DISEASES OF THE MALE GENERATIVE ORGANS. It is deeply to be regretted, that mankind are in general so little acquainted with the laws of bodily health, and the penalties or rewards consequent on their observance. In the young world, it was long the custom to leave the care of men's spiritual welfare in the hands of a certain class, and it is only after progressive reformations, that we can clearly see how vain it is for us to trust to another, in matters where our own knowledge and judgment are required. The case is the same now-a-days with man's bodily welfare; he is too pre-occupied by other pursuits, to pay attention to this, and delivers himself over in health and sickness to the guidance of chance or the physician, a passive unreasoning instrument. And yet but little reflection is needed to show us, that in this, as well as in spiritual and moral matters, our own knowledge and independent judgment are required at every step in life; that if we have not as full a knowledge of the body and of the paths to physical health and disease, as of the mind and the phenomena of its virtues and vices, our life is the sport of chance, and our brightest hopes are all liable to end in disappointment and misery; that no mental culture or moral excellence will avail us, if we are borne to the ground by bodily disease. The laws of our body will not be neglected; they demand our attention, and woe to him who offends against them. Shall we then, like our ancestors, be content to remain as children, on matters of such infinite importance? It is said, that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but truly none at all is still more dangerous, and far more unpardonable. Deeply convinced as I am, that there is no safety for man, till the laws that regulate our bodily health and disease be as well known to all, as any of the other most widely-spread branches of knowledge, I shall endeavour in this essav to give a short sketch of a class cf diseases, perhaps more fatal at present to the health and happiness of our race than any other, and also from their peculiar nature, if possible, less understood by the world at large. It is of the diseases of the genital organs that I shall speak, to which man and woman are most liable in the years that follow puberty. This is probably at the present day the most dangerous period of life, with the exception of the first year or two of existence; not so much because more die in it, but because the foundation of many chronic lingering diseases is then laid, which may embitter all the rest of life's cup. The great danger of the period arises from the fact of the genital organs, these mighty powers for the happiness or misery of each individual, then coming first into play; and from the lamentable ignorance in which youth, and indeed the whole of society, is plunged, as to the laws of these organs. There is no subject at present on which such a dense cloud of ignorance, prejudice, and every imperfect and degrading feeling lies brooding, as upon the genital organs, and their whole nature and duties. To raise this veil of obscurity and shame, which degrades the sexual part of man, and to strive to show, by the lights which modern research has thrown upon it, the simple and beautiful natural laws to which it is subjected, like other parts of the economy, shall be my endeavour in this essay. It is not sufficient that all men should become acquainted with the laws of health, as has been so admirably dwelt upon in some late popular works on physiology; it is necessary also that we should be acquainted with the history of disease; for it is as important that we should be aware of the penalty for breaking a law, as of the reward for obeying it. The great causes of the deplorable ignorance and prejudice which prevail on sexual subjects are, first, the erroneous moral views which are entertained regarding them; and, secondly, the ideas of mystery anc shame which are attached to them, and which must be completely overcome throughout society, before we be rescued from the innumerable evils that overwhelm mankind at present from their diseases. Mystery always causes ignorance, which is of itself sin, and the parent of sin; and therefore every one of us should seek entirely to rid ourselves of such feelings on sexual subjects, and to view that part of nature, like all others, with the calm and reverential spirit that the pursuit of truth demands. PUBERTY IN THE MALE. This period, which generally occurs about the age of fifteen or sixteen, is accompanied by important changes in the economy, connected with the developement of the genital or reproductive organs. Were anatomy and physiology as well known as the comparatively unimportant dead languages, it would be unnecessary to explain to any one, with a liberal education, the nature of these changes. They consist mainly, as has been already mentioned, in the production of a new secretion, called the seminal fluid, by the testicles, and the simultaneous growth of the generative organs, and increase of strength and manliness in the whole frame. With this new bodily developement, come the fresh and powerful feelings of sexual love, and the young man is impelled to new energy of thought and action. It is at this time that the senses, and that part of our nature, which we have been unhappily in the habit of regarding as a sort of slave or rebel against the other mental faculties, demand their free scope; and if these animal passions be unheeded, or unreasonably repressed, the whole organism is liable to become diseased. This is the season for youthful gaiety, and the amusements in which the two sexes join in friendly intercourse; for passionate love with all its hopes and fears, delights and griefs; in short for that part of our experience, which we are meant to draw more from the exercise of the passions, than from reflection. "The man who reflects is a depraved animal," said Rousseau; and the paradox, however exaggerated, is too often applicable to the youth of our time, prematurely enfeebled by care and thought. For our country is sadly deficient in those amusements so necessary for the health and happiness of youth; too frequently the free and joyous communion which should prevail between the two sexes, is overawed by the asceticism of our morality, and shrinks into morbid shyness and bashfulness, rendering distasteful the most agreeable society. How constantly do we see young people, poring over books till they become