Medicine and the Seven Deadly Sins in Late Medieval Literature and Culture

by Virginia Langum

  Lust is also a hot person’s sin. The Book of Vices and Virtues warns the faithful that the devil assaults “þe sanguyn of iolite and lecherie,” and Gower’s Mirror de l’Omme warns the sanguineous of the temptations of “luxure.” 24

  The intersection of medical and physiological motivations with sin and culpability finds poignant expression in a thirteenth-century confessional manual attributed to Robert Grosseteste. Detailing the senses and the possibilities of sin that arise therefrom, the speaker focuses on sexual desire. However, this desire is more voyeuristic than active, deriving from vision—either watching animals copulate or looking at women. As a result, the confessant incurs “titillacionem carnis” [titillation of the flesh] accompanied by physiological changes, occasionally “calefactionem” [warming] and “fragilitatem” [seminal emission]. 25 Yet the confessant does not take moral credit when he fails to emit seed, because he is “frigide sum nature” [cold by nature]. 26 This coldness may suggest that the speaker is old or simply colder than his peers. Regardless, this brief passage reveals the personal negotiation of medical factors in moral matters. 27

  One particularly contested aspect of the relationship between lechery, the will and medicine was nocturnal emission. The sinfulness of nocturnal emission had been debated and discussed since the days of the desert fathers. Cassian devotes an entire conference to the subject. After advocating fasting to prevent emission, he proposes three causes of nocturnal pollution: gluttony, carelessness, and the devil. Under the first heading, Cassian describes nocturnal emission as something that, like food, is necessary for health when occurring in moderation. It was thought to be medically necessary to release the accumulation of excess food through emission.

  In the later Middle Ages, Thomas of Chobham writes that nocturnal emission need not necessarily be sinful unless filth has struck the imagination. On the contrary, it is necessary to remove excess humoral build-up. 28 Furthermore, Thomas cites doctors’ claim that the emission of seed can be a medical condition, a symptom of disease rather than lust. However, the production of emissions can still be a sin. While Aquinas argues that people cannot possibly control their reason when asleep, Thomas of Chobham notes that nocturnal emissions are venial sins if they occur as a result of excess food or drink. However, when thought is involved, the mind moving the body, emission constitutes a graver sin. 29

  The debate over nocturnal emission represents one facet of the intricate relationship between lechery and the material body. Given the recognized intertwining of lechery with the body’s physiology, there is some theological dispute about the sinfulness of lechery and the virtue of chastity. William Ockham, for example, notes that physicians can weaken concupiscence in their patients, thus disposing them to be chaste. We recall the earlier discussion of complexion as a circumstance mitigating sin on the one hand and a false excuse made by sinners on the other. This kind of tension is particularly evident in the case of lechery. In his Summa Praedicantium, John Bromyard describes the particular sticky moral quandary of lechery. He shows how the lecherous might excuse themselves to the priest in confession by arguing that lechery is natural and ask “why did God will to make nature in this way if that which nature demands may be sin?” Yet other sinners make more personal excuses, claiming “that they cannot live chastely on account of the make-up and condition of their nature.” 30 Like Peraldus, Alexander Carpenter writes that it is blasphemy to excuse lechery on medical grounds, for this is tantamount to a claim that God commands impossible behavior. 31

  The compiler of Book to a Mother expresses suspicion about arguments related to complexion and the impossibility of chastity made by those who “seien þei ben so hote and so stronge of complexioun þat þei mowe not liue chast” yet “ʒif men bidden hem do penaunce to refreine her lustes and so serue God, þanne þei seien þei ben so febele and so tender of complexioun þat þer hede wolde ake, and þei schulde destruye himself.” Whereas the first type of complexion (hot), predisposing a sinner to lust, suggests sanguineous, the second (feeble and tender) suggests that the sinner is phlegmatic. Thus, physiology is a shifting convenience that the sinner can tailor to demands. 32

