Tax

Use in the book

Erasmus is said to tax scholars for neglecting patrons or choosing them badly. Burton endorses the criticism, includes himself in the fault and acknowledges bashfulness and excessive love of liberty. The continuation then turns against the opposite fault: too much importunity, ambition and flattering praise. Finally he returns the chief responsibility to harsh patrons. The reproach is one stage in a shifting argument about reciprocal obligations, not a final assignment of every failure to scholars. The printed Erasmus reference remains unresolved as evidence for the borrowing.

Aretino’s supposed pension gives the word a different force. Princes fear his attacks so much that, as some relate, they pay him not to taxe them in his Satyres. The money purchases protection from censure in the reported story; taxe itself means attack, not collect a financial levy. Burton places the story among examples of verbal injury, which can distress even powerful people. But his condemnation of ridicule is not a condemnation of every satire: he expressly excludes those who generally taxe vice and objects instead to personal affront, named attacks and humiliation. Even a real offence, he says, does not license cruel taunting.

His own treatment of love makes the distinction a defence of authorship. To tax and deter others from it declares a purpose of censuring lust, discouraging its practice and applying remedies. He does not claim to teach lust. The marginal Taxando makes censure part of an instrumental construction, joined to deterrence and the teaching of remedies. Thus the negative about teaching must not swallow the positive remedial instruction. The following appeal asks readers not to condemn the treatise merely because some passages seem frivolous; the defence establishes what Burton says he intends, not how every reader must respond.

Criticism also belongs to inquiry. Mercurialis taxeth Aretaeus’s definition of melancholy, but Montalto immediately defends it as sufficient and good. Scaliger taxeth definitions of love through desire or appetite because enjoyment may end desire while love continues; his alternative concerns union and its preservation. Neither example is simply a personal insult. Similarly, amulets are taxed by some and approved by others, and the censure of casting a nativity receives Burton’s qualified reply that it may be allowed in some cases as an absorbing exercise. These are reported disagreements within historical philosophy and medicine, not contemporary recommendations of the practices.

Burton can be the object as well as the agent of taxing. If he is taxed and shouted down by some readers, others may approve him; he claims both kinds of reception. He also admits that even Galen and Aristotle can be justly taxed and that his own book contains faults. His request is for friendly correction rather than bitter invective. This leaves room for warranted criticism without treating hostility as the sole meaning of the verb.

The same action can be described less favourably in an account of illness. Discontented sufferers taxe satyrically, venting passions against what they themselves think wrong. Burton’s further prediction of self-destruction belongs to his historical account, not a necessary course of mental illness. Conversely, Crato taxeth patients of a fault: changing physicians when they do not obtain immediate relief. The accusation’s all belongs to that reported generalization. The ensuing demands for perseverance and warning against self-prescription remain historical medical counsel; the lexicon does not adopt their judgments of patients.

Financial taxes are separately explicit. Burton’s imagined commonwealth exempts necessities from taxes while allowing little or no customs duty and imposing heavier duties on luxuries. A reserved public revenue is meant to avoid heavy taxes and fund war and other expenditure. Elsewhere taxes join fines, waste, losses and bad management in the account of household debt; they are one burden among many. These proposals and diagnoses of social distress do not define the verb of censure.

Taxa Cameræ Apostolicæ presents a related technical noun: a schedule of fees. Burton uses the title in a polemical allegation about easily obtained pardons, then infers a lower frequency of despair among Catholics. The supplied apparatus reports tax schedules predating his alleged first publication under Leo X, without identifying his edition or verifying its contents. Neither the title nor the existence of administrative fees by itself proves the sale of forgiveness or his conclusion about illness.

Related entries

Fact: The act or offence whose reality does not justify humiliating its offender.

Explode: Public rejection beside taxed in the author’s account of reception.

Censure: Judgment, criticism and disciplinary applications.

Church patronage: The changing attribution of responsibility between scholars and patrons.

Love: Rival definitions and the defence of discussing love.

Heroical love: The declared purpose of exposing and treating amorous excess.

Law and justice: The commonwealth’s financial and procedural proposals.

Despair: The polemical fee argument and the subsequent account of suffering.

