The Anatomy of Melancholy

“Let drinking companions not rejoice,” therefore says Mattioli, “because I have praised wine so highly. If taken immoderately, instead of bringing gladness it ruins both body and soul, producing a dizzy head and a sorrowful heart.”

And the ancient poet put it well: “The vine causes mirth and grief.” Nothing is so good for some people and so bad for others, especially, as one author observes, those “who suffer from a hot cause”—those who are hot or inflamed. The same applies to spices: as I have shown, they can by themselves cause head melancholy. Such people must not use wine as an everyday drink or as part of their diet.

But to conclude with Laurentius, chapter 8, On Melancholy: wine is bad for mad people and for those troubled by heat in their internal organs or brains; but for melancholy that is cold, as most melancholy is, wine used soberly may be very good.

I may say the same of a decoction of China roots, sassafras, sarsaparilla and guaiacum. China root, says Manardus, gives the face a healthy colour, takes away melancholy and all disorders arising from cold; similarly, sarsaparilla powerfully stimulates sweating, and guaiacum dries. Claudinus, consultations 89 and 46, Montanus, and Capivaccius, consultation 188 in Scoltzius’ collection, make frequent and effective use of guaiacum and China root, provided the liver is not inflamed. They are good for people of a cold constitution, as most melancholic people are, but are by no means to be considered for those of a hot constitution.

The Turks have a drink called coffee—for they drink no wine—named after a berry as black as soot and just as bitter, like the black drink once used among the Spartans, and perhaps the same. They keep sipping it, and drink it as hot as they can bear. They spend much time in these coffee houses, which are somewhat like our alehouses or taverns, sitting there chatting and drinking to pass the time and enjoy themselves together, because experience shows them that this kind of drink, used in this way, helps digestion and brings cheerfulness. Some of them take opium for this purpose.

I have spoken of borage, balm, saffron and gold. Montaltus, chapter 23, recommends preserved scorzonera roots. Garcius ab Horto, History of Plants, book 2, chapter 25, mentions a herb called datura which, if eaten, takes away all sense of pain for the next twenty-four hours and inclines people to laughter and merriment; and another called bhang, similar in effect to opium, which puts them for a time into a kind of trance and makes them laugh gently. One of the Roman emperors had a seed that he regularly ate to cheer himself up.

Christophorus Ayrerus prefers bezoar stone and the confection of alkermes to other cordials, and amber in some cases. Alkermes strengthens the internal organs, and bezoar stone has a special power against all melancholic disorders: it refreshes the heart and strengthens the whole body. Amber stimulates urination, helps the body, dispels wind and so on.