From the book
The Anatomy of Melancholy
Robert Burton · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The word“Religion” can name worship, a professed faith or community, the institutions administering it, pious conduct, or the religious standard by which conduct is judged.
- In the Anatomy of MelancholyBurton’s formal distinction uses both Cicero and Zanchi.
- In this edition“Religion is twofold, true or false” becomes “religion is of two kinds, true or false”; “vain superstition” becomes “empty superstition”.
- A place to readThe superstitious frontispiece figure, his hope and fear, and the substantive Latin caption.
Meaning
“Religion” can name worship, a professed faith or community, the institutions administering it, pious conduct, or the religious standard by which conduct is judged. Latin religio can mean reverence or scruple: religione is an ablative singular, religioni a dative singular, and religionibus a dative plural in the quoted contrast with rites. “Religiously” can mean piously or scrupulously, including fidelity to a promise. “Religious persons” can mean members of orders; “religious houses” are their foundations, while “religious uses” are purposes of worship or devotion. The same adjective can describe genuine piety or a show of it. These local meanings do not by themselves certify Burton’s approval.
“Superstition” chiefly condemns worship or belief judged false, misplaced or excessively scrupulous. Its adjective also reaches incantations and unfounded medical elaboration. Latin superstitio is the noun, superstitiosus an adjective, and superstitiose, printed “superstitiosè,” the adverb superstitiously. The frontispiece’s substantive “Superstitiosus” names the kneeling superstitious man. “the superstitious” can likewise name a person in English. “Irreligious” can condemn conduct that violates religious duty without alleging that the person has no beliefs. The oxymoron “irreligious Religion” calls a form of devotion contrary to true religion.
Use in the book
Burton’s formal distinction uses both Cicero and Zanchi. Religion is true or false; the false kind is “vain superstition,” with vain meaning empty or groundless. Cicero supplies Timorem deorum inanem, a groundless fear of the gods. Zanchi’s definition gives two alternatives: false gods are worshipped, or God is worshipped falsely. True religion, by contrast, worships the true God truly. Burton’s Seneca-attributed Latin says that religion worships God and superstition destroys him; it differs from the compared Senecan wording about the gods and violating them. These distinctions rest on Burton’s confessional commitments and do not neutrally classify all the communities he attacks.
True religion raises the dejected soul, gives courage and hope, and is represented as the mother of virtues, a light yoke, an anchor and a harbour. Superstition is religion’s “ape,” meaning imitator, as well as its bastard, shadow and false mirror. Burton alleges that the Devil contrives the imitation. The contrast returns as easy yoke against intolerable burden, harbour against stormy ocean, wisdom against folly, sincerity against counterfeit. His sweeping claim that superstition can never be remedied belongs to this rhetoric of its reach and eternal terrors; the book nevertheless goes on to discuss religious remedies. The “superstitious yoke” in a consolatory inscription is also a burden, but there it stands among the afflictions called life’s seasonings.
Religious affiliation is also a social bond. Burton invokes the shared religion of opponents in English civil war to sharpen his charge of madness. A maxim attributed to Montanus then makes religion produce both the strongest friendship and the greatest discord. Christian mutual aid is what believers are, or at least should be, united to practise; attachment to one’s sect and hatred of outsiders receive a different judgement. Burton’s Possevino-attributed maxim says religion makes humans from beasts and superstition beasts from humans. His ensuing English adds the claim that even wise people become fools through superstition. These are moral and rhetorical transformations, not biological changes or present-day diagnoses.
The criticism reaches Burton’s own community. The early satire contrasts many professed Christians with few imitators of Christ. His later survey attacks pagans, Jews, Muslims, Catholics and Christian sects, yet says Reformed Christians are not free from superstition: it enters “our prayers” and hearing of sermons. The reported proportions of Christians in the world change from a sixth or less to scarcely a fifth; these are arguments about the small extent of true religion, not reliable census figures. The Tacitus quotation is transferred from a hostile description of Jews to Burton’s account of northern Christianity. Its Latin religionibus concerns observances or rites; Burton’s English recasts that opposition as superstition versus religion.
Religion is a positive civic and ethical standard as well as a profession. Burton makes neglect of divine service a cause of national decline and repeats Echovius’s claim that Barcelona prospers because it is more religious than its neighbours. These are theological explanations, not established economic causation. His satire places an impious person over religion and shows an opportunist becoming “of all religions” for advantage. Corrupt patronage can bring religion itself into contempt, while the scholar’s learning and piety go unrewarded. The attack expressly allows many worthy patrons. Ancient pagan observance of rites can even be used to shame Christian patrons who fear neither God nor the Devil.
“Religion, as they hold, is policie” is an original English marginal attribution to cynical statesmen, not Burton’s unqualified definition. He reports religion being altered or used as a cloak to govern people, but allows many politicians to be sincerely religious and treats religion and justice as supports of a good state. His subsequent accusation concerns the majority he calls counterfeiters. The related priestly-profit argument also remains an accusation rather than proof of every priest’s motives. Similarly, in the cosmological digression Mersenne complains that others accuse theologians of defending superstition and gain; he does not endorse their charge.
Piety can be an inward rule of action. A few judicious people can curb unruly passions through religion, philosophy and divine precepts; Burton contrasts them with the majority led by sense. A promise may be “religiously kept” even to an enemy; appetite can nevertheless overcome known reason and religion. Religious virtue contributes to true nobility and can compensate for poverty or low birth in choosing a spouse. In consolation, poverty becomes the “mother of religion”; in the earlier account of its social pressures, avoiding poverty can drive people to “abjure Religion.” The opposing formulations serve different arguments. Religious trust in divine justice also supports patience, although Burton adds practical reasons for avoiding revenge. Erasmus’s quoted religiose observandas makes reverent observance of ancestral laws a duty, as though they came from God, while expressly excepting compulsion to impiety.
Uses and motives matter. Burton expressly denies that genuine love or worship of God can be excessive; the excess lies in misplaced zeal, needless observance and claims to perform more than duty requires. He praises moderate fasting, useful religious retirement and pious foundations, while condemning destructive seclusion and indiscriminate demolition of religious houses. The Ricci-attributed margin can give religion as one motive for a vegetable diet without repeating that motive in the English body. In the treatment of love, temperate abstinence is distinguished from fabulous or superstitious motives. Conversely, rejecting lawful enjoyment can be “not temperate” but sed superstitiosus, but superstitious.
Spiritual elevation has positive uses too. Burton allows a holy madness in good people and a beneficial “divine melancholy” in contemplation and ecstasy; abuse becomes a cause and symptom of religious melancholy. Canus’s musical boast promises to intensify a religious listener’s devotion: the Latin specifies divine inspiration and greater readiness to worship the gods, where Burton’s English says more devout. A true religious disposition makes natural and civic love greater in the account of Christian charity. In a different setting, erotic love itself is credited with sometimes making profane people religious; Cardano’s marginal religiosos names the resulting devout people.
Outward piety need not disclose its motive. Burton allows that relief may be “religiously done” while asking whether it remedies recurring poverty. His account of donations alleges that reputation, merit or promised release from punishment motivates most good works, yet explicitly allows many sincere benefactors. Religious temples and purposes can be profaned by the conduct he imputes to fashionable worshippers; moral adornment is set against cosmetics in his exhortation to religious matrons. The apparently religious wife can also be a hypocrite in the Ariosto example, but Burton’s marginal qualification excludes honest women from the charge. These are attributed literary and polemical portrayals, not evidence about all worshippers or women.