Places to read

1. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 15–18; Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraph 16taxed as hostile reception, balanced by possible approval and Burton’s claimed mixed reception.
2. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 1–3justly taxed authorities, admitted defects and the request for friendly correction.
3. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 24–26; Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraph 25proposed financial taxes and the distinction between necessities and luxury goods.
4. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 16–18; Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraph 17reserved revenue intended to avoid heavy taxes and meet public expenses; the proposal ends with deliberation and the author’s withdrawal from the digression.
5. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 33–35; Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraph 34taxes and fines among several household burdens, losses and failures of management.
6. Member 3 Subsection 1. The Definition of Melancholy Its Name and Distinctions · paragraphs 4–8; Member 3 Subsection 1. The Definition of Melancholy Its Name and Distinctions · paragraph 6Mercurialis’s criticism of a definition and Montalto’s contrary defence.
7. Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraphs 1–5Erasmus well taxeth at Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraph 1, Burton’s self-application, opposite failures of patron-seeking and renewed blame of patrons; the Erasmus locator remains unresolved.
8. Subsection 4 How Mockery, Slander and Bitter Jokes Cause Melancholy · paragraphs 26–28; Subsection 4 How Mockery, Slander and Bitter Jokes Cause Melancholy · paragraph 27Aretino’s reported pensions to prevent satirical attacks, with as some relate retained.
9. Subsection 4 How Mockery, Slander and Bitter Jokes Cause Melancholy · paragraphs 48–52; Subsection 4 How Mockery, Slander and Bitter Jokes Cause Melancholy · paragraph 50general censure of vice exempted from the condemnation of personal taunting and injurious jokes.
10. Subsection 3 Symptoms of Melancholy Abounding Throughout the Body · paragraphs 24–26; Subsection 4 Symptoms of Melancholy in Unmarried Women, Nuns and Widows · paragraphs 27–28; Subsection 3 Symptoms of Melancholy Abounding Throughout the Body · paragraph 26taxe satyrically in a historical symptom account, with perceived wrong distinguished from established wrong.
11. Subsection 2. Concerning the Patient · paragraphs 34–38; Subsection 2. Concerning the Patient · paragraph 35Crato’s accusation, the ensuing demand for perseverance and the caution about individual differences in remedies.
12. Member 4 Exercise of Body and Mind Regulated · paragraphs 10–12; Member 4 Exercise of Body and Mind Regulated · paragraph 11criticism of casting a nativity and Burton’s allowance in some cases.
13. Subsection 5 Alteratives and Cordials That Strengthen the Body, Disperse the Remaining Matter and Improve the Temperament · paragraphs 25–27; Subsection 5 Alteratives and Cordials That Strengthen the Body, Disperse the Remaining Matter and Improve the Temperament · paragraph 26amulets criticized by some and approved by others within historical treatment proposals.
14. Section 1. Member 1. Subsection 1 The Preface · paragraphs 13–18; Section 1. Member 1. Subsection 1 The Preface · paragraph 16; note 8198tax as declared censure and deterrence; Taxando joins teaching remedies, followed by the appeal against harsh judgment.
15. Subsection 2 Love’s Origin, Object, Definition and Divisions · paragraphs 29–33; Subsection 2 Love’s Origin, Object, Definition and Divisions · paragraph 31Scaliger’s criticism of appetite-based definitions and the union-based alternative.
16. Causes of Despair: The Devil, Melancholy, Meditation, Distrust, Weakness of Faith, Harsh Ministers, Misunderstanding Scripture, Guilty Consciences, and So On · paragraphs 17–19; Subsection 4 · paragraph 20; Symptoms of Despair: Fear, Sorrow, Suspicion, Anxiety, Horror of Conscience, Terrifying Dreams and Visions · paragraph 21Taxa as a fee schedule, the qualified bibliographical correction in note 13010, the polemical pardon claim and the unsupported inference about despair.

In this edition

“as Erasmus well taxeth” → “as Erasmus justly reproaches them”; “taxe them in his Satyres” → “attack them in his satires”; “to tax and deter others from it” → “to censure it and deter others from it”. The renderings follow the different objects and force of criticism. Them in the Erasmus phrase makes the scholars explicit; well supplies justly. In the final pair, the modern supplies it as the object of censure, referring to lust. Others belongs to deter. The payment in the Aretino story is the reported means of avoiding censure, not the meaning of tax.

Generally taxe vice becomes attack vice in general: generally defines the scope of the target rather than how frequently the writer attacks. Taxeth can also become criticizes when a definition is at issue, or accuses in the construction tax someone of a fault. The passive taxed becomes criticized. Taxe satyrically becomes criticize satirically, retaining the manner of the attack.

The original marginal Taxando is an ablative gerund, by censuring; humanam lasciviam & insaniam names human lust and madness as its object. The modern’s deterring people makes the persons understood with deterrendo explicit; people is supplied, while ab his means from these things. Remedia docendo means by teaching remedies. The complete construction prevents censure, deterrence and beneficial instruction from being confused.

Financial taxes is retained as taxes, while neighbouring mulcts becomes fines. In Taxa Cameræ Apostolicæ → Schedule of Fees of the Apostolic Chamber, Taxa supplies the fee schedule and the genitive Cameræ Apostolicæ specifies the institution. The rendering identifies the title without confirming Burton’s claims about its publication or contents.

Tax · taxeth

Printed “taxeth” (English; lemma).

