ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY, Part 1 of 4, Introduction. A Puke (TM) Audiobook

2 of 4:
https://rumble.com/v4dgu6o-the-anatomy-of-melancholy-2-of-4-the-first-partition-by-robert-burton-1621..html
3 of 4:
https://rumble.com/v4dh2lr-anatomy-of-melancholy-part-3-of-4-partition-2.-a-puke-tm-audiobook.html
4 of 4:
https://rumble.com/v4e2hjr-the-anatomy-of-melancholy-4-of-4.-robert-burton-1621.-a-puketm-audiobook.html

Quotes:

"Howsoever, it is a kind of policy in these days, to prefix a fantastical title to a book which is to be sold; for, as larks come down to a day-net, many vain readers will tarry and stand gazing like silly passengers at an antic picture in a painter's shop, that will not look at a judicious piece."

"If such a thing were now found, we should all fight for it, as the three goddesses did for the golden apple, we are so wise: we have women politicians, children metaphysicians; every silly fellow can square a circle, make perpetual motions, find the philosopher's stone, interpret Apocalypses, make new Theories, a new system of the world, new Logic, new Philosophy, and so on. Our country, says Petronius, "our country is so full of deified spirits, divine souls, that you may sooner find a God than a man among us," we think so well of ourselves, and that is an ample testimony of much folly."

"Is not he mad that draws lines with Archimedes, whilst his house is ransacked, and his city besieged, when the whole world is in combustion, or we whilst our souls are in danger, death follows, life flees, to spend our time in toys, idle questions, and things of no worth?"

The first of these is diet, which consists in meat and drink, and causes melancholy, as it offends in substance, or accidents, that is, quantity, quality, or the like. And well it may be called a material cause, since that, as Fernelius holds, “it hath such a power in begetting of diseases, and yields the matter and sustenance of them; for neither air, nor disturbances, nor any of those other evident causes take place, or work this effect, except the constitution of body, and preparation of humors, do concur. That a man may say, this diet is the mother of diseases, let the father be what he will, and from this alone, melancholy and frequent other maladies arise."

"Now the common cause of this mischief, ariseth from ourselves or others, we are active and passive. It proceeds inwardly from ourselves, as we are active causes, from an overweening conceit we have of our good parts, own worth, which indeed is no worth, our bounty, favor, grace, valour, strength, wealth, patience, meekness, hospitality, beauty, temperance, gentry, knowledge, wit, science, art, learning, our excellent gifts and fortunes, for which, Narcissus-like, we admire, flatter, and applaud ourselves, and think all the world esteems so of us and as deformed women easily believe those that tell them they be fair, we are too credulous of our own good parts and praises, too well persuaded of ourselves."

"and though they write of the contempt of glory,..., they will put their names to their books."

"And so they bring up their children, rude as they are themselves, unqualified, untaught, uncivil most part. Who among our youth is legitimately trained in letters? Who touches orators or philosophers? Who reads history, that life of things to be done?"

"How odious and abominable are those superstitious and rash vows of Popish monasteries, so to bind and enforce men and women to vow virginity, to lead a single life, against the laws of nature, opposite to religion, policy, and humanity, so to starve, to offer violence, to suppress the vigor of youth, by rigorous statutes, severe laws, vain persuasions, to debar them of that to which by their innate temperature they are so furiously inclined, urgently carried, and sometimes precipitated, even irresistibly led, to the prejudice of their soul's health, and good estate of body and mind: and all for base and private respects, to maintain their gross superstition, to enrich themselves and their territories as they falsely suppose, by hindering some marriages, that the world be not full of beggars, and their parishes pestered with orphans; stupid politicians; Do these things become flagella? Ought these things so to be carried? Better marry than burn, says the Apostle, but they are otherwise persuaded."

But who shall dwell in these vast bodies, earths, worlds, “if they be inhabited? Rational creatures?” as Kepler demands, “or have they souls to be saved? Or do they inhabit a better part of the world than we do? Are we or they lords of the world? And how are all things made for man?"

"But in all nature what is there so stupendous as to examine and calculate the motion of the planets, their magnitudes, apogees, perigees, eccentricities, how far distant from the earth, the bigness, thickness, compass of the firmament, each star, with their diameters and circumference, apparent area, surfaces, by those curious aids of glasses, astrolabes, sextants, quadrants, of which Tycho Brahe in his mechanics, optics, divine optics, arithmetic, geometry, and such like arts and instruments?"

"In the end, as Machiavelli observes, “virtue and prosperity beg rest; rest idleness; idleness riots; riot destruction from which we come again to good laws; good laws engender virtuous actions; virtue, glory, and prosperity; “and tis no dishonor then”, as Guicciardine adds, “for a flourishing man, city, or state to come to ruin,” “nor infelicity to be subject to the law of nature.”"

"Let them rail then, scoff, and slander, a wise man is not affected by insults, a wise man, Seneca thinks, is not moved, because he knows, there is no remedy for it: kings and princes, wise, serious, prudent, holy, good men, divine, are all so served alike."

"Love made the world, love built cities, soul of the world, invented arts, sciences, and all good things, incites us to virtue and humanity, combines and quickens; keeps peace on earth, quietness by sea, mirth in the winds and elements, expels all fear, anger, and rusticity;"

"If any man take exception at my words, let him alter the name, read him for her, and tis all one in effect.
But to my purpose: If women in general be so bad, and men worse than they, what a hazard is it to marry?
Where shall a man find a good wife, or a woman a good husband?"

