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BEFHESS&, KMkLAHD 20014 
 
 
            LECTURES


                    ON


POPULATION, MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE;


                 COMPRISING


  AN ACCOUNT OF THE CAUSES AND TREATMENT


                    OF


     IMPOTENCE  AND  STERILITY,


                   OF THE


MORBID  AND  CURATIVE EFFECTS OF  MARRIAGE,


                 AND ON THE


     DISEASES PRODUCED  BY ONANISM.




            BY MICHAEL RYAN, M.D.

Member of the Royal College of Physicians, Lecturer on Practice
          of Medicine and  Obstetrics, &c. &c.




   FIRST AMERICAN  FROM THE LAST LONDON EDITION.
          BALTIMORE*.

\VM. R. LUCAS  &  R.  N.  WIGHT.
1835. 

I6 *£??£ "?*:'>!
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£';f
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2Q314 
          LECTURES
                  ON
MEDICAL  JURISPRUDENCE,
               &c.  &c.
POPULATION, MARRIAGE, DIVORCE, AS QUESTIONS OP STATE MEDICINE J
  CAUSES AND TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE AND STERILITY; CURATIVE
  AND MORBID EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.
Gentlemen:
    The subjects we have next to consider have
been too long neglected in this country, and almost
consigned to the nefarious empiric; but I see no rea-
son why we should not imitate our contemporaries
in vicinal countries, and discuss them in a statistical
and medical point of view.  They are subjects of
intense interest to every class of society, as you will
perceive by  the subsequent observations:
  There are many bodily imperfections which  are
not sufficient to deprive married persons of mutual
succour.  The principal end of conjugal union is
the establishment of a contract, by which the par-
ties promise the exchange of mutual succour; and
many of the ordinary infirmities are not a sufficient 
4      DISQUALIFICATIONS FOR MARRIAGE.
motive to prevent consolation being given by those
affected.  Marriage is defined a civil and religious
contract between male and female, by which they
engage to live together in mutual  love and  friend-
ship for the purpose of procreation.  Some diseases
are aggravated by marriage, as inveterate scrofula,
epilepsy, confirmed phthisis, caries of the vertebras,
aneurism of  the heart and large  vessels; and as
some of these and other diseases may be commu-
nicated to  the offspring,  they are considered by
many as impediments to matrimonial union.  Again,
rachitis is  often transmitted to infants;  and this
rachitic predisposition in the female, predisposes
her to spinal  and pelvic deformity, and it too often
happens in such cases, that the very moment  she
hopes to be a mother, she is consigned to the tomb.
Fodere says,  marriage should be  interdicted when
the sacro-pubic diameter of the brim of the pelvis is
less than four inches; Orfila, when it is less  than
three inches; but defects of the outlet or perineal
strait are as  strong objections.  Mania,  and other
forms of mental imbecility, are impediments to the
marriage contract.  It is necessary for this compact
that there  should be capacity to contract, and the
consent of both  parties.  The various requisites for
conjugal union  are seldom duly considered by so-
ciety ; in fact, few persons trouble themselves about 
       DISQUALIFICATIONS  FOR MARRIAGE.      5
 them.   The age,  constitution, or health  of  the
parties, is  scarcely ever  considered, though highly
important.   All  physiologists agree that  early or
premature procreation  is  objectionable on  many
accounts, from  the imperfect development of the
parties, the smallness of the pelvis, which exposes
the woman to protracted suffering during parturi-
tion, and too often  to loss of life.  It is universally
known to  all practical obstetricians,  that females
who become mothers at an early age  purchase the
honour of maternity at a very dear  rate.  Such
persons are liable to numerous disorders during ges-
tation, the pelvis is unable to support the gravid
uterus, it is too small for the passage of the infant,
consequently parturition will  be laborious and pro-
tracted, and finally must be completed by artificial
means; while the degree of pressure  produced  by
this process on the important  organs of the pelvis,
causes great suffering and  danger to  the woman,
and may be followed by deplorable disease, or death
itself.   It is  also generally admitted by the most
eminent writers, that the present mode of female
education is highly injurious to health, predisposes
to spinal  curvature, and  consequently to pelvic
deformity,  thereby  rendering procreation  highly
dangerous  to the  other  sex.   Writers on spinal
diseases  have very fully illustrated this  position.
       1# 
6       DISQUALIFICATIONS FOR MARRIAGE.
Again, a  great obstacle  is opposed  to the natural
development of females, by the  custom of tight
lacing, the functions of the thoracic  and abdominal
viscera are impeded, the  development of the breasts
and nipples is prevented, these parts are considerably
absorbed  from pressure, the lactiferous ducts are
almost obliterated; the nipple is undeveloped, and
therefore lactation is impeded, and the natural food
of the offspring greatly  diminished.   Duges,  and
other foreign  writers, allude to unnatural  excite-
ment of the generative  organs, and contend  that
masturbation is the cause of rickets, and of various
chronic and incurable diseases.   In these countries
this vice  is forgotten, indeed no  practitioner  can
allude to it.   In the male sex, it is  productive of the
worst consequences,  and often causes impotence
and sterility.  The female is unfit for the  purpose
of procreation until after the twelfth or fourteenth
year, or until menstruation is established; for at an
earlier age the sexual  organs are undeveloped, there
is no venereal desire, and sexual intercourse is pain-
ful.  Hence the cruelty  and barbarity of violating
female children of tender age, which have been
described in the section on Violation of Women, in
my work on Midwifery.
  The male is also incapable of performing his part
in the mysterious process of procreation until after 
             CAUSES OF  IMPOTENCE.           7
puberty, and according to the law of this country
before the fourteenth  year.  He is not qualified to
enter into matrimonial engagement until the com-
pletion of the twenty-first year.
  There is no subject which distresses married per-
sons so much as want of family, or leads to so much
domestic feud and unhappiness, and finally to  the
nullification of marriage.   It is  necessary for  the
medical practitioner to be fully informed on all the
causes which disqualify both sexes for the object of
procreation.  All disqualifications for matrimonial
union  may be divided  into two  classes: 1.  those
caused  by defect of mental power; 2. those caused
by  defect of sexual organization.   The disqualifi-
cations are therefore  moral and physical, and  are
expressed  by  the terms  impotence and sterility.
These terms are often used synonymously, though
widely  different.  Impotence consists in  the incapa*
city for copulation, or in  the impossibility of exer-
cising the venereal   act;  sterility  consists  in  the
aptitude of the organs for procreation, without  the
power of reproduction.   Thus a person may be
impotent, but  not sterile; and vice versd.  Some
writers  apply the term impotence to the male and
sterility to  the  female; but such  a distinction is
arbitrary and unscientific: the female may be impo-
tent from malformation, and the male sterile from 
8            CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.
excessive venery, self-pollution, and ablation of the
testicles.  We may observe here, that sterility does
not afford a just plea for the nullity of marriage. We
have now to consider the manifest causes of impo-
tence in both sexes, physical and moral.
  Physical, manifest, natural or accidental impotence
of the male.—The causes of manifest impotence of
the male, are absence of the  penis  or testicles.
There must be total loss of the penis, as the slightest
penetration into the vagina is sufficient for procrea-
tion. (Blundell, Richerand, Sedillot, Manuel de Med.
Legale, 1830, and others.)—The absence of the tes-
ticles from the scrotum  is no proof of  their non-
existence in the abdomen; unless the penis be small,
the voice  puerile, the beard  absent, the  form deli-
cate, and the whole physical and moral constitution
feminine.   It is well  known that the testicles may
not descend into the scrotum, and be fully deve-
loped in the abdomen, and perform their functions
perfectly,  and according to  some  writers,  much
better than in the natural situation. The destruc-
tion of one testicle by castration or disease, is no
impediment to procreation.   (Astley Cooper, Marc.
Diet, des  Sc. Med.)—When  both  testicles are dis-
eased, their secretion is  injured or destroyed, and
sterility is the  consequence.   Frequent seminal
emissions, or the sudden secretion of  semen, will 
CUASES  OF IMPOTENCE.
9
be  a bar to  reproduction.   The  secreting power
may be very much increased or diminished.  The
more fluid parts of the spermatic secretion must be
absorbed, or it must be retained some time to fit it
for procreation.  Both testicles may be removed by
castration; yet procreation be effected, as the vesi-
culas seminales may contain a sufficient quantity of
semen for one or two prolific emissions, after which,
the person will be sterile, but not impotent.   M.
Boyer was consulted by a man whose testicles were
removed in consequence of sarcocele.   He saw his
wife, and she became pregnant.  He feared he was
not the father; but M. Boyer assured him he might
be, and if so, this would be his last infant.  (Sedillot,
Manuel de Med. Leg. ut supra.)  But such persons,
and also  eunuchs, have erection  and  emission,
which consists of  the prostatic fluid,  the mucus of
the  seminal  vesicles and   urethra.   (Sir Astley
Cooper on the Testis, 1830.)
  The Ureters may open above the pubes in mon-
sters (Duncan and  others,) and the whole genitals
are deformed.  Mahon,  and many  other jurists,
contended that individuals were impotent who were
affected with hypospasdias; that is, when the urethra
opens through any part of that canal from its orifice
to the scrotum.   If the opening is so placed that it
may enter the vagina,  impregnation will follow 
 10           CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.
 Frank relates a case in  point.   He knew a father
 so affected transmit it to  his son, and even to three
 generations.   Another individual had three  sons.
 (Bull,  de  la  Faculte de Medicine, 1810.)  Mor-
 gagni, Petit-Radel, Sabatier, who was hypospasdiac;
 Gauthier and Richerand have observed analogous
 facts; (Diet, de  Sc. Med. art. Hypospasdias;) and
 Blundell.
   Sometimes  the urethra opens along  the dorsum
 penis;  this  constitutes epispasdias.  It is evident
 that the reasoning employed in the preceding case
 is applicable to this.  It may end in  a cul-de-sac.
 (Goupil, Cloquet, &c.)
   Dimensions of  the penis, extraordinary thick-
 ness and  length, are considered by some  writers
 as causes  of impotence.  Fodere is of opinion
 that the respective organs may be so dispropor-
 tionate; as never to be adapted  to each other; and
 the physical inconveniences are such as to expose
the female to great injury and danger to her health-
It must be admitted, however, that thickness of the
penis, which  excites great pain in some  women,
 procures voluptuous sensations in others; and that
 the vagina is capable of great dilatation, which may
 be effected by gentle and  gradual efforts, and be
 brought to a  state  capable of receiving the  virile
 member.  Though extreme length  of the penis 
            CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.            11
may produce contusion of the os and cervix uteri,
it  cannot be deemed  a just cause of impotence,
because, by certain precautions, this danger may
be avoided,  unless there is great difference between
the age of parties.  Diminutiveness or shortness of
the penis is no proof of impotence, for the reasons
already stated.  Obliquity, tortuosity, or bifurcation
of the penis, bad stricture of the urethra, phymosis,
paraphymosis, warts,  chordee, chancres, or exces-
sive length  of the frcenum, cannot be considered
absolute causes of impotence, as they can be reme-
died by surgical operations.  Large scrotal hernias
cause recession  of the penis, and render coition
impracticable; but in some cases relief may be affor-
ded.  The same observations apply to large hydro-
cele.  Sarcocele or scirrhus of the testicle does not
cause absolute impotence, as it may be removed by
operation; and one testicle remaining is  sufficient
for procreation.   The testicles may disappear  by
disease  (R.  Hamilton, Larrey, Fodere,) or by the
use of iodine.   Three conditions are  necessary on
the part of the male for copulation—erectio et intro-
missiopenis, cum seminis emissione.  Impotence in
men depends  on defect of some  one or more of
these conditions;  erection, intromission, and ejacu-
lation of the spermatic fluid.  The causes of impo-
tence are more commonly observed in man than in 
12           CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.
the other sex; and  this is  easily accounted for, by
the greater part the male has to perform in nuptial
congress.  This  is evident from the  phenomena
which give the virile member the form and dispo-
sition proper for  erection,  the  introduction of the
organ, and the ejaculation of the semen, effected by
a violent and complicated  action, which requires a
concurrence of many indispensable conditions, as
the organs not only contract spasmodically to effect
the expulsion of the male fluid, but  all the body
participates  in  this convulsion at  the  moment of
emission, as if  nature at this  instant forgot every
other function.  The causes of impotence in man
arise from two sources, from  malformation of the
genitals or from  want  of  action in them; but in
females, impotence  can only depend on malforma-
tion, natural  or acquired, as the organs have little
to do in  the act of copulation, they being  merely
auxiliary to it.
  The causes of want of erection may be divided
into  physical  and  moral.   The physical  causes
depend on defects of the body, as paralysis of the
penis, curvature of  the spine,* frigid and apathetic
temperament.   The moral  causes are such as  act
  * Dr. Harrison has lately published some cases of this kind,
which were cured by the removal of the spinal disease. (Essay
on the Powerful Influence of the  Spinal Nerves on the Sexual
Organs, 1831.) 
            CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.           13
powerfully on the imagination, and suddenly pro-
duce an atony of the genitals, or induce an inactivity
in organs properly developed.  The genital organs,
says M.  Virey, offer two states during life, in the
young and old, which are the frozen zones of exis-
tence, the intermediate  state is the torrid zone of
life.   The infant has  nothing to give, the old  has
lost  all.   Immaturity of age and  senescence  are
cause of want of erection.   This doctrine, though
generally correct, admits of  exceptions, as children
have been precociously developed even before the
fourth year, examples of which have been cited; and
our author  described a boy, aged seven  years, a
native of the department of  Lot, who was as fully
developed as an  adult, and who  made  the most
furious comic attacks on his female  acquaintance,
and absolutely deprived one  of them of that which
she could never regain.  On  the other  hand, a
Frenchman, aged ninety-nine, married a tenth wife,
and  was a father at 102 (Bousquet;) and Thomas
Parr, married at 120, and  performed  his nuptial
duties so well at 140, as to make him forget his old
age.    He was even compelled to appear in a white
sheet at one of our churches, for an amour, in his
150th  year.  He outlived nine kings of England.
(Elliotson.)  But in general, the power of procrea-
tion continues from puberty  to the  65th year.   Ira
       2 
 14          CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.
 maturity of age, or senescence, may be put down as
 the first causes of want of power of erection.  Among
 such causes, we  must reckon a frigid or apathetic
 constitution,  a total insensibility to sexual  desire,
 and this is said to be an aggravated or profound lym-
 phatic temperament.  Descourtliz describes persons
 of this temperament in these words: "The  hair is
 white, fair, and  thin, no beard,  countenance pale,
 flesh soft  and without hair, voice clear, sharp, and
 piercing:  the  eyes  sorrowful  and  dull, the form
 round, the  shoulders straight,  perspiration acid,
testicles small, withered, pendulous, and  soft,  the
 spermatic cords  small,  the scrotum flaccid,  the
 glands of the testicles  insensible,  no capillary
 growth on the pubes, a moral apathy, pusillanimity
 and fear,  on  the least occasion, are symptoms of
 anaphrodisia or impotence, or sterility, and any one
 having  the majority of these signs is incapable of
 copulation or generation."   (Propositions sur PAna-
phrosidie.)
  A habitude of chastity is another opponent to
 erection, such as with the  ancient fathers of the
desert, and in those who, by fasting and other forms
of church discipline, extinguish those feelings, im-
planted by nature, but, in their opinion,  contrary to
 that purity which  should distinguish  those  who
 have made vows of chastity.  The organs of such 
            CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.           15
persons decay, like all corporeal organs whose func-
tions are not exerted.  Long continued debauchery,
whether with women or by masturbation, will cause
impotence.  Every practitioner has met with cases
of both these kinds.  "The impotence," says Pinel,
"caused by the latter excess, reduces youth to the
nullity of age, and is  too often incurable."  Long
watching, great fatigue, mental or corporeal, want of
