ontinuance of time they have been troubled.

To discern all which symptoms the better, [2610]Rhasis the Arabian makes
three degrees of them. The first is, _falsa cogitatio_, false conceits and
idle thoughts: to misconstrue and amplify, aggravating everything they
conceive or fear; the second is, _falso cogitata loqui_, to talk to
themselves, or to use inarticulate incondite voices, speeches, obsolete
gestures, and plainly to utter their minds and conceits of their hearts, by
their words and actions, as to laugh, weep, to be silent, not to sleep, eat
their meat, &c.: the third is to put in practice [2611]that which they
think or speak. Savanarola, _Rub. 11. tract. 8. cap. 1. de aegritudine_,
confirms as much, [2612]"when he begins to express that in words, which he
conceives in his heart, or talks idly, or goes from one thing to another,"
which [2613]Gordonius calls _nec caput habentia, nec caudam_, ("having
neither head nor tail,") he is in the middle way: [2614] "but when he
begins to act it likewise, and to put his fopperies in execution, he is
then in the extent of melancholy, or madness itself." This progress of
melancholy you shall easily observe in them that have been so affected,
they go smiling to themselves at first, at length they laugh out; at first
solitary, at last they can endure no company: or if they do, they are now
dizzards, past sense and shame, quite moped, they care not what they say or
do, all their actions, words, gestures, are furious or ridiculous. At first
his mind is troubled, he doth not attend what is said, if you tell him a
tale, he cries at last, what said you? but in the end he mutters to
himself, as old women do many times, or old men when they sit alone, upon a
sudden they laugh, whoop, halloo, or run away, and swear they see or hear
players, [2615]devils, hobgoblins, ghosts, strike, or strut, &c., grow
humorous in the end; like him in the poet, _saepe ducentos, saepe decem
servos_, ("at one time followed by two hundred servants, at another only by
ten") he will dress himself, and undress, careless at last, grows
insensible, stupid, or mad. [2616]He howls like a wolf, barks like a dog,
and raves like Ajax and Orestes, hears music and outcries, which no man
else hears. As [2617]he did whom Amatus Lusitanus mentioneth _cent. 3,
cura. 55_, or that woman in [2618]Springer, that spake many languages, and
said she was possessed: that farmer in [2619]Prosper Calenius, that
disputed and discourse