MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS OR LOVE AND COMFORT IN MARRIAGE To Promote Harmony in Married Life, to Avoid Avoidable Friction, to Remove Removable Causes of Discord, to Help Strengthen and Make Permanent the Foundation of Love is the Purpose of this Book M' BY WILLIAM J.c ROBINSON, PH.G.,M.D. Chief of the Department of Genito-Vrinary Diseases and Dermatology, Bronx Hospital and Dispensary; Editor of The Critic and Guide; Author of: Treatment of Sexual Impotence and Other Sexual Disorders in Men and Women ; Treatment of Gon- orrhea ; Woman, Her Sex and Love Life; Sexual Problems of To-day; Sex Knowledge for Men and Boys; Birth Control or the Limitation of Off- spring ; Never Told Tales; Stories of Love and Life; Eugenics and Marriage; Sex Knowledge for Women and Girls; Sex-Morality—Past, Present and Future; Sexual Truths; Prescription Incompatibilities, etc. ; Ex-President of the Berlin Anglo-American Medical Society, Fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine; Fellow of the American Medical Association; Member of the New York State Medical Society, Medical Society of the County of New York, Harlem Medical Association, American Medical Editors’ Association, American Urological Association, Internationale Gesellschaft fiir Sexual- forschung, British Society for the Study of Sex Psychology, American Association for the Ad- vancement of Science, etc., etc. 1922 CRITIC AND GUIDE COMPANY 12 MT. MORRIS PARK WEST NEW YORK CITY TO E. S. SHEPHERD WHO IS OF THE SALT OF THE EARTH AND MY FRIEND W. J. R. PREFACE I have written and published a number of books. Every one of them was written with a definite purpose—every one of them had a distinct message. I have never been a great believer in “art for art’s sake,” at least not so long as millions of men, women and children die of starvation and disease and go insane with mental agony. My motto, “No book has a right to exist that has not for its purpose the betterment of mankind, by affording either useful instruc- tion or healthful recreation,” has been no empty sound with me. Usefulness, service to mankind, should be keynote of every author during these days of physical and psychic agony. I know that to the idler, to the sneering cynic, the demand that a book be useful, utilitarian, sounds ridicu- lous. But praised be the fates, there are still some people left who make “usefulness,” “service,” their guiding prin- ciple. I am one of them. Perhaps it is because I am no artist, and have no style, and thus make a virtue out of necessity. Perhaps. Be it as it may, every one of my books, fictional or scientific, has been a useful book, cover- ing a certain subject, answering in a definite way a certain number of questions. But of the usefulness of none of my books have I been so convinced as I am of the usefulness, the practical every day usefulness of this volume. I know that it will accomplish a great deal of good. William J. Robinson, M. D. 12 Mount Morris Park West, New York. July 25, 1921. D. D. D. In the rather trifling but pleasant little comedy, “Call The Doctor/’ a pretty actress plays the doctor. But the doctor she plays so charmingly is not a medical doctor, but a Doctor of Domestic Difficulties. She visits houses in which there is friction between husband and wife, tries to discover the causes of the disharmony, and by clever and tactful advice brings the couples together so that they may live happily ever after. Of course to the audience the thing seems fantastic; just a silly jest to laugh over. They do not know that this is a serious matter, and has been seriously considered by many physicians as well as sociologists. In fact a small but growing number of physicians have for years been acting in the capacity of confidential ad- visers to unhappy couples, and many a home on the point of disruption has been repaired and strengthened and per- manently perpetuated through their advice. One of the functions of the Berlin Institute of Sexual Science is to examine the difficulties, physical and psychic, of couples on the point of separation or divorce and to give appropriate advice where such advice can be given. In the future, D.D.D. will be an important degree and its bearers will be considered of greater value to the com- munity than those with the title D.D. It will be a hard degree to earn; its bearers will have to be thorough physiologists, sexologists and psychologists. Personally, I should want no higher title. May this volume go forth to serve the purpose for which it was written, namely to serve as a Doctor of Domestic Difficulties in families where services of such a doctor may be needed. Married Life and Happiness CONTENTS Preface Dedication PART L LOVE AND COMFORT IN MAR- RIAGE TA9M Chapter I. Introduction 17 Chapter II. The Institution of Marriage. Is the Maternal Instinct Universal? Does Evert Woman Want or Need a Man? “Absolute Lib- erty” 19 Chapter III. The Criminal Lack of Preparation for Marriage. The Coming Change 24 Chapter IV. What the Candidate for Marriage Must Do. Venereal Disease. What to do When Veneral Disease Is Present .... 27 Chapter V. Sexually Potent and Impotent. The Effect of the Husband’s Impotence on the Wife. Two Types of Impotence. Impotence as a Cause of Divorce 31 Chapter VI. Fertility and Sterility 37 Chapter VII. Minor Ailments. Hernia or Rupture, Hemorrhoids or Piles. Acne. Nasal Catarrh. Bad Odor from Mouth. Offensive Perspira- tion. Snoring 38 Chapter VIII. Birth Control. Knowledge of Pre- venceptive Measures the Most Important Knowledge for Married People. Ignorance of Birth Control Measures Criminal. All Ob- jections Against Birth Control Answered. In- formation About Birth Control Now Easily Obtainable 43 CONTENTS FAQB Chapter IX. Behavior During the First or Wed- ding Night. Important Advice. Behavior After. Erogenous Zones. Periodicity in Woman’s Sex Desire 60 Chapter X. The Subject of a Definite Allowance for a Wife. The Question of Alimony ... 63 Chapter XI. Fifteen Invaluable Paragraphs for the Guidance of the Bridegroom and Husband 68 Chapter XII. The Female Partner in the Trans- action—the Wife. Rules of Guidance for the Wife. Cleanliness. Daintiness. Obesity. Clean Mouth. Excessive Perspiration. Clothes and Underwear. Cooking. Bringing Up the Chil- dren. Prudery. Relations for Propagation Only. Housecleaning. Sexual Frigidity . . 75 Chapter XIII. Corsets 85 Chapter XIV. Cosmetics—Paint, Powder and Rouge 87 Chapter XV. Excessive Sensuality or the Woman Vampire 89 Chapter XVI. Sex Morality. Should There Be a Single Standard of Morality for Men and Women? 93 Chapter XVII. General Advice How to Avoid Fric- tion and Quarrels and How to Promote Peace, Harmony and Comfort 96 Chapter XVIII. To Avoid Misunderstanding. An Overheard Conversation 99 PART II. TREATMENT OF MINOR ILLS, AILMENTS, ACCIDENTS AND DEFECTS Introduction to Part II 105 Some Simple Remedies Which Should Be in Every Home 107 Treatment of Obesity 109 Treatment of Constipation 118 Treatment of Wind and Rumbling in the Bowels 123 Treatment of Hemorrhoids or Piles 125 Care of the Teeth 127 Treatment of Bad Odor from the Mouth .... 130 CONTENTS PAQ1 Treatment of Chronic Catarrh of the Nose . . . 133 Treatment of Cold in the Head 134 For Sore Throat 134 How to Break Up a General Cold 134 Treatment of Leucorrhea or Whites 136 Treatment of Cracked Nipples 138 Treatment of Liver Spots 138 Treatment of Pimples on the Face 139 Treatment of Freckles 140 Treatment of Pimples on the Back 141 Treatment of Red Nose 142 Treatment of Eczema 142 Treatment of Ringworm 144 Treatment of Eczema of the Face in Children . . 144 Treatment of Psoriasis 146 Falling Out of the Hair and Baldness .... 147 When the Eyelids Stick Together 148 Treatment of Styes 149 Treatment of “Burning” Eyes 150 Treatment of Red Eyelids 150 Treatment of Black Eye 152 Treatment of Itching in the Ear 153 How to Remove Wax from the Ear 153 How to Remove Insects from the Ear 155 Treatment of Toothache 156 Treatment of Dandruff 157 How to Remove Superfluous Hair 158 Hairy Arms 160 Treatment of Burns and Scalds 161 Treatment of Bruises and Contusions 163 Treatment of Sprains 164 What to do When Baby Gets a Fit 165 Treatment of Colic 166 Treatment of Bedwetting 167 Treatment of Painful Teething 168 Treatment of Fainting 169 Treatment of Nosebleed 169 Treatment of Worms: Tape Worms, Round Worms and Seat Worms 170 Treatment of Chafing and Prickly Heat .... 173 CONTENTS PAGE Treatment of Nettle Rash 173 When Baby Cuts Its Finger 174 When Baby Gets a Splinter 174 Treatment of Offensive Perspiration of the Feet (also of the Armpits and Palms of the Hands) 175 Treatment of Warts 176 Treatment of Corns 177 Treatment of Bunions 178 Treatment of Chilblains 178 Hernia or Rupture. Varicocele 180 Treatment of Snoring 181 Treatment of the Itch. (Scabies) 182 Treatment of Lice on the Head and Body .... 183 Treatment of “Crabs” 184 Treatment of Poison Ivy 186 Treatment of Bites and Stings of Insects . . . 187 How to Prevent Mosquito Bites 188 How to Get Rid of Bedbugs and Roaches .... 189 What to Do in Cases of Poisoning 191 PART III. MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES Tragedies in a Sexologist’s Practice 194 Are Drugs Ever Necessary 208 Proprietary and Patent Medicines 217 About Self-Treatment 218 How Much Shall We Eat and What 222 Lazy Children 224 The Habit of Reading 225 About Catching Cold 228 Cold Baths 229 Separate Beds 230 About the Treatment of Sexual Impotence . . . 231 The Seven Requirements of an Ideal Prevenceptive 233 Harmless and Infallible Means for the Prevention of Conception 234 A Letter Worth Reading—from a Happy Couple . 236 What Other Sex-Books to Read 240 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS CHAPTER I INTKODUCTION Announce a lecture dealing with the “novel” subject of How to be Happy Though Married, and every available seat in the lecture hall will be taken. Perhaps even standing room will be at a premium. Men and women, those that are married and those that are about to be, are pathetically eager for knowledge which will show them how to avoid discord and how to increase harmony and happiness in married life. The marriage tie binds the great majority of the adult populations of every civilized and semi-civilized country, and by far the vast majority of people, I maintain, are anxious that the tie that binds them remain unbroken, but bind them in an agree- able and acceptable manner. Separation or divorce, while in some cases unavoidable, and in some cases the lesser of two evils, is, neverthe- less, considered a misfortune, and rightly so. It is proof that one or both of the partners had 18 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS made a mistake, had exercised poor judgment. And in every case of divorce or separation both parties feel somewhat humiliated and guilty, though perhaps not to the same degree. Yes, even the innocent party feels himself or herself partly guilty for the failure of the marital ex- periment. And as a general rule both parties are deeply anxious for information which may instruct them in the proper guidance of the matrimonial bark. In my lectures on Sexology to men and women, the most popular lecture has been the one that constitutes the basis of the first part of this volume. The people who crowded the hall to listen to this lecture will testify that at its con- clusion I was usually “mobbed” by men and women rushing on the platform, showering me with questions and asking me to promise that this particular lecture at least would appear in book form. I gave the promise and I am here fulfilling it. A good deal has been added to the lecture to make it more complete, more practically useful. Nothing has been taken away. And the conver- sational lecture style has been retained. I have also added a number of practical for- mulas and prescriptions which can be used by every intelligent man or woman in the prevention and treatment of minor ailments, accidents and defects. They constitute Part Two of the book. This part of the book will render it of additional THE INSTITUTION OF MARRIAGE 19 value, particularly to people who live away from medical centers and cannot have the services of a competent and conscientious, or of any, physician. CHAPTER II THE INSTITUTION OF MARRIAGE; “ABSOLUTE” LIBERTY Will the institution of marriage as we know it to-day exist forever? No one can tell. Some believe it will; others believe it will not. The conservatives believe that it will continue in its present form, without any change, forever and ever; the liberal believes that its essential fea- tures will remain, but that it will undergo many important transformations. The radical, partic- ularly the so-called ultra-radical, believes that marriage as we know it to-day is a decaying insti- tution and will cease to exist within a compara- tively brief period. We know that the wTish is often the father of the thought and that people often believe that certain things are going to hap- pen or not to happen because they want them or don’t want them to happen. Whatever your opinions may be on the subject, the fact remains that marriage, the monogamic marriage, is with us and will remain with us for some time to come. Most likely it will outlive every one of us here in this hall. Being with us as a practically universal institution we have to MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS make the best of it. It is silly to keep on con- tinually kicking against pin pricks. The proper thing is to do away with the pin pricks. The institution of marriage is here; we have to deal with it, and it is the task of the wise man and the humanitarian to see if we cannot do away with or minimize its disagreeable features, if we cannot level or at least partially smooth the rough road, if we cannot make married people, if not perfectly happy, at least as happy as they can be under present conditions. The object of to-night’s lecture is to see if we cannot find some means to “Decrease Misery and Increase Happiness Among Married Men and Women.” But, as in order to increase happiness among the married we have to start with the unmarried, this lecture becomes of equal impor- tance both to the latter and the former. Let me state at the outset that it is impossible, absolutely impossible, to decrease the misery or increase the happiness of all married people. For there are married people who should never have been married. I want at the very outset to stamp as a falsehood the statement that all men and all ■women should be, ought to be, or must be married, or that all men and all women are better off when married than when single. This is a biologic, physiologic and psychologic falsehood. As I have said so many times before, a great deal of this world’s misery arises from the stupid THE INSTITUTION OF MARRIAGE 21 and vicious attempt of legislators, theologians, moralists, social up-lifters and other ignoramuses to put all mankind in the same mould. They seem never to be able to learn that human beings are not stones or pieces of wood, and cannot be handled alike, but must be treated individually and must be permitted to act individually. To take but one or two examples: The Maternal Instinct. You will hear it said over and over again, you will see it repeated in books and tracts and philosophies, in novels and in poems, that the maternal instinct is a universal instinct, present in every woman’s breast. As an absolute statement it is false. It is true that most women would like to be mothers. It is true that some women burn passionately with the desire to cuddle to their breast a child which they can call their own, but it is also true that there are a great many women who are quite indifferent to children, who do not care to have any; and there are still others who have a perfect horror of being mothers, who detest children. Whatever the biologic reason for this condition may be, the fact is indisputable. Naturally, when such women marry and become mothers there is great misery all around. Such women should never have married, or if married, should never have become mothers. And to such women, if they are mothers, this lecture will prove of little value except that it may help them to understand them- 22 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS selves, and to know" just where the trouble lies and why they and those around them are so unhappy. Another Example. It is true that practically every woman needs an emotional outlet, but it is not true that every woman needs or wants a man. In fact, to some women men, not only one partic- ular man, that is their husband, but all men, are obnoxious and repulsive. When such a woman gets married there is the devil to pay; mere ad- vice cannot remedy the trouble. And to such women and to their husbands this lecture will not do much good except again, perhaps, in so far that it may help them to understand the nature of their trouble. Perhaps, understanding the nature of the trouble, they may become more tolerant toward one another and act in a more sensible manner. Knowledge alone is not a panacea against all ills. Understanding the nature of a trouble will not always do away with the trouble, but now and then it does help. Yes, we must bear in mind, bear it constantly, that there are men and women who, for various reasons, physical, mental, psychologic or moral, are absolutely unfit to be, should not be permitted to be, fathers and mothers. And there is a smaller class who, also for various reasons, are not fit to be husbands and wives, not fit to live in matrimony. Such people should never have mar- ried, or having married, should not only not have THE INSTITUTION OF MARRIAGE 23 permitted themselves to become progenitors, but should have separated at the earliest possible moment. But taking humanity in the mass, these people constitute only a minority, perhaps ten or twenty per cent. The majority of the people are fit to be parents, the trouble lying outside of them, that is, in the environment and our social-economic conditions and our artificial moral code, and above all, in ignorance—ignorance on the part of the man and the woman as to what factors are neces- sary in order to establish and to maintain a happy or at least a fairly happy relationship, a relation- ship which should last from the wedding day to the time when the angel with the black draught makes his appearance. And to such people this lecture or book, carefully read, will prove unques- tionably of benefit; it may be the turning point in the lives of many married couples; it may pre- vent a home on the point of disruption from being disrupted; it may bring people who have been drifting apart back into a closer union; it may help you to understand the causes of your quar- rels and bickerings, and headaches and sleepless- ness and restlessness and discontent and “wish- ing I was dead” and “wishing he or she were dead ”; in short, it will help to lift the veil of many of the mysterious causes of unhappiness in mar- ried life and it will help you, I trust, to decrease that unhappiness if you are really anxious to do 24 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS so. I say “if you are really anxious to do so,” because, strange as it may seem to the uninitiated, not every person is anxious to change his or her unhappy condition. Some people are only happy when they are miserable. But this may be too deep for you, so we will just let it go at that. The first thing people who are about to be married or who are married have to get through their heads is that there is no such thing as absolute liberty for the married; in fact, there is no such thing even for the unmarried. Absolute liberty is a chimera of the shallow thinker; abso- lute liberty can only be for a person if he is all alone on a desert island or continent. As soon as there is another person on that island there can be no further question of absolute liberty. The liberty of the one becomes limited by the equal rights of the other. If this is true of the un- married, it is certainly true of the married. Those who do not believe in the “give and take” principle should not get married. CHAPTER III THE CRIMINAL LACK OF PREPARATION FOR MARRIAGE*, THE COMING CHANGE The future historian who will deal with the absurdities of our present day so-called civiliza- tion will have a hard task before him; one man’s lifetime will he barely sufficient to deal with them UNPREPAREDNESS FOR MARRIAGE 25 all. For there are few things in our social-eco- nomic and political system that are not done stu- pidly, brutally, that are not topsy-turvy. I am sure that one of the absurdities that will strike the fu- ture chronicler’s sense of humor with particular force will be the manner in which men and women of our day entered the state of matrimony. Every profession, every vocation, every measly trade even, demands some sort of preparation, a prep- aration lasting from several months to several years. Into the marriage state alone, a state which is for life, a state which involves immedi- ately the life and happiness not of one but of two persons, and potentially of several more, people rush pell-mell, haphazard, without any prepara- tion whatever. Of course, the answer in your mind, no doubt, is: people have done so for thousands of years and got along. Yes, got along, but how? Have you observed the disillusionments, the heartaches, the disappointments? Have you measured the disgust, the indifference, the resentment, the mu- tual ill-will, nay, the deep hatred, the desire for injury and revenge? Have you estimated the amount of ill-health, the grief, the pain, the daily suffering, the nightly tossing and restlessness? Have you counted the hysterical outbreaks ? Have you any idea of the number of neurotic wives and neurasthenic husbands ? Have you estimated the disrupted homes, the number of separated and 26 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS divorced couples? Do you know the number of those who have committed suicide and murder, and the number of those who are even worse than dead, namely, those who are in the insane asylums ? Yes, got along! Yes, got along the way some ignorant mothers get along in the bringing up of their infants. You know the middle-aged woman who was advising her young neighbor about the method of feeding her baby. When the young mother seemed to be skeptical, the older woman said with indignation: “I ought to know how to bring up children. Ain’t I buried nine of them ? ’ ’ Yes, got along! People get along somehow in a prison and come out alive. But is such a life w'orth living? And I assert and could readily prove that the lives of many married couples, particularly married women, is not very different from, not much better than, life in prison. And one of the causes—I do not say the sole cause, because this would be untrue—one of the causes of this discontent, unhappiness and tragedy of married life, is ignorance, lack of proper prep- aration. The time will come, and it is not far distant, when every man and every woman contemplating marriage will take a preparatory course. Whether such a course will be given in high school or col- lege or by the family physician or by specialists in the subject, remains to be seen. Who imparts VENEREAL DISEASE 27 the knowledge is not so important. The impor- tant thing is that it be imparted and imparted properly. A foreshadowing of the coming preparatory matrimonial course is seen even now in many young men, with whom there is nothing the mat- ter, but who come to the physician to find out if it is all right for them to get married, and to get advice on the proper behavior on the wedding night, the proper manner of performing the sex act, the proper frequency of sex relations, the proper method of preventing conception, etc. And what I tell the patient, male or female, in the privacy of the office, I will try to tell you here, as far as it can be told in public print. CHAPTER IV VENEREAL DISEASE; WHAT TO DO WHEN VENEREAL DISEASE IS PRESENT We will begin with the man. You know man was created first; woman came after him; so we will start with him. The first thing that a man who intends to be- come married should be sure of is that he is free from transmissible venereal disease. This goes without saying. This is a conditio sme qua non. It is a requirement that is already obligatory in many States and which no doubt will soon become obligatory in all States. And it is pleasant to be 28 MABRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS able to state that even in many States where this requirement does not exist, men voluntarily try to find out whether or not they are free from vene- real disease. True, a good many men come rather late to get the information. I have had people come to me for an examination as to their free- dom from venereal disease three or four days before the date of the wedding. And recently I have had a man come to me on a Saturday morn- ing for a venereal examination whose wadding was to be Sunday night. If the man is found free from all traces of venereal disease, well and good. But suppose he is found to harbor gonococci; suppose he has a bad prostate, or suppose he shows suspicious symptoms of syphilis? What can be done for such a man in twenty-four hours ? Men who con- template marriage and who are not sure as to their freedom from venereal disease should come for an examination at least two or three months before the expected event. But suppose a man does come a few days before the date decided for the wedding and we find in him a possibility of transmitting venereal dis- ease, and he tells us that delaying the wedding is entirely out of the question, that he would rather disappear from the scene altogether than suggest or agree to such a step. In such cases we have to do the best we can. We advise him not to have any sex relations for several weeks, VENEREAL DISEASE 29 or have sex relations only with the nse of a pro- phylactic, and in the meantime to treat himself vigorously. This acts satisfactorily; at least I know of no case where infection had ever taken place. Should every candidate for marriage subject himself to the Wassermann test? Where a man is absolutely sure that he never had any symptom, sign or suspicion of syphilis and he feels and looks to be in perfect health, it is not necessary. But if there is a history of the slightest pimple on the genital organs, or of sore throat, of a rash on the body, of temporary falling out of the hair, or of headaches, pains in the bones, etc., it is best to take a Wassermann. The taking of the Wasser- mann test is a trifling thing; it is no more painful than the prick of a needle and takes but half a minute. And the feeling of security is worth the little trouble and trifling expense. While if the Wassermann is found to be positive, the patient should certainly know it. A Wassermann should also be taken in cases of all men whose fathers or mothers suffered from peculiar symptoms, died from apoplexy, were queer, or were confined, even if temporarily, in an insane asylum. We know that locomotor ataxia and softening of the brain are the result almost exclusively of syphilis, and a person may have shown no symptoms and carry in himself the taint of hereditary syphilis. I have known some very, very sad cases of young 30 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS men who lived an exemplary life, who had no sex relations whatever, who were brought up to lead a strictly chaste life, and who were nevertheless stricken down by a mysterious malady which, on examination, proved to be syphilis which they had inherited from their fathers. So on the whole, it is best to make a thorough examination, for it is always best to be on the safe side. As to people who knowing that they have or had had venereal disease and who neglect to have themselves examined, get married and infect their wives, language fails to characterize such people properly. Infecting the wife with venereal dis- ease should not only be considered sufficient cause for the annulment of the marriage with an allow- ance of substantial alimony, but should be con- sidered a criminal offense. In fact, the infection of another person with venereal disease, whether that person be a wife, a friend or a prostitute, should be considered a criminal offense and the guilty party should, besides, be liable to heavy damages. Infecting a person with venereal dis- ease, thus making him or her an invalid, perhaps, for life, is a greater offense than assault and battery. POTENCY AND IMPOTENCE 31 CHAPTER V POTENCY AND IMPOTENCE; THE EFFECT OF THE HUS- BAND’S IMPOTENCE ON THE WIFE; TWO TYPES OF IMPOTENCE The next thing to making sure that he is free from venereal disease, the candidate for marriage should determine whether his potency is or is not normal. Of course, for men who have indulged in sexual relations before marriage, this is an easy matter. They themselves know whether they are potent or not. But with people who have re- mained chaste, this is not always an easy matter to determine; but still, in the vast majority of cases, it can be determined without much diffi- culty. The history of the case alone is some- times quite sufficient to decide the point. The manner of sensations during latter-day mastur- bation—the frequency, character and quality of nocturnal emissions—the way certain sexual stim- uli affect him—whether he ever wakes in the morning with erections—the effect of prostatic massage, etc.—all these things are sufficient to determine fairly accurately the man’s erectile power. As to whether or not the ejaculation time is normal, this cannot always be accurately deter- mined. And in cases where the question is of great importance to the man, an actual trial can alone furnish the answer. The importance of sexual potency to the sta- 32 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS bility, permanence, happiness and contentment of the married state, I have emphasized times with- out number in various articles, editorials, books and lectures. And I can do no better than prac- tically to repeat here what I said on another occa- sion.* I consider sexual impotence the greatest mis- fortune that a man can inflict on a healthy, normal woman. It is a greater misfortune for a woman to have an impotent than a venereally infected husband. This statement which I made several times before is apt to he and was misunderstood and criticized. I repeat it now with all possible emphasis. But in order to avoid misunderstand- ings, I will offer a few words of explanation. I do not mean to say that venereal infection is less of a misfortune than unsatisfied sexual desire. What I mean to say is this: when a husband sutlers from venereal disease he can, by a little instruction, easily be taught how to avoid infect- ing his wife, but little can be done for the wife whose husband is suffering with complete impo- tence of long standing, due perhaps to organic causes. With the exception of the sufferers themselves, the laity has no idea how much misery women undergo on account of impotence in the male; it is women’s luck that so many of them are sexually frigid or anesthetic. But those who are sexually * See the author’s Sexual Problems of To-Day. POTENCY AND IMPOTENCE normal or—mercy on them—above the normal, how they do suffer! Even the family physician is seldom aware of the true state of affairs, for they are ashamed to tell him. It is only to the specialist that they pour out their hearts. The long sleepless nights, the restless tossing, the hot, burning longing, the splitting headache, the dry throat, the pain in the ovarian region, etc., etc.—have I painted the picture correctly? And the lord and master who has left the wife in this unsatisfied, irritated condition lies near and sleeps peacefully, or snores stentoriously. And if this condition of ungratified sexual desire lasts, we get anemia, a dingy complexion, black rings under the eyes, and generally premature old age. But the husband is often blissfully unaware of all this. The wife herself often does not know what the trouble is, and if she does, she wouldn’t tell him. It would be so unwomanly. It is indeli- cate, it is shameful for a woman to confess to possessing such an unladylike thing as a sexual instinct, a sexual desire. And so she goes on suffering, unless she happens to belong to an aris- tocratic or ultra-radical circle. TWO TYPES OF IMPOTENCE Men who are impotent when they enter mat- rimony BELONG TO TWO DISTINCT TYPES. To the first belongs the pure young man, who is often referred to sneeringly as goody-goody, who has 34 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS no intercourse up to the date of his marriage, but who is either addicted to masturbation or suffers with frequent pollutions. He comes to the mar- riage-bed undefiled, he will not infect his wife with any venereal disease, but her marital life will be a hell on earth, nevertheless. The second type is diametrically opposite. That type is rep- resented by the man, anywhere between twenty- five and fifty-five years of age, who has led a pretty free sexual life—he may or may not have had half a dozen attacks of gonorrhea—who has become weakened by excess, for whom sexual promiscuity has therefore lost its fascinations, and who decides to settle down and make some woman “happy.” On account of the man’s ex- perience in matters sexual, that happy woman’s life may not be quite so miserable as that of the goody-goody’s wife, but it is often wretched enough to make her pray for deliverance, and to regret bitterly that her husband did not select some other woman to make “happy.” I dwell so much on the sexual relations between husband and wife because I consider sexual health as the very basis of the happiness of the home. You know—if you don’t, I do—that I am not an extremist, am not given to making sensational statements, unsupported by facts; but the state- ment which I am going to make may seem to some of you extreme and sensational. Those, however, POTENCY AND IMPOTENCE 35 who have given the subject a careful, deep study- will corroborate and support me. I make the unequivocal statement that prac- tically every case of divorce has for its basis lack of sexual satisfaction. There may be numerous other causes on the surface, but the basic, under- lying, predisposing cause is sexual impotence, sex- ual dissatisfaction, sexual mismating. If there is perfect mutual sexual satisfaction—and when I say satisfaction, I mean not only physical but also emotional satisfaction—then all those causes which in sexually mismated couples lead to di- vorce, either do not make their appearance at all, or if they do make their appearance, they are glossed over, overlooked, and forgotten. A wife who is thoroughly satisfied and is treated kindly and in a comrade-like manner will overlook many things in her husband; if she knows to a certainty that he occasionally breaks the so-called marriage vows, she will either make believe that she knows nothing about it, or she will give him her blessing. The wife who sues an otherwise ideal husband for divorce, simply because he occasionally strays from the straight path, is an exceedingly rare phenomenon; she can only be found in a perverted religious bigot, and does not deserve much of our sympathy. Now, why is it that so many men, who would rather chop their right hands off than marry when suffering with a venereal disease in the infectious MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS stage, give no thought to the condition of their sexual potency? It is because the opinion is still general that a woman has, or should have, no sexual desire, or at any rate, that her purely sexual life is a secondary, unimportant matter, about which she herself cares little, and about which the husband needs care still less. You know my opinion on the subject. You know that I do not believe that the woman is exactly the same sexually as the man. You know that I be- lieve that, generally speaking, the sexual instinct in the human female is weaker than it is in the male, and awakens in full force at a much later period. But saying this is very far from denying the existence of a strong sex instinct in the fe- male; it is very far from denying that this in- stinct needs regular natural gratification. It is not even incompatible with the statement that many women are as passionate as any man can ever be, some of them being constantly smoulder- ing volcanoes. And all these facts are cruelly ignored by a large majority of the male sex. So utterly impotent are some men, that we know of a number of cases of women who had been married several months to several years and were still retaining their virginity. There are cases of women with intact hymens after ten years of married life. We know women who have been married a number of years, ten, fifteen, twenty-five, and during the entire period have not STERILITY 37 had one natural satisfying relationship. What the nervous and physical condition of such women is, can be better imagined than described. Lucky the husband if the wife is innocent and unsophis- ticated enough not to suspect what the trouble is. And the misfortune is, that the man may be impotent and still keep on impregnating his wife at frequent intervals. For impotence does not always go hand in hand with sterility, and vice versa. One may exist in a strong measure with- out the other. CHAPTER VI FERTILITY AND STERILITY After determining his freedom from venereal disease and his potency, the man should make sure whether he is fertile or sterile; whether he is capable of begetting children or not. I do not say that a man who is sterile, who is incapable of becoming a father should never get married, but if he does he should do so with his eyes open, and above all, he should not conceal his condition from his prospective wife. Some women do not care a particle as to whether they are going to have children or not. The happiest couple I have ever seen was one in which the male partner was found to be com- pletely sterile. They seemed to be overwhelmed with joy. It meant that they could live in corn- MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS parative comfort without bothering about the trouble and expense of bringing up children and without having to have recourse to the always somewhat troublesome, not always esthetic, and now and then unsafe and unreliable prevencep- tives. Yes, to some couples the knowledge that they are permanently sterile is like a message from heaven, for as I mentioned before, there are many men and women—a much greater number than the average man suspects—who are completely de- void of the parental instinct. But there are some men and women, particularly women, in whom the parental instinct is extremely strong. We still have with us many of the old fashioned women who marry primarily for the sake of be- coming mothers, and when a sterile man marries such a woman, he inflicts upon her an irreparable injury. I therefore say that after the questions of freedom from venereal disease and of potency, the question of sterility must be answered in the affirmative or the negative. Fortunately, the de- termination of a man’s fertility or sterility is one of the simplest of matters, and the question can be decided in the period of about one minute. CHAPTER VII MINOR DEFECTS AND AILMENTS After the three primary fundamental points, about the man’s freedom from venereal disease, MINOR DEFECTS 39 his potency and fertility, have been determined, the candidate for marriage should have himself overhauled generally and he should put his entire body in as good a condition as possible. A man who has been drafted into the army for the pur- pose of murdering his fellowmen, is, if found to possess certain defects, sent to the hospital and put into first-class shape before he is shipped to the battlefield. Married life is at least as im- portant as is the business of wholesale assassina- tion, and there is no reason why every prospective husband should not rid himself of certain defects before his wedding day, defects which may de- crease