"We have many such fondlings that are their wives' packhorses and slaves, for a wife overcomes her husband with a grave evil, as the comical poet hath it, there is no greater misery to a man than to let his wife rule, to carry her muff, dog, and fan, let her wear the breeches, lay out, spend, and do what she will, go and come whither, when she will, they give consent."

""This vice", says my author, "is so common with us in France, that he is of no account, a mere coward, not worthy the name of a soldier, that is not a notorious whoremaster." In Italy he is not a gentleman, that besides his wife hath not a courtesan and a mistress."

"Or if I shall see a monk or a friar climb up a ladder at midnight into a virgin's or widow's chamber window, I shall hardly think he then goes to administer the sacraments, or to take her confession."

"And first to begin of politicians, it hath ever been a principal axiom with them to maintain religion or superstition, which they determine of, alter and vary upon all occasions, as to them seems best, they make religion mere policy, a cloak, a human invention, nothing is equally effective in governing the minds of the people as superstition, as Tacitus and Tully hold. "

procreare liberos lepidissimum.
Hercle vero liberum esse, id multo est lepidius.
“To be a father is very pleasant, but to be a freeman still more so.”
Plautus Mil. Glor. act. 3. sc. 1.
Miles Gloriosus ("The Braggart Soldier")

"A man without religion, is like a horse without a bridle." No way better to curb than superstition, to terrify men's consciences, and to keep them in awe: they make new laws, statutes, invent new religions, ceremonies, as so many stalking horses, to their ends. For if this, religion, is false, as long as it is believed to be true, it tames the ferocity of the mind, controls the lusts, and makes subjects obedient to the prince."

"Sickness and sorrows come and go, but a superstitious soul hath no rest; A mind imbued with superstition can never be quiet, no peace, no quietness."

Homer.
Quam cum chara domi conjux, fidusque maritus
Unanimes degunt
“How harmoniously do a loving wife and constant husband lead their lives.”

Mox daturi progeniem vitiosorem,
Horace
"And yet with crimes to us unknown,
Our sons shall mark the coming age their own."

Dramatis Personae.
A partial list of common, or referenced name, other names and lifespan, and important works.

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ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY,
WHAT IT IS,
WITH ALL THE KINDS, CAUSES, SYMPTOMS, PROGNOSTICS, AND SEVERAL CURES OF IT.
IN THREE PARTITIONS.
WITH THEIR SEVERAL SECTIONS, MEMBERS, AND SUBSECTIONS, PHILOSOPHICALLY, MEDICALLY,
HISTORICALLY OPENED AND CUT UP.
BY DEMOCRITUS JUNIOR.
WITH A SATIRICAL PREFACE, CONDUCING TO THE FOLLOWING DISCOURSE.
A NEW EDITION, CORRECTED, AND ENRICHED BY TRANSLATIONS OF THE NUMEROUS CLASSICAL EXTRACTS.
BY DEMOCRITUS MINOR. TO WHICH IS PREFIXED AN ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR.
Reformatted, arrogantia remotum, for readability to obtain,
quid mirum, cum in alio millennio ad hunc oculi vertuntur?, Vomitio in Laminam, MMXXIV.
Project Gutenburg, and the 1883 edition. Credits: Karl Hagen, D. Moynihan and Distributed Proofreaders.
He that joins instruction with delight,
Profit with pleasure, carries all the votes.

ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR.
Robert Burton was the son of Ralph Burton, of an ancient and genteel family at Lindley, in Leicestershire, and was born there on the eighth of February 1576. He received the first rudiments of learning at the free school of Sutton Coldfield, in Warwickshire from whence he was, at the age of seventeen, in the long vacation, 1593, sent to Brazen Nose College, in the condition of a commoner, where he made considerable progress in logic and philosophy. In 1599 he was elected student of Christ Church, and, for form's sake, was put under the tuition of Doctor John Bancroft, afterwards Bishop of Oxford. In 1614 he was admitted to the reading of the Sentences, and on the twenty ninth of November, 1616, had the vicarage of Saint Thomas, in the west suburb of Oxford, conferred on him by the dean and canons of Christ Church, which, with the rectory of Segrave, in Leicestershire, given to him in the year 1636, by George, Lord Berkeley, he kept, to use the words of the Oxford antiquary, with much ado to his dying day. He seems to have been first beneficed at Walsby, in Lincolnshire, through the munificence of his noble patroness, Frances, Countess Dowager of Exeter, but resigned the same, as he tells us, for some special reasons. At his vicarage he is remarked to have always given the sacrament in wafers. Wood's character of him is, that “he was an exact mathematician, a curious calculator of nativities, a general read scholar, a thorough-paced philologist, and one that understood the surveying of lands well. As he was by many accounted a severe student, a devourer of authors, a melancholy and humorous person; so by others, who knew him well, a person of great honesty, plain dealing and charity. I have heard some of the ancients of Christ Church often say, that his company was very merry, facete, and juvenile; and no man in his time did surpass him for his ready and dexterous interlarding his common discourses among them with verses from the poets, or sentences from classic authors; which being then all the fashion in the University, made his company the more acceptable.” He appears to have been a universal reader of all kinds of books, and availed himself of his multifarious studies in a very extraordinary manner. From the information of Hearne, we learn that John Rouse, the Bodleian librarian, furnished him with choice books for the prosecution of his work. The subject of his labour and amusement, seems to have been adopted from the infirmities of his own habit and constitution. Mister Granger says, “He composed this book with a view of relieving his own melancholy, but increased it to such a degree, that nothing could make him laugh, but going to the bridge-foot and hearing the ribaldry of the bargemen, which rarely failed to throw him into a violent fit of laughter. Before he was overcome with this horrid disorder, he, in the intervals of his vapors, was esteemed one of the most facetious companions in the University.”
His residence was chiefly at Oxford; where, in his chamber in Christ Church College, he departed this life, at or very near the time which he had some years before foretold, from the calculation of his own nativity, and which, says Wood, “being exact, several of the students did not forbear to whisper among themselves, that rather than there should be a mistake in the calculation, he sent up his soul to heaven through a slip about his neck.” Whether this suggestion is founded in truth, we have no other evidence than an obscure hint in the epitaph hereafter inserted, which was written by the author himself, a short time before his death. His body, with due solemnity, was buried near that of Doctor Robert Weston, in the north aisle which joins next to the choir of the cathedral of Christ Church, on the twenty seventh of January 1639 to 40. Over his grave was soon after erected a comely monument, on the upper pillar of the said aisle, with his bust, painted to the life. On the original text is a horoscope calculation of his nativity.
And under the bust, this inscription of his own composition:
Known to few, unknown to fewer,
Here lies Democritus the younger.
To whom he gave life and death.
Melancholy.
8 January 1639.
A few months before his death, he made his will, of which the following is a copy:

