Despaires, Æquivocations, Definitions, parties and parts affected.

There be many kinds of desperation; whereof some be holy, some unholy, as one distinguisheth; that unholy he defines out of Tully, to be Ægritudinem animi sine ulla rerum expectatione meliore, a sickness of the soul without any hope or expectation of amendment: which commonly succeeds fear; for whilst evil is expected, we fear; but when it is certain, we despair.

According to Thomas 2.2æ. distinct. 40. art.4. it is Recessus à re desiderata, propter impossibilitatem existimatam, a restraint from the thing desired, for some impossibility supposed.

Because they cannot obtain what they would, they become desperate, and many times either yeeld to the passion by death it self, or else attempt impossibilities, not to be performed by men. In some cases, this desperate humor is not much to be discommended, as in Wars it is a cause many times of extraordinary valour; as Joseph. lib.1. de bello Jud. cap.14. L. Danæus in Aphoris. polit. pag.226. and many Politicians hold. It makes them improve their worth beyond it self, and of a forlorn impotent Company become Conquerors in a moment.

Una salus victis nullam sperare salutem.

In such courses when they see no remedy, but that they must either kill or be killed, they take courage, and often times præter spem, beyond all hope vindicate themselves. Fifteen thousand Locrenses fought against a hundred thousand Crotonienses, and seeing now no way but one, they must all die, thought they would not depart unrevenged, and thereupon desperately giving an assault, conquered their Enemies. Nec alia causa victoriæ (saith Justine mine Author) quam quod desperaverant.

William the Conqueror, when he first landed in England, sent back his ships, that his Souldiers might have no hope of retyring back. Bodine excuseth his Countrymens overthrow at that famous Battel at Agencourt, in Henry the Fifth his time, (cui simile, saith Frossard, tota historia producere non possit, which no History can parallel almost, wherein one handful of Englishmen overthrew a Royal Army of Frenchmen) with this refuge of despair, pauci desperati, a few desperate fellows being compassed in by their Enemies, past all hope of life, fought like so many Divels;

and gives a caution, that no Soldiers hereafter set upon desperate persons, which after Frontinus and Vegetius, Guicciardine likewise admonisheth, Hypomnes. part.2. pag.25. not to stop an enemy that is going his way.

Many such kinds there are of desperation, when men are past hope of obtaining any suit, or in despair of better fortune; Desperatio facit Monachum, as the saying is; and desperation causeth death it self; how many thousands in such distress have made away themselves, and many others? For he that cares not for his own, is master of another mans life.

A Tuscan South-sayer, as Paterculus tels the story, perceiving himself and Fulvius Flaccus his dear friend, now both carryed to prison by Opimius, and in despair of pardon, seeing the young man weep, quin tu potius hoc inquit facis, do as I do; and with that knockt out his brains against the door cheek, as he was entring into Prison, protinusque illiso capite in carceris januam effuso cerebro expiravit, and so desperately died.

But these are equivocal, unproper. When I speak of despair, saith Zanchie, I speak not of every kinde, but of that alone which concerns God. It is opposite to hope, and a most pernicious sin, wherewith the Divel seeks to entrap men.

Musculus makes four kinds of desperation, of God, our selves, our Neighbour, or any thing to be done; but this division of his may be reduced easily to the former: all kinds are opposite to hope, that sweet Moderator of passions, as Simonides cals it; I do not mean that vain hope which phantastical Fellows fain to themselves, which according to Aristotle is insomnium vigilantium, a waking dream;

but this Divine hope which proceeds from confidence, and is an Anchor to a floating soul; spes alit agricolas, even in our temporal affairs, hope revives us, but in spiritual it farther animateth; and were it not for hope, we of all others were the most miserable, as Paul saith, in this life; were it not for hope, the heart would break, for though they be punished in the sight of men, (Wisdom 3.4.) yet is their hope full of immortality:

yet doth it not so rear, as despair doth deject; this violent and sour passion of Despair, is of all perturbations most grievous, as Patritius holds. Some divide it into final and temporal; final is incurable, which befalleth Reprobates; temporal is a rejection of hope and comfort for a time, which may befal the best of Gods children, and it commonly proceeds from weakness of Faith, as in David when he was oppressed he cryed out, O Lord, thou hast forsaken me, but this for a time.

This ebbs and flows with hope and fear; it is a grievous sin howsoever: although some kind of Despair be not amiss, when, saith Zanchius, we despair of our own means, and rely wholy upon God: but that species is not here meant.

This pernicious kind of desperation is the subject of our Discourse, homicida animæ, the Murderer of the soul, as Austin terms it, a fearful passion, wherein the party oppressed thinks he can get no ease but by death, and is fully resolved to offer violence unto himself, so sensible of his burthen, and impatient of his cross, that he hopes by death alone to be freed of his calamity (though it prove otherwise) and chuseth with Job 6.8,9. 17.5. Rather to be strangled and die, then to be in his bonds.

The part affected is the whole soul, and all the faculties of it; there is a privation of joy, hope, trust, confidence, of present and future good, and in their place succeed fear, sorrow, &c. as in the Symptomes shall be shewed: The heart is grieved, the conscience wounded, the minde eclypsed with black fumes arising from those perpetual terrours.