his marital efficiency, if you know what I mean, or make the wife feel unpleasant or dis- gusted. I do not deal in generalities or platitudes, and I will therefore be specific, quite specific in fact. I will not deal with major diseases such as tuber- culosis, heart disease, tumors, diabetes; it is understood that a person suffering with any of those diseases is not a fit candidate for marriage. I will refer only to minor conditions which in themselves do not disqualify one for entering the state of matrimony, and which can be easily re- moved. Hernia. I will first take up the subject of hernia or rupture. This is a very common con- dition, can be easily relieved and there is no ex- cuse for a man suffering with hernia to get mar- 40 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS ried while in that condition. A truss is at no time an esthetic apparatus; it is a nuisance to have to remove it every night and put it on every morning, and it decidedly diminishes a man’s effi- ciency. But not only does it interfere with a man’s general efficiency, it also interferes both psychically and physically with a man’s potency. The man is afraid to “let himself go.” If the hernia is a scrotal one, it may really interfere with a man’s ability to have sexual relations, and it is in general a great nuisance. You know that I am very conservative about advising operations, but a hernia should always be attended to. The operation is not a serious one; in the vast major- ity of instances it is successful and it is worth the trouble and time spent upon it. I do not mean to say that every kind of hernia necessarily de- mands a surgical operation; certain kinds of hernia may be cured by an injection. But what- ever the method of cure, it should be cured before the man goes to the altar or to City Hall. Women do not always say what they feel, and wisely so. They are guided by the principle that what cannot be cured must be endured. They do not like to criticize their husbands because they know that men are very touchy to criticism, par- ticularly when it emanates from their wives, and so they keep silent and make the best of it. But I know that women feel a great aversion to rup- tures and trusses. I know of one woman who left MINOR DEFECTS 41 her husband and loathed sexual relations and the touch of men in general, on account of the shock which she experienced on first perceiving her hus- band who had a rather large scrotal hernia. The reality was so different from the ideal that she pictured in her imagination, that it simply knocked her over. And all the time of the en- gagement she had no suspicion that her husband was suffering from hernia. Hemorrhoids or Piles. This is another dis- agreeable subject and is also something that a man should attend to before getting married. It is not only a nuisance; a hemorrhoidal condition greatly contributes to a person’s irritability, quarrelsomeness and depression. Also, it some- how or other sows a feeling of contempt for the hemorrhoidal sufferer. By all means let all men and women who have the misfortune to suffer with hemorrhoids, external or internal, have them attended to before they enter the bonds of matri- mony. Not all varieties of hemorrhoids demand an operation, and it is not an operation that I advise in each case. I say: let them be attended to. Whether medicinally, by injection, by ligation or by operation, is not the important thing. The important thing is to be rid of them. Acne. Acne is not a serious condition, but some men’s backs are covered with pimples and warts of various shapes and sizes. It is not a serious matter, but the back does not present a 42 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS very esthetic appearance, and does not serve to increase the wife’s esthetic pleasure or libido. And as the condition can be easily cured or re- moved, there is no reason why it should not be attended to. All men of the present day are not Greek Apollos or Adonises, no more than the women are Venuses and Junos, and certain con- ditions cannot be helped, but at least certain things that can be remedied should be remedied; disabilities that can be removed should be removed. Snoring seems too absurd a thing to discuss seriously, and yet I have known cases where this condition has been an important factor in con- tributing to the discontent, friction and misery of the couple. Certain men or women, particularly men, snore so loudly that they make sleep an im- possibility for their partner, and I know couples who, when they travel, must take two separate rooms. This is no joke with the cost of rooms in fine hotels, both in this country and in Europe. Even on the steamers they must take separate staterooms. In the vast majority of cases snor- ing can be cured. Sometimes it is due to a bad catarrh of the nose or throat; sometimes to ex- cessive fat, and sometimes merely studying one’s position during sleep will help to remedy the trouble. Nasal and pharyngeal catarrh—bad odor from the mouth—offensive perspiration of the feet— BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 43 all these conditions should, as far as possible, be attended to before going to the altar. Their treatment, as well as the treatment of the other conditions referred to before, is outlined in plain language in the second part of the book. CHAPTER VIII BIRTH CONTROL OR PREVENCEPTION; KNOWLEDGE OF PREVENCEPTIVE MEASURES MOST IMPORTANT KNOWLEDGE FOR MARRIED PEOPLE; IGNORANCE OF PREVENCEPTION CRIMINAL; OBJECTIONS AGAINST BIRTH CONTROL FULLY ANSWERED. If the man has passed the doctor’s tests and has put himself in good physical shape otherwise, we give him a certificate with our blessing. But there is a little information he wants to have before the marriage act is consummated. The most important information he needs is the in- formation how to control the number of children, how to have as many children as they want and how to have them when they want them. To enter the marriage state without a knowledge of pre- venception or the means of birth control is crim- inal folly. Yes, it is not only stupid but distinctly criminal. For the thing that more than any one single factor contributes to the unhappiness of the family, to its poverty, often to its disruption, to the wife’s ill health and neurasthenia, is the too great number of children, and the spectre of 44 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS frequently repeated pregnancies which hovers above the bed of every married woman is the most horrible spectre of married life. It is well known that the writer is the pioneer of the modern birth control movement in this country. Of course there were people thousands of years ago who suggested limitation of the family, and killing off superfluous children was quite a common practice. And Malthus, at the end of the eighteenth century, brought the sub- ject of the limitation of the family prominently to the fore, hut his remedy, late marriage and ab- stinence, was a futile one. There were other ad- vocates of birth control, but the remedies sug- gested, such as coitus interruptus and coitus in- completus, were far from what we understand now when we speak of really prevenceptive meas- ures. Now and then there was an isolated phy- sician or layman who suggested the importance of the limitation of offspring, but it was the present writer who first systematically and persistently showed the vital importance to the individual and to the race of limited and controlled offspring, and he was the first to suggest the modern measures for practical birth control. Having advocated and discussed the subject of the limitation of off- spring, or birth control, or voluntary parenthood, for the past twenty years, I feel rather bored when called upon to bring out the arguments in favor of and to answer arguments opposed to it. BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 45 The whole subject has become somewhat stale, and particularly does it seem to me to be a waste of time to discuss it before any New York audi- ence. I doubt if there is a person who needs to be persuaded as to the great importance of birth control. If I were sent to Gopher Prairie to dis- cuss it before the Main Streeters I should be glad to do so, for to them ideas which seem to us hoary with antiquity are new, striking and shocking. The principal thing people who go to a birth con- trol lecture or buy a birth control book are inter- ested in are the actual means of prevenception and this, unfortunately, we cannot give in public. But nevertheless, assuming that there are some benighted individuals of either sex who may still doubt the beneficence of birth control, or who may be opposed to it for some fanciful reasons, I will devote a few pages to the subject. Tiresome as it may be, one must never miss an opportunity to spread the arguments for birth control, one of the most important measures for the welfare and happiness of the individual family and of the race. For a full discussion of the subject I shall be obliged to refer you to the author’s Birth Control or the Limitation of Offspring by the Prevention of Conception, or some of the other birth control books published by The Critic and Guide* Here * Birth Control or the Limitation of Offspring by the Pre- vention of Conception. By William J. Robinson, M.D. 46 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS I will present a brief summary of the arguments for and against the voluntary control of offspring. THE OBJECTIONS TO BIRTH CONTROL AND THE ANSWERS TO THOSE OBJECTIONS The objections to birth control are fourteen in number but I will prove that those fourteen ob- jections amount to as much as did the fourteen points of our beloved and esteemed ex-President, namely, to nothing, absolutely nothing. 1. The first point is the race suicide bugaboo. If Birth Control became universal the race would die out. The falsity of this argument has been shown time without number. It is sufficient to point to Holland and New Zealand where the use of prevenceptives is perfectly legal. Neither the Dutch nor the New Zealanders are a dying race. They are increasing in a nice, orderly manner. Their birth rate is smaller than that of some other races, but then their infantile mortality is correspondingly smaller. 2. Will lead to immorality. Ignorance of pre- venceptives is not a barrier against immorality. In certain instances the complete sexual act may be prevented, but instead of that certain perver- sions are indulged in which are of greater physical Small or Large Families. By Drs. Drysdale, Havelock Ellis, Robinson and Grotjahn. Population and Birth Control. A symposium bjy various authors. Uncontrolled Breeding or Fecundity vs. Civilization. By Ade- line More. BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 47 and psychic injury to the man and to the woman. And it is unnecessary to repeat that morality that is such by the virtue of fear only, is not morality at all, but simply cowardice. 3. It is injurious. This is unqualifiedly false. Certain methods of prevenception, particularly coitus interruptus and strong chemicals, are in- jurious ; but those are not the means which mod- ern birth control advocates advise. The modern means of birth control are absolutely harmless. 4. Produces sterility. This is just as untrue as the previous objection. I do not know of a single case where the use of modern prevencep- tives has produced sterility. As long as the means are employed, conception is prevented; when the means of prevenception are discarded, conception ensues. 5. Not absolutely safe. This is true; but this is not a valid objection. Most of our medicinal remedies are not sure in 100 per cent, of the cases, but still we would not on that account discard them. Quinine does not cure every single case of malaria, nor do mercury and salvarsan cure every single case of syphilis, but still we do not discard them on that account from our thera- peutic list. And besides, this objection is becom- ing less and less true with each year that passes by. Experimentation is giving us more and more perfect means of prevenception, and the time is not far distant—perhaps it is here al- 48 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS ready—when the means of prevenception will be practically 100 per cent, certain. 6. Would lead to excess in married life. Quite the contrary is the case. The use of prevencep- tives always involves some little care and trouble as well as expense, and thus serves as a check on excessive sexual relations; while the man who uses no prevenceptives and impregnates his wife every year or two, has during each pregnancy no further reason for care and caution and gen- erally indulges without measure. 7. Is against religion. I am not an authority on all the world’s religions, but I have inquired from a number of priests of various denomina- tions and they told me that there is nowhere in the Bible any distinct injunction against using means of prevention. And besides, those who believe that prevenception is against their re- ligion are at perfect liberty not to use such means. But they should not interfere with those whose religion or lack of religion does not prohibit the use of prevenceptives. 8. The use of prevenceptives is in itself im- moral. How an act can per se be moral or im- moral, passeth my understanding. Acts are to be considered in their relation to and their effect on human beings. An act that is injurious is immoral. An act that is not injurious is not immoral. There is nothing more immoral in using a prevenceptive than there is in using a douche BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 49 or a suppository in the treatment of leucorrhea. The objection is the silliest one of all so far re- ferred to and deserves no further consideration. 9. Leads to divorce. It is true that in certain cases children act as a tie that holds the parents together, but it is also true that in many instances, children, by increasing the struggle for existence, by causing nervous irritability in the mother and father, and in various other ways which it is not necessary to discuss here, are if not the primary at least the secondary cause of divorce. It is impossible, of course, to obtain reliable statistics on the subject, but in my opinion children quite as frequently pull the parents apart as keep them together. And do we want children to act as a chain which binds the parents against their will? Where love is no more, artificial chains may hold husband and wife together, but it is a question if such involuntary living together is preferable to living separately. 10. Here is a silly one—the silliest one yet. Birth Control, we are told, may prevent the birth of geniuses. And we are generally confronted with Lincoln. Just think of it, suppose Lincoln’s mother had used prevenceptives! On account of that Lincoln would not have been bom. And where would this country be now ? It would have been a calamity indeed, but when we think that the use of birth control might, as a counter bal- ance, have saved this country from such geniuses 50 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS as Lusk, Palmer and Burleson, we feel regret that prevenceptives were not better known sev- eral decades ago. No, that is really too silly an argument to waste too much time over. As the advocates of Birth Control do not advocate child- lessness, hut simply advise caution and modera- tion in begetting children, the fear is quite groundless. I feel quite certain that the universal use of prevenceptives, while diminishing the quan- tity, would decidedly improve the quality of the coming generations. 11. No children to support parents in old age. Who will support the parents in their old age if we have only one or two children or none at all? Well, first, it happens quite frequently that it is the parents who have to support the children even in their old age. But second, our system should not be so rotten that old people, after working thirty or forty years, should still be in need of outside support. They should have enough or the State should pension them liberally. 12. It would tend to lower the wages. It makes one laugh to hear the paid representatives of plutocracy weep over the possibility of wages being lowered because the parents have too few children. As a matter of fact quite the contrary is the case. The greater the supply of labor, the more prolific the proletariat, the lower the wages; the smaller the supply, the higher the wages. 13. It is unnatural. Here we meet with our BIRTH CONTROL BY PREYENCEPTION 51 old friend. Is it necessary to say that only a pig wallowing in the mud lives a perfectly natural life, and that the height of civilization can very well be measured by the number of unnatural things man does? From the moment we get up to the moment we go to bed we do unnatural things. Our washing and shaving is unnatural, our brushing the teeth is unnatural, our clothing is unnatural, our cooking the food is unnatural, our using artificial light is unnatural, our using of railroads, steamships and aeroplanes is un- natural, our employment of sanitary measures and disinfectants to destroy the germs of disease is unnatural—so why this outcry against the use of a mechanical or chemical measure to destroy one single spermatozoon out of many millions? Why is this any more unnatural than the other things I mentioned, and if it is unnatural, why is it more reprehensible than the other millions of unnatural things? I said “one single spermato- zoon” for, as is well known, only a single sperma- tozoon takes place in fecundation. During each intercourse about 100 million spermatozoa are ejaculated; 99 million and 999 thousand and 999 are destroyed anyway. They perish spontane- ously. So why is it a crime to render the one hundred-millionth spermatozoon ineffective? 14. We now come to the last but not by any means the least objection to Birth Control. And on this point I wish to spend a little more time 52 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS because it is of rather recent development. The objection is that Birth Control is anti-eugenic! Seeing that all the other objections to Birth Con- trol have been answered and answered in a man- ner that cannot be well denied or contradicted, the advocates of unlimited families are trying to make us believe that the use of prevenceptives would deprive the world of great men and would act in a dysgenic manner.* It is a rather bold as- sertion and I was curious to see how they would go about proving it. Here is the way they do it. They try to prove that the first children are in- ferior to the later children. They say that older parents are physically and mentally superior to younger parents, and that consequently the later children, born of older parents, inherit the phy- sique and mentality of these older parents, and are superior to the children which were first bom, when the parents were not yet fully developed physically and mentally. In my opinion this is all drivel, without any foundation in fact. It is sufficient to state that some investigators claim just the contrary, that the best and greatest children are derived from young parents. For instance, Dr. Vaerting of Berlin has written a little volume on the subject, in which he proves or thinks he proves, and he * I have discussed this point in Small or Large Families, but it will do no harm to repeat the principal points here, particu- larly as this book will have a much larger circulation than the former book. BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 53 gives a long list of names to substantiate bis con- tention, that geniuses are the children of young parents, and he would put the highest limit on fathers at forty-three years. This to me is also bosh. It is easy to prove anything by taking a few examples and disregarding the rest. But assuming even that the contention of the birth control oppo- nents that the first children are inferior to the later ones is true, it isn’t that the first children, per se, are inferior, it is because the parents are too young. And this can be easily remedied by just the means that we advocate, namely, let young couples by the use of prevenceptives abstain from having children and let them only have them at that period of life which is considered the most propitious for yielding children of the best phy- sique and the best mentality. It isn’t true, as some half-baked opponents claim, that under birth con- trol the young couples will have one, two or three children immediately after marriage and then stop. On the contrary, it is immediately after marriage, when the couples are not yet estab- lished economically, when their financial condi- tion is at its worst, that they want to avoid hav- ing children. And it is when they have reached the age of thirty, thirty-two or thirty-five, that most couples are anxious to become parents. So that argument falls to pieces. But let us look a little closer into the first-child bugaboo. It so happens that in all the families I 54 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS know personally, the first children are the supe- rior ones. But let us cast a glance over some historical personages, over some people that were undeniably great, so great that their genius is acceded universally. Let us take a few examples. For instance, one of the world’s greatest poets, Goethe, the author of “Faust,” was a first child. One of Germany’s sweetest singers, Friedrich von Schiller, was a first child. John Keats was a first child. Lord Byron, Alexandre Dumas, both father and son, Robert Louis Stevenson, were first children. Emile Zola, one of the world’s greatest writers, was a first child. Francis Bacon was a first child. Robert Burns was a first child. Heinrich Heine was the oldest of four children, the other three amounting to nothing. Thomas Carlyle was a first child, the oldest of nine chil- dren, the other eight not amounting to much. Her- bert Spencer was a first child. Spinoza and Im- manuel Kant, men whose philosophy still influ- ences us to-day, were first children. Another of the world’s great philosophers, Schopenhauer, was a first child. Samuel Johnson was a first child. Edward Gibbon, one of the world’s great- est historians, was a first child, the oldest of seven children, the other six not having amounted to much. Cardinal Newman was a first child, the oldest of six children, the other five not having been heard of. Petrarch was a first child. John Ruskin was a first child. Boccaccio, whose BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 55 “Dekameron” you have probably all enjoyed secretly, was a first child, and an illegitimate one at that. Leonardo da Vinci, one of the most many-sided geniuses that have ever lived, who bad few equals, either as a painter, sculptor, or anatomist, was a first child. Henrik Ibsen, one of the world’s greatest dramatists, was a first child. Jean Eaeine, one of the greatest of French dramatists, was a first child. Johannes Kepler, one of the world’s greatest astronomers, was a first child. Karl von Linne, absolutely the world’s greatest botanist, was a first child. Galileo, with whom, in spite of the obscurantists and the opponents of birth control, we believe that the world does move, was a first child. Isaac Newton, universally acknowledged as a genius of the very first magnitude, was a first child, and so was Karl Friedrich Gauss, a wonderful genius, known as the prince of mathe- maticians. The discoverer of the circulation of the blood, with whom even a non-medical audience is undoubtedly familiar, William Harvey, was a first child. Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill, two of the world’s greatest political economists, were first children. Leon Gambetta, one of the world’s greatest statesmen, was a first child. Martin Luther, the great religious reformer, was a first child. William the Silent was a first child. I do not consider kings and warriors great men, MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS otherwise I would mention that Charlemagne, one of history’s outstanding figures, was a first child. And so I could go on and on. But what is the use? I believe I have proved my point. One name, however, I must not omit. I refer to the man who as a boy could not tell a lie and who for that reason became the father of his country. Yes, George Washington was his mother’s first child. And here are some second children. Albrecht Diirer, one of the world’s greatest painters, was a second child. And by the way, he was the sec- ond of eighteen children, the other seventeen not amounting to anything. Balzac, the great French novelist, was a second child. Jean Jacques Rous- seau was a second child. Ralph Waldo Emerson was a second child. Mozart, the prince of all musicians, was a second child. Johann Sebastian Bach was a second child. Ernest Renan, one of the greatest of French writers, was a second child. Leo Tolstoy, by far the greatest novelist that has ever lived, whose novel “War and Peace” stands by itself without any rivals, was a second child. Charles Dickens was a second child. Our grey, big-hearted, democratic poet, Walt Whitman, was a second child. Edwin Booth, the actor, was a second child. Camille Cavour, the Bismarck of Italy, was a second child. Frederick the Great was a second child. Alexander von Humboldt was BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 57 a second child. Bismarck was a second son. Wil- liam Pitt was a second child. And many more. Another argument made by those who oppose birth control on allegedly eugenic grounds, is that “only” children are inferior to the children in large families. They are pampered and usually egotistic, irritable, unable to get along in the world, etc. This argument does not touch us at all. Because no advocate of birth control advises any couple to limit themselves to one child—two or three is the usual number advised. But we make no iron-clad rules for everybody. Some couples ought not to have any children at all, for some— one is sufficient, while on the other hand, those who have a good heredity, an exceptional mental- ity and physique, and are economically able to properly bring up and educate many children, should have as many as they want to. The race would be grateful to them if they had six or eight children. I have thus answered all the arguments against birth control. Let me state briefly the evils for which the ignorance of prevenception is responsi- ble. 1. Ignorance of birth control measures is re- sponsible for thousands of marriages being de- layed or not taking place altogether. 2. It is responsible for a great part of prosti- tution. 58 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS 3. It is one of the principal causes of venereal disease. 4. It is the principal cause of the abortion evil. 5. It is responsible for the economic misery and social degradation of thousands of families. 6. It is one of the principal causes of a high infantile mortality. 7. It is responsible for the ill-health, chronic invalidism, premature aging, and premature death of many women. It hastens the death of many women who on account of their condition should never be pregnant. 8. It leads to neurasthenia, frigidity, impo- tence, and many other nervous and psychic dis- orders. 9. It is to a great extent responsible for low wages, for the slums, and for the illiteracy and the rowdyism prevailing in the lower strata of society. 10. The lack of birth control among the poorest classes has a dysgenic influence on the race, be- cause the multiplication of the unfit is proportion- ally much greater than of those most fit. 11. It is responsible for thousands of syph- ilitic, epileptic, crippled, imbecile, and otherwise physically and mentally defective children. 12. And last but as important as, if not more important than, any of the others, it is a potent factor in international disputes and rivalries which eventually lead to war BIRTH CONTROL BY PREVENCEPTION 59 The widespread knowledge of prevenceptive measures would do away with all those evils, would do away with them either entirely or to a great extent. And, therefore, while I do not consider birth control a panacea for all our social ills, while I consider it only a phase in the great movement of rational sexology, it is in my opinion the most important immediate step in improving the race, in raising the level of our men, women and chil- dren, from every point of view: economic, moral, hygienic and eugenic. And I reiterate in conclusion that it is a crime for any man or woman to get married without acquiring the knowledge of the proper means of regulating conception. The excuse that it is against the law to impart the information will hold good no longer, for though the laws, both Federal and State, are strict about disseminating prevenceptive information, a person, man or woman, who is unable at the present time to obtain that information and obtain it free, without the expenditure of a cent, or with an expenditure of a two cent stamp, must be very naive, very simple, very ignorant or very helpless indeed. As a gen- eral thing, it may be said that the information can now be had for the asking. 60 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS CHAPTER IX BEHAVIOR DURING THE FIRST OR WEDDING NIGHT. IMPORTANT ADVICE. BEHAVIOR AFTER. EROG- ENOUS ZONES. PERIODICITY IN WOMAN’S SEX DESIRE Another little point, a little but important point, about which the prospective husband should be informed, is his behavior during the first, the wedding night. A good deal has been written on the subject of brutality on the wedding night; a good deal more has been rumored, but the subject deserves more serious consideration than it has received. It is an absolute fact that in the wed- ding night, at the very threshold of married life, there is often laid the foundation of disruption, of disappointment, disgust and even horror on the part of the wife. Some men go at the first sexual act with a violence, a brutality which well deserves the epithet “rape.” Many married women so speak of it. They say they were raped by their hus- bands. Some men who have cruel, sadistic traits in them derive peculiar pleasure from acting brutally and inflicting pain and suffering on their female partners. Some women, masochistically inclined, do not mind it much; some even enjoy the pain and the brutality. But to a great number of women brutal and too rapid action on the part of the husband causes great physical and psychic THE FIRST OR WEDDING NIGHT 61 agony, and from the first night they date their disgust and horror of sexual relations. That dis- gust and horror may be of short duration, but may last very many years or even forever. Men should, of course, always consider the woman’s feelings, but particularly so on the first night. If the woman is reluctant to have the act consummated, then the man should desist. Men should bear in mind that some women are ex- tremely sensitive at the vaginal entrance; in some the passage is very narrow and going at the thing brutally may cause quite some injury and severe hemorrhage. It is best, wherever the bride seems to demand it, to go at the act slowly, to take if necessary several nights in accomplishing deflora- tion. Also, the use of a little lubricant, such as plain white vaseline or borated petrolatum, will facilitate matters for both parties. Then it is well to know that in a certain number of cases the hymen is so thick, so tough, that it can not be ruptured except with very great pain and danger of hemorrhage. In some cases the husband, even if perfectly potent, cannot possibly accomplish penetration. In such cases the right thing to do is to have the hymen cut by a physi- cian. With the aid of a local anesthetic, like cocaine or novocaine, it is a painless and trifling “operation.” And what I said about the wedding night ap- plies equally well, though not with so much force, 62 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS to every other night. I do not believe that woman should be the sole judge and arbiter as to when sex relations should or should not be had, but a wise and kind husband will take the wife’s wishes into consideration. And particularly should he always bear in mind not to get through with the act too rapidly, thinking only of his own satisfac- tion. He must remember that the sexual act is a mutual affair and performing the act egotistically, leaving the wife unsatisfied, irritable, tossing about perhaps with pain in the ovarian region, is not exactly a noble act. With certain limits man can control and retard his climax, so as to make it synchronous with that of his wife. A man should also know something about the erogenous zones of the body. By erogenous (or erotogenetic) zones we understand those parts of the body the touching or caressing of which gives rise to pleasurable sensations. The genital organs are of course the principal erogenous zones. But there are secondary erogenous zones, such as the breasts, the lips, the hair, the armpits, etc. There is nothing wrong or immoral or obscene in caress- ing those parts of the woman, as a preliminary to the sexual act proper. Further, the man should remember that the sex instinct in woman is more or less periodic. In the human male the sex instinct is practically continuous. One time of the month is about as good for him as another. The woman is distinctly ALLOWANCE FOR THE WIFE 63 more passionate about the time of the menses, either immediately before or immediately after the menses, and also perhaps about two weeks after the menses, and it is just as well for the man to accommodate himself to his wife’s sexual waves. It won’t hurt him, and she will be duly grateful and recompense him for his occasional abstinence. CHAPTER X THE SUBJECT OF A DEFINITE ALLOWANCE FOB THE WIFE. THE QUESTION OF ALIMONY. We now come to an entirely different division of our subject. A topic that we must not shirk, because it is a frequent cause of friction and of dissatisfaction and unhappiness on the wife’s part, is the beggarly position in which the wife is put financially. No wife should have to come and ask the husband for money for every little expenditure she wants to make. The husband may be ever so kind and generous, but it is a humiliating and disagreeable position. If you don’t believe it just try it for a few months or a year. Let the wife have all the money and you be the one to have to ask for every dime or dollar. You will kick like a steer in a very short time. A wife should have a definite allowance to do with as she sees fit. I do not say the husband should strain himself 64 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS or put himself in a difficult position in order to satisfy his wife’s financial demands. That is not my idea. Not at all! I always despised the hus- band who worked his body and nerves to a frazzle and who perhaps did things he shouldn’t in order to be able to supply all his wife’s just and unjust demands. A woman who will force her husband to make more than he comfortably can earn is not worth having. What I do mean to say is whatever the husband feels he can afford for the upkeep of the house, the wife and the children, should be given to the wife in a lump sum and the details of the expendi- tures should be left to her. If she has some money left at the end of the month, if she wants to save some money for herself, that’s her affair. Don’t forget that a wife is the only employee who works for board, lodging and clothes without any wages, and it is extremely humiliating for a woman, par- ticularly for a high-strung woman, to have to give account of every cent she spends, and to have to lie and give excuses in case she wants to spend something on the side without the husband’s knowledge, or if she wants to contribute to a cause of which the husband may not approve. More and more women are refusing to be treated like beggars and have every cent doled out to them, but are demanding definite allowances. Whether the allowance be twenty dollars a week or five hun- dred or a thousand dollars a month, it doesn’t ALLOWANCE FOR THE WIFE 65 matter. The principle is the same. It is a dis- grace, as I said elsewhere, to see women married ten, twenty and thirty years, working like slaves and not having a dollar they can call their own. They have food and shelter; they can have all the jewelry and clothes they want, but they cannot dispose of one hundred dollars as they wish. They must do it secretly or else beg their master’s permission, which is certainly a disgraceful state of affairs. Right now, in the third decade of the 20th century, I am treating rich female patients who never have more than their carfare in their purse. Their husbands pay the doctors’ bills, they pay the druggists’ bills, they pay the bills from the department stores, etc., but they will not give them a ten dollar bill in cash. These wives are just well-dressed beggars—beggars in the real sense of the word. Alimony And while I am on the subject of a definite al- lowance, I will also say a few words on the sub- ject of alimony. I have been severely criticized by our radicals for my ideas on the subject of ali- mony, but I have not changed my ideas in the slightest. What I said ten and twenty years ago I repeat now: Our radicals seem to consider the payment of any kind of alimony a “damnable outrage.” So MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS one expressed himself. Others designate it as “legalized blackmail.’’ Again, I must say, what selfish brutes these men be! What would you want the woman to do after she has given up the best years of her life and is no longer beautiful enough to get another husband, or young and strong enough to learn a profession or trade? Shall she go begging or become a street-walker? “The woman should be economically independ- ent.” She should be, hut she is not at the present time. We are dealing with the present, not the future. It is quite possible, or even quite prob- able, that in the future when women are econom- ically on the same footing as men, many ugly and otherwise unattractive men who can have their pick now, will have to go without wives altogether. They will stay old bachelors against their will, the same as we now have involuntary old maids. But, as I said, we are speaking of the present and not of the future. At the present time when a man marries he makes a tacit contract to provide for his wife to the end of her days; and if he gets tired of her and wants to discard her—love and affection cannot be commanded—it is but right he should provide for her against destitution and starvation. Many women have excellent trades and professions when they marry. Attending to the household and caring for the children, who have a way of coming into the world once in a while even when you don’t want them, forces them ALLOWANCE FOR THE WIFE 67 soon to give up their customary work, and after ten or twenty years they are as badly off as if they had never had a profession. I know women drug- gists, dentists and physicians who now, after several years of married life, could not earn their salt at their chosen professions. Would it be right to put them out on the street without making any provision for them? Of course, I know some radicals will say a woman should not give up her profession when getting married. Well, I should like to see them attending to their profession, and particularly to follow its progress and advanced methods, with four children dangling at their coat tails. It can be done, it has been done, but I do not speak of exceptional, I speak of average, every-day cases. And so, do not be cruel to the woman who needs the alimony. It is not alms you are giving her— you owe it to her. Probably if you paid her in mere wages what she was actually worth, she would not be in need of your alimony. Yes, I am strongly in favor of a liberal alimony for the discarded or divorced wife. BUT that does not mean that the woman must be permitted to become a vampire and force the husband to excessive efforts in order to pay her an excessive alimony. Each case must be decided on its merits. In general, I should say that, depending upon the husband’s earnings, one-fifth to one-third of his MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS net income would constitute a fair and liberal allowance. CHAPTER XI FIFTEEN PARAGRAPHS FOR THE GUIDANCE OF THE BRIDEGROOM AND HUSBAND I would recapitulate and emphasize what I have had to say, and what I should like to say to the man, in the following terse paragraphs: 1. Be sure you are free from venereal disease. If you are not free, treat yourself until you are. If this cannot he done, then use preventive meas- ures so as to he sure not to infect your wife. 2. Be sure your are potent, that is, capable of performing the sexual act properly, with satisfac- tion to yourself and your wife. 3. Be sure you are not sterile, and if you are, make no secret of it from your future wife. She is the one to decide whether she wants to go through life childless or not. And don’t subject your wife to treatment for sterility until you are sure that it is she and not you who is at fault. 