be much grieved or angry; these things by little and little lead them on to this malady." From a disposition they proceed to an habit, for there is no difference between a mad man, and an angry man, in the time of his fit; anger, as Lactantius describes it, L. de Ira Dei, ad Donatum, c. 5, is [1732]saeva animi tempestas, &c., a cruel tempest of the mind; "making his eye sparkle fire, and stare, teeth gnash in his head, his tongue stutter, his face pale, or red, and what more filthy imitation can be of a mad man?"
[1733] "Ora tument ira, fervescunt sanguine venae, Lumina Gorgonio saevius angue micant."
They are void of reason, inexorable, blind, like beasts and monsters for the time, say and do they know not what, curse, swear, rail, fight, and what not? How can a mad man do more? as he said in the comedy, [1734] Iracundia non sum apud me, I am not mine own man. If these fits be immoderate, continue long, or be frequent, without doubt they provoke madness. Montanus, consil. 21, had a melancholy Jew to his patient, he ascribes this for a principal cause: Irascebatur levibus de causis, he was easily moved to anger. Ajax had no other beginning of his madness; and Charles the Sixth, that lunatic French king, fell into this misery, out of the extremity of his passion, desire of revenge and malice, [1735]incensed against the duke of Britain, he could neither eat, drink, nor sleep for some days together, and in the end, about the calends of July, 1392, he became mad upon his horseback, drawing his sword, striking such as came near him promiscuously, and so continued all the days of his life, Aemil., lib. 10. Gal. hist. Aegesippus de exid. urbis Hieros, l. 1. c. 37, hath such a story of Herod, that out of an angry fit, became mad, [1736]leaping out of his bed, he killed Jossippus, and played many such bedlam pranks, the whole court could not rule him for a long time after: sometimes he was sorry and repented, much grieved for that he had done, Postquam deferbuit ira, by and by outrageous again. In hot choleric bodies, nothing so soon causeth madness, as this passion of anger, besides many other diseases, as Pelesius observes, cap. 21. l. 1. de hum. affect. causis; Sanguinem imminuit, fel auget: and as [1737]Valesius controverts, Med. controv., lib. 5. contro. 8, many times kills them quite out. If this were the worst of this passion, it were more tolerable, [1738]"but it ruins and subverts whole towns, [1739]cities, families, and kingdoms;" Nulla pestis humano generi pluris stetit, saith Seneca, de Ira, lib. 1. No plague hath done mankind so much harm. Look into our histories, and you shall almost meet with no other subject, but what a company [1740]of harebrains have done in their rage. We may do well therefore to put this in our procession amongst the rest; "From all blindness of heart, from pride, vainglory, and hypocrisy, from envy, hatred and malice, anger, and all such pestiferous perturbations, good Lord deliver us."
SUBSECT. X.—Discontents, Cares, Miseries, &c. Causes.
Discontents, cares, crosses, miseries, or whatsoever it is, that shall cause any molestation of spirits, grief, anguish, and perplexity, may well be reduced to this head, (preposterously placed here in some men's judgments they may seem,) yet in that Aristotle in his [1741]Rhetoric defines these cares, as he doth envy, emulation, &c. still by grief, I think I may well rank them in this irascible row; being that they are as the rest, both causes and symptoms of this disease, producing the like inconveniences, and are most part accompanied with anguish and pain. The common etymology will evince it, Cura quasi cor uro, Dementes curae, insomnes curae, damnosae curae, tristes, mordaces, carnifices, &c. biting, eating, gnawing, cruel, bitter, sick, sad, unquiet, pale, tetric, miserable, intolerable cares, as the poets [1742]call them, worldly cares, and are as many in number as the sea sands. [1743]Galen, Fernelius, Felix Plater, Valescus de Taranta, &c., reckon afflictions, miseries, even all these contentions, and vexations of the mind, as principal causes, in that they take away sleep, hinder concoction, dry up the body, and consume the substance of it. They are not so many in number, but their causes be as divers, and not one of a thousand free from them, or that can vindicate himself, whom that Ate dea,
[1744] "Per hominum capita molliter ambulans,
Plantas pedum teneras habens:"
"Over men's heads walking aloft,
With tender feet treading so soft,"