Religion and superstition do not receive uniformly opposite practical effects. Prayer beads are called an excellent way to keep older people from idleness, with the praise checked by his objection that their use is profane and superstitious. In the jealousy discussion, reputation, zeal, fear of God, religion and superstition all restrain virtuous men and women; Burton immediately adds that many remain unfaithful. Later, religion and inward fidelity are better guardians than locks, eunuchs or prisons. By contrast, superstition is an impediment to marriage, especially in the attack on compulsory celibate vows. Wicelius’s claim that no man can live and die religiously without a wife is reported as his universal assertion, not silently converted into an unqualified rule of the lexicon.
Superstition often works through imagination and fear. Penotus is credited with making false imagination a source of heresy and superstition. Omens trouble people through fear, imagination and the Devil’s alleged craft. The superstitious person can also enjoy anticipated future rewards, as in the catalogue comparing an idolater with lovers and gluttons. Hope and fear, with reward and punishment as their objects, become means by which alleged deceivers govern followers. “take up Religion a trust” compares unexamined belief with buying on credit. Burton’s prejudicial generalizations about sex, age and social rank are part of this explanatory apparatus, not neutral evidence of susceptibility. Yet he also insists on faith without sensory demonstration for Christian mysteries. His boundary is confessional; it is not a general demand that every belief be demonstrable.
The medical uses require precise attribution. At the passage Burton asserts familiar cures by charms and spells, then adopts the explanation through imagination, humours and spirits attributed to Pomponazzi. The adjacent Weyer passage differs between the body’s “incredulity,” disbelief, and the margin’s credulitate, ready belief. He asserts daily cures and at 067-45 says such cures may occur; at 067-46 he assumes efficacy to debate lawfulness. Delrio’s marginal maxim nevertheless prefers death to being cured superstitiously. The subsequent catalogue of saints’ cures alternates reports, charges of fraud and diabolical illusion, and a hypothetical concession before turning to Christ. These historical claims are preserved without recommending refusal of treatment or endorsing the alleged cures.
“Superstition” also labels over-elaborate pulse discrimination. The body names Crato; the margin identifies Dudith’s letter in Crato’s collection. Some call pulse doctrine wholly superstitious, and Burton attacks its practical intelligibility before distinguishing medicine’s use from abuse. He calls some astrological practitioners too superstitious, then questions his competence to decide. Critics likewise charge magnetic cures with tending to magical superstition; Burton’s middle position approves minerals, not every sympathetic cure. He rejects most magical devices for enforcing fidelity as pagan, impious and irreligious.
Reported cosmologies and objections are not all authorial conclusions. Burton describes religions changing with mortal spirits, then rejects the account; the later discussion rejects spirits’ universal government while retaining divine permission and bodily mediation. A marginal challenge asks where “this superstition” comes from in the voices questioning providence. Later sceptics infer possible falsity from religious diversity, and Burton replies through Christian apologists. He reports celestial cycles of religions, praises Mersenne’s opposition, and also reproduces Vanini’s own stated Christian rejection of the doctrines he recites, without settling that disclaimer’s sincerity. Lucretius’s relligione personifies oppressive religion; Burton’s separate English verse calls it superstition. The three-rings tale reports a character’s strategic answer through an intermediary, rather than simply stating Boccaccio’s creed.
The closing distinctions retain this complexity. Burton surveys general toleration, including opposition to death for religion or conscience, but chooses a middle course that still permits coercion. Deficiency in religion includes worldly complacency and excessive distrust of mercy: despairing people lack hope, rather than merely showing too little feeling. Devout inclination, bodily predisposition and tender conscience can combine to intensify fear from misread Scripture. Final despair is distinguished from temporary distress among the best believers, and the later consolation forbids a verdict of final rejection from present suffering. In a separate civic argument Burton can concede the expediency of tolerated brothels yet oppose them “altogether in Religion.” Here religion is explicitly the standard of judgement.
Related entries
Religious melancholy; Zeal; Enthusiasm; Epicure; Precise; Tables; Ecstasy; Fear; Conscience; Faith and assurance; Policy; Imagination; Physick; Ceremony; Despair; Charity; Love melancholy; Solitude; Custom
Places to read
- Unnumbered preliminariesThe superstitious frontispiece figure, his hope and fear, and the substantive Latin caption.
- · paragraph 15–DJR-5-27Authority’s reverence and the comic Lucianic story of magical words.
- · paragraph 14–DJR-6-27The clergyman’s vocation and pious foundations; differing body and marginal numbers of religious houses.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-7-16The legitimate work of clergy, conscientious religion and hostile labels applied to Christians.
- · paragraph 7–DJR-9-16Religious profession and conduct, confessional strife, and the violation of shared religious bonds in civil war.
- · paragraph 12–DJR-10-29Impious rulers over religion, money before piety, and the opportunist of all religions.
- · paragraph 29–DJR-12-35Approved holy madness and the warning against mistaking its spiritual sense.
- · paragraph 6–DJR-13-12Religion as a civic good; the reported religious explanation of Barcelona’s prosperity.
- · paragraph 24–DJR-15-36Claims to reform religion, an imagined universal reform and Burton’s withdrawal from that fantasy.
- · paragraph 35–DJR-16-41Charitable purpose described as religiously done, with questions about the effectiveness of relief.
- · paragraph 23–DJR-18-28The Horatian catalogue of superstition and other disturbances, and Burton’s altered sadness wording.
- · paragraph 30–DJR-26-50Scrupulous promise-keeping, conscience, and appetite prevailing against reason and religion.
- · paragraph 6–DJR-29-12Religions alleged to change with mortal spirits, followed by rejection of the account.
- · paragraph 47–DJR-29-50Fire divination and household spirit observances; alternative natural explanation of fairy rings.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-31-21Alleged spirit government of religion, its rejection, divine permission, bodily mediation and uncertainty about possession.
- · paragraph 21–DJR-32-32Religious professors invoked for divination, age-based stereotypes, imagined witchcraft and demonic deception.
- · paragraph 32–DJR-35-36Reported harm from excessive fasting, and the marginal religious or poverty motive for Chinese vegetable diets.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-38-19Enforced religious solitude and its dangers, followed by the defence of useful and pious retirement.
- · paragraph 10–DJR-39-16Imagination as an explanation of religious error and supposed cures; body incredulity versus marginal credulity.
- []Religion, reason and philosophy as restraints on passions.
- · paragraph 13–DJR-42-19Pliny’s allegedly human-only superstition within the rhetoric of mortal misery.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-48-5The clergy’s poverty, counterfeit religion and pagan observance used to condemn corrupt Christian patronage.
- and sequence [printed 128]Many good patrons expressly excepted; religion praised but unrewarded in the corrupt patronage system.
- Sequence [printed 141]Clerical corruption and hardship bring religion itself into contempt.
- · paragraph 17–DJR-52-23Poverty’s competing spiritual and worldly valuations; its alleged pressure towards renouncing religion.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-55-19Omens, fear, excessive curiosity and needless religious observances.
- · paragraph 14–DJR-58-20Pulse-reading superstition, the body’s Crato attribution and Dudith’s marginal reference.
- · paragraph 6–DJR-63-14Religious virtue does not prevent bodily vulnerability in the account of women’s melancholy.
- [ for ]Asserted daily cures, acknowledged possibility of efficacy, the lawfulness dispute and Delrio’s severe maxim.
- · paragraph 25–DJR-68-43Saints, ancient gods and reported cures; accusations of imposture and the contrasting appeal to Christ.