4. Put yourself in as good a shape physically as you can; get rid of all minor defects such as hernia, hemorrhoids, constipation, acne, eczema and psoriasis, bad odors, snoring, etc. Full in- formation of how to remedy these conditions is given in the second part of this volume. 5. Be a gentleman on the wedding night. Your FIFTEEN RULES FOR THE HUSBAND 69 behavior on that night may leave a lasting im- pression for months or years to come. 6. Take into consideration, as far as possible, the feminine psychology and physiology, as re- gards the methods and manner of the sexual act, its frequency and the time of the month, that is the time of the wife’s monthly periods. Remem- ber that the sex act is a mutual act and in its per- formance you must not think of yourself alone, your own pleasure and comfort; there is another person to be considered. 7. Remember that too frequent impregnation of the wife is not merely a bad, reprehensible practice, is not merely a sin, but is a great moral crime, a crime against your wife, a crime against your other children, a crime against society and the race. To my mind it is one of the greatest moral crimes a man, particularly a comparatively poor man living in the city, can be guilty of. (For a well-to-do couple living in the country a large progeny, provided the wife is willing, is not ob- jectionable.) If the husband knows of no means of prevenception, he should abstain, no matter what suffering it may cost him. Let him do any- thing at all, but he must not subject his wife to annual or biennial pregnancies. 8. Sleep in separate beds or even, if possible, in separate rooms. This point will be given fur- ther consideration in the third part of this book. 9. Remember that the old idea that a wife is 70 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS the husband’s chattel to do with as he pleases, is going out of fashion. The idea that woman has no soul and should be treated on a par with im- beciles and idiots is also becoming antiquated. Women are really beginning to find out that they are human beings, almost as good as we are, and we simply must reckon with that fact. For the sake of your own comfort and for the sake of peace in the family you will have to remember that woman, even after marriage, has an indi- viduality of her own and may, if she wants to, have interests of her own. Even if she wants to keep up friendships with some of her former friends, male or female, she may do so with per- fect propriety. 10. Remember that home—Home, Sweet Home —is becoming somewhat narrow for some women, and alone can not fully satisfy all their cravings, can not afford a sufficient outlet for all their emo- tional and intellectual energies. 11. Remember, remember this particularly, that household work, the often praised and vener- ated—by those who do not have to do it—house- hold work is for the most part nothing but menial work, tiresome, boresome, soul-killing drudgery, particularly when performed alone in an isolated kitchen. Let the poets and hypocrites sing the praises of dish-washing and sock-mending; the high spirited woman is beginning to rebel, and rightly so. The time for cooperative housekeep- FIFTEEN RULES FOR THE HUSBAND 71 mg is or should be one of our immediate problems. 12. And because common household work is deadening drudgery, the wife should not be kept out of the husband’s business or professional in- terests. The time for considering the wife a cook during the day and a mistress at night is passing, and the sooner it passes the better for all con- cerned. 13. Don’t be a miser, and don’t force your wife to come to you for every cent or dollar. I repeat, I do not mean to say that any man should live above his means in order to supply his wife’s de- mands and caprices, but whatever you can afford to spend, spend it ungrudgingly, and the best way all around is to give your wife a regular allow- ance, corresponding to your means and earnings. 14. Do not make your home a deadhouse, a cemetery. It is nice to have pleasant and inter- esting people to come in. You may be the ideal husband, the paragon of all virtues, and yet you may get on your wife’s nerves, if it is you, you, YOU all the time, and if she never sees another specimen of the male sex. People who keep open house, who have many friends who come and go without much ceremony, are always happier than the exclusive families to whom nobody can drop in unannounced, without a formal invitation or previous appointment. Open house has a particularly good effect on children. You will find that children of families having 72 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS many friends, of houses in which there is always something going on, never run away and seldom look elsewhere for entertainment. And one needn’t be rich to keep what I call open house. It depends upon the temperaments of the man and the woman. It has little or nothing to do with one’s financial condition. It doesn’t cost much to treat to a cup of tea or coffee, and it is more than worth the expense. I know people in moderate circumstances whose houses are much pleasanter than those of their much richer friends in the same stratum of society. 15. Remember that besides the diseases to which woman is subject equally with man—there is but one disease that man has and that woman is free from, and that is disease of the prostate— she has a number of troubles distinctly her own. I could describe more than a dozen diseases and disorders to which woman is liable and from which man is entirely free; but space is limited and so I will limit myself to mentioning just a few. The disorders of menstruation—dysmenorrhea, amen- orrhea, metrorrhagia; the disorders of pregnancy —nausea, vomiting, urinary disturbances, vari- cose veins, etc.; the disorders of childbirth—the pains of labor, often excruciating—(I sometimes feel as if I would enjoy seeing men who are op- posed to birth control undergo the pangs of labor) —hemorrhages, infections which in spite of our improved methods are not so very rare, lacera- FIFTEEN RULES FOR THE HUSBAND 73 tions of the womb and the perineum, puerperal fever, inflammation of the breasts, etc., etc. And childbed mortality is not yet entirely done away with. Still too many women pay with their lives for the privilege of bringing children into the world and perpetuating the race. Once when I spoke of the hazards of childbirth, a gentleman got up and told me that men have a harder time of it. See, he said, how many are maimed and killed in wars, a danger from which women are entirely free. Yes, I answered, but wars are due exclusively to your, to man’s, stupidity and bru- tality. There is no such thing as a necessary war. There hasn’t been a war in the world that could not have been avoided if the people had a little more common sense and decency, and if our diplomats and militarists who are permitted to run the world were not, almost without exception, vicious, selfish, conscienceless brutes. War is an unqualified and unnecessary evil. While child- birth is a necessary evil—if the human race is to be perpetuated. I am not so sure that even this is necessary. When I see what is going on in this world, when I see the stupidity of the masses and the brutality of the rulers, I sometimes think that it would perhaps be better if the earth opened and swallowed up the entire human race (with the exception, perhaps, of a few of us here in this hall); but this is something of which you could not 74 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS convince the average man, and so we will not pursue the subject any further. Yes, Byron said that the daily process of shav- ing in man is equivalent to the pangs of child- birth in woman. But as Byron had never given birth to a child, he is not a competent judge, and we need not take his comparison seriously. Pardon this digression, and we will proceed with woman’s special troubles. Besides the trou- bles of menstruation, pregnancy, childbirth and lactation, we have special disorders of the womb— retroversions and retroflexions, prolapse, leucor- rhea—ovarian trouble, salpingitis, etc. Then we have the disorders of the menopause—a whole host of them. Man also has some sort of “change of life,” but in him it is almost entirely free from physical pathologic symptoms. Taking these facts into consideration, that is, that woman in addition to the general human dis- eases has a host of disorders peculiarly her own, it behooves man to be chivalrous and treat her with consideration—more consideration than he need expect from her. Particularly gentle should he be with her during pregnancy, in the period following childbirth, and during the menopause. When man hears what conditions are imposed upon him, what requirements he is expected to satisfy as a married man, he may begin to doubt if it is worth while—if the game is worth the candle. Evidently it is worth while, evidently the FIFTEEN PARAGRAPHS FOR WIFE 75 game is worth the candle, otherwise marriage with all the knocks it has been receiving on the stage, in the humorous—so-called—magazines and newspapers, and at the hands of disappointed and disgruntled husbands, would not remain as popular an institution as it is. We do not find any diminution in the number of marriage licenses issued. On the contrary, the number seems to be constantly increasing. If marriage is foolish- ness, it is a foolishness that is practically univer- sal. And as it is a hopeless task to dissuade people from that particular act of foolishness, it becomes our duty at least to remove as many of the points of friction, to guide the matrimonial bark safely through as many shoals, as possible. And this is what I am trying to accomplish in this book. CHAPTER XII THE FEMALE PARTNER IN THE TRANSACTION—THE WIFE I have spoken to the male partner in the trans- action of marriage, to MAN, the lord and master of creation, quite frankly. Here as else- where, I have not minced words in pointing out his faults and shortcomings, and I have not hesi- tated to give him a piece of my mind, when I thought he needed it. But I have never consid- ered all men brutes and devils and all women 76 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS sweet and lovely angels. Now and then, in fact quite often, though not as often as the man, woman is to blame for the shattering of the matri- monial bark. And it would be foolish to deny that in some households it is the husband who is the patient—too patient—saint and angel, and the wife who is the devil and vampire. And the role of a slight irritant is probably more often exercised by the wife than by the husband. As marriage is a partnership, both partners must bring forth the best that is in them —physically and spiritually, and correct the worst that is in them—again both physically and spir- itually—if the partnership is to run smoothly, pleasantly and permanently. Yes, the wife must do her share, physically and spiritually. We cannot all rise to supreme heights, but even the most average of wives ought to be able to hold up her head and say that nobody can criticize her on the score of the points that follow. 1. Cleanliness The wife, whether the bride of a day or the wife of thirty years, should be clean. Literally from the crown of her head to her very toes, she should be clean, so clean as to be able to stand inspection, even in complete nudity. Every fold in her body should be clean. FIFTEEN PARAGRAPHS FOR WIFE 77 2. Daintiness Cleanliness and daintiness are not exactly synonymous and one may go without the other. Not every woman can be dainty, but many of them can with a litle care. The hands should be well manicured and the feet should be properly pedi- cured. Corns and bunions should be taboo. They can be removed without much difficulty and ex- pense, and they should be, because they do not contribute to man’s esthetic enjoyment. A chi- ropodist now and then may be a necessity, but a manicure is a useless expense. With a small manicure set every woman should be able to keep her own finger nails in an immaculate condition. 3. Obesity As stated in the second part of this book, if there is one thing that destroys woman’s youth- fulness, girlishness, it is excessive fat. Plumpness is all right and is liked by many men, but excessive fat, particularly a hang-down abdomen, is relished by very few. And against this physical calamity woman must fight with all her will power and all the energy at her disposal. And with the exception of a small percentage of cases where obesity is hereditary, the careful woman can always guard herself against becoming too fat. Read the article on Obesity carefully. MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS 78 4. Clean Mouth This includes not only clean teeth but a clean, sweet odor. Few things are so repellent to man as a bad odor from his partner’s mouth, and this condition alone has in many cases been the cause for divorce. Altogether, a woman should not have any disagreeable odors about her. Her armpits, her inguinal and perineal regions should be prop- erly attended to. Follow the instructions in the second part of the hook and you will have little to worry about in this respect. 5. Excessive Perspiration This, particularly if accompanied with a bad odor, as it usually is, should invariably be at- tended to before marriage. Ill-smelling feet are had enough in a man; they are much worse in a woman. Decomposed and sour sweat smells equally had on male and female feet, but just be- cause we expect a woman to be dainty, the shock is greater when the had odor is on her and not on his feet. 6. Leucorrhea Many women or girls suffer from a slight dis- charge from the vagina. If it is slight, odorless, and causes no irritation, it may be disregarded, except for an occasional douche, once or twice a week, for the purpose of cleanliness. But it is FIFTEEN PARAGRAPHS FOR WIFE 79 remarkable, it is incredible, for how many years some women will go along with a profuse, ill- smelling irritating discharge, without doing any- thing for it. And that is bad. Not only is it bad for the woman, but it is bad for the man. A pro- fuse leucorrhea may cause a repulsion in the man against intercourse, and, moreover, it may now and then infect him, causing a discharge from the urethral canal, which looks like gonorrhea; the man may become suspicious of his wife’s faith- fulness—I have had several such cases—and great trouble may result. No, leucorrhea should be treated. If it cannot be radically cured by self- treatment, it can certainly be greatly improved and held in check. 7. Clothes Clothes are not meant to be only useful, pro- tective against the inclemency of the weather, and to guard one’s modesty; they are distinctly sup- posed to be ornamental also. The nude human body is not per se sufficiently beautiful, and the most primitive of savages paint it or hang fig leaves around it, or stick feathers around their heads to make themselves more beautiful. And that primitive instinct remains with us, and it is not only perfectly legitimate for a woman to like pretty clothes, it is her duty not to look dowdy. I am far from implying that woman must always 80 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS follow the crazy and inane and rapidly changing fashions. Not at all! In fact, some of the fash- ions may and do make some women look ugly. It is sufficient to refer to the puffed up sleeves and bustles of two decades ago. But woman is justi- fied in paying attention to her clothes, to seeing to it that they become her and set her off to best advantage. And what is true of clothes is equally, if not more true of underwear. That the underwear should be spotlessly clean goes without saying, but every woman should wear the best quality underwear that she can afford. And the color, as I explained in Woman: Her Sex and Love Life, should be preferably pink. And lace and ruffles, I am sorry to say, add to the attractiveness of underwear, and are liked by the average man. 8. Cooking This is a very important requirement for the stability, comfort and contentment of the home. Whether the woman is going to do her own cook- ing or not she should be able to cook and cook well if necessity demands. Bad cooking is re- sponsible for dyspepsia, dyspepsia is responsible for grouchiness and irritability, grouchiness and irritability lead to quarrels and squabbles. And bad cooking, which is the usual thing in the aver- age American home, has been responsible as much as any other factor for driving the husband to FIFTEEN PARAGRAPHS FOR WIFE 81 the saloon, and to other places. And when she does cook, she should cook, and not be, as some- body said, a mere can opener. 9. Some Knowledge About Children Before getting married the prospective bride and mother should read some books or take some special courses on how to bring up children. Every mother should know what to do in an emergency, such as burns, cramps, convulsions, etc. In short, every mother should have an idea about first aid, so that she can do something for the child before the doctor arrives. The mother’s ignorance of what to do in an emergency has been the first step in the breaking up of a home, more than once. 10. Education We can not have all mothers well educated, but it is an excellent asset where it can be had. Chil- dren both respect and love their mother more— love often depends upon respect—if she can answer their questions and if she can help them prepare their lessons. 11. Prigoishness and Prudishness A woman who is a prig or a prude is a nauseat- ing nuisance. For instance, a woman who makes a fuss and gets into conniption fits because her husband smokes deserves to smoke in the here- MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS after. If she drives her husband from the home so that he gradually forgets to come back, it is something that she has brought on herself and she well deserves the punishment. Man should be yielded to in his little vices, in order that he may not become addicted to big ones. 12. Perverted View of the Sex Instinct As to the woman who believes that sexual rela- tions should be indulged in for the purpose of propagation only, who considers indulgence at any other time or for any other purpose a sin, a symptom of lust and degeneracy, she deserves little sympathy; and argument will have little effect on her. She is generally a person with a perverted mind or a perverted instinct and her marriage is a fraud, committed under false pre- tenses. A person who entertains the belief that sexual relations are for the propagation of the species only has no right to get married, and the acting upon such a belief should be sufficient ground for the annulment of the marriage. 13. Fuss in Housecleaning Don’t fuss too much about the house. Don’t get the obsession that a particle of dust or a piece of paper on the floor or a wrinkle in the tablecloth is a reflection upon you as a housewife. And don’t work yourself to death running about from morn- ing to night cleaning, scrubbing, washing and FIFTEEN PARAGRAPHS FOR WIFE 83 picking up things. Men like a clean house, but fussing about all the time, upsetting the house in order to keep it clean, will drive a man from the house elsewhere. 14. To Get a Man and to Hold Him This is platitudinous. It has been said many times before. And yet it must not be omitted from a book of this character. Bear in mind that it is much easier to get a man than to keep him; and because you are legally married, you are not released from all further efforts to be pleasing and attractive. Before marriage, your “man” may be in a state of tumescence—usually is—and he may then overlook many little things; besides, before marriage, you are always on parade. After the honeymoon, when his purely physical hunger has been fully appeased—probably more than appeased, he may be oversatiated—he is apt to be more critical, and if your domestic happiness means something to you, you must not behave so, physically and spiritually, as to cause him a shock. There is nothing wrong in the advice that married people should always act as if they were unmar- ried. To a great extent, it is a matter of habit, and it can be done. Do not let your husband see you in soiled un- derwear, do not let him see your soiled menstrual napkins, do not let him see you perform excretory 84 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS functions. And the corsets are usually not a thing of beauty, although some men like to see their wives in their corsets. 15. Frigidity This is a delicate point which I discussed rather fully in “Woman: Her Sex and Love Life” and in “The Treatment of Sexual Impotence and Other Sexual Disorders in Men and Women.” Yet, it is imperative that a word or two on the subject be said right here. A great many women are what we call frigid, cold. That is, they either have no sexual desire or experience no sensation during the act. Some even have an aversion to the act. This condition of frigidity is sometimes also re- ferred to as sexual anesthesia; anesthesia means lack of sensation, lack of feeling. Now, if you are one of those frigid or sexually anesthetic women, don’t be in a hurry to inform your husband about it. To the man it makes no difference in the pleasurableness of the act whether you are frigid or not unless he knows that you are frigid. And he won’t know unless you tell him, and what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. Heed this advice. It has saved thousands of women from trouble. [An excellent article entitled “The Frigid Woman,” by Dr. Otto Adler, will be found in “Sexual Truths,” published by The Critic and Guide Press.] CORSETS 85 CHAPTER XIII CORSETS I am devoting special chapters to the subject of corsets and cosmetics, because, to judge from the numerous queries I receive, these things seem to bother a good many good souls. They seem to think there is a question of morality involved in the matter. Of course there is nothing immoral involved in the use of corsets and cosmetics, any more than the eating of meat is a question of morality. In fact, meat eating does involve a point of morality, because in order to eat meat we must kill living creatures. But it is ridiculous to characterize certain habits or fashions as moral or immoral; no act per se, aside from its effects, can be considered as moral or immoral. And the wearing or non-wearing of corsets and the use of cosmetics must be considered from the hygienic and esthetic viewpoint exclusively. Before I go further I cannot help digressing a bit in order to point out how “morality’’ changes with the times, how it is influenced or rather is wholly derived from custom, how absolutely cor- rect is the derivation of “morality” and “mor- als” from the Latin “mores,” which means cus- toms. The corset is an excellent illustration. In former years, say half a century ago, the wearing of corsets was considered indecent; the orthodox and the piously religious looked upon women who 86 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS wore corsets as akin to women of the streets. To lace oneself in order to show off one’s figure—it was dreadful. Now the conventional and religious women of the same type look upon women who do not wear corsets as upon prostitutes. To show one’s figure like that, without any corsets—why, it is dreadful. True, we have now also some anti- corset crusaders, but their crusading is differently motived. They battle against the corset not on the score of its indecency, hut on account of its alleged injuriousness. The corset, we are told, is a deadly apparatus. It cramps the body, interferes with the circulation, with the movement of the lungs, with the free action and motion of the stomach, bowels and other internal organs, squeezes the liver, etc., etc. All these strictures are true of some corsets as worn by some women; they are quite untrue of the modern sensible corset as worn by the modem sensible woman. Not only is the latter not in- jurious, but properly worn it is distinctly bene- ficial in supporting the abdomen and the ab- dominal organs. We must bear in mind that there is in woman a tendency to a sagging down of the internal organs, a certain degree of prolapse. A well-fitting corset, buttoning from below upward has a tendency to support the walls of the ab- domen, and this gives indirect support to the womb, bowels, kidneys, stomach, etc. No, a well- fitting, not too tightly laced corset is not injurious, ROUGE, PAINT AND POWDER 87 but beneficial. Some women can get along with a waist or abdomen girdle—so much the better. So much for the hygiene of the corset. Now for the esthetics. Blessed is the woman who is so built that she never needs a corset. There are such women; a corset takes away from the deli- cate, sinuous lines of their figure. But, alas! not all women are built that way. It may be blas- phemy to say it, but not all women are Junos or Venuses, and to see a big woman with her breasts, abdomen and buttocks shaking, at each step she takes, like big chunks of half-frozen calf’s foot jelly, is not a pretty sight. To them the corset is a necessity; they must have it if they do not wish to appear ridiculous. CHAPTER XIV COSMETICS—ROUGE, PAINT AND POWDER In the environment in which I was brought up—1 first extremely orthodox, then extremely radical— the use of any artifices to improve one’s appear- ance was frowned upon very severely. My ortho- dox relatives and friends considered the use of rouge a heinous sin, worthy only of the scarlet woman ; my radical circle considered it a disgrace, which stamped its user as a brainless, worthless parasite who is trading on her sex. It is hard to shake off early traditions, and I still think that beauty and color should come from within. But 88 MAERIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS what should he cannot always he, and our girls and women, particularly the city-bred, do often have wretched complexions, and as there are no morals involved in the question, we must submit to the universal custom and say that we give our permission to the use of a little rouge and powder. But in the names of Apollo and Venus, use the cosmetics in moderation, use them artistically. Some women give the impression that they made use of a heavy brush dipped in a pail, and to my humble self at least, the appearance of some women and young girls that we meet in the street is extremely obnoxious; it is no exaggeration to say that it is nauseating. And why they must give the nose, the most prominent protuberance on the face, an extra coat of heavy whitewash, passeth my understanding. As to artificial eye- lashes—there I draw the line. Only a creature of very low intelligence will use that idiotic ‘‘in- vention.” As to the hygiene of cosmetics, in former years many of them were quite injurious, containing as they did lead, mercury, etc. Now, both on account of the Pure Food and Drug Law and the general improvement in the composition of proprietary preparations, they are, generally speaking, harm- less ; except, perhaps, the cheapest varieties. But there is no question that the face that always uses rouges and powders fades and withers sooner than the face that gets along without them. It is THE WOMAN VAMPIRE 89 most probably due to the fact that the pores of the skin are always clogged up, so that the face cannot “breathe”; and this interferes with the circula- tion of the facial skin. If you do use rouge, whitewash or powder, be sure to wash them well off before going to bed. Wash off with pure soap and water, and rub in a little cold cream of the best quality or a little white vaseline. Massaging the face is useful, and to it there can be no objection. I consider it also as pretty well established that consistent massaging of the face with a good cream does ward off or delay wrin- kles, and may even cause them to disappear, if taken in hand soon after their first appearance. Women should not mind a few, or even many, wrinkles, but they do, and they probably will even after they have all become intellectual and eco- nomically independent. Perfume. The moderate use of a fine perfume is perfectly legitimate. A really fine perfume, reminding you of the fresh flowers of the fields, is a pleasure to the user and to those near her. It is the superabundant use of cheap perfume that is objectionable and therefore vulgar. CHAPTER XV EXCESSIVE SENSUALITY OR THE WOMAN VAMPIRE Here I have to touch upon a delicate point. As I said in a previous chapter, the woman who con- 90 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS siders the sex act as disgusting and degrading, is a nuisance; and luckily she is becoming rare, and no doubt, with our sex education becoming saner and more general, she will eventually dis- appear altogether. The woman who is frigid or anesthetic and has no sexual desire whatever is a misfortune, though a hearable one. But there is the opposite type of woman, who is a great danger to the health and even the very life of her husband. I refer to the liypersensual woman, to the wife with an excessive sexuality. It is to her that the name vampire can be applied in its literal sense. Just as the vampire sucks the blood of its victims in their sleep while they are alive, so does the woman vampire suck the life and exhaust the vitality of her male partner—or vic- tim. And some of them—the pronounced type— are utterly without pity or consideration. Some make excessive demands upon their husbands from ignorance, but some continue their practices even after being informed that it means im- potence, sickness and a premature grave for their husbands. In some cases, where the woman marries an old man for his money, this process of exhaustion is indulged in deliberately, intentionally. The wo- man wants the man to die, and very often she accomplishes her purpose. Many an old man had his life shortened by several years for the short- THE WOMAN VAMPIRE 91 lived pleasure of possessing a young woman for his wife. This is met with not merely in the realm of fiction; it is a piece out of real life. It is true some old men become rejuvenated and have their lives prolonged by marrying a young woman; but this is only the case if love is a factor, or at least respect and affection, and the woman is fine, sensible and considerate; but where the marriage is a cold blooded proposition on the part of the female and she makes excessive demands, often taunting the man with his weakness and even threatening that unless he satisfies her properly she will have to seek satisfaction elsewhere, a premature grave for the foolhardy husband is not infrequently the result. But it is not only the old husbands that are apt to suffer. Young men, if married to vampires as above mentioned, may have the devil to pay. During the past two months I have been treating a young man twenty-nine years of age for extreme impotence. A year ago he was as normal as any man can be. Normal in every way and strongly potent. He married a young woman about his own age—possibly a year older, and within eight months she made a complete wreck of him. The first two or three months he did not mind—he yielded to all her demands which were incredibly frequent (I do not care to say just how frequent he said they were, because people will say: that is impossible, that is exaggerated), after that he 92 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS began to object gently, but being an American gentleman, with a mistaken idea of chivalry, he finally, each and every time, submitted. The re- sult was that after a while, with the best of will and with his chivalry unabated, he was unable to accede to any of her demands. That household will never be a happy household. I told the man that if he gets well, if he ever does, he will have to be exceedingly moderate; and if his vampire wife refuses to be satisfied with occasional relations— not more than once in two weeks or ten days— instead of ten or twenty times a week—the only thing for him to do is to divorce her or separate from her. It is to be borne in mind that it is particu- larly older girls—girls between thirty and fifty—■ who are apt to be unreasonable in their demands when they get married; but no age is exempt; sexual vampires may be found among girls of twenty as well as among women of sixty and over. And this fact I would emphasize to my women readers: Do not exhaust your husbands by excessive de- mands, if you expect their health, their sex power, their sex desire, and their love for you to last. And remember, fair and gentle ladies, that the sex act is much more exhausting to the man than it is to the woman; for reasons that need not be discussed here, it is a much greater drain on his system than it is on hers. DOUBLE STANDARD OF MORALITY 93 A frigid anesthetic woman is bad; a strongly oversexed and inconsiderate woman is worse. The former is a nuisance, the latter is a menace. CHAPTER XVI THE SINGLE OK DOUBLE STANDAKD OF SEX MOEALITY This is an extremely delicate subject. Together with the question of the influence of prolonged continence on health it constitutes the twin noli me tang ere of sexology. It is a subject best left undiscussed. And yet it would be unfair, it would be cowardly, to leave the question untouched be- cause the proper or improper attitude towards it may spell the happiness or unhappiness of the couple, their clinging together or their drifting apart. I will preface my remarks on the subject with the statement that I am not very deeply interested in the twenty-fifth century; I am deeply interested in the twentieth century, particularly in the third and fourth decades of the twentieth century. Nor do I care very much about the hypothetical or mythical people dwelling on Mars or on the moon; but F do care about the people inhabiting the planet called Earth, and particularly that part of it called the continent of North America. Also, T om moro Interested in the concrete than in the abstract; in the practical, the pragmatic, rather than the absolute. Also, I believe, have always 94 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS believed, that half a loaf is better than no bread. Viewing the matter in the abstract, in theory, there is of course no question that the single standard of sex morality is the right standard; and what is more, it seems hardly subject to doubt that in the future the single standard of morality for both sexes will prevail. If the man will de- mand that his mate be chaste antenuptially and strictly monandrous postnuptially, she will de- mand the same standard from him; if however, he will insist upon his rights to have sexual ex- periences before marriage, she will gently but firmly demand the same privilege for herself. And the same with extra-marital relations. I even now, quite recently, heard a woman feminist say that she enjoyed seeing a drunken woman lying in the gutter, and that she would love to see women engage in burglary and hold-ups; she •wanted absolute equality. The woman of the future will simply refuse to listen to what will seem to her atrocious nonsense that what is sauce for the gander is not sauce for the goose. But at the present, in the third decade of the twentieth century, things are a little different. Woman, for her own sake and not at all for the sake of the man, should not insist too vociferously upon absolute sameness in the standard of sex morality, should not hold man too rigorously to her standard. As to sexual relations before marriage. To de- DOUBLE STANDARD OF MORALITY 95 mand that the man should go to the marriage bed as chaste as the bride, regardless of his age at the time of the marriage, is a species of modem insanity, a neurosis, a morbid condition resulting from false and perverted teachings by well- meaning, often extremely sincere and earnest, but misguided men and women. Whatever the man’s sexual life had been before entering matrimony, is no business of the girl, provided he enters free from venereal disease, sexually potent, fertile, and free from entanglements. That is all the bride has a right to demand. Better a man who has had ante-nuptial sexual experiences than one who is a confirmed masturbator, impotent or is addicted to some perversion. The fact alone that if every girl demanded of her prospective husband absolute chastity as a conditio sine qua non, there would not be ten per cent of women who could get mates, is sufficient to show the absurdity of such a requirement. No, for some time to come, com- mon sense will prevail and the girls, with the ex- ception of a few high strung neurotics or per- verted Veras, will not bother their heads about what their men did before they met them. All they will demand will be faithfulness after. But how about after? How about it, if the husband breaks his marital vows, if he indulges in extra-marital relations? If the husband is a habitual and confirmed philanderer, if he openly flouts his wife’s feelings, if he supports and MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS spends his time with a mistress—then the wife will act as she sees fit. No advice is necessary or would be accepted in such cases. Her action will be guided by her religious and moral ideas, her love or hate for her husband, her economic de- pendence and a number of other factors. But in case of an occasional lapse on the part of the husband—there a hit of advice may prove ac- ceptable. And my advice would he: forgive and forget. Or still better—make believe that you know nothing. An occasional lapse from the straight path does not mean that he has ceased to love you. He may love you as much; he may love you a good deal more. And though as said, the women will act in such cases according to the dictates of their hearts, without the aid of outside advice, nevertheless, the unprejudiced advice of a wise, experienced person may help to clarify their feelings and ideas on the subject, may help them to arrive at a saner de- cision than they otherwise would. CHAPTER XVII SOME GENERAL ADVICE. HOW TO AVOID FRICTION AND QUARRELS AND HOW TO PROMOTE PEACE AND HARMONY I know that the easiest thing in the world to give is advice. And I know that it is often a thankless, useless task—a waste of time and SOME GENERAL ADVICE 97 effort. Many people do not need your advice, while many of those who need it most, won’t take it. Nevertheless the giving of advice is not always a wasted effort. For there are borderline people, who are eager to listen to advice and are eager to follow it. Many people’s lives have been changed for the better by a piece of good sensible advice. Some actually did turn a new leaf and became different persons. It is just as well perhaps for you to make up your mind beforehand, that it is not likely that you two will go through life, from the day of the wedding to the day when the angel of death calls one of you away, without a single tiff, a single squabble or quarrel, without a single cross or disagreeable word. It can’t be, or at least, it is not likely to