  Lechery also occurs significantly in writings on pestilence—both plague and leprosy. As we have seen in regard to the hot complexion, lechery and lecherous behavior were often associated with plague. This is not to say that plague was thought to be contagious in the same sense as venereal disease. Rather, sex made the body hot and opened the pores, leaving it vulnerable to corrupt air. The same could be said of other activities such as bathing and excessive eating and drinking. Thus, there is a human responsibility. As John of Bordeaux writes in his treatise, “for the defect of good rule and diet in meat and drink, men fall often into this sickness. Therefore when the pestilence reigns in the country, a man that will be kept from this evil behooves himself to keep from all excess in meat an drink … for all this opens the pores of the body and makes venom enter … and especially lechery, for that enfeebles his nature.” 33 The relationship between behavior and health is apparent in John Lydgate’s verse “Dietary for Pestilence,” in which he gives general advice on manners as well as accepted methods for preventing plague. Therefore, advice such as not to be too gullible is listed with warnings against consuming excess food and drink. 34

  Although the metaphorical associations of leprosy and lechery are clear, there has been disagreement among scholars about the material relationship between the sin and the disease. Luke DeMaitre reads against leprosy’s association with increased sex drive. 35 Indeed, some scholars have argued that leprosy becomes increasingly associated with lechery after the outbreak of syphilis, and likely reflected a diagnostic confusion. 36 However, medical texts depict certain causal links between particular sexual acts and leprosy, namely sex with prostitutes, sex with menstruating women, and excessive sexual activity. 37

  Furthermore, there is a clear pastoral theme that diseases, including leprosy, are transmitted to children conceived from lecherous acts. Thomas of Chobham correlates abortion with having sex with pregnant women, as well as linking the conception of leprous children with sex during menstruation in his Summa Confessorum. 38 A common belief was that a child conceived when a woman was menstruating, but perhaps also pregnant or breastfeeding, would be born leprous. Robert of Flamborough, in his early thirteenth-century penitential, claims that a child conceived during menstruation, pregnancy, or breastfeeding would suffer from leprosy, elephantiasis, or severe deformities. 39 Robert even deems sex with a menstruating woman to be a mortal sin. 40 As Irina Metzler notes, all of these periods are “naturally contraceptive.” Thus the priest uses fear of illness and deformity to discourage immoral acts that would not result in children anyway. 41 Pastoral works designed for lay audiences also list such potential deformities. A Myrour to Lewde Men and Wymmen threatens that children conceived during menstruation shall be “mesells, maimed, vnschapliche, witles, croked, blynde, lame, dowmbe, deef, and of many mescheues.” 42

  Other pastoral texts warn against a general weakness and lack of faith passed on to children conceived in lecherous unions. Richard Lavynham’s treatise on the seven deadly sins recounts a French prophecy stating that the English will be punished on the battlefield for their lechery. Those who “breke þe knotte of wedlock & folwe hordom & lechery” conceive children who “schal not be streng in batayle ne stable in þe faith of holy churche.” 43 Likewise, the author of Dives and Pauper writes of the urgent threat that lechery poses to the future of England. As opposed to the lesser offenders in France and Italy, the English imperil the destiny of their children. The text warns of those born in lechery that “þei schul ben wode in lechery & alwey þe peple schal comyn to wars & wrase & at þe laste ben unable to batalye, vnstable in þe feith and withoutyn worchepe & nout louyd of God ne of man,” meeting a similar fate to that of unspecified heathen nations. 44

  Finally, medieval thought deemed excessive sex or emission of seed generally detrimental to the body’s health. Albertus Mag
nus, for example, writes, “excess copulation depletes the fluid and leads to premature death” and premature aging; “for it is possible for man to copulate so frequently that nature can no longer produce any semen and he discharges blood instead.” Furthermore, “eunuchs sometimes live longer than non-castrated men. Excessive emission of sperm particularly weakens the brain and its neighboring organs.” 45

  Rypon prescribes the same “remedy in nature” against lechery as recommended in many other pastoral and medical texts: coldness. 46 Yet Rypon offers what initially appear to be metaphorical sources of coldness: “if the flesh is too haughty and the humors overflow too much, let them be compressed by the coldness of abstinence, by fasting vigils and other works of penance.” However, he draws from material medicine in formulating this remedy: “medicine teaches the remedy against a rheum in the head: fasting, vigils, thirsts.” Medical texts indeed teach that rheums, or catarrhs, are hot and thus cured by cold herbs, such as the berries of the laurel tree.