- · paragraph 5–DJR-69-11Paracelsian magic and chemical medicine; astrological over-scruple and Burton’s competence caveat.
- · paragraph 25–DJR-75-31Cosmological debate and Mersenne’s complaint about others’ charges against theologians.
- · paragraph 8–DJR-76-15Providence challenged as superstition in a reported voice; Burton’s rebuke of speculative presumption.
- · paragraph 21–DJR-77-27Travel’s benefits alongside the possible loss of morals and religion.
- · paragraph 17–DJR-82-22Prayer beads can occupy idle people, but their devotional use remains condemned.
- · paragraph 11–DJR-85-16Music intensifies devotion; Canus’s Latin specifies divine inspiration and worship of gods.
- · paragraph 24–DJR-86-32Moderate mirth contrasted with appetite as an entire mock religion.
- · paragraph 11–DJR-88-16The yoke of superstition among the afflictions called life’s seasonings.
- · paragraph 5–DJR-89-9Religious virtue as a component of true nobility beyond inherited rank.
- · paragraph 31–DJR-90-36Poverty personified as the mother of religion in consolation.
- · paragraph 47–DJR-96-50Religion and divine justice as grounds for patience, alongside practical reasons to avoid revenge.
- · paragraph 16–DJR-99-22Pulse doctrine called superstition by some; Burton’s criticism and his subsequent defence of medicine’s use.
- · paragraph 39–DJR-100-44Magical superstition charged against magnetic cures; the middle position concerns minerals.
- · paragraph 10–DJR-108-15Religion as part of Burton’s defence of his book on love.
- · paragraph 3–DJR-110-9The superstitious person’s idol and anticipated joys beside other pleasurable objects.
- · paragraph 16–DJR-111-23A true religious disposition elevates natural and civic love into charity.
- · paragraph 15–DJR-112-21Religious rewards as motives for giving, with many sincere benefactors expressly allowed.
- · paragraph 39–DJR-116-44Religious persons as members of orders in the account of love melancholy.
- · paragraph 22–DJR-121-27Religious purposes of temples and the contrast between outward ornament and pious conduct.
- · paragraph 47–DJR-131-53Love’s reported power to make profane people religious, in English and in Cardano’s Latin.
- · paragraph 23–DJR-134-28Ascetic remedies and abstinence: temperate motive distinguished from fabulous or superstitious motive.
- · paragraph 34–DJR-136-40Religious obligation against adultery and the judgement of a proposed match.
- · paragraph 58–DJR-138-63Irreligious conduct and neglected marriage obligations, attributed to both sexes.
- · paragraph 13–DJR-140-19Superstition among marriage impediments; religion among qualities that can compensate for poverty or low birth.
- · paragraph 6–DJR-142-30Freedom from astrological necessity and the attack on celibate vows, orders and religious houses.
- · paragraph 9–DJR-143-16Wicelius’s universal marriage claim: English living and dying religiously versus Latin living piously and dying well.
- · paragraph 11–DJR-145-17Church customs and Scaliger’s hostile characterization of women as superstitious.
- · paragraph 46–DJR-146-52Counterfeit chastity and devotion; the original margin excludes honest women from the charge.
- · paragraph 32–DJR-148-38Religion and superstition both credited with restraint, followed by qualifications about continued infidelity.
- · paragraph 4–DJR-149-11Religion and inward fidelity as better guardians than locks or confinement.
- · paragraph 48–DJR-149-53Civic expediency versus religious judgement, and the rejection of most magical fidelity devices.
- · paragraph 30–DJR-152-36Divine love, no excessive genuine worship, both extremes, Cicero and Zanchi, consolation and counterfeit religion.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-153-14Confessional geography and its estimates, Tacitus’s transferred rites, and criticism within the Reformed church.
- · paragraph 15–DJR-154-18Alleged spiritual and human agents, political use of religion, sincere rulers and priestly profit.
- · paragraph 10–DJR-155-28Hope and fear, ignorance as cause and symptom, and religion accepted on credit.
- and [misnumbered; sequential ]Fasting, solitude, positive ecstasy and abuse; bodily and demonic explanations; the opposed effects of religion and superstition.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-157-34Religion’s concord and discord, sectarian attachment, the faith required for Christian mysteries, and irreligious religion.
- · paragraph 40–DJR-158-42Religion humanizes and superstition brutalizes in the Possevino-attributed maxim; Burton’s English adds wise men and fools.
- · paragraph 27–DJR-160-51Restricted religious impairment, persecution and the defence of lawful pleasure against superstition.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-161-27Arguments for toleration, its opponents, Burton’s coercive middle course and treatment of alleged prophetic disturbance.
- · paragraph 28–DJR-162-51Religious deficiency, sceptical arguments and replies, reported celestial cycles, Lucretius and the three-rings tale.
- · paragraph 1–DJR-163-43Practical hypocrisy, future judgement, differing remedies, and final versus temporary despair.
- · paragraph 16–DJR-164-33Religious disposition, bodily susceptibility, tender conscience and misread Scripture.
- Religious observance of law with an exception for compelled impiety, and refusal to infer final rejection.
- Unnumbered Table · paragraph 213The historical Table’s route to general toleration of religion.
- Unnumbered TableThe historical Table’s routes to superstition’s effects, symptoms and domination.
In this edition
“Religion is twofold, true or false” becomes “religion is of two kinds, true or false”; “vain superstition” becomes “empty superstition”. The false-god and false-worship alternatives remain distinct. “a divine melancholy” remains unchanged, and “Religious Melancholy in defect” becomes “Religious Melancholy from Deficiency”. These passages occur on. The modernization preserves the polemical distinctions; it does not make superstition a neutral synonym for every religious practice.
Other renderings clarify local senses: “superstitious words” becomes “magical words”; “religiously kept” becomes “scrupulously kept”; “religious persons” becomes “members of religious orders.” In “is all their religion,” the full modern clause retains the universal as “Their whole religion is sacrifice” before the same list of deities. The original English marginal assertion that religion is policy has no separate supplied-modern comparison claimed here. Translations and explanatory wrappers inside Burton-labelled notes remain editorial layers, distinct from their original quotations. Body and margin may disagree in wording, object, number or scope; neither is silently harmonized. The modern rendering is a reading aid, not independent primary authority, and historical witnesses have not been freshly collated for this article.
abjure religion
Printed “abjure Religion” (English; phrase).
Renounce one’s religious profession or allegiance under the pressure of avoiding poverty.
Context: Burton’s sweeping catalogue describes social pressure; he elsewhere praises poverty’s religious benefits from a different, consolatory standpoint.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: forsake God, abjure Religion
Modern rendering: forsake God, renounce religion
Word and construction: Abjure supplies renounce; religion is the object of the renunciation.
Supplied words note: No new agent is supplied; we is the explicit subject of the full catalogue.
divine melancholy
Printed “a divine melancholy” (English; phrase).
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording, Modern rendering: a divine melancholy
A beneficial spiritual elevation allowed in the qualified account of ecstasy.
Context: Burton praises contemplation in some cases, then condemns abuse.
Source: original body
Word and construction: The full phrase is unchanged; its approving force is established by the preceding conditional praise.
Supplied words note: No subject or object is added; divine is an approving description within the conditional account of spiritual contemplation.
false religion
Printed “Ubi falsi dii, aut falso cultu colitur Deus” (Latin; phrase).
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: Ubi falsi dii, aut falso cultu colitur Deus
Where false gods are worshipped, or God is worshipped falsely: two alternatives in the definition.