be. I have been told of such ideal families, but personally I have not seen any such. If there are, they must be so rare as to be con- sidered abnormal. And do not imagine that the quarrels will be due to the fact that you are mar- ried, that you are tied to one another. Not at all. Whenever two people live together in the same house—they may be of the same sex or of dif- ferent sexes—there is bound to be some friction. Couples who live in free union quarrel and fight— fight even viciously; men have quarrels with their mistresses, and women with their lovers; and friends do not remain friends forever. On the other hand, do not take it too tragically if a quar- 98 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS rel did take place. It will pass away, you will forget it and you will be as good friends as ever. Do not sulk. Sulking becomes a habit and it is a bad habit. Do not nurse a grudge. It is a bad habit. Do not nurse any thought or feeling of revenge, of “getting square.” Revenge is one of the vilest, dirtiest and meanest feelings that curse the human race. Some even pride themselves upon the fact that they are revengeful and that they don’t let things pass. It was a mean and vicious nature that said “revenge is sweet.” Only to sadistic brutes is revenge sweet. I am glad to say that I have always been entirely free from the slightest trace of the feeling of revenge. Do not imagine that you must always have the last word, that it dishonors you to let the other party have the last say. Quite the contrary. And please, please do not nag, and don’t chew the rag all the time. Do not think that it is humiliating to you to be the first to make an attempt at reconciliation. Quite the contrary—it honors you, particularly if you are the stronger. Remember, the worst peace is better than the best war. If quarrel you must, be moderate in the lan- guage you use. Do not use words which you will have cause to regret (yes, you can restrain your- self if you try, and if you bear this paragraph in mind). Remember the Arabian proverb: “Of the unspoken word you are the master; as soon TO AVOID MISUNDERSTANDING 99 as the word has left your lips, you are its slave.’9 The wife should hear in mind that the husband may have something unpleasant in his business place, in his shop, in college, etc., something that he may not care to speak about, but something that renders him irritable and depressed. The husband should bear in mind that the wife is apt to be irritable and cranky, without herself know- ing why, around the menstrual periods. And both husband and wife should bear in mind that there is a reason for everything; that people are not cranky and irritable for nothing, just for the fun of it, because there is no fun in being irritable; they should know that we are to a great extent the slaves of our endocrine glands, that whether we are cheerful or gloomy, sociable or sulky, sweet or snarling often depends upon the state of our internal secretions. Always try to make allow- ances. . . . CHAPTER XVIII TO AVOID MISUNDERSTANDING In conclusion: may I hope that I will not be misunderstood and misquoted! May I beg you to try to understand me rightly and not to draw false conclusions? Some people have a much greater capacity to misunderstand than to under- stand, and they often make a writer or lecturer responsible for ideas that he not only never en- 100 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS tertained, but that are diametrically opposed to the ideas he does hold. I trust that none of you will carry away the idea that the factors that I have discussed con- stitute love, or are of the essence of love; that the presence of certain conditions is a guarantee of love’s permanence, while their absence is sure to make love fly out of the window. Nothing could be further from my thought. Love is a more subtle, more complex thing than that. Pink silk underwear is no insurance policy against a hus- band’s fickleness or unfaithfulness. I have known cases where the wife was everything that could be desired, physically and spiritually, and still the husband ran after other women, women much in- ferior, both in body and in mind. Where for various psychogepetic reasons there is no love, perhaps was no love to start with, where there is complete indifference, antagonism or hatred, following of the suggestions discussed in this book will not create love that does not exist, nor recapture love that has flown away. On the other hand, I have known wives whose faces were like squeezed-out lemons, a very network of wrinkles, who were enormously fat, or scraggy and angular and as flat as an ironing board, and who nevertheless were sincerely and warmly loved by their husbands; it may not have been—prob- ably was not—a physical, sensual love, but it was a love spiritual which while not the same thing, TO AVOID MISUNDERSTANDING is in many respects superior, because more last- ing, less fickle, less depending on external and changeable conditions. I flatter myself, perhaps unjustifiably, with the thought that I know as much about love and its various components as any man ever did. And I certainly know that love is not a single entity; because there was love once, it does not follow that it will remain unchanged or undiminished regardless of all conditions and changes in the lovers; love consists of a thousand factors, phys- ical and psychic; these factors are not separ- able; they are closely interwoven, and mutually influence each other. A person’s mood and tem- per often depend upon his physical conditions, the activity of his internal glands, his liver and his bowels; and a person’s physical condition often depends upon his mental and spiritual out- look. The human body and psyche, the organ- ism and its function, form one chain, the links of which are inseparable. And love is not a sturdy perennial which will grow and flourish regardless of the soil in which it is planted, regardless of sun and rain. No, Love is a very tender plant which needs a favorable soil, the warm rays of the sun, frequent irrigation and careful tending. If it is deprived of these, it will become dwarfed and stunted, and finally it will perish. And the object of this book is merely to secure for the 102 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS plant of love a few of the simpler factors which will help it to live, grow and develop. And here comes another important point. We always hear Love, Love, as if it were a universal feeling, as if it were a prerequisite to every mar- riage, as if it were present in every marriage. Let us he honest. There are millions of people to whom the great passion, Love, is a stranger; they are incapable of a great love; but they can like a person, have a certain amount of affection and respect. They marry principally to have a home, to have comforts and conveniences; some marry principally for the purpose of having home cooking; others marry almost exclusively for the purpose of being parents. No matter what ec- static romanticists may think of such marriages, (which often turn out more successful than mar- riages for love), we have them with us and we have to deal with them. And to the partners of such marriages this book will prove of inesti- mable value. I would put it this way. There are certain loves so powerful, so all-embracing that they need no outside assistance or advice. They are the perfect loves; they are secure. But they are exceptional. There are certain hatreds and antagonisms so strong that nothing can remove them; no assist- ance or advice will be of any avail; to the unfortu- TO AVOID MISUNDERSTANDING 103 nate victims of such hatreds and antagonisms the book will prove of little or no value. But in the vast majority of married couples we find neither the omnipotent divine love nor de- structive hatred; we find love and affection of infinitely variable degrees, and a yearning to live in peace and harmony, a desire to make the home as pleasant a place to live in as possible. These millions of couples need and will benefit by this book. AN OVERHEARD CONVERSATION On leaving the hall after the delivery of the lecture which constitutes the basis of the first part of this book, I noticed a number of groups of girls engaged in animated conversation. And as I passed one group, I heard one young lady say, in a very decided voice: “If he is that kind of a man—if he will pay attention to a pimple, or to some odor from the mouth, or to the color of the underwear—then—then he is no good ” I stopped, turned around, and said to the confused group of girls: “Is that so! Well, suppose it is so, suppose he is no good—for the sake of the argument we will assume that he is no good— what then! Before you have him, before you are married to him, you won’t know whether he is ‘no good’ or not. After you are married to him —what are you going to do! Are you going to separate from him or divorce him because he 104 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS openly or tacitly makes certain demands'? Are yon willing to break np a home because the man has certain whims or peculiarities? And how do you know that the next one will be different? And is it not better to comply with the man’s wishes in the minor things than to live in war and antagonism or to break up the home ? But— and this is an important point—how do you know that a man who will pay attention to such things is ‘no good’? How do you know that all these apparently small things have not a deep biologic or hygienic basis? Think it over when you get home.” They promised they would. And I want you also to think it over, in case you are disposed to consider such details as dainti- ness, and a. pleasant odor from the body, and a scalp absolutely free from dandruff, and fluffy pink underwear, as things beneath the notice of an intellectual, high-spirited woman. Think it over. PART TWO THE TREATMENT of MINOR ILLS, AILMENTS, ACCIDENTS AND DEFECTS Containing a Number of Well Tried and Original Prescriptions and Formulas. INTRODUCTION TO PART II The Part that follows contains a number of reliable, practical and easily applicable prescrip- tions and methods of treatment for minor ail- ments, defects and accidents, and is its own justi- fication. What greater service can one render than to relieve pain, prevent disfigurement, in- crease physical health and efficiency, and now and then prevent or postpone a fatal issue? And this is what a study of the second part of this hook will accomplish. Yet, this was not my primary purpose in writ- ing it. My primary purpose was the primary purpose of the book—to increase love and happi- ness in married life. For I know of too many examples where ignorance of the elementary principles of hygiene and of the simplest rules of first aid led to catastrophes which in their turn led to a breaking up of the home. 106 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS The following case is within my personal knowledge. A young couple, he twenty-nine, she twenty-seven, were living a very harmonious life. Both the husband and wife were physically very attractive, and they had a little girl of seven who was remarkably beautiful. Both doted on her, but particularly the father. The father was really crazy about her. He was as anxious to meet her every evening on returning from his place of business as if she were his sweetheart and not his little daughter. Some Freudians would insist that there was an erotic element in it. One day the child upset a kettle of boiling water and received a terrible burn, extending over the face and neck. The child was in agony, the mother did not know what to do, and it took some two hours before a physician could be secured. When the father came home in the evening, he found the child in a very bad condition, and after his first outbreak of grief, he began to take it out of his wife. He said that she was negligent, took no care of the child, thought only of herself, etc., etc. She resented the unjust accusations, she felt very bitter that in addition to her grief over the terrible accident she was so unjustly attacked. The relations between them became strained. And when the burn healed badly and the child, after several months, recovered with a terribly disfig- ured face and somewhat crooked neck (the scar MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 107 tissue contracted and it seemed that nothing could be done), their relations became still worse. At the least provocation the husband would throw it up to her that it was on account of her careless- ness that their beautiful child became disfigured for life, and she resented it terribly—and justly. The result was—they finally separated. Had the wife known what to do immediately in case of a burn, most of the evil results of the accident would probably have been averted. And many similar examples could be given. And so this second part of the book is valuable both in its role as a family physician and in that of a promoter of peace and harmony between husband and wife. A Few Simple Remedies that Should Be On Hand in Every Household Every home should have a few simple rem- edies in case of emergency. The following are obtainable everywhere, are cheap and will answer for all ordinary purposes: Bicarbonate or Soda (Baking Soda; also called Sodium Bicarbonate). One pound. Very cheap—costs only about 10 cents a pound. It is a fine, white powder. In scalds and bums; in water brash or acid stomach. Boracic Acid (also called Boric Acid), or y<2, pound. Costs about fifty cents a pound. Use- 108 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS ful as a wash or compress for inflamed eyes, sore mouth, etc. Peroxide of Hydrogen (also called hydrogen peroxide or hydrogen dioxide). About % a pint. Cheap—costs about 15 cents. A clear, colorless liquid. Useful as an application or wash to small wounds, bruises, slight bleeding (nosebleed), spongy gums and yellow teeth. Tincture of Iodine. A 1 oz. bottle, with glass stopper. Costs about 20 cents. One of the strong- est and best antiseptics. For wounds, sores, ul- cers, cuts, abscesses, etc.; apply with piece of cot- ton wound tightly on a wooden stick or toothpick. Also invaluable as a douche injection in leucor- rhea. Essence of Peppermint (also called Spirit of Peppermint). About one or two ounces. G-ood as a mouth wash and in colic and wind. A couple of ounces of Absorbent Cotton, a yard of Sterilized Gauze, and two or three one-inch Gauze Bandages. A tube of plain vaseline and a tube of borated vaseline (petrolatum). Stearate of Zinc, preferable to talcum in chafed surfaces, in nettle rash, etc. Some powdered mustard. A small bottle of oil of turpentine. A small bottle of Syrup of Ipecac. With the exception of Tincture of Iodine, none of the drugs enumerated above is poisonous. In taking tincture of iodine by accident, give plenty of starch or flour mixed with water. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 109 The Treatment of Obesity You will all admit, that is all of you who are familiar with my writings and have attended some of my lectures, that I am not antagonistic to the female sex, that I am not a woman-hater. In fact, some men dislike my writings and my lec- tures because they claim that I am too partial to the women, that I generally lay the blame on men’s shoulders, always justifying and excusing the women. This is not true. I do not always justify and excuse the gentle sex. If I do some- times seem to be partial to the women it is because I know that the woman has always the heavier burden to carry, that she always has the greater payment to make and that she often has to pay where the man goes altogether scot free. But I rather pride myself on my constant endeavor to be unprejudiced and unbiased, to give credit where credit is due and to lay blame where blame belongs. It is quite true that man is often brutal, often inconsiderate towards woman. I have discussed that question exhaustively in my essay on Man’s Inhumanity to Woman. (See the author’s Sexual Problems of To-day.) Very often his neglect of woman, his changed behavior towards her is due to nothing but brute egotism. But justice de- 110 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS mands that I state that not in a few instances the woman is to blame; sometimes partly to blame, sometimes wholly so. Women often accuse men of fickleness, of having changed. They never think that it is possible that it is they who have changed and not the men. As I have stated so many times, love is not a simple thing. It is a compound of many factors, and the basis of love is physical. Now, we must remember that some men love and can love only a certain type of woman. And it isn’t always accidental that a man marries a certain kind of woman. And it is certainly never accidental that a man falls in love with a certain type of woman. He falls in love with the type that appeals to him. Let us assume that a man fell in love with a girl of a certain type, certain build, certain height, certain weight. Suppose when he married her she was slim and lithe and weighed 110 pounds. A year or two or three after marriage, either through neglect or through other causes which we needn’t go into now, that same woman has lost every delineament of her waistline and weighs 170 or 190 pounds, and her face instead of having well chiseled, delicate features, is rather bloated, and her slender neck has become con- verted into a chin with two or three stories. That good young woman feels aggrieved at the change in her husband’s attitude towards her; she feels deeply wounded that her husband who swore to MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 111 love her forever—a foolish thing to do under any circumstances—never asks her to sit on his lap, seldom, very seldom embraces her, never calls her his sweetest and most beloved darling, and in fact now and then seems to prefer her room to her company. And she comes complaining of man’s fickleness and appeals for advice what to do with or to the husband who has changed so completely. It doesn’t come to this young wife’s mind that it is she who has changed completely and not the husband. She feels pained when she is told that the husband is really not so very much to blame, that he married a certain kind of woman and that it is now an entirely different kind of woman that is his wife. This is a point that wives should remember. I wish to emphasize that I am far from absolving men from any blame for their neglect of and their unfaithfulness to their wives. I am too well familiar with man’s polygamous tendencies to do that. But I say once more that my unbiased judgment forces me to declare that in quite a number of instances it is the wife and not the husband who is to blame. And what I say about the change in the physi- cal condition is also true of the change in the emo- tional or spiritual sphere. When a man becomes charmed with a sweet-tempered, low-voiced, gen- tle-mannered girl and in a few years that same girl is a screeching, quarreling, fighting shrew; MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS then the husband is not to blame for having lost his affection and having turned away from his wife. It isn’t he but it is she who has changed. Pardon me this long detour and let us go back to the fat woman. If there is one thing that destroys woman’s youthfulness, attractiveness, girlishness, it is obesity, excessive fat. And against this calamity woman must fight with all her will-power. And with the exception of a few cases where obesity is strongly hereditary, the careful woman can always prevent the deposit of superfluous fat. I know that there are some men to whom a fat woman is an asset, a desideratum. In fact, among the savages there are tribes among whom the fatter the woman the more desirable she is. Among the Hottentots there are women whose abdomens hang down lower than their knees, and it is those women that are most sought after. There is no disputing about taste, or as the French say, chacun a son gout. But this is not the case in this country, and when you are in Rome you must do as the Romans do, particu- larly when it comes to physical appearances. And so we will say a few words about how a woman can prevent or remove excessive fat. I know perfectly well that what you would best like would be that I give you some prescription which, taken two or three times a day, would forever keep you slim and slender regardless of your diet, your lack of exercise or mode of living. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 113 Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, it cannot be done. Nothing worth while in this world can be obtained without effort. At least this is so now. Perhaps in the centuries to come we will have all the good things in this world without having to fight for them. Perhaps in the future it will he as Ingersoll said. When asked by a clergyman in what way he could improve upon the Lord or Nature, he answered: “In many ways. For one thing, I would make health catching instead of, as it is at present, disease being catching.” No, at the present time health is not catching, and if we want health we have to work for it. If you keep on depositing money in the bank and do not draw any checks upon it or draw very small checks, your balance will keep on growing bigger and bigger. And so if you keep on putting in food, more than you use up, more than the sys- tem bums up, you are going to grow fatter and fatter, and there is no remedy in the world which will prevent it without injury. True, by admin- istering thyroid gland we can make a fat person lose very rapidly. But small doses of thyroid have little effect, while large doses may prove very in- jurious to the heart and to the nervous system, and it is only in rare cases that I prescribe thy- roid, and that only when the patient can be watched. But while there is no single drug which in itself will reduce obesity without injury to the patient, there is hardly a case of excessive fatness 114 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS that cannot be brought back to normal if the patient is determined to become normal. But I repeat, the patient must be interested, must feel that it is a matter of vital importance to her, and must co-operate with the physician. Towards the end of the Winter and in the Spring we often see actresses who have become too fat for their roles. They do not exhibit the same sprightliness, and for the role of ingenue they often become entirely unfitted. When they get a hint that it may be difficult for them to get an engagement the following season, they get a move on themselves and they devote their Sum- mer vacation to getting rid of their superfluous fat. And in the Fall they come hack quite re- juvenated and weigh anywhere from twenty to fifty pounds less than they did. The first requirement in treating obesity is, of course, reduction in the amount of food, but par- ticularly must we reduce the starchy foods. As little bread as possible, and that only toasted or Graham bread. No potatoes under any circum- stances, no pies, pastry or puddings and of course no fats, either butter, lard or any other kind of fat. No sugar. Sugar is the worst—or the best— of fatteners. One can get used to drinking tea and coffee without sugar. In fact, the Japanese and the Chinese never use sugar in their tea— all Orientals claim that sugar spoils the taste of these two beverages. But those who cannot get MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS used to unsweetened tea or coffee can use sac- charin instead of sugar. One or two minute tab- lets are equivalent to one or two lumps of sugar and one does not know the difference. Meat may he eaten in plenty, but only lean meat. All fat must be cut away. The white of chicken is permissible. No salt. This is an important point. In any successful treatment of obesity salt should be entirely eliminated. Plenty of fruit. All fruit may be eaten in abundance with the exception of bananas. No nuts, because nuts are very fattening. If the patient has a feeling of emptiness in her stomach, she can fill herself up with substances of little nutritional value, but at the same time remove that feeling of hunger. Such substances are cabbage and salads of all kinds. Of course such salads should be eaten without any salt or oil, only with a little vinegar. Baths should be taken daily. A warm bath fol- lowed by a cold shower or sponge, and then the patient is to rub herself thoroughly dry with a rough Turkish towel. Very fat persons can use a masseuse, but the .most useful form of massage is the kind of massage that the patient adminis- ters to herself. Sea bathing is very useful, but the patient must exert her will-power not to eat too much after the bathing. Sea bathing, as is 'well known, often 116 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS increases the appetite enormously, and if the patient should yield to her appetite, all the good derived by the sea bathing would be neutralized by the extra consumption of food. That walking is necessary goes without saying. If the patient is so fat that she puffs readily and gets short of breath, the walks should be short and frequently repeated, but gradually they should be lengthened until the patient walks several miles a day. Then she should exercise. One of the simplest forms of exercise is to lie down on the floor on a mattress and try to raise herself to a sitting position without the aid of the hands or arms. This strengthens the abdominal muscles and increases the circulation and helps to reduce the fat. Rolling a heavy ball on the abdomen and raising and lowering the legs is useful. Walking on all fours, though perhaps not very dignified, is a very useful method of exercise. In addition to this, small doses of thyroid, not more than one grain three times a day, may be given in the beginning; but as soon as a definite loss of weight has been noticed the thyroid is to be discontinued. One must bear in mind that thyroid may be taken only when the patient has been examined and found to have a perfectly nor- mal heart. Small doses of borax—8 grains three times a day—are also claimed to be beneficial. Under this treatment, of which naturally I had MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 117 to give but a bare outline, I challenge any woman not to lose her extra avoirdupois. She can lose just as much as she wants to lose, and she can stop whenever she wants to stop. But of course it goes without saying that after having lost weight she will not remain so unless she watches herself and keeps up the proper regime. If she should go back to an excessive consumption of starchy foods, if she should give up exercise, she would naturally go back to her former state and be perhaps worse than ever before. If I were to give one piece of advice, and only one, to women who are anxious for their youthful appearance and attractiveness to last as long as possible, I would tell them: “avoid fat as you would avoid a plague.” It is quite a frequent occurrence, a very frequent occurrence, to see a mother and daughter, the mother looking just as youthful as and often more youthful than the daughter, and only because the mother is slim and the daughter is bulky. 118 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS The Treatment of Constipation There probably has been more nonsense written and more untruths told about constipation than about any other of the human ailments. The rea- son for this is threefold: (1) constipation is a very common ailment affecting a great number, prob- ably the greater number, of the men and women of every “civilized” community; (2) the condi- tion is easily relieved—temporarily—by the ad- ministration of cathartics, and (3) the manufac- turers have cathartics to sell. To believe the manufacturers of proprietary laxatives and ca- thartics, if one’s bowels do not move for a day, it is a great calamity, a catastrophe. According to them, about ninety per cent of all diseases are due to constipation; and they talk about autotox- emia, autointoxication (self-poisoning), arterio- sclerosis, etc., etc. The greater part of which is nonsense. Going a day now and then without a movement is no calamity, and it is not true that poisons are absorbed from the lower bowel, if it is not emptied two or three times a day, as is claimed by some extremists, or even once a day. While chronic constipation should be treated, I wish to state my emphatic conviction that a great deal more injury has been and is being done to MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 119 the human system by the habitual taking of ca- thartics than by habitual constipation. If I were given to epigrams I would say that if constipation has killed its thousands, cathartics have killed their ten thousands. Of course, chronic constipation should be treat- ed. But before giving medicines everything should be done to overcome it by dietetic meas- ures. The diet may have to be radically changed. It is possible that the person’s food does not con- tain enough residue—the bowels must have some residue to work upon, to push forward before they can move. In such cases, we should see that his food contains plenty of residue—he should eat coarse bread, bran, cabbage, plenty of raw fruit; in addition, he should eat things that are known to be laxative in character, such as prunes (raw), figs and apples. And he should avoid con- stipating articles, the most representative of which is cheese. Coffee, particularly in the strength in which it is usually drunk in this coun- try, is also constipating, though it must be stated that on some people coffee has a laxative effect. If the change of the diet alone does not have the desired effect, other measures must be tried in addition. Massage of the abdomen is some- times helpful, though its results are not so won- derful as its advocates try to make us believe. Very often it is without any results whatever. Walking is often advised in constipation, and it MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS sometimes does good. We know that a sedentary occupation is conducive to constipation, but on the other hand, I have known letter carriers, messen- ger boys and salesmen who were always out, al- ways on the go, who were victims of very ob- stinate constipation. Walking may help in some cases, but it is certainly no panacea. If the proper diet, plus massage, plus walking have not accomplished the desired results, other measures must be employed in addition. And the simplest is an enema or rectal injection. Inject from a douche bag (or glass or tin reservoir) or from a bulb syringe one-half a pint to pint of cool water and retain for a few minutes; where the constipation has been severe and prolonged and the feces are hard, water alone may not suf- fice, and it may be necessary to add some soap- suds to the water, or to dissolve in it some Epsom Salt—one or two tablespoonfuls of Epsom Salt to a pint of water. This will generally produce a very good evacuation. Injecting into the rectum .2 to 4 drams of glycerin generally works quite well. The insertion into the rectum of a glycerin (suppository is less troublesome than the pure glycerin, but it is not so efficient. Of recent years, Liquid Petrolatum, or Mineral Oil or Russian Mineral Oil has come extensively into use. It is the least injurious of the internal laxatives, because it does not irritate the bowels, acting principally as a lubricant, but again it is MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 121 not as wonderful a thing as its producers and sellers would make us believe. First, it does not cure constipation; it relieves it as long as it is taken, and that’s all. And second, on some peo- ple, it doesn’t act at all; it just passes out of the rectum in an unchanged condition, without pro- ducing any movement at all; it oozes out, soiling the linen, and is merely annoying to the patient without doing him any good. If the liquid petro- latum does not act well, then for a change, the fluid extract of cascara sagrada, 15 to 30 drops at night or night and morning, is the least objec- tionable. Agar-agar does not act as a drug—it just absorbs water and increases the bulk of the feces—may be taken now and then. In conclusion, I wish to say that while in general I am opposed to the regular taking of cathartics or even laxatives, I know people who are taking both, have taken them for years and without any apparent injury; on the contrary, with apparent benefit. I know a man who has taken an aloin, strychnine and belladonna pill practically every night for twenty-two years. If he misses taking a pill, his bowels do not move; if he takes a pill, he has one full, satisfactory movement. He has never had to increase the dose, but on the other hand he cannot get along without it. I know a female patient who has been taking an improved compound cathartic pill every night for at least twelve years. The dose does not hurt her, she 122 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS needs no more, but she can’t get along without it. I know a very highly intelligent man, a man who knows how to take care of himself, who must have his dose of Sal Hepatica in the morning, three or four times a week. And where I see that the patient in addition to all other measures must have some medicinal cathartic or laxative, I do not hesitate to prescribe it. It will be seen, that while I lay stress on proper diet, massage, walking, etc., and am opposed in general to cathartics, I do not hesitate to advise them when I consider them indicated. I have no superstitious fear of drugs, such as exhibited by our drugless friends, who, to tell the truth, are too often ignorant of the proper use of drugs. The physician who knows nothing except to write a prescription for every ailment and dis- ease is as narrow and as capable of harm as is the ignoramus who rails against the use of any drug, no matter how carefully and how intelligent- ly administered. Drugs are not unnatural; nothing that is a part of nature is “unnatural.” And drugs are often actually life saving. Avoid the drugging physician; but also avoid the drug- less healer and quack. Both are pests. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 123 Treatment of Wind and Rumbling in the Bowels Most people have a little rumbling in the bowels now and then. (Borborygmi we call it in medi- cal language.) It is due to the movements of in- testinal gas. But some people suffer from this condition in an aggravated form. The rumbling is very frequent and is so loud that it can be heard at a distance. I have known some girls who would never go with young men or go out anywhere on account of the humiliation they felt. I have known young men who gave up jobs on account of the constant rumbling in their bowels; they felt so ashamed and self-conscious. But the condition can be readily cured. Have the following pre- scription made up: Oil of Turpentine (the purest kind) 2 drams Spirit of Peppermint 5 drams Spirit of Chloroform 1 dram Pour 20 or 30 drops on a lump of sugar and take down. Bepeat the dose four times a day. The drops may also be taken in a tablespoonful of water, but it tastes much more unpleasant. In severe cases I also advise the application to the stomach of a turpentine stupe, once or twice a week. Take a Turkish towel wrung out 124 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS of boiling water, sprinkle over it about a table- spoonful of oil of turpentine and apply to abdo- men. The stupe bums good and plenty, but it does good. In some eases, of women especially, it may also become necessary to wear a snug, well- fitting abdominal bandage. In very obstinate cases, in addition to the drops recommended above, the patient may have to take the following powder: Pure Willow Charcoal 4 ounces Subnitrate of Bismuth 1 ounce One or two teaspoonfuls one hour after meals. I have cured many patients with the above treatment. Do not take cathartics: they weaken the bowels and make matters worse. In fact many cases of gas, noise and rumbling in the bowels are due to the frequent taking of laxatives and cathartics. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 125 Treatment of Hemorrhoids or Piles Painful, inflamed hemorrhoids are a great nui- sance and may render a person very wretched and irritable; while bleeding hemorrhoids, if the bleeding is frequent, may make the patient weak and anemic; if the bleeding is severe, they may become dangerous. Such hemorrhoids should be operated on. But there are certain kinds of hemorrhoids, where the patient can get along very well without an operation. Constipation, if any, should be treated with gentle measures (see article on Constipation). Avoid strong ca- thartics, because strong cathartics may be the cause of piles. Injecting a quarter to a half pint of cold water into the rectum twice a day— morning and night—is very useful. For the in- tolerable itching sometimes present in hemor- rhoids, use the following ointment: Menthol 3 grains Calomel 10 grains Subnitrate of Bismuth 30 grains Resorcin 10 grains Oil of Cade 15 grains Petrolatum 1 ounce The piles are well cleansed with hot water, and the salve is smeared over; a little pushed into the 126 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS rectum, and a piece of cotton is put over the anus; it is usually kept in place by the buttocks. The cotton protects the clothes from soiling and keeps the medicine in place for a longer time. The ointment may be applied three times a day. A very excellent application for external hem- orrhoids is Calamine Powder. Get in the drug- store, say, two ounces of pure Calamine (not Calomel), apply liberally to the piles and protect with a piece of cotton. The powder may be sprinkled on the cotton and then applied. A few such applications often shrivel up the piles, so that they become like a small tag of skin which causes no trouble. Instead of the ointment previously described or in addition to it, a cocoa butter suppository may be used. The following is a good formula: Nutgalls (finely powdered) 3 grains Oil of Cade 3 drops Resorcin 1 grain Subnitrate of Bismuth 5 grains Cocoa Butter 20 grains This is for one suppository. Having made up two dozen such suppositories, insert a suppository into the rectum twice a day — night and morn- ing (after the bowels have moved). In severe cases, three suppositories a day may be used. There are on the market ready made hemorrhoidal suppositories which are quite good. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 127 Care of the Teeth When the teeth are bad they should be attended to by a dentist, of course. But something should be done to prevent them from becoming bad. Why do we Americans and the English have the worst teeth in the world? Certainly not be- cause we do not keep them clean, for we unques- tionably use more tooth brushes, more tooth pastes and tooth powders and tooth washes than any other nation on earth. On the other hand the colored people, and many backward nations who hardly ever use a tooth brush have fine teeth. Animals never use tooth brushes and do not suf- fer from tooth decay. One trouble with us is that from infancy on we do not give our teeth sufficient exercise. We eat too much pap and mush. Our diet does not contain enough hard and tough articles which would give the teeth and the jaws the necessary exercise. In a child’s diet there should always be some articles which require thorough chewing — hard crusts of bread, hard tack, popcorn, dried as well as fresh fruit, nuts, etc. Not only the consistency, but the quality, the character of the food should be studied: it should contain a gen- erous amount of lime; and coarse bread and un- 128 MAEBIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS polished rice are good for the teeth. Too refined food is not the best for children any more than it is for adults. Of course, the teeth should be brushed and kept clean. But with many people brushing the teeth has become a fad — some brush their teeth six or eight times a day, and I am not so sure that the too frequent use of the brush is not injurious. And when we consider the condition in which most tooth brushes are found, we can hardly help the conviction that the tooth brush must be a frequent source of infection; on examination it is often found to be a fine breeding place for germs. The tooth brush should be kept clean — frequently washed with soap and hot water, and dipped now and then in Peroxide of Hydrogen. And brushing the teeth twice a day — on getting up in the morn- ing and on going to bed — is quite sufficient. Of course, you can use the various advertised tooth pastes, powders and washes; they are all good. But where money is an object, you can very well do without them. Keep on your washstand or in your medicine chest sonm .common table salt or some charcoal; either makes as good a tooth powder as any of the advertised ones; and as a wash keep a bottle of spirit of peppermint, drop 5 to 10 drops in a *4 glassful of water, and you have a good mouth wash. If the teeth show a tendency to discoloration, to yellowness, dip the brush in full strength MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 129 Peroxide of Hydrogen, and mb thoroughly; after- wards, rinse with plain water. In case the teeth and gums show a tendency to pyorrhea (by press- ing with the finger a little pus may be squeezed out) and there is no dentist available, buy a few one grain tablets of Potassium Permanganate, dissolve one in half a glass of water and use as a tooth wash and a mouth wash; afterwards rinse with water to which a little peroxide of hydrogen (a tablespoonful to a glass of water) has been added. In case the gums are spongy, receding and bleeding, rub them morning and night with finely powdered dried alum. Or you can buy a crystal of alum for one or two cents, or an alum pencil for ten cents, and pass it over the gums three or four times a day. Touching the unhealthy part of the gum with a bit of cotton tightly wound on the end of a toothpick and dipped in aromatic sulphuric acid acts very nicely, but requires care and intelligence in application. A still better application, however, is Tincture of Myrrh. Apply freely on a bit of cotton on the end of a toothpick. Excellent for spongy, bleeding gums. There is a craze just now for extracting all the teeth for all possible ailments; do not have your teeth extracted unless positively advised so by a competent and conscientious physician and den- tist. Too many teeth are being extracted which 130 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS for the patient’s welfare had better have re- mained in. For the horrible truth must be told that in our corrupt and commercial age many an operation is sometimes performed not because the patient needs the operation, but because the oper- ator needs the fee. Bad Odor from the Mouth Those who think that love should be superior to such little things as physical defects and ailments, should try to live in close intimacy with a partner with a very bad breath. An offensive breath will prove a severe strain on the finest sort of love. And nobody knows how really offensive a bad odor from the mouth can be except the physician who has to handle many patients of various sorts. Summarily, a bad odor from the mouth, partic- ularly from a woman’s mouth, must be treated, must be cured, and about ninety-five per cent of all cases can be cured. The proper thing is to consult a physician, in order that he may deter- mine the cause of the odor, because a bad odor or a bad breath may be due to a variety of causes. It may be due to bad teeth, to pyorrhea (pus around the gums), it may be due to bad tonsils (chronically inflamed tonsils contain little cheesy masses which are full of germs and have an ex- ceedingly offensive odor); it may be due to ca- tarrh of the nose and throat, to disease of the lungs, to catarrh of the stomach or even to intes- MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 131 tinal indigestion and fermentation. It may be due to a combination of causes. The doctor will diagnose the cause or causes and will prescribe proper treatment. But where a physician is for some reason un- available, the patient if intelligent can do a great deal for himself or herself in the matter. For instance, a person can see if he has a dirty coated tongue; and while a coated tongue is as a rule not a primary trouble, but is due to a bad stomach, still the tongue itself must be cleaned. Scrape it thoroughly every morning or every two or three hours if necessary, with a tongue scraper (they are only ten cents each), and then rub off the surface of the tongue with a piece of lemon. The mere scraping of the tongue removes billions of germs from the oral cavity. Diseased tonsils should be painted vigorously once a day with the following solution: Iodine ...10 grains Potassium Iodide 20 grains Glycerin 1 ounce The same solution may be painted over the back of the throat in cases of chronic catarrh of the throat. The painting may be done with a long camel’s-hair brush, but preferably with a piece of cotton tightly wound on a long stick of wood. If there is catarrh of the nose, that should be attended to (see article on Chronic Catarrh of the Nose). The teeth and the gums must of course MARBIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS be given proper attention (see article “Care of the Teeth”). If there seems to be indigestion, catarrh of the stomach, with fermentation of food, belching of gas and water brash, large doses of pure willow charcoal should be taken — say about a table- spoonful about an hour after each meal. The following combination is better than char- coal alone: Willow Charcoal 4 ounces Calcined Magnesia 2 ounces Subnitrate of Bismuth 1 ounce Oil of Peppermint 12 drops A tablespoonful one hour after meals. Take it dry on the tongue, then swallow just enough water to wash it down. A Few Additional Formulae In bad odor from decayed teeth, the following formula will be found useful: Thymol 8 grains Alcohol 1 ounce Glycerin 4 drams Sol. of Formaldehyde 8 drops Water, to make 8 ounces Use as a mouth wash, or Solution Chlorinated Soda 1 y2 drams Glycerin 4 drams Peppermint Water, to make 8 ounces Use as a gargle. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 133 In bad odor from gastric fermentation, the fol- lowing mixture has given satisfactory results: Creosote. 30 drops Besorcin 15 grains Alcohol 4 drams Chloroform Water, to make 3 ounces Teaspoonful after meals in a little water. Treatment of Chronic Catarrh of the Nose In the treatment of the nose the simplest treat- ment is the best. In catarrh of the nose with crusts, the nose should be frequently cleansed, with a mild solution. The simplest is the fol- lowing : Borax 2 ounces Table Salt 2 ounces Bicarbonate of Soda 2 ounces Dissolve a teaspoonful of this powder in half a glass of warm water, put a little of the solution in the palm of the hand and snuff up gently into each nostril. Or the solution may be used from a spray, or from a nasal cup or a so-called Bir- mingham douche. I do not like to recommend a syringe or a reservoir with a tube, because un- skilled syringing may result in injury. After the nose has been well washed out, so that it is clean of crusts, a little borated vaseline should be snuffed up into each nostril. MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Treatment of a Cold in the Head No food of any kind for twelve to twenty-four hours; even of water sparingly. A hot mustard foot bath; a good saline laxative (such as Epsom Salt — 1 to 2 teaspoonfuls in half a glass of water) if necessary, and a rhinitis tablet every half hour for 6 to 8 doses. This will generally break up the worst cold in the head, that is if the treatment is taken as soon as the cold makes its appearance. For the stopped up nose the best things to inhale is Solution of Formaldehyde. (A solution of 20 grains of menthol in a half ounce of chloroform makes an excellent inhala- tion.) For Sore Throat The best thing for a commencing sore throat is to paint the throat with a 10 per cent solution of argyrol. Wind a piece of cotton tightly on a wooden stick, dip in the argyrol solution, and paint throat freely. A pledget of cotton dipped in the argyrol solution and inserted in each nos- tril is also very beneficial. To Break Up a General Cold Use the treatment given for a cold in the head, and in addition go to bed and take a 5-grain tablet of acetyl-salicylic acid (aspirin), followed by a large glassful of hot lemonade. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 135 I am opposed to the careless and indiscrimin- ate use of what are known as coal tar products, that is, phenacetin, acetanilid, antipyrin, aspirin, e*c. But as I am not an extremist or fanatic on any subject, so I am not on this subject, either. And there is no question that a sudden chill, a “general cold,” a grippy feeling with pains in the bones and muscles, a commencing sort throat, etc., may be completely broken up (“aborted” we call it in medicine), and its further development prevented by the timely taking of a dose of aspirin or phenacetin, or a combination of both. A very good combination is the following: Phenacetin 1 grain Acetyl-Salicylic Acid 4 grains Caffein 1 grain This can be made up in powders, capsules, or tablets, and one may be taken every 3 hours for 3 doses. 136 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS The Treatment of Leucorrhea or Whites Many girls and married women—perhaps the majority — have some discharge from the vagina. If the discharge is so scanty as to he hardly no- ticeable, and causes no annoyance, it may be dis- regarded. But if it is at all abundant, if it causes itching or irritation, it should be attended to. The proper thing is, of course, to consult a physician. Where, for some reason or another, a physician is not consulted, self treatment may be attempted. General Treatment. The general treatment consists in general hygienic measures and com- mon sense. The patient should not be on her feet more than she can help, and she should not walk until exhausted or fatigued. Where the leucor- rhea is due to or is aggravated by anemia and gen- eral weakness, a good iron preparation, such as one Blaud’s five-grain pill three times a day, or a tonic of iron, quinine and strychnine, will do good. A daily cold bath or cold sponge, followed by a brisk dry rubbing with a rough towel, is also useful. One of the simplest things is an alum tampon. You take a piece of absorbent cotton, about the size of a fist, spread it out, put about a table- MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 137 spoonful of powdered alum on it, fold it up, tie a string around the center, insert it in the vagina as far as it will go, and leave it in for twenty-four hours. Then pull it gently by the string and syringe yourself with a quart or two quarts of warm water. Such a tampon may he inserted every other day or every third day, and I have known cases where this simple treatment alone produced a cure. In some cases, however, douches work better and the two best things for douching are tincture of iodine and lactic acid. Buy, say, four ounces of tincture of iodine, and use one teaspoonful in two quarts of hot water in a douche bag. This injection should be used twice a day, morning and night. Of the lactic acid you buy, say, a pint, and use two tablespoonfuls to one quart of water. The lactic acid has the advantage over the tincture of iodine that it is colorless, while the iodine is dark and stains whatever it comes in contact with. Sometimes I order the use of tinc- ture of iodine and the lactic acid alternately; for one douche the tincture of iodine, for the next the lactic acid, and so on. When the condition improves, it is sufficient to use one tablespoonful of the lactic acid to two quarts of water. These injections are quite efficient and have the advan- tage of being perfectly harmless. 138 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS The Treatment of Cracked Nipples If the nipples of the nursing mother are cracked and painful, the nursing should be done through a nipple shield, and between the nursings the nipple should be rubbed with the following simple preparation. Thymol Iodide, 1 dram; olive oil, 1 ounce. This should be applied every hour to the nipple and covered with a piece of absorbent cot- ton; before each nursing the nipple must be well washed with warm water and castile soap, or warm boric acid solution. This simple prepara- tion is very excellent. Since I recommended it in my “Woman: Her Sex and Love Life,” a number of women have written in, speaking of its good effects and thanking me for the advice. Liver Spots Paint with tincture of iodine morning and night. Or use the following ointment: Betanaphthol 1 dram Salicylic Acid dram Zinc Oxide 2 drams Petrolatum 1 ounce Apply at night on going to bed. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 139 Treatment of Pimples on the Face Pimples on the face or acne as they are called are a very common condition, particularly in young people. Sometimes they can be cured very quickly, sometimes they are very obstinate. The general condition must be looked after; if there is constipation it must be attended to (see the article on The Treatment of Constipation). Starch foods must be eaten in moderation; lit- tle sugar, candy, butter, pastry and greasy foods in general; very little coifee or none at all. Plenty of plain water. Plenty of fresh air, though not when it is dusty and windy. Externally the following treatment is to be used. Wring a towel out of hot water, apply it to the face for a few minutes, dry and apply the fol- lowing lotion: Liver of Sulphur 1 dram Sulphate of Zinc dram Peppermint Water 4 ounces Shake well and apply with piece of cloth. This should be done at night. In the morning wash face with warm water and tar soap. If the skin is very oily, the following applica- tion should be used: Powdered Sulphur 1 dram Ether 2 drams Alcohol 2 ounces 140 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Yeast may be taken internally: half a cake in the morning and half a cake at night. It is a useful preparation, though its virtues have been greatly exaggerated by those interested in its sale. Arsenic in very small doses —1/100 of a grain tablet 3 times a day after meals — is also very useful, but this is best taken under the supervision of a physician. Treatment of Freckles Ammoniated Mercury 10 grains Bismuth Subnitrate 30 grains Zinc Oxide 1 dram "White Petrolatum 1 ounce Apply at night. Salicylic Acid 10 grains Ammoniated Mercury 15 grains White Petrolatum 1 ounce Apply at night. In severe cases, where the entire face seems one mass of freckles a stronger application may be necessary. Here is a good formula, but it must be used with caution: Betanaphthol 1 dram Green Soap 2 drams Lard 2 ounces Cover the face on going to bed and wash off MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 141 in the morning; if the face is irritated, apply a good toilet powder or some stearate of zinc. The following is an excellent application, but as it is poisonous, containing as it does corrosive sublimate, I do not care to recommend it; but a physician may prescribe it. The formula is as follows: Mercuric Chloride 4 grains Bismuth Oxide 2 drams Emulsion of Almonds 4 ounces Shake well and apply by means of a clean piece of cloth three times a day. Let it dry on the face. Treatment of Pimples (Acne) on the Back The skin on the back is tougher and less sensi- tive than the skin of the face, and it can therefore stand a stronger application. For pimples on the back I recommend the fol- lowing ointment: Salicylic Acid 2 drams Betanaphthol 2 drams Lard 1 ounce Apply small quantity to each pimple. If the pimples are very hard the application should be made night and morning: in ordinary cases once a day is sufficient. 142 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Treatment of Red Nose (Acne Rosacea) The general measures are: regulation of the diet — not to eat too much, to drink no alcoholics and very little coffee; and to avoid winds. Ex- ternally the nose should be painted with pure ichthyol on going to bed; the ichthyol is allowed to dry on and is washed off in the morning. It is also advised to take ichthyol internally, 5 drops in a capsule 3 times a day after meals; however, I cannot say from personal experience if it is of any definite value. But, as it is harmless, it may be given a trial. Treatment of Eczema (Tetter, Salt-Rheum) There are several varieties of eczema, but for practical purposes it is sufficient to know two varieties — acute, wet or weeping eczema, and chronic or dry eczema. All varieties of eczema do not like water, particularly the acute kind, and plain water should never be used on eczema. If necessary to clean an eczematous patch, use cold cream, vaseline, olive oil, or water containing some bran or some bicarbonate of soda. And re- member that acute and wet eczema are very intol- erant to preparations containing tar. Tar is good for chronic eczema, but not for the acute stage. Eczema is not contagious. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 143 In acute eczema use the following lotion: Calamine 4 drams Zinc Oxide 4 drams Bismuth Subnitrate 2 drams Lime Water 8 ounces Shake well and apply liberally with a piece of absorbent cotton; let it dry on. This may be ap- plied every hour or two during the day; at night use the following ointment: Salicylic Acid 10 grains Zinc Oxide 2 drams Starch 2 drams Petrolatum 2 ounces If the patient cannot stay in the house and use the lotion during the daytime, he may use this ointment morning and night instead. Apply thickly, cover with absorbent cotton or gauze and wrap snugly, not tightly, with bandage. CHRONIC ECZEMA In chronic eczema use the following ointment: Resorcin 15 grains Zinc Oxide 2 drams Bismuth Subnitrate 2 drams Oil of Cade (01. Rusci) 1 dram Petrolatum 1 ounce Apply two or three times a day. For children the ointment should be used in half the strength. MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS In cases of very chronic eczema, with the skin rough and thickened, a stronger ointment should be used as follows: Salicylic Acid 30 grains Betanaphthol 15 grains Oil of Cade 30 grains Resorcin 30 grains Zinc Oxide 2 drams Petrolatum 1 ounce Apply once or twice a day. Treatment of Ringworm For Ringworm of the Body (hands, face, etc.) apply the following ointment: Resorcin 15 grains Betanaphthol 10 grains Salicylic Acid 10 grains Lard 1 ounce Apply night and morning; cover with gauze and bandage. This ointment if properly used will cure the worst case of ringworm. Ringworm of the Scalp. Wash the scalp thor- oughly with tar soap and hot water, pull out the diseased hair and apply the following ointment: Betanaphthol 40 grains Salicylic Acid 20 grains Lard 1 ounce MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 145 Ringworm of the Beard (Barber’s Itch). Pull out the diseased hair, apply compresses of a solu- tion of hyposulphite of soda (2 ounces of hyposul- phite to 1 pint of water) for one hour steady; then wipe dry and apply the ointment recom- mended for ringworm of the body. Treatment of Eczema of the Face in Children There is a kind of eczema of the face in children (real name: impetigo) which looks very terrible; it covers the entire face, so that only the eyes are barely visible. And still it can be easily cured if yon know how. I have had children who had been suffering for months cured within a week by the application of a certain ointment, which does not seem to be known to many physicians. The formula of the ointment is as follows: Red Mercuric Sulphide 15 grains Zinc Oxide 2 drams Bismuth Subnitrate 1 dram Resorcin 10 grains Petrolatum 2 ounces (In older children I sometimes use double the strength.) Apply to face night and morning, covering the entire face with a gauze mask (two or three thick- nesses of gauze, in which little openings are cut out for the eyes, nostrils and mouth). 146 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS No water should be applied to the face; if nec- essary to wipe off, use warm sweet oil. If water is to be used, use only luke warm water in which a little borax or bicarbonate of soda has been dissolved. The Treatment of Psoriasis Psoriasis is a formidable sounding and very obstinate affection. Yet once you know you have it, you can treat it as well as any physician, even as well as any specialist in skin diseases. For even we can never promise a cure; all we can do is to remove the psoriatic patches, and keep them away for a few months or years. We can never guarantee that they won’t come back. If you have psoriasis, proceed as follows: Cut out all meat, all alcoholics as well as coffee; and apply the following ointment: I. Salicylic acid y2 ounce Soft Soap (so-called Green Soap) y2 ounce Oil of Cade y2 ounce Petrolatum 3 ounces Rub in thoroughly into each psoriatic patch with a stiff brush (a stiff toothbrush will do) every night, for three nights; for the fourth night apply plain zinc oxide ointment or the following salve: MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 147 II. Zinc oxide 4 drams Subnitrate of bismuth 2 drams Petrolatum 2 ounces If the patch has not entirely disappeared, re- peat the first ointment. Taking internally small doses of arsenic, 1/100 of a grain tablet of arsenous oxide, 3 times a day after meals is also considered useful. Thyroid extract and the X-ray are used in very obstinate cases with good results, but these things are not for the layman. Falling Out of the Hair. Baldness After the hair has fallen out and the man or woman is bald, little or nothing can be done. But while the hair is falling out, much can be done to stop or delay its further progress. Massaging the scalp, if done properly and persistently, is unquestionably beneficial, and where the roots have not been destroyed, a new and even luxurious growth of hair may be brought about by proper massage. But it must be done by a masseuse or masseur, as few people possess the patience necessary to massage one’s own scalp for half an hour. If there is dandruff, that must be cured first, of course (see article on Dandruff). After mas- saging, or at night on going to bed, the following lotion should be well rubbed in: 148 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Chloral . .■ 1 dram Tannic acid 1 dram Tincture of cantharides 2 drams Glycerin 4 drams Alcohol 8 ounces If the skin of the scalp is dry, then in the above lotion use only 4 ounces of alcohol and 4 ounces of castor oil instead of 8 ounces of alcohol. Quinine as a hair tonic is of no value. Men should not wear their hats tight. If men wore no derbys, only soft hats, or no hats at all, there would be much less baldness. That constant intellectual work and worry contribute to bald- ness there is no question. If this is any consola- tion to baldheads, they are welcome to it. MINOB AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 149 Eyelids Sticking Together Many sickly and scrofulous children have in- flammation of the eyelids, and wake in the morn- ing with the eyelids partly or entirely stuck to- gether. To cure this condition, wash the eyes several times a day with a warm solution of boric acid (one teaspoonful of boracic acid to half a glass of hot water), and on going to bed apply to the eyelids a little borated vaseline from a tube. The finger with which you apply the vase- line must be thoroughly clean; wash it with soap and water; antiseptic soap is still better. Treatment of Styes Styes in children are generally due to dirt—to the child rubbing its eyes with its unclean little hands which have been in all kinds of places. Sometimes a stye may be due to a cold. In adults styes may result from straining the eyes too much. If the face were well washed before going to bed, if the eyes were often wiped with a clean little rag dipped into a solution of boric acid, there would be few cases of styes. 150 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS The simplest application for styes is a hot solu- tion of boracie acid. Take a teaspoonful of boraeic acid (more correctly called boric acid), put it in half glass of very hot water, stir until it is dissolved, dip a clean linen rag, or a gauze compress in the solution, and apply to the eye. Change frequently. Have a hot compress ready before your remove the cooling one. At night, on going to bed, apply to the eyelid a little borated vaseline from a tube. When the entire eyelid is inflamed, a gauze com- press dipped in cold camphor water, makes a pleasant cooling application. Burning Eyes Some people complain of a burning in the eyes, and an intolerance to light. There may be some redness and congestion and there may not. Ap- ply cold compresses of boracic acid solution. An- other good remedy is cold boiled tea leaves. Just apply directly over the closed eyes. They draw out the heat nicely. Red Eyelids Many a woman's—and man's too—appearance is spoiled by red eyelids. Particularly when the person has a pale complexion, the red rim around MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 151 the eye stands out prominently. The most beauti- ful woman will not look beautiful if her eyelids are red. A simple remedy to relieve this condition is to apply several times a day cold compresses of Lime Water. Get some lime water in the drugstore, pour out some in a glass (in the summer you may add a piece of ice), fold a piece of gauze in several thicknesses, soak it in the solution, and apply to the eyes. Repeat several times a day. In the night time apply to the eyelids a little borated vas- eline from a tube. This treatment will cure many cases. But in cases in which the condition has lasted many years and has become chronic, the above treat- ment may not suffice. In such cases the following treatment is suggested: Get a crystal of alum or an alum pencil, dip it lightly in water and pass over the eyelids. Do this three times a day. At night apply to the eyelids the following ointment: Yellow mercuric oxide ........ .>..., 1 grain Borated vaseline i. ounce In very old chronic cases, passing over the eye- lids with a crystal of copper sulphate (bluestone) may become necessary, but that is a remedy for the physician’s hands, and not the layman’s. 152 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Black Eye I have little sympathy with the slugger who in brawls with other bums gets a black eye. I would not remove the badge of his rowdyism if I could. But now and then one gets a black eye innocently and such cases we must help. The best applica- tion I have found to be the following: Compound tincture of benzoin 1 dram Spirit of camphor 2 dram Tincture of capsicum 2 drams Paint very carefully with small camel ’s-hair brush, or with bit of cotton wound on the end of a toothpick, over the discolored spots (the “black eye”), taking good care that none of the liquid gets into the eye. Apply every hour. If applied persistently during twenty-four hours, the dis- coloration, the “black eye,” is usually gone. Gentle massaging before each application helps along. Painting the black eye with a flesh colored pencil may be better than nothing, rendering the part less conspicuous, but it is a makeshift at best. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 153 Itching in the Ear I am not referring to itching of the external ear; that is a simple matter. I am referring to itching in the canal of the ear; this, if not relieved immediately, can render a person frantic. The best and most efficient remedy for it is the following: A 5 per cent solution of carbolic acid in glycerin. Just tell the druggist to give you half an ounce of a 5 per cent solution of carbolic acid in glycerin, dip a bit of cotton wound on a toothpick in this solution and apply gently to the canal of the ear; the itching will quickly stop. Make these applications three or four times a day, and the condition will be permanently cured. If it is not (there may be an exception now and then), you must consult an otologist—a specialist in diseases of the ear. How to Remove Wax in the Ear Wax in the ear can be very annoying, and may interfere with proper hearing. The proper thing is to prevent its accumulation, by keeping the ears clean, using an ear spoon gently now and then or wiping the inside with cotton wound on a tooth- pick and dipped in warm water. But where the 154 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS accumulation of wax has taken place, you must not try to remove it forcibly, or you may injure the membrane of the ear. The best way to remove wax from the ear is the following: Dissolve a teaspoonful of bicarbonate of soda in about a quarter of a glass of hot water. By the aid of a medicine dropper, drop a few drops into the ear and lie down on the opposite ear for a few moments. The bicarbonate of soda solution softens the wax, which can then be easily wiped out by the aid of a bit of cotton wound on a toothpick. Where the wax is abundant and hard, the drop- ping of the bicarbonate of soda solution may have to be repeated several times. Now and then we meet with cases where the wax has become so hardened that it is practically as hard as a stone. In such cases the bicarbonate of soda will not accomplish the desired object, and we have to look for a more active remedy. For- tunately we have such a remedy, and that is peroxide of hydrogen. Saturate a piece of cotton in pure peroxide of hydrogen and insert it gently into the ear until it touches the wax; leave it there for two or three or five minutes; remove it, and if necessary, repeat the same thing again; or drop a few drops with a medicine dropper; the wax will soon be found softened and disintegrated MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 155 (broken up into little bits) and can be easily wiped away by a piece of dry cotton wound on a stick or toothpick. Ether disintegrates wax very quickly, but this is for the doctor’s use only. After all the wax has been removed it is well to introduce into the ear a small amount of plain or borated vaseline. This is for the purpose of heal- ing any irritation which might have been caused by the manipulations for the removal of the wax. The vaseline may be left in for a day or so, and then the ear is to be wiped dry with some cotton or gauze. Insects in the Ear It sometimes happens that a child wakes in the middle of the night frantic with fear and agony, because an insect—a fly, bug or what not—got into its little ear, is tickling and scratching it and buzzing and can’t get out. The thing to do is to fill the ear at once with some liquid—warm water, olive oil or glycerin. The insect drowns in the liquid and eventually comes to the surface. Glycerin is the best, because being a heavy liquid, it drops to the very bottom of the ear, and is sure to kill the bug; also being a heavy liquid, the insect is more certain to float on the surface. 156 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS A few drops of ether dropped into the ear will also quickly kill the insect. A bottle of chloroform held closely to the ear will also accomplish the work: the vapor of the chloroform has a lethal effect on the insect. Toothache Severe or frequently recurring toothache should receive the attention of a dentist. For temporary relief, the following will be found satisfactory: If there is a cavity in the tooth take a wisp of cotton, wind it around the end of a toothpick, dip it in oil of cloves and insert in the cavity, leaving the cotton in the cavity. Pure liquefied carbolic acid is even more efficient than oil of cloves, but as it is a strong poison, I do not care to recommend it for general use. Where there is no cavity in the tooth rub the gums with the following mixture: Chloroform 1 dram Tincture of aconite 1 dram Tincture of iodine 1 dram Hot drinks, particularly hot coffee, and sweets are bad for people subject to toothache. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 157 Dandruff Shampoo the scalp thoroughly once a week with tincture of green soap or with tar soap, and apply every night, or if the case is a bad one, every night and morning, the following lotion: Resorcin ... 2 drams Glycerin 4 drams Bay rum 8 ounces Mark: Dandruff Lotion Apply thoroughly every morning. In very obstinate cases, the following ointment should be applied at night, and the above lotion in the morning: Powdered Sulphur 30 grains Salicylic Acid 15 grains White Petrolatum 1 ounce Rub into the scalp thoroughly at night. There is a variety of dandruff the scales of which are not dry, but oily, greasy. They don’t fly off like dry dandruff, but form a greasy layer on the scalp; if you scratch with the nails they get full of greasy debris. In this kind of dandruff, I advise to wash the scalp once or twice a week with bicarbonate of soda or with very weak ammonia water (a tablespoonful or two of ammonia water 158 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS to a small basinful of water). Besides, the fol- lowing salve is applied at night. Carbonate of Soda 1 dram Powdered Sulphur 1 dram White Petrolatum 2 ounces (May be flavored with 1 drop of oil of rose, 5 drops of oil of bergamot or some lilac.) Apply at night. In the morning the dandruff lotion should be applied. There are no cases of dandruff that cannot be cured by patient and intelligent treatment. How to Remove Superfluous Hair It is perfectly proper and legitimate (I would say it is a duty) for a woman to try to remove any superfluous or unsightly growth of hair. The prettiest and most intelligent female face is dis- figured by a growth of hair on the upper lip or chin. It may be unpleasant to say so, but a woman with a mustache or a beard is a monstrosity. The electric needle is the only permanent cure; but the treatment is painful, takes very much time where the hairs are numerous, and sometimes leaves scars. The X-ray is dangerous and some- times causes scars which are worse than the superfluous hair. The razor is troublesome, and does not leave the skin perfectly smooth. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 159 On the whole, therefore, a depilatory powder or paste is the most satisfactory. The following is the best formula: Barium Sulphide (fresh) .. 2 drams Zinc Oxide 2 drams Starch 4 drams Put about a teaspoonful of this powder in a small saucer, add a few drops of water—enough to form a paste; spread some of it with a flat piece of wood (wooden “spatula,” or the handle of a spoon) over the superfluous hair, leave on for about five minutes (where the hair is coarse, ten minutes may be necessary) and wipe off. Apply a little talcum powder. This is best done in the evening. Where the skin is very sensitive, it is well to apply some zinc ointment over night. Of course as soon as the hair begins to show again, the paste is to be reapplied. The same powder-paste may be used to remove hairy moles, and also the hair under the armpits. Where the above powder does not work as it should it is because the barium sulphide is too old and spoiled. You should insist that the druggist dispense a good quality of freshly prepared barium sulphide (and be sure that you do not ask for barium sulphite or sulphate). 160 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Hairy Arms Many women, as you know, have very hairy arms, almost as hairy as men’s. Of course the above powder-paste would remove the hair on the arms as elsewhere. But it is not advisable to use it, for too much of the paste would have to be used at a time, and this might cause considerable irritation and other unpleasant symptoms. In such case I advise the frequent application of a very strong peroxide of hydrogen. Not the ordi- nary kind that is sold in the drug stores for medicinal purposes, but the kind that is sold for bleaching. The peroxide does not remove the hair, hut it bleaches it and thus makes it prac- tically unnoticeable. The strong peroxide of hydrogen (“golden bleach,” etc.) may be applied full strength 3 times a day, until the desired re- sult has been obtained, and after that once a day, or only once or twice a week. Should there be some irritation after a few applications, the treat- ment is to be discontinued for a few days, and the skin covered with some talcum or, better still, stearate of zinc; and then the treatment may be resumed. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 161 Bums and Scalds When the bum or scald is very extensive, a physician should invariably be called in. But in cases of slight or moderate burns, or where a physician is unobtainable, or until the physician comes, home treatment can be used with very good success. There is a very simple remedy which every mother and father, in fact everybody should be familiar with. That remedy is Bicarbonate of Soda. There should always he a pound of bicarbonate of soda in every house. It has many uses. Bicarbonate of Soda in burns and scalds is to he used as follows: Put a quarter of a pound, or half a pound or a whole pound (de- pends upon the size of the bum) in a saucer or soup plate, add a little water, just enough to make a kind of paste, and apply thickly over the entire surface of the burn. If the bum is very extensive, several pounds of bicarbonate may be necessary. Fortunately the drug is cheap—only a few cents a pound. It is remarkable what immediate relief the ap- plication of the bicarbonate gives the sufferer. It “draws out” the heat, and helps the burn to heal without scarring. But one application is not enough. The surface must always, that is, for 162 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS the first few hours at least, be covered with a thick and moist layer of bicarbonate of soda. When the layer gets dry the pain is apt to reappear; be sure therefore to be on the lookout and to apply in time another layer of moist bicarbonate. If the burn or scald is of a moderate degree, the bicarbonate applications may be all that is neces- sary until complete healing is brought about. But in deeper and more extensive burns, some other treatment may be necessary. Compresses of a 1 or 2 per cent solution of chloramine are now very frequently used, with very good results. The following is a good ointment for bums, and may be used after the acute inflammation and pain has been reduced by the bicarbonate of soda ap- plications. Thymol Iodide 2 drams Zinc Oxide 4 drams Bismuth Subnitrate 4 drams White Petrolatum 4 ounces Apply twice a day, cover with gauze and bandage. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 163 Treatment of Bruises (and Contusions) By bruises we understand injuries resulting from falling or striking or being struck by a blunt object without the skin being broken. Where the skin is broken it is no longer a bruise. It is a wound, a laceration, not a bruise. And the fol- lowing applications apply to bruises and not to open wounds. One of the simplest applications is Burow’s solution. That is a solution of acetate of aluminium. Get in the drugstore 4 or 8 ounces of Burow’s solution, mix one part with 2 parts cold water, saturate some soft cloth or gauze with the solution and apply snugly over the bruise; keep wet with the solution most of the time. Instead of Burow’s solution, eold lead water may be used. Buy the lead water in the drug store ready made, or buy 2 ozs. of Goulard’s Extract, add 2 teaspoonfuls of this to a glassful of water, and you have lead water. Compresses of diluted alcohol (one part of grain alcohol to 3 parts of water) are also very good. An excellent application is a solution of Epsom Salts. Epsom Salt is cheap—5 to 10 cents a pound. Make a strong solution—in the propor- tion of two heaping tablespoonfuls to a tumblerful of water—and use on compresses. A hot Epsom 164 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Salt solution acts better and more quickly than a cold solution, so whenever feasible the hot solution should be given the preference. Of course hot compresses are more troublesome than cold ones, because they have to be changed quite often —a new one is to be applied before the old one gets cold. Treatment of Sprains A very bad sprain accompanied with much swelling should be examined by a surgeon, because it may not be a sprain but a fracture. But an ordinary sprain should be treated as follows: put the patient to bed, give the foot absolute rest, by putting a pillow underneath and apply ice cold compresses of lead water. Get some Goulard’s extract (which is a strpng solution of subacetate of lead), put a tablespoonful in a small basinful of water, soak some gauze in it, and apply to the injured part. Put a small gauze bandage around it. Make it snug but not too tight. Keep com- presses wet. