Works on phrenology, physiology, etc

Contents

AMATIYENESS ; or Evils and Remedies of Excessive and Perverted Sexuality, with Advice to the Married and Single.

LOYE and PARENTAGE ; applied to the Improvement of Offspring,

including important Directions to Lovers and the Married.

Preface

Every human function is perfect when exercised in harmony with its primitive constitution ; but, when perverted, occasions suffering proportionate to the happiness its right exercise confers.

Pre-eminently is this true of the sexual function. It was instituted to perpetuate our race, but has been perverted to a depraved use, more, probably, than any other faculty, and occasioned more misery.

It is high time its ravages were staid ; but who is there to come up to the 4 help of the Lord ’ and of humanity against this blighting curse ? The pulpit — that ordained watch-tower of morality and exponent of sin, is comparatively mute concerning it, at least, touching its worst forms — an omission utterly unjustifiable. The medical profession, whose duty it is to sound the alarm, and diffuse knowledge, is almost silent ; yet pockets the wages of sins and sufferings which it should obviate. Lawyers live on the fees rendered by this propensity, more, probably, than from any other crime perpetrated by our fallen nature ; besides being infinitely above (? below) attempting its remedy. The moralist is silent, and the philanthropist is dumb. Most of the self- constituted watchmen on the walls of the public safety, are 4 dead dogs/ seeming afraid to touch this vile thing. A mere moiety attempt to arrest this might}7- current, yet the aggregate effort is utterly insignificant compared with the evil. Nor can more be said of the mode. But not for this alone. None beard the lion in his den. Of the few recent productions on this subject, none have effectually probed this festering bile to its core, or anointed it with an effectual remedy. Nor can this be done but by understanding the primitive constitution of this element, and thereby the consequences of its perversion.

Phrenology mounts the breach. It descries the evil. It weeps over its ravages. It points out the remedy ; and the Author claims to be its humble expositor. Long has he seen and sighed over this monster disease and wretchedness. He hoped to have escaped both the woe of silence and the odium of utterance by its effectual exposition from some other quarter. But he has seen nothing which did full justice to this subject. Not that he would disparage the earlier efforts of that noble apostle in this cause, Dr. Woodward, from whom he so often quotes. He was almost the first among distinguished men to open the battery of facts upon this enemy of all good. Above all praise are his noble efforts in this forlorn cause. But his 4 Hints to the Young/ have not sufficiently explained the rationale of the injury sensuality inflicts, or * attempted to reach more than a single form of lust. Nor, even if it had, would this work be uncalled for ; because our thoughtless youth need 4 line upon line/ and the married require 4 precept upon precept.’ This work may find its way where his has not gone, 4 Facts, &c., to Young

INTRODUCTION,

Men/ we cordially recommend. They have done good ; yet they occupy ground less comprehensive and scientific than that assumed here. Mrs. Gove has awakened attention to this sin and shame of too many of her own sex ; yet we endeavour to grapple this goring monster * by the horns/ and expose the why and how of this frightful evil. To disseminate knowledge is our object. INFORMATION is the required preventive. Our misguided youth dream not that they are sinning, nor suspect the direful consequences that impend, till their ruin is well nigh complete — till their bark of life is stranded on the quicksands of inflamed passion, or dashed to atoms by the billows of lust in one or other of its forms.

The married, too, need warning. Thinking themselves entitled to a perfect glut of indulgence in wedlock, they little suspect it as the cause of their physical diseases or mental alienations. Nor has the warning voice probably ever before been raised in their ears.

Let not the erring think that we come to scorn or deride. We proffer pity for your folly, and ointment for your self-inflicted wounds. So far from casting reproaches, we would put you again on the feet of self-respect, and the road of restoration.

Those who object to the presentation of this subject, or think it uncalled for, err in judgment. They may sit supinely if they will, and even bark, but shall neither hinder us from snatching from the fires of lust those half consumed brands within our reach, nor wrest from us the joys of doing good, or the thanks of suffering humanity.

