Book contents
- A User’s Guide to Melancholy
- A User’s Guide to Melancholy
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations and Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Part 1 Causes
- Part 2 Symptoms
- Part 3 Cures
- 7 The Non-Naturals
- 8 Medicine and Surgery
- 9 Lifting the Spirits
- Robert Burton, ‘The Author’s Abstract of Melancholy’
- Conclusion
- Endnotes
- Further Reading
- Index
9 - Lifting the Spirits
from Part 3 - Cures
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 February 2021
- A User’s Guide to Melancholy
- A User’s Guide to Melancholy
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations and Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Part 1 Causes
- Part 2 Symptoms
- Part 3 Cures
- 7 The Non-Naturals
- 8 Medicine and Surgery
- 9 Lifting the Spirits
- Robert Burton, ‘The Author’s Abstract of Melancholy’
- Conclusion
- Endnotes
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
How do you treat melancholy’s bad feelings? Renaissance therapies for ‘perturbations of the mind’ – the sixth of the Galenic non-naturals – are many and varied. Since melancholy is a disease of the imagination in which the emotions become disturbed, remedies for it must tackle melancholics’ emotional states, known in Robert Burton’s time as the passions. But how far sufferers can treat themselves, and how far they can be aided by others, is a matter open to question. In this chapter, we will see how self-help, good advice, and emotional regulation work as cures for melancholy – and what their limitations are.
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- A User's Guide to Melancholy , pp. 201 - 222Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021