Reproaches or censures; third-person singular verb.

Here: Erasmus is said to reproach scholars for neglecting patrons or choosing them badly.

Context: Burton endorses the reproach and admits his own fault, then condemns the opposite excess of importunity before returning chief responsibility to harsh patrons. The printed Erasmus citation does not establish the borrowing.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: as Erasmus well taxeth

Modern rendering: as Erasmus justly reproaches them

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxeth supplies reproaches; well supplies justly. Them is an explicit modern object supplied from the university scholars in the surrounding sentence.

Tax · taxe

Printed “taxe” (English; lemma).

Attack or censure in satire.

Here: Princes reportedly pay Aretino so he will not attack their conduct.

Context: Burton qualifies the pension story as some relate; the precise Barth preface remains uncollated. The money is the means allegedly used to avoid satire, not a levy imposed by the word taxe.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: taxe them in his Satyres

Modern rendering: attack them in his satires

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxe supplies attack, them names the rulers, and in his Satyres identifies the medium; the negative should not stands outside this retained selected unit and is preserved in the context.

Tax · tax

Printed “tax” (English; lemma).

Censure or rebuke.

Here: Burton declares that discussing lust should expose it, discourage others and apply remedies.

Context: This is his avowed defensive purpose, not proof of every reader’s response. He denies teaching lust, not teaching its remedies; the original margin expressly includes teaching remedies.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: to tax and deter others from it

Modern rendering: to censure it and deter others from it

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Tax supplies censure. The first it is an explicit modern object supplied from lust; others is the object of deter, not a person censured by tax. The remaining deterrence construction is retained.

Tax satirically

Printed “taxe satyrically” (English; phrase).

Criticize or censure in a satirical manner.

Here: Discontented sufferers are described as railing at the world.

Context: Burton’s historical symptom account attributes criticism to frustrated emotion and qualifies perceived wrong with as they mean. Its eventual self-destructive outcome is not a necessary course of mental illness or a modern diagnostic claim.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: taxe satyrically

Modern rendering: criticize satirically

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxe supplies criticize and satyrically supplies satirically; the manner remains distinct from the object, the world and its perceived wrongs in context.

Tax someone of a fault

Printed “taxeth” (English; phrase).

Accuses or reproaches someone for a fault.

Here: Crato charges melancholy patients with changing physicians when immediate relief fails.

Context: The universal all is Crato’s reported accusation, not an adopted judgment of patients. The continuation demands prolonged perseverance and then warns against copying recipes because one person’s remedy may harm another; all are historical medical counsels.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: taxeth all melancholy persons of this fault

Modern rendering: accuses all melancholy people of this fault

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxeth supplies accuses in the construction tax persons of a fault. All is retained as the reported generalization; of introduces the alleged fault.

Tax; criticize a proposition

Printed “taxeth” (English; family).

Criticizes or finds fault with.

Here: Mercurialis objects to Aretaeus’s definition of melancholy.

Context: The very same sentence says Montalto defends the definition as sufficient and good; Burton reports disagreement rather than endorsing the critic as a settled verdict. All medical categories here are historical.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: which definition of his, Mercurialis de affect. cap. lib. 1. cap. 10. taxeth

Modern rendering: Mercurialis criticizes this definition in On Diseases of the Head, book 1, chapter 10

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxeth supplies criticizes; the fronted original object becomes this definition after the verb. The book reference is reordered and expanded in the modern.

Further local use

Printed “taxeth” (English; family).

Citation key: Tax; critique of definition.

Criticizes or rejects as inadequate.

Here: Scaliger objects to defining love by appetite, since love can persist after desire is satisfied.

Context: Scaliger’s counterdefinition makes union or its preservation central; Burton says it partly agrees with Leone Ebreo, while retaining preceding definitions.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: taxeth these former definitions

Modern rendering: criticizes these earlier definitions

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxeth supplies criticizes, former means earlier, and definitions remains the object.

Further local use

Printed “taxed” (English; family).

Citation key: Tax; disputed practice.

Criticized or censured.

Here: Amulets are disapproved by some but approved by named others.

Context: Burton presents disagreement and attributed prescriptions; the following planetary herb recommendation is historical, not verified treatment advice.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: taxed by some

Modern rendering: criticized by some

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: The passive participle and indefinite agents are retained; taxed means criticized.

Further local use

Printed “taxe” (English; family).

Citation key: Tax; condemn a practice.

Condemn or censure.

Here: Some object to casting a birth horoscope.

Context: Burton explicitly replies that it may be allowed in some cases as an absorbing exercise; the modern identifies the last of the preceding activities as the objection’s object. The qualified allowance is historical.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: which howsoever some taxe

Modern rendering: However some may condemn the last

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxe supplies condemn; some names unspecified critics. The last explicitly identifies casting a nativity from the preceding list; it is a contextual clarification of which.