Introduction

4 The crying sin of our race/ says our author, ‘ in every age, and in almost every nation under heaven, has been excessive or unlawful indulgence in sexual pleasures.’ He gives a melancholy account of the prevalence of this form of evil in his own country. It would appear from his statements, that in some cities in America, this evil prevails to an alarming extent. Even public prostitution is now no longer unknown in the cities of the United States : while private or select prostitution is exceedingly common. He tells us, that even pretended widows, who profess to live by industry, and who are members of churches, visit places of worship only to mark and entrap men by their looks and smiles, and other wily arts. He speaks of solitary sexual crime, or self- abuse, as still more prevalent : as pervading, in fact, every nook and corner of the land. He assures us, that the remarks which he makes on the prevalence of this form of crime, are grounded on facts which have come to his own knowledge. His professional practice and extensive observation, he says, give him access to sources of information, and to individual histories, which extort the reluctant declaration, that people in general have not the faintest conception of the fearful extent to which this vice is practised.

It would seem from some of our author’s statements, that certain forms of sexual vice prevail to a greater extent in the United States, than m our own country, especially self-abuse. The facts he gives on this subject appear almost incredible. He assures us, that if we were to catechise every boy we met on this subject, we should find, that nine in every ten, from eleven years old and upwards, and that one-half of those from seven to eleven, are guilty of this unnatural crime : and that of those still older, the proportion is still greater. He assures us, that he himself has known hundreds ruined by this crime before they were thirteen years of age. He says, that the schools are especially nurseries of this vice ; and that it is often practised by scholars in companies. He assures us, that in making these statements, he speaks only what he knows , and testifies what he has seen.

In reply to those that think that nothing should be published on this subject, for fear of corrupting the minds of youth, he quotes the words

INTRODUCTION, of Dr, Woodward, who says, ‘I have never conversed with a lad twelve years of age who did not know all about the practice, and understand the language commonly used to describe it.5 Our author assures us, that this Dr. Woodward is a cautious and discreet man, and one of the best authorities that he could quote. Dr. Woodward lias published a work on the subject, entitled, Hints to the Young . W. C. Woodbridge, the celebrated advocate of education in the United States, speaks of this solitary vice as * spreading desolation throughout our schools and families, unnoticed and unknown.’ Mr. E. M. R. Wells, a distinguished teacher in Boston, gives similar testimony to the prevalence and mischievous influence of this vice. The higher schools and colleges, Mr. Fowler says, are more afflicted with this vice, than even the lower schools.

The following letter was written by Mr. Fowler in 1841, to the author of Facts and important Information for Young Men.

^ Philadelphia, Sept. 8, 1841.

4 Mr. G. — Dear Sir : Your letter and book are received. I am right glad you have taken hold of this subject. Much as reform is needed in other matters, no reform— no, not even that in reference to alcoholic drinks— is demanded half so much as reform in reference to this solitary vice. To this conclusion my practice, which, you know, has not been limited, and my means of information, which have been varied and extensive, have led me reluctantly but inevitably. And what is most deplorable, unlike other forms of vice which prey upon the coarse and the vulgar, this is even more likely to attack those of fine feelings and ardent temperaments, and otherwise unblemished morals. They are not aware that this is one of the greatest sins they can commit.

4 1 have of late seen this evil to be so alarming, and its ravages on the intellect, and morals, and health, so fearful, that I have contemplated preparing a work on the phrenological organ of Amativeness, to consist mainly of the physiological, intellectual, and moral effects of this vice ; but I rejoice that you are before me in this matter.

4 I could give you a vast number of facts that have come to my knowledge. A few days ago, a young man, who had been a gentleman , called upon me, in a state of mind and body truly wretched-— the mere wreck of a man. His head was affected and painful, the back part of it in particular ; and his mind was literally distracted with those horrors which this indulgence always induces. His mind was flighty, his appetite destroyed, and the tones of his voice the very personification of grief. Both his head and his conversation gave evidence of superior talents in ruins. Fifty times, in the course of an hour, did he exclaim,

4 0 my God, what shall I do ! I am mad, I know it. What can I do ? ’

4 In laying open his case, in order that I might give him advice, he mentioned his having been much addicted to this habit, and would often bring his hands to these parts — an invariable sign of their being in a fevered state, either by secret indulgence, or indulgence with the other sex. His anxiety was, to escape the mad-house and regain self-controul ; because on this he had always prided himself. On inquiring of him as to the prevalence of this evil, he said that nine-tenths of his acquaintances were given to it.

