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Title: Owen's Moral Physiology - or, A Brief and Plain Treatise on the Population Question
Author: Owen, Ralph Dale
Language: English
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MORAL PHYSIOLOGY
BY RALPH GLOVER, M.D.
[Illustration: Alas! that it ever should have been born.]
OWEN’S MORAL PHYSIOLOGY:
A BRIEF AND PLAIN TREATISE
ON THE
POPULATION QUESTION.
SECOND EDITION,
WITH ALTERATIONS AND ADDITIONS,
BY RALPH GLOVER, M.D.
“The principle of utility is the foundation of the present work.”
_Bentham on Morals and Legislation._
NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED BY R. GLOVER, 2 ANN-ST.
1846.
ENTERED
According to Act of Congress, in the year 1846,
BY RALPH GLOVER,
In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Southern
District of the State of New York.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
EXPLANATION OF FRONTISPIECE.
EDITOR’S PREFACE.
PREFACE.
INTRODUCTION.
MORAL PHYSIOLOGY.
CHAPTER II. STATEMENT OF THE SUBJECT.
CHAPTER III. THE QUESTION EXAMINED IN THE ABSTRACT.
CHAPTER IV. THE QUESTION IN ITS CONNEXION WITH POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER V. THE QUESTION CONSIDERED IN ITS SOCIAL BEARINGS.
CHAPTER VI. THE SUBJECT CONSIDERED IN ITS IMMEDIATE CONNEXION WITH
PHYSIOLOGY.
CHAPTER VII. ADDITIONAL REMARKS.
CHAPTER VIII. TO THE MARRIED OF BOTH SEXES IN GENTEEL LIFE.
CHAPTER IX. THE PURPOSES AND OBLIGATIONS OF MARRIAGE.
CHAPTER X. CONCLUDING REMARKS.
EXPLANATION OF FRONTISPIECE.
The frontispiece which accompanies this treatise, represents a poor
mother abandoning her infant, at the gate of the Hôtel des Enfans
trouvés, (Foundling Hospital) at Paris. The original painting, from
which this is a faithful copy, is by Vigneron, a French artist of
celebrity; it was purchased at the price of one thousand dollars for the
Galerie Royale, and is now in the possession of the French king.
The Hôtel des Enfans trouvés, than which a more humane institution was
never founded, exhibits, in its every arrangement, order, economy, and,
above all, a beautiful tenderness of the feelings of those poor
creatures who are thus compelled to avail themselves, for their
offspring, of the asylum it affords. No obtrusive observation is made,
no unfeeling question asked: the infant charge is received in silence,
and either trained and supported until maturity, or, if circumstances,
at any subsequent period, enable the parents to claim their offspring,
it is restored to their care.
There is surely no sect or creed so frozen, or ritual so rigid, that it
can systematize away the common feelings of humanity, or dry up, in the
breasts of some gentler spirits, the milk of human kindness. The
benevolent founder and indefatigable supporter of this noble
institution, was a Jesuit! Be the good deeds of St. Vincent de Paul
remembered, long after the intrigues and cruelties of his fellow
sectaries are forgotten!
The case selected is one of mild, of modified,—I had almost said, of
_favoured_ misfortune: an extreme case were too revolting for
representation. But even under these comparatively happy circumstances,
when benevolence extends her Samaritan care to the destitute and the
forsaken, who that regards for a moment the abandoned helplessness of
the deserted child, and the mute distress of the departing mother, but
will join in the exclamation, “Alas! that it should ever have been
born!”
EDITOR’S PREFACE.
Ten years have already elapsed since the publication of the last edition
of Mr. Owen’s book, and it is believed that such change of public
sentiment has taken place, as will render a republication of the work,
with such additions and alterations as the discoveries and improvements
in this department of physiology have brought to light, acceptable to
the author, his friends, and the public. Several years spent in a course
of experimental investigation, have brought to the Editor’s knowledge
some practical facts, which, taken in connexion with the author’s candid
investigation of the subject, would be sufficient apology (were any
necessary) for the publication of this little treatise, at the present
time. Moreover, a train of circumstances have developed themselves
during the last few years, which have done much to remove a bias from
the public mind, unfavourable to the subject matter herein discussed.
These circumstances will insure for it a more favourable reception at
this time. It is a self-evident fact, that every discovery in science
which serves to make mankind happier and better beings, and at the same
time evidently tends to the prevention of crime and to the removal of
moral evil, deserves to be extensively made known.
PREFACE.
It may be proper to state, in few words, the immediate circumstances
which induced me, at the present time, to write and publish this
treatise.
Some weeks since, a gentleman coming from England brought with him two
pretty specimens of English typography. One represented a triumphal arch
with a statue of the late king, and was made up of 17,000 different
pieces of common printing type; the other, an altar piece, having the
Lord’s Prayer, Creed, and Commandments, printed within it, and composed
of about 13,000 separate pieces. The gentleman was requested by a
Brighton printer who executed them, to present these, as specimens of
English typography, to some of his brethern craftsmen in America. He
presented them to me. I admired the ingenuity displayed in the
performance; but thought they ought to have been presented rather to
some printers’ society than to an individual. I therefore addressed them
to our Typographical Society in New York, accompanied by a note simply
requesting the society’s acceptance of them, as specimens of the art in
England.
I thought no more of the matter, until I received, the other day, my
specimens back again, with a long and not a little angry letter, signed
by three of the members, accusing Robert Dale Owen of principles
subversive of every virtue under heaven, and calculated to lead to the
infraction of every commandment in the decalogue: and, more especially,
accusing him of having given his sanction to a work, as they expressed
it, “holding out inducements and facilities for the prostitution of
their daughters, sisters, and wives.”
I subsequently learned, from one of the society, circumstances which
somewhat extenuate (albeit nothing can excuse) their childish
incivility. A gentleman who busied himself last year in making out a
notable reply to the “Society for the Protection of Industry,” got up,
at a late Typographical meeting, and read to the Society several
detached extracts from a pamphlet written by Richard Carlile, entitled
“Every Woman’s Book,” which extracts he pronounced to be excessively
indecent; and asked the Society whether they would receive any thing at
the hands of a man who publicly approved a book of a tendency so
dreadfully immoral; which, he averred, I had done. The society were (or
affected to be) much shocked, and thereupon chose a committee to return
to me the heretical specimens, which committee penned the letter to
which I have alluded.
Probably some members of the society really did believe the work to be
of pernicious tendency. Had some garbled extracts only from it been read
to me, I might possibly have utterly misconceived its tone and tendency,
and its author’s motives. But he must be blind indeed, who can read the
pamphlet through, and then (whether he approve it or not) can attribute
other than good intentions to the individual who was bold enough to put
it forth.
As to the book itself, I was requested, two years since, when residing
in Indiana, to publish it, and declined doing so. My chief reasons were,
that I doubted its physiological correctness; that I did not consider
its style and tone in good taste; but chiefly (as I expressed it in the
New Harmony Gazette) because I feared it would be circulated in this
country only “to fall into the hands of the thoughtless, and to gratify
the curiosity of the licentious, instead of falling, as it ought, into
the hands of the philanthropist, of the physiologist, and of every
father and mother of a family.” The circumstances I have just detailed
may afford proof, that my fears regarding the hands into which it might
fall, were well founded.
My principles thus officiously and publicly attacked, I have felt it a
duty to the cause of reform to step forward and vindicate them; and this
the rather, because, unless I give my own sentiments, I shall be
understood as unqualifiedly endorsing Richard Carlile’s. Now, no one
more admires than I do the courage and strength of mind which induced
that bold advocate of heresy to broach this important subject; and to
him be the praise accorded, that he was _the first_ to venture it. But
the manner of his book I do not admire. There is in it that which was
repulsive (I will not say revolting) to my feelings, on the first
perusal; and though I afterwards began to doubt whether that first
impression was not attributable, in a great measure, to my prejudices,
yet I cannot doubt that a similar, and even a more unfavourable
impression, will be made on the minds of others, and thus the interests
of truth be jeopardized. Then again, I think the physiological portion
of his pamphlet somewhat incorrect as to the facts, and therefore
calculated to mislead, where an error might be of fatal consequence.
It may seem vanity in me to imagine, that this treatise is free from
similar objections; yet I have taken great pains to render it so.
R. D. O.
INTRODUCTION.
The reader, after having been taxed with the perusal of two prefaces
before reaching the subject matter, may consider it a hardship to be
further called upon to read a somewhat lengthy introduction, when the
title of a book should be its best preface; but the Editor would ask
your indulgence while he briefly states the object and design of the
following pages.
It has often been held of questionable propriety, whether the public
should be furnished with medical readings, it being presumed that such
literature tended to thwart the very purposes it professed to encourage:
that, instead of affording an exposition of the ills of our nature,
whereby we might avoid or remove them, its effect necessarily, from the
probable absence of all preliminary medical knowledge on the part of the
reader, was but to create confusion and alarm, and, even where
understood, only to magnify the fear; and this latter notion is grounded
on the popular error, that even professional men, from the same cause,
are least efficient when in attendance upon themselves. The doubt,
however, may now be considered as removed if we but observe how of late
years the desire to possess general information on all matters relative
to the functions of life, has manifested itself, by the public
attendance at the various learned institutions, and how also it has been
encouraged by men eminent for their talents and worth, devoting
themselves to the unfolding and simplification of the professional lore
they had been years in acquiring. Lectures have been given, and large
crowds of silent and anxious auditors have attended them—edition after
edition of popular works on similar subjects, by the same men, have been
called for, and eagerly caught up—the mysteries of physiology have been
laid open from the lowest to the highest scale of creation: the history
of man has been displayed, and his several elements have been
demonstrated—the phenomena of respiration, digestion, and the
circulation of the blood, have all had their share of attention, and
many of the most prevalent diseases of humanity have been discussed and
examined, their causes exposed, and the means of their avoidance
detailed. So far from the public suffering from this diffusion of
medical knowledge, immense advantages have accrued to all classes of
mankind.
Among all the departments of anatomical research thus introduced, public
decorum has judiciously excluded popular enquiries into the
physiological laws of generation. I say judiciously, for the discussion
of such topics, constituted as society is, could not be tolerated in
large assemblies, and probably of both sexes, without the risk of
engendering associations inimical to morality and virtue;[1] but no one
can be blind to the creeping progress there is daily being made, of
touching upon these subjects in popular journals and publications, and
no one can deny at least the importance of obedience to the laws that
abide over the procreation of a healthy or diseased population. In the
absence of information afforded through legitimate channels to the
public, and feeling sensible that many errors are committed through
ignorance, and endured through shame, this little work is tendered,
accompanied with the hope that its usefulness may not be deteriorated by
any misinterpretation of the writer’s motives.
The philosopher, in asking himself the question, _what is love_, solves
it by asking another question, _what is an animal_, or _what is man?_
Looking at mankind, he finds them of two classes, male and female,
varying but little as to external form or internal character. He finds
that they possess the same passions, the same desires, that they live by
the same means, and with the difference of the female being the body
qualified to breed the species, he sees them in every respect to be
exactly alike.
Reproduction or accumulation of identities similar to self is a common
law of animal and vegetable matter; and the disposition to reproduce in
all well-formed and healthy subjects is as powerful as hunger, or
thirst, or the desire of self-preservation. It is a passion not criminal
in the indulgence, but criminality attaches where the indulgence is
withheld; because health, and even life, is endangered. It is not an
artificial passion, such as a craving to exhibit the distinctions of
society; but a natural passion, which we hold in common with every other
animal. It grows with our growth, and is strengthened with our strength.