DEMOCRITUS JUNIOR TO HIS BOOK.

Go forth my book into the open day;
Happy, if made so by its garish eye.
O'er earth's wide surface take thy vagrant way,
To imitate thy master's genius try.
The Graces three, the Muses nine salute,
Should those who love them try to con thy lore.
The country, city seek, grand thrones to boot,
With gentle courtesy humbly bow before.
Should nobles gallant, soldiers frank and brave
Seek thy acquaintance, hail their first advance:
From twitch of care thy pleasant vein may save,
May laughter cause or wisdom give perchance.
Some surly Cato, Senator austere,
Haply may wish to peep into thy book:
Seem very nothing, tremble and revere:
No forceful eagles, butterflies ever look.
They love not thee: of them then little seek,
And wish for readers triflers like thyself.
Of ludeful matron watchful catch the beck,
Or gorgeous countess full of pride and pelf.
They may say “pish!” and frown, and yet read on:
Cry odd, and silly, coarse, and yet amusing.
Should dainty damsels seek thy page to con,
Spread thy best stores: to them be ne'er refusing:
Say, fair one, master loves thee dear as life;
Would he were here to gaze on thy sweet look.
Should known or unknown student, freed from strife
Of logic and the schools, explore my book:
Cry mercy critic, and thy book withhold:
Be some few errors pardoned though observed:
An humble author to implore makes bold.
Thy kind indulgence, even undeserved,
Should melancholy wight or pensive lover,
Courtier, snug cit, or carpet knight so trim
Our blossoms cull, he'll find himself in clover,
Gain sense from precept, laughter from our whim.
Should learned leech with solemn air unfold,
Thy leaves, beware, be civil, and be wise:
Thy volume many precepts sage may hold,
His well fraught head may find no trifling prize.
Should crafty lawyer trespass on our ground,
Caitiffs avaunt! Disturbing tribe away!
Unless, white crow, an honest one be found;
He'll better, wiser go for what we say.
Should some ripe scholar, gentle and benign,
With candor, care, and judgment thee peruse:
Thy faults to kind oblivion he'll consign;
Nor to thy merit will his praise refuse.
Thou mayest be searched for polished words and verse.
By flippant spouter, emptiest of praters:
Tell him to seek them in some mawkish verse:
My periods all are rough as nutmeg graters.
The doggerel poet, wishing thee to read,
Reject not; let him glean thy jests and stories.
His brother I, of lowly sembling breed:
Apollo grants to few Parnassian glories.
Menaced by critic with sour furrowed brow,
Momus or Troilus or Scotch reviewer:
Ruffle your heckle, grin and growl and vow:
Ill-natured foes you thus will find the fewer,
When foul-mouthed senseless railers cry thee down,
Reply not: fly, and show the rogues thy stern;
They are not worthy even of a frown:
Good taste or breeding they can never learn;
Or let them clamor, turn a callous ear,
As though in dread of some harsh donkey's bray.
If chide by censor, friendly though severe,
To such explain and turn thee not away.
Thy vein, says he perchance, is all too free;
Thy smutty language suits not learned pen:
Reply, Good Sir, throughout, the context see;
Thought chastens thought; so prithee judge again.
Besides, although my master's pen may wander
Through devious paths, by which it ought not stray,
His life is pure, beyond the breath of slander:
So pardon grant; tis merely but his way.
Some rugged ruffian makes a hideous rout,
Brandish thy cudgel, threaten him to baste;
The filthy fungus far from thee cast out;
Such noxious banquets never suit my taste.
Yet, calm and cautious moderate thy ire,
Be ever courteous should the case allow,
Sweet malt is ever made by gentle fire:
Warm to thy friends, give all a civil bow.
Even censure sometimes teaches to improve,
Slight frosts have often cured too rank a crop,
So, candid blame my spleen shall never move,
For skillful gardeners wayward branches lop.
Go then, my book, and bear my words in mind;
Guides safe at once, and pleasant them you'll find.