4 On inquiring of one of the physicians in Brockley Alms House, Philadelphia, as to the number of its inmates who were brought into the insane department by its instrumentality, he started at once upon his feet, and spoke with great energy and emphasis of its influence in inducing derangement, and narrated several very affecting cases. In my visit to that institution, a few days ago, I saw several insane patients who were brought there by this vice, and whose hands were tied, to prevent self-pollution.

4 If it is facts that you want, I assure you they exist in abundance in every degree of aggravation. Let the young be warned, for most of its victims fall a prey to it ignorantly. Let us have light, especially iq

INTRODUCTION.

our institutions of learning ; because there, the absence of exercise, the seclusion from female society, and the character of their studies, especially those that cultivate (vitiate) the imagination, all tend to induce and increase the evil.’

The following is from Dr. Alcott : —

< We believe that there is not a town in New England, whose bills of mortality, from year to year, are not greatly increased by this fearful and wide wasting scourge. We believe that a majority of our diseases and infirmities — our aches, our pains, and our deformities too— after the age of puberty, are either induced or aggravated in this way.’

The following is from Dr. Snow, of Boston : —

< Self-pollution is undoubtedly one of the most common causes of ill health that can be found among the young men of this country. From the observations that I have been able to make, I am satisfied that the practice is almost universal. Boys commence it an early age ; and the habit once formed, like that of intemperance, . becomes almost unconquerable. In boarding schools and colleges, it obtains oftentimes without an exception. Hence the many sickly students, and the many young men of the most brilliant and promising talents, who have broken their constitutions and ruined their health, as it is said, 4 by hard study ! ’

Mr. Fowler adds, that even females do not escape the infection of this horrible vice. He says, —

‘ They may be less infected, yet women, young and modest, are dying by thousands of consumption, of female complaints, of nervous or spinal affections, of general debility, and of other ostensible complaints innumerable, and some of insanity, caused solely by this practice. On this point. Dr. Woodward again thus speaks out : —

‘About two years ago, a young woman, aged twenty-two years, came under my care, in a state of the worst form of insanity. She was furious, noisy, filthy, and, apparently, nearly reduced to idiocy. She had been in this condition many months, and continued so for some time while with me. She was pale and bloodless, had but little appetite, frequently rejected her food, and was reduced in flesh and strength. Finding her one day more calm than usual, I hinted to her the subject of masturbation [self-pollution], and informed her that, if she practised it, she could not get well — if she abandoned it, she might. She did not deny the charge, and promised to follow my advice strictly. In two or three weeks from this time, she was perceptibly better ; her mind improved as her health gained ; and both were much better in the course of a few weeks. The recovery was very rapid in this case. At the end of six months she had excellent health, was quite fleshy, and became perfectly sane ; and has continued so, so far as we have known, to this time.

‘Not long since, a case of periodical insanity came under my observation, the subject of which was a young lady. The disease had existed ten years without any material change. Suspecting that masturbation was the cause, I directed her mother to ascertain, if possible, and inform me. Some months after, 1 received intelligence that my patient was better, and that my suspicions of the habit were confirmed by the observation of her friends. The case is not without hope, although of so long standing, if the cause is removed.

‘ Three or four similar cases have been under my care recently in which individuals of the same sex have been reduced to the same degraded state. They are now, and will continue to be while life remain® a melancholy spectacle of human misery, without mind, without delicacy oi modesty, constantly harassed by the most ungovernable passion, and under the influence of propensities excited to morbid activity by a vice fai moie pie valent than has been supposed. A large proportion of the ‘bed-ridden cases, of which there are so many in the community, will be found to have originated m this cause/ 4 ?

INTRODUCTION.

