Continent. Tract. 9. lib. 1. cap. 16. Avicenna, and most of our new writers. Th. Erastus makes two kindes; one perpetual, which is Head melancholy; the other interrupt, which comes and goes by fits, which he subdivides into the other two kindes, so that all comes to the same pass. Some again make four or five kindes with Rodericus à Castro de morbis mulier. lib. 2. cap. 3. and Lod. Mercatus, who in his second book de mulier. affect. cap. 4. will have that melancholy of Nuns, Widowes, and more ancient maids, to be a peculiar species of Melancholy differing from the rest: some will reduce Enthusiasts, extaticall and dæmoniacall persons to this rank, adding Love melancholy to the first, and Lycanthropia. The most received division is into three kindes. The first proceeds from the sole fault of the Brain, and is called Head melancholy: the second sympathetically proceeds from the whole body, when the whole temperature is Melancholy: The third ariseth from the Bowels, Liver, Spleen, or Membrane, called Mesenterium named Hypocondriacal, or windy Melancholy, which Laurentius subdivides into three parts, from those three Members, Hepatick, Splenatick, Meseriack. Love melancholy, which Avicenna calls Ilishi: and Lycanthropia, which he cals Cucubuthe, are commonly included in head Melancholy: but of this last, which Gerardus de Solo cals Amoreos, and most Knight melancholy, with that of Religious melancholy, Virginum, & Viduarum, maintained by Rod. a Castro and Mercatus, and the other kinds of Love melancholy, I will speak apart by themselves in my third Partition. The three precedent species are the subject of my present discourse, which I will anatomize, and treat of, through all their causes, symtomes, cutes, together, and apart; that every man that is in any measure affected with this malady, may know how to examine it in himself, and apply remedies unto it.

It is a hard matter, I confess, to distinguish these three specics one from the other, to express their several causes, symptoms, cures, being that they are so often confounded amongst themselves, having such affinity, that they can scarce be discerned by the most accurate Physicians; and so often intermixt with other diseases, that the best experienced have been plunged. Montanus consil. 26. names a patient that had this disease of Melancholy and Caninus Appetitus both together: And consil. 23. with Vertigo. Julius Cæsar Claudinus with Stone, Gout, Jandice. Trincavellius with an Ague, Jandice, Caninus Appetitus, &c. Paulus Regoline, a great Doctor in his time, consulted in this case, was so confounded with a confusion of symptomes, that he knew not to what kinde i Cap. 13. Hildisheim. spicel. 2. fol. 166.

Laurentius cap. 4. de mel. consil. 12.

1430. & 116. consult.

of

n

of Melancholy to refer it. Trincavellius, Fallopius, and Francanzanus, famous doctors in Italy, all three conferred with about one party, at the same time, gave three different opinions. And in another place, Trincavellius being demanded what he thought of a melancholy young man, to whom he was sent for, ingenuously confessed, that he was indeed melancholy, but he knew not to what kinde to reduce it. In his 17. con

sultation, there is the like disagreement about a melancholy Monke. Those symptomes, which others ascribe to misaffected parts and humors, Herc. de Saxonia attributes wholly to distempered spirits, and those immaterial, as I have said. Sometimes they cannot well discerne this Discase from others. In Reinerus Solinander's counsels, Sect. consil. 5. he and Dr. Brande both agreed, that the patient's disease was hypocondriacal melancholy. Dr. Matholdus said it was Astma, and nothing else. Solinander and Guarionius, lately sent for to the melancholy Duke of Cleve, with others, could not define what species it was, or agree amongst themselves. The species are so confounded, as in Cæsar Claudinus his 44. consultation for a Polonian Count, in his judgment "he laboured of head melancholy, and that which proceeds from the whole temperature both at once. I could give instance of some that have had all three kindes semel & simul, and some successively. So that I conclude of our melancholy species, as many Politicians do of their pure formes of Commonwealths, Monarchies, Aristocracies, Democracies, are most famous in contemplation, but in practice they are temperate and usually mixt, (so Polybius enformeth us) as the Lacedæmonian, the Roman of old, German now, and many others. What Physicians say of distinct species in their books, it much matters not, since that in their patients' bodies they are commonly mixt. In such obscurity therefore, variety and confused mixture of symptomes, causes, how difficult a thing is it to treat of several kindes apart; to make any certainty or distinction among so many casualties, distractions, when seldome two men shall be like affected per omnia? 'Tis hard, I confess, yet nevertheless I wil adventure through the midst of these perplexities, and, led by the clue or thread of the best writers, extricate my self out of a labyrinth of doubts and errors, and so proceed to the causes.