To prove that genuine love is nothing but this passion, it is sufficient
to refer to the period at which it comes on, and at which it leaves us.
We hear not of love in decaying age or in infancy; and the attachments
of habit, of kindness, of gratitude, or of human, social, individual,
parental, filial, or domestic affection, have no connexion with the
passion of love. We talk of a love, of virtue, of friendship, of
heroism, of character, of generosity; but this kind of love is a matter
wholly distinct from the passion of love between the male and female.
All men are apt to feel the tender passion of love for a beautiful
woman: all women for a handsome and agreeable man: but this is nothing
more than a desire to associate ourselves with the most agreeable
objects for sexual commerce. The every day occurrences of mankind
explain this matter, and hence the many violences and intrigues
connected with the passion of love; hence seductions, adulteries, rapes
and intercourses pronounced unlawful in different countries.
The present purpose of this work is, to explain the physiology of the
reproductive organs, and the social bearing that a proper control of the
reproductive instinct will have upon society, and its consequences when
uncontrolled, and the benefits that must necessarily accrue when kept
under due restraint.
Chemical science and experimental investigation, aided by the recent
discoveries in that department of literature, have enabled the Editor to
offer to the suffering mother a safe and sure preventive of conception.
The expediency and moral propriety of its use he trusts will be
satisfactorily explained in the subsequent pages.
MORAL PHYSIOLOGY.
I sit down to write a little treatise, which will subject me to abuse
from the self-righteous, to misrepresentation from the hypocritical, and
to reproach even from the honestly prejudiced. Some may refuse to read
it; and many more will misconceive its tendency. I would have delayed
its publication, had the choice been permitted me, until the popular
mind was better prepared to receive it; but the enemies of reform have
already foisted the subject, under an odious form, on the public: and I
have no choice left. If, therefore, I prematurely touch the honest
prejudices of any, let them bear in mind, that the occasion is not of my
seeking.
The subject I intend to discuss is strictly a physiological subject,
although connected, like many other physiological subjects, with
political economy, morals, and social science. In discussing it, I must
speak as plainly as physicians and physiologists do. What I mean, I must
say. Pseudo-civilized man, that anomalous creature who has been not
inaptly defined “an animal ashamed of his own body,” may take it ill
that I speak simply: I cannot help that.
A foreign princess, travelling towards Madrid to become queen of Spain,
passed through a little town of the peninsula, famous for its
manufactory of gloves and stockings. The magistrates of the place, eager
to evince their loyalty towards their new queen, presented her, on her
arrival, with a sample of those commodities for which alone their town
was remarkable. The major domo, who conducted the princess, received the
gloves very graciously; but when the stockings were presented, he flung
them away with great indignation, and severely reprimanded the
magistrates for this egregious piece of indecency. “Know,” said he,
“that a queen of Spain has no legs.”[2]
I never could sympathize with this major domo delicacy; and if you can,
my reader, you had better throw this book aside at once.
If you have travelled and observed much, you will already have learnt
the distinction between real and artificial propriety. If you have been
in Constantinople, you probably know, that when the grand seignor’s
wives are ill, the physician is only allowed to see the wrist, which is
thrust through an opening in the side of the room, because it is
improper even for a physician to look upon another man’s wife; and it is
thought better to sacrifice health than propriety.[3]
If you have sojourned among the inhabitants of Turcomania, you know that
they consider a woman’s virtue sacrificed for ever, if, before marriage,
she be seen to stop on the public road to speak to her lover:[4] and if
you have read Buckingham’s travels, you may remember a very romantic
story, in which a young Turcoman lady, having thus forfeited her
reputation, is left for dead on the road by her brothers, who were
determined their sister should not survive her dishonor.
Perhaps you may have travelled in Asia. If so, you cannot be ignorant
how grossly indecorous to Asiatic ears it is, to enquire of a husband
after his wife’s health; and probably you may know, that men have lost
their lives to atone for such an impropriety. You know, too, of course,
that in Eastern nations it is indecent for a woman to uncover her face;
but perhaps you may not know, unless your travels have extended to
Abyssinia, that there the indecency consists in uncovering the feet.[5]
In Central Africa, you may have seen women bathing in public, without
the slightest sense of impropriety; but you were doubtless told, that
men could not be permitted a similar liberty; seeing that modesty
requires they should perform their ablutions in private.
If my reader has seen all or any of these countries and customs, I doubt
not that he or she will read my little book understandingly, and
interpret it in the purity which springs from enlarged and enlightened
views; or, indeed, from common sense. If not—if you who now peruse these
lines have been educated at home, and have never passed the boundary
line of your own nation—perhaps of your own village—if you have not
learnt that there are other proprieties besides those of your country;
and that, after all, genuine modesty has its legitimate seat in the
heart rather than in the outward form or sanctioned custom—then, I fear
me, you may chance to cast these pages from you, as the major domo did
the proffered stockings, unconscious that the indelicacy lies, not in my
simple words, or the Spanish magistrates’ honest offering, but in the
pruriently sensitive imagination that discovers impropriety in either.
Yet, even though inexperienced, if you be still young and pure-minded,
you may read this book through, and I shall fear from your lips, or in
your hearts, no odious misconstruction.
Young men and women! you who, if ignorant, are uncorrupted also; you in
whose minds honest and simple words call up none but honest and simple
ideas; you who think no evil; you who are still believers in human
virtue and human happiness; you who, like our fabled first parents in
their paradise, are yet unlearned alike in the hypocritical
conventionalities and the odious vices of pseudo-civilization; you, with
whom love is stronger than fear, and the law within the breast more
powerful than that in the statue book; you whose feelings are still
unblunted, and whose sympathies still warm and generous; you who belong
to the better portion of your species, and who have formed your opinion
of mankind from guileless spirits like your own—young men and women! it
is to your pure feelings I would fain speak: it is by your
unsophisticated hearts I would fain have my treatise and my motives
judged.
Libertines and debauchees! this book is not for you. You have nothing to
do with the subject of which it treats. Bringing to its discussion, as
you do, a distrust or contempt of the human race—accustomed as you are
to confound liberty with license, and pleasure with debauchery, it is
not for your palled feelings and brutalized senses to distinguish moral
truth in its purity and simplicity. I never discuss this subject with
such as you.
It has been remarked, that nothing is so suspicious in a woman, as
vehement pretensions to especial chastity; it is no less true, that the
most obtrusive and sensitive stickler for the etiquette of orthodox
morality is the heartless rake. The little intercourse I have had with
men of your stamp, warns me to avoid the serious discussion of any
species of moral heresy with you. You approach the subject in a tone and
spirit revolting alike to good taste and good feeling. You seem to
pre-suppose—from your own experience, perhaps—that the hearts of all
men, and more especially of all women, are deceitful above all things
and desperately wicked; that violence and vice are inherent in human
nature, and that nothing but laws and ceremonies prevent the world from
becoming a vast slaughter-house, or an universal brothel. You judge your
own sex and the other by the specimens you have met with in wretched
haunts of mercenary profligacy; and, with such a standard in you minds,
I marvel not that you remain incorrigible unbelievers in any virtue, but
that which is forced on the prudish hotbed of ceremonious orthodoxy. I
wonder not that you will not trust the natural soil, watered from the
free skies and warmed by the life-bringing sun. How should you? you have
never seen it produce but weeds and poisons. Libertines and debauchees!
cast my book aside! You will find in it nothing to gratify a licentious
curiosity; and, if you read it, you will probably only give me credit
for motives and impulses like your own.
And you, prudes and hypocrites! you who strain at a gnat and swallow a
camel; you whom Jesus likened to whited sepulchres, which without indeed
are beautiful, but within are full of all uncleanness; you who affect to
blush if the ancle is incidentally mentioned in conversation, or
displayed in crossing a style, but will read indecencies enough, without
scruple, in your closets; you who, at dinner, asked to be helped to the
bosom of a duck, lest by mention of the word breast, you call up
improper associations; you who have nothing but a head and feet and
fingers; you who look demure by daylight, and make appointments only in
the dark—you, prudes and hypocrites! I do not address. Even if honest in
your prudery, your ideas of right and wrong are too artificial and
confused to profit by the present discussion; if dishonest, I desire to
have no communication with you.
Reader! if you belong to the class of prudes or of libertines, I pray
you, follow my argument no farther. Stop here, and believe that my
heresies will not suit you. As a prude, you would find them too honest;
as a libertine, too temperate. In the former case, you might call me a
very shocking person; in the latter, a quiz or a bore.
But if you be honest, upright, pure-minded—if you be unconscious of
unworthy motive or selfish passion—if truth be your ambition, and the
welfare of our race your object—then approach with me a subject the most
important to man’s well-being; and approach it as I do, in a spirit of
dispassionate, disinterested free enquiry. Approach it, resolving to
prove all things, and hold fast that which is good. The discussion is
one to which it is every man’s and every woman’s _duty_, (and ought to
be every one’s _business_,) to attend. The welfare of the present
generation, and—yet far more—of the next, requires it. Common sense
sanctions it. And the national motto of my former country, “Honi soit
qui mal y pense,”[6] may explain the spirit in which it is undertaken,
and in which it ought to be received.
Reader! it ought to concern you nothing who or what I am, who now
addresses you. Truth is truth, if it fall from Satan’s lips; and error
ought to be rejected, though preached by an angel from heaven. Even as
an anonymous work, therefore, this treatise ought to obtain a full and
candid examination from you. But, that you may not imagine I am ashamed
of honestly discussing a subject so useful and important, I have given
you my name on the title page.
Neither is it any concern of yours what my character is, or has been. No
man of sense or modesty unnecessarily obtrudes personalities that regard
himself on the public. And, most assuredly, it is neither to gratify
your curiosity or my vanity, if I now do violence to my feelings, and
speak a few words touching myself. I do so, to disarm, if I can,
prejudice of her sting; and thus to obtain the ears, even of the
prejudiced; and also to acquaint my readers, that they are conversing on
such a subject as this, with one, whom circumstance and education have
happily preserved from habits of excess and associations of profligacy.
All those who have intimately known the life and private habits of the
writer of this little treatise, will bear him witness, that what he now
states is true, to the letter. He was indebted to his parents for habits
of the strictest temperance—some would call it abstemiousness—in _all_
things. He never, at any time, habitually used ardent spirits, wine, or
strong drink of any kind: latterly, he has not even used animal food. He
never chanced to enter a brothel in his life; nor to associate, even for
an evening, with those poor, unhappy victims, whom the brutal, yet
tolerated vices of man, and sometimes their own unsuspicious or
ungoverned feelings, betray to misery and degradation. He never sought
the company but of the intellectual and self-respecting of the other
sex, and has no associations connected with the name of woman, but those
of esteem and respectful affection. To this day, he is even girlishly
sensitive to the coarse and ribald jests in which young men think it
witty to indulge at the expense of a sex they cannot appreciate. The
confidence with which women may have honored him, he has never selfishly
abused; and, at this moment, he has not a single wrong with which to
reproach himself towards a sex, which he considers the equal of man in
all essentials of character, and his superior in generous
disinterestedness and moral worth.
I check my pen. I have said enough, perhaps, to awaken the confidence of
those whose confidence I value; and enough, assuredly, to excite the
ridicule, or the sneer, of him who walks through life wrapped up in the
cloak of conformity, and laughs among his private boon companions, at
the scruples of every novice, who will not, like himself, regard
debauchery and seduction (in secret) as manly and spirited amusements.