nutriment, excessive  evacuations,  sanguineous or
otherwise, of  blood,  bile,  fasces,  saliva, menses,
scorbutus, cachexia, marasmus, peripneumony, hy-
dro thorax, anasarca, malignant fevers, diseases of
the brain and spinal marrow, whether from external
injuries  or poisons, and numerous other diseases,
are temporary causes of impotence.  Sexual desire
is suppressed  by acute diseases, and returns  after
convalescence.  Zacchias and Beck relate  nume-
rous cases in proof of this position. We  see this
further illustrated during  the convalescence  after
fevers, when erection often occurs.   Some diseases
stimulate the generative organs, as calculus in the
kidneys or bladder, gout, rheumatism, consumption,
piles, mania,  itch,  leprosy, and other cutaneous
affections.  Others may diminish or suppress vene-
real desire for twenty-four years, when the functions
will be restored.  (Zacchias.)
  Excessive venery is a frequent cause of  want of 
 16          CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.
 erection and impotence.  I have been consulted in
 cases of this description, especially after marriage.
 This is a frequent cause of want of family in young
 married persons.
   The abuses of narcotics, saline refrigerants, acids,
 acid fruits, iodine, camphor, and  nitre are causes
 of impotence.  Of all causes cold is the most pow-
 erful.   Thus, in the  Polar regions, there is neither
 love nor jealousy.
   Moral Causes.—There are  no facts which so evi-
 dently prove the influence of  the moral over  the
 physical state of man as the phenomena of erection.
 A lascivious idea will arise  in the midst of our
 gravest meditations; the virile organ will answer its
 appeal,  and will become erected, and fit, for  the
 functions which nature has  confided  to it; but
 another  thought arising, will instantaneously  ex-
 tinguish, with the most frigid indifference, all our
 amorous transports.
   This  statement is well exemplified by the effects
 of the  passions.  Chagrin,  inquietude,  and  de-
 bilitating passions, prostrate  the whole  economy;
jealousy and profound meditation impede the faculty
 of procreation.   Thus, at the very moment  when
 enjoyment is about  to be commenced,  too  eager
 desire, the  trouble which seizes on  too ardent an
 imagination, the excess  of love,  the  fear of not 
             CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.          17
being loved,  timidity, respect, doubt of capability,
the fear of being surprised, the shame of excessive
modesty on being in the presence of witnesses,
antipathy, the sudden knowledge of some physical
defect  in the  female, aversion, from filth,  odour,
and pre-occupations  of the mind, are sufficient to
oppose  erection, and to  abate  it most  suddenly.
But who can enumerate all the moral causes capa-
ble of impeding  or  destroying erection?  A sigh,
doubtfully interpreted, a recollection, an equivocal
word, are sufficient to destroy the illusion, and con-
geal the most violent passion.   A  newly-married
man has become suddenly impotent on discovering
his bride  was without a  hymen; and a debauchee
has as suddenly become impotent, on finding the
membrane perfect.   (Diet, des Sc. Medical.)—And
thus with a  literary man, a  philosopher, or those
who have a  ruling  idea,  which excites the brain
more than the sexual organs.  The fear of being
impotent is the most  frequent  and powerful cause of
this condition.   Thus  the  cases  related  by the
illustrious  Hunter, and  the absurd  impressions of
former  times, as  to  the influence  of his  Satanic
majesty and  his worthy  colleagues, the witches.
Men supposed there was no  physical power when
the moral state had consumed their desires, and
they were impotent as long as they supposed them-
       2* 
IS          CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.
selves so.   Such is the power of the moral over the
physical state of man.  How many impotent per-
sons of this class were cured  with  bread pills, by
Hunter; and  how  many are annually  cured by
mere placebos?  In remote ages men allowed the
illusions of the imagination to have a most extraor-
dinary  power over  their minds and  bodies.   This
was most remarkable in the subject before us.
  Thus we cannot easily  comprehend  how the
power of rue, or St. John's wort, could  prevent a
man,  properly  developed,  from  performing his
nuptial duties on his bridal night;  or how the pro-
nunciation  of a few obscure and  unintelligible
words,  could have a similar effect.   These words,
were to be written on paper with the  blood of a bat,
sewed up with a needle which was used in making
the shrouds of the dead, and then the charm was to
be tied round the neck of  the new-married man
(Venette; also Les  Secrets  du Petit  Albert,) or
merely pronounced.   To cure this enchantment the
church prescribed prayers, the  doctors physic, and
the law severe punishment.  Bacon  describes it in
his Natural History as prevalent in  Germany and
France; in the  latter country it was designated
nouer Veguilette, or tying  the point.  Mr. Hunter's
plan was best.  He ordered timid bridegrooms to
refrain  from any venereal combats for a week, no 
           CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.            19
matter what might be their desires, and then to try
their  powers.   This cure was effectual, and many
of his patients succeeded sufficiently to remove all
unfavourable impressions of impotence ever after-
wards.  They  casually  took  some mild  form of
medicine, and a few drops of tincture of opium each
night, during the period of preparation.
  Impotence, natural,  manifest, or accidental, in
woman.—It has  been  long  held, I  think  erro-
neously, that the  generative organs  of the female
are more  complicated than those of the male, and
therefore  that the causes  of  impotence  are  more
numerous and less apparent than in the other  sex.
If we examine  the  genital organs of both sexes
anatomically, we shall  find them equally complicat-
ed, and possessing an equal adaptation or arrange-
ment of parts, as well as an identity of structure.
Thus we find the structure of the penis very similar
to that of the genital fissure and vagina, the double
fold of prepuce, the cavernous structure, its perform-
ance of a part of the genito-urinary  functions, the
openings  of the vesiculaa seminales and uterine
tubes, the vesiculas seminales and uterus, the testes
and ovaries, the spermatic cords  and the uterine
tubes.  We also find  the  diseases of one sex as
numerous  as those  of the other; and  those  who
doubt the assertion, need only refer to the works of 
 20           CAUSES  OF IMPOTENCE.
 Chopart,  Titley, and  others, on diseases  of the
 genito-urinary organs of the male, for ample proof
 of  the  position.   I need  scarcely  observe,  that
 diseases of the vasa deferentia, vesiculas seminales,
 the pressure of tumours, hydatids,  &c. on these
 parts, diseases of the prostate gland, urinary calculi,
 diseases of the urethra, fistulas in perineo, diseases
 of the bladder, penis,  and scrotum, will be found
 as  numerous  as those of  the  generative system
 of  the  other  sex.  Besides,  it would be  incon-
 sistent with the wisdom and beneficence  of Pro-
 vidence that one sex should  have more to do  in
 the perpetuation of the species than the other.
  The  causes of impotence  in  woman are  mal-
 formation or diseases of the organs  subservient to
 procreation.  Some of these  causes are apparent,
 others obscure.   The apparent causes  are, oblitera-
 tion of the external sexual organs,  both soft and
 hard, absence of the vagina and  uterus, and great
 deformity of the pelvis, with numerous diseases of
 the external and internal genitals.  The vagina and
 uterus have been found to consist of a dense, fleshy
 substance (Morgagni, Mott, Fodere,) and the  vagina
 has been partially closed by such substance.   (Par-e,
Ruysch, Fabricius,  Physick, Fodere.)—It may  be
absent (Haller, Vicq.  d'Azyr, Journ. des  Savans,
Boyer, Caillot, and Willaume,)  unusually  small, 
            CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.            21
impervious from adhesion, tumours, or a  frcenum
passing across above the hymen, or it may be filled
with a  fleshy growth.  If too narrow, it may be
dilated  with a bougie or a tent sponge, and when
unattended to must be divided by incision, to admit
the passage of the infant.  It has closed up after con-
ception.  There is sometimes a great congenital con-
tusion of parts, so much so, that it would be tedious,
if not impossible to describe it.  In cases of extreme
narrowness, impregnation may take place, and the
canal be gradually dilated during  parturition.  I
have seen four cases of cohesion of the labia externa,
at the age of puberty, so complete, that only a small
probe could be introduced at  the superior  commis-
sure.   The vaginal canal may be totally or partially
obliterated, and in such cases an operation is imprac-
ticable, and impotence absolute.  The vagina has
opened into the bladder (Sue,) rectum, anterior
parietes of the abdomen, and pregnancy has occur-
red in the two latter  cases.   Morgagni attests  that
of the abdomen, lib. v. epist. 67; and the other is
given in the Annales de Med. de Montpellier, which
led the celebrated  Louis  to propose  the  following
question to the casuits: "An uxore sic disposita uti
fas vel non, judicent theologi morales?"  Barbaut
cites  two  examples  of  pregnancy  of this kind.
(Diet, des Sc. Med., art. Impuissance.)—Orfila con- 
22          CAUSES OF IMPOTENCE.
tends such malformation is a cause of impotence;
for though coition is not physically impossible, it is
contrary to the laws of morals and of nature.   The
royal court of Treves annulled a marriage in such
a case.   In  cases of  vesico-vaginal, recto-vaginal
fistulas, and amplification of the vagina from lacer-
ation of the perineum, inflammation and ulceration
may occur and impede sexual intercourse; but such
cases could not warrant a divorce, as they occurred
after marriage. Excessive straitness or partial occlu-
sion of the vagina, is no impediment to procreation,
as fecundation may occur, if the spermatic fluid be
applied  inside  the labia, as  already  mentioned.
Besides, fecundation has happened, and the hymen
perfect.   (Ruysch, Pare, Smellie, Hildanus,  Mauri-
ceau, Baudelocque, Nasgele, Nysten, Journ. de Med.
de Corvisart, and Leroux.)—Prolapsion and some
forms of ulceration of the vagina, are only  tempo-
rary causes  of  impotence.   Cauliflower tumours
of the clitoris or  nymphas may be temporary causes
of impotence, as also tumours in the vagina.  (Burns,
Trans.  Dublin  College  of Phys. 1824, vol.  iv.5
Edinburgh Med. and  Surg.  Journ., 1805.)—Leu-
corrhcea  is  one of the  most common causes of
sterility.
  The uterus may be absent.   (Columbus, Schlegel,
Morgagni, Meyer, Renauldin, Hamilton, Bousquet, 
             CAUSES  OF IMPOTENCE.          23
Theden, Engel, Lieutaud, Caillot, Ford, and Bres-
chet.)—I might quote numerous writers who de-
scribe the cavity of the uterus divided by a septum,
but it is not stated whether or not procreation was
impeded.   Many authors have also described partial
or total  obliteration of  the uterine cavity, among
whom are Bichat, Lallement, Segard, Gardien, &c.
The uterus may be double, that is, there may be
two uteri.   (Haller, Purcell, Med. Facts, vol. iii.
Mem.  Med.  Science, vol.  iv. Lond. Med.  Journ.
1782, vol. iii. Diet,  des  Sc. Med, Medical Transac-
tions, vol. vi. Duges, Journal de Progres, vol. xxii.)
—A vicious direction of the  os and cervix uteri,
and complete  occlusion of the former, are irreme-
dial causes of  sterility.  The whole of the  causes
of impotence and sterility in females may be arrang-
ed under three classes: 1.  those depending on the
organs  which  receive  the male fluid, namely, the
genital  fissure,  the vagina, and  the  uterus; 2.
malformation or diseases of the organs that transmit
it to the ovaries, and reconvey the embryo  to the
uterus, and these are the fallopian or uterine tubes;
3.  the  malformation or diseases of the ovaries, or
organs which supply  the  germ for fecundation.
Inflammation,  ulceration,  scirrhus, cancer,  ossifi-
cation, calcareous deposit, or tumours in any of these
organs, may be the cause of sterility.  In fact, any 
 24          CAUSES OF  IMPOTENCE.
 disease of the female genitals, attended with much
 constitutional disturbance, may be held a temporary
 cause of sterility.  Tumours of various kinds, callo-
 sities, cicatrices, adhesion, from disease or mechan-
 ical violence, displacement of the uterus, prolapsus,
 procidentia, retroversion,  antiversion,  lateral obli-
 quity, and the various disorganizations incident to
 muscular, serous, and  to mucous  tissues,  when
 present in the female organs, are causes of sterility.
 In the London Medical and Surgical Journal, 1830,
 vol. iv. is  an account of two singular cases of proci-
 dentia uteri; in  both impregnation  was effected
 through the natural orifice, though permanently fixed
 without the genital fissure for years.  I  have also
 published cases of dysmenorrhcea, in which preg-
 nancy occurred.  In  the disease  called irritable
 uterus, so well described  by Gooch and Dewees, a
 cure may be effected.   In absence of the ovaries
 and uterine tubes there can be no conception; or in
 dropsy, or enlargement of the former; or in occlusion
or adhesion of the latter to the uterus or adjoining
parts.  There are some cases of constitutional steri-
lity, which are inexplicable; for example, those  in
which  a woman has had no family for years, and
at length becomes a mother.
  The principal moral causes  of  impotence  are
hatred, disgust, fear, timidity, and excessive ardour 
             CAUSES  OF IMPOTENCE.          25
of desire, divers ramblings of the imagination; in a
word, every passion strongly excited, that is to say,
all cerebral action so  strong as to diminish that of
the genital organs, which require for coition great
exaltation. Conception seldom happens under such
circumstances.   Fodere  is of  opinion  that com-
plaisance, tranquillity,  silence,  and  secrecy  are
necessary for prolific coition; it is  arrested, as if by
enchantment, by noise, dread, fear, publicity, jeal-
ously, contempt, repugnance, slovenliness, by love
too much respected, and by  every  thing that can
illumine the imagination.
  Many of  the  causes of impotence in both sexes
may be removed, but many are beyond the reach
of  art.    It  has been  long maintained that the
powers  of the mind have great influence in promot-
ing and impeding the process of procreation.
   From the preceding statements we may, I think,
deduce  the following general principles:
   1. To declare either sex impotent, it is necessary
that certain physical causes be  permanent, malfor-
mations or accidental lesions, and be evident to our
senses,  which art cannot remedy, and  which pre-
vent the faculty of exercising a fecundating coition.
   2. These causes, when rigorously examined, are
few in number.
   3. The moral causes of impotence ought not to be
       3 
 26             HERMAPHRODITES.
 taken into consideration, as they would serve as an
 excuse for an individual accused of impotence.
   4.  That if there is the  slightest penetration into
 the vagina, it is sufficient to excite in the other sex
 a degree of erethysm necessary for fecundation; or
 if the spermatic fluid is applied at the  entrance of
 the vagina virile impotence cannot be admitted.
   In  this country the medical  jurist  is seldom
 required to decide questions of impotence or sterility
 in our courts of justice; but every  medical practi-
 tioner may be consulted in private, either before or
 after  matrimonial  engagements.  He may be the
 cause  of great  domestic trouble,  and embitter the
 life of male or female.  He should be exceedingly
 cautious in  fixing the stigma of impotence or ste-
 rility  on either  party.  The legitimacy of children
 may be contested on a plea of impotence, and such
 a plea may  be  offered by a man accused of rape.
It is therefore evident that a proper knowledge  of
the subject is necessary to the medical practitioner.
   Ambiguity  of  Sex.—Hermaphrodites.—There
may be malformation of the genitals in both sexes,
but there is no example of one individual possessing
the perfect organs of both.   Again, the organs may
not resemble those of either male or female.  There
is no truth  in  the statement, that hermaphrodites
 have  married and propagated;  the  obstetrician is 
                HERMAPHRODITES.              27
 aware of the physical impossibility of a full-grown
 infant passing through the male pelvis.   It is evi-
 dent that hermaphrodites must be  impotent and
 sterile.  The ancient physicians were of opinion
 that such persons might propagate.  Even a canon-
 ist went so far as to maintain one individual could
 propagate within himself or herself, "tanquam mas
 generare ex alio, et tanquam fcemina generare in se
 ipsa."  There is no case on record  of a perfect her-
 maphrodite, and  no truth whatever  in the assertion
 that such class of beings can propagate the  species.
 I can see no difficulty in supposing that persons of
 both  sexes,  with  malformations  of  the  genital
 organs, may marry, when I recollect the  curious
 and well-attested case of a female, who dressed in
 male attire, and assumed the name of James Allen,
 married another female, and lived, as a husband for
 several years without detection.   This  case hap-
 pened  in  London,  in 1829, and  was discovered
 when Allen died; and on dissection was found  to
 be a well-formed female.   Also  the case of Marie
 Marguerite, who was born in 1792, and considered
 a female till  1813, when her real  sex was deter-
 mined, as mentioned by the French jurists.
  Voltaire, that enemy to religion and disgrace  to
 mankind, exerted his depraved mind  to prove that
hermaphrodites,  or androgyni, might beget  off- 
28             HERMAPHRODITES.
spring.  He said there were many insects of both
sexes, and why not the human race be of the same
