From the tables of L. Mayer, Krieger has instituted a comparison between the duration of menstrual activity in 101 women who began to menstruate early and 180 women who began to menstruate late, finding in the case of the former a mean duration of 33.673 years, and in the case of the latter a mean duration of 27.344 years, showing therefore a sexual life longer on an average by 6.429 years in those in whom puberty was early as compared with those in whom puberty was late.
From the tables of Tilt, based on the observation of 164 cases, 76 women in whom menstruation appeared early and 88 in whom it appeared late, we learn that among the former the shortest duration of menstrual activity was 18 years, among the latter 12 years; among the former the longest duration was 37 years, among the latter only 33. The majority of those who began to menstruate early continued to menstruate for 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 38, or 39 years; those who began to menstruate late, for 23, 27, 28, 30, or 31 years. The mean duration of the sexual life in those who began to menstruate early was 33.66 years; in those who began to menstruate late it was 28.28 years. Since the average duration of the menstrual function is given by Tilt as 31.33 years, those who began to menstruate early exceeded this average by 2.33 years, while those who began to menstruate late exhibited a duration of menstrual activity of at least three years less than the average.
In addition to climate, nationality, and the age at which menstruation begins, the sexual activity of women also exercises an influence on the duration of their sexual life, and of especial importance in this connection are the number of children born, and exercise or neglect of the function of lactation. From my own observations on this matter it appears, that in women who are healthy and of powerful constitution, whose reproductive organs have been sufficiently exercised, who have given birth to several children and have suckled these children themselves, the duration of menstrual activity is in general notably longer than in women whose circumstances have been just the opposite in these respects. Among the women in my own series of cases in whom menstrual activity lasted longest, of the 177 women in whom menstruation ceased between the forty-fifth and the fiftieth year of life, 1 only was unmarried, 2 were married but childless, 32 married with 1 or 2 children only, and 142 married and with more than 2 children; of the 89 women in whom menstruation ceased between the fiftieth and the fifty-fifth year of life, none were either unmarried or childless, 19 were married with 1 or 2 children, 17 married and with more than 2 children; of the 17 women in whom menstruation ceased later than the fifty-fifth year of life, there were 2 only with less than 2 children, but 10 who had each given birth to from 6 to 8 children. A similar influence is exercised by the function of lactation. Among 40 women who had not suckled their children, the average duration of menstrual activity was 4 years less than the general mean.
As regards the conditions of life, L. Mayer affirms that the duration of sexual activity among well-to-do women is on the average a year and a half longer than among women of the working classes.
Metschnikoff has drawn attention to the remarkable disharmony in the development of three of the phases of the sexual life of woman, inasmuch as the sexual impulse, the union of the sexes, and the capacity for procreation, which, considering their nature and purpose, might have been expected to be attuned so as to act in harmony, exhibit as a matter of fact no such relation; the different factors of the sexual function develop independently and unharmoniously. In a child not yet fitted to fulfil the function of procreation, the sexual impulse will none the less make its appearance, and be liable to misuse. In the girl the pelvis does not attain that complete development which fits it for the process of parturition until toward the age of twenty, whilst puberty occurs at the age of sixteen. “A girl of ten is capable of aspiring to play the part of a woman, but not before the age of sixteen is she fitted to play that part, nor indeed fitted to become a mother before the age of twenty.”
In general, we may say, regarding the women of our own part of the world, that in those who are healthy, who lead a regular life, are well fed, free from the pressure of anxieties, with their sexual functions sufficiently exercised, the duration of the sexual life is longer than in women whose circumstances are the reverse of those just enumerated. It is a sign of decadence when women of the well-to-do classes, leading a life of ease, manifest a diminished duration of the sexual life. The greatest physical power and the highest ethical development are associated with a lengthening of life in general, and associated also with a lengthening alike in the sexual life of woman and the sexual potency of man. A decline in morals and culture entails a diminution of sexual vital capacity, this being true alike of individuals, of families, and of nations. Woman is venerated and valued the more, the longer the duration of her sexual life; a woman in whom the sexual life is short quickly loses value and significance, both in domestic and in social circles.
The social significance of the sexual life of woman is disproportionately greater and farther reaching than the sexuality of the male, as the former is concerned with the fundamental principles of human social life, influencing the constitution of the family, and controlling the good of the coming race. Sexual purity, which to the youth is a romantic dream, is to the maiden a vital condition of existence; adultery, in the husband a pardonable transgression, is in the wife an overwhelming sin committed against family life. To the freedom of the male in affairs of love is opposed the strict restraint of the female, based on monogamic marriage. The sexual needs and desires of the female are transformed in an ideal manner by means of the feeling of duty of the wife and mother; the violent pressure of the sexual impulse is restrained by the opposition of ethical forces. When this restraint fails, the running off the rails that ensues has a far profounder influence in the case of the female than of the male, an influence not limited to her own personality, but dragging down the whole family into the abyss of consequences, into the depths of moral and physical destruction.
Though in nature everywhere the same, the sexual life of woman exhibits in the various gradations of social life different outward manifestations, from the brutal sexual congress that does not greatly shun publicity, to the modern would-be philosophical free love. And throughout all variations the two darkest points remain, the illegitimate child and venereal infection, both of which entail upon the woman the most unspeakable anxieties and the greatest possible misery, whilst the man who is in either case to blame passes comparatively unscathed.
The social sexual position of woman suffers most at the present day from the mature age at which under existing social conditions men are alone able to marry and from the ever-increasing number of cases of venereal infection. In both these directions social science and medical skill must work hand in hand for the amelioration of the sexual life of woman.
On the twentieth century falls the duty of furnishing a solution for these problems. Contesting voices are heard on all sides. Tolstoi’s rigid demand for complete sexual abstinence, the exhortation of the professors of the German universities to their students in favor of moral purity, the associations for the official prevention of venereal diseases, the agitation among young men in favor of abstinence from sexual intercourse before marriage, finally, the clamorous voices of the supporters of women’s rights—all these are influences within the sphere of sexual morality, which must lead slowly but surely to extensive social changes in the sexual life of women.