Trincavellius tom. 2. consil. 15. & 16.

*

*Cap. 13 tract. posth. de melan. • Guarion. cons. med. 2. P Laboravit per essentiam & à toto corpore. *Machiavel, &c. Smithus de rep. Angl. cap. 8. lib. 1. Buscoldus discur. polit. discurs. 5. cap. 7. Arist. 1. 3. polit. cap. ult. Keckerm. alii, &c. + Lib. 6.

SECT.

IT

SECT. II.

MEMB. I. SUBSEC. I.

Causes of Melancholy. God a cause.

T is in vain to speak of cures, or think of remedies, untill such time as we have considered of the causes," so 9 Galen prescribes Glauco: and the common experience of others confirms, that those cures must be unperfect, lame, and to no purpose, wherein the causes have not first been searched, as Prosper Calenius well observes in his tract de atrá bile to Cardinal Cæsius. Insomuch that "Fernelius puts a kinde of necessity in the knowledg of the causes, and without which it is impossible to cure or prevent any manner of disease." Empericks may ease, and sometimes help, but not throughly root out: sublatá causá tollitur effectus, as the saying is, if the cause be removed, the effect is likewise vanquished. It is a most difficult thing (I confess) to be able to discern these causes whence they are, and in such variety to say what the beginning was. He is happy that can performe it aright. I will adventure to guess as neer as I can, and rip them all up, from the first to the last, generall and particular, to every species, that so they may the better be descried.

Generall causes, are either supernaturall, or naturall. "Supernatural are from God and his angels, or by God's permission from the devil" and his ministers. That God himself is a cause for the punishment of sin, and satisfaction of his Justice, many examples and testimonies of holy Scriptures make evident unto us, Ps. 107. 17. "Foolish men are plagued for their offence, and by reason of their wickedness." Gehazi was strucken with leprosie, 2. Reg. 5. 27. Jehoram with dysentery and flux, and great diseases of the bowels, 2 Chron. 21. 15. David plagued for numbring his people, 1 Par. 21. Sodom and Gomorrah swallowed up. And this disease is peculiarly specified, Psalme 127. 12. "He brought down their heart through heaviness." Deut. 28. 28. " He stroke them with madness, blindness, and astonishment of heart." *“An evil spirit was

9 Primo artis curative.

esset.

66

Nostri primu sit propositi affectionum causas indagare; res ipsa hortari videtur, nam alioqui earum curatio, manca et inutilis Path. lib. 1. cap. 11. Rerum cognoscere causas, medicis imprimis necessarium, sine qua nec morbum curare, nec præcavere licet. Tanta enim morbi varietas ac differentia ut non facile dignoscatur, unde initium morbus sumpserit. Melanelius è Galeno. Foclix qui potuit rerum cognoscere

Causas.

* 1. Sam. 16. 14.

