Wichmann, also, remarks the resemblance between individuals affected with diurnal pollution and those affected with phthisis pulmonalis. Experience has taught me, (says he,) that in many patients who have been considered as affected with true phthisis, the disease must be referred to this cause alone. The symptoms of diurnal pollution are not very dissimilar to those of the first period of phthisis pulmonalis, at this purely spasmodic period, which I should be tempted to term insidious, if I considered merely the difficulty and uncertainty of the diagnosis at this period. The cough which then attends some patients, also, leads physicians to dread phthisis: or, rather, consumption, arising from diurnal pollution, assumes so much the characters and form of this disease, that one is disposed to treat it by the ordinary method, to the great disparagement of the patient, whose state requires opposite remedies. Farther: it is clear, that the disease of which we speak must infallibly terminate in phthisis, if it be not soon arrested.
In 1772, Wichmann observed internal pollution for the first time. The case was that of a young man, over twenty years of age, who for a long time had been affected with spasms. “He was manifestly in a state of cachochymia, and of wasting away. The physicians whom he had consulted before he came to me judged, from these appearances, that he was hypochondriac: in fact, different symptoms led to the belief that the disease was situated in the hypochondria. The loss of strength—the languor of digestion, although the appetite was not lost—the paleness of the countenance—the sadness and pusillanimity which led him to seek solitude—the vivid redness which rushed over his cheeks in conversation—his restlessness of character—and, finally, a certain weakness of intellect—seemed to justify the diagnosis. He had formerly indulged with females, and had been affected with venereal disease, to which he attributed his present state. Although there was not the slightest trace of these old affections, the physician, misled by the false conjectures of the patient, had kept him for a long time on mercurial preparations, by which the symptoms were aggravated, the true cause being overlooked.
“Mercury was then abandoned for tonics; and the ferruginous waters were employed, with the idea that the patient suffered from hypochondria. But this was no better than the former treatment; and the patient begged me to take charge of him. I could not attribute the extreme thinness which existed to the remnant of an imperfectly cured venereal affection, nor to the usual cause of exhaustion and fever. I then asked the patient if he indulged with females, or in onanism; or if he was affected with involuntary loss of semen. He almost swore to the contrary. I then told him of his obligation to speak the truth, and assured him that I should not prescribe for him until he was attentively examined. Some days after, he came to me again, and told me that he had been affected with something like loss of semen. I satisfied myself that the observation was correct. The cause of the evil being known, the treatment was simple. In a few months, the patient was restored to health; and this happy effect of the remedies proved that we had attacked the origin of the evil.
“This young man had probably indulged in premature excesses: in fact, this is the most usual cause of involuntary pollution. All the patients observed by me, (says Wichmann,) were from twenty-five to forty years old. All were addicted to the pleasures of love, or to onanism; or had become affected with blenorrhœa, by intercourse with diseased women.
“I am led to believe,” (adds he,) “that the effects of onanism would not be so pernicious, were it not for this diurnal pollution; that without it, this shameful habit would not be followed with consumption, and other symptoms of phthisis. In fact, onanism does not always give rise to this pollution. If this were the case, the number of onanists affected with consumption would be very great. The number of men addicted to this vice from early childhood is immense; for we do not know a greater scourge than this social corruption. From the fact, too, that onanism sometimes produces involuntary diurnal pollution, we ought to investigate if it does not exist in those who have renounced this pernicious habit. Advice to them would be useless, inasmuch as, having renounced this vice, they do not suspect the enervating cause which destroys them. About eighteen years ago, before I had discovered this cause of consumption, I knew a young man, thirty years old, who had been addicted to masturbation from the time he was ten years old, and who learned this pernicious habit from his preceptor. He died, after experiencing all kinds of infirmities, with extreme debility of all his physical and moral faculties. He acknowledged his error, and that for a long time he had renounced his bad habit; but his late return to continence did not save him. Now, I feel confident that this shameful habit had brought on an involuntary diurnal pollution, which caused his death.”
Wichmann remarks, that it is at the commencement of the fine season of spring that the patients are most conscious of their situation. They owe this increase of their ills (says he) to that general procreative faculty which becomes more active in all animated beings at this period of the year. The more full the vesicles of semen, the more liable are patients to lose it. We must also remark, that most patients secrete prolific semen, and preserve their procreative power. This, however, requires the patient to have the faculty of erection; for, otherwise, he would be impotent. This was the case with an individual, whose case is stated by Henry Van-Hers.
A young man of rich family, and who had arrived at puberty, consulted this physician, avowing, that from the time he was ten years old, he had enjoyed frequent intercourse with young girls, who had excited him by their lascivious touches; adding, that from this period the power of erection had disappeared. He had travelled for a long time, and had received advice from several French physicians. He went to the Spa waters, and there his case was examined by Van-Hers. The sensibility and weakness of the genital organs were so great, that on the slightest touch, and without any desire for coition, or any sensation, there was a discharge similar to thin milk. This excretion continued both night and day, whenever he passed urine, or on the least rubbing of his shirt. A great many remedies had already been tried. Van-Hers regarded the disease as incurable, but the young man would not listen to his advice; and being very rich, he continued to travel in Italy, France, England, and Germany, in the hope of recovering his lost virility. He consulted many physicians. He then had recourse to quacks; and even tried the powers of magic: but all in vain. After six years of travel, he returned to Van-Hers, regretting that he had not taken his advice. The young man then returned home, deploring the advantages of a large fortune, which rendered him the victim of a precocious abuse of pleasure, of a kind of premature depravity.
