The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1885-04-24
The Age OF Melancholy

The prevalence OF melancholia, mild
or intense, among the cultivated classes,
and especially amongst educated and
reflective men, in these DAYS, would,
there are good grounds for believing,
seem portentous could it only be faith
fully set forth. Could the secrets of
some case-books be revealed, it would
be found that men in high places, pro-
fessional men in active employment,
business men in prosperous circum-
stances, literary men who are delight
ing the world with their wit and genius,
artists who are Illuminating life with
glowing colors, students who are gain
Ing prizes and distinctions, tradesmen
who have climbed to success on the
ruin-heaps Of competition, and idlers
who have only to amuse themselves.
are all visited by melancholy, revealed
only to their doctors and sometimes to
their domestic circle, which darkens
existence as with terrible storm-clouds
now and then or rob it persistently of
brightness, reducing it to monoton-
GUS leaden gloom. Behind many a
''shining morning face" there is deep,
dull wretchedness; under many q stol-
Id exterior there Is racking, mental
misery. A curious yet familiar sight
Is to see the mask suddenly cast aside
In the consulting-room, and the face
that but a minute ago was cheerful or
serene gathering into an expression Of
suffering or despair as the skeleton in
the cupboard Is disclosed. We are all
meeting in daily life victims of morbid
melancholy, whom we should as soon
suspect OF being afflicted with small
pox or jaundice, but who are even in
our presence struggling beneath load
OF 1t, and who, when we leave them,
sink nigh exhausted by the efforts re-
quired for its concealment. Could we
In invisible companionship follow home
that friend who has delighted us at the
dinner table by bis brilliant converse
ton, we should perhaps see him throw
himself Ia his chair, In his dark study,
and sit for hours, absorbed in vague,
dismal thought. Could we thus pursue
the Judge who has won our admiration
In court by the logical precision and
ethical propriety with which he has
distinguished the offenses of the GRIM
inals brought before him, we should
perhaps find him pacing the floor of his
bedroom and wringing his hands under
the horrible, If fictitious, conviction
that he is himself more guilty and
stepped In sin than the wretch he has
sent to penal servitude. Could we
keep watch over that popular preacher
who has stirred us by his fervid words,
and strengthened the foundations of
our faith by his confident dogmatism,
We should observe him perhaps tossing
sleepless and distressed throughout the
livelong night, haunted by doubts and
perplexities, and by the incessant
whispering of voice which asks:
We're II not better not TO be,
Than i've 30 full OF Misery
Could we In diSembodiment remain q
little with that good physician who has
just given us such sound advice and |
urged us to fight against the despond-
ency for which we have consulted him, |
we would perceive him, perhaps, as
soon as he has dismissed his patient, |
hurry on to the house Of brother
practitioner and pour fourth in his ear,
with tremulous anxiety, description
of the hopeless diseases from which he
conceives himself to be suffering, and |
which exists only In his hypochondriac
Times.