THE ARGUMENT OF THE FRONTISPIECE.
Ten distinct Squares here seen apart,
Are joined in one by Cutter's art.
One.
Old Democritus under a tree,
Sits on a stone with book on knee;
About him hang there many features,
Of Cats, Dogs and such like creatures,
Of which he makes anatomy,
The seat of black choler to see.
Over his head appears the sky,
And Saturn Lord of melancholy.
Two.
To the left a landscape of Jealousy,
Presents itself unto thine eye.
A Kingfisher, a Swan, an Hern,
Two fighting-cocks you may discern,
Two roaring Bulls each other hie,
To assault concerning venery.
Symbols are these; I say no more,
Conceive the rest by that's afore.
Three.
The next of solitariness,
A portraiture doth well express,
By sleeping dog, cat: Buck and Doe,
Hares, Conies in the desert go:
Bats, Owls the shady bowers over,
In melancholy darkness hover.
Mark well: If it be not as it should be,
Blame the bad Cutter, and not me.
Four.
It under column there doth stand.
Inamorato with folded hand;
Down hangs his head, terse and polite,
Some ditty sure he doth indite.
His lute and books about him lie,
As symptoms of his vanity.
If this do not enough disclose,
To paint him, take thyself by the nose.
Five.
Hypocondriacus leans on his arm,
Wind in his side doth him much harm,
And troubles him full sore, God knows,
Much pain he hath and many woes.
About him pots and glasses lie,
Newly brought from's Apothecary.
This Saturn's aspects signify,
You see them portrayed in the sky.
Six.
Beneath them kneeling on his knee,
A superstitious man you see:
He fasts, prays, on his Idol fixt,
Tormented hope and fear betwixt:
For Hell perhaps he takes more pain,
Than thou dost Heaven itself to gain.
Alas poor soul, I pity thee,
What stars incline thee so to be?
Seven.
But see the madman rage downright
With furious looks, a ghastly sight.
Naked in chains bound doth he lie,
And roars amain he knows not why!
Observe him; for as in a glass,
Thine angry portraiture it was.
His picture keeps still in thy presence;
Twixt him and thee, there's no difference.
Eight, Nine
Borage and Hellebor fill two scenes,
Sovereign plants to purge the veins
Of melancholy, and cheer the heart,
Of those black fumes which make it smart;
To clear the brain of misty fogs,
Which dull our senses, and Soul clogs.
The best medicine that ever God made
For this malady, if well assayed.
Ten.
Now last of all to fill a place,
Presented is the Author's face;
And in that habit which he wears,
His image to the world appears.
His mind no art can well express,
That by his writings you may guess.
It was not pride, nor yet vainglory,
Though others do it commonly.
Made him do this: if you must know,
The Printer would needs have it so.
Then do not frown or scoff at it,
Deride not, or detract a whit.
For surely as thou dost by him,
He will do the same again.
Then look upon it, behold and see,
As thou likest it, so it likes thee.
And I for it will stand in view,
Thine to command, Reader, adieu.

The author's abstract of melancholy, dialogically.
When I go musing all alone
Thinking of divers things fore-known.
When I build castles in the air,
Void of sorrow and void of fear,
Pleasing myself with phantasms sweet,
Methinks the time runs very fleet.
All my joys to this are folly,
Naught so sweet as melancholy.
When I lie waking all alone,
Recounting what I have ill done,
My thoughts on me then tyrannise,
Fear and sorrow me surprise,
Whether I tarry still or go,
Methinks the time moves very slow.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Naught so mad as melancholy.
When to myself I act and smile,
With pleasing thoughts the time beguile,
By a brook side or wood so green,
Unheard, unsought for, or unseen,
A thousand pleasures do me bless,
And crown my soul with happiness.
All my joys besides are folly,
None so sweet as melancholy.
When I lie, sit, or walk alone,
I sigh, I grieve, making great moan,
In a dark grove, or irksome den,
With discontents and Furies then,
A thousand miseries at once
Mine heavy heart and soul ensconce,
All my griefs to this are jolly,
None so sour as melancholy.
Methinks I hear, methinks I see,
Sweet music, wondrous melody,
Towns, palaces, and cities fine;
Here now, then there; the world is mine,
Rare beauties, gallant ladies shine,
Whatever is lovely or divine.
All other joys to this are folly,
None so sweet as melancholy.
Methinks I hear, methinks I see
Ghosts, goblins, fiends; my phantasy
Presents a thousand ugly shapes,
Headless bears, black men, and apes,
Doleful outcries, and fearful sights,
My sad and dismal soul affrights.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
None so dammed as melancholy.
Methinks I court, methinks I kiss,
Methinks I now embrace my mistress.
O blessed days, O sweet content,
In Paradise my time is spent.
Such thoughts may still my fancy move,
So may I ever be in love.
All my joys to this are folly,
Naught so sweet as melancholy.
When I recount love's many frights,
My sighs and tears, my waking nights,
My jealous fits; O mine hard fate
I now repent, but tis too late.
No torment is so bad as love,
So bitter to my soul can prove.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Naught so harsh as melancholy.
Friends and companions get you gone,
Tis my desire to be alone;
Ne'er well but when my thoughts and I
Do domineer in privacy.
No Gem, no treasure like to this,
Tis my delight, my crown, my bliss.
All my joys to this are folly,
Naught so sweet as melancholy.
Tis my sole plague to be alone,
I am a beast, a monster grown,
I will no light nor company,
I find it now my misery.
The scene is turned, my joys are gone,
Fear, discontent, and sorrows come.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Naught so fierce as melancholy.
I'll not change life with any king,
I ravish am: can the world bring
More joy, than still to laugh and smile,
In pleasant toys time to beguile?
Do not, O do not trouble me,
So sweet content I feel and see.
All my joys to this are folly,
None so divine as melancholy.
I'll change my state with any wretch,
Thou canst from gaol or dunghill fetch;
My pain's past cure, another hell,
I may not in this torment dwell!
Now desperate I hate my life,
Lend me a halter or a knife;
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Naught so dammed as melancholy.

