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The word. Clown can mean a country labourer. In the selected passage the word identifies a person accustomed to hard bodily work.
In Burton. The description of Cape Verde claims that heat defeats even the hardiest men and stiffest clowns. The comparison depends on the labourer’s presumed toughness. Reading clowns as comic performers would remove the point of the example.
The places. Extreme heat is said to overcome even hardy labourers. (p. 82; DJR-036-36.)
In this edition. “stiffest clowns” → “toughest labourers” (DJR-036-36). Labourers supplies the occupational sense, while toughest preserves the force of stiffest.
Collogue
Source forms: collogue; colloguing; cogging; collogueing; colloging
The word. To collogue is to flatter, coax or ingratiate oneself through speech. Burton’s forms colloguing, collogueing and colloging belong to the same family; cogging in the paired phrase means lying or cheating.
In Burton. Writers collogue with powerful men to gain favour. The larger catalogue of folly joins colloguing to parasitical fawning, while the portrait of ambition gives it a place among bows, visits and other attempts to obtain office. The warning to scholars then rejects extravagant praise as a shameful means of approaching patrons. The repeated word exposes speech used for advantage.
The places. Scribblers flatter powerful patrons. (p. 7; DJR-004-08.) Wheedling forms part of the catalogue of folly. (p. 74; DJR-018-35.) Ambition employs lying and coaxing. (p. 112 [122]–113; DJR-043-22.) Scholars are warned against parasitical praise. (p. 140; DJR-049-04.)
In this edition. “collogue” → “ingratiate themselves” (DJR-004-08); “colloguing” → “wheedling” (DJR-018-35); “cogging and collogueing” → “lying and wheedling” (DJR-043-22); “colloging” → “coaxing” (DJR-049-04). The varying equivalents retain the shared element of interested flattery and distinguish the lying named by cogging.
See also. Parasite.
Comfortable
Source forms: comfortable speeches
The word. Comfortable can mean giving comfort or consolation. Comfortable speeches are words intended to relieve mental distress.
In Burton. Introducing the consolatory section, Burton links these speeches with good counsel and persuasion. He proposes to gather examples from orators, philosophers, theologians and church fathers. The adjective describes what the words do for a troubled hearer, not how physically pleasant they are.
The places. Consoling words introduce the collection of remedies for discontent. (p. 307; DJR-086-38.)
In this edition. “comfortable speeches” → “consoling words” (DJR-086-38). Consoling makes the active sense explicit and fits the passage’s emphasis on advice and persuasion.
Commodity
Source forms: commodity; commodious; commoditie
The word. Commodity can mean benefit or advantage. Commodious can describe something materially advantageous or profitable.
In Burton. In justifying his subject, Burton pairs commodity with common good: knowledge of melancholy is meant to benefit everyone. In the satire on learning, commodious professions attract students because they offer financial rewards. In the description of a form of melancholy, commoditie names the relative advantage of intermittent rather than continuous symptoms. The beneficiaries and kinds of benefit differ.
The places. Knowledge of the disease promises a common benefit. (p. 16–17; DJR-006-24.) Students choose profitable professions. (p. 133–134; DJR-047-33.) Intervals between symptoms count as a relative advantage. (p. 201; DJR-062-21.)
In this edition. “commodity” → “benefit” (DJR-006-24); “commodious” → “lucrative” (DJR-047-33); “commoditie” → “advantage” (DJR-062-21). Benefit, lucrative and advantage specify the local sense. None requires the modern meaning of an article of commerce.
Common sense
The word. Common sense is an internal faculty that receives and combines what the separate senses perceive. In this technical usage it does not mean ordinary practical judgment.
In Burton. Burton’s account of the brain assigns common sense to the ventricles associated with animal spirits, sensation and movement. His fuller definition calls it the judge or governor of the other senses: it compares sounds, colours and other sensory forms. The phrase names a particular power within a system of faculties, with a proposed bodily seat.
The places. The ventricles are identified as the seat of common sense. (p. 19; DJR-024-18.) Common sense judges the evidence brought by the separate senses. (p. 23; DJR-025-17.)
In this edition. “seat of the common sense” → “seat of the common sense” (DJR-024-18); “Judge or Moderator” → “judge or governor” (DJR-025-17). The phrase remains unchanged because it is the name of a faculty; the lexicon supplies the distinction from its familiar everyday sense.
Commonwealth
Source forms: body politick; common-wealth
The word. Commonwealth names a political community, including a monarchy. Body politic presents that community as an organized body whose parts can suffer disorder.
In Burton. Burton explicitly extends the language of disease to kingdoms, provinces and political bodies. The analogy compares bodily humours with the disorders of a commonwealth. His subsequent list of public grievances includes oppression, broken privileges and unfit magistrates. These examples make government and social organization part of the book’s enlarged anatomy of illness.
The places. Kingdoms and other political communities are compared with diseased bodies. (p. 46; DJR-013-01.) Public grievances harm the political body. (p. 47; DJR-013-10.)
In this edition. “common-wealth” → “commonwealth” (DJR-013-01); “body politick” → “political body” (DJR-013-10). Commonwealth is retained without narrowing it to a republican constitution. Political body preserves the governing bodily analogy.
See also. Policy; Estate; Calling; Custom and education; Manure.
Complement
Source forms: complement; vulgar complement
The word. Complement can name a courtesy or social observance; it can also mean completion or fulfilment. The spelling alone does not decide between these senses.
In Burton. In the symptom catalogue, an omitted small complement can be felt as contempt, while another passage describes reluctance to perform vulgar complement, ordinary courtesies. In the discussion of charity, works of mercy are the complement of love: they bring love into fulfilment through action. The later theological use must remain distinct from the social formality.
The places. An omitted courtesy is interpreted as neglect. (p. 185; DJR-059-15.) Ordinary courtesies are avoided. (p. 185–186; DJR-059-24.) Works of mercy complete the exercise of love. (p. 637; DJR-152-12.)
In this edition. “small complement” → “small courtesy” (DJR-059-15); “vulgar complement” → “ordinary courtesies” (DJR-059-24); “complement of Love” → “completion of love” (DJR-152-12). Courtesy and completion keep the two senses separate; vulgar here means ordinary.
See also. Conversation; Charity.
Complexion and temperament
Source forms: temperature; temperament; complexion; distemperature; Crasis; temperatures; temper
The word. Complexion, temperament, temperature and crasis can name bodily constitution or a mixture and balance of qualities. Distemperature denotes a disordered state. Temper can also describe the inherent constitution of something other than a human body.