Volume 1
The anatomy of melancholy / edited by Rev. A.R. Shilleto.
- Burton, Robert
- Date:
- Reprint 1896 (3 vol set)
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The anatomy of melancholy / edited by Rev. A.R. Shilleto. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by UCL Library Services. The original may be consulted at UCL (University College London)
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![no better cure than businessas 1 Rhasis holds: and howbeit stultus labor est ineptiarum,2 to be busied in toys is to small purpose, yet hear that divine Seneca, better aliud agere quam nihil, better do to no end than nothing. I writ therefore, and busied myself in this playing labour, otiosaque diligentia ut vitarem torporem feriandi* with Vectius in Macrobius* atque otium in utile verterem negotium.5 6 Simul & jucunda & idonea dicere vitae, Lectorem delectando simul atque monendo.7 To this end I writ, like them, saith Lucian,* that recite to trees, &* declaim to pillars, for want of auditors: as 9 Paulus AZgineta10 ingeniously confesseth, not that any thing 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, (Scire tuum nihil est, nisi te scire hoc sciat alter}1) I might be of Thucydides* opinion,12 to know a thing 6° not to express it, is all one as if he knew it not. When I first took this task in hand, 6° quod aitt13 tile, impellente genio negotium suscepi,14e this I aimed at, 15 vel ut lenirem animum scribendo, to ease my mind by writing, for I had gravidum cor, foztum caput, a kind of imposthume in my head, which I was very desirous to be unladen of, & could imagine no fitter evacuation than this. Besides I might not well refrain, for ubi dolor, ibi digitus™ one must needs scratch where it itches. I was not a little offended with this malady, shall I say my Mis- tress Melancholy, my Egeria,11 or my Malus Genius ? 18 & for that cause, as he that is stung with a scorpion, I would expel clavum clavo,19 20 comfort one sorrow with another, idleness with idleness, ut ex Vipera Theriacum,21 make an Antidote out of that which was the prime cause of my disease. Or as he did, of whom22 Felix Plater 1 Cont. 1. 4, c. 9. Non est cura melior quam labor. [2 Martial ii. 86. 10/ [3 That I might avoid the torpor of laziness.] [4 Saturnal. i. 7.] [5 And turn my leisure to useful purpose.] 6 Hor. De Arte Poet. [334, 344.] [7 At once to say- both useful things and pleasant, So as to please the reader, yet instruct.] [8 See Hist, quomodo conscribenda, § 4.] 9 Non quod de novo quid addere, aut a veteribus praetermissum, sed propriae exercitationis causa. [10 Preface to his Works, memo- riter. Ed. 1553.] [u Pers. i. 27.] 12 Qui novit, neque id quod sentit exprimit, perinde est ac si nesciret. [ii. 60.] 13 Jovius Praef. Hist. [14 And, as he says, undertook the work, my genius impelling me.] 15 Erasmus. [16 See Erasmi Adagia, p. 462.] [17 Livy, i. 19, 21.] [18 Evil genius.] [39 Erasmi Adagia, p. 70.] 20 Otium otio, dolorem dolore, sum solatus. [21 See Pliny, N.H. xxix. 4.] »2 Observat, L I.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21270818_001_0062.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
