"The sorrow of the world worketh death."

I suppose I am not the only one thinking about depression outside the psychological box. The phenomenon of depression, "melancholia", has been noted by writers in the west for centuries.

The Catholic thinkers in the Middle Ages called it Acedia and Tristitia (sadness).

John Zmirak writes today on Inside Catholic:

St. Thomas Aquinas warns that Accedia, unacknowledged and unanswered, is a sure road to despair and can lead even to suicide. It rarely urges us to sin, even by omission, but rather allows us to slog through our daily duties, jaundiced by a sickly tint of dismay and even disgust. Pleasures can start to weary us, and the prospect of Heaven seem not so much unattainable as irrelevant.

Sounds depressingly familiar, doesn't it?

Thomas Aquinas said:

Sloth, according to Damascene ... is an oppressive sorrow, which, to wit, so weighs upon man's mind, that he wants to do nothing; thus acid things are also cold. Hence sloth implies a certain weariness of [spiritual] work, as appears from a gloss on Psalm 106:18, "Their soul abhorred all manner of meat," and from the definition of some who say that sloth is a "sluggishness of the mind which neglects to begin good."

Thomas further answers the objections that Acedia is not a sin, saying when it is indulged, it is the sin of ingratitude, at least:

It is a sign of humility if a man does not think too much of himself, through observing his own faults; but if a man contemns the good things he has received from God, this, far from being a proof of humility, shows him to be ungrateful and from such like contempt results sloth, because we sorrow for things that we reckon evil and worthless.

He even recommends a cure:

by resistance, when perseverance in the thought diminishes the incentive to sin, which incentive arises from some trivial consideration. This is the case with sloth, because the more we think about spiritual goods, the more pleasing they become to us, and forthwith sloth dies away.

The Desert Fathers, those pioneers and spiritual alpinists, warned that Acedia is particularly the downfall of solitaries.

John Cassian wrote about it, calling acedia a "tedium or perturbation of heart ... akin to dejection and especially felt by wandering monks and solitaries, a persistent and obnoxious enemy to such as dwell in the desert."

He goes on:

When this [acedia] besieges the unhappy mind, it begets aversion from the place, boredom with one's cell, and scorn and contempt for one's brethren, whether they be dwelling with one or some way off, as careless and unspiritual-minded persons.

Well, I'm pretty solitary, I suppose.

Amma Theodora said:

You should realize that as soon as you intend to live in peace, at once evil comes and weighs down your soul through acedia, faint-heartedness, and evil thoughts. It also attacks your body through sickness, debility, weakening of the knees, and all the members. It dissipates the strength of soul and body. ... But if we are vigilant, all the temptations fall away.

Vigilance.

Others suggest, essentially, keeping busy. But these are monastics and their advice is for the problems of novices in keeping to strict routines of prayer, fasting and spiritual exercises. Keeping busy with praying all night and making rush baskets by day isn't going to be very helpful now.

But it certainly is true that for years, a large part of my suppressed fury (which is what the Head People say depression is) has been at God. I have done my share, I'll freely admit, and so have others. But the basic facts of my life, the founding situation, was God's alone. And it is that one thing that I look upon as the insurmountable wall, the thing that makes every effort look futile.

Thomas warns that the effect of Acedia is to make one hate holy things, and have an aversion to the spiritual goods of religion.

He quotes Gregory the Great who assigned "six daughters" to Acedia, "malice, spite, faint-heartedness, despair, sluggishness in regard to the commandments, wandering of the mind after unlawful things."

Thoomas argues against Cassian and the earlier writers that it is not merely a condition of the soul, but a vice and if acted upon a sin. And depending upon the circumstances, mortal:

mortal sin is so called because it destroys the spiritual life which is the effect of charity, whereby God dwells in us. Wherefore any sin which by its very nature is contrary to charity is a mortal sin by reason of its genus.

It "is opposed to the precept about hallowing the Sabbath day. For this precept, in so far as it is a moral precept, implicitly commands the mind to rest in God: and sorrow of the mind about the Divine good is contrary thereto."

Acedia, then, is spiritual depression and it results in the hatred of holiness and the extinguishing of joy.

For some reason, Puddleglum's great profession of Faith has suddenly come into my mind.

In a dark place, where there was little hope of seeing daylight again, this good melancholic servant of Aslan said to the devil in a witch's body:

"One word, Ma'am," he said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. "One word... All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder... Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things-trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones.

Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say."