nature?  I answer, because the union of the repro-
ductive organs in the same individual must prevent
all possibility of generation.  In such a case, and
no such is on record, or could happen, there should
be two  distinct sets of arteries, veins, nerves, and
organs, which have never been discovered by ana-
tomists.   Would  it not  be  inconsistent in  out
species and in almost all classes of perfect animals,
to be amorous and to be the object loved; to be ever
present with the object of desire, and every instant
to have the means of gratifying desire?  Human
life would be a tissue of  amorous transports and of
luxurious sacrifices, which would render man to-
tally unfitted for the performance  of  the  social
duties allotted to his condition.
  The idea is  absurd, erroneous, unscientific, un-
natural, unscriptural, and could  only have bee,n
cherished by a miserable infidel, ignorant of anato-
mical and physiological science, an enemy to nature,
morals, and the  divine principles of Christianity.
  Rochefort relates in his dictionary a case  of a
Scotch  servant, an hermaphrodite, who  was  con-
demned to be buried alive, for having impregnated
the master's daughter, and that the French  parlia-
ment permitted  persons  of this class  to marry, 
               HERMAPHRODITES.              4V
whether  they were men or women, but never to
deviate from the functions  of the sex which they
had adopted.
  Skenchius asserted he knew a reputed  herma-
phrodite  married to a man, and who had sons and
daughters, and  yet that this person impregnated
servant maids.   Here is a medical fact with a ven-
geance, one of the mendacious stories of the dark
ages.  If we examine this case critically, we find it
unsatisfactory and incredible. It is a hearsay fable,
a reputed case, with  no description of the genital
organs, no proof that the individual possessed male
organs.  Admitting that this person had elongation
of the clitoris, it was  more likely that the servants
distributed their favours, after a partial taste of the
sweets of Venus, than confined themselves  to the
embraces of this individual.  Such was the gross
credulity of physicians in ancient times, and the
wisdom  and infallibility of canonists, who held the
maxim,  "that a man could  propagate in himself,
and a woman in herself."
   Blackstone says, "a monster having deformity iu
any part of its body, yet if it hath human shape,
may inherit; and every heir is male, or  female, or
hermaphrodite; that is, both  male and female, and
shall be  heir according  to  that kind of  sex which
doth prevail and accordingly it ought to be baptized.
       3* 
30
DIVORCE.
The same is  observed in cases concerning  tenants
by courtesy."  As the brain is generally perfect in
monsters, and the mind perfect, it is clear that such
persons ought  to inherit  property.   When  two
perfect bodies are united at the chest or back, as in
the cases of the Siamese youths,  lately exhibited in
this city, and the Hungarian  sisters, exhibited in
1723, it would be difficult  to determine primogeni-
ture, or right to property.
  Before I consider the treatment  of impotence,
a few  words may be said  on the law relating to
divorce, on account of this  defect.
  Divorce.—Marriage cannot be legally contracted
in these countries without the full and free consent
of the parties, and hence medical  men may be called
on to decide whether one of the parties was incom-
petent to form the compact from mental imbecility,
inebriation, or narcotism. Adultery, of either party,
or external violence, is a sufficient cause for divorce
in this country.   The former can be proved by the
temporary impotence of the husband at the time of
a conception, or  by the birth of an infant in the
absence of the latter (see Legitimacy  in my  work
on  Forensic Medicine;) or by the existence of syphi-
lis in either party.  By the law  of  this empire the
parties may marry again; but  in all Catholic coun-
tries there can  be no  second marriage, during the 
           TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.        31
life of either party.  A divorce is granted whenever
it is proved that corporeal imbecility existed before
marriage.   The contract is declared null and void,
ab initio.  Imbecility after marriage is not a suffi-
cient cause, because there was no fraud in the origi-
nal contract (Blackstone;) and to  provide  for this
case, the ritual prescribes in the marriage ceremony,
by compelling each party to  swear "that heo r she
takes each other for  better for worse, in sickness
and in health, until death doth ye  part.
   Treatment of Impotence.—There  is no  work
in the English  language which gives  a complete
account of the causes and treatment of impotence;
and hence I have undertaken the task of supplying
this want, with what success the reader must deter-
mine.   The subject  is one of importance  to all
classes of society, and deserves as  much attention
as any  other malady.   How much is one  to be
pitied who never felt the desires of love, whose icy
heart never palpitates  at the sight of a lovely
woman.   His existence  resembles the insensible
marble; his soul is as cold as the stones of the grave;
his life resembles death.  But how much  more is
he to be pitied, who  has  extinguished his desires,
and  languishes  to obtain that pleasure which his
organs refuse, and which he cannot obtain at the
expense of all his tenderness for a sex which he 
32         TREATMENT  OF IMPOTENCE.
adores.   The first must remain in the sad apathy
in which he is plunged; the second may be ensured
hope in the majority of cases.   Persons affected
with impotence must avoid the alluring  promises
of empirics, who, one and all, are perfectly igno-
rant of the innumerable causes of the affection, and
whose  nostrums do much  more harm than good.
It will appear by the subsequent  remarks, that no
single plan of treatment is  effectual; that  a variety
of causes must be removed by  a variety  of reme-
dies.   Many of  these  causes  are  removable by
medicine or by surgical operation; many are beyond
the power of either.   In corroboration of  the truth
of these remarks I am happy to quote the  authority
of Sir A. Cooper.
  "There are," say he, in his last course of lectures,
1823, "several causes  which produce a destruction
of  the  virile power.  These may sometimes  be
traced to a  peculiar  sluggishness of constitution, to
a general torpor of the procreative system,  on which
the  usually  attractive  animal  affinities  exert  no
influence.  To  such persons a Venus might display
her charms,  and on such  her  son might exhaust
his quiver in vain.  No genial spring is here, no
blooming  summer  or fruitful autumn, but all  is
winter, a dreary, desolate,  and barren winter, in
which  the springs of life  are frozen up and the 
TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.         33
animal propensities destroyed.   Some men are so
constituted that they may  be said never to possess
a venereal stimulus, and some of the other sex are
equally frigid.   I knew a person who remained
unwarmed by the flame  from the hymeneal  altar
for seven years, and who was incapable of perform-
ings the duties which devolved on him.
   "Gentlemen, it is likely you  may hereafter be
consulted on these subjects; but these are some of
the arcana of the profession into which you will not
readily be  admitted.  No, it is not until  you have
contended long with popular prejudices  that you
will be  made  acquainted with such  important
secrets.   When forty years of practice, or perhaps
more,  shall have rolled  over you, when you  shall
have the snow on the tops of the mountains {here the
esteemed professor, with great good-humour, passed
his hand through the white locks which grace a well-
formed front:) then it is, and not till then, that you
will be  required  to  give your  opinion on  such
weighty matters !  (A laugh.)  When consulted by
persons  about to enter the  marriage state, you
should ask if they have any developement of sexual
power in the morning? and if they have, depend on
it they will not be deficient in energy in the after
part of the day; but if otherwise, advise them by no
means to marry. 
 34        TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.
   "Another cause which might produce the cala-
 mity we are now considering, is an excessive irrita-
 bility, of the vesicular seminales, which produces a
 premature expulsion of the seminal fluid, and this
 is almost as bad as the former  cause.  Sometimes
 it is the result of debauchery, but most frequently
 it occurs in irritable and delicate  young men.  In
 such cases we have to support the constitution by a
 generous  diet and bark, giving  at the same time
 opium, to allay the irritability.  In  addition  to
 which, let the person stand over a large pan of cold
 water, and dash it over the genitals two or three
 times  in  the day.   Turpentine  and rhubarb are
 sometimes given, but I am not sure that they do
 any good.
   "Another cause of impotence is the frequency of
 nocturnal emissions, and this is most commonly the
 case with young people.  It is frequently the effect
 of bad habits  at school, and it occasions a  great
 degree of anxiety.  We must try to lessen this, by
 representing to the party that it is.an  occurrence
 which frequently happens to  persons in a state of
 health every nine days or a fortnight, although in
 the patient's case it may happen two or three times
 during the night. The  treatment of this species
will be very much as the preceding.
  "Sometimes it arises from a wasting of the testi- 
          TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.        35
cle, or from  an abscess of this  gland, producing
absorption of its  structure.  The removal  of one
testicle does not destroy, neither does it  seriously
impair the generative power. The removal of both,
however, emasculates.  There is an opinion to the
contrary, but it is an erroneous one.   This  loss of
power does not happen at once, the secretion of the
semen continues for a short time, and the inclina-
tion and the power remain; but gradually the desire,
and afterwards the power is extinguished.
   "Impotence  sometimes  arises  from the testicles
not having descended.  Mr. Hunter has said that
the testicles, when  confined  in  the  abdomen,  do
not exercise their functions.   This is the case when
the testicle is pressed upon by a congenital hernia,
when in  the inguinal canal;  but in the case of an
apprentice of mine, who  shot himself because his
testicles had  not descended,  the  secretory ducts
were found full of semen.  Impotence  sometimes
arises from the state of mind, generally from too
great an impetuosity and eagerness to cohabit.  A
gentleman, for example, is recently married, and if
not able to perform his wishes in two or three days,
he is very full of anxiety, and the imbecility is
considered by him to be  permanent.  When con-
sulted by such a person, you must not try to laugh
him out of it, but tell him that it is not uncommon, 
36         TREATMENT  OF IMPOTENCE.
but that it is necessary that he should promise you
to abstain from the attempt for three of four days,
or until he has taken all the pills which you will
give him.  These  may be made of some harmless
material, and that  if he will  observe what he has
promised, he is sure to get quite well.  He takes two
or three pills; but  the very promise he  has made,
and the impression made on  his mind  by the pro-
mise, induces him to do the very contrary, and it
seldom happens that  he can return with any com-
plaint."  (Lancet, 1824.)
  Such are the very brief observations  of the first
surgeon in the world, on the causes and treatment
of impotence.  That there is  much room for a fur-
ther consideration of the subject  I shall endeavour
to prove in the subsequent remarks.
  In the first place, we should endeavour to remove
all defects of conformation that are curable  by sur-
gical  operation, restore diminished function, regu-
late disordered  action, and  tranquillize all parts,
especially the brain, whose excessive activity affects
the generative organs.  Every well-informed physi-
cian and surgeon must admit  that a great variety of
medicines  and  of  operations  may be  resorted to
with  advantage.  It  is  to be recollected, however,
that most  of the pretended aphrodisiacs,  external
and internal, electricity, flaggellation, and urtication 
          TREATMENT OF  IMPOTENCE.        37
are without effect, or produce a momentary effect,
and that a complete change of regimen and of life
can produce the  necessary effect on  the economy.
   In the second place, to avoid excess, to appease
the imagination, to regulate the digestive functions,
that is, to attend to the morbid conditions of the
brain and stomach, which so often cause impotence,
is the only  method upon which we can hope for
legitimate success.
   In the last place, we must regulate the function
of menstruation.
   Impotence may  arise from excessive  venery,
natural or otherwise.  Thus we find young per-
sons, before the adult age, incapable of procreation;
others equally so in the prime of life, and others in
this condition about the middle age.  These unfor-
tunate  persons seldom consult respectable physi-
cians or surgeons, or if they do, are too often derided
and unrelieved;  and hence the application  to igno-
rant quacks,  who  fatten upon the fears  of their
victims.
   I have now a gentleman under my care, who was
treated in this manner, and driven  to  a  rapacious
empiric, who in a time fleeced him of fifty pounds,
for much injury received.  Such cases are of daily
occurrence.   Derided by the profession, or exposed
to acquaintances, such persons are almost afraid to
        4 
38       TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.
consult their ordinary medical attendants, too many
of whom forget the sacred pledge they have given,
on obtaining their diplomas, to keep secret all deli-
cate cases which come before them.  Hence, an
unreserved disclosure of the symptoms is seldom
given, from fear  of exposure, or through bashful-
ness, though the  most implicit  confidence may be
placed in all eminent and  honourable members of
the profession.  I shall not prosecute these remarks,
but proceed to consider the  subject under notice.
   It is universally admitted by all medical writers
that excessive venery, either by bad habits acquired
at school or by legitimate means, too generally cause
impotence and sterility.   It would be foreign to our
purpose to expatiate upon this subject, but I may
observe, that excess of amorous pleasures produces
nervousness, hypochondriasis, indigestion, disorder
of the  digestive functions, melancholy, and great
enervation of body and imbecility of mind, the lat-
ter often causing a great  propensity to suicide.
Those to whom these observations apply will find
all their multitudinous symptoms under the above
heads, in any popular system of medicine.
  Dr. Parry speaks thus of immoderate and preco-
cious coition: "Inde apud mares oritur cultus pre-
cox et effrenus, quo nihil mentem magis infirmat,
nihil corporis vires frangit, nihil articulorum, ven- 
           TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.        39
 triculi,  cordis cerebri, morbis virium magis obnox-
 ium reddit." (Pathology, 18-25.)  "Hasc vero nimis
 culta,"says Professor Gregory, "valde nocet prasser-
 tim junioribus, quorum animos pariter ac corpora
 multum degenerat."  (Conspectus de Med.)  Every
 person's feelings must convince him of the languor,
 lassitude, and inertness which  succeed the evacua-
 tion of  the  spermatic fluid.   This was noticed by
 Aristotle, who said, "Tristiam autem multam semi-
 nis emissionem censet, cur ex omnibus animantibus
 homo maxime omnium, postquam concubit dissol-
 vatur et languescat."
   Frequent seminal emissions, whether by coition,
 masturbation, or pollution, greatly  debilitate the
 mind, and  enervate the body  generally, and the
 reproductive organs in particular,  which are ren-
 dered incapable of performing  their natural  func-
 tions.  Physiologists hold that  the semen must be
 retained for sometime in its receptacles,  where its
 thinner parts are absorbed, before it can be prolific.
 Masturbation, manustrupation,  or onanism,  is the
 unnatural effusion of the seminal fluid, and  is too
 commonly induced  by young persons by the force
 of bad example.  It is  highly  injurious  to health,
is  contrary to morals, religion, and nature.   It is
condemned in the sacred writings, Gen. c. xxxviii.
v«  10; Deut. c. xxiii. v.  10, 11.;  Lev. c. xv.  v. 16; 
 40        TREATMENT OF  IMPOTENCE.
 John, c. iii. v. 9; Prov. c. xxii. v. 11; Matt. c. vi. v.
 1;  Cor. c. vi. v. 15;  Rom. c. i. v. 8.  It is contrary
 to human nature; because it is beastly, terrestrial,
 and unworthy of man.  It is sometimes commenced
 before puberty, and at this period becomes invete-
 rate, unless  removed  by the  legitimate pleasures
 of love;  and if continued, excites  an  invincible
 estrangement from natural pleasure.  When young
 persons are addicted to this destructive habit, they
 become inactive, dejected,  fond of solitude,  the
 appetite is diminished, there is great depression of
 spirits, and a total disinclination to  activity, play-
 fulness, and vivacity.   These symptoms are greatly
 increased by the constant  and frequent repetition of
 their cause.   The forehead is partially covered with
 crimson-coloured hard pimples, called acne.  There
 is great timidity and disrelish for society by such
 persons.   The memory is impaired, and  the power
 of comprehension considerably diminished;  all the
 mental faculties so much injured, that stupidity,
 idiocy, or lunacy, sooner or  later  appears.   The
 digestion is much injured, and flatulence becomes a
 troublesome symptom, even before or after puberty.
 The senses of vision and hearing become imperfect;
 and  blindness  from amaurosis,  or  deafness fre-
quently occurs.  I was once consulted  by a young
man who had amaurosis of both eyes, whose spirits 
          TREATMENT  OF IMPOTENCE.         41
