SECT. LV.—ON GONORRHŒA AND LIBIDINOUS DREAMS.
Gonorrhœa is an involuntary discharge of semen, taking place frequently without erection of the privy member, owing to weakness of the retentive faculty. In this case it will be proper to keep the patient in a state of rest, covering the loins and pubes with compresses out of wine, oil of apples, or that of the flowers of the wild vine; and cataplasms may be afterwards applied, made of dates, apples, flowers of the wild vine, acacia, hypocistis, sumach, and the like. He may also be made to sit in a hip-bath of the decoctions of lentisk, of bramble, and the like, in wine, or even in water, and use desiccative food. After a little while, he may take gymnastic exercises, by which both the general system and the affected parts will be restored to strength. Redundance of semen has been treated of sufficiently in the [First Book], under the head of Hygiene; and there, too, impotence is treated of. A cool couch is beneficial in cases of libidinous dreams; also, laying on the right or left side; all medicines of a cold nature rubbed into the loins, such as coriander, hemlock, ceruse, and purslain, all of which are to be used with vinegar.
Commentary. Celsus recommends strong friction, affusion of cold liquids, swimming in cold water, food and drink of a cooling nature, avoiding everything flatulent and calculated to engender semen, applications such as rue and vinegar to the part, avoiding lying upon the back, and so forth.
Aretæus, in his chapter on Gonorrhœa, makes some very ingenious speculations on the effect which the semen genitale exerts upon the development of the moral character. He remarks that a long-continued draining of the semen sometimes occasions paralysis: he alludes to the tabes dorsalis, a disease well described by Hippocrates. He properly states that gonorrhœa proceeds from relaxation of the genital organs. With regard to the treatment, he recommends at first cooling and astringent applications to stop the flux, but these are afterwards to be exchanged for calefacients and rubefacients. Castor, mint, and the theriac are to be taken internally, along with strong exercise.
Galen defines gonorrhœa to be an involuntary emission of semen, arising from debility of the genital organs, especially of the spermatic vessels.
Aëtius gives a full account of gonorrhœa from Galen, and of oneirogmon from Philagrius, but his treatment is little different from our author’s. For the latter he directs the patient to take such things as are calculated to prevent the formation of semen, as rue, calamint, the chaste-tree, &c.; and further recommends astringent and refrigerant applications, lying on a hard bed, wearing a plate of lead on the loins, and abstaining from the usual provocatives to venery.
The practice of Alexander is exactly the same as that of Aëtius.
Cælius Aurelianus treats oneirogmon upon much the same principles, namely, by cooling applications and injections, the cold bath, astringent food, and so forth. He makes mention of a disease of the genital organs, which we have met with in practice, although we do not recollect to have seen it noticed in any modern author, unless Heberden alludes to it (Comment. 80.) It is an emission of bloody semen in actu venereo. He directs it to be treated by astringent and restorative remedies.
For oneirogmon, the Pseudo-Dioscorides recommends an infusion of the seed of lettuce and purslain, the decoction of nymphæa, &c. (Euporist. ii, 100.) Dioscorides himself recommends hemlock. (Meth. Med. iv, 79.)
Avicenna and Rhases follow the treatment of our author. For the oneirogmon, Haly Abbas recommends various refrigerant and sedative medicines, such as purslain, coriander, lentils, fleawort, poppies, roses, &c. For gonorrhœa he recommends bleeding; emetics if connected with repletion; sleeping in a cold place; various anodyne, astringent, and refrigerant medicines, such as henbane, poppies, roses, lettuce, &c. He also directs a plate of lead to be worn over the loins. Alsaharavius treats minutely of these complaints according to the nature of the exciting cause. His general remedies for gonorrhœa are of a refrigerant and cooling nature, such as citrons, pomegranates, lettuces, henbane, &c. with a plate of lead and other cooling applications. For oneirogmon he recommends liniments of camphor and opium, lying on a hard bed, and refrigerant medicines. Rhases recommends styptic applications, snow, the plate of lead, and the cold bath. He speaks also of rubbing the parts with myrrh, henbane, and opium.
On the pollutio nocturni somni referred to in Deut. xiii, 13, see Isidorus (Comment. in Deut. 20.) Pliny treats of certain herbs which excite, and others which dispel, the “somnia veneris.” Martial, in his epigram addressed to Ponticus, expresses himself in terms of just abhorrence against the detestable vice of manustupration. Galen, however, relates a story of it with disgusting sang froid.