And now, reader! if I have succeeded in awakening your attention, and
enlisting in this enquiry your reason and your better feelings, approach
with me a subject the most interesting and important to you—to me—to all
our fellow-creatures. Reader! if you be a woman, forget that I am a man:
if a man, listen to me as you would to a brother. Let us converse, not
as men, nor as women, but as human beings, with common interests,
instincts, wants, weaknesses. Let us converse, if it be possible,
without prejudice and without passion. Reader! whatever be your sex,
sect, rank, or party, to you I would now, ere I commence, address the
poet’s exhortation—here, far more strictly applicable, than in the
investigation to which he applied it:—
“Retire! the world shut out: thy thoughts call home.
Imagination’s airy wing repress.
Lock up thy senses; let no passion stir;
Wake all to reason; let her reign alone.”
CHAPTER II.
STATEMENT OF THE SUBJECT.
Among the human instincts which contribute to man’s preservation and
well-being, the instinct of reproduction holds a distinguished rank. It
peoples the earth; it perpetuates the species. Controlled by reason, and
chastened by good feeling, it gives to social intercourse much of its
charm and zest. Directed by selfishness, or governed by force, it is
prolific of misery and degradation. Whether wisely or unwisely directed,
its influence is that of a master principle, that colours, brightly or
darkly, much of the destiny of man.
It is sometimes spoken of as a low and selfish propensity; and the
Shakers call it a “carnal and sensual passion.”[7] I see nothing in the
instinct itself that merits such epithets. Like other instincts, it may
assume a selfish, mercenary, or brutal character. But in itself, it
appears to me the most social and least selfish of all our instincts. It
fits us to give, even while receiving, pleasure; and, among cultivated
beings, the former power is ever more highly valued than the latter. Not
one of our instincts, perhaps, affords larger scope for the exercise of
disinterestedness, or fitter play for the best moral feelings of our
race. Not one gives birth to relations more gentle, more humanizing and
endearing; not one lies more immediately at the root of the kindliest
charities and most generous impulses that honor and bless human nature.
Its very power, indeed, gives fatal force to its aberrations; even as
the waters of the calmest river, when dammed up or forced from their
bed, flood and ruin the country: but the gentle flow and fertilizing
influence of the stream are the fit emblems of the instinct, when
suffered, undisturbed by force or passion, to follow its own quiet
channel.
That such an instinct should be thought and spoken of as a low, selfish
propensity, and, as such, that the discussion of its nature and
consequences should be almost interdicted in what is called decent
society, is to me a proof of the profligacy of the age, and the impurity
of the pseudo-civilized mind. I imagine that if all men and women were
gluttons and drunkards, they would, in like manner, be ashamed to speak
of diet or of temperance.
Were I an optimist, and, as such, had I accustomed myself to judge and
to admire the arrangements of nature, I should be inclined to put
forward, as one of the most admirable, the arrangement according to
which the temperate fulfilling of the dictates of this, as well as of
almost all other instincts, confers pleasure. The desire of offspring
would probably induce us to perpetuate the species, though no
gratification were connected with the act. In the language of the
optimist, then, “pleasure is gratuitously super-added.” But instead of
pausing to admire arrangements and intentions, the great whole of which
human reason seems little fitted to appreciate or comprehend, I content
myself with remarking, that this very circumstance (in itself surely a
fortunate one, inasmuch as it adds another to the sources of human
happiness) has often been the cause of misery; and, from a blessing, has
been perverted into a curse. Enjoyment has led to excess, and sometimes
to tyranny and barbarous injustice.
Were the reproductive instinct disconnected from pleasure of any kind,
it would neither afford enjoyment nor admit of abuse. As it is, the
instinct is susceptible of either; just as wisdom or ignorance governs
human laws, habits, and customs. It behooves us, therefore, to be
especially careful in its regulation; else what is a great good may
become for us a great evil.
This instinct, then, may be regarded in a two-fold light; _first_, as
giving the power of reproduction: _secondly_, as affording pleasure.
And here, before I proceed, let me recall to the reader’s mind, that it
is the province of rational beings to bear UTILITY strictly in view.
Reason recognizes as little the romantic and unearthly reveries of
Stoicism, as she does the doctrines of health-destroying and
mind-debasing debauchery. She reprobates equally a contemning and an
abusing of pleasure. She bids us avoid asceticism on the one hand, and
excess on the other. In all our enquiries, then, let reason guide us,
and let UTILITY be our polar star.
I have often had long arguments with my friends, the Shakers,[8]
touching the two-fold light in which the reproductive instinct may be
regarded. They commonly stand out stoutly against the propriety of
considering it, except as a means of perpetuating the species; and,
apart from that, they deny that it may be regarded as a legitimate
source of enjoyment. In this I totally dissent from them. It is a much
more noble, because less purely selfish, instinct, than hunger or
thirst. It is an instinct that entwines itself around the warmest
feelings and best affections of the heart; and though it differ from
hunger and thirst in this, that it may remain ungratified without
causing death. I have yet to learn, that because it is _possible_, it is
therefore also _desirable_, to mortify and repress it. I admit, to the
Shakers, that in the world, profligate and hypocritical as we see it,
this instinct is the source of infinite misery; perhaps even, on the
whole, of a _balance_ of unhappiness: and I always freely admit to them,
that if I had to choose between the life of the profligate man of the
world and that of the ascetic Shaker, I should not hesitate a moment to
prefer the latter. But for admitting that the most social and kindly of
human instincts is sensual and degrading in itself, I cannot. I think
its influence moral, humanizing, polishing, beneficent; and that the
social education of no man or woman is fully completed without it. Its
mortification (though far less injurious than its excess) is yet very
mischievous. If it do not give birth to peevishness, or melancholy, or
incipient disease, or unnatural practices, at least it almost always
freezes and stiffens the character, by checking the flow of its
kindliest emotions; and not unfrequently gives to it a solitary,
anti-social, selfish stamp.
I deny the position of the Shaker, then, that the instinct is
justifiable (if, indeed, it be at all) only as necessary to the
reproduction of the species. It is justifiable, in my view, just in as
far as it makes a man happier and a better being. It is justifiable,
both as a source of temperate enjoyment, and as a means by which the
sexes can mutually polish and improve each other.
If a Shaker has read my little book thus far, and cannot reconcile his
mind to this idea, he may as well shut it at once. I found all my
arguments on the position, that the pleasure derived from this instinct,
independent of, and totally distinct from, its ultimate object, the
reproduction of our race, is good, proper, worth securing and enjoying.
I maintain, that its temperate enjoyment is a blessing, both in itself
and in its influence on human character.
Upon this distinction of the instinct into its two-fold character,
hinges the chief point in the present discussion. It sometimes happens,
nay, it happens every day and hour, that mankind obey its impulses, not
from any calculation of consequences, but simply from animal impulse.
Thus many children that are brought into the world owe their existence,
not to deliberate conviction in their parents that their birth was
really desirable, but simply to an unreasoning instinct, which men, in
the mass, have not learnt either to resist or control.
It is a serious question—and surely an exceedingly proper and important
one—whether man can obtain, and whether he is benefitted by obtaining,
control over this instinct. IS IT DESIRABLE, THAT IT SHOULD NEVER BE
GRATIFIED WITHOUT AN INCREASE TO POPULATION? OR, IS IT DESIRABLE, THAT
IN GRATIFYING IT, MAN SHALL BE ABLE TO SAY WHETHER OFFSPRING SHALL BE
THE RESULT OR NOT?
To answer the questions satisfactorily, it would be necessary to
substantiate, that such control may be obtained without the slightest
injury to the physical health, or violence to the moral feelings; and
also, that it should be obtained without any real sacrifice of
enjoyment; or, if that cannot be, with as little as possible.
Thus have I plainly stated the subject. It resolves itself, as my
readers may observe, into two distinct heads; first, the _desirability_
of such control; and, secondly, its _possibility_.
In discussing its desirability, I enter a wide field—a field often
traversed by political economists, by moralists, and by philosophers,
though generally, it will be confessed, to little purpose. This may be,
in a great measure, attributed rather to their fear than their
ignorance. The world would not permit them to say what they knew. I
intend that my readers shall know all that I know on the subject; for I
have long since ceased to ask the world’s leave to say what I think, and
what I believe to be useful to the public.
I propose to begin by considering the question in the abstract, and then
to examine it in its political and social bearings.
CHAPTER III.
THE QUESTION EXAMINED IN THE ABSTRACT.
Is it in itself desirable, that man should obtain control over the
instinct of reproduction, so as to determine when its gratification
shall produce offspring, and when it shall not?
But that common sense is so scarce an article, and that the various
superstitions of the nursery pervade the opinions and cramp the
enquiries, even of after life—but for this, the very statement of the
question might suffice to obtain for it the assent of every rational
being. Nothing so elevates man above the brute creation, as the power he
obtains over his instincts. The lower animal follows them blindly,
unreflectingly. The serpent gorges himself; the bull fights, even to
death, with his rival of the pasture; the dog makes deadly war for a
bone. They know nothing of progressive improvement. The elephant or the
beaver of the nineteenth century, are just as wise, and no wiser, than
the elephant or the beaver of two thousand years ago. Man alone has the
power to improve, cultivate, elevate his nature, from generation to
generation. He alone can control his instincts by reflection of
consequences, and regulate his passions by the precepts of wisdom.
It is strange, that even at this period of the world, we should have to
remind each other, that _all_ knowledge of facts is useful; or, at the
least, cannot be injurious. The knowledge of some facts may be
unimportant; the knowledge of none is mischievous. A human being is a
puppet—a slave, if his ignorance is to be the safeguard of his virtue.
Nor shall we know where to stop, if we follow up this principle. Shall
we give our sons lessons in mechanics? but they may thereby learn to
pick locks. Shall we teach them to read? but they may thus obtain access
to falsehood and folly. Shall we instruct them in writing? but they may
become forgers.
Such, in effect, was the reasoning of men in the dark ages. When Walter
Scott puts in the mouth of Lord Douglas, on the discovery of Marmion’s
treachery the following exclamation, it is strictly in accordance with
the spirit and prevailing opinions of the times:
“A letter forged! Saint Jude to speed!
Did ever knight so foul a deed!
At first in heart it liked me ill,
When the king praised his clerkly skill.
Thanks to Saint Bothan, son of mine,
Save Gawain, ne’er could pen a line:
So swore I, and so swear I still,
Let my boy bishop fret his fill.”
But the days are gone by when ignorance may be the safeguard of virtue.
The _only_ rock-foundation for virtue is knowledge. There is _no_ fact,
in physics or in morals, that ought to be concealed from the enquiring
mind. Let that parent, who thinks to secure his sons’ honesty or his
daughters’ innocence, by keeping back from them facts—let that parent
know, that he is building up their morality on a sandy foundation. The
rains and the floods of the world’s influence shall beat upon that
virtue, and great shall be the fall thereof.
If man, then, can obtain control over this most important of instincts,
it is, _in principle_, right that he should know it. If men, after
obtaining such knowledge, think fit not to use it; if they deem it
nobler and more virtuous, to follow each animal impulse, like the beasts
of the field and the fowls of the air, without a thought of its
consequences, or an enquiry into its nature—then let them do so. The
knowledge that they have the power to act more like rational beings,
will not injure, if it fail to benefit them. They are at perfect liberty
to set it aside, to neglect it, to forget it, if they can. Only let them
show common sense enough to permit that others, who are more slow to
incur sacred responsibilities, and more willing to give reason the
control of instinct, should obtain the requisite knowledge, and follow
out their prudent resolutions.