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 165 When the Baby Gets a Fit Few things are so terrifying to a mother as a sudden fit or convulsion in her child. But a word of counsel is: Be calm. Convulsions are a serious matter, but they are very seldom fatal, and gen- erally leave even no bad after effect. Most cases of convulsions in children are due to some dis- order in the stomach or bowels, and the first thing to do is to give the baby a rectal injection of cold water; this will clear out the lower bowel, may quickly reduce the fever, and thus end the attack. If there is reason to suspect that the child had recently eaten a lot of indigestible stuff, it is ad- visable to make it vomit—by introducing the fin- ger (be sure the nail is closely trimmed) into the throat, or by tickling the throat with a feather. If both these things have been done, and the convulsions still continue, the child should be put in a warm bath; or it should be wrapped in a towel, which has been wrung out of hot water to which a tablespoonful of mustard has been added. After wrapping it in a towel, it should be wrapped on top of it in a woolen blanket; this will produce profuse perspiration which may re- duce high temperature, which may be the cause of the convulsions. A towel wrung out of ice water or an ice bag should be kept on the child’s head. A doctor should always be sent for in cases of 166 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS convulsions; but if a doctor is unavailable, or before the doctor comes, the above treatment should be instituted without delay. Treatment of Colic in Children Colic may be due to overeating, to indigestion, fermentation which causes gas, and to a chill. The proper treatment is: First a good enema of warm water with a teaspoonful of bicarbonate of soda in it; second a hot water bag to the abdomen, or rubbing it with warm oil, or the application of a compress wrung out in hot mustard water, or in older children the application of a turpentine stupe. A good dose of castor oil is generally indicated. Where it is known that the child has recently eaten a lot of stuff that is not good for it, the proper thing to do is to make the child vomit. This is best accomplished by inserting the finger (of which the nail must be closely trimmed) in the throat, or by tickling the throat with a feather. If this does not work, you must give a teaspoonful of syrup of ipecac. In ordinary cases of griping or cramps, a hot application to the abdomen and the drinking of fennel tea or anise seed tea is sufficient (put a teaspoonful of fennel seed or anise seed in a cup of hot water, let stand for 10 to 15 minutes, strain and sweeten with a little sugar). MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 167 Treatment of Bed Wetting (Enuresis) I wish I could impress it upon every parent that bedwetting is not a vicious habit, but a dis- ease; either a disease of the neck of the bladder or a psychic disorder. The child no more wants to wet the bed than the parents want him to do it, and it is cruel and futile to scold the child, punish it and beat it for something it cannot help. Every case of bedwetting can be cured with patience and intelligence, but unfortunately there is no remedy for the treatment of this disorder which I can put with any sense of assurance in the layman’s hands. The reason is that many cases of bedwetting require local applications to the urethral canal, to the neck of the bladder, and this of course a layman cannot be expected to do. The general advice is: the child should be given no liquids to drink after 5 in the afternoon, he should be awakened once or twice during the night time, his feet should be warmly covered, and his spine should be rubbed every day with cold water con- taining a handful of salt. He should not be allowed any tea or coffee, or any sharp and spicy things. 168 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Painful Teething Teething (dentition) is a normal physiological process, and as such ought to cause no pain or disturbance. But many physiological processes cause trouble and disturbance (think of pregnancy and childbirth), and those who deny that teething may make a child cross, feverish, sleepless, etc., may even produce convulsions, are foolish. If the gums are hot and tender they should be gently wiped or rubbed with a piece of gauze dipped in a warm solution of borax (about *4 tea- spoonful of borax to one ounce of warm water); this alone often relieves the painful, itching sensa- tion of the gums. The tongue and the inside of the cheeks should be wiped with the solution, as they are apt to be coated on account of the diges- tive trouble which is quite frequent during teeth- ing. If the gums are very painful, rubbing them with a solution of chloral may be necessary, but this is for a physician to prescribe. In some cases the gums are so hot and inflamed that they must be lanced. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 169 Treatment of Fainting (Swooning) First, don’t lose your own head. Then lower the patient’s head—put him flat on a bed, couch or floor, remove collar quickly, loosen all constricting articles of clothing, corsets, garters, etc., and ad- mit plenty of fresh air. Sprinkling cold water on the face, or, in severe cases, even slapping with a wet towel is perfectly all right. Putting strong smelling salts or a little ammonia water to the nose is often alone sufficient to bring the patient to. When the patient has regained consciousness and is able to swallow, a few drops of aromatic spirit of ammonia or Hoffmann’s anodyne will help matters along. If a child is subject to fre- quent fainting spells, a physician should be con- sulted who will discover the cause and treat it. Nosebleed If a child is subject to frequent nosebleed, a competent physician should be consulted without fail, because it may mean something serious. For the stopping of the individual attack of nosebleed, proceed as follows: Raise both arms above the head and keep them so for a few minutes; this alone will suffice to stop nosebleed in many cases. Passing a piece of ice along the nape of the neck or along the bridge of the nose is often effective. If the nosebleed is more serious pack the nostril MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS from which the blood comes with absorbent cotton dipped in pure peroxide of hydrogen, or if the bleeding is very obstinate, in a ten per cent solu- tion of antipyrin. Do not remove the cotton too soon. A piece of ice or a cold compress over the nose while it is packed with cotton is an additional good measure. The Treatment of Worms There are three kinds of worms which infect the human intestine: the round worm, the seat worm and the tapeworm. The Round Worm The Round Worm is one of the commonest of human parasites and children often suffer from it. Fortunately it is not hard to get rid of it. There are several drugs which quickly kill it. The most effective is santonin, a white crystalline powder obtained from Levant Wormseed (the scientific name of which is santonica). Santonin is best given to children in the form of lozenges. Give a lozenge or candy containing % to y2 grain of santonin (they can be purchased ready made at the drug store) at night, and follow in the morn- ing with a laxative, such as castor oil or citrate of magnesia. This treatment may be repeated for three nights in succession, when as a rule all the MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS worms will be killed and expelled. Adults may take one or even two grains at a dose. Before taking the santonin the patient should take no food whatever—except water—for twelve hours. The Seat Worm The Seat Worm which looks like a little piece of white thread, to % inch long, is found in the rectum and causes intense itching. Sometimes it migrates to the genital organs, and then the itch- ing it produces may be the cause of masturbation. Treatment consists of injecting into the rectum about 4 ounces of water in which there has been dissolved a tablespoonful of salt. Before making the injection the anus should be well washed with carbolic soap or with a two per-cent solution of carbolic acid. An enema of quassia wood is also efficient. Get some quassia chips in a drug store (about an ounce), soak them in half a pint of water for two or three hours, strain through gauze or a handker- chief and inject in the rectum. Retain for 5 to 10 minutes. It sometimes happens that the seat worms are very high in the lower bowel; in such cases the enema must be given high up with a soft rubber tube. After the worms have been gotten rid of, there may remain some irritation or itching around the anus. Apply a little zinc salve or carbolated vaseline. 172 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Tapeworm Tapeworm should really be treated by a physi- cian, because it is a more serious matter than the round or seat worm. It is much harder to get rid of completely—that is with the head. If the head is not removed, the worm will grow again. Where a physician is not available the following treat- ment may he given. It gets rid of the worm usually, but it also makes the patient pretty sick. Fast for twelve to twenty hours. Take abso- lutely no food, only water or weak tea without sugar may be taken. Then at night take the following: Oleoresin of male fern 1 dram Chloroform 1 dram In the morning, take two or three ounces of castor oil. The male fern and the chloroform kill or stupefy the worm and the castor oil brings him away. If instructions about food are followed and the stomach and bowels are empty, the worm will usually be completely removed, including the head. This treatment is for adults only. Tape- worm in children must be handled by a physician. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 173 Chafing For chafing apply liberally stearate of zinc. Prickly Heat Apply liberally stearate of zinc. In some very obstinate cases a more active powder may be necessary. Use the following: Calcined Magnesia 4 drams Subnitrate of Bismuth 2 drams Stearate of Zinc 1 ounce Nettle Rash. Urticaria Use the above powder, but as nettle rash or urticaria is sometimes due to a spoiled stomach or certain articles of food, the stomach and the diet must be attended to. A mild laxative, such as a bottle of citrate of magnesia or a seidlitz powder, should be taken; an enema of warm water is also useful; besides it is well to administer a teaspoonful of mixture of rhubarb and soda, 3 times a day after meals; in children only a quarter to half a teaspoonful of the rhubarb and soda mixture should be given, according to age. 174 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS When Baby Cuts its Finger When baby cuts or lacerates its finger or some other part of the body, wash the wound with pure peroxide of hydrogen (full strength) or paint it with tincture of iodine, put a piece of gauze or absorbent cotton over it and tie with a little bandage to hold it in place. If the child complains of no pain, and the wound does not seem to sup- purate, leave it alone. It will probably be all right in two or three days. If it does suppurate, remove the bandage and gauze, paint again with iodine, sprinkle with some Thymol Iodide and bandage again. Benew application every twenty- four hours. For small cuts and bleeding surfaces anywhere an application of powdered potassium permanga- nate is very efficient. When Baby Gets a Splinter Bemove the splinter carefully—with care you can pull it out whole without breaking it—and apply some tincture of iodine. Dip a toothpick with a bit of cotton in the iodine and apply to the point where the splinter entered and hold it there for 2 or 3 minutes. See that the iodine penetrates the track of the splinter and thus destroys any germs that may have entered with it. And that’s all. Of course, it is well to watch. If the splintered part should get inflamed or swollen, it will have to he treated accordingly. But if the splinter has been removed carefully, there is no reason why anything should happen. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 175 Offensive Perspiration of the Feet Sweating and “smelly” feet can become very offensive, nanseatingly so. And there is no reason why anybody should have offensively smelly feet, for the worst cases of excessive and foul perspira- tion can be cured. Ordinary cases of excessive perspiration of the feet should be treated as follows: Soak the feet for 5 or 10 minutes every night in cold water, con- taining some alum or common salt (a handful or two of alum, a handful or two of salt to a basinful of water); dry and rub well with alcohol; then put on dry fresh socks or stockings. If the skin between the toes is softened and broken (“macer- ated”), put a pledget of cotton soaked in alcohol between each toe. In the morning rub the feet with the following powder, and shake some of the same powder into the socks: Salicylic Acid 1 dram Boric Acid 1 ounce Dried Alum 2 ounces Talcum 4 ounces In the more severe and obstinate cases of ex- cessive perspiration with foul odor, the feet should be soaked in a solution of permanganate of potassium—y2 ounce of the permanganate to 2 quarts of water; soak for 10 or 15 minutes; the feet will acquire a brown color; do not try to rub MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS it off; it will come off by itself. Do this for sev- eral nights in succession, using the powder in the daytime. The socks should be changed every day. Instead of potassium permanganate, we may use formaldehyde in very severe cases; two table- spoonfuls of solution of formaldehyde (such as you buy it in the drugstores—40 per cent strong) to a quart of water. The formaldehyde solution and the powder may also be used in excessive perspiration of the arm- pits and the palms. For the palms of the hands, the full strength formaldehyde may be used, though it smarts quite a bit. But perspiration of the palms is very obstinate and very hard to cure. Warts Salicylic Acid 1 dram Alcohol Y2 ounce Wind a bit of cotton around the end of a tooth- pick, dip in the above solution and apply to the wart 4 times a day. May be applied much oftener, as often as every hour. Gradually the wart will shrivel up and disappear. This is a perfectly harmless method, and may be used on warts on the face, and even on very young children. Betanaphthol 1 dram Salicylic Acid 1 dram Petrolatum % ounce MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 177 A very small quantity of this ointment is to be applied to the wart 3 times a day. Will remove the biggest wrarts. At night to be applied over the wart, covered with a little cotton and held in place with a small bandage. Corns Soak the foot in hot water, dry thoroughly and use the following application: Salicylic Acid 30 grs. Collodion y2 ounce The bottle must be kept tightly corked, as other- wise the ether of the collodion evaporates, and the collodion becomes thick and worthless. This ap- plication is to be repeated for several nights in succession (without removing the previous layer), until the corn comes off. The cannabis indica, or extract of Indian hemp, which is generally added to corn collodions is a useless ingredient; it does neither harm nor good. But the best thing for corns, as for all other ailments, is prevention. See that your shoes are roomy and comfortable and exert no pressure on the toes. In painful corns the temporary use of corn plas- ters, obtainable in all drugstores, is advisable. The same in the case of bunions. 178 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Bunions Soak the foot in hot water, scrape off the thick- ened skin and then apply the following ointment: Salicylic Acid 1 dram Lard 1 ounce Bad bunions should be attended to by a chiropo- dist, but the important thing to do, after you once get rid of a bunion, is to see to it that you do not get another one; and for this purpose you must see that your shoes are roomy and comfortable. As a rule it may be said that everybody who has bunions and corns deserves to have them. Chilblains One of the best applications for chilblains is diachylon ointment, particularly when mixed with a little Balsam of Peru. The following is the proper formula: Balsam of Peru 1 dram Diachylon Ointment 10 drams Apply thoroughly to the chilblain at night, or night and morning, and cover with absorbent gauze and a little bandage to hold in place. When the skin of the chilblain is unbroken, painting over the chilblain once with tincture of MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 179 iodine before applying the above ointment will quicken the cure. People have chilblains not only on their feet but also on their hands; in either case chilblains are a sign of poor circulation of the blood, and therefore in addition to the local applications, the patient’s general health should be attended to. Cod Liver oil is useful; some good iron prepara- tion is advisable; 10 drops of the syrup of iodide of iron is often very beneficial. After the chil- blains have been cured, the feet and hands should be rubbed with cold water or snow, so as to make them less sensitive. Dipping the feet at night in a basin of cold water containing a handful of powdered alum is also very useful. Of course the feet should be wiped thoroughly dry, and warm socks put on. Where the diachylon ointment is not obtainable, applying spirit of camphor to the chilblain wdll answer the purpose. Dip pieces of gauze or soft cloth in the spirit of camphor and apply to the chilblain. Keep moist with the spirit—that is as soon as the gauze or cloth begins to get dry, drop a few drops onto it from the bottle. 180 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Hernia or Rupture I mention here hernia or rupture not because I want to give you some home treatment for it; there is no home treatment for it. But I want to say that every case of rupture should be operated on. As you know, I am very conservative about advising an operation. But an operation for hernia is a simple thing, and if performed by a competent surgeon is invariably successful. And an operation is on the whole the quickest way to get rid of a hernia. Many cases of hernia are now operated even without general anesthesia—only a local anesthetic is used. Trusses are a nuisance, are unesthetic, and debar a person from certain activities. And you lose a good deal more time in putting on and taking off the truss daily than the week or two consumed by the operation. Varicocele Most cases of varicocele can get along without an operation; a mild degree may need a well fitting suspensory bandage. Very severe vari- coceles which fill the scrotum like with a bunch of worms, drag and cause pain, should be oper- ated on. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 181 Snoring Sometimes snoring is due to nothing but a stopped up nose; the nostrils get filled with crusts, and the air passing through a clogged opening makes the noise we call snoring. All it is necessary to do is to cleanse the nose. Wash or spray with warm water containing a little com- mon salt or bicarbonate of soda, until the crusts have been removed and then insert and snuff up a little borated vaseline; or the nose may be sprayed with liquid petrolatum containing 5 grains of menthol to the ounce. Sometimes snoring is due to the back of the palate being filled with thick tenacious mucus— this must be removed by syringing or gargling, but removed it must be. In some people, as soon as they lie down on their back, the tongue and soft palate relax and fall backwards; such people should sleep on their side or even on their stom- ach. Some people snore because they are very fat, and have a thick layer of fat around their short necks. Such people cannot get rid of snor- ing until they get rid of their fat; as they very, very seldom have the perseverance and will-power to rid themselves of the latter, they but very, very seldom get rid of the former. 182 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS The Itch [Scabies] The itch is due to a little bug which gets under the skin, and which can be very readily seen under the microscope. It is very infectious; if one member has it, the whole family is apt to get infected in short order. The itch is very annoy- ing; it can drive one mad; it makes people “jump out of their skins” (Napoleon is said to have lost the battle of Waterloo on account of it); but if you are sure you have it, you can easily get rid of it. We fortunately have an absolutely sure remedy against the itch mite—that remedy is sulphur. During the day rub in powdered sulphur, where- ever there is the least sign of itching; be particu- larly careful to rub in thoroughly between the fingers and around the elbows and armpits. At night rub the whole body with green soap, leave on for 10 minutes, then take a hot bath and rub well with brush; after leaving the bath dry yourself well and rub in the following ointment: Sulphur 1 ounce Potassium carbonate 1 dram Lard 4 ounces All bed linen and underwear must be washed or sterilized; in fact, all the clothes the person wears must be sterilized, because if there is one itch mite left alive, he may develop and in a longer or MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 183 shorter period, yon will have another attack of the itch. If the one treatment as outlined above has not destroyed all the itch mites, and there is still some itching, it shows that the treatment was not per- formed properly, and it must be done over again. The rubbing with the green soap and the sul- phur ointment sometimes causes quite an irrita- tion of the skin—what we call, a dermatitis. This is particularly the case in younger people, in women and in people with a delicate skin. If this happens, apply plenty of stearate of zinc, a talcum powder, or if necessary, the following ointment: Zinc oxide 4 drams Bismuth subnitrate 2 drams Boric acid 1 dram Vaseline 4 ounces Lice on the Head The best and quickest treatment for lice, which are occasionally found on the heads of poor im- migrant children, is a thorough application of kerosene. Saturate the scalp with kerosene (in boys the hair may be closely clipped, and also of course in girls if they raise no objection) before going to bed and cover with a towel. It may bum 184 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS some, but it does not matter. In very young children, only a little kerosene may be applied at a time, and the application may be repeated sev- eral times. The kerosene kills both the lice and the nits. If kerosene causes an irritation of the scalp, apply a little petrolatum, or zinc salve. Instead of kerosene you may use the Tincture of Larkspur Seed. Another very excellent appli- cation is the following: Xylol, ether, alcohol, equal parts of each. Not every drug store has xylol, but it can be easily obtained and is not expensive. This solution quickly destroys both the lice and their eggs (nits). In very young children the xylol may be used in the form of an ointment: Xylol, 1 dram; petrolatum, 1 ounce. 1 ‘Crabs” or Crab Lice Crab lice (called for short crabs) are little pests which sometimes infest the hairy parts of the genitals of men and women. They may be con- tracted from an unclean water closet seat, from sleeping on a bed previously occupied by a person infested with them or, of course, from sexual con- tact with such a person. They are very tenacious and cause severe itching. Fortunately they can be completely gotten rid of in five minutes. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 185 An application of corrosive sublimate destroys them instantly. Cut the hair around the genitals with a pair of scissors and rub the parts well with a piece of cotton or gauze dipped in a 1 to 1000 solution of corrosive sublimate (one 7 grain tablet dissolved in a pint of water—or 1 grain dissolved in 2 ounces of water). One thorough application destroys them all; if some are left the application should be repeated. Instead of corrosive sublimate, which is strongly poisonous, you may use blue ointment (mercurial ointment). It is efficient, but is messy and takes longer to act. Another perfectly efficient application is the Tincture of Larkspur Seed. Use in the same manner as advised for the corrosive sublimate. 186 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Poison Ivy; Poison Oak; Poison Sumach Only one who has suffered from poison ivy or who has treated patients suffering from it can know what agony these various plants, poison ivy, poison oak, poison sumach or poison dogwood, can cause. The author has seen people tossing about and scratch and scream as if they were on fire. Help must be given quickly. Get half a pound of sodium hyposulphite, dissolve it in 2 quarts of water and apply freely on compresses. Change frequently. This gives quick relief. Or buy an ounce of fluid extract of grindelia, mix it with a quart of water and use on compresses. If sodium hyposulphite is unobtainable, use compresses of bicarbonate of soda (or use it as a paste, the same as described for burns), or cold compresses of lead water. If the entire body seems poisoned, the patient will have to take baths with washing soda—2 pounds of washing soda to a bath. When the burning and itching have passed away, it may be necessary to use an ointment to heal the vesicles and blisters caused by the poison ivy. The following is a good ointment: Resorcin 10 grains Carbolic Acid 10 grains Menthol 3 grains Petrolatum 1 ounce MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 187 Bites and Stings of Insects Every mother and father and everybody else should know what to do in cases of bites and stings by various insects. A sting by a bee or cer- tain wasps may prove very troublesome; the face may swell up enormously, if near the eye, the eye may be completely closed, etc. If taken in time, a great deal of trouble may be avoided. Most of the stings are in the nature of an acid, and an im- mediate application of diluted ammonia water will often completely cut short any further develop- ment of trouble. Take a piece of absorbent cotton or gauze, dip in ammonia water (for young chil- dren the ammonia may be mixed with five or six parts of plain water) and apply to the spot of the bite. Eeapply two or three times. Where ammonia water is unobtainable, bicarbonate of soda (in the form of a paste or compress) may be used, but it is not as good as ammonia. Instead of ammonia water, aromatic spirit of ammonia may be used. 188 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS To Prevent Mosquito Bites Mosquito bites are not only annoying, they may prove dangerous, because mosquitoes transmit malaria. You should not go to places where there are mosquitoes, but sometimes it cannot be helped. It is the State’s business to exterminate the mos- quito, but before that is done, you in the meantime should know something how to prevent his bites. The following combination will keep the mosquito away: Oil of Citronella 1 ounce Oil of Pennyroyal 1 ounce Glycerin 2 ounces Spirit of Camphor 12 ounces Shake well and apply to various parts of the body several times a day. The odor of this prepa- ration keeps the mosquito away. The following is also highly recommended: Dis- solve 2 ounces of Epsom Salts in a pint of water and apply freely (with a piece of absorbent cotton or small sponge) to all exposed parts. When the solution dries it leaves a thin layer of Epsom Salt over the surface; Epsom Salt is bitter and the mosquito does not like its taste. The solution of Epsom Salt is very much cheaper than the other mixture. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 189 Fumigating pastilles (bought in a drug store, or, preferably, in one of the Chinese stores) or burning “punk” is also somewhat efficient in keeping away the pest. In some places it becomes necessary to sleep under mosquito netting. The eucalyptus plant kept in the room has a tendency to keep away the mosquito. Adults may sponge themselves with a weak solution of carbolic acid (one teaspoonful of carbolic acid to a quart of water). How to Get Rid of Bedbugs Some people may think it rather queer to have an article on such a subject in a book like this. But, as I stated more than once, I consider noth- ing that is likely to diminish human misery by one iota, nothing that is likely to contribute to human comfort, beneath the dignity of discussion. And bedbugs are a pest, disturbing sleep and causing irritability of temper, even if we disregard the fact that they are a menace to health as carriers of dangerous infectious diseases. From my general practitioner days I remember a case of a violent quarrel between husband and wife which started from bedbugs. It seems that when he came to the office, a fellow employee called his attention to the fact that a bedbug was 190 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS crawling on his collar. He felt deeply humiliated, and when another employee unkindly suggested that he hoped he would not transfer all the hugs from his home to the office, his cup of humiliation was overful. When he came home, he had to take out on his wife. He told her that she did not keep the house clean, that she was dirty, etc. She denied it. She said that she had worked several hours on the beds with bug exterminators, but that they did not seem to do any good. She used a solution of corrosive sublimate in water, sometimes sold in drugstores against bedbugs. This is practically worthless; because the bugs have a resinous coat impermeable to water. The best thing to destroy bedbugs is either boiling water or turpentine or benzine. The liquid is best applied from a syringe. Every suspected spot is to be saturated with the turpentine or benzine. So called Insect Powder (pyrethrum) if of good quality and applied lib- erally will help to destroy and to prevent the spread of the pest. For roaches a liberal sprinkling of borax is sufficient. MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 191 What to Do in Cases of Poisoning It goes without saying that in all cases of poisoning the best available physician should be secured at once. But until the physician comes, something must be done, done without delay, as otherwise the physician may come too late. Some poisons act very quickly. And so a few general rules will be given here. It is well to bear in mind that practically in all cases of poisoning the first thing to do is to make the victim vomit, so as to get rid of as much of the poison as possible. Vomiting should be in- duced by pushing in two fingers in the throat and gagging the patient, or by giving 15 grains of zinc sulphate dissolved in y2 glass of water, or by giving fluid extract of ipecac, half a teaspoonful, or as much as is required until vomiting is in- duced. The only exception to making the patient vomit is when the poison taken is a very strong caustic acid, such as sulphuric acid, nitric acid or muriatic acid. In these cases give a lot of calcined mag- nesia, or milk of magnesia. If magnesia is not at hand give bicarbonate of soda or carbonate of magnesia or a lot of lime water (or if nothing else is at hand, scrape some plaster from the wall). 192 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS In case of poisoning with oxalic acid the best antidote is lime water; give lots of it. In case of poisoning with lye (caustic soda or caustic potash) or with ammonia give at once plenty of diluted vinegar or a solution of citric acid or lemon juice or lime juice. In poisoning with corrosive sublimate (mer- curic chloride), after making the patient vomit, give the white of an egg. The whites of two eggs beaten up with water are usually sufficient. In poisoning with arsenic (white arsenic, rat poison), make patient vomit, then give a mixture of milk of magnesia and tincture of iron. In poisoning with opium, laudanum, morphine, heroin, cocaine, besides making the patient vomit and giving him a strong cathartic, he should be made to drink several cups of very strong hot coffee. In poisoning with carbolic acid [a hypodermic injection of apomorphine, 1/10 grain, should be given first, if there is anybody to give it] give plenty of whiskey or brandy, or pure alcohol di- luted with an equal amount of water; if no alco- holic liquors are at hand, give vinegar or white of egg. After this, give a solution of Epsom Salt —1 ounce dissolved in pint of water. The feet should be kept warm with hot water bottles, and the patient should be given lots of flaxseed tea, to MINOR AILMENTS AND DEFECTS 193 soothe and help heal the inflamed mucous mem- brane of throat, esophagus, stomach and intes- tines. After the patient has been made to vomit, after the proper antidote has been administered, he is put to bed, hot water bottles are put around him, and sweet oil is given in tablespoonful doses every hour or so. The oil soothes and heals the inflamed tissues of the stomach and bowels. The after treatment of poisoning must be in- variably in the hands of a physician. PART m MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES Tragedies in, a Sexologist’s Practice The practice of one specializing in venereal and sexual disorders is an interesting one. One hears peculiar stories, one acquires a unique insight into human nature, into the intricacies and aberrations of that powerful mainspring of human life—the sex instinct. Unexplored and uncharted depths of human psychology are opened up to you. It is the most interesting branch of medicine, but it is also the saddest one, though now and then not de- void of humor. At the end of a day’s work my heart often is filled with sadness and pity for human ignorance, human weakness, and human suffering; and I feel amazed at the intensity of the conflict between human instinct and social-religious restrictions imposed upon the natural expression of that in- stinct. And so it is no wonder that at the end of nine or ten months of steady daily work of this nature I feel tired and weary; and I long to get away to places where nature is at its best and men appear at their best. SEX TRAGEDIES 195 Here are a few cases from my practice: Case 1 Young Mexican. Quiet, timid boy, aged 19. Sent to this country by his wealthy parents to acquire an education in a private school. What he did acquire very soon was a case of precocious malignant syphilis. The entire body is a mass of sores and ulcers, so that the underwear sticks, and upon the attempt to remove it there is bleeding from hundreds of points. The mouth is full of mucous patches. A few days’ treatment worked wonders in his case—how I did wish that Chris- tian Scientists and drugless healers could have watched this case from day to day—but he wrote home, asking for money and telling just what his trouble was. Then he received a letter from his father order- ing him to come home at once, together with just enough money for a steamship-ticket to Vera Cruz. He trembled like a leaf when he referred to his father, who apparently was not any too gentle. He said he thought the best thing for him to do was to jump off the steamer. Not only a career but a young life completely ruined. One can imagine what kind of reception he will be accorded at his father’s hands, and what kind of treatment he will receive at the hands of some local doctor. 