He gave me a mind and He took it away when He saw how I used it wrongly, and gave it to me again just as He pleased. He allowed me to repent my sins and afterwards to be aware of his divinity, to do His bidding and to improve my sinful way of life. [407-413] Glory and honour and thanks be to you, Lord God, who are a medicine for all misfortune! Thank you for my well-being and for my adversity. Thank you for my growing older and my sickness. And thanks be to your infinite goodness for all your gifts and benefits, and to your mercy and your grace I call out.

Goodbye to my sorrow, I throw it to the birds! With patience, I think to unpick the lock of such melancholic disease and sorrow from now on, and let out those things which have made me sick. Our Lord God may, if it please Him, make all my former friendships return in the future, and I will comfort myself with the hope of that.

‘Rather you should think in your heart like this and say, “To you, Lord God, I have done wrong: I must suffer so painfully for my offences. Just as I deserve, I am destroyed, unless you will grant your mercy to me. I am very sure you cannot deny it to me. Lord, I repent and I beg mercy from you.”’

‘Wrestle,’ said Reason, ‘against the oppressions of the world, troubles, suffering and hardships. [344-350] ‘Look how many people suffer disease, as much as you and often more seriously, and though it pains them sharply and seizes them, yet they suffer and bear it patiently.

The other day I saw in a book a lamentation by a sorrowful man*, to whom Reason gave words of consolation, speaking helpfully, and my heart was very eased by it, for when I had read for a while in that book, I was well nourished by the speech of Reason.

And they told them every part of the truth, but they considered their words nothing but lies. They might as well have kept quiet.

I blamed them for only one fault. They could not believe that I was healthy, and yet day by day they saw me pass by them in hot weather and cold, and neither when speaking or silent did they find me acting suspectly. A dark cloud obscured their sight within and without, and because of all that they were in such an uncertainty.

And as quickly afterwards I thought like this: ‘If I despair in this fashion, it is a way of obtaining yet more adversity. What need is there to harm my feeble wit since God — blessed is he — has made my health return home? And whatever people think or speak, I plan to endure it and I won’t take revenge on myself.’

260-266] Since my good fortune has changed her mind, it’s high time for me to creep into my grave. What am I doing here, living without joy? I’m able to find no gladness in my heart. I can say little without people deciding that I’m raving. Since I can grasp nothing other than sorrow, I’m now ready for my tomb.

225-231] If someone falls into drunkenness once, will they remain in that state for ever more? No, even though someone drinks to excess, so much that he cannot speak or walk, and his wits are almost taken from him and buried in the bottom of the cup, afterwards he comes to himself again — otherwise things would be difficult. [232-238] Just so, though my mind has been a pilgrim and travelled far from here, he returned again. God emptied me of this harmful poison which had infected and maddened my brain. See how the most excellent and merciful doctor gives medicine to the sick at their time of need and relieves them of their pain.

Thus the best test is by conversation.

By tasting a fruit you can truly know and identify what it is, there is no other proof: everyone knows that well as far as I can see. Just so for those that think that my mind has left me. Still to this day there are many people who think I am not well: may they, as I pass by them, taste and assay if that be true or not.

But then I thought on the other side of things: ‘If I’m not seen among the crowds, people will think that I hide my head and am worse than I am, that’s the truth.’ O Lord, my spirit was so restless, I sought rest and I did not find it, yet trouble was always ready at hand.

I am a great fool to beat these streets like this every day and to work doggedly and sweat indoors and outdoors, in order to earn nothing but restlessness and misery, since I am fallen out of all good fortune and grace

Since I have recovered, I have very often had cause to be angry and impatient, at times where I have born it gently and patiently, suffering wrong and offence to be done to me but not answering back and keeping quiet, in case that people would judge me and say, ‘See how this man has become afflicted once more.’

If I knew how, I would willingly do the right thin

I often leapt up to get this mirror, thinking, ‘If I look in company in the same way as I look now, no fault of a suspect look may appear in my face. I’m sure that if I go on adopting this expression and this behaviour, there will be nothing to object to, at least for those who have reasonable ideas in their heads.

struggled anxiously to fake my expression, behaviour and look, because people spoke about me with such amazement and I shook for very shame and fear

141-147] And I considered this carefully, and also understood well that whatever I might answer or reply, they would not have considered it worth anything. Because of that, as if I had lost my tongue’s key, I kept myself hidden away and went on my way, drooping and dejected, and completely overcome with woe. It seemed to me that I had little reason to be happy

it’s wise to dread a coming fall.

but in the end He smites.

that madness

Thanks be to God that it did not happen as they predicted.

Lots of people spoke like this and said about me, ‘Although his violent sickness has receded and passed from him for the time being, it will return, especially at the age he is now’ and then my face began to burn for hurt and fear. Those words reached my ear without them realising.

I heard many a person living near me blame me and find fault with me.

I saw the faces of those who used to invite me into their company fall and grow pale. They turned their heads away when I met them, as if they did not see me.

[64-70] For even though my mind had come home again, people would not understand or accept it. They disdained to deal with me: I was thought to be a disorderly person and thus ignored. All my old friendships were shaken off: no one wanted to make conversation with me.

But although the main part of my memory took a break for a while, yet the Lord of Virtue, the King of Glory, through His high power and merciful grace, made it return to the place from where it came, which happened exactly five years ago on All Saints’ Day*, neither more nor less.

They promised pilgrimages for my health and undertook them themselves, some on horseback and some on foot — may God reward them for it — to get me my cure.

which threw and hurled me out of my own self.

As it pleases His goodness, Almighty God afflicts folks every day, as you can see, with loss of possessions and physical sickness, and He did not forget me among the others.

Grief so swelled around my heart and constantly bulged so painfully, more and more, that I absolutely had to come out with it. I thought I couldn’t keep it hidden any more nor block it up within me while I grow old and grey. And in order to prove that I was born of a woman, I burst out in the morning and thus began. Here my prologue ends and my complaint follows.

The sun lost its strength and the dark shower poured right down on me and made me wallow in depression, so that my spirit had no desire to live, nor no delight.

the melancholic disease so troubled me.

however rich they are now, strong, vibrant, fresh or lively

However wealthy or lucky in life someone is, it will not last — they will lose it. Death will trample them down under foot: that will be everyone’s ending

which had once been green and of vivid brightness, and had dyed them the colour of yellowness and thrown them down under foot, that change sank down to the very bottom of my heart.