An educational approach to emotions at the crossroads of Galenism and Reformation: Melanchthon’s "Commentarius de anima" (1540) and "Initia doctrinae physicae"(1549)

Emotions, in Renaissance educational theory, were considered to be the result of both a person’s temperament and an excess in their humors. Such understandings were based on reinterpretations of classical Galenic medicine and the Platonic tradition, which were circulating amongst the intellectual spheres of European society. The mastery and virtuous development of emotions were therefore considered to be of major educational concern during the period in question. Early reformers, such as Philip Melanchthon, had great interest in the interplay between education, character and the body, considering medicine necessary to understand the human soul and its movements. Melanchthon’s Commentarius de anima (1540) and the textbook Initia doctrinae physicae (1549) combined Galenic medical foundations with Vesalius’ anatomical innovations in order to interpret the soul (including the emotions) through a doctrinal context where an individual’s complexion was the expression of God’s will and predestination. Nevertheless, Melanchthon proposed that education could act on the body if it was paired with medical knowledge; considering emotions to be a part of humanity that could not be managed by appealing to the rational soul or intellectual faculties. Within such understandings of the corporeal self, the shaping and controlling of emotions was therefore believed to be an important and necessary part of the salvation of one’s soul.