sent

Nebuchadnezzar

a

sent by the Lord upon Saul, to vex him." did eat grass like an oxe, and his "heart was made like the beasts of the field." Heathen stories are full of such punishments. Lycurgus, because he cut down the Vines in the country, was by Bacchus driven into madness: so was Pentheus and his mother Agave for neglecting their sacrifice. Censor Fulvius ran mad for untiling Juno's Temple, to cover a new one of his own, which he had dedicated to Fortune," and was confounded to death, with grief and sorrow of heart." When Xerxes would have spoiled* Apollo's Temple at Delphos of those infinite riches it possessed, a terrible thunder came from Heaven and struck 4000 men dead, the rest ran mad. A little after, the like happened to Brennus, lightning, thunder, Earthquakes, upon such a sacrilegious occasion. If we may believe our Pontificiall Writers, they will relate unto us many strange and prodigious punishments in this kinde, inflicted by their Saints. How + Clodoveus sometime King of France, the son of Dogebert, lost his wits for uncovering the body of S. Denis and how a sacrilegious Frenchman, that would have stolne a silver image of S. John, at Birgburge, became frantick on a suddain, raging, and tyrannizing over his own flesh : Of a Lord of Rhadnor, that coming from hunting late at night, put his dogs into S. Avan's Church, (Llan Avan they called it) and rising betimes next morning, as hunters use to do, found all his Dogs mad, himself being suddenly strucken blinde. Of Tyridates an Armenian King, for violating some holy Nuns, that was punished in like sort, with loss of his wits. But Poets and Papists may go together for fabulous tales; let them free their own credits: Howsoever they faine of their Nemesis, and of their Saints, or by the devil's means may be deluded; we finde it true, that ultor á tergo Deus, " He is God the avenger," as David stiles him; and that it is our crying sins that pull this and many other maladies on our own heads. That he can by his Angels, which are his Ministers, strike and heal (saith Dionysius) whom he will; that he can plague us by his Creatures, Sun, Moone, and Stars, which he useth as his in

C

f

▾ Dan. 5. 21. 2 Lactant. instit. lib. 2. cap. 8. summo animi morore consumptus.

• Mente captus, & * Munster. cosmog. lib. 4. cap. 43. de cœlo substernebantur, tanqua insani de saxis præcipitati, &c. b Livius lib 38. Gaguin. 1. 3. c. 4. quod Dionysii corpus discooperuerat, in insana incidit. Idem lib. 9. sub. Carol. 6. sacroru contemptor, templi foribus cffractis, dum D. Johannis argenteum simulachrum rapere contendit, simulachru aversa facie dorsum ei versat, nec mora sacrilegus mentis inops, atq; in semetinsaniens in proprios artus desævit. d Giraldus Cambrensis lib. 1. c. 1. Itinerar. Cambriæ. Delrio tom. 3. lib. 6. sect. 3. quæst. 3.

8. cap. de Hierar.

Psal. 44. 1. Lib.

struments,

struments, as a Husbandman (saith Zanchius) doth an Hatchet: Hail, Snow, Windes, &c.

"Et conjurati veniunt in classica venti:""

k

1

as in Joshua's time, as in Pharaoh's reign in Egypt; they are but as so many executioners of his justice. He can make the proudest spirits stoop, and cry out with Julian the Apostate, Vicisti Galilæe: or with Apollo's Priest in Chrysostome, O cælum! 6 terra! unde hostis hic? What an enemy is this? And pray with David, acknowledging his power, "I am weakned and sore broken, I roar for the grief of mine heart, mine heart panteth, &c." Psal. 38. 8. O Lord rebuke me not in thine anger, neither chastise me in thy wrath," Ps. 38. 1. "Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the bones which thou hast broken, may rejoice," Psal. 51. 8. & verse 12. "Restore to me the joy of thy salvation, and stablish me with thy free spirit." For these causes belike Hippocrates would have a Physician take special notice whether the disease come not from a divine supernatural cause, or whether it follow the course of Nature. But this is farther discussed by Fran: Valesius de sacr. philos: cap. 8. Fernclius, and J. Cæsar Claudinus, to whom I refer you, how this place of Hippocrates is to be understood. Paracelsus is of opinion, that such spiritual discases (for so he cals them) are spiritually to be cured, and not otherwise. Ordinary means in such cases will not avail : Non est reluctandum cum Deo. When that monster-taming Hercules overcame all in the Olympicks, Jupiter at last in an unknown shape wrestled with him; the victory was uncertain, till at length Jupiter descryed himself, and Hercules yielded. No striving with supreme powers.

m

"Nil juvat immensos Cratero promittere montes," Physicians and Physick can do no good, "we must submit our selves under the mighty hand of God, acknowledg our offences, call to him for mercy. If he strike us una eademque manus vulnus opemque feret, as it is with them that are wounded with the spear of Achilles, he alone must help; otherwise our diseases are incurable, and we not to be relieved.