If this little book were in the hands of every adult in the United
States, not one need profit by it, unless he sees fit. Nor will any man
admit that he can possibly be injured by it. Oh no. _His_ virtue can
bear any quantity of light. But then, his neighbour’s, or his son’s, or
his daughter’s!
This would lead me to discuss the _social bearings_ of the question.
But, as conceiving it more in order, I shall first speak of it in
connexion with political economy.
CHAPTER IV.
THE QUESTION IN ITS CONNEXION WITH POLITICAL ECONOMY.
The population question, as it is called, has of late years occupied
much attention, especially in Great Britain. It was first prominently
brought forward and discussed, through two large volumes, by Malthus, an
English clergyman. Godwin, Ricardo, Thompson, Place, Mill, and other
celebrated cotemporary writers, have all discussed it, with more or less
reserve, and at greater or less length.
Malthus’ work has become the text book of a large politico-economist
party in England. His doctrine is, that “_population unrestrained, will
advance beyond the means of subsistence_.” He asserts, that in most
countries population at this moment presses against the means of
subsistence; and that in all countries, it has a tendency so to do. He
recommends, as a preventive of the growing evil, celibacy till a late
age, say thirty years; and he asserts, that unless this “moral
restraint” is exerted, vice, poverty and misery, will and must become
the checks to population. His book, in my opinion, has done infinite
mischief. I have heard his disciples openly declare, that they
considered the crimes and wretchedness of society to be _necessary_—to
be the express ordainings of Providence, intended to prevent the earth
from being over-peopled. I have heard it argued by men of rank, wealth
and influence, that the distinctions of rich and poor, and even of
morality and immorality, of luxury and want, will and must exist to the
end of the world; that he who attempts to remove them fights against God
and nature; and, if he partially succeed, will but afford the human race
an opportunity to increase, until the earth shall no longer suffice to
contain them, and they shall be compelled to prey on each other. It must
be confessed, that this is a comfortable doctrine for the rich idler: it
is a healing salve to the luxurious conscience; an opiate to drown the
still small voice of truth and humanity, which calls to every man to be
up and do his part towards the alleviation of the human suffering that
every where stares him in the face.
It is vain to argue with these defenders of the evils that be, that the
day of overstocking is afar off. They tell you, it must come at last;
and that the more you do to remove vice and misery—those destroyers of
population—the sooner it will come. And what reply can one make to the
argument in the abstract? I believe it to be proved, that population,
unrestrained,[9] will double itself on an average every twenty-five to
fifty years. If so, it is evident to a demonstration, that, if
population be not restrained, morally or immorally, the earth will _at
last_ furnish no foothold for the human beings that will cover it.
Take a medium calculation as to the natural rate of increase, and say,
that population, unrestrained, will double itself every _thirty-three
and a third_ years. That it has done so, (without reckoning the increase
from emigration,) in many parts of this continent, is certain.
Then, if we suppose the present numerous checks to population, viz.
want, war, vice, and misery, removed by national reform, and if we
assume the present population of the world at one thousand millions, we
shall find the rate of increase as follows:
At the end of 100 years, there will be 8,000 millions.
------------- 200 ------------------- 64,000 ---------
------------- 300 ------------------ 512,000 ---------
------------- 400 ---------------- 4,096,000 ---------
------------- 500 --------------- 32,768,000 ---------
And so on, multiplying by 8 for every additional hundred years. So that,
in 500 years, there would be more than _thirty thousand_ times as many
as at present: and in 1000 years, upwards of _a thousand million_ times
as many human beings as at this moment: consequently, _one single pair_,
if suffered to increase without check, _would, in 1000 years, increase
to more than double the present population of the globe_.
It appears evident, then, to a demonstration, that population CANNOT be
suffered to increase unrestrained for more than a very few hundred
years. We are thus compelled to admit to Malthus, that, _sooner_ or
_later_, some restraint or other to population _must_ be employed; and
compelled to admit to his aristocratic disciples, that if no other
better restraint than vice and misery can be found, then _vice and
misery must be_; they are the lot of man, from generation to generation.
Let me repeat it: it is no question—never can be a question—whether
there shall be a restraint to population or not. There MUST be; unless
indeed we find the means of visiting other planets, so as to people
them. In the nature of things, there must be a check, of some kind, at
some time. The _only_ question is, what that check shall be—whether, as
heretofore, the check of war, want, profligacy, misery; or a “moral
restraint,” sanctioned by reason and suggested by experience.
Let those, then, who cry out against this little treatise, be told, that
though they may postpone the question, no human power can evade it. It
must come up. Had the friends of reform been left to choose their own
time, it might, perhaps with advantage, have been postponed. And it is
an imaginable case, that prejudice might delay it until a general famine
or a universal civil war became the frightful checks. But will any man
of common sense argue the propriety of suffering such a crisis to
approach?
Malthus saw this. He saw that some check must exist; and, whatever some
of his disciples might permit themselves to say, he did not choose to be
considered the apologist of vice and misery. His theory, indeed,
supplied specious arguments to those who asserted, with the ingenious
author of the Fable of the Bees,[10] that “private vices are public
benefits;” and in consequence, its tendency appears to be essentially
aristocratic and _demoralizing_, as tending to produce supine
contentment with a vicious and degrading order of things. But Malthus
himself declares the only proper check to be, the general practice of
celibacy to a late age. He employs all his eloquence to persuade men and
women that they ought not to marry till they are twenty-eight or thirty;
and that if they do, they are contributing to the misery of the
world.[11]
Now, Mr. Malthus may preach for ever on this subject. Individuals may
indeed be found, who will look to distant consequences, and sacrifice
present enjoyment; even as individuals are found to become and remain
Shaking Quakers: but to believe that the mass of mankind will abjure,
through the ten fairest years of life, the nearest and dearest of social
relations; and during the very holiday of existence, will live the life
of monks and nuns—all to avert a catastrophe which is confessedly some
hundreds of years distant—to believe this, requires a faith which no
accurate observer of mankind possesses.
This weak point the aristocratic expounders of Malthus’ doctrines were
not slow to discover. They broadly asserted, that such “moral restraint”
would never be generally practiced. They asked, whether a young woman,
to whom a comfortable home and a pleasant companion were offered, would
refuse to accept them, on this theory of population; whether a young man
who had a fair (or even but a very indifferent) prospect of maintaining
a family, would doom himself to celibacy lest the world should be
over-peopled. And they put it to the advocates of late marriages,
whether, in one sex at least, the recommendation, if even nominally
followed, would not almost certainly lead to vicious excess and
degrading associations; thus resolving the check into vice and misery at
last. If experience answered these questions in the negative, was it not
clear, (they would exultingly ask,) that vice and misery are the natural
lot of man; and that it is quixotic, if not impious, to plague ourselves
about them, or to attempt, by their suppression, to controvert the
decrees of God?
It was very easy for generous feelings to reply to so heartless an
argument. It was easy to ask, whether even the apparent hopelessness of
the case formed any legitimate apology for supine indifference; or
whether, where we cannot cure, we are absolved from the duty of
alleviating. But it was not very easy fully and fairly to meet the
question. It was idle to deny that preaching would not put off marriage
for ten years: and if no other species of moral restraint than ten years
Shakerism could be proposed, it did appear evident enough, that moral
restraint would be by the mass neglected, and that the physical checks
of vice and misery must come into play at last.
I pray my readers, then, distinctly, to observe how the matter stands.
Population, unrestrained, _must_ increase beyond the possibility of the
earth and its produce to support. At present it is restrained by vice
and misery. The only remedy which the orthodoxy of the English clergyman
permits him to propose, is, late marriages. The most enlightened
observers of mankind are agreed, that nothing contributes so positively
and immediately to demoralize a nation, as when its youth refrain, until
a late period, from forming disinterested connections with those of the
other sex. The frightful increase of prostitutes, the destruction of
health, the rapid spread of intemperance, the ruin of moral feelings,
are to the mass, the _certain_ consequences. Individuals there are who
escape the contagion; individuals whose better feelings revolt, under
_any_ temptation, from the mercenary embrace, or the Circean cup of
intoxication; but these are exceptions only. The mass must have their
pleasures; the pleasures of intellectual intercourse, of unbought
affection, and of good taste and good feeling, if they can; but if they
cannot, then such pleasure (alas! that language should be perverted to
entitle them to the name!) as the sacrifice of money and the ruin of
body and mind can purchase.[12]
But this is not all. Not only is Malthus’ proposition fraught with
immorality, in that it discountenances to a late age those disinterested
sexual connexions which can alone save youth from vice; but it is
_impracticable_. Men and women will scarcely pause to calculate the
chances they have of affording support to their children ere they become
parents: how, then, should they stop to calculate the chances of the
world’s being over-peopled? Malthus may say what he pleases, they never
will make any such calculation; and it is folly to expect they should.
Let us observe, then: _unless some less ascetic and more practicable
species of “moral restraint” be introduced_, vice and misery will
_ultimately_ become the inevitable lot of man upon earth. He can no more
escape them, than he can the light of the sun, or the stroke of death.
What an incitement, this, to the prosecution of our enquiry! Here is a
principle set up, which is all but an apology for the apathy that
prevails among the rich and the powerful—among governors and
legislators—in regard to human improvement. How important, how essential
for the interests of virtue, that it should be refuted! How beneficent
that knowledge, which discloses to us some moral, practicable check to
population, and relieves us from the despairing conclusion, that the
irrevocable doom of man is misery, without remedy and without end! In
the absence of such knowledge, truly the prospects of the world were
dark and cheerless. The modern doctrine of population has weighed like a
spell on the exertions of benevolence, and chilled, almost to inaction,
even the warm heart of charity. Philanthropy herself pauses, when she
begins to fear that all her exertions are to result in hopeless
disappointment. And yet—such is this world—even the ablest opponents of
Malthus stop short when they come to the question, and leave an argument
unanswered, which a dozen pages might suffice for ever to set at rest.
Let one of the most intelligent of these opponents, a man of splendid
and sterling talent—let MILL, the celebrated political economist and
talented author of “British India,” speak for himself.
I extract from the article “Colony,” in the supplement to the
Encyclopædia Britannica, and which is from the pen of Mill, the
following paragraph:
“What are the best means of checking the progress of population, when it
cannot go on unrestrained without producing one or other of two most
undesirable effects, either drawing an undue portion of the population
to the mere raising of food, or producing poverty and wretchedness, it
is not now the time to enquire. _It is, indeed, the most important
practical problem to which the wisdom of the politician and the moralist
can be applied._ It has, till this time, been miserably evaded by all
those who have meddled with the subject, as well as by those who were
called upon by their situation to find a remedy for the evils to which
it relates. And yet, _if the superstitions of the nursery were
disregarded, and the principle of utility kept steadily in view_, a
solution might not be very difficult to be found; and the means of
drying up one of the most copious sources of human evil—a source which
_if all other sources were taken away, might alone suffice to retain the
great mass of human beings in misery_, might be seen to be neither
doubtful nor difficult to be applied.”
Let my readers bear in mind, that this is from the pen of one of the
most justly admired writers of the present day; a man celebrated
throughout all Europe, for his works on political economy, and whose
writings are not unknown even on this side the Atlantic. He considers
the question now under discussion to involve “the most important problem
to which the wisdom of the politician and moralist can be applied.” This
question, he admits, has ever been “miserably evaded.” Yet even a man so
influential and enlightened as Mill, must himself yield to the weakness
he reprobates; must speak in parables, as the Nazarene reformer did
before him; and, even while commenting on the “miserable evasion” of a
subject so engrossingly important, must imitate the very evasion he
despises.