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O

Mrs. Gove, in her Lectures to Ladies on Anatomy and Physiology — subjects which every woman should understand — thus discourses concerning its prevalence among her sex : —

‘ About eight years since, my mind was awakened to examine this subject by the perusal of a medical work that described the effects of this vice when practised by females. This was the first intimation I had that the vice existed among our sex. Since that time I have had much evidence that it is fearfully common among them.

‘ There is reason to believe that, in nine cases out of ten, those unhappy females who are tenants of houses of ill-fame, have been victims of this vice in the first place. Were this the peculiar vice of the low and vulgar, there might be more excuse for the apathy and false delicacy that pervade the community respecting it. But it invades all ranks. Professed Christians are among its victims.

‘ Our boarding and day schools are sources of untold mischief. A short time since, two sisters, ladies of the first respectability, informed me that, when very young, they were put to a female boarding-school, where this vice prevailed, and the practice was explained to them. They were blessed with parents who were willing to converse with and warn their children, and they escaped the contamination.’

One of her correspondents writes that she 4 became addicted to solitary vice about the age of nine years.’ ‘Facts and important Information to Young Women,’ &c., a work which we recommend cordially, details, many instances illustrative of the prevalence of this vice.

‘ My own practice and observation,’ says Fowler, ‘ as to its prevalence, confirm and considerably exceed these statements. I have one infallible test, which I often apply without the knowledge of its subjects, and thereby detect many who little suspect me of knowing their secret practices. Called to prescribe for a young woman, and knowing from this sign what caused her complaint, I sought an interview with her mother, to whom I disclosed my suspicions. She said she thought her daughter innocent, but knew she had slept much with an elder girl who was addicted to it. I asked her what she knew concerning its prevalence. She said a girl in her neighbourhood had just died from its effects, and that the female operatives in a neighbouring factory practised it almost universally ; as she learned from one of them. She named other factories in which it was hardly less prevalent. I know little girls below their teens, who thus abuse themselves, and, from my application of the test named above, am constrained to believe the practice alarmingly extensive among the fairest portion of creation ! I sicken at the thought. Oh ! woman, ‘ who hath thus bewitched you that ye should’ thus depart from the paths of delicacy, and health, and happiness %

‘ But I forbear, simply alleging that the plague is all around and all among us. None of our daughters or sons are safe, however carefully we may guard them, till we cast out ‘ this accursed’ plague from among us. And being a common enemy, it can be extirpated only by community of effort. Single hands can do but little. Nothing but combined , concentrated , and long continued exertion, can avert the wide-spread and insidious contagion. Come, up and be doing, every lover of his race, every lover of his own dear children. Even for their sakes, if on no other account, gird yourselves to this disagreeable but indispensable work of philanthropy and reform, till we drive this common enemy from our midst.’

We have reason to believe, that this form of crime prevails, to a considerable extent, in our own country. We shall not enter into the particulars on which our painful belief is grounded ; but we know enough to satisfy us that instruction on this subject is exceedingly necessary. We have little or no apprehension that the work we are laying before the public will prove injurious to any : while we have, on the other hand, the fullest assurance that it will prove beneficial to multitudes. The unhappy creatures who indulge in this vice, have not in general, the

Q effects.—it injures health.— it exhausts the body.

least idea of the injury they are doing themselves, either m body or m mind ; and we see no way by which they can be instructed but through the press. Preachers will not meddle with such matters ; and parents are unwilling to speak on the subject to their children ; and even the public lecturer is afraid to notice it. The press alone remains, and great indeed would be our guilt, should we refuse to employ the press in such a work, while so many are suffering so grievously tor want of the instruction which we are able to impart.

We expect to be abused by some for laying this work befoie the public : but we are justified in our own mind ; and we have no doubt, that if our readers will give the subject due consideration, they will see, in the end, that we rather deserve their thanks for what we are doing, than their rebukes.