were as depressed as possible, and who finally con-
fessed  that  excessive  masturbation had produced
his disease.  We can  easily understand how this
and a variety of other formidable diseases may arise
from too frequent coition, when  it is recollected that
it produces the most vivid and repeated stimulation
of the  whole nervous system, and excites an acute
or chronic irritability,  or total loss of sensibility in
organs which are naturally the  most irritable.  Mr.
Hunter was of opinion, that masturbation, unless
excessive, was not  more  injurious than  coition,
(Work on Venereal, 1st edition;) but he recanted in
his future editions.  He forgot that the solitary mas-
turbator can repeat his crime as often as he pleases;
but the compliance of  a female is not always to be
obtained.   Few escape the evil results of onanism,
which is much worse than coition, being more fre-
quently repeated, and being more vivid and violent.
Hence we find it induces the worst forms of indi-
gestion or morbid  sensibility of the stomach, (Andral,
Pathol.) the worst form of hypochondriasis, or low-
ness of spirits, (Martinet, Therapeutics,) aneurism,
and  other incurable diseases of the  heart and  its
large  vessels, (Diet,  de Med. and Chir. Pratiques,
art. Arteritis,)  all the  diseases of the  brain and
spinal  marrow, (Diet.  Abrege  des  Sc. Med. art.
Onanisme,) feebleness  of the whole muscular sys-
     4* 
42        TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.
tem, chronic inflammation  of the viscera  of the
chest, abdomen, and pelvis, and consumption, (Op.
Cit.) stricture of the urethra, suppression or incon-
tinence  of  urine, piles, and nocturnal emissions,
These are only a few of the evils induced by ex-
cessive  venery, as  will appear by a reference to
Tissot's work  upon Onanism, to Winchman  de
Pollutione  diurna, Beddoes  on Hygeia, and A. P.
Buchan's production,  entitled "Venus sine  Con-
cubitu."
  It has  been held, from  time  immemorial,  by
moralists, physicians, and divines, that the mind,
or imagination, by dwelling on  obscene subjects,
excites  the commission and repetition of  mastur-
bation; and consequently, that the suppression and
prevention of impure ideas  is the chief indication
for  the prevention of this  habit.   The  cure  is
certainly in  the  mind  rather than  in the body.
Hence it is, that  breaking through the  association
of such ideas, controls and prevents even the most
inveterate habit.   Thus  we find  constant  occupa-
tion prevents obscene ideas,  and  therefore constant
attention to business, and exercise in the open air,
are to be strictly  enjoined in the treatment of this
miserable affection.  Solitude, indolence, and seden-
tary pursuits are to be carefully avoided.  All causes
which excite amorous ideas must be avoided;  and 
           TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.        43
the association of such ideas which  has been long
cherished,  and influences the mind even during
sleep, by exciting dreams and nocturnal pollutions,
is  completely destroyed  by  the  use of opium, or
other sedatives, at bed-time.  Dreaming is  often
prevented by sleeping with the head considerably
raised, which accelerates the  return of blood from
the  brain.   The  best position  upon  which  the
patient can  compose  himself to sleep is on  either
side; for sleeping upon the back should be avoided.
   The first and great rule to be impressed upon
the  sufferer is to return to  the paths of nature.
The next,  to remove his  morbid  sensibility, or
irritability, to all internal and external objects, by
advising him to avoid all impure ideas or medita-
tions, and  by improving  his general  health.   The
derangements of the digestive organs claim great
attention, and are to  be improved by the ordinary
remedies for dyspepsia and hypochondriasis.  Cold
sea  bathing,  and  daily  affusion of  cold water on
the  genitals,  are beneficial.   Should there be an
excessive secretion of  semen, the food.must not be
too  nutritious, as, of course, it increases all  secre-
tions.   All  drink should be  rather cold and all
liquors avoided.  When the patient is reduced  to a
state of impotence from excessive  seminal  emis-
sions, he  too often  supposes that  these can be 
44         TREATMENT OF  IMPOTENCE.
arrested by medicine.   I have been often applied
to under such circumstances after marriage*, but
need scarcely mention, there is no  astringent capa-
ble of arresting the evacuation.  Such persons also
request some  temporary excitant; being  ignorant
that  temporary  excitement will be  followed by
collapse, and perhaps an extinction of the venereal
appetite.   The tincture of lytta has produced this
effect.   Of this and other aphrodisiac medicines
hereafter.—The health should be restored  so as to
enable the  sufferer to enter into wedlock.   This is
the natural  cure for the malady.   As the mind  is
greatly depressed  in those who have indulged  in
excessive  masturbation,  they suppose themselves
impotent should they fail to accomplish their wishes
with a female selected at random; but this is an
erroneous idea; for while the venereal desire  con-
tinues, and the organs are natural, there may  be
moral; but  not absolute impotence.  In such cases,
some physicians have  recommended concubinage;
and if it succeeds, then marriage.  This advice is
decidedly immoral; but is followed in general without
a medical counsellor, that  the reader  must not  be
too ready to censure  the faculty  for occasionally
proposing it.  In any case, should the person marry,
the rule laid down as to diet in a former paragraph
is  not  to be followed,  as here the most nutritious 
           TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.        45
aliment, with a moderate use of vinous or  ardent
liquors,  will  be requisite to restore  the general
health and strength which had been impaired.
   In some cases, the seminal  vesicles  discharge
their contents, without any venereal  desire being
experienced, when the bowels are evacuated.   This
form of seminal effusion was called Diurnal Pollu-
tion, by Celsus, (Book iv. c. 21,) and other ancient
writers.  It is sometimes accompanied by the usual
sensation.   In other instances, the semen is effused
on walking, without  erection, but with voluptuous
sensations.  A case  of this kind came under my
care, in 1825, the subject of which was  a gentleman
aged 26, of a sanguineous temperament, spare habit,
and  tall stature.  He was married about a year,
and  was  distressed by  as many as ten seminal
emissions during the day, which were excited by
the friction of his dress.   He ascribed  the original
cause  of his  condition  to the  habit  acquired at
school. He did not  indulge  in natural marital
rights more than once a week.  He had tine, opii
every  night, a  blister to  the perineum, and  a free
use of sulph. quininas, cold sea-bathing, &c,  which
removed his complaint.   He  was  also advised to
obviate the urgency  of  his infirmity  by natural
resources.   Dr. Colles, the justly celebrated profes-
sor,  of Dublin, was  consulted  in  this case,  and 
46          TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.
concured  in  this mode of treatment.  In a  sub-
sequent case, I found, in addition to the  plan of
treatment advised in these pages, that the daily
introduction  of a bougie was productive of much
benefit.  In cases of impotence arising from moral
causes in which nuptial  duty cannot be accom-
plished after marriage, the use of  opium, with total
abstinence from all attempts  at  procreation for a
few days, nutritious diet, excitant drinks, and lytta,
after the effect of the sedative had ceased, are gene-
rally efficacious.
  I need  scarcely  observe, that the practitioner
should endeavour to alleviate  or  cure all the dis-
eases of  the genital organs.   Besides manifest
diseases  of  these organs, impotence  may  be pro-
duced by other causes, as the previous excessive
use of the organs.   Thus we  find young persons,
scarcely of the adult age, incapable of procreation;
others equally so in the prime of  life;  and others in
this  condition when  approaching the  climacteric
period.  These unfortunate individuals seldom con-
sult  regular  physicians; and  if they  do, they are
treated with  levity  or derision, and therefore  they
must commit themselves to rash  and unprincipled
empirics.  Dr.  Cullen asserted there  was no medi-
cine or food capable of increasing the generative
functions; and hence all British writers subsequent 
           TREATMENT  OF IMPOTENCE.         47
to his  time have  implicitly  adopted his  opinion.
Therefore  medical practitioners in  this  country,
when  applied to in cases of impotence,  have no
means of acquiring therapeutic information,  or of
affording  relief to their miserable  patients;  some
will  observe, there is the  tinctura lyttas, so loudly
praised as an aphrodisiac in many of our dispensa-
tories;  but we must recollect that it is as extensively
condemned in others. When this remedy fails, as it
generally does, then we must commit our  dejected
patients to the distressing despondency of their con-
dition.  It is  therefore  right to describe the reme-
dies  proposed in other countries; many of which are
highly useful, others inert.
   That some substances possess a power of exciting
sexual desires cannot be doubted, for they  manifest
their power on animals, which cannot be supposed,
like  man, to be under the  influence of imagination:
thus the  hemp-seed,  buckwheat, will excite  birds
to copulate; and oysters, if eaten at  the spawning
time, will excite man, according to Bloch, and even
their effects at times are  very generally  acknow-
ledged.
   Among the substances which augment the action
of the generative  organs, we find  some which act
by affording an abundance of chyle and  general
renovation, and  these are called spermatopia; and 
 48        TREATMENT  OF IMPOTENCE.
 others that act on  the genital  organs as excitants-,
 as aromatics  and stimulants, which first act as  the
 former, and then are called aphrodisiac remedies.
   Spermatopia.—All alimentary and  highly nutri-
 tious substances are included in the first class, and
 these are evidently useful in all  cases of debility,
 from whatever cause, from  abuse  of venereal plea-
 sures, excessive fatigue, long and intense  study,
 copious  evacuations, inanition of every kind, as
 during  convalescence  after  fevers and acute dis-
 eases; and in all these cases aphrodisiacs do more
 harm than good.   Then to all who  have lost the
 power of erection  from such  causes, we  exhibit
 mild, light,  and nutritious food, which does not
 fatigue the stomach, which is easily converted into
 chyle, which is  slightly tonic  and stimulant;  for
 example, strong chicken  or fowl broth or jelly,
 slightly spiced, turtle, and other soups, eggs, oysters,
 rice-milk, sago, arrow-root, salep, chocolate, roast or
 broiled  meats, a moderate  quantity of white wine,
 air, and exercise of various kinds, walking, riding,
 &c, flesh brush, &c.
  Aphrodisiacs.—We  find many vegetable sub-
 stances produce effects on the reproductive system.
 Thus the genus of plants called umbelliferce,  as the
 artichoke, celery, seeds and root of parsnip, carrot,
and  fennel.  Cruciferce, as radish, turnip, water- 
           TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.         49
cresses, and rockets,  which were strewed at the
temple of Priapus;
          Et quae frugifero seritur vicina Priapo
          Excitet ut Veneri tardos eruca maritos.
  In the class acotyledones, the orange, mushrooms,
especially the smaller kind, which with sweetbread
were so lauded by Ovid.  The French also include
the leguminous plants—beans, especially those call-
ed French beans, which from their flatulent proper-
ties in distending the intestinal canal in the vicinity
of the  spermatic  cords, excite  the circulation in
them,  and  thus ultimately excite  the testicles,
inducing  artificial plethora, or increased circulation
of blood in these organs.  We must not forget the
class gynandria-diandria  of Linnasus,  the orchis,
ophiris, and  satyrion.   The bulbous roots of these
plants  resemble the testicles, exhale a spermatic
odour, which has long fixed the attention of men,
and induced them to  think  these  excited  love.
Linnasus  states that  the leaves of orchis  bifolia
render  bulls  more ardent and  vigorous for  copu-
lation.  This class is  highly nutritive;  and hence
the  bulbs may  be  given without  sugar, or in any
other  convenient manner.  We find, in  Genesis,
that Rachel married Jacob; but had no family unti*
she ate  a certain plant,  when  she  conceived of
Joseph. This plant is  called dudam in the Hebrew
       5 
50         TREATMENT  OF IMPOTENCE.
 ext, and is called cucumis dudaim by Linnasus, a
species of orchides: of this family is also the salep,
which is prepared as an article of diet, in the  pro-
portion of  § ss. to Oij. of water.
  The sweet  fruits, as peaches, pine-apples, rasp-
berries,  &c. are  styled spermatopia.  Of all the
foods, fresh eggs are the most powerful aphrodisiacs.
Chaumenton praises a fresh egg and chocolate, the
yolk  especially, as highly  nutritious  and aphro-
disiac; and even we have a  proof afforded by ana-
logy from the stallion, whose  generative functions
are wonderfully increased  by the use of eggs  and
sweet milk. We find it recorded, that Alcimenes,
an Athenian, had triumphantly made fifty women
mothers in one night!!!  But perhaps this demigod
had taken a few poached eggs to supper.  It is also
stated, that  crabs, lobsters, pigeons, almonds,  and
hazel-nuts, have wonderful influence on the genital
functions, as also  oysters, rayfish,  and  all cartila-
ginous fish.  It has been long observed, that the
Japanese,  and   other ichthyophagous  nations, are
highly prolific.   There is  no  more prolific people
than the Irish, the lower orders of whom almost
wholly subsist on potatoes and fresh eggs; but we
should recollect, that the greater part of our arrow-
root  is made  from the  potatoe, according to Dr.
Paris (Pharmacologia.)  Of all the causes of impo- 
         TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.          51
tence, excessive venery, and too much chastity, are
the most common; and to these we may add a cold
and  apathetic  temperament, which arises  from
infirm  and unhealthy parents.  The sexual organs
of such persons are badly developed.  The exces-
sive use and abuse of narcotics and refrigerants are
causes of impotence.  Phosphorus is a most pow-
erful aphrodisiac; but cannot be exhibited, being a
violent  poison.  Animals, to  which it has been
exhibited, died of the most violent and amorous
convulsions.   Borax has been exhibited to horses,
and renders them  most ardent; and  that produced
from sea-salt is best, which perhaps accounts for
the salacity of the residents on the coasts.
   In the class oroides, we have the arum colocasia
of Linnasus, which is lauded by the Egyptians; the
flowers of pathos, or calamus aromaticus, by the
Malays.   The saffron of the Juddaeas  is  highly
praised in the Ency. Methodique.  The seeds and
leaves  of the hemp are in great reputation with the
Turks and Indians, combined with  musk, amber-
gris, and sugar.  The species amomum are remar-
kably  aphrodisiac;  galanga,  ginger,  cardamom,
zedoary, curcuma, and  the maranta  galanga  of
Linnasus, which is extolled by the Egyptians.  The
myristica  are also included, as pimenta, mace, ca-
nella,  myrtle.  The Jews caused newly-married 
52         TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.
persons to repose on the flowers of sage and marjo-
ram; and also  used embrocations  of oil of spike.
We should not forget the ginseng, celebrated by the
Chinese, the betel of the Indian, and the pepper,
lauded  by Tourtelle  and  Peyrilhe, or the opium
and  aromatics used by the  Turks.   The juniper
berries, savine, and turpentine, have been long con-
sidered aphrodisiac, all of which irritate the urethra
and vaginal canal, as in leucorrhoea and gonorrhoea.
Many animal substances have been praised by the
ancients, as the celebrated hypomane, which was
nothing but the mucus of the vagina of the mare,
which   excited  the stallion.   (Olivier de Serres,
Theatre d'Agriculture.)  Castor, ambergris, musk,
and civet, are also  said to be  of undoubted efficacy.
Prosper Alpinus informs us, that the women in his
time rubbed the genital fissure with ambergris and
musk,  to  reconcile the good graces  of  their  hus-
bands.   (Med. Egypt, lib. iii. c. 15.)  There is also
a species of lizard, used by the Egyptians, called
by the  French scinque Marin, the yellow amber,
the cricket, the ant, the spider, and lytta, which the
women of Kamtschatka devour to promote fecun-
dation.   The use of cantharides ought to  be  ban-
ished from medicine, as it is a most violent poison,
and it only causes priapism without desire, or vio-
lent  strangury  and inflammation of the bladder. 
           TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.         53
Pare relates the case of an Abbe, who intended to
be chevalier of Venus, and who had taken  a dose
of this drug, which produced a mortal haematuria.
A cautious use of this medicine may produce aphro-
disiac effects.   The  following  formulas are  lauded
in France as aphrodisiacs:
           Essentia Regalis.
       R. Ambras Griseas,  9ij.
           Moschi,  9j.
           Zibethi,  9 ss.
           Olei Canellas.
           ----e Ligno Rhodii.
           Carbonatis Potassas, § ss.
           Tincturas Rosarum. )
                      A       Caa  §iss*
           ---- r lor. Aurant. )
  Solidis prius  commixtis, dein immitantur olea, et
denique tincturas, stent in lagena bene obturata per
triduum  illico  coletur liquor,  et hujus  sumantur
minima pauca in syrupo.
       R. Panacis quinque folii pulv. § v.
           Vanillas aromaticas, § x.
           Succini essentia?, B ss.
           Tincturas Lyttas, § v.
           Olei Canellas, niL.
           Sacchari purificat. lbx.
           Mucilaginis, q. s.