mere thinking machines; or so intensely spiritual, that it would seem they had escaped from their bodies; or with natural tastes so perverted, that they become at last almost incapable of vigorous manly love! These evils arise from mistaken ideas of their duties to themselves and to their neighbours, from ignorance of the great sexual laws, which I shall now endeavour to the best of my knowledge to explain. LAWS OF THE SEXUAL ORGANS. One physiological law of supreme importance and universal application in our constitution is, that every several member must, in order to be vigorous and healthy, have a due amount of exercise, and that of the normal kind. Thus the eye must have light, the limbs motion, the intellect reflection, and our appetites and passions their normal gratification, else will they infallibly become enfeebled and diseased. Either excessive or deficient exercise is injurious; and in order to have a wellbalanced bodily constitution, (just as much our honor and our duty, as a well-balanced mind), we must obey this law. The generative organs are subject to 't as well as every other, and hence we shall see the duty and necessity of their having due exercise from the time of their ma turity, which takes place at puberty, till that of their decline. If this be neglected, they will be enfeebled, and although in some cases, when other parts of the system take on a vicarious action for the unexercised genital organs, according to another admirable physiological law; in other words, though, by directing the mind to other thoughts and pursuits, and strengthening the frame by exercise, (according to the advice so often given by physicians to the youth of both sexes, whose health is suffering from their ungratified sexual appetites), though thus in some cases health and vigour may apparently be retained, yet it is comparatively rarely, and only in very favourable circumstances, that this will be the case; and even in these, I do not consider the health perfect, where one organ or passion acts vicariously for another, and has thereby double work to do. I feel convinced, that when we have a far higher standard of health than passes current in the present sickly state of our society, such deviations from it will not be permitted. If on the other hand, the genital organs be excessively exercised, they will in like manner become enfeebled; just as the excessive indulgence and dwelling on the feeling of love, detracts from the beauty of the moral character; as is exemplified in some amatory poets, and in the dissipated pleasure hunters, who sacrifice all the rest of their nature to this one passion. Further, if the mode of their exercise be not, the normal one, the consequences will be still worse, for nature allows no departure from her plan with impunity. By the most beautiful and delicate adjustment, she has so united our health and happiness to the natural and normal mode of sexual gratification, that we cannot depart in the least from it without being injured. This, every one will understand to be the case in the injurious habits of self-pollution; but it is not so generally understood, that even in sexual intercourse, the more intense and genuine is the passion felt, the more will its gratification stimulate and elevate mind and body. Love should be real and intense, free from all fear and suspicion, in order to produce its best effects on man. When mercenary or clandestine, in which case the mind is suspicious, solicitous, or, especially on the female side, apathetic, it cannot be said to be normally indulged. I now proceed to speak of the diseases of the genital organs arising from the ignorance and neglect of these laws of healthy exercise. These constitute a most important class of diseases, which may be named the genital diseases, in contradistinction to the venereal ones, from which they are totally different. The former arise from neglect of the laws of healthy exercise, &c., and are not infectious; whereas the latter are propagated by contagion, and are of a completely different nature. EVILS OF ABSTINENCE. It is most unwise to suppose that our chief duty with regard to our appetites and passions is to exercise self-denial. This quality is far from being at all times a virtue; it is quite as often a vice; and it should by no means be unconditionally praised. Every natural passion, like every organ of the body, was intended to have normal exercise and gratification; and this it is to which every individual and society at large should aspire. It is always a sign of imperfection in an individual, or in society, if the normal requirements of all their members be not duly provided for. At present, in this country, abstinence or self-denial in the matter of sexual love is much more frequently a natural vice than a virtue; and instead of deserving praise, merits condemnation, as we may learn from the mode in which all-just nature punishes it. Wherever we see disease following any line of conduct, we may be certain it has been erroneous and sinful, for nature is unerring. Sexual abstinence is frequently attended by consequences not one whit less serious than sexual excess, and far more insidious and dangerous, as they are not so generally recognised. While every moralist can paint in all its horrors the evils of excess, how few are aware that the reverse of the picture is just as deplorable to the impartial and instructed eye! The young man enters on the period of puberty with an imagination glowing with the ideas of love and romance he has read of, or conceived in his own visions of happiness, and all these receive ten-fold intensity from the stimulus of the new bodily developement. If this have no natural outlet, the consequences may be most fearful and deplorable. Thrown upon himself by the asceticism of our morality, he is very liable to contract the habit of solitary indulgence, the baneful effects of which I shall describe under the head of the abuse of the sexual organs. If he do not if, persuaded by the theoretically received, but by no means generally practised, views on moral subjects which surround him, he abstain from all sexual gratifications, he is exposed to the following evils, of which, if we look around us, we may see too many examples. "Haunted by a matory ideas, and tormented by frequent erections of the sexual organ, the spirited youth wars manfully for the citadel of his chastity; he takes refuge in study, in severe bodily exercise, in platonics, the un |