The Anatomy of Melancholy

Subsection 4 Cheerfulness, merry company, and pleasing sights as remedies

Cheerfulness and lively company cannot be separated from music: both are relevant and necessary to this undertaking. Cheerfulness, says Vives, cleanses the blood, strengthens health, gives a fresh, pleasing, clear complexion, prolongs life, sharpens the mind, and keeps the body young, vigorous, and fit for any kind of work.

The merrier the heart, the longer the life. “A merry heart is the life of the flesh,” Proverbs 14:30. “Gladness prolongs his days,” Ecclesiasticus 30:22. This is one of the three Salernitan doctors: Doctor Merryman, Doctor Diet, and Doctor Quiet, who cure every disease—“a cheerful mind, rest, and a moderate diet.”

Gomesius, in the preface to book 3 of On Genial Salt, greatly praises wholesome merriment, through which, he says, we cure many disturbances of the mind in ourselves and our friends. Galateus gives this as a reason why we love cheerful companions. They well deserve that love: as Magninus maintains, a cheerful companion is better than any music. As the saying goes, “a pleasant companion on the road serves as a carriage”—a wagon for the traveller weary on the way.

“Pleasant conversation, wit, jokes”—agreeable talk, jests, clever sayings, merry stories, “honeyed little balls of words,” as Petronius, Pliny, Spondanus, Caelius, and many good authors argue—are Homer’s one true nepenthe, Helen’s bowl, and Venus’s girdle, so renowned in antiquity for dispelling grief and care and bringing mirth and gladness to the heart, if properly understood or applied at the right moment. In a word,

Love, pleasure, Venus, joy, Jesting, play, sweet conversation, kissing,

are the true nepenthe. For these reasons our physicians generally prescribe this as a principal siege engine for battering down melancholy’s walls, a chief antidote and a sufficient cure in itself. By every means, says Mesue, bring these people pleasure through things heard, seen, tasted, smelled, or otherwise perceived. Give them every attraction and encouraging promise, the sight of outstanding beauty, fine clothes and ornaments, and delightful experiences, to draw their minds away from fear and sorrow and the things that so absorb their attention.

Let them enjoy hunting, games, entertainments, jokes, and lively company, as Rhazes prescribes, to keep the mind from distress; a cup of good drink now and then; music; and companions whose company especially delights them. Let them have amusing stories or diversions, drinking, singing, dancing, and whatever else may bring cheerfulness. By no means, says Guaineri, allow them to be alone.