Context: Burton quotes a definition attributed to Zanchi and follows it with his own English restatement.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: where false gods are worshipped, or God is worshipped with false worship
Word and construction: The complete definition is aligned; falsi qualifies the gods in the first alternative, falso cultu the manner of worship in the second.
Supplied words note: Are worshipped is supplied in the first alternative from the following colitur; with false worship renders the ablative falso cultu. The two alternatives remain distinct.
general toleration of religion
Printed “no man for religion or conscience be put to death” (English; phrase).
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: no man for religion or conscience be put to death
Religious profession or conscience as grounds on which advocates of toleration reject capital punishment.
Context: Burton reports one side of a debate and names its defenders; he next calls their view an error and chooses a middle course that still includes coercion.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: no one put to death for religion or conscience
Word and construction: Religion names the disputed ground of punishment; the negation and death belong to the full policy claim.
Supplied words note: One modernizes man; the modal force comes from the governing they would have.
irreligious · so irreligious
Printed “so irreligious” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Failing in religious and moral duty, especially disregard for marriage obligations, without necessarily denying all belief in God.
Context: Burton’s hostile survey addresses both sexes and makes the particular warning conditional upon being or marrying such a person.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Modern rendering: men and women are so irreligious
Word and construction: Irreligious characterizes conduct; the subsequent catalogue supplies depravity and unobserved marriage rites.
Supplied words note: No new subject is added; the degree so remains explicit.
irreligious
Printed “irreligious” (English; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Contrary to religious duty, qualifying supposed magical devices for enforcing fidelity.
Context: Burton rejects most of the recipes as pagan and impious; the methods are historical allegations, not recommended practices or established cures.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: most part Pagan, impious, irreligious, absurd, and ridiculous devices
Modern rendering: mostly pagan, impious, irreligious, absurd and ridiculous devices
Word and construction: Irreligious is one evaluative adjective; most part qualifies the whole condemnation.
Supplied words note: Mostly preserves most part rather than changing it to all.
irreligious religion
Printed “irreligious Religion” (English; phrase).
Citation key, Modern rendering: irreligious religion
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: irreligious Religion
Worship condemned as contradicting genuine religion.
Context: Burton’s oxymoron introduces his catalogue of particular symptoms; it is his judgement, not a neutral community label.
Source: original body
Word and construction: The full oxymoron is preserved, naming a religion that Burton regards as religiously false.
Supplied words note: No referent is added. Irreligious negates conformity to the true religion Burton recognizes, not the presence of all religious observance.
magical superstition
Printed “Magicall superstition” (English; phrase).
Religiously suspect magic, used by critics as a charge against magnetic or sympathetic cures.
Context: Some condemn the cures; their defenders exalt them. Burton’s middle position approves minerals without thereby approving every magnetic procedure.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: as tending to Magicall superstition, witchery, charms
Modern rendering: as tending towards magical superstition, witchcraft, charms
Word and construction: Magical qualifies superstition; tending towards preserves the charge’s formulation.
Supplied words note: Witchcraft modernizes witchery; the unnamed some, rather than every physician, make the accusation.
mother of religion
Printed “mother of religion” (English; phrase).
A figurative source of piety: poverty is personified as religion’s mother in consolation.
Context: Burton gathers praises of poverty while acknowledging that the poor may view it as a curse; this differs in purpose from his earlier account of poverty provoking apostasy.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: the mother of religion, vertue, sobriety
Modern rendering: the mother of religion, virtue, and sobriety
Word and construction: Mother gives the generative metaphor; religion is one of the virtues it allegedly fosters.
Supplied words note: And links the coordinated list; the subject poverty appears in the complete sentence.
religio · religione
Printed “religione” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Religious reverence or scruple: religione is the ablative singular of religio, here the means by which established authority possesses minds and suppresses free judgement.
Context: Erasmus is the body’s authority; the original Latin occurs in the margin, without being a judgement on a specified religion.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: religione quadam animos occuparit
Modern rendering: has possessed people’s minds with a kind of reverence
Word and construction: Religione contributes with reverence; quadam adds a kind of, animos minds, and occuparit possessed.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: People’s makes the human possessors of animos explicit; with renders the instrumental ablative religione, while possessed comes from occuparit.
religio · religionibus
Printed “religionibus” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Religious observances or rites: religionibus is dative plural, governed by adversa, in the hostile Tacitean quotation; Burton’s English recasts the contrast as opposition to religion.
Context: Burton applies the hostile Tacitean phrase to the northern Christianity he describes after Damião de Góis; the supplied note distinguishes Tacitus’s original target, Jews of Judaea, and his religious rites from Burton’s true-religion contrast.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: Gens superstitioni obnoxia, religionibus adversa
Modern rendering: A people subject to superstition, opposed to religious rites
Word and construction: Religionibus contributes religious rites; superstitioni is the object of obnoxia, not another inflection of religio.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: A supplies an English article; religious rites explains the dative plural religionibus governed by adversa. The people are specified by the surrounding application.
religio · relligione
Printed “relligione” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Religion or religious fear, represented as a crushing power: relligione is the printed double-l spelling of the ablative singular of religio.
Context: Lucretius’s celebration of Epicurus is quoted within Burton’s attack on unbelief; Burton’s next English verse uses superstition.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: oppressa gravi cum relligione
Modern rendering: oppressed under heavy religion
Word and construction: Relligione contributes religion; gravi gives heavy and oppressa gives oppressed. The surrounding verse personifies the oppressive force.
Supplied words note: Under makes the ablative construction idiomatic; heavy renders gravi. The surrounding human life, not religion, is oppressed.
religio · religioni
Printed “religioni” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Religion as a field of authority or administration: religioni is dative singular with the understood presiding.
Context: Burton’s satire imagines an impious person presiding over religion, among other inversions of proper government.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: impium religioni
Modern rendering: the impious over religion
Word and construction: The presiding relation comes from præsidentem in the preceding coordinated clause, not from religioni alone.
Supplied words note: The makes the substantival adjective idiomatic; over supplies the relation governed by the shared presiding.
religio · religionis causa
Printed “religionis causa” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
For religion’s sake or from religious motive: religionis is genitive singular governed by postpositive causa.
Context: The Ricci-attributed margin gives poverty or religion as motives for many common people’s vegetable diet; the English body omits these motives.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: vel tenuitatis, vel religionis causa
Modern rendering: because of poverty or religion
Word and construction: Religionis supplies religion; causa gives because of and vel marks the alternative to poverty.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: Because of is shared by both alternatives; the claim is not that all Chinese people have one motive.
religio · ipsa religio
Printed “ipsa religio” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religion itself as an institution and revered practice whose reputation suffers from clerical corruption and poverty.
Context: Burton speaks in Latin and invokes Seyssel; the preceding contrast is between unworthy office-holders and learned, holy but impoverished clergy.
Source: original body
Locator qualification: Preserve sequence and printed-number distinction exactly.
Source wording, Original wording: hinc ipsa religio (quod cum Secellio dicam) in ludibrium & contemptum adducitur
Modern rendering: hence religion itself—to speak with Seyssel—is brought into ridicule and contempt
Word and construction: Religio is nominative singular; ipsa intensifies it, and the passive predicate supplies the exposure to contempt.
Supplied words note: To speak with makes the parenthetical attribution idiomatic; no external authentication of Seyssel’s exact words is claimed.
religio · Religio Deum colit
Printed “Religio Deum colit” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religion as worship that honours God, contrasted with destructive superstition; religio is nominative singular, subject of colit.
