It is chronic in course, varied and intermittent in character, and the length of time it remains in the body is indefinite.
It is so widespread that no country in the world is free from it, neither is any organ of the body exempt from its ravages.
Let us take a young man indulging in promiscuous sexual intercourse, who cohabits with a syphilitic woman. He notices nothing wrong for about five weeks, when he becomes aware of a pimple on the sexual organs, to which perhaps he pays little attention. This grows and becomes hard at the base and is ulcerated on the top.
About ten days after the appearance of the ulcer (or chancre) the boy notices that the glands of the groins begin to swell, but as there is little or no pain attached he still pays no attention to all this.
After three, or sometimes four weeks the ulcerated opening heals, but leaves the hard lump under the skin. In two or even three months after the time of infection the first general symptoms appear. His bones ache, he is mentally depressed, slightly feverish at night, and a rash appears upon his body and sore spots in the mouth; and throat. These symptoms usually decide him to consult a doctor, who finds him in the second stage of syphilis. This condition lasts usually about two and one-half years, the rash often lasting a short period, and leaving, but to return again.
The blood within and the ulcers on the body contain the poisons of the disease, and for three or four years the poison can be transmitted by contagion, or by heredity.
The third stage is the most destructive, especially to the nervous system, for this disease is recognized as the greatest factor in organic disturbances of the nervous system.
It not rarely is the cause of cerebral and spinal meningitis, paralysis of the legs, paralysis of one side of the body, and that most helpless and terrible disease, softening of the brain and many other diseases which affect the spinal cord, which are seldom ever cured. The majority of those diseased are left with physical or mental infirmities, rendering them public charges.
There have been cases where the third stage did not develop, and as this stage is not distinctly separated from the second stage by a definite line, it may not take place for months, or even years after the first sore appeared. Again, this stage has been averted by careful treatment in the early stages, and it is here the hope of all afflicted lies.
Every case of syphilis begins with the characteristic pimple or chancre, except inherited syphilis. The chancre always appears where the infection enters, and the glands swell in the same vicinity. For instance, if in using a pipe of a syphilitic, whose mouth contains the sore patches, the victim finds the chancre will appear on his lips, mouth or throat, and the glands of the neck will swell.