We have already mention’d the French Disease as one of the worst Attendants upon Lewdness, and with good Reason; for in the Enjoyment of this Life, Health is the sine qua non: i. e. the greatest Happiness. And this Distemper has one Thing in it peculiarly inveterate, as if it came out of Pandora’s worst Box; there is no other Disorder, but what at some Age, or in some particular Constitution, will abate of itself without the Application of Medicines; but this is such a busy restless Enemy, that unless resisted, he is never at a Stand, but gathers Strength every Day, to the utter Disquiet of the Patient. Now it is so evident that the Publick Stews, when well regulated, will prevent the Spreading of this Plague, that a prolix and tedious Proof of it would look like Declaiming. As this Disease has its Spring and Source entirely from publick Whoring, and from thence creeps into private Families; so it likewise receives continual Supplies and Recruits thro’ the same Channel: When this Source is once dry’d up the Nation will naturally recover its pristine Health and Vigour: And this cannot fail to happen, if due Care be taken to keep the Stews free from Infection; for what young Fellow will be so industriously mad, as to take Pains to run his Head into an Apothecary’s Shop, when he may with so much Ease and Conveniency, and without the Fear of a Reforming Officer, both secure his Health and gratify his Fancy with such a Variety of Mistresses.
’Tis true, the keeping of the Publick Stews so very safe, will appear a difficult Task, at first Sight; but not so if we consider the Case a little nearer. This Disease is propagated reciprocally from the Woman to the Man, and from the Man to the Woman; but the first is the most common for several Reasons: We are not like Cocks or Town-Bulls, who have a whole Seraglia of Females entirely and solely at their Devotion; on the contrary, one industrious Pains-taking Woman, who lays herself out that Way, is capable of satisfying several rampant Males; insomuch, that a select Number of Women get a handsome Livelihood by being able to oblige such a Number of Customers. Now, if but a few of these Women are unsound, they can infect a great many Men; whereas these Men have neither Power nor Inclination to infect the like Number of Women. I say, Inclination; for a Woman, to raise Money for the Surgeon’s Fee, may counterfeit Pleasure when she really receives Pain; nay, she may even venture to complain of being hurt: for the Man will attribute the Pain he gives her, either to her Chastity, or his own Vigour; not dreaming, perhaps, that he has molested a Shanker. This a Female may do, as being only passive in the Affair, but a Man must have real Fancy and Inclination before he is qualify’d to enter upon Action: And how far this Fancy to Woman may be cool’d by a stinging Gonorrhœa, I leave the experienc’d Reader to judge; and whether a Man won’t rather employ his Thoughts upon his round Diet, i. e. Pills, how to digest 2 at Night, and 3 in the Morning; what Conveyance to find out when poach’d Eggs grow nauseous, and how to preserve his Linnen from being speckled; with a Thousand other Particulars that occur to a Man in this Distress: but these are sufficient, with the Assistance of a Cordee, to bridle any moderate Passion. So that from the whole we may safely draw this Conclusion; That since the Men are so seldom guilty of transgressing in this Kind, the spreading of this Distemper must be owing to the Neglect of Cure in the Women. Now the Publick Stews will be so regulated, that a Woman cannot possibly conceal her Misfortune long; nay, it will be highly her Interest to make the first Discovery; so that whatever Damage the Society may sustain at first, when Claps are most current, it will be soon repair’d, and this Distemper, in Time, entirely rooted out. But of this enough.
