The Anatomy of Melancholy

O blessed health! You are above all gold and treasure, Ecclesiasticus 30:15: the poor man’s riches, the rich man’s bliss; without you there can be no happiness. Or we may be afflicted with some loathsome disease, offensive to others or troublesome to ourselves: bad breath, misshapen limbs, bodily crookedness, the loss of an eye, leg or hand, pallor, thinness, redness, baldness, the loss or lack of hair, and so on.

“When it begins to fall out, it deals dreadful blows to the heart,” says Synesius, himself not a little troubled “by the loss of his hair.” Hair loss alone strikes a cruel blow to the heart. Acco, an old woman, happened to see her face in a truthful mirror—for, apparently, she used false, flattering mirrors at other times, as most gentlewomen do—and “through anguish of mind fell into madness” (Caelius Rhodiginus, book 17, chapter 2): she went mad.

Brotheus, the son of Vulcan, threw himself into the fire because his imperfections made him an object of ridicule. Lais of Corinth, now grown old, gave her mirror to Venus because she could not bear to look into it: “As I am, I will not see myself; as I was, I cannot.” Generally, to these beautiful, fastidious creatures, old age and dirty linen are the two most hateful things, a torment of torments; they cannot endure even the thought of them.

O god, whoever you are Who hear these words, would that I might wander Naked among lions! Before hideous wasting possesses My lovely cheeks, and the life’s sap drains From this tender prey, I seek, still beautiful, To feed the tigers.

To be foul, ugly and deformed—far better to be buried alive. Some are beautiful but barren, and that torments them. Hannah wept bitterly, did not eat, and was troubled in spirit, all because she was barren, 1 Samuel 1. And in Genesis 30, Rachel said in the anguish of her soul, “Give me a child, or I shall die.” Another has too many. One has never married, and that is his hell; another is married, and that is his plague.

Some are troubled because they are obscure; others because they are maligned, slandered, abused, disgraced, vilified or injured in any way: “I am not at all surprised at those,” as he said, “who begin to go mad through being wronged.” I do not wonder at all if injuries make men mad. Aristotle lists seventeen particular causes of anger and offence, which for brevity’s sake I must omit.

No news troubles one person; ill reports, rumours, bad news, hard fortune, failure, losing a lawsuit, vain hopes or hope deferred trouble another. Then there is waiting: “So burdensome is waiting, always and in every matter,” as Polybius observes. One is far too prominent, another too low-born, and that alone tortures him as much as the rest. One has no activity, company or employment; another is overwhelmed and tormented by worldly cares and burdensome business. But what tongue could suffice to tell them all?