Tax; financial levy

Printed “taxes” (English; family).

Compulsory public financial levies.

Here: Necessary imports and exports should bear no taxes in Burton’s imagined commonwealth.

Context: His proposal distinguishes little or no customs on necessities from heavier imposts on pleasure and ornament. It is not a universal abolition of taxation or a report of current law.

Source: original body

Source and modern wording: no taxes

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: The noun and negative are retained in their financial sense; this is not verbal reproach.

Further local use

Printed “taxes” (English; family).

Citation key: Tax; financial levy.

Public financial levies.

Here: Reserved commonwealth revenue is proposed to avoid heavy taxes and meet war and civil expenditure.

Context: The proposed third part has no stated modern accounting basis; cited ancient examples remain uncollated. It is a plan for funding expenses, not a demonstration of feasibility.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: heavy taxes and impositions

Modern rendering: heavy taxes and levies

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxes retains the financial noun, impositions supplies levies, and heavy qualifies the burdens.

Further local use

Printed “taxes” (English; family).

Citation key: Tax; household burden.

Financial levies.

Here: Taxes join fines, waste, losses and other causes of household financial collapse.

Context: Burton lists converging burdens and mismanagement rather than assigning all impoverishment to tax alone.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: taxes, mulcts

Modern rendering: taxes, fines

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxes is retained; mulcts supplies fines, a separate financial burden.

Tax; general moral satire

Printed “taxe” (English; family).

Attack or censure a fault.

Here: General criticism of vice is exempted from the condemnation of personal ridicule.

Context: Burton distinguishes satirists who attack vice in general from those who single out, name, slander or affront particular people. The preceding moderation argument says even an actual shameful deed does not license humiliating its offender.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: generally taxe vice

Modern rendering: attack vice in general

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxe supplies attack, vice remains the object, and generally becomes in general. The adverb marks the scope of the target, not habitual frequency.

Tax; receive criticism

Printed “taxed” (English; family).

Criticized or censured.

Here: Burton imagines hostile readers criticizing and shouting him down.

Context: The conditional hostility is balanced by perhaps receiving praise from others and by his claim to mixed reception. The borrowed Giovio formula is not a verified catalogue of Burton’s own acquaintances.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: If I be taxed, exploded by thee and some such

Modern rendering: If you and others like you criticize and shout me down

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: The passive becomes active: taxed supplies criticize, exploded shout me down, and thee and some such becomes you and others like you. If preserves the condition.

Further local use

Printed “taxed” (English; family).

Citation key: Tax; warranted criticism.

Criticized or found faulty.

Here: Even the works of Galen and Aristotle contain defects that may justly be criticized.

Context: Burton admits defects in his own book and requests friendly correction rather than bitter invective. The comparison does not claim that every criticism is just.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: may be justly taxed, altered, and avoided

Modern rendering: may justly be criticized, corrected, and avoided

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxed supplies criticized; altered is separately corrected. May expresses warranted possibility, and justly retains the judgment of warrant.

Taxa

Printed “Taxa” (Latin; lemma).

A tariff or schedule of assessed charges.

Here: Burton names a schedule of fees associated with the Apostolic Chamber.

Context: The polemic alleges fees for offences and a first publication under Leo X. An accompanying note reports earlier catalogued tax schedules, without identifying Burton’s edition or verifying his alleged contents. Administrative fees cannot automatically be equated with selling forgiveness.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Taxa Cameræ Apostolicæ

Modern rendering: Schedule of Fees of the Apostolic Chamber

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxa supplies Schedule of Fees; Cameræ is genitive of Chamber, with Apostolicæ agreeing, together of the Apostolic Chamber. The title does not itself mean a tax imposed on committing each listed offence.

Taxare

Printed “Taxando” (Latin; lemma).

By censuring: ablative gerund of taxare, used instrumentally.

Here: The marginal defence couples censure of human lust and madness, deterrence and instruction in remedies.

Context: Original marginal language, associated with the defensive authorities and continued with an Aeneas Sylvius attribution; precise bibliographical links remain uncollated. It supports a declared purpose, not guaranteed therapeutic effect.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: Taxando & ab his deterrendo humanam lasciviam & insaniam, sed & remedia docendo

Modern rendering: By censuring human lust and madness and deterring people from these things, and also by teaching remedies

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Taxando supplies by censuring, with humanam lasciviam & insaniam as the censured object. Deterrendo is by deterring; ab his is from these things. People is supplied to make the object of deterrence explicit, rather than translating an expressed homines. Sed & supplies and also; remedia is remedies and docendo by teaching.

Modern container: note

Translator-supplied words: people, the understood persons deterred; no homines is printed