Genre:

Essay / Afterword, Editorial Reply

Subjects:

Mental Illness, Medical Treatment, Nomenclature, Physiology

    Describes comic humour in quasi-medical terms. 'An enquiry into the nature of this powerful antidote against melancholy, will not perhaps be displeasing to those who, tormented by its black vapours, may stand in need of such assistance. A celebrated physician of the mind, who, by this remedy, has affected many miraculous cures, shall be my guide. The English call this antidote humour.' (177) Quotes from one of Ben Jonson's comedies a passage on the theory of humours.