Wichmann’s dissertation was but little known in France, when Sainte Marie undertook its translation; and not only this, but added many important notes, which have shed new light on diurnal pollution. Wichmann had said, as we have seen, that patients affected with this disease ejaculated the semen. This expression was inexact, and has been rectified by M. Sainte Marie. The patients (said he) do not ejaculate the semen; but it runs away from them: it is not emitted with force. The characters which it presents had briefly been alluded to by Wichmann: his translator has stated them more clearly. According to him, the semen which runs away in diurnal pollution is paler, thinner, and more watery, than that which escapes when the act is attended with pleasure. Its odor, also, is fainter; and the stains it leaves on the linen are slight, superficial, and not very apparent. Wichmann had admitted the existence of a discharge from the prostate gland, which ought not to be confounded with diurnal pollution. Sainte Marie has attempted to point out the characteristics of this discharge. Those in whom it exists, (says he,) find the glans moistened in the morning when they rise with an unctuous substance: if they then compress the urethra from the root to the end of the penis, they press out some drops of a greenish, gluish, and slightly fetid fluid. They thus lose a little of this fluid after indulging in desires, or after erections which have not been followed by the act of venery. Sainte Marie considers it as probable that the mucus of the urethra then mixes with the fluid of the prostate gland, and forms a part of the discharge.
This author confirms Wichmann’s remarks on the general effects of diurnal pollution. He says, “Since I read his treatise, I have found this pollution in diseases of languor, which I could not attribute to a special or primitive alteration of any organ; and I have discovered, that a great many cases of hypochondria, of slow nervous fevers, of consumptions, were kept up by this kind of gonorrhœa, to which the patients, unable to observe themselves, had paid no attention. I have known several individuals, who have been affected with this diurnal pollution for a long time, without experiencing any marked derangement in their health: to them, it was an inconvenience; rather than a disease. But in these cases, diurnal pollution is not habitual: it only occurs when continence of days or weeks, an exciting or substantial regimen, long exercise on horseback or in a carriage, have accumulated semen in its reservoirs, or have irritated specially the genital organs: then the least effort to expel the feces causes the seminal vesicles to pour forth the surplus of fluid which they contain. Let not this state inspire too much security. Diurnal pollution is commenced: it is not yet serious; but it may progress, return every day at each evacuation, and finally produce all the bad results noticed by Wichmann.”
Wichmann said nothing in regard to the organic conditions of the diurnal pollution: he merely stated that this affection was the result of debility. M. Sainte Marie, on this point, makes many interesting remarks. He considers diurnal pollution as sometimes the cause, and sometimes the effect, of dorsal consumption; and he considers this to be an affection of the spinal marrow. We will quote this passage:—Diurnal pollution (says Sainte Marie) is sometimes only an effect; the origin of which must be sought after in a serious and primitive alteration of an important system of organs. Thus, we must reason, for instance, in respect to dorsal consumption. It is said, that one remarkable symptom of this disease is an abundant discharge of watery semen, which comes sometimes at each emission of urine. Involuntary diurnal pollution is here only a symptom: it occurs, because the genital organs do not receive, from the spinal marrow, the nervous and well regulated influence which they require to perform their functions properly. Hence, the super-abundant secretion of semen—its unfitness for fecundation—the relaxation of the seminal vesicles, which allow it to escape so readily—the atony of the scrotum—the inconvenient pulling of the spermatic vessels—the weakness of the erections—impotence, &c., &c. The same state of the organs which deprives the genital organs of life, explains, on the other hand, the wasting of parts which respond to this sensitive centre—the thinness of the loins, thighs, and lower extremities—the debility—the paralysis of these extremities—the obstinate constipation, complained of by the patients, and which is similar to that of old men, yielding only to the employment of stimuli—the formications along the back—the incontinence of urine—the gangrenous eschars, which at a more advanced period of the disease form on the sacrum, hips, and trochanters. We might easily pursue this subject, and extend it to the most general symptoms of consumption, as deep melancholy, weakness and slowness of the pulse, disposition to faint, and all those marked symptoms which assimilate this disease to slow nervous fever; but this would estrange us from the principle we seek to establish—which is, that diurnal pollution is sometimes the cause, and sometimes only the symptom, of dorsal consumption. Wichmann has treated only of the first: the second is connected with a general disease, and cannot be studied separately. These remarks of Sainte Marie will be admitted to be much more important, if compared with our remarks on the abuse of the genital organs on the spinal marrow, and with what we shall say hereafter on the power which this has on the same organs.