Chapter I. Effects

Happiness is the one constitutional object and product of every function of our being. Yet every function is capable of a painful action. Nor are these two forms or products of the action of our respective functions, chance comers and goers, but all are governed by inflexible law. . That function is necessarily pleasurable which harmonizes with the primitive constitution, and fulfils the legitimate design, of the faculty excercised, and is called normal or natural. That action of any function is painful which violates or departs from this normal, primitive institution or end, and is called abnormal , which means unnatural.

Of course, these natural axioms apply with significant emphasis to the element before us. To fulfil the legitimate ends for which this was ordained, is to be happy in its exercise ; not to fulfil it, and especially to depart from it, is to suffer in and by its exercise. In ‘ Love and Parentage,’ we have seen in what this function consists. Now excessive indulgence, promiscuous and matrimonial, and solitary, violate this function and cause pain. We come now to consider the evils consequent on these its perversions.

To enumerate the tithe of the evils consequent on excessive sexual whether promiscuous, or matrimonial, or solitary indulgence, all one in substance, would fill a world with volumes, as it has already with woes, and keep it full. We shall develope, first, some of its destruction of health, and generation of physical evils and sufferings : Lnext, its destruction of the moral tone or stamina, and its production of propensity and depravity in forms without number, and aggravation beyond description. To enumerate a few.

IT INJURES HEALTH.

To dwell here on the importance of health as a means of enjoyment, and its essentiality to every form and degree of happiness, would take us too far from our subject. Suffice it to say, that whatever impairs the health, or engenders disease, is proportionally fatal to happiness, and prolific of suffering.

Now, that excessive sexual indulgence injures the health, and in a pre-eminent degree, appears from the following, among its other effects.

IT EXHAUSTS THE BODY.

. -^lose at all acquainted, experimentally, with the nature of this function, need not be told that few things are equally exhausting ; and leaders of ‘ Love and Parentage’ will remember our exposition of the cause, namely, it was instituted to transmit the entire mentality and p ysiology of parents to offspring ; and since the latter take on them the existing conditions of the former, and these only, it becomes absolutely necessaiy that this function should call forth, in a powerful degree of ac ion, a the mental, all the physical functions of parents, as the means of their transmission to offspring. Now this intense and simul-

IT ENFEEBLES THE MIND, taneous action of all the functions of our nature in this indulgence, of course proportionally exhausts. A hard day’s work does not equally prostrate and fatigue3 The fallow buck, after this passion has subsided, is so tamed down by exhaustion, that he can be approached and almost caught by hand*

IT ENFEEBLES THE MIND,

Frequent indulgence in any of its forms, will run down, and run out, any one, of either sex. Those who would write, or speak, or study, must either forego excessive indulgence, or intellectual exertion, or else die. Powerful constitutions will stand an immense drain before they finally break, but terrible indeed is the result.

Mere animal temperaments are less injured, because, by supposition, their vitality is abundant, and its drain by other functions is slight ; nor do they enjoy this function as do those more highly organized, and hence are proportionally less exhausted. Such live, to be sure ; so do brutes. Carnal, grovelling, sensual, low-lived animals , living mainly on a single pleasure, when their nature serves up so many ! Let such revel in lust, because capable of little else. But those highly organized must partake rarely, else it will excite to destruction, and proportionally exhaust. Besides, they can expend their less abundant, perhaps deficient, vitality to better advantage. Frequent indulgence must necessarily be lustful, and therefore debasing to their higher feelings. Those whose intellectuality and morality are feeble, may spend their surplus vitality on this passion with less injury, yet cannot cultivate their higher faculties while they thus revel in lust. Let such remain all animal and revel on. But for those who have already too little vitality to sustain their higher faculties — for such to rob all their nobler, god-like elements of vitality, just to spend it on a sensual, debasing passion, is physical, mental, and moral suicide. Red-faced, bloated, coarse-grained, gouty subjects — it matters little what becomes of them. About as well go to Texas and be shot as any wray, or stay and kill themselves, because worth little any how. But for light-buiit, fine-skinned, fine-haired, spare-built, sharp-featured, light -eyed persons of either sex, to indulge, even in wedlock, as often as the moon quarters, is gradual but effectual destruction of both soul and body ; because they already work off vitality faster than their feeble vital apparatus manufactures it. This excess of expenditure over supply, occasions their sharpness. A surplus vitality would render them fleshy. Now to add the most powerful drain of all to their already spare supply, must sooner or later, according to their vigour of constitution, render them bankrupts of life.