  Pastoral texts often prescribe fasting and special diets to quell lust. Quattuor Sermones, for example, suggests that against this sin the faithful “vse also prayer, fastyng, good and lawful ocupacions and withdrawe the fro superfluytees and excesse of hoote metis and drynkys.” 47 Writers often treat lechery uniquely in terms of offering practical advice. For example, amid a complex array of bodily metaphors for the other sins, the author of the mystical text Chastising of God’s Children offers fairly material explanations of cures for lechery:to distrie vttirli þat vice fastyng is needeful. Also a principal remedie and a nedeful is to eche man and womman to fle þe occasion þat is cause of þis passion … sum tyme þis passion comeþ of grete troublynge of þouʒtis, bi temptacion of þe fiende, and sum tyme bi disposicion of a man or womman, þouʒ he be fieble of complexion, or ellis for peyne to hym for his synnes done bifore, whiche roote of synne is nat fulli distried by satisfaccion 48

  Although the flesh may be weak and physiologically disposed to lechery, it can be directed through certain behaviors.

  As for the physiological constraints of lechery, the sin demands a particular attention to gender and sexuality. All sins are gendered to some extent in the sense that dispositions are affected by humors, with particular examples provided in our discussion of pride and sloth. Yet despite their physiological disposition toward sin in general, women are overwhelmingly associated with lechery. Although the seat of lechery in the sanguine humor is consistent, its common coupling with women demands exploration. Although the hot masculine complexion of the sanguineous would suggest sexual sins, women receive by far the more blame for lechery. This has both theological and medical origins. Despite equal blame accorded to Adam in the Bible, late medieval writers tended to hold Eve more culpable. She came to represent lust and the dangers of the flesh that tempted Adam to abandon his reason. All women were to some extent daughters of Eve and threatened men with similar pulls to the flesh. A useful example is afforded in one study of the exempla, or illustrative stories, in an important medieval collection of sermon materials—John Bromyard’s Summa Praedicantium, which shows that only 14 percent of the 1300 exempla included women. However, women feature in more than half of the tales concerning lust. 49

  Moralists explained female lust in terms of complexional imperfection. This might seem at first to contradict the complexional theories mentioned above. How could a colder and moister nature feel a more burning desire? Moralists explained this by way of analogy. Vincent of Beauvais writes that damp wood takes a long time to catch fire but then burns for longer than dry wood. 50 Additionally, feminine coldness was also thought to yearn for its opposite: hot sperm.

  Furthermore, thinkers explained that women were more drawn to sex because they enjoyed sex more than men, owing to their twofold pleasure. Women both expelled and received seed (the typical medieval belief being that both men and women had sperm), whereas men simply expelled seed. Not only were women lustful but they were inconstant in their lust due to their mutable complexion, which leads to a desire for novelty and change. Albertus Magnus sums up the scholastic explanation for the alleged inconstancy and fickleness of women as follows:For a female’s complexion is moister than a male’s, but it belongs to a moist complexion to receive [impressions] easily but to retain them poorly. For moisture is easily mobile and this is why women are inconstant and always seeking after new things. Therefore when she is engaged in the act under one man, at that very moment she would wish, were it possible, to lie under another. Therefore, there is no faithfulness in a woman. 51

  Other pastoral writers take up the issues of gender, lechery, and physiology in unexpected ways. The author of Dives and Pauper, for example, in his discussion of lechery under the Sixth Commandment, acknowledges the physiological weaknesses of women and their disposition to sin. However, contrary to conventional moral literature, Pauper faults men for their adultery more than women on the grounds of their physiology of “kende.” As he states, men are more “myʒty be weye of kene to withstondyn & hat mor skyl & resun whereby he may withstondyn and bewar of þe fendis gyle.” 52 When Dives counters that women often appear in court on adultery charges, Pauper offers a seemingly sympathetic response: “men ben nout so oftyn takyn in auoterie ne punchyd for auouterie as women ben, nout for þei ben lesse gylty but for þat þey ben mor gylty & mor myʒty.” They are in positions of authority such as “witnessis iugis & doerys to punchyn auouterie in woman,” and abuse their power if they allow their own sins to continue. 53