Context: Burton attributes the maxim to Seneca but changes the compared source’s plural gods and its verb for violating them; his printed wording is retained.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: Religio Deum colit, superstitio destruit
Modern rendering: religion worships God; superstition destroys him
Word and construction: Religio contributes religion; Deum God, colit worships, and the second clause supplies the opposed action.
Supplied words note: Him makes explicit the object understood with destruit; it is God carried forward from Deum.
religion
Printed “religion” (English; lemma). Attestation: word form.
A mock worship consisting entirely of gratification of appetite.
Context: Burton satirically describes drinkers through deities associated with pleasure and consumption.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: to sacrifice to Volupia, Rumina, Edulica, Potina, Mellona, is all their religion.
Modern rendering: Their whole religion is sacrifice to Volupia, Rumina, Edulica, Potina, and Mellona.
Word and construction: Religion is a satirical name for the whole practice of appetite; the complete original predicate and modern clause are aligned.
Supplied words note: Their and whole correspond to their and all; the modern moves the predication before the list of deities without dropping the universal all.
religion · in Religion
Printed “in Religion” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
According to religious judgement, contrasted with civic expediency.
Context: Burton concedes plausible policy arguments for tolerated brothels but opposes them religiously.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: but altogether in Religion
Modern rendering: though in terms of religion they must be opposed entirely
Word and construction: The full adversative clause is aligned; the modern supplies the verb of opposition implicit from the preceding clause, not a meaning inherent in Religion alone.
Supplied words note: They refers to the preceding tolerated brothels; must be opposed is the verb supplied from the adversative relation to the preceding concession about policy.
religion · Religion is twofold, true or false
Printed “Religion is twofold, true or false” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: Religion is twofold, true or false
Worship or religious practice, here classified as true or false according to Burton’s confessional standard.
Context: Zanchi is the invoked authority; Burton applies the division according to his own confessional commitments.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: religion is of two kinds, true or false
Word and construction: Religion names the subject; is twofold and true or false carry the classification.
Supplied words note: Of two kinds explains twofold; the contrast true or false remains explicit and belongs to the predicate, not to religion alone.
religion · same nation, language and religion
Printed “same nation, language and religion” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
A shared faith or religious community, named alongside nation and language as a bond violated by civil war.
Context: Burton invokes Commynes in the imagined Democritus’s survey of the wars of Lancaster and York; the reported death counts are not verified statistics.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: men of the same nation, language and religion
Modern rendering: people of the same nation, language, and religion
Word and construction: Religion is one of three shared affiliations; the full phrase is not a claim that faith always prevents war.
Supplied words note: People modernizes men without adding a different group.
religion · of all religions
Printed “of all religions” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Professions of faith adopted opportunistically, in a catalogue of a self-interested person’s changing roles.
Context: The chameleon and Proteus comparisons satirize accommodation for advantage; this is not a policy of principled toleration.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: of all religions, humors, inclinations
Modern rendering: accommodating every religion, temperament, and inclination
Word and construction: Religions names the varying professions; the full list also contains humours and inclinations.
Supplied words note: Accommodating supplies the relation implied by of and the preceding shifting personae.
religion · religion and Gods service
Printed “religion and Gods service” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religion as the worship and service whose neglect Burton makes a cause of a commonwealth’s decline.
Context: Burton advances a theological explanation of civic prosperity; the following Barcelona example is attributed to Echovius, not independently established.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: religion and Gods service is neglected, innovated or altered
Modern rendering: religion and the worship of God are neglected, changed by innovations, or altered
Word and construction: Religion and God’s service are coordinated; neglected, innovated and altered carry the adverse civic conditions.
Supplied words note: Worship renders service here; changed by innovations explains innovated.
religion · Reason, Religion
Printed “Reason, Religion” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
A moral and religious rule opposed to appetite, even when its authority is known.
Context: Burton’s account of passion joins Phaedra’s confession to David’s adultery and murder; he claims that knowledge of the good does not prevent the deed.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: enforced against Reason, Religion, to follow his Appetite
Modern rendering: compelled to follow his appetite against reason and religion
Word and construction: Religion names the violated norm; enforced and follow belong to the account of appetite’s force.
Supplied words note: And joins the two coordinated norms; his appetite remains explicit.
religion · religion and policy dies and alters with them
Printed “religion and policy dies and alters with them” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: religion and policy dies and alters with them
Religious systems said to die and change with mortal spirits in a reported cosmology.
Context: The assertion is attributed to Zosimus after accounts of spirits’ mortality; Burton rejects such paradoxes in the continuation.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: religion and government die and change with them
Word and construction: Religion names what allegedly changes; policy denotes government, not necessarily deliberate deceit here.
Supplied words note: Them refers to the spirits discussed in the preceding sequence; modern plural verbs regularize the agreement.
religion · If there be any religion
Printed “If there be any religion” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religion or religious belief, invoked alongside belief in God and divine justice as a ground for confidence in retribution.
Context: Burton addresses the injured person and argues from the accepted premises of religion and divine justice; the conditional does not announce his disbelief.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: If there be any religion, any God, and that God be just
Modern rendering: If there is any religion, any God, and that God is just
Word and construction: Religion contributes the first premise; God and divine justice remain additional explicit premises.
Supplied words note: Is modernizes be; no conclusion of present earthly punishment is inserted into the phrase.
religion · if he be of any religion
Printed “if he be of any religion” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: if he be of any religion
Some religious belief or allegiance, made a condition of persuading a reluctant donor by rewards after death.
Context: Burton attacks merit and purgatory arguments and claims self-interest drives most good works, but then expressly allows many sincere benefactors.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: if he has any religion
Word and construction: The conditional concerns whether the donor is receptive to religious arguments; it does not assert that all charity is insincere.
Supplied words note: Has makes the older be of idiom natural without specifying a new denomination.
religion · religion, zeal, are better keepers
Printed “religion, zeal, are better keepers” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religious commitment as an internal safeguard of marital fidelity.
Context: The argument begins with a faithful wife and opposes intrusive physical confinement; it is a moral claim about the described woman, not proof that any lock or surveillance is needed.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: love, vertue, religion, zeal, are better keepers then all those locks, Eunuches, prisons
Modern rendering: love, virtue, religion and devotion are better guardians than all those locks, eunuchs and prisons
Word and construction: Religion contributes one inward restraint; the comparison to guardians belongs to the full predicate.
Supplied words note: Devotion renders zeal; guardians explains keepers without adding a literal guard.
religion · diversity of Religions
Printed “diversity of Religions” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Different professions and systems of belief, whose conflict is reported as a cause of hesitant belief or doubt.
Context: Burton describes people he classifies as milder atheistical spirits; Campanella is said both to raise and to answer the argument, and Burton rejects its conclusion.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: that horrible consideration of diversity of Religions
Modern rendering: the disturbing thought of the diversity of religions
Word and construction: Religions names competing belief systems; the emotional judgement belongs to horrible consideration.
Supplied words note: The of construction is made explicit; disturbing interprets horrible in this context.
religion · Alterations of Religions
Printed “Alterations of Religions” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Changes of religious systems, placed in a reported theory of natural and celestial causation.
Context: Burton attributes the explanation to Vanini, praises Mersenne’s attack on it, and later reproduces Vanini’s own stated Christian rejection. The disclaimer’s sincerity is not settled by the passage.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: Alterations of Religions, Kingdoms
Modern rendering: changes of religions and kingdoms
Word and construction: Religions and kingdoms are separate objects of alteration; the claim of total natural causation belongs to the surrounding full catalogue.
