Feather-beds are not conducive to the health of either sex. Mattresses made of wool, or of wool and horsehair, are much better. The bed should be opened, and its contents exposed to the air and sunlight, once every year. Beds long saturated with the night exhalations of their occupants are not wholesome. A number of ancient writers have alleged—and it has been reasserted by modern authorities—that sleeping on sponge is of service to those who desire to increase their families. The mattresses of compressed sponge recently introduced, therefore, commend themselves to married people thus situated. Hemlock boughs make a bed which has a well-established reputation for similar virtues.
The odor of cone-bearing trees has a well-known influence upon the fruitfulness of wedlock. Those who live in pine forests have ordinarily large families of children.
Excessive clothing at night is highly injurious. So also is a fire in the bed-room, except in case of sickness. If the body be too much heated during sleep, perspiration occurs, or the action of the heart is increased, and the whole economy becomes excited. Either condition prevents sound sleep and reinvigoration of the body. Wives in feeble health, and those liable to attacks of flooding, should therefore have a particular regard to the quantity of clothing on their beds.
THE DIGNITY AND PROPRIETY OF THE SEXUAL INSTINCT.
A distinguished medical writer has divided women into three classes in regard to the intensity of the sexual instinct. He asserts that a larger number than is generally supposed have little or no sexual feeling. A second class of women, more numerous than these, but still small as compared with the whole of their sex, are more or less subject to strong passion. Those of the first class can no more form an idea of the strength of the impulse in other women, than the blind can of colors. They therefore often err in their judgments. The third class comprises the vast majority of women, in whom the sexual appetite is as moderate as all other appetites.
It is a false notion, and contrary to nature, that this passion in a woman is a derogation to her sex. The science of physiology indicates most clearly its propriety and dignity. There are wives who plume themselves on their repugnance or their distaste for their conjugal obligations. They speak of their coldness and of the calmness of their senses, as if these were not defects. Excepting those afflicted with vices of conformation, or with disorders of sensibility,—which amount to the same thing,—all wives are called upon to receive and pay the imposts of love; and those who can withdraw themselves from the operation of this mysterious law without suffering and with satisfaction, show themselves by that fact to be incomplete in their organization, and deficient in the special function of their being. There should be no passion for one which is not shared by both. Generation is a duty. The feeling which excites to the preservation of the species is as proper as that which induces the preservation of the individual. Passionate, exclusive, and durable love for a particular individual of the opposite sex, it has been well said, is characteristic of the human race, and is a mark of distinction from other animals. The instinct of reproduction in mankind is thus joined to an affectionate sentiment, which adds to its sweetness and prolongs infinitely its duration.
Many physiologists have assigned to the feelings an important rôle in conception, the possibility of which has even been doubted if there be no passion on the side of the woman. Although this extreme view is not tenable in the light of modern research, yet all recent authorities agree that conception is more assured when the two individuals who co-operate in it participate at the same time in the transports of which it is the fruit. It is also without doubt true that the disposition of the woman at that time has much power in the formation of the fœtus, both in modifying its physical constitution and in determining the character and temperament of its mind. The influence, long ago attributed by Shakspeare to 'a dull, stale, tired bed' in creating a 'tribe of fops,' is not a mere poet's fancy.
In this manner also may be explained the results of prolonged continence upon the offspring, for desires are usually vivid in proportion to the previous period of rest. The father of Montaigne, returning after an absence of thirty-two years, during which he was engaged in the wars of Italy, begot his son, so justly celebrated in French literature. The father of J. J. Rousseau, after a considerable absence in Constantinople, brought to his wife the reward of a long fidelity.
Sexual passion exerts, therefore, a marked influence upon the future being before conception, by the impression made upon the elements which come together to form it. The question now occurs; What effect does its presence and gratification produce upon the parents? We answer; It is a natural and healthful impulse. Its influence is salutary. A marked improvement in the physical condition of delicate women often follows a happy marriage. This sometimes occurs even in those cases where, from the nature of the disorder, the reverse might be expected. The utility of the passions, well directed, has become a maxim in medicine as in morality. And what passion is more important and fervent than that of which we write? The fathers in medicine, and their modern followers, agree in ascribing to the pleasures of love, indulged in with moderation, activity and lightness of the body, vigor and vivacity of the mind.
Music, apart from its immense influence on the nervous system in general, seems sometimes to exercise a special action on the sexual instinct. Science possesses at the present day some facts beyond dispute, which prove the great power of music in this respect.