]

      A reason of these symptoms. Memb. 3.

      Why they are so fearful, sad, suspicious without a cause, why solitary, why melancholy men are witty, why they suppose they hear and see strange voices, visions, apparitions.

      Why they prophesy, and speak strange languages; whence comes their crudity, rumbling, convulsions, cold sweat, heaviness of heart, palpitation, cardiaca, fearful dreams, much waking, prodigious fantasies.

      C. Prognostics of melancholy. Sect. 4.

      Tending to good, as

       Morphew, scabs, itch, breaking out, &c.

       Black jaundice.

       If the hemorrhoids voluntarily open.

       If varices appear.

      Tending to evil, as

       Leanness, dryness, hollow-eyed, &c.

       Inveterate melancholy is incurable.

       If cold, it degenerates often into epilepsy, apoplexy, dotage, or

       into blindness.

       If hot, into madness, despair, and violent death.

      Corollaries and questions.

       The grievousness of this above all other diseases.

       The diseases of the mind are more grievous than those of the body.

       Whether it be lawful, in this case of melancholy, for a man to offer

       violence to himself. Neg. How a melancholy or mad man offering violence to himself, is to be censured.

THE FIRST PARTITION.

       Table of Contents

      THE FIRST SECTION, MEMBER, SUBSECTION. Man's Excellency, Fall, Miseries, Infirmities; The causes of them.

      Man's Excellency.] Man the most excellent and noble creature of the world, "the principal and mighty work of God, wonder of Nature," as Zoroaster calls him; audacis naturae miraculum, "the [820]marvel of marvels," as Plato; "the [821]abridgment and epitome of the world," as Pliny; microcosmus, a little world, a model of the world, [822]sovereign lord of the earth, viceroy of the world, sole commander and governor of all the creatures in it; to whose empire they are subject in particular, and yield obedience; far surpassing all the rest, not in body only, but in soul; [823]imaginis imago, [824]created to God's own [825]image, to that immortal and incorporeal substance, with all the faculties and powers belonging unto it; was at first pure, divine, perfect, happy, [826] "created after God in true holiness and righteousness;" Deo congruens, free from all manner of infirmities, and put in Paradise, to know God, to praise and glorify him, to do his will, Ut diis consimiles parturiat deos (as an old poet saith) to propagate the church.

      Man's Fall and Misery.] But this most noble creature, Heu tristis, et lachrymosa commutatio ([827]one exclaims) O pitiful change! is fallen from that he was, and forfeited his estate, become miserabilis homuncio, a castaway, a caitiff, one of the most miserable creatures of the world, if he be considered in his own nature, an unregenerate man, and so much obscured by his fall that (some few relics excepted) he is inferior to a beast, [828]"Man in honour that understandeth not, is like unto beasts that perish," so David esteems him: a monster by stupend metamorphoses, [829]a fox, a dog, a hog, what not? Quantum mutatus ab illo? How much altered from that he was; before blessed and happy, now miserable and accursed; [830]"He must eat his meat in sorrow," subject to death and all manner of infirmities, all kind of calamities.

      A Description of Melancholy.] [831]"Great travail is created for all men, and an heavy yoke on the sons of Adam, from the day that they go out of their mother's womb, unto that day they return to the mother of all things. Namely, their thoughts, and fear of their hearts, and their imagination of things they wait for, and the day of death. From him that sitteth in the glorious throne, to him that sitteth beneath in the earth and ashes; from him that is clothed in blue silk and weareth a crown, to him that is clothed in simple linen. Wrath, envy, trouble, and unquietness, and fear of death, and rigour, and strife, and such things come to both man and beast, but sevenfold to the ungodly." All this befalls him in this life, and peradventure eternal misery in the life to come.

      Impulsive Cause of Man's Misery and Infirmities.] The impulsive cause of these miseries in man, this privation or destruction of God's image, the cause of death and diseases, of all temporal and eternal punishments, was the sin of our first parent Adam, [832]in eating of the forbidden fruit, by the devil's instigation and allurement. His disobedience, pride, ambition, intemperance, incredulity, curiosity; from whence proceeded original sin, and that general corruption of mankind, as from a fountain, flowed all bad inclinations and actual transgressions which cause our several calamities inflicted upon us for our sins. And this belike is that which our fabulous poets have shadowed unto us in the tale of [833] Pandora's box, which being opened through her curiosity, filled the world full of all manner of diseases. It is not curiosity alone, but those other crying sins of ours, which pull these several plagues and miseries upon our heads. For Ubi peccatum, ibi procella, as [834]Chrysostom well observes. [835]"Fools by reason of their transgression, and because of their iniquities, are afflicted." [836]"Fear cometh like sudden desolation, and destruction like a whirlwind, affliction and anguish," because they did not fear God. [837]"Are you shaken with wars?" as Cyprian well urgeth to Demetrius, "are you molested with dearth and famine? is your health crushed with raging diseases? is mankind generally tormented with epidemical maladies? 'tis all for your sins," Hag. i. 9, 10; Amos i.; Jer. vii. God is angry, punisheth and threateneth, because of their obstinacy and stubbornness, they will not turn unto him. [838]"If the earth be barren then for want of rain, if dry and squalid, it yield no fruit, if your fountains be dried up, your wine, corn, and oil blasted, if the air be corrupted, and men troubled with diseases, 'tis by reason of their sins:" which like the blood of Abel cry loud to heaven for vengeance, Lam. v. 15. "That we have sinned, therefore our hearts are heavy," Isa. lix. 11, 12. "We roar like bears, and mourn like doves, and want health, &c. for our sins and trespasses." But this we cannot endure to hear or to take notice of, Jer. ii. 30. "We are smitten in vain and receive no correction;" and cap. v. 3. "Thou hast stricken them, but they have not sorrowed; they have refused to receive correction; they have not returned. Pestilence he hath sent, but they have not turned to him," Amos iv. [839]Herod could not abide John Baptist, nor [840]Domitian endure Apollonius to tell the causes of the plague at Ephesus, his injustice, incest, adultery, and the like.

      To punish therefore this blindness and obstinacy of ours as a concomitant cause and principal agent, is God's just judgment in bringing these calamities upon us, to chastise us, I say, for our sins, and to satisfy God's wrath. For the law requires obedience or punishment, as you may read at large, Deut. xxviii. 15. "If they will not obey the Lord, and keep his commandments and ordinances, then all these curses shall come upon them." [841]"Cursed in the town and in the field," &c. [842]"Cursed in the fruit of the body," &c. [843]"The Lord shall send thee trouble and shame, because of thy wickedness." And a little after, [844]"The Lord shall smite thee with the botch of Egypt, and with emerods, and scab, and itch, and thou canst not be healed; [845]with madness, blindness, and astonishing of heart." This Paul seconds, Rom. ii. 9. "Tribulation and anguish on the soul of every man that doeth evil." Or else these chastisements are inflicted upon us for our humiliation, to exercise and try our patience here in this life to bring us home, to make us to know God ourselves, to inform СКАЧАТЬ