DEMOCRITUS JUNIOR TO THE READER.
Gentle reader, I presume thou wilt be very inquisitive to know what antic or personate actor this is, that so insolently intrudes upon this common theatre, to the world's view, arrogating another man's name; whence he is, why he doth it, and what he hath to say; although, as he said, First, if I don't want to, I won't answer, who is going to force me? I am a free man born, and may choose whether I will tell; who can compel me? If I be urged, I will as readily reply as that Egyptian in Plutarch, when a curious fellow would needs know what he had in his basket, When you see what is veiled, what do you look for in the hidden thing? It was therefore covered, because he should not know what was in it. Seek not after that which is hid; if the contents please thee, “and be for thy use, suppose the Man in the Moon, or whom thou wilt to be the author;” I would not willingly be known. Yet in some sort to give thee satisfaction, which is more than I need, I will show a reason, both of this usurped name, title, and subject. And first of the name of Democritus; lest any man, by reason of it, should be deceived, expecting a pasquil, a satire, some ridiculous treatise, as I myself should have done, some prodigious tenet, or paradox of the earth's motion, of infinite worlds, in an infinite vacuum, from the accidental collision of atoms, in an infinite waste, so caused by an accidental collision of motes in the sun, all which Democritus held, Epicurus and their master Lucippus of old maintained, and are lately revived by Copernicus, Brunus, and some others. Besides, it hath been always an ordinary custom, as Gellius observes, “for later writers and impostors, to broach many absurd and insolent fictions, under the name of so noble a philosopher as Democritus, to get themselves credit, and by that means the more to be respected,” as artificers usually do, The new inscribe their praxatile upon the marble. Tis not so with me.
No Centaurs here, or Gorgons look to find,
My subject is of man and human kind.

Thou thyself art the subject of my discourse.
Whatever men do, vows, fears, in ire, in sport,
Joys, wanderings, are the sum of my report.

My intent is no otherwise to use his name, than Mercurius Gallobelgicus, Mercurius Britannicus, use the name of Mercury, Democritus Christianus, and cetera; although there be some other circumstances for which I have masked myself under this vizard, and some peculiar respect which I cannot so well express, until I have set down a brief character of this our Democritus, what he was, with an epitome of his life.

Democritus, as he is described by Hippocrates and Laertius, was a little wearish old man, very melancholy by nature, averse from company in his latter days,and much given to solitariness, a famous philosopher in his age, coaevus with Socrates, wholly addicted to his studies at the last, and to a private life: wrote many excellent works, a great divine, according to the divinity of those times, an expert physician, a politician, an excellent mathematician, as Diacosmus and the rest of his works do witness. He was much delighted with the studies of husbandry, saith Columella, and often I find him cited by Constantinus and others treating of that subject. He knew the natures, differences of all beasts, plants, fishes, birds; and, as some say, could understand the tunes and voices of them. In a word, he was omnifariam doctus, a general scholar, a great student; and to the intent he might better contemplate, I find it related by some, that he put out his eyes, and was in his old age voluntarily blind, yet saw more than all Greece besides, and writ of every subject, There is nothing in the whole work of nature of which he has not written. A man of an excellent wit, profound conceit; and to attain knowledge the better in his younger years, he travelled to Egypt and Athens, to confer with learned men, “admired of some, despised of others.” After a wandering life, he settled at Abdera, a town in Thrace, and was sent for thither to be their lawmaker, recorder, or town-clerk, as some will; or as others, he was there bred and born. Howsoever it was, there he lived at last in a garden in the suburbs, wholly betaking himself to his studies and a private life, “saving that sometimes he would walk down to the haven,” “and laugh heartily at such variety of ridiculous objects, which there he saw.” Such a one was Democritus.