aa M iv. 
54         TREATMENT  OF IMPOTENCE.
  M.  et divide in pastillos granorum xxiv ex  his
sumantur quatuor singulis horis.
  The tincture of Magnanimity of Dr.  Virey is
loudly extolled; but I am unable to  state its com-
position.
  It is curious that many inert substances have an
effect  on  some  individuals, and will excite them to
venery, though inert on others: those are the various
vinous and ardent liquors.   Bousquet never took
rice and milk without much  amorous propensities.
  Independently  of the  various  alimentary  and
medicinal substances now enumerated, there  are
others afforded  by art and instinct which are origi-
nally  preferred  to all drugs,  as  cold baths, eratic
lectures, voluptuous music, amorous  prints, female
society, nudity, &c.   "Eh!"  says Bousquet, "quel
homme  resista jamais  a la vue d'un jolie sein?"
What passion and sensation arises  at the sight of a
lovely woman, a voluptuous marble, or print! When
all these means fail, it is necessary to  resort to other
measures, which  are thus described  by our Gallic
contemporaries: "II faut en venir aux frictions, aux
attouchemens a l'excitations du mamelon, et  des
testicles, au chatouillement de la peau des lombes,
ou  de la partie interne  des cuisses, aux lavemens
acres, au ligatures, au message a l'emploi de l'elec-
tricite et meme de l'urtication, et de la flagellation." 
          TREATMENT OF IMPOTENCE.        55
  Flagellation causes powerful erection, and this
has been long observed when soldiers underwent
such punishment.  Rousseau was thus affected at
his eighth year, which was observed by his gover-
ness, who never after punished him. (Confessions.)
He as well as Swift was impotent from bad habits
acquired at school.  Strangulation is also an exci-
tant, and men have lost their lives by urging it too
far to gratify  their desires.   Such is the treatment
of the physical causes of impotence.  We next pro-
ceed to consider that of the moral causes.