I will not imitate it. I am more independently situated than the English
economist; and I see, as clearly as he does, the extreme importance of
the subject. What he saw and declared _ought_ to be said, I will say.
Before concluding this chapter, let me state distinctly, that I by no
means agree with Malthus and other political economists in believing,
that, at this moment, there is an actual excess of population in any
country (China perhaps excepted) in the known world. I believe that
there is more than enough land in every country of Europe to support, in
perfect comfort, all its present inhabitants. That they _are_ not
supported in comfort, is, in my opinion, attributable, not to
overpopulation, but to mal-government. Monopolies favour the rich, taxes
oppress the poor, commercial rivalry grinds its victims to the dust. To
such causes as these, and not to overpopulation, _at the time being_, is
the mass of distress (felt more or less over the civilized world) to be
attributed. Thus, if the enemies of reform would but let us alone, we
might long postpone to other and more important discussions, this
population question. But they will not. They _force_ it upon us. And
though it might have evinced want of judgment to obtrude it
unnecessarily or prematurely on the public, it would betray cowardice to
evade it now, when thrust upon us.
Besides, though it be undeniable that iniquitous laws and a vicious
order of things often produce the result that is falsely attributed to
overpopulation, it is yet equally undeniable, that the most perfect
system of laws in the world could not _ultimately_ prevent the evils of
a superabundant population. And it is no less certain, that, in the
meantime, the pressure of a large family on the labouring man greatly
augments the evil, and often deprives him of that very leisure which he
might employ in devising constitutional means to better his condition,
instead of leaving public business in the hands of political gamblers.
Thus an answer to the population question is offered as an _alleviation_
of existing evils, not as a _cure_ for them. Population might be but
half what it is, and unjust legislation and vicious customs would still
give birth, as they now do, to luxury and want. The laws and customs
ought to be, _must_ be changed; but while the grass is growing, let us
prevent the horse from starving, if we can.
Enough has been said, probably, in this chapter, to determine the
question, whether it is, or is not, _desirable_, in a political point of
view, that some check to population be sought and disclosed—some “moral
restraint” that shall not, like vice and misery, be demoralizing, nor,
like late marriages, be ascetic and impracticable.
CHAPTER V.
THE QUESTION CONSIDERED IN ITS SOCIAL BEARINGS.
This is by far the most important branch of the question. The evils
caused by an overstocking of the world, if even inevitable, are distant;
and an abstract view of the subject, however unanswerable, does not come
home to the mind with the force of detailed reality.
What would be the probable effect, in social life, if mankind obtained
and exercised a control over the instinct of reproduction?
My settled conviction is—and I am prepared to defend it—that the effect
would be salutary, moral, civilizing; that it would prevent many crimes
and more unhappiness; that it would lessen intemperance and profligacy;
that it would polish the manners and improve the moral feelings; that it
would relieve the burden of the poor, and the cares of the rich; that it
would most essentially benefit the rising generation, by enabling
parents generally more careful to educate, and more comfortable to
provide for, their offspring. I proceed to substantiate as I may these
positions.
And first, let us look solely to the situation of married persons. Is it
not notorious, that the families of the married often increase beyond
what a regard for the young beings coming into the world, or the
happiness of those who give them birth, would dictate? In how many
instances does the hard-working father, and more especially the mother,
of a poor family, remain slaves throughout their lives, tugging at the
oar of incessant labour, toiling to live, and living only to die; when,
if their offspring had been limited to two or three only, they might
have enjoyed comfort and comparative affluence! How often is the health
of the mother, giving birth every year to an infant—happy, if it be not
twins!—and compelled to toil on, even at those times when nature
imperiously calls for some relief from daily drudgery—how often is the
mother’s comfort, health, nay, her life, thus sacrificed! Or, if care
and toil have weighed down the spirit, and at last broken the health of
the father, how often is the widow left, unable, with the most virtuous
intentions, to save her fatherless offspring from becoming degraded
objects of charity, or profligate votaries of vice!
Fathers and mothers! not you who have your nursery and your
nursery-maids, and who leave your children at home, to frequent the
crowded rout, or to glitter in the hot ball-room; but you by the labour
of whose hands your children are to live, and who, as you count their
rising numbers, sigh to think how soon sickness or misfortune may lessen
those wages which are now but just sufficient to afford them
bread—fathers and mothers in humble life! to you my argument comes home,
with the force of reality. Others may impugn—may ridicule it. By bitter
experience you know and feel its truth.
It will be said, that government ought to provide for the support and
education of all the children of the land. No one is less inclined to
deny the position than I. But it _does_ not support and educate them.
And, if it did, a period must come at last, when even such an act of
justice would be no relief from the evils of overpopulation.
Yet this is not all. Every physician knows, that there are many woman so
constituted that they cannot give birth to healthy—sometimes not to
_living_ children. Is it desirable—is it _moral_, that such women should
become pregnant? Yet this is continually the case, the warnings of
physicians to the contrary notwithstanding. Others there are, who ought
never to become parents; because, if they do, it is only to transmit to
their offspring grievous hereditary diseases; perhaps that worst of
diseases, insanity. Yet they will not lead a life of celibacy. They
marry. They become parents, and the world suffers by it. That a human
being should give birth to a child, knowing that he transmits to it
hereditary disease, is, in my opinion, an immorality. But it is a folly
to expect that we can ever induce all such persons to live the lives of
Shakers. Nor is it necessary: all that duty requires of them is, to
refrain from becoming parents. Who can estimate the beneficial effect
which rational moral restraint may thus have, on the health, beauty, and
physical improvement of our race, throughout future generations?
But, apart from these latter considerations, is it not most plainly,
clearly, incontrovertibly _desirable_, that parents _should have the
power_[13] to limit their offspring, whether they choose to exercise it
or not? Who _can_ lose by their having this power? and how many _may_
gain! may gain competency for themselves, and the opportunity carefully
to educate and provide for their children! How many _may_ escape the
jarrings, the quarrels, the disorder, the anxiety, which an overgrown
family too often causes in the domestic circle?
It sometimes happens, that individual instances come home to the
feelings with greater force than any general reasoning. I shall, in this
place, adduce one which came immediately under my cognizance.
In June, 1829, I received from an elderly gentleman of the first
respectability, occupying a public situation in one of the western
states, a letter, requesting to know whether I could afford any
information or advice in a case which greatly interested him, and which
regarded a young woman for whom he had ever experienced the sentiments
of a father. In explanation of the circumstances to which he alluded, he
enclosed me a copy of a letter which she had just written to him and
which I here transcribe verbatim. A letter more touching from its
simplicity, or more strikingly illustrative of the unfortunate situation
in which not one, but thousands, in married life, find themselves
placed, I have never read.
L***, KENTUCKY, MAY 3, 1829.
DEAR SIR,
The friendship which has existed between you and my father, ever since I
can remember; the unaffected kindness you used to express towards me,
when you resided in our neighbourhood, during my childhood; the lively
solicitude you have always seemed to feel for my welfare, and your
benevolence and liberal character, induce me to lay before you, in a few
words, my critical situation, and ask you for your kind advice.
It is my lot to be united in wedlock to a young mechanic of industrious
habits, good dispositions, pleasing manners, and agreeable features,
excessively fond of our children and of me; in short, eminently well
qualified to render himself and family and all around him happy, were it
not for the besetting sin of drunkenness. About once in every three or
four weeks, if he meet, either accidentally or purposely, with some of
his friends, of whom, either real or pretended, his good nature and
liberality procure him many, he is sure to get intoxicated, so as to
lose his reason; and, when thus beside himself, he trades and makes
foolish bargains, so much to his disadvantage, that he has almost
reduced himself and family to beggary, being no longer able to keep a
shop of his own, but obliged to work journey work.
We have not been married quite four years, and have already given being
to three dear little ones. Under present circumstances, what can I
expect will be their fate and mine? I shudder at the prospect before me.
With my excellent constitution and industry, and the labour of my
husband, I feel able to bring up these three little cherubs in decency,
were I to have no more: but when I seriously consider my situation, I
can see no other alternative left for me, than to tear myself away from
the man who, though addicted to occasional intoxication, would sacrifice
his life for my sake; and for whom, contrary to my father’s will, I
successively refused the hand and wealth of a lawyer and of a preacher;
or continue to witness his degradation, and bring into existence, in all
probability, a numerous family of helpless and destitute children, who,
on account of poverty, must inevitably be doomed to a life of ignorance,
and consequent vice and misery.
The dreadful sentence pronounced against me by my father for my
disobedience, forbids me applying to him, either for advice or any thing
else. My husband being somewhat sceptical, my father attributes his
intemperance to his infidelity; though my brother, as you know, being a
member of the same church with my father, is nevertheless, though he
does not fool away his property, more of a drunkard than my husband, and
ranks among the faithful. You will therefore plainly see, that for these
and other reasons, I stand the more in need of your friendly advice; and
I do hope and believe, you will give me such advice and counsel as you
would to your own daughter, had you one in the same predicament that I
am. In so doing, you will add new claims to the gratitude of your
friend,
M. W.
Need I add one word of comment on such a case as this? Every feeling
mind must be touched by the amiable feeling and good sense that pervade
the letter. Every rational being, surely, must admit, that the power of
preventing, without injury or sacrifice, the increase of a family, under
such circumstances, is a public benefit and a private blessing.
Will it be asserted—and I know no other even plausible reply to these
facts and arguments—will it be asserted, that the thing is, in itself,
immoral or unseemly? I deny it; and I point to the population of France,
in justification of my denial. Where will you find, on the face of the
globe, a more polished or more civilized nation than the French, or one
more punctiliously alive to any rudeness, coarseness or indecorum? You
will find none. The French are scrupulous on these points, to a proverb.
Yet, as every intelligent traveller in France must have remarked, there
is scarcely to be found, among the middle or upper classes, (and seldom
even among the working classes,) such a thing as a large family; very
seldom more than three or four children, A French lady of the utmost
delicacy and respectability will, in common conversation, say as
simply—(ay, and as _innocently_, whatever the self-righteous prude may
aver to the contrary)—as she would proffer any common remark about the
weather: “I have three children; my husband and I think that is as many
as we can do justice to, and I do not intend to have any more.”[14]
I have stated notorious facts, facts which no traveller who has visited
Paris, and seen any thing of the domestic life of its inhabitants, will
attempt to deny. However heterodox, then, my view of the subject may be
in this country, I am supported in it by the opinion and the practice of
the most refined and most socially cultivated nation in the world.
Will it still be argued, that the practice, if not coarse, is immoral?
Again I appeal to France. I appeal to the details of the late glorious
revolution—to the innumerable instances of moderation, of courage, of
honesty, of disinterestedness, of generosity, of magnanimity, displayed
on the memorable “three days,” and ever since; and I challenge
comparison between the national character of France for virtue, as well
as politeness, and that of any other nation under heaven.
It is evident, then, that to married persons, the power of limiting
their offspring to their circumstances is most desirable. It may often
promote the harmony, peace, and comfort of families; sometimes it may
save from bankruptcy and ruin, and sometimes it may rescue the mother
from premature death. In _no_ case can it, by possibility, be worse than
superfluous. _In no case can it be mischievous._
If the moral feelings were carefully cultivated, if we were taught to
consult, in every thing, rather the welfare of those we love than our
own, how strongly would these arguments be felt? No man ought even to
_desire_ that a woman should become the mother of his children, unless
it was her express wish, and unless he knew it to be for her welfare,
that she should. Her feelings, her interests, should be for him in this
matter _an imperative law_. She it is who bears the burden, and
therefore with her also should the decision rest. Surely it may well be
a question whether it be desirable, or whether any man ought to ask,
that the whole life of an intellectual, cultivated woman, should be
spent in bearing a family of twelve or fifteen children; to the ruin,
perhaps, of her constitution, if not to the overstocking of the world.