The next Thing that comes to be consider’d in this Vice, is the Expence it occasions, and the Neglect of worldly Business, by employing so much of our Time and Thoughts; for let a Man have ever so much Business, it can’t stop the Circulation of his Blood, or prevent the Seminal Secretion: for Sleeping or Waking, the Spermaticks will do their Office, tho’ a Man’s Thoughts may be so much employ’d about other Affairs, that he cannot attend to every minute Titillation. A Man of Pleasure, indeed, may make this copulative Science his whole Study; and, by Idleness and Luxury, may prompt Nature that Way, and spur up the Spirits to Wantonness: but then his Constitution will be the sooner tired; for the Animal Spirits being exhausted by this Anticipation, his Body must be weaken’d, and his Nerves relax’d; neither will his irregular effeminate Life assist them in recovering their former Force. Besides, those Parts which more particularly suffer the Violence of this Exercise, are liable to many Accidents; and Men of Pleasure, though otherwise pretty healthy, are often troubled with Gleets and Weaknesses, either by a former Ulceration of the Prostrates, or else some violent Over-straining, which occasions this Relaxation. These Men, ’tis true, will talk very lusciously of Women; but, pretend what they please, they can never have that burning Desire which they had formerly, when their Vessels were in full Vigour. The Truth is, their Lust lies chiefly in their Brain, kept alive by the Impression of former Ideas, which are not so easily rubb’d out as the Titillation which created them; and this Passion comes to be so diminished, that, in Time, it changes its Residence from the Glans Penis to the Glandula Penealis. A Man of Business, on the contrary, or one who leads a sober regular Life, will seldomer be attack’d by these wanton Fits, but then they will come with double the Violence; for though it is a common received Opinion, that the longer a Man refrains, the better he is able to refrain, yet it is only true in one Sense, and amounts to no more than this: That if a Man has been able, for such and such Reasons, to curb this Passion, for Instance, a Month, he will, if the same Reasons hold, and without an additional Temptation, be able to curb it a Month longer; but, nevertheless, he may have Desires much stronger than a Man who, for want of these Motives to Abstinence, gratifies them every Day. If there are some Men of a particular Constitution, whose puny Desires may be easily block’d up with the Assistance of three small Buttons: or else endow’d with such an extraordinary Strength of Reason, that they can master the most rampant Sallies of this raging Passion; I heartily congratulate their happy Conquest, but have nothing more to do with them at present, the Publick Stews not being design’d for such: I am here speaking of those Men of Business, who, notwithstanding their Abstinence or the Regularity of their Lives, are sometimes prevailed upon to quench these amorous Heats; and, I say, in such Men the Passion is much stronger than in Men of Pleasure, and that their Abstinence contributes to heighten the Violence of the Desire, and make it the more irresistible: for the Fancy not being cloy’d with too frequent Enjoyment, presently takes fire; and the Spermaticks, not being weaken’d with forc’d Evacuations, are in their full Vigour, and give the Nerves a most exquisite Sensation: so that upon the least toying with an alluring Wench, the Blood-Vessels are ready to start; and to use Othello’s Words, The very Sense aches at her.
Now, what shall this Man do, when he has once taken the Resolution to make himself easy? He must either venture upon the Publick, where, it is Odds, he may meet with a Mischance that will either drain his Pocket, and make him unfit for any Business, at least without Doors; or else he must employ both his Time and Rhetoric, and perhaps too his Purse, in deluding some modest Girl; which, besides the Loss of Time in carrying on such an Intrigue, is apt to give the Head such an amorous Turn as is quite inconsistent with Business, and may probably lead a Man into After-Expences, which at first he never dreamt of.
