SOURCE: Gatta, John. “Pills to Purge New England Melancholy.” In Gracious Laughter: The Meditative Wit of Edward Taylor, pp. 33-62. Columbia, Mo.: University of Missouri Press, 1989.

In the following excerpt, Gatta explores Taylor's use of wit as an ameliorative against the well-documented melancholic temperament of the New England Puritans.

The Diagnosis of Puritan Sorrow

If Taylor's rhetorical invocation of delight to draw the heart toward salvation is well rooted in theology, clearly it is no less grounded in spiritual psychology. And as we examine more closely this psychological matrix of the poet's comic aesthetic, we confront the presumed antithesis of joy: the traditional problem of religious melancholy. Taylor's practical concern with spiritual infirmities related to melancholy, as experienced personally and as observed in members of his congregation, is demonstrably related to his practice of verbal wit. To appreciate just how the problem of despondency figures in his writing...