No man ought to require or expect it.
Shall I be told, that this is the very romance of morality? Alas! that
what ought to be a matter of every day practice—a common-place exercise
of the duties and charities of life—a bounden duty—an instance of
domestic courtesy too universal either to excite remark or to merit
commendation—alas! that a virtue so humble that its absence ought to be
reproached as a crime, should, to our selfish perceptions, seem but a
fastidious refinement, or a fanciful supererogation!
But I pass from the case of married persons to that of young men and
women who have yet formed no matrimonial connexion.
In the present state of the world, when public opinion stamps with
opprobrium every sexual connexion which has not received the orthodox
sanction of an oath, almost all young persons, on reaching the age of
maturity, desire to marry. The heart must be very cold, or very
isolated, that does not find some object on which to bestow its
affections. Thus, early marriages would be almost universal, did not
prudential considerations interfere. The young man thinks, “I must not
marry yet. I cannot support a family. I must make money first, and think
of a matrimonial settlement afterwards.”
And so he goes to making money, fully and sincerely resolved, in a few
years, to share it with her whom he now loves. But passions are strong,
and temptations great. Curiosity, perhaps, introduces him into the
company of those poor creatures whom society first reduces to a
dependence on the most miserable of mercenary trades, and then curses
for being what she has made them. There his health and his moral
feelings alike are made shipwreck. The affections he had thought to
treasure up for their first object, are chilled by dissipation and
blunted by excess. He scarcely retains a passion but avarice. Years pass
on—years of profligacy and speculation—and his first wish is
accomplished; his fortune is made. Where now are the feelings and
resolves of his youth?
Like the dew on the mountain,
Like the foam on the river,
Like the bubble on the fountain,
They are gone—and for ever!
He is a man of pleasure—a man of the world. He laughs at the romance of
his youth, and marries a fortune. If gaudy equipages and gay parties
confer happiness, he is happy. But if these be only the sunshine on the
stormy ocean below, he is a victim to that system of morality, which
forbids a reputable connexion until the period when provision has been
made for a large, expected family. Had he married the first object of
his choice, and simply delayed becoming a father until his prospects
seemed to warrant it, how different might have been his lot! Until men
and woman are absolved from the fear of becoming parents, except when
they themselves desire it, they ever will form mercenary and
demoralizing connexions, and seek in dissipation the happiness they
might have found in domestic life.
I know that this, however common, is not a universal case. Sometimes the
heavy responsibilities of a family are incurred, at all risks; and who
shall say how often a life of unremitting toil and poverty is the
consequence? Sometimes—if even rarely—the young mind _does_ hold to its
first resolves. The youth plods through years of cold celibacy and
solitary anxiety; happy, if before the best hours of life are gone, and
its warmest feelings withered, he may return to claim the reward of his
forbearance and his industry. But even in this comparatively happy case,
shall we count for nothing the years of ascetical sacrifice at which
after-happiness is purchased? The days of youth are not too many, nor
its affections too lasting. We may, indeed, if a great object require
it, sacrifice the one and mortify the other. But is this, in itself,
desirable? Does not wisdom tell us, that such sacrifice is a dead
loss—to the warm-hearted often a grievous one? Does not wisdom bid us
temperately enjoy the spring-time of life, “while the evil days come
not, nor the years draw nigh, when we shall say, ‘We have no pleasure in
them?’”
Let us say, then, if we will, that the youth who thus sacrifices the
present for the future, chooses wisely between two evils, profligacy and
asceticism. This is true. But let us not imagine the lesser evil to be a
good. It is _not_ good for man to be alone. It is for no man’s or
woman’s happiness or benefit, that they should be condemned to
Shakerism. It is a violence done to the feelings, and an injury to the
character. A life of rigid celibacy, though infinitely preferable to a
life of dissipation, is yet fraught with many evils. Peevishness,
restlessness, vague longings, and instability of character, are among
the least of these. The mind is unsettled, and the judgment warped. Even
the very instinct which is thus mortified, assumes an undue importance,
and occupies a portion of the thoughts which does not of right or nature
belong to it; and which, during a life of satisfied affection, it would
not obtain.
I speak not now of extreme cases, where solitary vice[15] or disease, or
even insanity, has been the result of ascetical mortification. I speak
of every day cases; and I am well convinced, that, (however wise it
often is, in the present state of the world, to select and adhere to
this alternative,) yet no man or woman can live the life of a
conscientious Shaker, without suffering, more or less, both physically,
mentally, and morally. This is the more to be regretted, because the
very noblest portion of our species—the good, the pure, the high-minded,
and the kind-hearted—are the chief victims.
Thus, inasmuch as the scruple of incurring heavy responsibilities deters
from forming moral connexions, and encourages intemperance and
prostitution, the knowledge which enables man to limit his offspring,
would, in the present state of things, save much unhappiness and prevent
many crimes. Young persons sincerely attached to each other, and who
might wish to marry, would marry early; merely resolving not to become
parents until prudence permitted it. The young man, instead of solitary
toil or vulgar dissipation, would enjoy the society and the assistance
of her he had chosen as his companion; and the best years of life, whose
pleasures never return, would not be squandered in riot, or lost through
mortification.
My readers will remark, that all the arguments I have hitherto employed,
apply strictly to the present order of things, and the present laws and
system of marriage. No one, therefore, need be a moral heretic on this
subject to admit and approve them. The marriage laws might all remain
for ever as they are; and yet a moral check to population would be
beneficent and important.
But there are other cases, it will be said, where the knowledge of such
a check would be mischievous. If young women, it will be argued, were
absolved from the fear of consequences, they would rarely preserve their
chastity. Unlegalized connexions would be common and seldom detected.
Seduction would be facilitated. Let us dispassionately examine this
argument.
I fully agree with that most amiable of moral heretics, Shelley, that
“Seduction, which term could have no meaning in a rational society, has
now a most tremendous one.”[16] It matters not how artificial the
penality which society has chosen to affix to a breach of her capricious
decrees. Society has the power in her own hands; and that moral Shylock,
Public Opinion, enforces the penality, even though it cost the life of
the victim. The consequences, then, to the poor sufferer, whose offence
is, at most, but an error of judgment or a weakness of the heart, are
the same as if her imprudence were indeed a crime of the blackest dye.
And his conduct who, for a momentary, selfish gratification, will
deliberately entail a life of wretchedness on one whose chief fault,
perhaps, was her misplaced confidence in a villain, is not one whit
excused by the folly and injustice of the sentence.[17] Some poet says,
“The man who lays his hands upon a woman
Save in the way of kindness, is a wretch
Whom ’twere gross flattery to call a coward.”
What epithet, then, belongs to him who makes it a trade to win a woman’s
gentle affections, betray her generous confidence, and then, when the
consequences become apparent, abandon her to dependence, and the scorn
of a cold, a self-righteous, and a wicked world; a world which will
forgive any thing but rebellion against its tyranny, and in whose eyes
it seems the greatest of crimes to be unsuspecting and warm-hearted! I
will give my hand freely to a galley-slave, and speak to the
highway-robber as to an honest man; but there is one character with whom
I desire to exchange neither word nor greeting—the cold-hearted,
deliberate, practiced, and calculating seducer!
And, let me ask, what is it gives to the arts of seduction their sting,
and stamps to the world its victim? Why is it, that the man goes free
and enters society again, almost courted and applauded for his
treachery; while the woman is a mark for the finger of reproach, and a
butt for the tongue of scandal? Because she bears about her the mark of
what is called her disgrace. She becomes a mother; and society has
something tangible against which to direct its anathemas. Nine tenths,
at least, of the misery and ruin which are caused by seduction, even in
the present state of public opinion on the subject, result from cases of
pregnancy. Perhaps the unfeeling selfishness of him who fears to become
a father, administers some noxious drug to procure abortion; perhaps—for
even such scenes our courts of justice disclose!—perhaps the frenzy of
the wretched mother takes the life of her infant, or seeks in suicide
the consummation of her wrongs and her woes! Or, if the little being
lives, the dove in the falcon’s claws is not more certain of death, than
we may be, that society will visit, with its bitterest scoffs and
reproaches, the bruised spirit of the mother and the unconscious
innocence of the child.
If, then, we cannot do all, shall we neglect a part? If we cannot
prevent every misery which man’s selfishness and the world’s cruelty
entail on a sex which it ought to be our pride and honor to cherish and
defend; let us prevent as many as we can. If we cannot persuade society
to revoke its unmanly and _unchristian_[18] persecution of those who are
often the best and gentlest of its members—let us, at the least, give to
woman what defence we may, against its violence.
I appeal to any father, trembling for the reputation of his child,
whether, if she were induced to form an unlegalized connexion, her
pregnancy would not be a frightful aggravation? I appeal to him, whether
any innocent preventive which shall save her from a situation that must
soon disclose all to the world, would not be an act of mercy, of
charity, of philanthropy—whether it might not save him from despair, and
her from ruin? The fastidious conformist may frown upon the question,
but to the father it comes home; and, whatever his lips may say, his
heart will acknowledge the soundness and the force of the argument it
conveys.[19]
It may be, that some sticklers for orthodox morality will still demur to
the positions I defend. They will perhaps tell me, as the Committee of a
certain Society in this city lately did, that the power of preventing
conceptions “holds out inducements and facilities for the prostitution
of their daughters, their sisters, and their wives.”[20]
Truly, but they pay their wives, their sisters, and their daughters, a
poor compliment! Is, then, this vaunted chastity a mere thing of
circumstance and occasion? Is there but the difference of opportunity
between it and prostitution? Would their wives, and their sisters, and
their daughters, if once absolved from the fear of offspring, all become
prostitutes—all sell their embraces for gold, and descend to a level
with the most degraded? In truth, but they slander their own kindred;
they libel their own wives, sisters, and daughters. If they spoke
truth—if fear were indeed the only safeguard of their relatives’
chastity, little value should I place on virtue like that! and small
would I esteem his offence, who should attempt to seduce it.[21]
That chastity which is worth preserving is not the chastity that owes
its birth to fear and to ignorance. If to enlighten a woman regarding a
simple physiological fact will make her a prostitute, she must be
especially predisposed to profligacy. But it is a libel on the sex. Few,
indeed, there are, who would continue so miserable and degrading a
calling, could they but escape from it. For one prostitute that is made
by inclination, ten are made by necessity. Reform the laws—equalize the
comforts of society, and you need withhold no knowledge from your wives
and daughters. It is want, not knowledge, that leads to prostitution.
For myself, I would withhold from no sister or daughter, or wife of
mine, any ascertained fact whatever. It should be to me a duty and a
pleasure to communicate to them all I knew myself: and I should hold it
an insult to their understandings and their hearts to imagine, that
their virtue would diminish as their knowledge increased. Vice is never
the offspring of just knowledge, and they who say it is, slander their
own nature. Would we but trust human nature, instead of continually
suspecting it, and guarding it by bolts and bars, and thinking to make
it very chaste by keeping it very ignorant, what a different world we
should have of it! The virtue of ignorance is a sickly plant, ever
exposed to the caterpillar of corruption, liable to be scorched and
blasted even by the free light of heaven; of precarious growth; and,
even if at last artificially matured, of little or no real value.
I know that parents often think it right and proper to withhold from
their children—especially from their daughters—facts the most
influential on their future lives, and the knowledge of which is
essential to every man and woman’s well-being.[22] Such a course has
ever appeared to me ill-judged and productive of very injurious effects.