Supplied words note: And connects the two printed nouns; no claim of Burton’s endorsement is supplied.
religion and superstition
Printed “religion and superstition containes” (English; phrase).
Religion and superstition as restraints on sexual misconduct: contain means restrain.
Context: Burton concedes virtuous men and women in his own age, then adds that many are unfaithful. His willingness to ascribe restraint to superstition does not make it true religion.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: whom fame, zeal, fear of God, religion and superstition containes
Modern rendering: restrained by reputation, zeal, fear of God, religion and superstition
Word and construction: The paired nouns are two of the listed restraints; the restraining effect comes from containes.
Supplied words note: Restrained by recasts the active relative clause; reputation explains fame.
religion as policy
Printed “Religion, as they hold, is policie” (English; phrase).
The alleged statesmen’s view of religion as an instrument of political control.
Context: The original English margin explicitly attributes the claim to them; the subsequent concession allows sincere politicians.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: Religion, as they hold, is policie, invented alone to keep men in awe.
Edition note: No supplied-modern comparison claimed
Supplied words note: No supplied-modern comparison is claimed. The original English as they hold attributes the view to the politicians; policie means political management.
religion’s ape
Printed “Religions Ape” (English; phrase).
Religion’s imitator: ape names a counterfeit likeness, followed by the distinct images bastard, shadow and false mirror.
Context: Burton’s series of metaphors attributes imitative worship to the Devil.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: Religions Ape, Religions bastard, Religions shadow, false glass
Modern rendering: religion’s ape, religion’s bastard, religion’s shadow and distorting mirror
Word and construction: Ape supplies imitator; bastard, shadow and false glass are coordinated images with their own meanings.
Supplied words note: The possessive apostrophes clarify Religions; and links the last image. Distorting interprets false in false glass, and mirror explains glass.
religiose
Printed “religiose observandas” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religiously or scrupulously, describing the observance of ancestral laws as a religious duty.
Context: The Erasmus-attributed Latin urges deference to public authority but expressly excepts compulsion to impiety; it says as though from God, not that every law is actually divine.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: leges majorum reverenter suscipiendas, & religiose observandas, velut a Deo profectas
Modern rendering: the laws of our forebears should be reverently accepted and religiously observed, as though they came from God
Word and construction: Religiose is an adverb; observandas is a feminine accusative plural gerundive agreeing with leges, expressing what should be observed.
Supplied words note: Should be renders the gerundive obligation; as though preserves velut, and our makes the relation to forebears idiomatic.
religiosus · religiosum
Printed “religiosum” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
A religious or devout person: religiosum is masculine accusative singular, the object transformed by the musician’s claimed effect.
Context: Canus speaks in Philostratus’s reported conversation. The Latin specifies divine inspiration and worship of gods, whereas Burton’s body merely says more devout.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: religiosum divino numine correptum, & ad Deos colendos paratiorem
Modern rendering: the religious person possessed by divine inspiration and readier to worship the gods
Word and construction: The substantive adjective supplies religious person; the participle and comparison add the claimed inspiration and increased readiness.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: Person makes the substantival adjective explicit; the governing make is shared from earlier in the sentence.
religiosus · religiosos
Printed “religiosos” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Religious or devout: religiosos is masculine accusative plural, the resulting state in a transformation of impious people.
Context: The Cardano-attributed marginal catalogue describes love as commonly making these changes; it does not make every lover devout.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: ex impiis religiosos
Modern rendering: the impious religious
Word and construction: Religiosos is the predicate object of the shared efficere; ex impiis supplies the prior condition.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: The makes impious a substantive expression in English; religious is its resulting predicate complement. The governing makes and commonly occur earlier in the margin.
religious · to become religious
Printed “to become religious” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Devout or pious, as one of the good changes erotic love is said to produce.
Context: Burton’s balancing concession cites Cardano after Plutarch; the Latin says commonly, and the body’s often and some qualify the surrounding account of love’s beneficial effects.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: wicked prophane persons, to become religious
Modern rendering: wicked and irreligious people devout
Word and construction: Religious supplies devout; the transformation belongs to makes and become in the whole catalogue.
Supplied words note: People renders persons; the modern supplies irreligious as its interpretation of prophane, not as an exact English source form here.
religious · so religious
Printed “so religious” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Apparently pious, used ironically of an outward performance of chastity and devotion.
Context: Burton accuses the described wives of hypocrisy; his original margin expressly says the charge does not prejudice honest women. The Ariosto example is a literary narrative.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: so chaste, so religious, and so devout
Modern rendering: so chaste, so religious and devout
Word and construction: Religious is one of the displayed virtues; the counterfeiting is established by the preceding and following context, not by the adjective alone.
Supplied words note: The modern omits one repeated so while retaining the list; no general verdict on every woman is supplied.
religious house
Printed “religious houses” (English; phrase).
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording, Modern rendering: religious houses
Monastic foundations or houses of religious communities.
Context: Burton’s analogy praises pious foundation but the body’s six and margin’s two remain discrepant.
Source: original body
Word and construction: The whole institutional compound is aligned without asserting that every religious establishment is approved.
Supplied words note: No referent is added; the compound describes foundations belonging to religious communities.
religious melancholy in defect
Printed “Religious Melancholy in defect” (English; phrase).
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: Religious Melancholy in defect
Religious melancholy attributed to deficiency in devotion, belief or trust.
Context: Burton’s heading is followed by a list including both insufficient fear and excessive distrust.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: Religious Melancholy from Deficiency
Word and construction: The full classificatory title is aligned; deficiency remains an evaluative relation to religion.
Supplied words note: From explicates in defect as arising from deficiency; the following account specifies religion, knowledge, fear, faith and hope.
religious person
Printed “religious persons” (English; phrase).
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: religious persons
Members of religious orders, rather than everyone with religious beliefs.
Context: Savonarola is the reported medical authority; Burton endorses the polemical account of idle monastic life.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: members of religious orders
Word and construction: The institutional compound, not religious alone in every context, warrants members of religious orders.
Supplied words note: Members of and orders explicate the institutional meaning of religious persons; the phrase does not include everyone who is devout.
religious rite
Printed “religious rites” (English; phrase).
Rites of worship, here the practices of ancient Greeks and non-Greeks rather than exclusively Christian observances.
Context: Burton invokes Dionysius to shame corrupt Christian patrons: the body says all rites, while the Latin margin emphasizes ancestral worship and its endurance.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: Greeks and Barbarians observe all religious rites
Modern rendering: Greeks and non-Greeks observe all their religious rites
Word and construction: Religious qualifies rites; all belongs to Burton’s generalization.
Supplied words note: Their makes the possessive relation explicit; non-Greeks renders the historical Greek/Barbarian contrast.
religious use
Printed “religious uses” (English; phrase).
Purposes of worship or devotion for which buildings are consecrated.
Context: Burton continues Basil’s reported denunciation of ostentatious churchgoing, casting it as sexual display; the charges remain historical polemic.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: holy Temples consecrated to godly Martyrs, and religious uses
Modern rendering: holy temples, consecrated to godly martyrs and religious uses
Word and construction: Religious qualifies uses; holy, temples and consecrated contribute the institutional setting.
Supplied words note: No group of worshippers is added; the indictment of their conduct lies in the ensuing predicate.
religiously · religiously done
Printed “religiously done” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Piously or with charitable purpose, qualifying what has been done.
Context: Burton grants the charitable motive while questioning whether relief addresses recurrent poverty.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: religiously done, I deny not
Modern rendering: A pious act, I do not deny it
Word and construction: Religiously contributes pious; done is recast as an act. I deny not grants, rather than rejects, the charitable interpretation.
