“8. That when such prevention is occasioned by incompleted intercourse, by whatever means effected, the effect is equally bad for the husband’s health as for that of the wife—there resulting dyspepsia, functional or organic nervous disease, and at times impotence, temporary or persistent.”
It will be seen by the above, not merely that in many instances of unfruitful marriage the barrenness is intentional, but that thus to trifle with the full gratification of our natural instincts, whenever the rein is given to them, is fraught with the most detrimental consequences to both parties concerned,—to us men, as well as to our associates,—and this in either event: for if we permit or counsel them to destroy their unborn offspring, their health is very likely to be thereby undermined, and our conjugal intercourse with them very materially interfered with, or permanently ended; and if, on the other hand, we allow ourselves to use them merely as mistresses, we not only are liable to seriously injure their health, but are almost sure to ruin our own. So that in both instances we are the losers.
It will thus be seen that certain of the conjugal rights that are assumed by men, are, whether absolute or not, of a very questionable character; harmful to our moral natures, destructive to our physical constitutions, and much more wisely honored in the breach than in the observance.
How is it with others? Some may allege that while they would neither approve the wilful interference with or prevention of impregnation, no harm can surely attach to very frequent indulgence in what they call living a perfectly natural life, that is to say, giving themselves up, fully and constantly, to unbridled sexual license.
To this I reply that some men are brutes. Even among husbands, pledged truly to love and cherish those who generally give far more real affection than they receive, there exist the veriest satyrs, eroto-maniacs, madmen. Knowing that they are endangering their wife’s life, that they are causing her health seriously to suffer, or to be ruined, they still persist in their demands for what at the best is but a momentary gratification, and when begrudged, becomes the most selfish and the basest of all pleasures; and this they do in the face of remonstrance, entreaties, tears. Many a married man has, as I have said, virtually committed a rape upon his wife: though the crime may be unrecognized as such by the law, it is none the less this in fact, the element of consent having been wholly wanting.
There are others of our number, who, kind at heart and not so selfish, equally err through ignorance of the real nature of the case, or from inconsiderateness. It is only of late that even physicians are awakening to the importance of the manifold special diseases of women, and to the very existence of many of them. It is often asked if these diseases are not a new thing, if they have not indeed wholly sprung up during the present century. This may be true to a certain extent, in consequence of certain variations from the normal standard of living; but there is no doubt, on the other hand, that hosts of women used to die of disease, then undetected or wholly misunderstood, that is now readily cured. Among these diseases, all of which are enshrouded by the veil of a woman’s natural delicacy, but which, involving as they do the very existence of social life, come directly within the physician’s province, and that also of simple common sense,—among them there is a very large class, closely related to the subject of our present inquiry, those occasioned or aggravated by excessive sexual indulgence. I shall, of course, refrain from speaking more explicitly than I have now done, but will merely say that we may all of us be thankful that our development was carried to the positive extreme, and that we are not women. They are subject to an immense variety of disease, of which, from personal experience, we know nothing, and it is often attended by the most exquisite suffering. This they are prone to conceal; far from generally exaggerating it, they endeavor to undervalue it, and suffer, with a fortitude that we could but feebly emulate, in silence. There are exceptions to this statement, it is true, but they are still but exceptions, and so prove the rule. Even where such do exist, there is usually present great nervous excitement or exaltation, which is often much more difficult to endure than direct physical pain. Far from ridiculing or chiding these sufferers, they deserve and should receive our hearty sympathy, which is by no means sure, as it is so commonly supposed to do, of evoking a fresh accession of the malady. Many a heart is broken by the sneer of disbelief at the gentle complaint of bodily anguish; many a divorce takes its origin in the charge of lost affection, because a wife refuses to be accessory to her own slow destruction; in many cases she prefers to this disgrace, and resorts to, suicide. These are facts, instances of all of which have been known to me. There are men, and very many women, who will thank me for so plainly stating them. Men do I say? They are facts that should be made known to every man, that, so warned, he may live a truly manly, generous, and dutiful life.
For these rights, of which I have been speaking, are, in reality, not absolute, but reciprocal with duties. How can we ourselves expect enjoyment, if perchance we are inflicting terrible suffering? How can we look for constant and untiring affection, if, inconsiderate or brutal, we compel what would be withheld perhaps, however reluctantly, by ill health? Is it thus we would cherish? As we sow, even so must we reap. No true conjugal enjoyment can exist, unless it is mutual. We cannot be loved, unless we are respected. We cannot be respected, even by our wives, unless we respect them. The true rule should be to take only what is freely given; were this the case, far more freely would gifts be offered.
FOOTNOTES:
[37] Simpson. Obstetric Works, vol. ii. p. 294.
[38] New York Medical Journal, Sept., 1866, p. 423.