It will not kill you outright. It will first weaken the garrison of life, and thus open the door for disease to come in and attack the weakest part, and complete the work of death in the name of other diseases. As bees, by swarming two freely leave portions of their hive unprotected, and thus allow the deposit of those destructive worms which a full supply of bees would have prevented, so this indulgence drains the system of vitality, and of course leaves the weaker organs especially debilitated, till disease, thus invited, sets in, destroys the feebler organs, and ends in death ; attributed, however, to consumption, dyspepsia, gravel, nervous, heart, and other affections, according as this or that organ is naturally most feeble, but rarely to its true cause. Ask any medical man, conversant with diseases having this origin, and he will tell you that no other cause of disease equals this, either as to number, or aggravation, or difficulty of cure. Hear Dr. Woodward on this point.

4 That the evil is wide-spread and exceedingly injurious, cannot be denied or doubted. A great number of the ills which come upon the young, at and after the age of puberty, arise from this habit, persisted in, so as to waste the vital energies and enervate the physical and mental powers of man.

4 Nature designs that this drain upon the system should be reserved

I i it inflames the whole system.

to mature age, and even then that it be made but sparingly. Sturdy manhood, in all its vigour, loses its energy and bends under the too frequent expenditure of this important secretion; and no age or condition will protect a man from the danger of unlimited indulgence, though legally and naturally exercised.

4 In the young, however, its influence is much more seriously felt ; and even those who have indulged so cautiously as not to break down the health or the mind, cannot know how much their physical energy, mental vigour, and moral purity, have been affected by the indulgence.

4 No cause is more influential in producing insanity . The records of the institutions give an appalling catalogue of cases attributed to it.’

A doctor in Brooklyn thus writes to the author of 4 Facts, &c., to Young Men.’

Brooklyn , Deo. 19, 1840.

* In my own practice, I think I have seen the following results of masturbation* — involuntary emissions, prostration of strength, paralysis of the limbs, hysteria, epilepsy, strange nervous affections, dyspepsia, hypochondria, spinal disease, pain and weakness in the back and limbs, costiveness— and, in fine, the long and dismal array of gastric, enteric, nervous and spinal affections, that are so complicated and difficult to manage.’

Dr. J. A. Brown, of Providence, writes to the same author as follows : —

‘ That it is an evil of vast magnitude, no physician who has been in the habit of tracing effects to causes, can for a moment doubt. I, sir, could tell of hundreds who labour under incurable maladies, produced by this practice ; and I do not believe that I have a better faculty for obtaining such information than many others, who are, and will be, dumb on this subject.’

Another physician writes that 4 seven-eighths of all the bodily ills and diseases of the people, are caused, or greatly aggravated, by self-abuse, or excessive legal indulgence.’

Nor is this all, nor the worst. The loss of this secretion is the loss of vitality itself . We saw, in Love and Parentage, that it embodied the very quintessence of parentage, in order thereby to impart this quintessence of parents to offspring. To dwell on this point, however important, is unnecessary, because so evident. Now it is a well known principle of jdiysiology, that when any organ is especially over- taxed, it robs the other parts of the system of vitality to supply its own taxation. Thus, overloading the stomach causes mental lassitude and muscular debility, because the stomach withdraws energy from the brain, the muscles, and wherever it can find it, to enable it to discharge its burden. Now overtax this secretion, and it withdraws energy from all the other parts to re-supply the draft. Doing this frequently, diverts the energies permanently from the other organs to this. As those wno get into the habit of being bled frequently, soon get full of blood, jecause they over-tax the blood manufacturing energies by this drain, so that an undue amount of vitality goes to blood ; so the frequentwithdrawal of this condensed vital secretion, causes a drain from all the o ler pans and organs to re-supply it, and thus frequent indulgence causes the very life’s blood to run out thereat. Well has Wisdom