Balm.] Melissa balm hath an admirable virtue to alter melancholy, be it steeped in our ordinary drink, extracted, or otherwise taken.  Cardan, lib. 8. much admires this herb.  It heats and dries, saith [4129] Heurnius, in the second degree, with a wonderful virtue comforts the heart, and purgeth all melancholy vapours from the spirits, Matthiol. in lib. 3. cap. 10. in Dioscoridem.  Besides they ascribe other virtues to it, [4130]"as to help concoction, to cleanse the brain, expel all careful thoughts, and anxious imaginations:”  the same words in effect are in Avicenna, Pliny, Simon Sethi, Fuchsius, Leobel, Delacampius, and every herbalist.  Nothing better for him that is melancholy than to steep this and borage in his ordinary drink.

Mathiolus, in his fifth book of Medicinal Epistles, reckons up scorzonera, [4131]"not against poison only, falling sickness, and such as are vertiginous, but to this malady; the root of it taken by itself expels sorrow, causeth mirth and lightness of heart.”

Antonius Musa, that renowned physician to Caesar Augustus, in his book which he writ of the virtues of betony, cap. 6. wonderfully commends that herb, animas hominum et corpora custodit, securas de metu reddit, it preserves both body and mind, from fears, cares, griefs; cures falling sickness, this and many other diseases, to whom Galen subscribes, lib. 7. simp. med. Dioscorides, lib. 4. cap. 1. &c.

Marigold is much approved against melancholy, and often used therefore in our ordinary broth, as good against this and many other diseases.

Hop.] Lupulus, hop, is a sovereign remedy; Fuchsius, cap. 58.  Plant. hist. much extols it; [4132]"it purgeth all choler, and purifies the blood.”  Matthiol. cap. 140. in 4.  Dioscor. wonders the physicians of his time made no more use of it, because it rarefies and cleanseth:  we use it to this purpose in our ordinary beer, which before was thick and fulsome.

Wormwood, centaury, pennyroyal, are likewise magnified and much prescribed (as I shall after show), especially in hypochondriac melancholy, daily to be used, sod in whey:  and as Ruffus Ephesias, [4133]Areteus relate, by breaking wind, helping concoction, many melancholy men have been cured with the frequent use of them alone.

And because the spleen and blood are often misaffected in melancholy, I may not omit endive, succory, dandelion, fumitory, &c., which cleanse the blood, Scolopendria, cuscuta, ceterache, mugwort, liverwort, ash, tamarisk, genist, maidenhair, &c., which must help and ease the spleen.