196 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Case 2 Man, married seven years. Father of three young children and husband of a beautiful young wife. And still he considered it necessary to in- dulge extramaritally. There was the not infre- quent result—gonorrhea. And now he is in a great hurry to get cured; for he cannot have rela- tions with his wife, and if she should get sus- picious—why, there would be no end of trouble. She is not one of those who would stand for such a thing. And he is a fine fellow: a pillar in his church and conducts a Sunday-school class. The tragedy in this case is not the contraction of the gonorrhea—sometimes it is the best thing that can happen to a man, for it keeps him straight forever after and makes him sublimate his sexual energies into higher directions. The tragedy here is that a man who has a young, healthy, and at- tractive wife should consider it necessary to patronize women who are greatly inferior, not alone mentally and spiritually, but even physi- cally. Yes, this is a real tragedy, and unfortu- nately a very frequent one. Case 3 Congenital homosexual. Refined fellow, feels his condition very deeply, considers it the most terrible tragedy that could ever befall any man or woman. He would love to have a home and children. His dreams, all of a homosexual char- SEX TRAGEDIES 197 acter, fill him with loathing and disgust and drive him to despair. There are homosexuals who are reconciled to or even proud of their abnormality, but I must confess that I do not often meet such types. Naturally, those who are satisfied with their condition will not come to a physician to be treated for it. Girl of fifteen, infected with gonorrhea by her uncle. Nothing more, I think, need be said to make the tragedy stand out in greater relief. The tragedy is tragic enough in the one sentence of nine words. And, en passant, I wish to add that instances of seduction and infection of young nieces by uncles or near relatives are extremely common. Only physicians, and generally only specialists, learn about them. The public never or only very seldom hears of them. To bring the case to court means a scandal and disgrace to the family and the penitentiary for a blood-rela- tion. Consequently the tragedy is hidden and the parents do the best they can under the circum- stances. Usually—except in the lowest strata of society—the relative pays for the cost of the treat- ment. Case 4 Case 5 Woman about twenty-nine. Was married about a year and a half ago and was infected soon after the wedding; left her husband two months 198 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS later and has been struggling very hard since then to support herself. Has taken up stenography and typewriting, and has now a position at ten dollars a week. Says she would work her finger- nails off before she would return to her husband. Some women just can’t swallow certain things. Others put up with all their husband’s derelictions —infidelity, abuse, venereal infection. Which is the higher type of woman? Case 6 Young fellow with an ordinary gonorrhea. He is practically well, and he does not take his trouble seriously. And that is just what is tragic about this case. For he will probably keep on getting infected, then he will consider himself cured, will get married, and will probably infect his wife. Case 7 Man of thirty-six. Has never had sexual rela- tions, but has masturbated in moderation since the age of fourteen. Wants to get married, hut on making an attempt finds himself impotent, there being complete impotentia erigendi and ejaculatio praecox. Is extremely despondent and gets se- vere attacks of the blues. A man who up to the age of thirty-six has had no sexual relations is a tragedy—a victim of our stupid social restrictions and false teachings. SEX TRAGEDIES 199 Case 8 A man of forty-seven, married, father of sev- eral children, a substantial and respectable busi- ness man from Columbus, Ohio, came to New York for a few days to do some buying. He went out one evening and—contracted syphilis. It is per- fectly heartbreaking to watch him when the positive diagnosis is pronounced. His face is blanched, his knees tremble, and he looks a picture of the deepest despair. How will he go home, what will he say, how will he be able to take the long tedious treatment? But what could I do? I could only sympathize with him, pity him, and start him on the proper treatment (for every day counts) which will have to be continued in his home town. Case 9 Girl of nineteen. One of our radical feminists. In spite of some of her uncompromising radical- ism, she has some difficulty in telling her trouble. But it is easy to guess it. She is two months overdue, and so forth, and so on. Gently but firmly I tell her that I sympathize with her deeply, but that I cannot help her. That I am not in that line of work. That abortion always is accom- panied with some element of risk, and that my important work does not permit me to take any risks, and more like that. She goes away broken- hearted; still, I am sure, she will not have very 200 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS great difficulty in finding an accommodating phy- sician. Case 10 Another young woman. She had an abortion performed on her some six weeks ago by a mid- wife, and since then she has been bleeding con- tinually and lately has experienced severe pain in her left side; has lost several pounds in weight; is very anemic and suffers from insomnia. An examination shows an endometritis and salpin- gitis, the result, undoubtedly, of infection at the hands of the midwife. She may get well under conservative treatment; but she also may need an operation. Women who go through life chronic invalids on account of bungling abortions are met with only too frequently. Case 11 A young physician, an exceedingly sympathetic fellow, was to be married on a certain date. Everything was arranged. Went out with some friends, drank more than he should have, went to a notorious place, contracted gonorrhea. The condition is of the ultravirulent type. The wed- ding will have to be delayed indefinitely, for the doctor would not think of marrying until he is absolutely cured. And we know how long it some- times take to effect an absolute cure of gonorrhea. Why will men do such things—jeopardize their own health and happiness and the health and hap- SEX TRAGEDIES 201 piness of their prospective wives on the very eve of their entering the bonds of matrimony! Is it just sheer wickedness! Or does the word ‘ ‘ bonds ’9 offer some explanation! Of course, it is very simple to explain things by calling them wicked, vicious or immoral, but, while some of the men do deserve some such epithet fully, it does seem so absurd to apply it to some types of men. Nobody, I am sure, who knew this physician well would call him vicious or immoral, for in all things he is the very soul of honor. So, what is the explana- tion! Case 12 A middle-aged couple. In poor circum- stances, the husband having a small printing-shop. Married twelve years, but no children, and the wife is just “crazy” to have a child. Examination of the husband shows plainly the legacy of an antecedent double epididymitis, and an examina- tion of the semen shows total azoospermia. Am obliged to tell them that there is virtually no hope, and they go away with a feeling of despair. For what is a poor man’s life without one or two children! The only pleasure, the only interest they have in life. And I cannot help smiling sadly when I think of another couple who were in the office the day before, but whose cry for help was of an entirely different character. They were married five 202 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS years and had four children, and wouldn’t I, for God’s sake, give them something so that they should not have any more. For the husband, who is a bank-clerk, is getting but a small salary, the wife’s health is run down, and they simply can- not afford to have any more children. Why is nature so inconsiderate? People who would be quite satisfied with one or two children have half a dozen and must have recourse to prevenceptives not to have any more; while other couples who are just dying to have one or two children can have none at all. Case 13 Young musician. Very promising. And now he finds his fingers are stiff and painful, and are becoming crippled. Gonorrhea a year ago, and for the past three months rather severe gonor- rheal “rheumatism.” As long as only the heel, the ankle and the knee were affected, he did not mind it so much; but now, when his career and his livelihood are in jeopardy, he is in despair. A sad case, because a complete cure of gonorrheal arthritis can never be promised. Case 14 A young couple. Married eight months, and she is a virgo intacta, while he is completely im- potent. No erections whatever, while any attempt at coitus is followed by immediate ejaculation. It SEX TRAGEDIES 203 is a case not of ejaculatio prascox, but of ejaeula- tio prsecipitata. And in spite of that he has suc- ceeded in infecting her with gonorrheal urethritis. Disgusting, tragic, but true. Case 15 Age 47. Has never had any sexual relations. Has not even made an attempt. Has not had any nocturnal emissions for two or three years. Mas- turbated only for about two years—15 to 17. Evidently very weak sexuality. And now he has met a girl of twenty-five who wishes to marry him, and whom he intends to marry. And he probably will. I forbear to comment, except to say that the tragedy in this case lies in the future. Case 16 Woman married thirteen years. And in all that time she has experienced no sensation whatever. During the first years of her married life she did not know that there had to be any sensation, but during the past few years she has heard her friends speak and she has read about the sensa- tions during coitus, and it drives her frantic that she should he so different from all other women, should he so abnormal as to be utterly devoid of any womanly feeling. It is hard to make out dur- ing the first visit whether it is a case of congenital anesthesia or one of acquired frigidity through in- hibitions and repressions. But whichever it is, she will be a difficult case to manage. 204 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Case 17 One of the commonest, one of the very com- monest, cases in a sexologist’s practice. She is twenty-five years old, has been married four years, and is a nervous wreck. One can see that she is not exaggerating her woes. The lines in the face and the rings under the eyes tell the true story. Her worst complaint is an obstinate in- somnia, which has ceased to be influenced by in- creasingly large doses of hypnotics. Her trouble is—her husband. He is completely impotent, and in all these years she has not experienced any normal satisfaction even once. And it is driving her to hypochondria, to despair, to insanity, to thoughts of suicide. And the husband absolutely refuses to take any treatment or consult a phy- sician. I said this was one of the commonest cases in a sexologist’s practice. It is also one of the saddest. Because what can you prescribe for such a woman, what can you suggest to herf Case 18 Thirty-one years old. Married eleven years. Has had six miscarriages, one stillborn child at term, two living children, of whom one died when about a week, and the other when seven months old. She wants to have a good healthy child. She doesn’t know why she should be so unfortunate. She is in pretty good health, the husband seems SEX TRAGEDIES 205 to be in very good health—so why can they not have good healthy children like other people? Shall you tell her what is really the matter with her, or shall you just give her the proper treat- ment without informing her of the true state of affairs? Poor woman—what a terrible waste— emotional, physical and economic. Nine preg- nancies in eleven years, and without any results, except heartaches. A decidedly wrong state of society in which such things can happen, and fre- quently do happen. Case 19 And here is another case, seen only to-day, the day these notes are being written. Young woman, very young woman, married six months, and, as the result of the examination shows, at least five months pregnant. And she is furiously frantic, though she tries to restrain herself. And she is furiously frantic, because she is still a virgin, a virgo intacta; and she is still a virgin, because the husband is impotent, quite impotent. As she says, “to be pregnant for nothing”—that’s what makes her so mad. Case 20 Man of 28, entirely beardless, with high pitched voice, etc. Makes the impression of a eunuch, and that’s what he is. As a child he was bitten by a dog in the scrotum, an inflammation set in and the doctor considered it advisable to remove one MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS of the testicles, which he said was badly dam- aged. The wound did not heal well, evidently there was some septic infection, and six months later the same doctor removed the second tes- ticle. Whether either or both operations were imperative, I cannot of course say. It is quite likely that at the present day at least a small piece of testicular tissue would have been left, even if the operation of removal had been decided to be absolutely necessary. The young man has read the exaggerated re- ports of the results of testicular transplantation, and he wants to know if the operation cannot be performed on him. He knows a lovely girl whom he would like to marry and whom he could marry, if he were only sure that he could have children. When he is told that the transplantation improves the libido only, the power of erections and the general health, but cannot under any circum- stances render a man fertile, that, in fact, the spermato-genetic cells in the transplanted glands soon atrophy and perish, he is deeply disap- pointed. When he is further told that even the general effects of the transplantations are not ab- solutely certain in each case and are not perma- nent, but must be repeated at certain intervals, he is altogether downcast, and makes up his mind that married life and the love of a mate are not for him. He will have to pass his life in celibate loneliness. I could of course give many more cases, but SEX TRAGEDIES 207 these will suffice as an illustration of the kind of cases the sexologist has to deal with in his daily practice. Of course, all disease is more or less a tragedy. But venereal or sexual disease is a double tragedy, for it generally affects another person besides the patient—and sometimes that other person, be it the husband or the wife, is a greater sufferer than the patient himself or herself. We could call venereo-sexual disease a triple tragedy, for, be- sides the husband and the wife, it also affects the race; doing this by preventing children from being born or by afflicting the children that are bom with disease and mental and physical inferiority. There is still another element. A stigma of disgrace attaches to venereo-sexual disease which attaches to no other class of diseases. All other diseases are avowed openly and treated openly. The venereal patient alone must hide his trouble from his family, from his relatives, from his boarding-house keeper, his room-mate, from everybody, and this makes it so much more diffi- cult to cure the disease properly. Yes, venereo-sexual disease is a great tragedy, and we are in the midst of such tragedies every day of the year. And, while seeing numerous cases, you necessarily grow somewhat callous, still, they do not fail to have their effect upon you. But things are improving; slowly, very slowly, but I can discern definite indications of progress. 208 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Are Drug's Ever Necessary? This seems such a futile question to discuss, for most people are aware of the benefit of drugs, in certain illnesses at least. And yet this question must be discussed, and right here, for upon the viewpoint may depend the comfort and happiness of the home. Within recent years certain people have been decrying the use of drugs, have been denying their utility, have claimed in fact that drugs are always injurious, and have been im- planting in the minds of the people very false, not to say vicious, ideas in regard to scientific medi- cine in general. I am not going to impugn the motives of the opponents of scientific medicine; I will even assume that their opposition is sincere; but that that opposition is based upon colossal ignorance, about this I have no doubt. I have convinced myself on that point over and over again. Leaving aside the general opposition to scien- tific medicine, and limiting ourselves only to the subject of opposition to drugs, I can do no better than to reprint in its entirety one of my articles on this subject which appeared in The Critic and Guide. The article follows: “Internal drugs are rarely or never necessary. ” If this statement emanated from an ignorant quack or from a member of one of the sects of drugless healers, I would pass it by unnoticed. ABE DRUGS EVER NECESSARY? 209 There was a time when I used to argue with various quacks and irregulars, but I have dis- covered that it is a waste of time. There are too many varieties of quacks to make it possible to engage in controversy with each one, and, besides, the quacks do not wish to be convinced. If they wanted to know the truth they might discover that they were engaged in an anti-social occupation, and if they were honest they would have to give up their occupation and look for something else. There are very, very few people in this world brave enough to give up their bread and butter, and so in the quacks there is an unconscious bias, a powerful inhibition which prevents them from learning or even wishing to learn the truth. But the statement occurs in a decent magazine, Rational Living, edited by an honest and cultured physician, Dr. B. Liber. And for this reason I would consider it shirking my duty if I permitted it to pass unchallenged. A statement like this is capable of doing a good deal of harm, and there- fore its untenability must be shown. First of all I wish to say that the phrase ‘ ‘ rarely or never” is somewhat disingenuous. Which is it, rarely or never! If drugs are rarely necessary, one cannot say they are never necessary. It is either one or the other. The truth of the matter is that people who make such statements really wijjjh to say “never,” but as a sop to some of the readers and also from fear that they may be 210 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS shown to be wrong, they make that concession and insert the adverb “ rarely. ” But it is really “never” that they mean. Now let us see. I will take just a few examples from the “good old days” when I was a hard working general practitioner. Here is a woman lying in bed shivering so violently that it seems she will tumble out of the bed unless held down. Also she is actually burn- ing up. Her temperature is nearly 106°. She has a splitting headache, her tongue is heavily coated, and she says, or the people in the room say, that she has been having these chills and fever every day for several days. It is a clear case of malaria. A laxative is ordered, a dozen quinine capsules are prescribed, the young doctor comes around three days later and the picture is entirely changed. No chills, no fever, the woman is walk- ing around and says she feels perfectly well. Was the quinine necessary or not! The best thing would be to ask the woman who for many years afterward considered the doctor a messenger from God. Only a very perverted, a very biased mind would deny or even doubt that quinine had saved millions of people from invalidism or death. Another patient. A man, lying in bed unable to move, with an enormous abdomen tense as a drum. He is water-logged, not having passed any urine in twenty-four hours, while for several days previously he only passed a few ounces a day. ARE DRUGS EVER NECESSARY? 211 No time to make a refined diagnosis, whether the edema is cardiac, hepatic or renal, or a mixture of all the three. I prescribe a favorite combination consisting of digitalis, calomel and squills, order large amounts of potassium bitartrate (cream of tartar) lemonade, and within twenty-four hours the man passes eighty ounces (five pints) of urine. He also sweats profusely and while he still feels weak the next morning, the picture is entirely changed. His wife had been gently weeping, fear- ing that her husband did not have long to live. As a matter of fact, he outlived his wife, and ten years later he was still a hale and hearty, though idle and useless old man. I verily believe that in that case drugs proved actually life-saving. Take a little cretin, with his mouth open, tongue sticking out, the saliva dribbling from his mouth, undersized, stupid, hardly able to pronounce a word. Give him thyroid and watch him grow in size and improve in intelligence almost from day to day. Can there be any question as to the value of thyroid in cretinism and myxedema? And it is not the drugless doctors who discovered this rem- edy as well as a dozen other remedies from the ductless glands, but the so-called regular scientific physicians whom the quacks like to refer to as drugging doctors. Look at that young man who is entering your office. His face, particularly his forehead, is full of pimples and pustules which to the experienced 212 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS specialist tell their story at a glance. The man has a bad sore throat, and on the gums, on the lips, on the tonsils you notice the well-known mucous patches. When he undresses you see hun- dreds of different lesions all over the body. In short, the man is a menace to his family and to the community in which he lives. You give him one salvarsan injection or two or three mercurial in- jections, or, if you are a modest general practi- tioner, you give him some tablets of the red or yellow iodide of mercury; and lo! within forty- eight hours a really magical change has taken place. The patches in the throat and mouth have disappeared, the pimples are gone, the man’s entire complexion is different, he has no more headache and altogether he feels, and says that he feels, like a different man. Were the salvarsan and the mercury necessary drugs in that man’s case, or not? Here is a little baby struggling for breath; its pharynx is covered with diphtheritic membrane and there is danger that the diphtheria may spread into the larynx. Assuming that it was your child, Doctor, would you dare to treat him without administering antitoxin, without squirt- ing ‘‘the poison from a horse into the pure stream of the child’s blood,” to use the phraseology of the ignorant quacks, to whom all serums and vac- cines, which they have never seen with their own eyes, always suggest some filthy, dirty, ill-smell- ing fluid! I know how far the ignorant quack, the ARE DRUGS EVER NECESSARY? 213 fanatic, and even the Christian Scientists may go in their ignorance, but I would like to know if you, a physician, would dare to treat your own child without that filthy drug, diphtheria antitoxin? Here is another case. A young man is rolling on the floor with the most excruciating pain. He is, to judge by his deathly pale, sweat-covered countenance, in extreme agony. In short, he is suffering from renal colic. He screams, he says he cannot stand it any longer. Something must be done for him. A physician hurriedly arrives, and seeing the state of affairs administers quickly a hypodermic injection of morphine. In a few minutes the patient quietens down, falls asleep, wakes after several hours and is apparently well. In his urine he passes a considerable amount of gravel. Evidently the morphine relaxed the ureter and the gravel or small stone was permit- ted to pass into the bladder. The young man says that if medicine could do nothing more than that, then it would be worth while. He blesses the person who discovered morphine. Now, morphine is not a cure for renal stone, but it is a most marvellous relief and it often does what no other drug in the world can do. There is nothing to equal its pain-relieving properties in certain cases. I purposely brought the instance of morphine, the bugaboo of all drugless quacks, because I want to say also a few words about hypnotics in general. Nobody is more opposed than I am to 214 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS the reckless abuse of hypnotics. Hypnotics are not a cure for insomnia. To cure insomnia its cause must he discovered and treated. But, and this is an important but, there are cases where either the causes cannot be discovered or if dis- covered, cannot be removed. I need not go into details here, but every physician will understand what I mean. In the meantime an insomnia habit is established, the patient’s constitution is weak- ened, his nerves become more and more frazzled, and it becomes more and more difficult for him to sleep. In such cases hypnotics often prove a life- saving measure, because they help to break the habit of insomnia; they give the patient a tem- porary respite; they rest his body and brain, and they permit us, if it is at all possible, to get at the root of the trouble and to overcome it. Any one who has seen a case of purulent cystitis clear up almost from hour to hour under the ad- ministration of sodium acid phosphate and hexa- methylenamine, the dirty, ill-smelling urine be- coming quickly converted into a crystal-clear, nor- mal fluid, will not question the power or the value of internal drugs. And so I could give many more examples where everybody but the most prejudiced quack, only one suffering from irremovable inhibitions, would admit that drugs are extremely useful, sometimes wonderfully efficacious, and not infrequently di- rectly life saving. ARE DRUGS EVER NECESSARY? 215 Altogether, this opposition to drugs seems to me to he nothing but a fad or a groundless fear. Why are drugs worse than any other things in nature ! Aren’t drugs a part of nature just the same as any other mineral, vegetable or animal product! Where is the line of demarcation between a drug and a non-drug! Where is even the line of de- marcation between a drug and a food! Common salt is an indispensable article of our diet; at the same time it is one of the most valuable of our drugs, and, administered intravenously, is often life saving. The same may be said of sugar or glucose. Many of our drugs, such as benzoic, salicylic, citric and tartaric acids, are contained in various fruits. So why this opposition to drugs! Isn’t it possible that in very many cases, perhaps in most cases, this opposition is due to ignorance! In other words, is it so far-fetched to assume that only those people who rarely han- dle drugs, who do not know their doses, their method of prescribing, their indications and contra-indications, are opposed to their use! Think it over. “Internal drugs are rarely or never necessary.” That means that external drugs are necessary. Why this difference! If external drugs are useful and necessary, why may not internal drugs be just as useful and necessary! That external drugs are useful, the dullest intellect can be easily convinced. Take two patches of eczema on the 216 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS same body; apply the proper ointment to one patch and leave the other patch untreated, and note the difference. Now if an ointment may pro- duce a soothing and healing effect in eczema, psoriasis, etc., why may not, for instance, milk of bismuth produce a soothing, healing effect in ulcer of the stomach? Why may not the same drug incorporated in a soothing, mucilaginous vehicle produce a healing and soothing effect in dysentery or inflammation of the bowels? No, opposition to drugs in general is based on ignorance, faddism and fanaticism! That drugs have been and are still being fright- fully abused in many instances, being used either in too large or in too small doses, being used where not indicated or distinctly contra-indicated, this I do not deny in the very least. I would be the last person in the world to deny it. But that means the abuse of drugs and the abuse of a thing should never militate against its proper use. It is time, I believe, that intelligent people cease carrying on warfare against the proper use of soothing, comforting, curing, life-lengthening and life-saving agencies, because in time past they had been abused, or because they are still being abused by those not very critical or not very well in- structed in their use. Let us cease our opposition to the judicious, proper and critical use of drugs. PROPRIETARY MEDICINES 217 Proprietary and Patent Medicines The author of this book was among the very- first to attack the patent medicine evil and to ex- pose the worthless and poisonous preparations which were shamelessly advertised to the public as infallible cure-alls. That he was a pioneer in this movement, just as much as in the movement of birth control, venereal prophylaxis, rational sexology, etc., can be seen convincingly by reading the first issues of The Critic and Guide published in 1903, as well as his paper read before the American Medical Association at its meeting held in New Orleans, in 1904. And I am just as op- posed as ever I was to the use of nostrums or preparations of unknown composition. But there is no longer occasion to get excited about and to go crusading against the nostrum evil, for the evil has been practically eliminated. It is a dead issue. As a result of our propaganda, as a result of government activity, as a result of the Pure Food and Drug Law, and as a result of the Harrison Anti-narcotic Act, the Prohibition Act, nostrums of the character that used to excite our just indignation have gone out of existence. Claims as cure-alls or even as positive cures for single ailments are no longer made—the law for- bids it, and nobody cares to pay fines and risk a sojourn in jail. Narcotic drugs, such as opium, morphine, cocaine can no longer be used at all. MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS The amount of alcohol and of toxic or powerful ingredients must be stated on the label. In short, the vile nostrums are dead. And the manufacturers have found that it is not only more decent, more honest to give the public decent, non-injurious and efficient preparations, but that it pays almost as well. The preparations put out by the manufacturers of the present day are almost uniformly what they claim to be, and are usually carefully and scien- tifically prepared. It is but very, very seldom that they do not answer the purpose for which they are recommended. An occasional out-and- out fake still makes its appearance, but such a fake is an exception nowadays, and it is invari- ably short-lived. The government is alert and manufacturers are punished not only for false statements about the composition of their rem- edies but for any exaggerations about their thera- peutic virtues. Hence I am no longer zealous in the battle against the nostrum evil. I do not fight dead issues. I leave them to be buried by the public undertaker, and take up new living issues. About Self-Treatment I know that many of my professional colleagues will shake their heads sadly and disapprovingly at Part II of this book. I know they will do it, SELF-TREATMENT 219 because fifteen or twenty years ago I would have acted similarly — would have shaken my head sadly and disapprovingly at any book containing advice about treatment by the laity, treatment even of very minor ills and ailments. Encour- aging or aiding and abetting self-treatment by the laity was formerly generally considered and by a large part of the medical profession is still considered little short of criminal. At that time, not knowing anything about unconscious motives — Freudism was still in its first infancy—and economic determinism, we were sure that our in- dignation against self-treatment was inspired by the purest of altruistic motives: self-treatment is dangerous, the patient is apt to get worse, etc., etc. Now those of us who are familiar with psy- choanalysis and with the influence of economic conditions on our thoughts and emotions, can af- ford to smile — very, very gently, of course — at the tirades against self-treatment. We know that, at best, the motives of the opposition to self- treatment are somewhat mixed. I am as opposed as I ever was to self-treatment in serious disorders, but it is sheer hypocrisy to say that a person has no right to treat himself or herself for constipation, or corns, or eczema, or dandruff, or excessive perspiration, without get- ting a prescription from an M.D. The people’s general intelligence, as far as their bodies are concerned, is now considerably higher than it was 220 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS a quarter of a century ago, and they may be trusted to exercise pretty good care in attending to their ailments. It is not infrequently the case that an intelligent patient knows better what is the matter with him and what to do for himself than does the doctor. Not only have I been opposed to self-treatment, but I have always refused to prescribe for or give medical advice at a distance, no matter how clear the description of the case was. And I can say without exaggeration, that I have been consulted by mail by many thousands of patients—and my answer has almost invariably been: “Dr. Robin- son does not give medical advice by mail.” I am not so sure that I have always acted right. I am not so sure that my rule of action was not the result of prejudice, of narrow professional tra- dition. For instance: A teacher in a small college asked me to send him something for his psoriasis, which was becoming very bad, prevented him from going before the public and doing his work. Following my general principle, I refused, advis- ing him to consult a local physician. He answered that he had no confidence in the local physicians, that he consulted one and that he did him no good. Made his case worse. And he begged and pleaded so much that I yielded, and sent him two prescrip- tions — the same as are given in this book. And lo! in ten days he wrote to me that his psoriasis SELF-TREATMENT 221 cleared up completely, and he was profuse in thanks and blessings. Wherein was the harm! To obviate or allay the ire of my professional brethren I humbly beg to submit the following propositions: 1. I do not advocate or advise self-treatment. On every possible occasion I advise to consult a physician. It is only before the physician arrives, or where no physician is available, or when the ail- ment is a very trifling one, that the treatments outlined in this book are suggested. 2. All the treatments recommended here are harmless, so that if it should happen now and then that they did no good, they at least would do no harm. 3. Treatment outlined by a fairly competent and experienced physician can not be referred to as self-treatment. 4. And finally, I cannot help expressing my conviction that in the ailments in question the various measures and remedies suggested here will do the patient practically or quite as much good as if he — or she — consulted the average physician, not to speak of the quack, of which, praised be the Lord and the Constitution of the United States, we have in this country an endless variety. 222 MARKIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS How Much Shall We Eat and What? Among the numerous fads which bless our blessed country, there is one which I would call the anti-eating fad. We eat entirely too much, we are told. Oh, yes, some people eat too much. But then, some people eat too little, much less than they should. And I am not referring here to the millions of semi-starved and undernour- ished who are so involuntarily, because they have not the money to eat proper and sufficient food. No, there are people who have the means, but who, either from habit or from some ill-defined illness, eat less than they ought to in order to accomplish the best that is in them. We are told that we all eat entirely too much; that we could get along on one-quarter to one-half of what we eat. I take very little stock in this nonsense. Individual cases of over-eating are not infrequent. But speaking generally we do not eat too much. Bather the contrary. And if you want to do good work, physical and mental, you must eat plenty of substantial, nutritious food. Big workers are as a rule big eaters. And people who eat like a chicken usually accomplish as much as a chicken. There are exceptions in either direction, but ex- ceptions remain exceptions. As to the kind of food to eat, I do not care to enter here into any discussion, with arguments pro and con, with the vegetarians, fruitarians, HOW MUCH SHALL WE EAT? 223 nut-fetishists, etc., but will merely state my con- victions that a mixed variable diet is the best for mankind. Eat everything — milk, cheese, meat, fish, oysters, clams, crabs, lobsters, fruit, vege- tables, cereals, nuts; anything that.the race has found to be edible may be eaten; for in this respect the experience of the race is more dependable than the opinions or personal preferences of well- meaning faddists. But of course everything in moderation. As a general thing, meat should be eaten but once a day, and fruit and vegetables should be a part of every day’s diet. I do not mean to imply that some people can not get along splendidly without meat — to some meat and proteins of every sort are like poison — but I am speaking of the general run of mankind. I am sorry, but I cannot be a faddist or extremist even in the matter of food. I am not even afraid of those terrible poisons, tea and coffee; as I have seen some people drink these beverages, they are injurious; but prepared properly, not too strong, and taken in moderation they are, in my humble opinion, distinctly beneficial. They are pleasant, refreshing stimulants, and the life we live we need mild refreshing stimulants, and they improve the action of the bowels and the kidneys. Nor do I have a superstitious fear of that other anathema of the faddists — condiments. In mod- eration — and immoderately used the most bene- ficial substance will prove injurious — condiments MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS are beneficial and in our sedentary life almost a necessity. A little salt, a little pepper, a little ketchup, or even a little horseradish or mustard will not kill you nor shorten your days; they may improve your appetite and aid your digestion. If we fell trees or break stones several hours a day we do not need any condiments to improve our appetite or to aid our digestion, but then we do not all fell trees or break stones. As to the recent attacks on sugar, that product of the beet or the sugar cane being branded as the worst of poisons, leading to cancer, insanity, and a lot of other ills, that is simply the vaporing of unbalanced minds. In short—ne quid nimis — not too much zeal. Lazy Children Children are not infrequently scolded or pun- ished for being lazy. I am one of those who do not believe that there is such a thing as a lazy child. A lazy child is a sick child; there is some- thing the matter with him; something the matter with his liver, or with his internal glands. There is such a thing as masked illness. A “lazy” child, a child lazy to work and lazy to play, should be examined. A normal healthy child likes to he ac- tive, the same as a healthy animal does; and if a child is lazy in his studies, it is because the things have not been properly explained to him, because HABIT OF READING 225 the teacher does not know how to make him feel interested in his studies or because he is sick. But in saying that I do not believe that there is such a thing as “lazy” children, I do not mean to imply that there are no selfish children. There are selfish children who are not lazy to do things that please them, but who like others to do their chores or other disagreeable work. Such children should be severely reprimanded and should be made to understand the difference between right and wrong, between gentlemanliness and piggish- ness, between altruism and coarse selfishness. The Habit of Reading Learn to read. Of course, I know that you know how to read, or you would not be reading this book. What I mean is: get the habit of reading. Learn to need and to enjoy good books. The love of books is one of the greatest assets in a person’s life. It is a love that never needs go unrequited, and it is a love of comfort only, without any troubles or entanglements. You can suspend it and resume it at your pleasure, and there are no heartaches or jealousies connected with it. I sin- cerely pity the man or woman who has not ac- quired the habit of reading, who has not learned to love books. They are in for some dull days and nights at some periods of their lives. Loneliness has no real terror for the person who loves books. 