But in the meantime, how doth this concern me, or upon what reference do I usurp his habit? I confess, indeed, that to compare myself unto him for aught I have yet said, were both impudency and arrogancy. I do not presume to make any parallel, He stands before me by three hundred thousand, I am small, I am nothing, I neither breathe nor hope. Yet thus much I will say of myself, and that I hope without all suspicion of pride, or self-conceit, I have lived a silent, sedentary, solitary, private life, to me and to you in the University, as long almost as Xenocrates in Athens, almost to old age to learn wisdom as he did, penned up most part in my study. For I have been brought up a student in the most flourishing college of Europe, the most august college, and can brag with Jovius, almost, in that light the residence of the Vacicani, the most famous of all the world, per I have learned many good things over the years; for thirty years I have continued, having the use of as good libraries as ever he had, a scholar, and would be therefore loath, either by living as a drone, to be an unprofitable or unworthy member of so learned and noble a society, or to write that which should be any way dishonourable to such a royal and ample foundation. Something I have done, though by my profession a divine, yet a whirlwind of talent, as he said, out of a running wit, an unconstant, unsettled mind, I had a great desire, not able to attain to a superficial skill in any, to have some smattering in all, to be one in all, none in each, which Plato commends, out of him Lipsius approves and furthers, “as fit to be imprinted in all curious wits, not to be a slave of one science, or dwell altogether in one subject, as most do, but to rove abroad, centum puer artium, to have an oar in every man's boat, to taste of every dish, and sip of every cup,” which, saith Montaigne, was well performed by Aristotle, and his learned countryman Adrian Turnebus. This roving humour, though not with like success, I have ever had, and like a ranging spaniel, that barks at every bird he sees, leaving his game, I have followed all, saving that which I should, and may justly complain, and truly, He who is everywhere is nowhere, which Gesner did in modesty, that I have read many books, but to little purpose, for want of good method; I have confusedly tumbled over divers authors in our libraries, with small profit, for want of art, order, memory, judgment. I never travelled but in map or card, in which mine unconfined thoughts have freely expatiated, as having ever been especially delighted with the study of Cosmography. Saturn was lord of my geniture, culminating, and so on, and Mars principal significator of manners, in partile conjunction with my ascendant; both fortunate in their houses, and so on. I am not poor, I am not rich; there is nothing, nothing is lacking, I have little, I want nothing: all my treasure is in Minerva's tower. Greater preferment as I could never get, so am I not in debt for it, I have a competence, old god from my noble and munificent patrons, though I live still a collegiate student, as Democritus in his garden, and lead a monastic life, He is the theater for me, sequestered from those tumults and troubles of the world, And as if placed in glasses, as he said, in some high place above you all, like Stoicus Sapiens, seeing all the ages, past and present, with one glance as it were, I hear and see what is done abroad, how others run, ride, turmoil, and macerate themselves in court and country, far from those wrangling lawsuits, I used to laugh with myself at the vanity of the courts, the ambition of the market: I laugh at all, only secure, lest my suit go amiss, my ships perish, corn and cattle miscarry, trade decay, I have no wife nor children good or bad to provide for.
A mere spectator of other men's fortunes and adventures, and how they act their parts, which methinks are diversely presented unto me, as from a common theatre or scene. I hear new news every day, and those ordinary rumours of war, plagues, fires, inundations, thefts, murders, massacres, meteors, comets, spectrums, prodigies, apparitions, of towns taken, cities besieged in France, Germany, Turkey, Persia, Poland, and others, daily musters and preparations, and such like, which these tempestuous times afford, battles fought, so many men slain, monomachies, shipwrecks, piracies and sea-fights; peace, leagues, stratagems, and fresh alarms. A vast confusion of vows, wishes, actions, edicts, petitions, lawsuits, pleas, laws, proclamations, complaints, grievances are daily brought to our ears. New books every day, pamphlets, corantoes, stories, whole catalogues of volumes of all sorts, new paradoxes, opinions, schisms, heresies, controversies in philosophy, religion, and other things. Now come tidings of weddings, maskings, mummeries, entertainments, jubilees, embassies, tilts and tournaments, trophies, triumphs, revels, sports, plays: then again, as in a new shifted scene, treasons, cheating tricks, robberies, enormous villainies in all kinds, funerals, burials, deaths of princes, new discoveries, expeditions, now comical, then tragical matters. Today we hear of new lords and officers created, tomorrow of some great men deposed, and then again of fresh honours conferred; one is let loose, another imprisoned; one purchaseth, another breaketh: he thrives, his neighbour turns bankrupt; now plenty, then again dearth and famine; one runs, another rides, wrangles, laughs, weeps, and carries on. This I daily hear, and such like, both private and public news, amidst the gallantry and misery of the world; jollity, pride, perplexities and cares, simplicity and villainy; subtlety, knavery, candour and integrity, mutually mixed and offering themselves; I rub on privy private; as I have still lived, so I now continue, in the same state as before, left to a solitary life, and mine own domestic discontents: saving that sometimes, lest I should lie, as Diogenes went into the city, and Democritus to the haven to see fashions, I did for my recreation now and then walk abroad, look into the world, and could not choose but make some little observation, not so much a shrewd observer as a simple reciter, not as they did, to scoff or laugh at all, but with a mixed passion.

Ye wretched mimics, whose fond heats have been,
How oft! the objects of my mirth and spleen.