A girl is surely no whit the better for believing, until her marriage
night that children are found among the cabbage leaves in the garden.
The imagination is excited, the curiosity kept continually on the
stretch; and that which, if simply explained, would have been
recollected only as any other physiological phenomenon, assumes all the
rank and importance and engrossing interest of a mystery. Nay, I am well
convinced, that mere curiosity has often led ignorant young people into
situations, from which a little more confidence and openness on the part
of their parents or guardians, would have effectually secured them.
In the monkish days of mental darkness, when it was taught and believed,
that all the imaginations and all the thoughts of man are only evil
continually—when it was deemed right and proper to secure the submission
of the mass by withholding from them the knowledge even how to read and
write—in those days, it was all very well to shut up the physiological
page, and tell us, that on the day we read therein we should surely die.
But those times are past. In this nineteenth century, men and women
read, think, discuss, enquire, judge for themselves. If, in these latter
days, there is to be virtue at all, she must be the offspring of
knowledge and of free enquiry, not of ignorance and mystery. We _cannot_
prevent the spread of any real knowledge, even if we would; we _ought_
not, even if we could.
This book will make its way through the whole United States. Curiosity
and the notoriety which has already been given to the subject, will
suffice at first to obtain for it circulation. The practical importance
of the subject it treats of will do the rest. It needed but some one to
start the stone; its own momentum will suffice to carry it forward.
But, if we _could_ prevent the circulation of truth, why _should_ we? We
are not afraid of it ourselves. No man thinks _his_ morality will suffer
by it. Each feels certain that his virtue can stand any degree of
knowledge. And is it not the height of egregious presumption in each to
imagine that his neighbour is so much weaker than himself, and requires
a bandage which he can do without? Most of all, is it presumptuous to
suppose, that that knowledge which the man of the world can bear with
impunity, will corrupt the young and the pure-hearted. It is the sullied
conscience only that suggests such fears. Trust youth and innocence.
Speak to them openly. Show them that you respect them, by treating them
with confidence; and they will quickly learn to respect and to govern
themselves. You enlist even their pride in your behalf; and you will
soon see them make it their boast and their highest pleasure to _merit_
your confidence. But watch them, and show your suspicion of them but
once—and you are the jailor, who will keep his prisoners just as long as
bars and bolts shall prevent their escape. The world was never made for
a prison-house; it is too large and ill-guarded: nor were parents ever
intended for goal-keepers; their very affections unfit them for the
task.
There is no more beautiful sight upon earth, than a family among whom
there are no secrets and no reserves: where the young people confide
every thing to their elder friends—for such to them are their
parents—and where the parents trust every thing to their children; where
each thought is communicated as freely as it arises; and all knowledge
given, as simply as it is received. If the world contain a prototype of
that Paradise, where nature is said to have known no sin or impropriety,
it is such a family; and if there be a serpent that can poison the
innocence of its inmates, that serpent is SUSPICION.
I ask no greater pleasure than thus to be the guardian and companion of
young beings whose innocence shall speak to me as unreservedly as it
thinks to itself; of young beings who shall never imagine that there is
guilt in their thoughts, or sin in their confidence; and to whom, in
return, I may impart every important and useful fact that is known to
myself. Their virtue shall be of that hardy growth, which _all_ facts
tend to nourish and strengthen.
I put it to my readers, whether such a view of human nature, and such a
mode of treating it, be not in accordance with the noblest feelings of
their hearts. I put it to them, whether they have not felt themselves
encouraged, improved, strengthened in every virtuous resolution, when
they were generously trusted; and whether they have not felt abased and
degraded, when they were suspiciously watched, and spied after, and kept
in ignorance. If they find such feelings in their own hearts, let them
not self-righteously imagine, that they only can be won by generosity,
or that the nature of their fellow-creatures is different from their
own.
There are other considerations connected with this subject, which
farther attest the social advantages of the control I advocate. Human
affections are mutable, and the sincerest of mortal resolutions may
change.[23] Every day furnishes instances of alienations, and of
separations; sometimes almost before the honey-moon is well expired. In
such cases of unsuitability, it cannot be considered desirable that
there should be offspring; and the power of refraining from becoming
parents until intimacy had, in a measure, established the likelihood of
permanent harmony of views and feelings, must be confessed to be
advantageous.
The limits which my numerous avocations prescribe to this little
treatise, permit me not to meet every argument in detail, which
ingenuity or prejudice might put forward. If the world were not actually
afraid to think freely or to listen to the suggestions of common sense,
three-fourths of what has already been said would be superfluous; for
most of the arguments employed would occur spontaneously to any
rational, reasoning being. But the mass of mankind have still, in a
measure, every thing to learn on this subject. The world seems to me
much to resemble a company of gourmands, who sit down to a plentiful
repast, first very punctiliously saying grace over it; and then, under
sanction of the priest’s blessing, think to gorge themselves with
impunity; as conceiving, that gluttony after grace is no sin. So it is
with popular customs and popular morality. Every thing is permitted, if
external forms be but respected. Legal roguery is no crime, and
ceremony-sanctioned excess no profligacy. The substance is sacrificed to
the form, the virtue to the outward observance. The world troubles its
head little about whether a man be honest or dishonest, so he knows how
to avoid the penitentiary and escape the hangman. In like manner, the
world seldom thinks it worth while to enquire whether a man be temperate
or intemperate, prudent or thoughtless. It takes especial care to inform
itself whether in all things he conforms to orthodox requirements; and,
if he does, all is right. Thus men too often learn to consider an oath
an absolution from all subsequent decencies and duties, and a full
release from all after responsibilities. If a husband maltreat his wife,
the offence is venal; for he premised it by making her, at the altar, an
“honest woman.” If a married father neglect his children, it is a
trifle; for grace was regularly said, before they were born.
So true is this, that if some heterodox moralist were to throw out the
idea, that many of the rudenesses and jarrings, and much of the
indifference and carelessness of each others’ feelings that is exhibited
in married life, might be traced to the almost universal custom (in this
country though not in France) of man and wife continually occupying the
same bed—if he put it to us whether such a forced and too frequent
familiarity were not calculated to lessen the charms and pleasures, and
diminish the respectful regard and deference, which ought ever to
characterize the intercourse of human beings—if, I say, some heretical
preferrer of things to forms were to light upon and express some such
unlucky idea as this, ten to one the married portion of the community
would fall upon him without mercy, as an impertinent intermeddler in
their most legitimate rights and prerogatives.
With such a world as this, it is a difficult matter to reason. After
listening to all I have said, it may perhaps cut me short by reminding
me, that nature herself declares it to be right and proper, that we
should reproduce our species without calculation or restraint. I will
ask, in reply, whether nature also declares it to be right and proper,
that when the thermometer is at 96°, we should drink greedily of cold
water, and drop down dead in the streets? Let the world be told, that if
nature gave us our passions and propensities, she gave us also the power
wisely to control them; and that, when we hesitate to exercise that
power we descend to a level with the brute creation, and become the
sport of fortune—the mere slaves of circumstance.[24]
To one other argument it were not, perhaps, worth while to advert, but
that it has been already speciously used to excite popular prejudice. It
has been said, that to recommend to mankind prudential restraint in
cases where children cannot be provided for, is an insult to the poor
man; since all ought to be so circumstanced that they might provide
amply for the largest family. Most assuredly all _ought_ to be so
circumstanced; but all _are_ not. And there would be just as much
propriety in bidding a poor man to go and take by force a piece of
Saxony broadcloth from his neighbour’s store, because he _ought_ to be
able to purchase it, as to encourage him to go on producing children,
because he _ought_ to have wherewithal to support them. Let us exert
every nerve to correct the injustice and arrest the misery that results
from a vicious order of things; but, until we have done so, let us not,
for humanity’s sake, madly recommend that which grievously aggravates
the evil; which increases the burden on the present generation, and
threatens with neglect and ignorance the next.
And now, let my readers pause. Let them review the various arguments I
have placed before them. Let them reflect how intimately the instinct of
which I treat is connected with the social welfare of society. Let them
bear in mind, that just in proportion to its social influence, is it
important that we should know how to control and govern it; that, when
we obtain such control, we may save ourselves—and, what we ought to
prize much more highly, may save our companions and our offspring, from
suffering or misery; that by such knowledge, the young may form virtuous
connexions, instead of becoming profligates or ascetics; that, by it,
early marriage is deprived of its heaviest consequences, and seduction
of its sharpest sting: that, by it, man may be saved from moral ruin,
and woman from desolating dishonour; that by it the first pure
affections may be soothed and satisfied, instead of being thwarted or
destroyed—let them call to mind all this, and then let them say, whether
the possession of such control be not a blessing to man.
It shocks the mind of a woman at the first thought; but once practiced,
all prejudice flies, and gratification must be the consequence. To weak
and sickly females, to those to whom parturition is dangerous, and who
never produce living or healthy children, the discovery is a great
blessing. And it is also a real blessing in all other cases, where
children are not desired. It will become the very bulwark of love and
wisdom, of beauty, health, and happiness.
CHAPTER VI.
THE SUBJECT CONSIDERED IN ITS IMMEDIATE CONNEXION WITH PHYSIOLOGY.
It now remains, after having spoken of the _desirability_ of obtaining
control over the instinct of reproduction, to speak of its
_practicability_.
As, in this world, the value of labour is too often estimated almost in
proportion to its inutility, so in physical science, contested questions
seem to have attracted attention and engaged research, almost in the
inverse ratio of their practical importance. We have a hundred learned
hypotheses for one decisive practical experiment. We have many thousands
of volumes written to explain fanciful theories, and scarcely as many
dozens to record ascertained facts.
It is not my intention, in discussing this branch of the subject, to
examine the hundred ingenious theories of generation which ancient and
modern physiologists have put forth. I shall not enquire whether the
future human being owes its first existence, as Hippocrates and Galen
asserted, and Buffon very ingeniously supports, to the union of two
life-giving fluids, each a sort of extract of the body of the parent,
and composed of organic particles similar to the future offspring; or
whether, as Harvey and Haller teach, the embryo reposes in the ovum
until vivified by the seminal fluid, or perhaps only by the _aura
seminalis_; or whether, according to the theories of Leuvenhoeck and
Boerhaave, the future man first exists as a spermatic animalcula, for
which the ovum becomes merely the nourishing receptacle; or whether, as
the ingenious Andry imagines, a vivifying worm be the more correct
hypothesis; or whether, finally, as Perault will have it,[25] the embryo
beings (too wonderfully organized to be supposed the production of any
mere physical phenomenon) must be imagined to come directly from the
hands of the Creator, who has filled the universe with these little
germs, too minute, indeed, to exercise all the animal functions, but
still self-existent, and awaiting only the insinuation of some subtle
essence into their microscopic pores, to come forth as human beings.
Still less am I inclined to follow Hippocrates and Tertullian in their
enquiries, whether the soul is merely introduced into the fœtus, or
preexists in the semen, and becomes, as it were, the architect of its
future residence, the body;[26] or to attempt a refutation of the
hypothesis of the metaphysical naturalist,[27] who asserts, (and adduces
the infinite indivisibility of matter in support of the assertion,) that
the actual germs of the whole human race, and of all that are yet to be
born, existed in the ovaria of our first mother, Eve. I leave these and
fifty other hypotheses as ingenious and as useless, to be discussed by
those who seem to make it a point of honour to leave no fact unexplained
by some imagined theory; and I descend at once to the _terra firma_ of
positive experience and actual observation.