Now to remedy all these Inconveniences, the Publick Stews will be always ready and open, where a Man may regulate his Expences according to his Ability, from Half a Crown to a Guinea; and that too without endangering his Health: And besides, which is chiefly to be consider’d, if a Man should be overtaken with a sudden Gust of Lechery, it will be no Hindrance to him even in the greatest Hurry of Business, for a ready and willing Mistress will ease him in the twinkling of an Eye, and he may prosecute his Affairs with more Attention than ever, by having his Mind entirely freed and disengag’d from those troublesome Ideas which always accompany a wanton Disposition of the Body. But to proceed:
Another ill Consequence of Whoring, is the Tendency it has to dispeople a Nation; and that both by the Destruction of Illegitimate Infants, and by ruining young Men’s Constitutions so much, that, when they marry, they either beget no Children, or such as are sickly and short-liv’d. The first of these, indeed, is almost unavoidable, especially in modest Women, who will be guilty of this Cruelty as long as Female Chastity carries that high Reputation along with it, which it really deserves: However, in common Women, it may and will be, in a great measure, prevented by this Scheme; for every profess’d Courtezan, that is legally licens’d, will have an Apartment allotted her in the Infirmary when she is ready to lie in, and will be obliged to take Care of her Child; by which means a considerable Number of Infants will be reared up, that otherwise might probably have perish’d. Besides, there are a great many ordinary Girls, such as Servant-Maids, who are chiefly mov’d to this Action, by the fear of losing their Services, and wanting Bread. Now this handsome Provision that is made for them, will be a great Inducement for such to enter themselves in the Stews, rather than commit such an unnatural Action, especially when the Discovery is Death.
Let us now consider the Affair of Matrimony. Since the World is now no longer in a State of Nature, but form’d into several Societies independent of one another, and these Societies again divided into several Ranks and Degrees of Men, distinguish’d by their Titles and Possessions, which descend from Father to Son; it is very certain that Marriage is absolutely necessary, not only for the regular Propagation of the Species, and their careful Education, but likewise for preserving that Distinction of Rank among Mankind, which otherwise would be utterly lost and confounded by doubtful Successions. And it is no less certain and indisputable, that all Sorts and Kinds of Debauchery whatever are Enemies to this State, in so far as they impair the natural Vigour of the Constitution, and weaken the very Springs of Love.
This necessary Passion is, indeed, of such a ticklish Nature, that either too much or too little of it is equally prejudicial, and the Medium is so hard to hit, that we are apt to fall into one of the Extremes. We are naturally furnish’d with an extraordinary Stock of Love; and, by the Largeness of the Provision, it looks as if Nature had made some Allowance for Wear and Tear. If young Men were to live intirely chaste and sober, without blunting the Edge of their Passions, the first Fit of Love would turn their Brains Topsy-turvy, and we should have the Nation pestered with Love-Adventures and Feats of Chivalry: By the time a Peer’s Son came to be Sixteen, he would be in danger of turning Knight-Errant, and might possibly take a Cobler’s Daughter for his Dulcinea; and who knows but a sprightly young Taylor might turn an Orlando Furioso, and venture his Neck to carry off a Lady of Birth and Fortune. In short, there are so many Instances every day of these ruinous disproportion’d Matches, notwithstanding our present Intemperance, that we may justly conclude, if the Nation was in a State of perfect Sobriety, no Man could answer for the Conduct of his Children.
It must, indeed, be confess’d, as Matters now stand, the Excess of Chastity is not so much to be fear’d as the other Extreme of Lewdness, tho’ there are Instances of both; and many Fathers, now living, would gladly have seen their Sons fifty times in a Stew, rather than see them so unfortunately married. The other Extreme is equally, or rather more dangerous, as it is more common; for most young Men give too great a Loose to their Passions, and either quite destroy their Inclination to Matrimony, or make their Constitutions incapable of answering the Ends of that State.
To avoid therefore these two dangerous Extremes, we have erected the Publick Stews, which every considerate Man must allow to be that Golden Mean so much desired: For, in the first Place, we avoid the Inconvenience of too strict a Chastity. When a Man has gained some Experience by his Commerce in the Stews, he is able to form a pretty good comparative Judgment of what he may expect from the highest Gratifications of Love; he finds his Ideas of Beauty strangely alter’d after Enjoyment, and will not be hurry’d into an unsuitable Match by those romantick chimerical Notions of Love, which possess the Minds of unexperienced Youth, and make them fancy that Love alone can compleat the Happiness of a married State. But this will be so readily granted, that I shan’t insist upon it farther.