I did sometime laugh and scoff with Lucian, and satirically tax with Menippus, lament with Heraclitus, sometimes again I was a luaher with a petulant spleen, and then again, bile burns the liver, I was much moved to see that abuse which I could not mend. In which passion howsoever I may sympathise with him or them, tis for no such respect I shroud myself under his name; but either in an unknown habit to assume a little more liberty and freedom of speech, or if you will needs know, for that reason and only respect which Hippocrates relates at large in his Epistle to Damegetus, wherein he doth express, how coming to visit him one day, he found Democritus in his garden at Abdera, in the suburbs, under a shady bower, with a book on his knees, busy at his study, sometimes writing, sometimes walking. The subject of his book was melancholy and madness; about him lay the carcases of many several beasts, newly by him cut up and anatomised; not that he did contemn God's creatures, as he told Hippocrates, but to find out the seat of this slow speed, or melancholy, whence it proceeds, and how it was engendered in men's bodies, to the intent he might better cure it in himself, and by his writings and observation teach others how to prevent and avoid it. Which good intent of his, Hippocrates highly commended: Democritus Junior is therefore bold to imitate, and because he left it imperfect, and it is now lost, as the succinctuary of Democritus, to revive again, prosecute, and finish in this treatise.
You have had a reason of the name. If the title and inscription offend your gravity, were it a sufficient justification to accuse others, I could produce many sober treatises, even sermons themselves, which in their fronts carry more fantastical names. Howsoever, it is a kind of policy in these days, to prefix a fantastical title to a book which is to be sold; for, as larks come down to a day-net, many vain readers will tarry and stand gazing like silly passengers at an antic picture in a painter's shop, that will not look at a judicious piece. And, indeed, as Julius Caesar Scaliger observes, “nothing more invites a reader than an argument unlooked for, unthought of, and sells better than a scurrile pamphlet,” and especially when novelty excites the palate. “Many men,” saith Gellius, “are very conceited in their inscriptions,” “and able”, as Pliny quotes out of Seneca, “to make him loiter by the way that went in haste to fetch a midwife for his daughter, now ready to lie down.” For my part, I have honourable, precedents for this which I have done: I will cite one for all, Anthony Zara, Pap. Epis., his Anatomy of Wit, in four sections, members, subsections, and so on, to be read in our libraries.
If any man except against the matter or manner of treating of this my subject, and will demand a reason of it, I can allege more than one; I write of melancholy, by being busy to avoid melancholy. There is no greater cause of melancholy than idleness, “no better cure than business,” as Rhasis holds: and howbeit, fool's work is for fools to be busy in toys is to small purpose, yet hear that divine Seneca, to do something other than nothing, better do to no end, than nothing. I wrote therefore, and busied myself in this playing labour, and oiled care to avoid striking torpor with Vectius in Macrobius, and I would turn the negative into a useful idleness.

At the same time both delightful and suitable to say life,
Entertaining and instructing the reader at the same time.
Poets would profit or delight mankind,
And with the pleasing have the instructive joined.
Profit and pleasure, then, to mix with art,
To inform the judgment, nor offend the heart,
Shall gain all votes.

To this end I write, like them, saith Lucian, that “recite to trees, and declaim to pillars for want of auditors:” as Paulus Aegineta ingenuously confesseth, “not that anything was unknown or omitted, but to exercise myself,” which course if some took, I think it would be good for their bodies, and much better for their souls; or peradventure as others do, for fame, to show myself. To know yours is nothing, unless the other knows that you know this. I might be of Thucydides' opinion, “to know a thing and not to express it, is all one as if he knew it not.” When I first took this task in hand, and what he said, impelled by genius, I undertook the business, this I aimed at; or to ease my mind by writing, to ease my mind by writing; for I had pregnant heart, fetal head, a kind of imposthume in my head, which I was very desirous to be unladen of, and could imagine no fitter evacuation than this. Besides, I might not well refrain, for where there is pain, there is a finger, one must needs scratch where it itches. I was not a little offended with this malady, shall I say my mistress Melancholy, my Aegeria, or my malus genius? and for that cause, as he that is stung with a scorpion, I would expel nail, nail, comfort one sorrow with another, idleness with idleness, as from the Theriacum viper, make an antidote out of that which was the prime cause of my disease. Or as he did, of whom Felix Plater speaks, that thought he had some of Aristophanes' frogs in his belly, still crying Breec, okex, coax, coax, oop, oop, and for that cause studied physic seven years, and travelled over most part of Europe to ease himself. To do myself good I turned over such physicians as our libraries would afford, or my private friends impart, and have taken this pains. And why not? Girolamo Cardano, known as Cardan, professeth he wrote his book, De Consolatione after his son's death, to comfort himself; so did Tully, the anglicized form of Cicero, write of the same subject with like intent after his daughter's departure, if it be his at least, or some impostor's put out in his name, which Lipsius probably suspects. Concerning myself, I can peradventure affirm with Marius in Sallust, “that which others hear or read of, I felt and practised myself; they get their knowledge by books, I mine by melancholising.” Expert believes Roberto. Something I can speak out of experience, painful experience has taught me; and with her in the poet, I learn to help those who are not ignorant of evil; I would help others out of a fellow-feeling; and, as that virtuous lady did of old, “being a leper herself, bestow all her portion to build an hospital for lepers,” I will spend my time and knowledge, which are my greatest fortunes, for the common good of all.
Yea, but you will infer that this is to act, an unnecessary work, add the twice-cooked cramben, the same again and again in other words. To what purpose? “Nothing is omitted that may well be said,” so thought Lucian in the like theme. How many excellent physicians have written just volumes and elaborate tracts of this subject? No news here; that which I have is stolen, from others, And he said unto me, Thou art a thief of my page. If that severe doom of Synesius be true, “it is a greater offence to steal dead men's labours, than their clothes,” what shall become of most writers? I hold up my hand at the bar among others, and am guilty of felony in this kind, You have a guilty plea, I am content to be pressed with the rest. Tis most true, It keeps many people from writing unscathed, and “there is no end of writing of books,” as the wiseman found of old, in this scribbling age, especially wherein “the number of books is without number,” as a worthy man saith, “presses be oppressed,” and out of an itching humour that every man hath to show himself, desirous of fame and honour, we write unlearned and learned, he will write no matter what, and scrape together it boots not whence. “Bewitched with this desire of fame,” even in the middle, to the disparagement of their health, and scarce able to hold a pen, they must say something, “and get themselves a name,” saith Scaliger, “though it be to the downfall and ruin of many others.” To be counted writers, writers to be saved, to be thought and held polymaths and polyhistors, among the ignorant common people because of the name of windy art, to get a paper-kingdom: no hope of gain but of wide fame, in this precipitate, ambitious age, now, as the age is, among immature learning, ambitious and impetuous, tis Scaliger's censure, and they that are scarce auditors, hardly any listeners, must be masters and teachers, before they be capable and fit hearers. They will rush into all learning, armed civilian, divine, human authors, rake over all indexes and pamphlets for notes, as our merchants do strange havens for traffic, write great tomes, Since they are not really more learned, but more talkative, whereas they are not thereby better scholars, but greater praters. They commonly pretend public good, but as Gesner observes, tis pride and vanity that eggs them on; no news or aught worthy of note, but the same in other terms. Perhaps the printers should not be struck, or something must be written to prove that they lived. As apothecaries we make new mixtures everyday, pour out of one vessel into another; and as those old Romans robbed all the cities of the world, to set out their bad-sited Rome, we skim off the cream of other men's wits, pick the choice flowers of their tilled gardens to set out our own sterile plots. They castrate others to stuff their thin books with foreign fat, so Jovius inveighs. They lard their lean books with the fat of others' works. Unlearned thieves, and others. A fault that every writer finds, as I do now, and yet faulty themselves, Men of three letters, all thieves; they pilfer out of old writers to stuff up their new comments, scrape Ennius' dunghills, and out of Democritus' pit, as I have done. By which means it comes to pass, “that not only libraries and shops are full of our putrid papers, but every close-stool and jakes,” They write poems that they read while pooping; they serve to put under pies, to lap spice in, and keep roast meat from burning. “With us in France,” saith Scaliger, “every man hath liberty to write, but few ability.” “Heretofore learning was graced by judicious scholars, but now noble sciences are vilified by base and illiterate scribblers,” that either write for vainglory, need, to get money, or as Parasites to flatter and collogue with some great men, they put cut bullshit, rubbish and nonsense. Amongst so many thousand authors you shall scarce find one, by reading of whom you shall be any whit better, but rather much worse, by which it is infected rather than completed, by which he is rather infected than any way perfected.

