The Anatomy of Melancholy

“Speech is a remedy for the wounded mind”: gentle words are the true cure of a wounded soul, as Plutarch argues from Aeschylus and Euripides. Wisely administered, they ease grief and pain, just as different remedies relieve other diseases. They are “like an incantation,” a charm, “refreshment for an agitated mind”—Homer’s true nepenthe. As Macrobius in book 7 of the Saturnalia, Goropius in book 9 of the Hermathena, Gregory Nazianzen, and others interpret it, this was no Indian plant or imaginary medicine sent by Epidamna, Thonis’ wife, to Helen as a gift, but speech suited to the occasion.

For Helen’s bowl, Medea’s ointment, Venus’s girdle, and Circe’s cup cannot enchant, move, or transform so powerfully. A letter sent or read can do as much: “I find great relief when I read your letters”—I am much eased, as Cicero wrote to Pomponius Atticus, when I read your letters.

And as Julian the Apostate once told Maximus the philosopher: just as Alexander slept with Homer’s works, so I sleep with your letters, “as with healing medicines, and read them continually as though they were fresh and new. Write, then, and keep on writing”—or else come yourself: “you will come as a friend to a friend.”

Surely a wise and eloquent person can accomplish whatever he wishes in such a case. A good orator alone, as Cicero maintains, can change emotions through the power of eloquence: comfort the afflicted, raise up the downcast, banish and moderate fear, desire, anger, and so forth. And how powerful is the charm of a prudent, dear friend! “He rules their minds with words and calms their anger.” What can he not accomplish?

As Chremes told Menedemus: “Do not fear or hide it, my friend; tell me what troubles you, and I will surely help through comfort, counsel, or practical action.” Arnoldus, in book 1, chapter 18 of the Breviary, speaks of a moneylender in his time who had become deeply melancholy and discontented after a loss, and was cured in this way.

Just as imagination, fear, and grief cause such passions, so thoughts alone, set right by good hope, counsel, and the like, can in turn bring relief. It is incredible how much they can accomplish in such a case, as Trincavelli illustrates through one of his patients.

The philosopher Porphyry relates, in his Life of Plotinus, that, distressed by unbearable mental anguish, he was about to take his own life. But he happened to meet his teacher Plotinus, who saw from his distracted expression that something was wrong and urged him to disclose his grief. After hearing it, Plotinus spoke with such comfort that he rescued him “from the jaws of the underworld” and calmed his troubled mind. He was readily reconciled to himself and afterwards felt deeply ashamed that he had ever entertained so base an impulse.