If I must die, I will encounter darkness like a bride, and hug it in my arms.

John Duncan, The coming of the bride, 1918.

In western Europe from the tenth to the eighteenth centuries, mental disorders were often ascribed to demons and witchcraft.11 Relief was theorized to come with exorcism. The medical teachings that psychiatric disorders resulted from aberrations in the brain were oYcially denied. Many physicians, however, continued to recognize melancholia as disease. Bright (1586) described a ‘‘natural’’ form of mental disorder that resulted from ‘‘the mind’s apprehension’’ and an ‘‘unnatural’’ illness of the humors of the body. The ‘‘natural’’ is recognized today as ‘‘reactive depression’’, the ‘‘unnatural’’ as ‘‘major depression.’’ A similar division is presented by Robert Burton in The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), the most detailed and poetic description of melancholia in the literature. Another description is that of Richard Baxter (1716) (Hunter and Macalpine, 1982, p. 241):

Melancholy Persons are commonly exceedingly fearful . . . Their Fantasie most erreth in aggravating their Sin, or Dangers or Unhappiness . . . They are still addicted to Excess of Sadness, some weeping they know not why, and some thinking it ought to be so . . . They are continual Self- Accusers . . . They [apprehend] themselves forsakenofGod. . .They are utterlyunable torejoyce in anything.

A great part of their Cure lieth in pleasing them, and avoiding all displeasing Things, as far as lawfully can be done . . . As much as you can, divert them from the Thoughts which are their Trouble.

If other means will not do, neglect not Physick; and tho’ they will be averse to it . . . yet they must be perswaded or forced to it . . . I have known a Lady deep inMelancholy, who a long time would not speak, nor take Physick; nor endure herHusband to go out of the Room; and with the Restraint and Grief he Died, and she was Cured by Physick put down her Throat, with a Pipe by Force.