 Treatment of Impotence induced by Moral Causes.
   All the depressing passions have great influence
on the organs of the body, and their removal often
claims the attention of the physician.  The most
frequent of these causes which impede the genera-
tive act are chagrin and inquietude.  In such cases
we prescribe the consolations of friendship and
those occupations which divert the mind, and to
these we add the  use of tonics.  Again, we  know
that ambition and jealousy have great influence on
the cerebral system, and often produce great activity
in these  and  other organs, and hence we prescribe
light, nourishing  nutriment,  acidulated drinks, a
milk and vegetable diet, and recommend less exer- 
56            CAUSES OF STERILITY.
tion of the imagination, exercise almost to fatigue,
and on no account the use of aphrodisiac remedies.
  The effects of the strong passions  if prolonged,
such as  ambition, hatred, jealousy, will suddenly
prostrate the genital faculty in man; so also will too
ardent desires, excited imagination, excess of love,
fear of not being loved, excessive modesty, and
numerous other sudden emotions of the mind, will
suddenly destroy erection.   These causes are to
be  ascribed to irritability, and are  best relieved by
tonics and antispasmodics.   But what can we pre-
scribe, if impotence arise from disgust, or physical
imperfection in the female?
  Sterility in Man.—It must  be  admitted by the
best informed physicians, that in most cases it is
absolutely impossible  to  determine,  during  life,
what  are the causes which render man or woman
sterile.   The  most common causes in the former
are  immaturity of age, excessive venery, or sene-
scence,  together with defect  of harmony between
the  moral and physical states of his  constitution;
the  frigidity or the inordinate  ardour of tempera-
ment; and perhaps these likewise apply to the other
sex.
  It is only on dissection we can be able to discover
the  physical causes  of sterility.   Then can we dis-
cover the absence  of spermatic arteries, of  the 
              CAUSES OF  STERILITY.           5?
 seminal receptacles and their appendages, the vasa
 deferentia, &c.  The  spermatic  cords  are  often
 extensively diseased.   The testicles may be atro-
 phied or hypertrophied.   If the  secretion of the
 seminal fluid be slow  and imperfect, as in weak,
 delicate habits, there will be more chance of fecun-
 dity than in strong and vigorous habits.  Similar to
 the other secretions in the economy,  that of the
 testicles may be increased or diminished; and noth-
 ing is so prejudicial to its power as its too frequent
 expulsion.  Thus we seldom find a man who per-
 forms the sexual act oftener  than once  or twice a
 week have family; and this fact  we  can readily
 understand, if we recollect the  doctrines of physi-
 ology.
   The  fluid must  be first secreted and next col-
 lected in the seminal vesicles for some time, where
 its thinner parts are absorbed, before it is fit for its
 functions.  Hence the sudden secretion and sudden
 expulsion of it are injurious to the laws of the eco-
 nomy.  This  accounts  for the  sterility of strong
 and healthy young married persons, many cases of
 which  have  fallen under my  own  observation.
 But as soon as such persons become less affection-
ate, and avail  themselves of occasional enjoyment,
 fecundation will readily happen.
  Again, we  know that the male fluid is mixed 
58           CAUSES  OF STERILITY.
with that of the seminal receptacles and prostate
gland during ejaculation, if already too thin, will
be so diluted as to render it  unprolific.
  It is a strange but certain fact, as yet inexpli-
cable by  the  illumination of science, that those
eunuchs  who  have no testieles have amorous de-
sires, and will  perform  the  generative act.  They
have power of intromission and ejaculation, but the
fluid expelled  is merely the prostatic.   Even  the
perversity of humanity profited  by this  circum-
stance, and women have frequently indulged their
passions  with  such persons, in  ancient Germany
and Rome, because there was no fear of impregna-
tion, or as Juvenal has it,  "quod abortivo non est
opus."   Cannot we reproach the women of the pre-
sent age with something analogous, when we recol-
lect the  barbarous precautions  proposed by  the
disciples of Mai thus and the French, to frustrate the
end of marriage.  The brutal proposition of the
enemies of population  in this country, which was
propagated by a wretch upon whom legal  ven-
geance has  justly fallen, cannot  defeat generation.
  Zacchias  maintained that marriage ought to be
permitted to eunuchs, as its whole  end is not for
propagation, but for mutual attention and  comfort.
And may we  not  contend  it is as proper  for such 
             CAUSES  OF STERILITY.           59
persons as for those impotent old men who embrace
it on the brink of the grave.
  Sir A. Cooper removed the testicle from a man
on  whom  he  had  performed a similar operation
sometime previously, and this man  had erections
and emissions, accompanied by the usual sensation,
for  some months afterwards.   (Work on Diseases of
the Testis, 1830.)
  The sultans  seem good physiologists for they"
cause  the  whole external male  appendages to be
removed prior  to  the admission of eunuchs  into
their harems.   This cruel and odious operation is
fatal to every fourth person.
  With respect to sterility in females, we  are told
by medical authorities there are thirty women  in
this condition  to one man, and this on account of
the complication of the sexual organs of the former.
I have already endeavoured to prove that this is a
false theory.
   When  the physical causes of impotence  do not
exist in the external organs of the male, we should
recollect  the  many  internal  causes which  may
account  for this condition.   Thus the diseases of
the vasa deferentia, the pressure of tumours of other
parts on their ducts, on the vesiculas seminales, the
diseases of these receptacles, hydatids,  tumours,
 scirrhus, cancer, &c, the diseases of the  prostate 
 60           CAUSES OF  STERILITY.
 gland, enlargement, calculus, fungus, &c, the dis-
 eases about the neck of  the bladder and seminal,
 ducts, the calculus of the latter, tumours, &c.,
 presence of stricture at the neck of the bladder and
 in  the urethra, diseases that are described in many
 systematic works  on surgery, but much more mi-
 nutely in  monographs  on the  respective organs.
 There are some physical and many moral differ-
 ences between prolific and sterile individuals.  We
 find the latter distinguished by effeminacy, paleness,
 flaecidity of the flesh, deficiency of beard, the hairs
 thin and lank on every part of the body, especially
 about the genitals,  and the virile member is remark-
 able for its exiguity or smallness; the voice is sharp
 and feminine, and never developes, as in  strong
 and vigorous individuals.  It is also  said such
 persons are pusillanimous, deceitful, and perfidious;
 but this does  not apply to persons emasculated after
 puberty.   I mentioned  how the testicles may be
retained in the abdomen, but not produce impotence.
Bayle mentions a  strange case of this kind, which
occurred in 1600.   A female obtained  a divorce
before  the  Chamber of  Deputies in Paris, but the
husband alleged he was  capable of discharging his
 nuptial duties, and as a  positive proof he proposed
 to perform his operations before the  Chamber.
 The lady's modesty was shocked at the proposal, 
             CAUSES OF STERILITY.           61
and  she fascinatingly  replied,  "Messieurs,  vous
savez tres-bien, que  les testicules sont necessaires
pour ejaculer."—"Gentlemen, you well know that
testicles  are  necessary  for ejaculation."  She  ob-
tained a divorce.   Even in 1665 the law of France
required both testicles to be in the  scrotum for the
validity of marriage.
   Rolfink  relates  a  case of a man  whose testicles
had never descended into the scrotum,  and who
was a great votary  to Venus, and a great favourite
with the other  sex, as  they feared no unpleasant
consequences from connexion with  him.  After
death the  testicles  were found at the abdominal
 rings.  (De Part. Genit., part i. c. 5.)
   Sterility in Females.—We should consider the
 causes which impede  impregnation,  those  which
 destroy conception the first  few days after impreg-
 nation,  the causes which  prevent  some women
 from ever having children, and those which induce
 abortion, or the premature oxpulsion of the offspring.
 The whole of these causes may be  referred to three:
 1st, those  depending on the organs  which receive
 the male fluid, as the  vagina and uterus; 2d, the
 diseases of the organs  which further  transmit it to
 the ovaries, as the fallopian  tubes; and 3d, the dis-
 eases of the ovaries.   We have already considered
 the absence and  diseases of these parts,  as well as
        6 
 62           CAUSES OF STERILITY.
 their excess or defect of function.  In fact, all thr
 morbid growths of these organs are causes of steril-
 ity.   Fluor albus is the most frequent cause of the
 disease under consideration, as the male fluid is too
 much diluted after its effusion, and also is seldom
 retained,  the  retentive faculty of the vagina and
 uterus being lost.  I have known this occur to the
 finest young lady I have ever beheld.   Gonorrhoea
 acts in  the same manner, as also  hydatids, in fact,
 all secretions which inundate the  genital organs
 and render them unfit to receive the principle of life
 communicated during  the  generative act.    Too
 frequent coition is the common cause of fluor albus,
 or rather of an increased mucus vaginal  discharge;
 and hence we seldom observe prostitutes have off-
 spring.   All  acute diseases  of the genital organs
 render the other sex barren, and most of the chronic
 maladies  produce the same effect.  Again, certain
 changes of the position of the uterus  impede  con-
 ception, as hernia, inversion, antiversion, retro-
 version, lateral  obliquity,  and renversement, or
 turning inside out of the organ.   In all such cases
 the os uteri will  not be presented  to the penis; but
 I am strongly disposed to think that this  is not the
real cause of sterility, but the disorder of function,
the pain, and  often the disorganization going on in
the genital parts, as the prevailing theory of concep- 
             CAUSES OF STERILITY.           63
tion now obtains, that absorption of the semen from
the vaginal surface is the true cause of fecundation.
The slightest penetration or intromission is suffi-
cient for generation.
  But there  may be an inertness and  frigidity in
the uterus, and a total disrelish  for the  procreative
act, even  by well-formed, interesting,  and lovely
women.   I have been consulted in four remarkable
cases of this description, and in all the subjects
were excessively vain of their personal appearance,
and  fond of admiration, and having  the strongest
passion for dress and shew, but a complete frigidity
to venereal enjoyments.  They would talk most
ardently of  dress during the  conjugal act, and
suffered it without the smallest enjoyment.
  Fine women are  generally  fond of admiration
and dress, and seldom possess that desire so natural
and  common to the sex.  Corpulent females have
also  this inertness of the uterus, and seldom bear
children.  Impuberty is a cause of sterility; although
impregnation has happened  prior to the appearance
of menstruation.  This is an exception, however, to
the general rule.
  On  the  other hand, too  much  activity  in  the
uterus is  a preventive to generation.   Thus  ex-
cessive irritability, too ardent for enjoyment, will
derange the uterine functions; and hence our Galli- 
64           CAUSES OF STERILITY.
can neighbours assure us that spasmodic contraction
of the uterus will prevent the reception of the
semen.  But here I  may remark, that  in  most
cases there are no particular sensations experienced
by the female at the  time of conception; and thus
we can  readily understand why so many of them
mistake their reckoning, that is, the period of preg-
nancy, which they often do, to the extent of one.or
two months.
  ■The absence or obliteration- of the uterine tubes,
or the attachment of their extremities to the uterus,
is said to be a complete barrier to conception, exam-
ples of which I have observed; but this is a mere
assumption,  and  requires further  observation to
confirm its  stability.
   The  ovaries secrete a fluid necessary to concep-
tion, and  therefore  the  old opinion  that females
produced semen,  is not  so  absurd as might be
imagined.   These organs may be affected  with
enlargement, scirrhus, cancer, and encysted dropsy,
atrophied,  or hypertrophied, as already described,
and becomes useless.
   Again, we are  informed by Skenckius, that  a
 Greek,  being  irritated  at the prostitution of his
 daughter, removed the ovaries by the operation of
 spaying, by cutting through the abdomen.  Women
 thus treated are said to lose all the moral and physi- 
           TREATMENT OF STERILITY.         65
cal  feelings of the  sex, and assume  those  of the
male; the voice becomes hoarse, beard appears, the
mammas become effaced, and even they have desire
for  their own  sex.  It is also  well  known that
females of inferior animals assume the character of
the male when the ovaries have been removed.
   Treatment of Sterility in  Women.—If sterility
depends on the internal diseases of the genital organs
of either sex, it cannot  be  cured, because  during
life it is impossible to  ascertain  the cause, or even
apply proper  remedies.   Thus the uterus, tubes,
and ovaries may be wanting, or so diseased that no
remedy can be of use.   Again, if the seminal vesi-
cles or their tubes be diseased, the case is hopeless.
When a frigid temperament is the cause, we  should
have recourse to those means of exciting love which
nature and instinct teach the sexes.
  The general health must be  first attended to, and
then that  diet and medicine  employed which have
been  already  described.   If the simple fluor albus
is the cause, and it generally  is, it  is to be treated
as on the  usual principles.  When excess of irrita-
bility of the  uterus is  the cause, the exhibition  of
saline refrigerants and  the injection  of narcotics, as
poppy,  opium, and decoction  of mallows,  will be
used with advantage.   If it depends on inertness of
the uterus, we have many remedies to propose, as
       6* 
66           HYGIENIC AND MORBID
the aphrodisiacs already enumerated,  opiates and
aromatics, or injection of tinctures of assafoetida,
castor, and amber, into the uterus; irritating pessa-
ries are also of great efficacy, and clysters of gratiola
(hedge hyssop) are so powerful as to excite tem-
porary  nymphomania.   Those  means  are  more
useful than the waters of the Nile, so lauded by the
Mussulmans, and absolutely imported into Toulon,
by a  Captain Roustan, who was assailed by  num-
bers of females, who wished to purchase his provi-
sions, and among the rest, "the waters of the-Nile."
(Diet, des Sc. Med.)

