SOURCE: Baskerville, Charles Read. “A Study of Humours.” Bulletin of the University of Texas 178, no. 12 (April 8, 1911): 34-75.

In the following essay, Baskerville discusses the meaning of “humors” as used by Jonson; examines Jonson's predecessors' use of the term; explores the connections between humors comedy, morality, and psychology; and considers the treatment of humors in works by John Lyly, Gabriel Harvey, Thomas Nashe, and others.

Jonson's celebrated definition of humour has fixed the meaning of the word for us in connection with the comedy of manners. As Jonson defines the term, it is fairly inclusive and may represent almost any decided moral inclination or mental attitude. Beginning with the broadest definition of the term in the physical sense, he proceeds to the figurative meaning of the word (Every Man out, Induction, p. 67):

                    Whatsoe'er hath fluxure and humidity, As wanting power to contain itself, Is humour. So in every human...