Supplied words note: Act makes the substantival force of done explicit; pious renders religiously, not the whole original judgement.
religiously · religiously kept
Printed “religiously kept” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: religiously kept
Scrupulously or faithfully, qualifying the keeping of a promise even to an enemy.
Context: The Regulus example explains the moral judgement of synderesis, reason and conscience.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: scrupulously kept
Word and construction: The adverb alone supplies scrupulously; kept remains a separate verbal component.
Supplied words note: Scrupulously renders religiously; kept translates the separate participle and does not belong to the adverb’s definition.
religiously · live and die religiously
Printed “live and die religiously” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Piously or in conformity with religious duty, qualifying both living and dying in Burton’s English report.
Context: The universal assertion belongs to Wicelius’s defence of marriage. The separate Latin has live piously but die well, rather than repeating piously for both.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: no man can live and die religiously, and as he ought, without a wife
Modern rendering: no man can live and die religiously, as he ought, without a wife
Word and construction: Religiously modifies the paired verbs; the requirement of a wife belongs to the full reported proposition.
Supplied words note: No man and without a wife are explicit; the translation adds no exception to the reported claim.
religiously given
Printed “religiously given” (English; phrase).
Inclined to religion or devotion, here one condition increasing the distress caused by frightening meditations and misread Scripture.
Context: Burton qualifies the claim by bodily predisposition to melancholy and tender conscience; his preceding age and occupation generalizations belong to historical medicine and moral rhetoric.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: they religiously given, and have tender consciences
Modern rendering: they are religiously inclined, with sensitive consciences
Word and construction: Religiously given contributes religiously inclined; the other conditions retain their own roles.
Supplied words note: Are completes the original ellipsis; sensitive interprets tender rather than introducing a clinical diagnosis.
superstitio · superstitio ex hominibus feras
Printed “superstitio ex hominibus feras” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: superstitio ex hominibus feras
Superstition, condemned religious belief or practice: superstitio is nominative singular, subject of the elliptical claim that it makes beasts out of humans.
Context: Possevino is the named authority; Burton’s subsequent English adds wise men and fools beyond the Latin.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: superstition makes beasts out of human beings
Word and construction: Superstitio contributes superstition; the human-to-beast transformation is the full elliptical construction, not the noun’s dictionary meaning.
Supplied words note: Makes is supplied from facit in the preceding coordinated clause; ex hominibus contributes out of human beings and feras beasts. These are not all meanings of superstitio.
superstitio · superstitione
Printed “superstitione” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Superstition as a source of disturbance in a satirical catalogue: superstitione is ablative singular.
Context: Burton’s Horatian margin modifies the quoted wording by making sadness a separate noun; the body applies madness especially to greed.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: Quisquis luxuria, tristitia, superstitione
Modern rendering: whoever [suffers] from luxury, sadness, superstition
Word and construction: The noun contributes superstition; the preceding catalogue supplies the suffering or pallor understood with these ablatives.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: Suffers is explicitly bracketed editorial supply; it is not an additional Latin verb in this fragment.
superstitio · uni superstitio
Printed “uni superstitio” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Superstition: nominative singular in Pliny’s catalogue of afflictions allegedly peculiar to humanity.
Context: The original margin’s uni refers to humanity and is repeated before superstition; Burton’s body extends the list. This is a rhetorical ancient claim, not a finding about animals.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: uni animantium ambitio data, luctus, avaritia, uni superstitio
Modern rendering: of living creatures, man alone has been given ambition, grief, greed and superstition
Word and construction: Superstitio supplies the final item; uni animantium and the repeated uni supply the restriction to humanity alone, while data supplies given in the preceding shared construction.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: Man is supplied from the context; has been given makes data with its understood auxiliary explicit; the noun superstitio supplies only the final item.
superstitio · unde hæc superstitio
Printed “unde hæc superstitio” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Superstition as an opponent’s dismissive name for the religion or divine providence being challenged.
Context: The marginal question accompanies objections voiced with Caecilius; Burton condemns such speculative challenges in the continuation. It is not his own concession that belief in God is superstition.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: unde hæc superstitio?
Modern rendering: Where does this superstition come from?
Word and construction: Superstitio is nominative singular; unde asks whence and hæc identifies this.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: Does and come from make the verbless Latin question idiomatic.
superstition
Printed “superstition” (English; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Unfounded or excessively elaborate discrimination in reading the pulse.
Context: The body attributes the complaint to Crato; the margin identifies Dudith in Crato’s collection.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: there being so much superstition in it
Modern rendering: there is so much superstition about it
Word and construction: Superstition is Burton’s adverse label for pulse distinctions; the pronoun is resolved by the complete preceding context.
Supplied words note: It refers to pulse discrimination in the preceding account; there is makes the original participial construction a finite clause.
superstition · vain superstition
Printed “vain superstition” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: vain superstition
Worship or belief condemned as false; vain further characterizes it as empty or groundless.
Context: Burton’s evaluative term is not a neutral description of the communities he lists.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: empty superstition
Word and construction: Vain contributes empty; the noun superstition retains its separate evaluative sense.
Supplied words note: Empty translates vain; the evaluative noun superstition remains unchanged.
superstition · heresie and superstition
Printed “heresie and superstition” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religious error explained through false or corrupted imagination.
Context: Burton attributes this causal claim to Bernardus Penotus; nearby accounts combine imagination and demonic illusion rather than excluding the latter.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: heresie and superstition to proceed from this fountain
Modern rendering: heresy and superstition spring from this source
Word and construction: Superstition names one alleged result; proceeding from this fountain is the causal image.
Supplied words note: This source refers to false imagination in the preceding paragraph, not to a newly supplied physical organ.
superstition · superstition, those rash vowes
Printed “superstition, those rash vowes” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religion judged false or excessive, here identified with binding vows of celibacy that obstruct marriage.
Context: Burton condemns obligatory celibacy as opposing nature and producing diseases and crimes; these are Protestant polemical and historical medical claims.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: Of like nature is superstition, those rash vowes of Monks and Friers
Modern rendering: Superstition is of a similar nature—those rash vows of monks, friars
Word and construction: Superstition labels the vows; their being rash is an additional judgement.
Supplied words note: Is of a similar nature translates Of like nature is with reordered syntax; no new cause or subject is supplied.
superstitiose
Printed “superstitiosè” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Superstitiously, by means judged religiously forbidden: an adverb in Delrio’s maxim preferring death to such a cure.
Context: The original marginal maxim is attributed to Delrio; the article reports its historical severity without endorsing refusal of care.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: Mori præstat quam superstitiosè sanari
Modern rendering: It is better to die than to be cured superstitiously
Word and construction: Superstitiosè contributes the manner of curing; the preference for death belongs to the full maxim.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: It is supplies idiomatic English for præstat; to die and to be cured come from mori and sanari, and the adverb alone contributes superstitiously.
superstitiosus · Superstitiosus
Printed “Superstitiosus” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: Superstitiosus
A superstitious man: superstitiosus is a masculine nominative singular adjective used as a noun in the frontispiece caption.
Context: The caption names a figure whose fasting, prayer, hope and fear are judged and pitied in the explanatory poem.
Source: original body
Locator qualification: Source record identifies these leaves as unnumbered; plain numerical passage labels are scan numbers.
Modern rendering: The superstitious man
Word and construction: The single substantive adjective is aligned with its English noun phrase.