Sec 2.—Hygienic and Morbid Effects of Marriage.
  At  the age of puberty, young persons  of both
sexes experience a train of new sensations wholly
indefinable, which induce an imperious and irre-
sistible desire  for  coition;  a  desire  much  more
ungovernable in the male, so that if coition  does
not take  place, the excessive activity of the genera-
tive organs induces unsolicited emissions of semen,
especially during sleep, or the youth is misled by
instinct to deliver himself up to solitary manoeuvres
—to  onanism or pollution.   This  unnatural re-
source supplies  the place of  coition, and  is even
resorted  to  by  the inferior animals.   Nocturnal
pollutions are the result of an excited imagination, 
             effects of marriage.           67
and are not injurious to health, unless of too  fre-
quent occurrence.   Diurnal pollutions are highly
injurious to health from the frequency of repetition.
The truth of this position is manifest, if we only
reflect upon  the phenomena which occur  at the
instant of coition, when the  sensitive action of the
brain is carried to the highest degree of intensity.
The collapse which instantly supervenes on seminal
emission, extinguishes all desire of coition, in the
same manner that hunger  ceases  after  a repast.
When coition is precocious, or too  often repeated,
it exalts excitability of the whole nervous system,
and consequently  of the  whole body.    In the
midst of this  excessive activity, the slightest mor-
bific cause acts  upon any of the important viscera,
developes  a morbid irritation, which may be fol-
lowed by  great prostration,  convulsions, and even
death, from the excited action of the brain.  This
is the  reason why coition  excites the  nervous
system, the organs  of respiration, and circulation,
expedites the  flow of blood, and aggravates chronic
diseases.   It produces nervous excitement and con-
sequent collapse or  debility;  and hence induces the
diseases of debility, or as they are called the ataxic,
and hence the danger of this debilitating cause to
delicate persons, invalids or  convalescents.  It has
been followed by all these accidents  when too much 
68           HYGIENIC AND  MORBID
abused in old age, nay, it has caused sudden death.
There is no acute or chronic diseases  which the
abuse of coition or frequent pollutions do not pro-
voke, aggravate, or renew: the viscera of the head,
chest, and abdomen are  powerfully affected; dis-
eases of the lungs and heart are developed,  then
those of the brain and nervous system; and, finally,
those of the digestive  organs,  and articulations.
These pathological remarks accord with the general
phenomena which manifest themselves before, dur-
ing,  and after coition; the heart palpitates violently,
its impulse is felt over the whole side of the chest,
and  even  in  the abdomen,  and the action  of the
arteries, or, in other  words, the pulse is quickened
in every part  of the body.   We cannot conceive
that  this tumultuous action of the heart can be
frequently  repeated; without producing  different
diseases of its tissue, both acute and chronic, dis-
eases which  are in general irremediable.   The
brain is also highly  excited, and reflects its action
on the chest and digestive organs, and not unfre-
quently produces convulsive or tetanic spasms in
every muscle of the body.  During this time the
respiration is quick, difficult, and nearly suspended
at the moment of the  seminal ejaculation.   This
violent condition in which every organ participates,
is followed by a depression or collapse more or less 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          69
prolonged, or by the greatest debility.  It  must be
manifest to every one of common comprehension,
that the  frequent repetition of this viofent commo-
tion must be highly injurious to the  faculties of
mind and body, while the physician must consider
it as the cause of an immense number of formida-
ble and incurable   diseases.   It has  long been
observed that the bad effects of copulation are not
so great on the other sex.   We cannot explain the
causes  of this difference, perhaps  it is  that  man
contributes most to the perpetuation  of the species.
Irritation, inflammation,  and  excoriation  of the
sexual  organs  may arise from excessive venery,
as also  leucorrhoea and urethritis, accompanied by
simple gonorrhoea.
   It is a physiological axiom, that when an organ
is irritated or inflamed, it affects all parts which are
connected with it  by nerves;  and hence we can
readily explain how excessive  action or disorder of
the genital organs must affect all parts of the body,
as all parts are  intimately connected with each other
by the cerebro-spinal system, or by  nerves.  In
further illustration of this point, we may state, that
irritation, discharges, or ulcerations of the  genital
mucous membrane, may be produced  by diseases
of remote organs, as the brain, chest, and abdomen,
as described in the  article Rape in  my Midwifery. 
70            HYGIENIC  AND MORBID
We  observe  the throat,  the eyes, and  the  joints
most commonly affected  by metastasis, or sudden
suppression of the genital disease.  Here we must
recollect  the  change of  voice  at  puberty, and
the momentary  abolition  of  vision during coi-
tion.  Amaurosis is induced by  excessive venery,
as exemplified in a case already  narrated.  Again,
the sympathy of mucous  membranes is univer-
sally admitted.   When the mucous  membrane of
the rectum is irritated by worms, there is itching
of the nose; and when that of the cheeks or  gums
are affected by dentition, there is irritation in  the
genital portion of the same  tissue.  In cases of
cynanche parotidea or mumps, when the swelling
suddenly  subsides, the testicles  become inflamed,
and hence the application  of irritants to these organs
for the cure of the disease.   It is needless to illus-
trate the  universal sympathy which exist between
all organs in the body,  there  can  be no dissent
upon the  point.  From the preceding statements,
the inference is manifest that coition must have the
most powerful influence over the whole body,  and
if carried to excess is a fertile cause of an immense
number of diseases.   On the other hand its  mode-
rate use  is necessary to the preservation of health.
This is not  the place to  discuss its influence in a
moral, religious, or philosophic  point of view, but 
              EFFECTS  OF MARRIAGE.          71
merely as a  medical topic, that is to say, as relates
to hygiene and pathology, or  as a means of pre-
serving health or inducing disease.
  Let us now consider the influence of continence
upon health and disease.   A moderate use of coition
regulates  the functions  of  the brain  or nervous
system, and consequently of the whole body.  Abso-
lute continence or abstinence from venery in a
healthy subject much disposed to it, induces many
dangerous diseases, and even death.  The venereal
appetite is seated  in the brain, or rather in the cere-
bellum, and is excited by the  reproductive organs,
and if not indulged, becomes greater and greater, and
finally ungovernable, producing satyriasis, priapism,
and nymphomania, which  are often  instinctively
obviated  by masturbation.  If not so obviated or
by nocturnal pollutions, the morbid condition of the
brain deranges the functions of the organs of sense,
as vision, hearing, &c. and of thought and volition,
and hence  hypochondriasis,  mania,  monomania,
apoplexy, epilepsy, convulsions, hysteria, and cata-
lepsy, low fevers, disorders  of the chest and abdo-
men, may  be  the results.  But such  effects  are
seldom seen, inasmuch  as  absolute continence is
seldom if ever observed.  It is, however, the orna-
ment of virtuous women, and  is well exemplified
by the  train of nervous and hysterical  symptoms,
which render their lives distressing  and uncom- 
72            HYGIENIC  AND MORBID
fortable.  Hysteria, in nine cases out of ten, arises
from  continence.  (Louyer-Villermay.  Traite de
Mai. Nerv.)  epilepsy  arises from  the same cause,
(Haller, Buffon,  Esquirol, Maisonneux,)  and is
cured by  marriage,  (Lauzonius,) and it is  also
the commonest cause of insanity; (Marc. Gall,  &c.)
It has been  held, that on the continent are the
most frequent suicides.  Chaste women are most
subject to diseases of the womb, (Gardien, Bayle,
Marc. Diet, des Sc. Med.) and cancer of the breast
and  womb are most  common after the  climacteric
period, when women become  useless to the repro-
duction of the species (Richerand, Nosog. Chir.
Beatty, in Dub.  Hosp.  Rep. 1830, vol.  v.;) dropsy
and scirrhus of the ovary arise from the same cause.
(Gardien, Sur les Acch;)
  Chaste people seldom live to old age, (Hufeland,
Art of prolonging Life;  Buffon, Supplement to  Nat.
Hist. torn, iv; Deparcieux on Duration of Human
Life; Haygarth, Phil. Trans. 58; Sinclair's Code of
Health; Fodere, art. Marriage,  Diet, des Sc. Med.)
The fact may be accounted for by the following
causes, by the weariness and monotony of life, by
the hatred of paternity, a rite so pleasant  to  mar-
ried persons; and by the  certainty  of leaving  pro-
perty to greedy, thankless relations,  or friends.
Such persons are subject to scrofulous enlargements
when  young, "which are cured by the general 
             EFFECTS  OF MARRIAGE.           73
excitation that coition  occasions," (Richerand, Op.
Cit.) a fact also attested by Wharton,  who  says,
uJuvenes ccdibes strumosi fiunt: postea  vero matri-
monio sponte curantur."
  The old writers considered marriage as the best
means of  preventing  diseases  which  arise  from
suppressed perspiration, as different fevers, conges-
tions, erysipelas, gout, rheumatism, and numerous
other maladies.  It has been stated by Van Swieten
and many others, and observed by every attentive
physician, that gouty persons are addicted to vene-
real pleasures, and here it appears that nature points
out a remedy;  and Hoffman informs us,  that this
disease is unknown among the  Persians who obey
the law  of  Mahomet, and consequently are  not
models of continence.  "The natural state of man
after puberty is marriage," according to Buffon; for
it certainly  possesses great influence  on morals,
on population,  on health, and  on disease.  But
granting all  this, puberty  is not the proper period
for conjugal  union, the sexual organs are not suffi-
ciently developed, and consequently the productive
fluids  cannot be  properly  elaborated,  nor possess
 the character of vitality.   The sexes  at this  age
would  be unfit  to perform the various important
duties of parents; and hence the laws of this and
 most civilized countries have  wisely prescribed a
     7 
74           HYGIENIC AND MORBID
certain age as the most proper for marriage, and the
real  interests of population,  which  is the age  of
twenty-one years for males, and eighteen for females.
It must be admitted,  that the sooner marriage  is
contracted after these  respective  periods the better
both for the parties and their offspring.   It removes
a vast number of diseases incidental to both sexes.
It is the best cure for hysteria, according to Hippo-
crates, Forestus,  Hoffman, Reid, Boerhaave, Lou-
yer-Villemay, Esquirol, Elliotson, and many others.
It removes amenorrhoea and chlorosis,  when all
other remedies have failed.  Another of its good
effects is pregnancy, which produces the happiest
changes on woman; because the determination  of
blood to the uterus, suspends, as if by enchantment,
a great variety of diseases, by the  concentration of
vascular and nervous  actions, which arrests irrita-
tion and morbid action in remote organs. It arrests
consumption and hypochondriasis; it exempts the
woman from contagious diseases; it cures chronic
affections, as hysteria, chorea, epilepsy, mania, me-
lancholy, ague, &c. affords the greatest probability
of life (Hufeland, Op. Cit.)  and according to Sir
John Sinclair, women, though exposed to the innu-
merable dangers  of delivery, live  generally longer
than those who are unmarried.
  It has been urged on the  other side,  that preg- 
            EFFECTS  OF MARRIAGE.           75
nancy predisposes to a vast number of diseases,
induces a host of moral and physical evils, exposes
woman to much  danger  during, at, and after deli-
very.  These objections  can only apply to women
in crowded  cities, to the affluent, the subjects of
luxury and effeminacy, who  cannot supply their
fictitious  wants, control  their passions, their wan-
derings of  imaginations  or excesses of  various
kinds, which conspire to injure or destroy the best
constitution. How much more happy and fortunate
are the inhabitants of the country, the poorest pea-
sants, who experience no danger during pregnancy,
or no alarm during  delivery.  It  is known  to all
physicians who are versed in the records of obste-
tricy, that little solicitude is entertained by women
in a state of natural simplicity for parturition, and
this  has  been amply attested in  my Manual of
Gynaecology.   It therefore follows, that pregnancy
must be considered as a  state highly conducive to
the health and happiness of women.   Nevertheless,
marriage  is not a universal panacea; it cannot be
advised indiscriminately  in all diseases, as it aggra-
vates  nearly all the numerous disorganizations of
the uterus and ovaries.  It ought to be interdicted
when obstacles exist to its consummation in  either
sex.   Both parties should be healthy: "for how can
two  individuals," says Mahon, "be united by  a 
 76          HYGIENIC AND MORBID
 contract which  exposes  one to  great danger, and
 renders  the  other  excusable in violating its con-
 dition?" (Med. Leg.)—Should either labour under
 any serious diseases, or bad constitution, such con-
 ditions  will,  in  general,  be aggravated; the union
 will be  unfruitful, or the offspring will be delicate,
 or of short existence.   It has been maintained, that
 persons afflicted with  scrofula, epilepsy, and con-
 sumption ought  not to  enter into marriage; but the
 last disease is the only  one  that can be deemed
 hereditary, and from the evidence already adduced,
 the  others may be cured  by this  change of life.
 Those  who labour under  mental imbecility  or
 mania, or who may be descended from parents cured
 of these diseases, ought to be advised against con-
jugal union.  Women who labour under  spinal
 curvature affecting the pelvis, and  inducing such
 deformity as must endanger the lives of themselves
 or their offspring, should be cautioned against enter-
 ing into nuptial engagements. In all unfavourable
 cases,  we should  pronounce our  opinions with
 great caution and reserve;  we  should  not only
 possess a knowledge of our  science, but also that
 of the human heart, and recollect that we touch a
 delicate  cord of  affection and passions,  which
 obliges  us to forget a purely physical medicine, or
 rather to combine it  with  moral  medicine,  this 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          77
medicine of the heart and brain, so well known fo
all  enlightened  and  scientific practitioners.  We
have to bear in mind, the rights of nature, morals,
religion, and medicine.
  When we consider the influence of morals and
vicious habits upon youth after the age of puberty,
it is manifest that conjugal union should be effected
at the time allowed by the lawr, and thus  the ruin
of fortune and health would be frequently  avoided.
Debauchery and dissipation affect the offspring, and
render  it  delicate and unhealthy.  The  ancient
nobles of France fell into the opposite extreme, and
for  the extinction of their families, married their
sons when children.  Precocious or late marriages
are injurious to reproduction.
  Every disproportion in the age of the married is
incompatible with a good union, old men espousing
young women, and young men espousing old wo-
men.   Such unions are contrary to the moral and
physical states of mankind.   So also when either
party is unhealthy, and labours under any serious
chronic disease.  It is admitted by physiologists,
that the genital faculties  will vary according to
various circumstances, as  age, temperament, habit,
diet, occupation, climate, and season. A few words
may be said in illustration of each of these points.
  When the lymphatic system predominates, the
       7* 
78           HYGIENIC AND MORBID
individual is pale, of a relaxed, flabby spare habit
of body, with white hair, pale round lips, large blue
languishing eyas, the  sanguineous vessels are not
developed, the pulse is slow  and feeble, the  cha-
racter gentle, affable, bordering on silliness; this is
called the lymphatic temperament.  With such sub-
jects, there is an inertness of the genital apparatus,
and they beget feeble, delicate infants.
  The bilious temperament is characterized  by  a
predominance of the  vascular over the lymphatic
system, a dry spare habit, brown skin tinged with
yellow, black curled hair, superficial veins full and
large.  Such a person is much given  to  love and
jealousy, and ought not to marry an individual of
the same temperament, as their physical and moral
happiness would be much  endangered; but  if he
marries a woman of  a sanguineous temperament,
he will enjoy with her happiness, and  a numerous
posterity.
  The melancholic temperament is said to depend
on the abdominal  viscera, and the modification of
the  bilious  temperament.   It is characterized by
sadness  and  melancholy.   Love  is  a means of
secondary ambition with the subjects of it.
  When the  vascular system predominates, the
individual is of  the sanguineous temperament, his
health is good, his  pulse strong, his body symme- 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          79
trical,  his  hair sandy,  his  mind and  body  are
vigorous, he is much addicted to venereal pleasure.
  The  nervous temperament is characterized by
an increased susceptibility, a great vivacity in sen-
sation,  an extreme promptitude  in  judgment,  a
precipitate  and inconstant determination,  a vivid
imagination, a fickle disposition.
  This predominance of the nervous system is
often united to the sanguine temperament, and then
the character is impetuous, hasty, violent: a person
so  constituted offers the greatest persistance in his
resolutions.   Such  persons  are capable  of  great
 amorous excesses.
   The muscular or athletic temperament  may or
 may not be  characterized  as  that  which is  just
 described.  These different  temperaments may be
 combined in  various degrees, so that  it is difficult
 to trace them in a large majority of cases.  M. Halle
 describes a temperament, which he  denominates
 the genital, which is characterized  by an excess
 of susceptibility of the sexual organs, by a violence
 of venereal  appetite which constitutes  an innate,
 imperious, and irresistible  desire, associated with
 an intense colour of the skin, of the eyes and hair,
 and a peculiar odour.  These men are ardent, co-
 vered with black hair, and seem only to live for the
 purpose  of  communicating their  existence;  the 
 80          HYGIENIC AND MORBID
genital  force is in  excess, and may be, in some
measure, abated by  anaphrodisiac remedies.
   From what has  been said in the physiological
part of my work  on  Midwifery,  it appears that
age, season, and  climate have  great influence  on
reproduction.  It is true that  man, in a state  of
health, may propagate  his  species at all seasons,
and at all times: but still it has been observed, from
times immemorial, that with  the majority of indi-
viduals, certain seasons of the year, and moments
of the day, are more favourable than others for sen-
sual enjoyment.   Hippocrates said, spring was the
season most favourable for conception; Pliny called
it  the genital  season.  The purity of the air, the
freshness  of aliment, the bracing effects  of tem-
perature, all conspire to the  improvement of the
functions of the body, the  maintenance of health,
and conservation of the species.   At this season
animals and  vegetables reproduce,  all animated
nature is  excited;  and repeated observation has
demonstrated that there are more infants  born in
December and January than in any of the other
months.  Though  averse to the  citation  of  the
Sacred  Writings  in support of science, we may
allude  to the conception of the Virgin in March,
and the birth of the Saviour in December.   Sum-