Homer's Goddess Ate hath not involved into this discontented [1745]rank, or plagued with some misery or other. Hyginus, fab. 220, to this purpose hath a pleasant tale. Dame Cura by chance went over a brook, and taking up some of the dirty slime, made an image of it; Jupiter eftsoons coming by, put life to it, but Cura and Jupiter could not agree what name to give him, or who should own him; the matter was referred to Saturn as judge; he gave this arbitrement: his name shall be Homo ab humo, Cura eum possideat quamdiu vivat, Care shall have him whilst he lives, Jupiter his soul, and Tellus his body when he dies. But to leave tales. A general cause, a continuate cause, an inseparable accident, to all men, is discontent, care, misery; were there no other particular affliction (which who is free from?) to molest a man in this life, the very cogitation of that common misery were enough to macerate, and make him weary of his life; to think that he can never be secure, but still in danger, sorrow, grief, and persecution. For to begin at the hour of his birth, as [1746]Pliny doth elegantly describe it, "he is born naked, and falls [1747]a whining at the very first: he is swaddled, and bound up like a prisoner, cannot help himself, and so he continues to his life's end." Cujusque ferae pabulum, saith [1748]Seneca, impatient of heat and cold, impatient of labour, impatient of idleness, exposed to fortune's contumelies. To a naked mariner Lucretius compares him, cast on shore by shipwreck, cold and comfortless in an unknown land: [1749]no estate, age, sex, can secure himself from this common misery. "A man that is born of a woman is of short continuance, and full of trouble," Job xiv. 1, 22. "And while his flesh is upon him he shall be sorrowful, and while his soul is in him it shall mourn. All his days are sorrow and his travels griefs: his heart also taketh not rest in the night." Eccles. ii. 23, and ii. 11. "All that is in it is sorrow and vexation of spirit. [1750]Ingress, progress, regress, egress, much alike: blindness seizeth on us in the beginning, labour in the middle, grief in the end, error in all. What day ariseth to us without some grief, care, or anguish? Or what so secure and pleasing a morning have we seen, that hath not been overcast before the evening?" One is miserable, another ridiculous, a third odious. One complains of this grievance, another of that. Aliquando nervi, aliquando pedes vexant, (Seneca) nunc distillatio, nunc epatis morbus; nunc deest, nunc superest sanguis: now the head aches, then the feet, now the lungs, then the liver, &c. Huic sensus exuberat, sed est pudori degener sanguis, &c. He is rich, but base born; he is noble, but poor; a third hath means, but he wants health peradventure, or wit to manage his estate; children vex one, wife a second, &c. Nemo facile cum conditione sua concordat, no man is pleased with his fortune, a pound of sorrow is familiarly mixed with a dram of content, little or no joy, little comfort, but [1751]everywhere danger, contention, anxiety, in all places: go where thou wilt, and thou shalt find discontents, cares, woes, complaints, sickness, diseases, encumbrances, exclamations: "If thou look into the market, there" (saith [1752] Chrysostom) "is brawling and contention; if to the court, there knavery and flattery, &c.; if to a private man's house, there's cark and care, heaviness," &c. As he said of old,
[1753] "Nil homine in terra spirat miserum magis alma?"
No creature so miserable as man, so generally molested, [1754]"in miseries of body, in miseries of mind, miseries of heart, in miseries asleep, in miseries awake, in miseries wheresoever he turns," as Bernard found, Nunquid tentatio est vita humana super terram? A mere temptation is our life, (Austin, confess. lib. 10. cap. 28,) catena perpetuorum malorum, et quis potest molestias et difficultates pati? Who can endure the miseries of it? [1755]"In prosperity we are insolent and intolerable, dejected in adversity, in all fortunes foolish and miserable." [1756]"In adversity I wish for prosperity, and in prosperity I am afraid of adversity. What mediocrity may be found? Where is no temptation? What condition of life is free?" [1757]"Wisdom hath labour annexed to it, glory, envy; riches and cares, children and encumbrances, pleasure and diseases, rest and beggary, go together: as if a man were therefore born" (as the Platonists hold) "to be punished in this life for some precedent sins." Or that, as [1758]Pliny