Supplied words note: The and man make explicit the substantival masculine adjective; its nominative singular form names the pictured man.
superstitiosus · sed superstitiosus
Printed “sed superstitiosus” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: sed superstitiosus
Superstitious, rather than temperate, as a description of one who rejects lawful enjoyment; sed supplies the contrast but.
Context: Burton’s application of the preceding argument contrasts this with temperance; the pleasures are expressly lawful.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: but superstitious
Word and construction: The adjective supplies superstitious; sed contributes but.
Supplied words note: But translates sed; superstitious translates the predicate adjective superstitiosus, masculine nominative singular.
superstitiosus · superstitioso
Printed “superstitioso” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Superstitious, qualifying idleness: superstitioso is ablative neuter singular agreeing with otio.
Context: Burton adopts Bale and Hospinian’s hostile description of enforced monastic solitude, but later defends useful and devout religious foundations.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: Otio superstitioso seclusi
Modern rendering: secluded in superstitious idleness
Word and construction: The adjective contributes superstitious; seclusi supplies secluded and otio idleness.
Supplied words note: In makes the ablative relation idiomatic; the judgement is reported and endorsed locally by Burton.
superstitiosus · superstitiosæ
Printed “superstitiosæ” (Latin; lemma). Attestation: word form.
Superstitious: feminine nominative plural, one adjective in a hostile characterization of women.
Context: The marginal catalogue is attributed to Scaliger; Burton’s accompanying argument generalizes about women and jealousy. These are prejudicial historical claims, not findings about sex.
Source: original marginal quotation
Source wording, Original wording: simulatrices, superstitiosæ
Modern rendering: deceitful, superstitious
Word and construction: The adjective contributes superstitious; deceitful renders the distinct simulatrices.
Edition note: checked against supplied editorial translation within Burton-labelled note; translation is not original Burton wording
Supplied words note: The feminine plural subject women is given earlier in the marginal sentence, not supplied from a modern stereotype.
superstitious · superstitious words
Printed “superstitious words” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: superstitious words
Magical or incantatory, qualifying words in a narrated marvel.
Context: Burton retells Eucrates’s story in Lucian as a comic wish for writing assistance, not an authenticated magical event.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: magical words
Word and construction: Superstitious contributes magical; the separate noun words is retained.
Supplied words note: Magical explains the local sense of superstitious; words translates the separate noun.
superstitious · too superstitious
Printed “too superstitious” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Excessively committed to astrological conditions and predestined healers.
Context: Burton marks this as his judgement, then questions his competence to adjudicate.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: are too superstitious in my judgement
Modern rendering: are too superstitious, in my judgement
Word and construction: The degree and first-person judgement remain explicit; the next sentence questions his competence.
Supplied words note: Too retains the degree of condemnation and in my judgement explicitly identifies Burton as its speaker.
superstitious · prophane and superstitious
Printed “prophane and superstitious” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
Religiously illicit, qualifying the devotional use of prayer beads despite an acknowledged capacity to occupy otherwise idle people.
Context: Burton calls the invention excellent for keeping older people from idleness, then checks the praise with this Protestant religious objection.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: if it were not prophane and superstitious
Modern rendering: if it were not profane and superstitious
Word and construction: Superstitious is coordinated with profane; the if-not clause qualifies his praise rather than unconditionally approving the devotions.
Supplied words note: It refers to the practice of counted prayers with beads; the conditional wording is retained.
superstitious · the superstitious
Printed “the superstitious” (English; lemma). Attestation: phrase.
A superstitious person, with the adjective used substantivally; here an idolater taking pleasure in expected future rewards.
Context: Burton places this person beside the lover, glutton and pleasure-seeker; his characterization of Muslim paradise is confessional polemic, not a verified account of Muslim belief.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: the superstitious on his Idoll, and fats himself with future joys
Modern rendering: the superstitious man on his idol, fattening himself on joys to come
Word and construction: The adjective names the person; the idol and anticipated pleasure are the objects and effects specified by the rest of the clause.
Supplied words note: Man makes the substantival adjective explicit; dotes is shared from the earlier members of the catalogue.
superstitious cure
Printed “superstitious cures” (English; phrase).
Cures performed by means judged magical or religiously illicit, here explained through imagination and belief.
Context: Burton asserts familiar cures, endorses an imaginative/humoral explanation attributed to Pomponazzi, and quotes Weyer; his body’s incredulity differs from the margin’s credulitate.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: our Magicall effects, superstitious cures
Modern rendering: magical effects, superstitious cures
Word and construction: Superstitious qualifies cures without itself saying they fail; the explanation of their alleged effect belongs to the surrounding sentences.
Supplied words note: The modern omits the possessive our in this short coordinated list; it adds no independent witness of efficacy.
take religion on trust
Printed “take up Religion a trust” (English; phrase).
Accept religion on another’s credit without examination.
Context: Burton’s mercer simile criticizes credulity within a socially prejudiced account of susceptibility.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: they take up Religion a trust, as at Mercers they do their wares
Modern rendering: they take religion on trust, as they buy goods on credit at the cloth merchant’s
Word and construction: The phrase transfers buying on credit to accepting religion without examination; each comparison remains explicit.
Supplied words note: Buy and credit articulate the commercial implication of take up and a trust; the comparison remains Burton’s, rather than a literal sale of belief.
timor deorum inanis
Printed “Timorem deorum inanem” (Latin; phrase).
Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: Timorem deorum inanem
A groundless fear of the gods: an accusative singular phrase used to define superstition.
Context: Burton invokes Cicero and changes his quoted case and word order; the supplied note locates the parallel in Cotta’s speech, not a direct endorsement by every participant in Cicero’s dialogue.
Source: original body
Modern rendering: a groundless fear of the gods
Word and construction: Timorem gives fear, deorum the genitive plural of gods, and inanem groundless; the normalized key denotes the phrase.
Supplied words note: A makes the English noun phrase idiomatic; the definition’s object gods is explicitly plural.
touch of religion
Printed “a true touch of Religion” (English; phrase).
A genuine religious disposition or feeling, elevating natural and civic loves into Christian charity.
Context: Burton praises natural affection but gives greater worth to love proceeding from a sanctified spirit; his requirement of Christianity is theological.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: a sanctified spirit, that hath a true touch of Religion, and a reference to God
Modern rendering: a sanctified spirit with a true feeling for religion and a regard for God
Word and construction: Touch contributes feeling or inward disposition; reference to God is a separate coordinated qualification.
Supplied words note: With recasts that hath; the adjective true and sanctification remain explicit.
true religion
Printed “True Religion” (English; phrase).
True worship of the true God, represented as consoling and productive of virtues.
Context: Burton’s positive norm follows his condemnation of superstition.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: True Religion, ubi verus Deus vere colitur
Modern rendering: True religion, where the true God is truly worshipped
Word and construction: The English compound True Religion and its adjoining Latin definition are aligned together; the latter supplies the full true-God/true-worship condition.
Supplied words note: Where translates ubi; the true God and truly worshipped belong to the accompanying Latin definition, rather than to the two English words alone.
yoke of superstition
Printed “superstitious yoke” (English; phrase).
A burden of religious fear or constraint, likened to a yoke among life’s afflictions.
Context: Burton quotes the inscription through Chytraeus and uses adversity as a seasoning and corrective of life; the supplied note disputes his attribution to Pontano’s own tomb.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording: bear that superstitious yoke
Modern rendering: bearing that yoke of superstition
Word and construction: Superstitious is recast as of superstition; yoke retains the burden image.
Supplied words note: Bearing modernizes bear to fit the catalogue; no endorsement of the superstition follows from its place among corrective afflictions.