mer is  not so favourable for the exercise of  the 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.           81
genital functions: the excessive heat induces pers-
piration and debility, and enfeebles the whole body.
Persons of  the lymphatic  temperament are  more
disposed to  love in this than in any  other season
of the year.
  Autumn is still more unfavourable to reproduc-
tion,  as the functions of  the  body  are readily
deranged by the sudden  vicissitudes of the atmos-
phere; cholera, dysentery, and ague, are suddenly
produced, and  it is  held this season is the most
inimical to the exercise of conjugal rights.  Winter,
from its coldness, is also unfavourable to reproduc-
tion: we have only to refer to the animal and vege-
table kingdoms for attestation of the fact.
  "Morning," says M. Virey, "is the spring of the
journey;" it is the  matinal sleep, which causes
voluptuous illusions; it is the morning in which all
the functions of the body are renovated.  "Behold
the reason," says he, "which ought to engage us
to choose this  time to contribute to the conservation
of the species, after having contributed to the health
of the individual.   All the senses enjoy the pleni-
tude of their  functions during the day,  and this
time offers  moments favourable  to love."   But it
must not be after a repast, as nothing deranges the
functions of the stomach more than coition.   The
process of digestion  must be finished; and this  is 
82           HYGIENIC AND MORBID
not completed for three or four hours after a meal.
However plausible and forcible these observations
appear, it must be admitted that night is as favour-
able as the  other  times of the  day  to amorous
impulse.  Allusion has been made in the course of
these remarks to the ill consequences of excess  of
venereal pleasure; nothing,  I  repeat, is more inju-
rious to the well-being of mind and body, nothing
so likely to produce  impotence and sterility, and
want of family.  Nothing more effectually preserves
the conjugal  union than the birth of an infant; the
happiness of  the parents is  increased, when they
see themselves revived in their infants; their mutual
love receives a new impulse; the cords which bind
their family connections are strengthened; little else
is wanted to complete domestic happiness.   Those,
on the contrary, who are  not blessed with children,
experience daily a diminution of affection; a vague
inquietude agitates them; they are sad, and anxious-
ly seek the  cause of their  infecundity; apply  to
medical men  for advice and  assistance, or too often
violate conjugal fidelity.
  The  first object of such  persons  should be  to
endeavour to  discover the cause of infertility among
those of impotence and  sterility, many of which
are curable by the  remedies already described  in
the course of this article.   They are to avoid those 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          83
obstacles to conception which have been enume-
rated,  such as long abstinence, insufficient nutri-
ment,  excessive corporeal  or  mental exertion, an
inactive, voluptuous life, too frequent repetition of
the conjugal act, and they  must use some of those
aphrodisiac remedies, an account of which is to be
found in this article.
  They  must refrain  from copulation  during the
presence of menstruation, and employ it moderately
during  pregnancy, as nothing is more likely to
induce  abortion.   They must also attend to those
circumstances which are favourable  to conception,
as for  example, 1. the use of abundant  nourish-
ment,  for years of prosperity always augment the
number of births; 2. the use  of certain aliments,
which  experience  has led them to discover as
excitants of love, as certain foods already enumerat-
ed; certain fishes, and buckwheat, are said to render
the inhabitants of  Cologne prodigiously prolific; 3.
change of habitation, when  practicable, as residence
seems to have great effect; for  example, the inhabi-
tants of Ireland have twelve or fifteen children, the
Germans five  or six, the French four or five, the
Spaniards two or three; 4. abstinence from the  con-
jugal act for some days; 5.  and coition should  take
place  immediately after the cessation of menstrua-
tion; this was the  advice  given  by Fernel, the 
84           HYGIENIC  AND  MORBID
physician to Henry III., whose queen, Catherine
de Medicis, had not conceived till it was followed.
It is said that the equinoxes are more  favourable to
conception than the solstices, and that the autum-
nal months are the most unfavourable for propaga-
tion.   It is always to be remembered, that coition
is only to take place as  often as  the genital organs
manifest their energy,  which must depend  upon
idiosyncrasy  or  peculiarity of habit,  mode of life,
and locality, diet, habits, and various circumstances
already  detailed.   Finally,  it cannot  be prolific
unless employed at the intervals of some days.   I
cannot conclude this article  without  inserting the
valuable and interesting remarks on this subject by
my distinguished correspondent Professor Dewees,
of  Philadelphia, which deserves  great attention.
His chapter on  Marriage, in his excellent Treatise
on  the Physical and  Medical Treatment of Chil-
dren, is  so  replete with  sound sense, and  really
scientific views, that I  cannot refrain from quoting
it in full, as it corroborates the  opinions I  have
recorded in the preceding pages.  He considers the
subject of marriage under the following heads: 1.
the most proper period for its consummation; 2. the
constitution; 3.  the disposition to disease; 4. the
immediate state of health. 
              EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          85
   Period of Life.—It is notorious, that the deve-
 lopment of body is  successive, and requires a cer-
 tain period for its completion;  consequently,  that
 certain functions  cannot be performed in their best
 manner until  the body has acquired its full deve-
 lopment; this rule applies as well to the female as
 the  male.   It  is also  familiar to  observation, that
 when  any  function is prematurely  urged, it leads
 to the imperfection of the product dependant upon
 that function, as well as entails upon the  part so
 exercised, debility and premature  decay.
   From this it will follow, that too early marriage
 is never to be advocated, since it will materially
 influence the  health  and  well-being of offspring.
 This fact is no less conspicuous in the inferior ani-
 mals, than it is certain in its consequences in man.
 We  would  therefore  not only  say that marriage
 should  not  take place until the body is healthily
 and  completely  developed,  but  also that there
 should have been, on the part of the male, the most
 scrupulous  continency,  that  the  great object of
 marriage  (the  propagation  of  healthy children)
 should not be defeated; this  cannot be too strongly
 insisted upon.   The female is always supposed to
be so.
  It  would be  difficult rigorously to fix the period,
by years, at which the body becomes fully expanded,
      8 
86           HYGIENIC AND MORBID
since original stamina, physical  and moral educa-
tion,  climate, mode of life, <fcc. will have  their
influence; but we may with much certainty fix  it
in this climate at  between the twenty-third and
twenty-fifth years, for the male, and from the  nine-
teenth to the  twenty-first years for the female.
  We are  informed by Tacitus, that the ancient
Germans never married until the twenty-fourth or
twenty-fifth year of their age, and were as continent
before that consummation as the females to whom
they were  united; in consequence of which  they
acquired a size and strength that excited the  asto-
nishment of even the Romans.
  It has frequently excited the surprise, as well as
provoked the reproach of foreigners, that the females
in this country lose their beauty so early, especially
when compared with the females of  Europe, and
particularly those of Great Britain.  The cause of
this hasty decay must be principally sought for in
our very early, or rather premature  marriages, but
we  confess that climate has also limited agency;
and  though we are  far from discouraging  early
marriages, yet we are decidedly  against premature
ones.  By  early marriage we would wish to be
understood such as may take place so soon as the
body has received its first expansion; and that time
we have just fixed, as a general rule at nineteen or 
            EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          87
a little more, for the female, and twenty-three and
a little upwards, for the male.  By premature ones
we mean those which  happen before the system
has received its ultimate development.
   It will readily be seen that no precise or absolute
rule, based upon  the lapse  of years, can be laid
down, since the bodies of both males and females
may be precociously expanded, or  may be preterna-
turally  retarded.   In the first instance, the period
we have assigned may  be anticipated with safety,
but in the second it would  be wise to extend  it.
Thus, in India females become mothers oftentimes
at ten, while in Lapland they rarely give evidence
of womanhood until eighteen; consequently  the
woman of India  would be on  the  wane did they
wait for the limit at which it would be proper for a
Lapland woman to marry; and the Lapland woman
could not support the contingencies of marriage did
she attempt to regulate it by the usage of India.
   The  examples of the  evils resulting from preco-
cious unions in this country are  familiar to every
body; they are not limited to the diminished vigour
and shortened life of the male,  nor  to the faded
beauty, the blasted health, and the premature old
age  of  the female; for they are extended to  their
unhappy  offspring, on  whom they  have  perhaps
entailed a diminutive  stature, debility of body, 
88          HYGIENIC AND MORBID
and imbecility of mind; or have handed down to
them strong predisposition to consumption, rickets,
scrofula, &c.   It is therefore of the utmost con-
sequence that parents do not consign their children
to inevitable ill health, by consenting, or sometimes
by urging them to too early marriages; and on the
part of the children themselves, that they do not
yield themselves  up to almost inevitable destruc-
tion (especially the  female,) by  anticipating the
eligible moment for marriage consummation.
  We are, however strong advocates for early mar-
riages (agreeably to our definition of them;) we are
persuaded of the importance of both their moral and
political tendency, and we think they should ever
be encouraged wherever there is a  rational expec-
tation of both these great ends being answered.
  The consequences of ill-assorted  marriages were
well known to the ancients, and  were strictly for-
bidden by the Greek legislators; and though things
have not proceeded to such lengths  in this country,
as to require the interference of the laws, it is never-
theless sufficiently common, to make a caution upon
the point proper.   Should no attention be paid to
compatibility,  the obvious and most  desirable
objects  of marriage will be defeated, and one great
source of health and longevity destroyed; for it is a
fact, no less important than well established, that a 
              EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          89
well regulated marriage contributes largely to these
two  great ends.   It is declared by Hufeland, that
all those who have attained great age were married
even more than once, and generally at a late period
of life, and  that there  is no instance of a bachelor
attaining a great age.   We may give two remarka-
ble  instances of longevity,  where marriage was
often repeated; one in Thomas Parr, of England,
who attained to one hundred and fifty-two years,
and was married several years; and the other in De
Longville, of France, who lived until he was one
hundred and ten years old, and married ten wives;
his  last he married in his ninety-ninth  year, and
she bore him a son when he was in his hundred
and first.
   It would seem to be agreeable to all observation,
that better constitutions are perpetuated to offspring
by men advanced in life, where the physical pow-
ers  have  been well  preserved by moderate and
proper  use, than  by young  men  who  have been
prodigal of them; for it is oftentimes better to be old
in years than in constitution.
   Though  we have said that men advanced in life
 may have healthier offspring than the man  who too
 early attests his prowess, or the one  who has been
 too prodigal of his powers, we are  not advocates for
 the union of old age to  blooming youth.  On the
        8* 
90           HYGIENIC  AND MORBID
contrary, we are entirely convinced that none  so
completely fulfil their duties to society as those who
unite themselves so soon as the proper development
of body  and  well-established health  will  justify
their union.   Yet  we are equally persuaded of the
truth of what we have just observed, namely, that
a man advanced in years may have every requisite
firmness of constitution to justify a union; while a
young man, who may have a natural feebleness of
constitution, a strong predisposition to diseases, or
its actual existence,  or a debility from  overtaxed
powers, may  be altogether ineligible to it.
   Of Consumption.—It is not alone sufficient for
the best  purposes of marriage that  the  body has
received its final development, either on the part of
the male or the female, since all the functions  of
the body may be disturbed, by either feeble organi-
zation, disease, or accident.  When, then, the male
or female, or  either, has  suffered in constitution, it
is not to  be expected they can impart to offspring
that which they  themselves  do not  possess.  It
should therefore always  be a consideration  in  a
marriage  contract  that  both  parties  be of sound
health and constitution.
   We are aware it may be said, in many instances,
that  hale, healthy-looking children belong to peo-
ple of feeble constitution; but we must be cautious 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.           91
how we admit this, as militating against  our posi-
tion,  since  such  appearances  are  by no means
conclusive of the good health or the soundness of
constitution.   We have many times seen children
of robust appearance from parents of feeble health;
but  we do not recollect a single  instance  where
such children attained an age much beyond  man-
hood, old age was out of the question.   Indeed it
would seem, in many instances, that children of
such parents most frequently give an early promise
of future health; but it is illusory, for it is never, or
but very rarely, realized.  In the early  part of the
lives of the children of whom we are now  speak-
ing, a rapid, but morbid, development of the body
takes  place, every  function is inordinately  per-
formed; and when the constitution is confirmed in
appearance  by such a display of health, it is but
hastening to decay.   Let us not, then, be deceived
by such appearances; and when we are making  a
choice for our children, let us choose such as give
a rational reliance upon the soundness of their con-
stitution.
   Predisposition to Disease.—There are  numerous
diseases, or rather a disposition to them, which do
not show themselves for many  years after birth, or
until they are called into action by some exciting
cause, suddenly or gradually applied, such as gout, 
92            HYGIENIC AND MORBID
madness, scrofula, consumption, &c.  Those who
may inherit such predispositions  may for many
years enjoy good health, and may not be led  to
suspect any cause to  be lurking in their systems,
which, when called into action, shall but too soon
destroy such  flattering  expectations.  It therefore
becomes  a point of duty in parents to investigate
the tendency to hereditary  complaints, before they
connect their children with those who can give but
a temporary security against the most painful, afflict-
ing, irremediable, or suddenly fatal diseases.
  We hold it selfish, at least, if not  dishonest, for
either  sex to marry  under  such predispositions,
when, from the knowledge of the disease of  their
forefathers, there was  every reason to anticipate a
perpetuation of them.   Who has not witnessed the
most deplorable consequences of such unions; and
who, after witnessing them,  would  not deprecate
their continuance, or further propagation?  This
subject is one of much importance, for some of the
best interests  of society are  involved  in  it; and
every one is  concerned in diminishing the  evils
spoken  of,  by preventing marriages  which can
promise  nothing but  the  extension of the  most
dreadful  diseases.  We have  seen but too many
instances of the  perpetuation of each of the dis-
eases above enumerated, not  to feel interested  in 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.           93
arresting  them, by recommending the two only
means by which they can be either prevented or
mitigated, namely, by judicious and well-assorted
marriages, and a well-conducted physical educa-
tion.
  By the first means we may stop, in a great mea-
sure, the hereditary transmission of predisposition,
by  selecting such  subjects as shall  be free from
constitutional taint; or at least we may diminish,
by  this  plan, the risk of such occurrence, if we
cannot  ensure exemption from it.  We may also
do much good by preventing the union altogether
of such as may have  these tendencies; or diminish
the evils  in a degree, when no better can  be done,
of not admitting to  this union more than one of the
party who may have hereditary taints.
   By the second, much may be effected by invigo-
rating the system in general, so as to render it less
susceptible to exciting causes;  by attention, while
conducting this education, to strengthen the parti-
cular parts which  may be predisposed to disease.
 But of  this more by and  by.
   Of the Immediate  State of  Health.—By the
 immediate or actual state  of health, we would  wish
 to  be understood that condition of the system in
 which  either of the above-named diseases is abso-
 lutely  developed.  It might  at  first sight appear 
94            HYGIENIC AND  MORBID
strange  that we should notice this change of the
system, as every one would  seem to be apprized of
it, and consequently the person labouring under it
would not be considered eligible by any one for the
married state.  But this is not exactly  so, as  we
find that every kind of artifice is resorted  to, to hide
their condition from those the  most interested  in
the knowledge of  it, hence the frequency of mar-
riages under such circumstances.
  Besides, it but too frequently happens, that this
foreknowledge is entirely disregarded by the per-
sons most concerned.   This may arise from several
causes;  1st, to a want of proper feeling  for the
consequences  of such disease, when extended  to
offspring; 2d, to a  hope of an escape from their
consequences, as sometimes  happens;  3d, to  an
ignorance of their  nature, and of the risk of their
propagation; 4th, to a disgraceful selfishness, where
fortune or beauty is concerned.
  In Europe they have such dread of the perpetua-
tion of these diseases (with perhaps the exception of
gout,) that the inquiry  is frequently made  in  the
higher  ranks  of society  whether either of these
diseases is actually existing, or whether the parties
are liable to them by hereditary descent,  before the
marriage contract is signed; and we are  informed,
that marriages have been frequently broken off, and 
             EFFECTS OF MARRIAGE.          95
even  at a late period, when it was discovered, on
the side of either party, that scrofula, consumption,
or madness  had existed, or was actually  existing,
in any member  of the family.
  It is not, however, predisposition to disease, or
Hs  actual existence, that  exclusively disqualifies
the parties for marriage, or that  may entail feeble-
ness of body or  mind upon  offspring, for  there are
others equally  certain,  though  less notorious  to
common observation; such are the habits of general
dissipation and  habitual intoxication.  The first
appear to have most effect upon the body,  the latter
upon the mind;  therefore a woman would  not unite
herself to a man who labours under either, if it be
known; and  the laws should protect her  by gran-
ting a divorce, if it occur after.
THE END. 
 
 
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