He who reads such.
What has he learned at last, what does he know but dreams, nonsense?

So that oftentimes it falls out, which Callimachus taxed of old, a great book is a great mischief. Cardan finds fault with Frenchmen and Germans, for their scribbling to no purpose, He does not say that I will deter them from eating, but that they may find something new, he doth not bar them to write, so that it be some new invention of their own; but we weave the same web still, twist the same rope again and again; or if it be a new invention, tis but some bauble or toy which idle fellows write, for as idle fellows to read, and who so cannot invent? “He must have a barren wit, that in this scribbling age can forge nothing. Princes show their armies, rich men vaunt their buildings, soldiers their manhood, and scholars vent their toys;” they must read, they must hear whether they will or no

And whatever comes to the cards once, all of them.
He will return from the oven to know the lake, And the children and the old.
What once is said and writ, all men must know,
Old wives and children as they come and go.

“What a company of poets hath this year brought out,” as Pliny complains to Sossius Sinesius. “This April every day some or other have recited.” What a catalogue of new books all this year, all this age, I say, have our Frankfort Marts, our domestic Marts brought out? Twice a year, They present themselves as new characters and show off, we stretch our wits out, and set them to sale, we do nothing with great effort. So that which Gesner much desires, if a speedy reformation be not had, by some prince's edicts and grave supervisors, to restrain this liberty, it will run on infinitely. Who is so eager for helluva books, who can read them? As already, we shall have a vast chaos and confusion of books, we are oppressed with them, our eyes ache with reading, our fingers with turning. For my part I am one of the number, we are the number, we are mere ciphers: I do not deny it, I have only this of Macrobius to say for myself, Omne meum, nihil meum, tis all mine, and none mine. As a good housewife out of divers fleeces weaves one piece of cloth, a bee gathers wax and honey out of many flowers, and makes a new bundle of all, Flowers love everything like bees in forests, I have laboriously collected this cento out of divers writers, and that without injury, I have wronged no authors, but given every man his own; which Hierom so much commends in Nepotian; he stole not whole verses, pages, tracts, as some do nowadays, concealing their authors' names, but still said this was Cyprian's, that Lactantius, that Hilarius, so said Minutius Felix, so Victorinus, thus far Arnobius: I cite and quote mine authors, which, howsoever some illiterate scribblers account pedantical, as a cloak of ignorance, and opposite to their affected fine style, I must and will use, I took it, I did not steal it; and what Marcus Terentius Varro, in book Six of “About the country”, speaks of bees, at least the witches do nothing more than winking, I can say of myself, Whom have I injured? The matter is theirs most part, and yet mine, it appears whence it was taken, which Seneca approves, but it appears otherwise than whence it was taken, which nature doth with the aliment of our bodies incorporate, digest, assimilate, I do to digest what I drew, dispose of what I take. I make them pay tribute, to set out this my Maceronicon, the method only is mine own, I must usurp that of Wecker from Ter. nothing is said that has not been said before, the method alone shows the artist, we can say nothing but what hath been said, the composition and method is ours only, and shows a scholar. Oribasius, Aesius, Avicenna, have all out of Galen, but to their own method, in a different style, not different faith. Our poets steal from Homer; he spews, saith Aelian, they lick it up. Divines use Saint Augustine, also known as Austin's words verbatim still, and our story-dressers do as much; he that comes last is commonly best:
Until the age is gr