226 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS Even jail, nay, even solitary confinement, is greatly softened and made more bearable for those who love to read. I know it, because I get letters from many people in many jails. Give me a good book — or rather a trunkful of them — a pad and a fountain pen, and put me on a rock in midocean, and I will not mind it. At least, not for a while. The value of books in married life is even greater than it is in the lives of single people. It is well known that one of the great causes of mis- chief, of discontent, of quarrels, is idleness, bore- dom. When two people sit around, have nowhere to go, don’t know what to do with themselves, something is likely to happen. Either a quarrel, or an indulgence — out of sheer boredom — which may lead to oversatiation, which in its turn is followed by still greater boredom, which brings in its tracks pin pricks and squabbles. While if both the man and the woman love to read, they can read one book together — one reading, the other listen- ing— which brings the two still closer together, or they may read separately. In either case addi- tional topics of conversation and discussion are furnished by the books. Long winter evenings and rainy or stormy days have no terrors for those who love to read: on the contrary, they are often looked forward to with anticipation. And bear in mind that books still are and will HABIT OF READING 227 probably always remain the cheapest of all sources of information and pleasure. Go to the theater and it costs you (for two) four to ten dollars, for two hours. Invest the same amount in books, and the whole family has some- thing to read for many days or weeks, and you have something left for your library shelves, to read again in a leisure hour. And let me tell you that even as far as plays are concerned, the reading of a good play is much more pleasurable than the seeing of it. Reality can never come up to the imagination—that is if you have any. It very seldom happens, if you read a play before and then go and see it, that you are not disappoint- ed : the people seem so inadequate in comparison with the pictures you have made of them in your mind. I do not say that you should not attend theaters if you can well aff ord it, but if it has to be a choice between theater and books, by all means spend your money for the latter. And if you do not wish to throw out your money and waste your time on trash, you must read one of the honest, independ- ent and unbiased weeklies like The Nation (New York). You will be safe in being guided by The Nation’s book reviews (as well as by its dramatic criticisms). In conclusion: If you haven’t it, you must work hard to acquire the habit of reading. The habit can be acquired. It takes longer to acquire a 228 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS good habit than it does a bad one, but it can be done. And I insist that you acquire the habit, because I consider the habit of reading good books as one of the important contributing factors to the health, happiness, comfort and stability of the home. About Catching Cold Some ultra-scientific doctors claim that there is no such thing as catching cold. It is all germs, or autotoxemia, or overeating or overheating. This is an allegedly free country and people are at liberty to entertain and even express any opin- ions at all (provided they are of a non-political, non-economic, non-religious and non-sexual char- acter). So our ultra-scientific, non-scientific and anti-scientific physicians and laymen may say that they do not believe in catching cold. I de- cidedly do. A person in apparently good health may sit in a draft, or read a book and have a gen- tle breeze blow on him — and find himself with a stiff neck or a severe lumbago, so that he can hardly move; a person in perfect health may step barefoot on a cold marble bathroom floor, and in about two minutes find himself sneezing and with a running nose. A gentleman with whom there is nothing the matter may sit on a cold stone park bench or on his own damp stoop for half an hour or an hour and find himself the next morning with COLD BATHS 229 a severe, excruciatingly painful inflammation of the prostate. Yes, there is such a thing as catching cold, and opinions of extremists to the contrary notwith- standing, people should avoid drafts, sudden changes of temperature, and last but not least, sleeping too close to open windows. Cold Baths Have you ever observed with what pride and satisfaction a man — or a woman — tells you: 11 Every morning I plunge in my cold tub or take a cold shower. It is great.” The cold tubber really thinks that he is performing an act of heroism. And the usefulness of the cold bath is accepted as a universal truth. Well I am a heretic on this, as on many other subjects. The cold bath is beneficial to those — to whom it is beneficial. It is certainly not a good thing for everybody. There are people, anemic, weak, rundown, nerv- ous, on whom the cold bath acts injuriously. It aggravates their condition, making bad matters worse. The cold bath hardens many people against catching cold — it predisposes others to colds; in fact they get a cold each time they take a cold bath. The trouble with people is — they love to apply their standard to all mankind. Just as there are 230 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS people who would want to apply their own sexual standard to all humanity, so there are people who would like to impose their hygienic standard on the rest of the world. If the cold bath acts so wonderfully well on you, then in the name of heaven, go on using it for the rest of your days. But do not try to force or persuade everybody else to subject themselves to that daily shock. The Japanese never take cold baths, only luke- warm ones, and they are the healthiest race on earth. The shock of a cold shower can be greatly les- sened by putting the feet in hot water, while tak- ing the shower. This is a method which I have been recommending for many years. And to avoid misunderstanding I will say that my criticism to the indiscriminate use of the cold bath applies only to the cold tub or shower at home. Ocean baths are a different matter. If the sun is hot, it is much easier to bring about the proper reaction and thus avoid the undesirable results of the cold water. Separate Beds I have been taken to task by a number of women for my advice that husbands and wives occupy separate beds. It is not a subject which can be discussed in too great and explicit detail, but I will say what I can. SEXUAL IMPOTENCE 231 I know very well that some couples occupy the same bed for many years — even for several decades — without it affecting their affection; in some it seems to increase the attachment to such an extent that when they have to be parted or to occupy separate beds for a time, they suffer and may find it even impossible to sleep. Nevertheless, speaking of the majority — as I always do, unless stated to the contrary — I insist that my advice: sleep in separate beds, is the correct one. Sleeping together all the time, that is every night, is unhygienic; it may and often does lead to excessive indulgence with its resulting oversatiation. It often interferes with the proper sleep of one of the partners. In short, I am op- posed to it. Of course, as I do not impose my advice by force, you do not have to take it, and may follow your own inclination in the matter. About the Treatment of Sexual Impotence I have laid great stress upon the baneful, tragic effects of sexual impotence in the husband on the health of the wife, and upon its disastrous influ- ence on the stability and permanence of the home, and yet I have said nothing about its treatment, have given no prescriptions or formulae. The reason is a very simple one: it can’t be done. Sex- ual impotence, sexual neurasthenia and the nu- merous other sexual disorders in men and women 232 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS do not belong to the category of minor ills and ailments, and a prescription per se will do no good. They are extremely complex affections and it often requires the experienced specialist’s ut- most acumen, all the resources of his knowledge, combined with fine tact, all the aids that modern medicine can supply — drugs, endocrine products, mechanical measures, hydrotherapy, etc. — before any results can be accomplished. It will therefore be seen how childish it is to expect a cure of im- potence from some one prescription. And it will also be seen how much confidence can be placed in the advertisements of the quacks who guarantee to cure “lost manhood” by mail, or by some won- derful apparatus of their own. Then there is this important point to bear in mind: Sexual impotence is not amenable to self- treatment. Most cases require local applications, instillations, massage, intramuscular injections, etc., which can be administered by a physician only. I should be very happy to give here a brief out- line of the treatment of sexual impotence if it could be done; but it can’t. The subject is too complex. The author’s “Treatise on the Symptoms and Treatment of Sexual Impotence and other Sexual Disorders ’ ’ occupies over 400 pages; to try to con- dense that information within a few pages for presentation to a lay reader would be a futile undertaking. THE IDEAL PREVENCEPTIVE 233 The Seven Requirements of an Ideal Prevenceptive What are the requirements of an ideal, i. e., absolutely perfect, prevenceptive? An ideal prevenceptive should fulfil the follow- ing conditions: (1) It should be absolutely certain and in- fallible. That is, it should accomplish what it is intended to accomplish in one hundred per cent, of all cases. (2) It should be perfectly harmless; it should cause no damage or disagreeable sensation to the man or the woman during or after the act, nor should it injure the health in the long run. (3) It should cause no inconvenience of any kind. (4) It should not be unesthetic or disagreeable to use. (5) It should not diminish the pleasure of the act and it should not interfere with the voluptu- ous sensation in either the man or the woman. (6) It should be easily used or applied without any expert instruction. It should not be necessary to have a physician or an expert to teach its ap- plication or to insert it and remove it periodically. (7) It should be cheap. In this country this is not such an important requirement, but still in view of the fact that it is the poor strata of the population that are in the greatest need of preven- MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS ception, this condition cannot be altogether neglected. Do we possess at the present such an ideal prevenceptive ? No, at the present time there is no single prevenceptive measure which fulfils all the seven conditions. There are prevenceptives that fulfil two, three or more of the above enu- merated, but not one that answers every one of them. However the time is coming, it is almost here, when the ideal prevenceptive will be real, fulfilling all the seven requirements. Harmless and Infallible Means for the Prevention of Conception At the risk of repetition I must emphasize a few points. When yon hear anybody attack birth control because it is injurious to the woman or the man or to both, you may make up your mind to one of two things: Either the person does not know what he is talking about, simply parroting what he heard others say, or he is referring to methods of prevention which we ourselves were the first to attack as injurious. That there are methods of prevention of conception which are injurious to the wife, or to the husband or to both, is quite true, but those are the old and antiquated methods which the modern advocates of birth control have discarded long ago; they are cer- tainly not the methods that we have reference to when we speak of prevenceptives. Now, to the question: Are there absolutely THE IDEAL PREVENCEPTIVE harmless and absolutely certain means to prevent conception, the answer is: decidedly, yes. As to the harmlessness of the modem preven- ceptives, we can speak with absolute and unquali- fied assurance. Not one of the chemical preven- ceptives recommended can ever be injurious in the slightest degree. For the mildest substances suffice to render the spermatozoa inert. More- over, I repeat what I asserted many years ago: the modern prevenceptives not only are not in- jurious but are distinctly beneficial, curing or im- proving, as they do, obstinate leucorrhea, cervical catarrh, etc. I repeat that there is not the slight- est question about the perfect harmlessness of the modern prevenceptives. Now, as to the certainty. This can also be answered in the affirmative, but with a certain qualification. There are prevenceptives which are one hundred per cent, sure, certain and infallible for certain people, but the same prevenceptive is not sure, certain and infallible for all people. Women are not all anatomically exactly alike and the proper prevenceptive must be adapted to the given case. But after the proper adaptation, the means are sure and infallible. There are millions of women nowadays who use prevenceptives with- out any fear or worry. As long as they use the prevenceptives they are sure of avoiding preg- nancy. When they desire a child, they discon- tinue the use of the prevenceptives and conception usually takes place. MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS A Letter Worth Reading from a Happy Couple Practically after every one of my sex lectures I would receive a number of letters and notes thanking me and “blessing” me for the valuable information. After the lectures constituting the basis of this book I received more letters than after all the other lectures combined; probably because it touched on so many varied points, be- cause it hit at once the heads of so many nails. The letter that follows, received five months after the delivery of that lecture, is so significant, tells the truth so pleasingly, and is so genuinely flattering to the author, that I cannot help taking the liberty of reproducing it here. It makes inter- esting reading besides. Lake Champlain, N. Y. Labor Day. Dr. William J. Robinson 12 Mount Morris Park, W. New York. Dear Doctor: We — my husband and I — have been spending a few days in this lovely place. It is the first holi- day we have spent together in many a year — perhaps six or seven. For ten years we have been drifting apart, and the reason we are together again is due to the good luck we had of hearing your lecture in Arlington Hall. We saw the an- nouncement of your lecture in the Evening Post A LETTER WORTH READING 237 and in The Nation and we are glad we obeyed our impulse and went. We felt that matters could not go on like that much longer, and there had to be a change — or divorce. I hesitate to give the details of our troubles, and maybe you would not be interested to read them; no doubt you hear such stories often enough in your office; but I am glad to tell you this, and perhaps you will be glad to hear it: your lecture is responsible for our conciliation, for our again happy relations, for everything that makes life again worth living. The impression left on us by your lecture made us look into ourselves, examine ourselves, to find the cause of the trouble, and the suggestions given in your lecture helped us to dis- cover the truth. It gave us both a new outlook, and made us, as the saying is, turn a new leaf. From the very bottom of our hearts we are grate- ful. In our case, I was the more guilty party, though my husband was not entirely blameless. But when you made us see the light, we both saw how guilty or rather foolish we were, and we de- cided to do better! And thanks to your guidance, we have succeeded beyond our expectation. . . . Yes, we are very happy. I hope you will get that lecture out in book form. If you do, you will please send us at once ten copies. It ought to be in every home in the United States, in every home in every English speaking country, and it ought to be translated in 238 MARRIED LIFE AND HAPPINESS many languages, so that those who do not read English might also enjoy the benefit of your hu- mane and common sense advice. My husband joins me in every sentiment ex- pressed in this letter, and we both sign it as a very slight expression of the gratitude that we feel for what your lecture has done for us. Gratefully yours, John II. Mrs. Olivia H. P.S. If you will not mind the length of our letter, we will add that previous to your lecture we had not read one sex book. Stimulated by your lecture, we have read a considerable num- ber of books on the sex question. We have read several of your books—Woman, Her Sex and Love Life (surely a splendid book), Sexual Problems of Today, The Treatment of Sexual Impotence, Sex Knowledge for Men and Boys, Birth Control, and four or five others; then we read The Sexual Crisis, by Meisel-Hess, a very great book indeed, and deserving of all the praise you gave it. We have read the books by Forel, Stopes, Malchow, Ellis and some others; and we are bound to say that not only have your books proved more helpful to us practically than any of the others, but to our minds your views on sex are the sanest and health- iest. You are not grossly materialistic nor are you sickly sentimental and ecstatic, as is Dr. , the author of . To you sex is not shameful A LETTER WORTH READING or filthy, nor on the other hand is it something holy about which one must speak with eyes raised to heaven. To you sex is a normal, natural function — nei- ther more nor less. If your views on sex could by some miracle become the universal views, cer- tainly a very great part of human unhappiness, among the married and the unmarried, would rapidly disappear. Once again we thank you. Olivia H. What Other Sex Books to Read We are often, very often, asked to give the names of books on sex which are reliable, repre- sent the latest research in sexual science, are in- terestingly written and are therefore worth read- ing. Every one of the books described in the fol- lowing pages is worth reading. They all discuss different phases of the sex question, discuss it from various angles. And for the average man or woman who is in search of practical information, of something that will make his own life smoother and happier, those are all the books that are nec- essary. The sex perversions are not discussed, except very lightly, in these books, and for a very good reason: We do not think that it is either useful, necessary or healthy for the average man or woman to delve into the perversities and per- versions of human sexuality. Of course, the spe- cialist in sexology, the advanced physician, the conscientious jurist, must be familiar with those also, and to them Kraft-Ebing’s Psychopathia Sexualis is a necessity. But for the average, even intelligent, man and woman it is an unnecessary and unhealthy book. Havelock Ellis' Studies in the Psychology of Sex in six volumes is a pioneer work and indispensable to the student of sexology. But the greatest single book on sexology that has ever been written, a truly monumental work, is Iwan Bloch’s The Sexual Life of Our Time. It is approached by no other book in any language. The Sexual Question by August Forel is also THE BEST SEX BOOKS 241 an excellent book, but is becoming somewhat an- tiquated. The books by Magnus Hirschfield and Albert Moll are all very fine, but most of them are not translated into English. We publish none of the above books; we publish only the books announced in the pages that follow, but as an ac- commodation we will secure those books for any member of the medical or legal professions or any bona fide student of sexology. Practical Books on Sex. To the question often put to us, what practical books on the sex question would we recommend, we would answer: Sex Knowledge for Men and Boys; Woman: Her Sex and Love Life; Married Life and Happiness; The Treatment of Sexual Impotence and Other Sexual Disorders in Men and Women, and Birth Control or the Limitation of Offspring by the Prevention of Conception. These five books should be con- sidered as the minimum of sex reading, as the basis of every elementary sex library. They are all by Dr. William J. Robinson. Theoretical Books on Sex. Of books dealing with the theories of sex, with sexual ethics, monog- amy and polygamy, the origin of modesty, etc., we recommend the following: A Liberal Code of Sexual Ethics (sold by subscription only), Sex Morality, Past, Present and Future, by Dr. Rob- inson and others, The Sexual Crisis by Grete Meisel-Hess, Sexual Truths by Dr. Robinson and others, The Sexual Life of Our Time by Iwan Bloch and Studies in the Psychology of Sex by Havelock Ellis. The following pages contain announce- ments of some of The Critic and Guide Co.'s publications A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE CAUSES, SYMPTOMS AND TREATMENT OF SEXUAL IMPOTENCE And Other Sexual Disorders in Men and Women BY WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M.D. Chief of the Department of Genlto-Urinary Diseases and Dermatology Bronx Hospital and Dispensary; Editor The American Journal of Urology, Venereal and Sexual Diseases; Editor and Founder of The Critic and Guide; Author of Sexual Problems of Today; Never Told Talesi Practical Eugenics, etc* BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS. Part I—'Masturbation. Its Prevalence, Causes, Varieties, Symptoms Results, Prophylaxis and Treatment. Coitus Interruptus and its Effects. Part II—Varieties, Causes and Treatment of Pollutions, Spermator* rhea, Prostatorrhea and Urethrorrhea. Part III—Sexual Impotence in the Male. Every phase of its widely varying causes and treatment, with illuminating case reports. Part IV—Sexual Neurasthenia. Causes, Treatment, case report* and its relation to Impotence. Fart V—Sterility, Male and Female. Its Causes and Treatment. Part VI—Sexual Disorders in Woman, Including Frigidity, Vaginif mus, Adherent Clitoris, and Injuries to the Female in Coitus. Part VII—Priapism. Etiology, Case Reports and Treatment. Part VIII—Miscellaneous Topics. Including: Is Mar'urbation • Vice?—Two Kinds of Premature Ejaculation.—The Frequency of Coitus.—“Useless” Sexual Excitement.—The Relation Between Mental and Sexual Activity.—Big Families and Sexual Vigor.—Sexual Pe*« versions. Part IX—Prescriptions and Minor Points. Cloth bound, 422 pages. Postpaid, $4.00. CRITIC AND GUIDE COMPANY 12 MT. MORRIS PARK WEST :: NEW YORK CITY THE DISORDERS OF THE SEXUAL SYSTEM “He who throws light on the dark and intricate problems of sex, helping to unravel the mysteries of and to cure the complex sexual disorders, does indeed a signal service to humanity.” We believe that in bringing out our latest work, Sexual Impotence and Other Sexual Disorders in Men and Women, we have given the profession one of the most useful, one of the most valuable books that have ever been published. A gratifyingly large num- ber of physicians have told us that the book not only helped them to treat successfully sexual weakness and other disorders in their patients or in themselves, but that it opened their eyes to the significance of many things which they did not understand before. Those who have read the book know its value and importance; those who have not may be interested to read what the medical journals have to say about it. Here are a few extracts: No American authority has given more serious thought to the subject of sexual diseases than the author of this volume; he has given to us in it the best that in him lies. No physician who has had to combat this distressing condi- tion, and those conditions dependent upon it, has any doubt of its serious importance. And we all recognize the weak- ness af the literature on the subject. Dr. Robinson takes SEXUAL IMPOTENCE a sensible view of things which have not been sensibly con- sidered; nowhere has he shown this to better advantage than in this volume on a difficult subject. —Medical Fortnightly. Dr. Robinson discusses the numerous phases of this sub- ject, in both sexes, clearly and in detail. He tells no lies to conform to moral, social and religious ideals, and con- sequently those who differ with him in beliefs or in pre- tensions may censure him as immoral. In some of these points there is opportunity for difference of opinion, but on the whole we think that Dr. Robinson has expressed what the majority of physicians believe, tho not necessarily the opinion most frequently published. Pretty nearly every conceivable sexual abnormality, physical or psychic is at least alluded to. If we were to select any one feature of this work for special mention, it would be the uniform common sense of the author.—Buffalo Medical Journal. This book is not by any means a rehash of some other book or a resume of several. This treatise is interesting and valuable, and the author is absolutely honest and fear- less in his opinions. A unique and helpful feature is the case reports which illustrate every phase of sexual dis- order.—Indianapolis Medical Journal. Dr. Robinson deals with the subject in a dignified, scien- tific way, that will be helpful to the physician who has judgment enough to realize that he is as responsible for functions around which a modem, sham, conventional modesty has thrown a hiatus of folly as he is for the ap- petite, eliminative powers or nutritive functions of the same persons. And the science of eugenics can never be worthy of medical consideration until the people are taught that it is as much the duty and ousiness of physicians to in- quire about the sexual habits of patients as of their habits of eating and drinking. This book will do much good, and that good will be as extensive as its reading. —Texas State Journal of Medicine. SEXUAL IMPOTENCE In this book we have a complete treatise on sexual dis- orders and their treatment, with descriptions of actual individual ca°es, giving the individual symptomatology and individual treatment. When given in this manner the de- scription becomes indelibly impressed on the memory and enables a physician when he gets a case to understand and classify it without a great amount of difficulty. —Charlotte Medical Journal. The name of the author is ample assurance that this treatise is not a rehash nor lacking in honest opinions fear- lessly expressed. The style of the writer is notably per- sonal, clear, straightforward and conversational. The ex- haustion of the first edition in less than two months from the day of publication shows unmistakably the need of a book of this character. It also shows that the profession is at last becoming alive to its shortcomings in the matter of sexual disorders and is beginning to be willing to learn. —Southern California Practitioner. Perhaps no subject pertaining to human ills has been so neglected by medical teachers or medical text-books as the subject discussed in this volume. While legitimate medical literature was indiscreetly silent on sex teachings, the quack literature was teeming with misinformation, which, as the author intimates, did more real harm than did sexual ignorance or sex abuse. The doctor will find this work instructive.—Illinois Medical Journal. As is to be expected Robinson goes into the subject thoroly, and calls a spade a spade, with the result that he has evolved a volume full of meat and of great value to the physician, whose ingenuity is often taxed to the ut- most to discover the whys and wherefores at the bottom of impotence. The racy Robinsonesque style adds interest to the text matter of the volume.—Medical Times. WOMAN: HER SEX AND LOVE LIFE FOR MEN AND WOMEN By WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M.D. Illustrated This is one of the most important, most useful books that we have ever brought out. It is not de- voted to abstruse discussions or doubtful theories: it is full of 'practical information of vital importance to every woman and through her to every man, to every wife and through her to every husband. The simple practical points contained in its pages would render millions of homes happier abodes than they are now; they would prevent the disruption of many a family; they show how to hold the love of a man, how to preserve sexual attraction, how to re- main young beyond the usually allotted age. This book destroys many injurious errors and superstitions and teaches truths that have never been presented in any other book before. In short, this book not only imparts interesting facts; it gives practical points which will make thousands of women, and thousands of men happier, healthier, and more satisfied with life. Certain single chapters or even paragraphs are alone worth the price of the book. You may safely order the book without delay. But if you wish, a complete synopsis of contents will be sent you. Cloth bound. Price $3.00 THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK W„ NEW YORK A New Book by Dr. Robinson Sex Knowledge for Men. By WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M. D. ILLUSTRATED. An honest, unbiased, truthful, strictly scientific and up-to-date book, dealing with the anatomy and physi- ology of the male sex organs, with the venereal diseases and their prevention, and the manifestations of the sex instinct in boys and men. Absolutely free from any cant, hypocrisy, falsehood, exaggeration, compromise, or any attempt to conc;>iate the stupid and ignorant. An elementary book written in plain, understandable language, which should be in the possession of every adolescent boy and every parent. Price, cloth bound, $2.00. Sex Knowledge fandWGmcsn What Every Woman and Girl Should Know A Companion Volume to SEX KNOWLEDGE FOR MEN Price, cloth bound, Si.50. ADDRESS* THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK W. NEW YORK CITY npvil I I nrniTTIIP Versus SEXUAL LIES, NrAl /ll I KB I HS MISCONCEPTIONS ULlAUrlLl lllUllllJ AND EXAGGERATIONS An Unparalleled Collection of Splendid Essays on Vital Sex Subjects Edited by DR. WILLIAM J. ROBINSON 400 Pages. Price, $4.00 A Liberal Code of Sexual Ethics By E. S. S. FROM THE FOREWORD BY THE EDITOR I sent out a questionnaire on Sexual Ethics to a number of liberal- minded people. I presented to them a number of problems which confront the modem man and woman and asked them to give me their frank opinion as to how they would solve them. I asked them to answer frankly and honestly or not at all. If for certain reasons they did not care to write their honest thoughts under their own names they could write pseudonymously or anonymously. The best and most complete essay that has been received is the one that I take extreme pleasure in publishing herewith. I bespeak for it a careful reading. Those who are not familiar with the liberal viewpoint on many of our vexing sex problems will find that view- point well presented in this essay.—Dr. W. J. R. It is one of the finest things we have ever published. It is an extremely difficult task to write on sexual ethics-with perfect frank- ness, and yet with a delicacy and restraint that would disarm criticism. The author has acquitted himself of his task in a most admirable manner. Price, $2.00. (Cheaper edition, $1.00.) SOME ASPECTS OF ADULTERY By Dr. RALCY HUSTED BELL A serious and yet delightful study of a delicate subject as old as is humanity itself. A gem for the cognoscenti. Price, $2.00. THE ABOVE THREE BOOKS ARE PRINTED FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION AND ARE SOLD BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY Not sold in bookstores. Obtainable from The Critic and Guide only SEXUAL PROBLEMS OF TODAY By WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M.D. Dr. Robinson’s work deals with many phases of the sex question, both in their individual and social as- pects. , In this book the scientific knowledge of a physician, eminent as a specialist in everything per- taining to the physiological and medical side of these topics, is combined with the ’vigorous social views of a thinker who has radical ideas and is not afraid to give them outspoken expression. A few of the subjects which the author discusses in trenchant fashion are: The Relations Between the Sexes and Man’s Inhumanity to Woman. — The Influence of Abstinence on Man’s Sexual Health and Sexual Power. — The Double Standard of Morality and the Effect of Continence on Each Sex.— The Limitation of Offspring: the Most Important Immediate Step for the Better- ment of the Human Race, from an Economic and Eugenic Standpoint. — What To Do With the Prostitute and How To Abolish Venereal Disease.—The Question of Abortion Considered la Its Ethical and Social Aspects. — Torturing the Wife When the Husband Is At Fault. — Influence of the Prostate on Man’s Mental Condition.—The Most Efficient Venereal Prophylactics, cbc. etc. " SEXUAL PROBLEMS OF TO-DAY” wifi give most of its readers information they never possessed before and ideas they never had before — or if they had, never heard them publicly expressed before. Cloth-bound, 320 Pages, $2 Postpaid CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. IS MT. MORRIS PARK W. NEW YORK tlM Population and Birth Control A SYMPOSIUM EDITED BY EDEN and CEDAR PAUL One of the greatest books on Birth-Control in the English or any other language. By writers of international reputation. CONTENTS Introduction, by William J. Robinson; Malthus, a Biographical and Critical Study, by Achille Loria; Birth-Control and the Wage Earners, by Charles V. Drysdale; Race Suicide in the United States, by Ludwig Quessel; Eugenics, Birth-Control, and Social- ism, by Eden Paul; Economics of the Birth Strike, by Ludwig Quessel; Decline in the Birth-Rate, Nationality, and Civilisation, by Edward Bernstein; Philosophy of the Birth Strike, by Ludwig Quessel; Over-Population as a Cause of War, by B. Dunlop; The Decline in the Birth-Rate, by R. Manschke; Dysgenic Tendencies of Birth-Control and of the Feminist Movement, by S. H. Halford; Women and Birth-Control, by F. W. Stella Browne; Editorial Sum- mary and Conclusion. Price S3.00 SMALL OR LARGE FAMILIES BIRTH-CONTROL FROM THE MORAL, RACIAL AND EUGENIC STANDPOINT BY Dr. C. V. DRYSDALE DR. HAVELOCK ELLIS DR. WILLIAM J. ROBINSON PROFESSOR A. GROTJAHN Price SI.50 ADDRESS THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. '2 MT. MORRIS PARK W. NEW YORK CITY SEX MORALITY PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE Will monogamy or variety prevail in the future ? Is continence injurious ? Are extra - marital relations ever justifiable ? Should there be one moral stand- ard for men and women ? Will our present moral code persist? These and similar questions are here discussed by original and unbiased thinkers as well as by orthodox conservatives. No matter what your opinion on the subject may be, no matter whether your ideas on the relations of the sexes are those of the 15 th, 20th or 25 th century, you should read this book. Nobody who is earnestly inter- ested in the sex question has a right to have any opinion on it without having read this volume, the price of which, in cloth, is $1.50, including postage. THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK W. NEW YORK CITY AN EPOCH-MAKING BOOK Never-Told Tales GRAPHIC STORIES OF THE DISASTROUS RESULTS OF SEXUAL IGNORANCE By WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M.D. Editor of the American Journal of Urology and of The Critic and Guide Every doctor, every young man and woman, every newly-married touple, every parent who has grown-up children, should read this took. ' Every one of the tales teaches a distinct lesson, a lesson of vital frnportance to the human race. _ .We knew that we were getting out a useful, a NECESSARY book, jmd we expected it would meet with a favorable reception, but we never expected the reception would be so extravagantly and so unanimously enthusiastic. There seems to have been a long-felt but dormant want for just such a book. One reader, who has a fortune running into the millions, writes: “I would have given a good part of my fortune if the knowledge I obtained from one of j,our stories to-day had been imparted to me ten years ago.” Another one writes: “I agree with you that your plain, unvarnished tales from red life should have been told 1 ng ago. But better late than never. Your name will be among the benefactors of the human race for having brought out so forcibly those important, life-saving truths. £ know that I personally have already been benefited by them.” $1.50 THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK W. NEW YORK DR. ROBINSON’S PRESCRIPTION INCOMPATIBILITIES The book for which physicians and pharmacists, medical and pharmaceutical students have been asking and waiting for. It is meeting with universal favor. 540 Prescriptions We believe it is the best and most complete book on the subject Price, S3.00 Heredity, Disease and Evolution By PROFESSOR HUGO RIBBERT Truly a great book Price, $2.00 THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK WEST NEW YORK I consider myself extremely fortunate in having been instru- mental in making this remarkable book accessible to the English reading public. It is a great book well worth a careful perusal. From Dr.jWillinm J. Robinson’s Introduction. The Sexual Crisis A CRITIQUE OF OUR SEX LIFE A Psychologic and Sociologic Study By CRETE MEISEL-HESS AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION BY EDEN AND CEDAR PAUL EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION By WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M. D. One of the greatest of all books on the sex question that have appeared in the Twentieth Century. It is a book that no educated man or woman, lay or professional, interested in sexual ethics, in our marriage system, in free motherhood, in trial marriages, in the question of sexual abstinence, etc., etc., can afford to leave unread. Nobody who discusses, writes or lectures on any phases of the sex question, has a right to overlook this remarkable volume. Written with a wonderfully keen analysis of the conditions which are bringing about a sexual crisis, the book abounds in gems of thought and in pearls of style on every page. It must be read to be appreciated. A Complete Synopsis of Contents Will Be Sent on Request 350 PAGES. PRICE $3.00 THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK, WEST tt it u u NEW YORK CITY Woman from Bondage to Freedom By RALCY HUSTED BELL Always a great movement produces a great man to articulate its aims and aspirations and achievements; some one man from among the multitude of its adherents whose strong voice rings voluminously above and beyond the common chorus. Signally is this so if the movement be one for social emancipation, of whatever class. Even in the movement for woman's higher freedom has such a man arisen — a knightly figure, with the soul of a Sir Gala- had, whose pen is a lance not unworthy of Launcelot. This man is Dr. Raley Husted Bell, who has written a book, "Woman from Bondage to Freedom,” that is the last word on Feminism. It deals with every phase of this tremendous question — historical, social, political, economic, ethical, philosophical, sci- entific, esthetic, sexual. . . . To this work the author has brought a ripe scholarship, a keenly penetrative mind, and a prescient vision. He is both historian and prophet. Over it all is spread a fineness of literary finish that may be likened to the polish which a master lapidary gives to his choicest gem. Indeed, the elegance of this writer’s English quite equals the strength of his logic — than which no more can be said for the luxury of language. Walter Hurt. It is a splendid book. It is a delight from the first page to the last. Price, *2.50 THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK WEST NEW YORK FEWER AND BETTER BABIES BIRTH CONTROL OR THE LIMITATION OF OFFSPRING BY THE PREVENTION OF CONCEPTION BY WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M.D. Chief of the Department of Genito-Urinary Diseases and Dermatology, Bronx Hospital and Dispensary; Editor of “The Critic and Guide;” Author of: Treatment of Sexual Impotence and Other Sexual Disorders in Men and Women; Treatment of Gonorrhea; Woman, Her Sex and Love Life; Married Life and Happiness; Sexual Problems of Today; Sex Knowledge for Men and Boys; Birth Control or the Limitation of Offspring; Never Told Tales; Stories of Love and Life; A Clergyman’s Son and Daughter; Eugenics and Marriage; Sex Knowledge for Women and Girls; Sex-Morality—Past, Present and Future; Sexual Truths; Prescription In- compatibilities, etc.; Ex-President of the Berlin Anglo- American Medical Society, Fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine; Fellow of the American Medical Association; Member of the New York State Medical Society, Medical Society of the County of New York, Harlem Medical Asso- ciation, American Medical Editors’ Associa- tion, American Urological Association, In- ternationale Gesellschaft fiir Sexual- forschung, British Society for the Study of Sex Psychology, Ameri- can Association for the Advance- ment of Science, etc., etc. Editor Dr. A. Jacobi’s Collected Works With an Introduction by A. JACOBI, M.D., LL.D. Late President of the American Medical Association EIGHTEENTH EDITION 1922 THE CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK W. NEW YORK CITY A CLERGYMAN’S SON AND DAUGHTER BY WILLIAM J. ROBINSON, M.D, Author of Never Told Tales, Stories of Love and Life, Married Life and Hap> piness, Eugenics and Marriage, Sexual Problems of Today, Birth Control or the Limitation of Offspring, Woman: Her Sex and Love Life, Sex Knowledge for Men and Boys, etc. 1922 THE CRITIC AND GUIDE COMPANY 12 Mount Morris Park Wist New York A UNIQUE JOURNAL THE CRITIC AND GUIDE Dr. Robinson's Famous Little Monthly It is the most original journal in the country. It is the only one of its kind, and is interesting from cover to cover. There is no routine, dead matter in it. It is one of the very few journals that is opened with anticipation just as soon as it is received and of which every line is read with real interest. Not only are the special problems of the medical profession itself dealt with in a vigorous and progressive spirit, but the larger, social aspects of medicine and physiology are discussed in a fearless and radical manner. Many problems untouched by other publications, such as the sex question in all its varied phases, the economic causes of disease and other problems in medical sociology, are treated boldly and freely from the standpoint of modern science. In discussing questions which are considered taboo by the hyper-conservative, the editor says what he wants to say very plainly without regard for Mrs. Grundy. The Critic and Guide wa3 a pioneer in the propaganda for birth control, venereal prophylaxis, sex education of the young, and free discussion of sexual problems in general. It contains more interesting and outspoken matter on these subjects than any other journal. While of great value to the practitioner for therapeutic sugges- tions of a practical, up-to-date and definite character, its editorials and special articles are what make The Critic and Guide unique among k ~nals, read eagerly alike by the medical profession and the intelligent laity. PUBLISHED MONTHLY TWO DOLLARS A YEAR CRITIC AND GUIDE CO. 12 MT. MORRIS PARK W. NFAV YORK CITY