  In this passage and others, the text presents an idea of sin as socially conditioned, propagated in men by conditions of power, and an idea of sin as physiological, disposing women naturally to sin. Later, the text considers again the blameworthiness of women and men, their propensity to sin and grace in relation to their natural faculties. Dives poses the question to Pauper: “syth it is so þat man is mor principal in ordre of kende þan is woman & mor stable & myȝty & of heyer discrecion be cours of kende þan is woman,” why are women more often chaste and stable in virtuous living than men? 54 Pauper responds that despite their physiological weaknesses, women have more grace, because they lack men’s pride: “men trostyn to mychil in hemself & hout trostyn in God as þei autȝtyn to do. Women knowynge her frelte trostyn nout in hemself but only in God & comendyn hem mor to God þan don men, and þey dredyn mor to offendyn God þan do men ” 55 As in the case of pride, physiological superiority is a moral liability, even when this physiological superiority should create a virtuous advantage.

  The author of Dives and Pauper is a unique voice in the discussion of physiology and culpability for lechery. Not only does the text present social and cultural rather than biological reasons for the prosecution of women for lecherous acts, but goes as far as to blame Adam more than Eve. As mankind was lost through Adam, Christ became a man and not a woman. 56 Although little is known about the text or its anonymous author, it survives in at least 11 manuscripts and is featured in at least one heresy trial. 57 Whether Dives and Pauper is heretical or not, it is fair to say that its author’s views on women and lechery are unconventional. 58 In a more typical example, John Bromyard writes that adultery is worse in a woman, appealing to biological arguments: “an adulterous man does not disinherit his own sons, but the sons of him with whose wife he sins, and it is more against nature to exercise cruelty upon one’s own than upon others.” 59

  Notes

  1.Augustine, City of God I.16, 18.

  2.In Fasciculus Morum, p. 717.

  3.Kent, “On the Track of Lust,” p. 365.

  4.Ockham, Quodlibetal Questions, Vol. 1, pp. 154–156.

  5.Amundsen, “The Medieval Catholic Tradition,” from Caring and Curing, ed. Numbers and Amundsen, p. 87.

  6. Councils and Synods, ed. Powicke and Cheney, p. 1287; trans. in Pastors and the Care of Souls, ed. Shinners and Dohar, p. 180. Such balance between thoroughness and discretion is conventional in penitential discussions of sex. For example Peraldus advises “there is to be great caution in speak
ing and preaching about this vice and in asking questions about it in confession so that nothing is revealed to men that might provide them an occasion for sinning.” See Pierre J. Payer, The Bridling of Desire: Views of Sex in the Later Middle Ages (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), p. 77.

  7.James A. Brundage, “Playing by the Rules: Sexual Behaviour and Legal Norms in Medieval Europe,” in Desire and Discipline: Sex and Sexuality in the Premodern West, ed. Konrad Eisenbichler and Jacqueline Murray (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996), pp. 23–41.

  8.Young, p. 171.

  9.“Templum domini,” lines 599–600.

  10.“A Treatise of Ghostly Battle,” p. 432.

  11.Gower, Mirrour de l’Omme, pp. 132–3.

  12.Ibid., p. 133.

  13.In a fifteenth-century poem on the seven deadly sins, “luxuria is a lither mormale … my brokyll body he bryngith yn bale,” evoking the symptomatic abscesses of leprosy. When the “rebaude” rises on the faithful, they should take the herb “castitats fre” that will “drayne” the sin. “Medicines to Cure the Deadly Sins,” lines 109–111.

  14. Man and the Beasts: De Animalibus Books 22–26, trans. James J. Scanlan (Binghampton: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1987), p. 60.