All things having life, increase and multiply upon an analogous
principle, but the method of effecting that increase differs very
considerably. In the human race, nature has furnished the sexes parts,
which it is necessary for the purpose of reproduction, should
approximate and commingle their elements or rudiments of future
existence, and that, that intermixture should take place in the womb of
the female. In some of the lower order of animals and in the vegetable
world the sexes are combined in one object which object possesses the
power of increase. To enter into the physiological minutæ of
impregnation would be embarking more scientifically in these matters
than this little book professes to do, it being our intention more to
hold up a popular view than to discuss the various opinions upon any
given point.
It is exceedingly to be regretted that mankind did not spend some small
portion, at least, of the time and industry which has been wasted on
theoretical researches, in collecting and collating the _actual
experience_ of human beings. But this task, too difficult for the
ignorant, has generally been thought too simple and common-place for the
learned. To this circumstance, joined to the fact, that it is not
thought fitting or decent for human beings freely to communicate their
personal experience on the important subject now under consideration—to
these causes are attributable the great and otherwise unaccountable
ignorance which so strangely prevails, even sometimes among medical men,
as to the power which man may possess over the reproductive instinct.
Many physicians will positively deny that man possesses any such power.
And yet, if the thousandth part of the talent and research had been
employed to investigate this momentous fact, which has been turned to
the building up of idle theories, no commonly intelligent individual
could well be ignorant of the truth.
I have taken great pains to ascertain the opinions of the most
enlightened physicians of Great Britain and France on this subject;
(opinions which popular prejudice will not permit them to offer publicly
in their works;) and they all concur in admitting, what the experience
of the French nation _positively proves_, that man may have a perfect
control over this instinct: and that men and women may, without any
injury to health, or the slightest violence done to the moral feelings,
and with but small diminution of the pleasure which accompanies the
gratification of the instinct, refrain at will from becoming parents. It
has chanced to me, also, to win the confidence of several individuals,
who have communicated to me, without reserve, their own experience: and
all this has been corroborative of the same opinion.
Thus, though I pretend not to speak positively of the details of a
subject, which will then only be fully understood when men acquire sense
enough simply and unreservedly to discuss it, I may venture to assure my
readers, that the main fact is incontrovertible. I shall adduce such
facts in proof of this as may occur to me in the course of this
investigation.
However various and contradictory the different theories of generation,
almost all physiologists are agreed, that the entrance of the sperm
itself (or of some volatile particles proceeding from it) into the
uterus, must precede conception. This it was that probably first
suggested the possibility of preventing conception at will.
The Author informs us, that among the modes of preventing conception
which may have prevailed in various countries, that which has been
adopted and practiced by the cultivated classes, on the continent of
Europe, by the French, the Italians, and to some extent by the Spaniards
and Germans, consists in a complete withdrawal, on the part of the man,
immediately previous to emission. This is undoubtedly effectual where it
can be done, but as our author remarks, that he can readily imagine,
that there are men who, in part from temperament, but much more from
their continued habits of unrestrained indulgence, may have so little
command over their passions as to find difficulty in practising it, and
some there may be who will declare it to be impossible. If there be any
to whom it is impossible, Mr. Owen tells us, that he is convinced that
the number is exceedingly small. In this, however, the Editor thinks the
Author is in error.
Numerous facts have come to the Editor’s knowledge which have
demonstrated the impracticability of this check, and have convinced him
that the number who are physically incapable of profiting by the
Author’s recommendation, is much greater than he imagined. It is not
unusual to see men, in a fit of anger, lose all self-control. Why, then,
should we suppose them capable at all times of exercising restraint over
the strongest passion of our nature? Mankind are endued with different
degrees of passion. Some never loose that perfect command of their
feelings which enables them to profit by the Author’s suggestions, while
others differently constituted cannot practice the same forbearance.
The Editor knows many affectionate husbands and kind fathers who would
most gladly practice the check before mentioned had they the ability to
do it.
It is but recent that the father of a very large family, consulted the
Editor on this subject, and in the course of conversation, he stated
that he had read Mr. Owen’s book, and had endeavoured to adopt the
course recommended by him, but found himself totally unable. Several
others have mentioned the same fact. The Author tells us that the
practice is attended with but trifling diminution of physical enjoyment;
but however trifling it may be to some, it is not so to all, for however
great their sense of duty, or however weighty the risk of incurring
sacred responsibilities, they are unable to exercise the necessary
restraint.
It is a commendable virtue in those who have the ability to practice it,
but for such as cannot or will not, and such as are regardless of
consequences, it is of the utmost moment to the mother that the power of
control should be placed in the right hands. How frequently do we hear
the mothers say, I have all the family I want, and am determined to have
no more children if I can prevent it; but alas: she has not the power,
when the partner of her bosom loses the self-control of his passions.
She who bears the burden and suffers the affliction, should be able to
protect herself and the fault is her own if she does not.
Mr. Owen was aware of the strong objection which would be urged against
the practicability of the preventive recommended by him, for in speaking
of it, he remarks, that it places the power in the hands of the man, and
not in those of the woman—she who is the sufferer is not secured against
the culpable carelessness, or perhaps the deliberate selfishness of him,
who goes free and unblamed whatever may happen.
To obviate this defect, spoken of by the Author, and to provide a remedy
for the suffering mother by placing it in her own hands, is the object
of the Editor of the present edition of Mr. Owen’s work. The science of
medicine and surgery is indebted to galvanism for some of its most
important remedial agents. Physiological facts of great utility to the
medical profession, have through its agency been demonstrated, and
physicians have been enabled to turn the electrical influence to many
useful purposes, in the treatment of diseases, and in furnishing a
remedy for functional derangements. It is capable of exercising a
powerful influence over the nervous system, and in the hands of the
physician, is a most potent remedy.
The discovery which has enabled us to obtain such control over uterine
action or seminal influence, as to prevent conception,[28] was effected
through its aid.
In the present state of society, a great number of persons are compelled
to make an appearance and to live in a style, which consumes all their
incomes, leaving nothing, or next to nothing, as a provision for their
children. To such persons a great number of children, is a never failing
source of discomfort and apprehension; of a state of bodily, mental, and
pecuniary vexation and suffering, from which there is no escape. This
state of things pervades, to a very great extent, that respectable class
of society called genteel. To those whose incomes depend on some
particular exertion, which cannot be remitted, these distressing
circumstances are, from various causes, greatly increased. To those who
constitute the great mass of the community, whose daily bread is alone
procured by daily labour, a large family is almost always the cause of
ruin, both of parents and children: reducing the parents to cheerless,
hopeless, and irremediable poverty; depriving the children of those
physical, moral, and mental helps which are necessary to enable them to
live in comfort, and turning them out at an early age to prey upon the
world, or to become the world’s prey.
For these general reasons, cognizable by every body, it is of the
greatest possible importance that married people should be informed of a
method to prevent such tremendous evils.
If methods can be pointed out by which all the enjoyment of wedded life
may be partaken of without the apprehension of TOO LARGE _a family_, and
all its bitter consequences, he, surely, who points them out, must be a
benefactor of mankind.
The means of prevention are simple, and harmless, and might, but for the
false delicacy of the press, or, rather, of those for whom it caters,
have been more generally communicated.
A course of experiments instituted several years past, with a view to
test the efficacy of the galvanic power, as a check to reproduction, has
demonstrated and proved its perfect adaptation, to the accomplishment of
this important object. The Editor has a very simple and perfectly
harmless instrument, (so far as the health of the mother is concerned,)
and one which may be depended upon for this purpose.
The application requires to be immediate, and its effect is
instantaneous. Like many other operations, the effect of which is known,
it may be somewhat difficult satisfactorily to explain its _modus
operandi_; nevertheless, the certainty of its action has been clearly
proved. It is known to impart a slight momentary impetus to the parts,
so that the vivifying influence of the semen is destroyed or expelled.
It would be no difficult matter to devise a multitude of ingenious
theories of the manner in which this operation may be accomplished, but
inasmuch as no practically good effect could arise from it, we content
ourselves by simply quoting the concluding remarks of Dr. Maunsell upon
the theory of conception, as expressed in Dr. Gilman’s edition: “At
present it will be sufficient for our purpose to state simply the facts
known and indulge as little as possible in hypotheses which must be more
the product of fancy than of reason.”
In offering this instrument to the public, the Editor is aware that his
motives may be misconceived and misjudged, and that he may subject
himself to be censured by that class of persons who think this too
delicate a subject to be even mentioned, much less to be publicly
discussed, and a remedy offered in this publication. He will be told by
some that the operations of nature ought not to be interfered with, be
the consequences what they may. It is well known by every person who is
at all conversant with writers upon midwifery, that in consequence of
deformity of the pelvis, recourse must be had in many instances to the
use of instruments to destroy the child, that the life of the mother may
be saved; and where the deformity is very great, resort is had to that
most desperate of all remedies, the Cæsarean operation. Dr. Gilman, in
the work from which we have already quoted, tells us that this last
mentioned operation was performed five times upon the same woman, by
Michaelis, of Kiel. It has also been performed twice by Dr. Gibson, of
Philadelphia, and once by Dr. R. K. Hoffman, of New York, and by other
operators, on the continent of Europe, and in the United States. The
same Author tells us, that “A British writer suggest the propriety of
dividing the Fallopian tubes when this operation is performed, that thus
the women being rendered barren, might be guarded against the
possibility of requiring a repetition of this terrible Cæsarean
section.”
Improvements have been made in almost every department of the medical
profession, and many new and important remedies have been brought to
light through the aid of the science of chemistry; but none have
heretofore been discovered, which could afford relief in these cases;
therefore, it affords us a degree of satisfaction to be able to
announce, that a safe and sure preventive of these sufferings will be
found in the instrument before mentioned, which we are confident will be
acceptable to every father and husband, who regards the safety and
happiness of his wife. Perhaps it will be said that these cases seldom
occur. In answer, it will be sufficient to state, that this is but one
of a numerous class of cases, which imperiously demands the same
preventive aid. As the writer, from whom we have just quoted, further
remarks: “When an individual woman, has been frequently delivered by
perforation of the child’s head, it becomes an object to devise some
means for obviating these successive sacrifices, and accordingly it has
been proposed in such cases, to induce premature labour at a period of
gestation, when the child’s head is sufficiently small to pass through
the pelvis.” This, he remarks is a step by no means to be lightly
undertaken, as there must always be a certain degree of danger incurred
by the mother, and the act itself, even though it be justified by a
powerful necessity, is unwarrantable, and even criminal in the eye of
the law.
From these quotations it will be perceived that the best and only remedy
adapted to these cases, which has heretofore been devised by the
profession for the relief of such as cannot safely become mothers,
consists in destroying the child, that the life of the mother may be
saved, and where a powerful necessity exists, premature labour or
abortion at an early stage. Why not anticipate this stage, and prevent
the necessity spoken of, by preventing conception? Would not this be
more moral, and would it not save the mother from that degree of danger
spoken of? _Prevention_ is always to be preferred to _cure_, and where
the remedy is fraught with such dangerous consequences to the patient,
it is especially incumbent upon the medical attendant, to devise some
means that will supersede the necessity of resorting to these desperate
measures.
Since some publicity has been given to the article before mentioned,
numerous applications have been made, and much enquiry elicited, which
has brought a great variety of cases, under the Editor’s observation.
These cases were of such a nature as to demonstrate the necessity of
some preventive which should be placed in the right hands, and would
have been sufficient to remove any doubt (had any remained) as to the
propriety of giving publicity to this instrument. It was but yesterday
that the husband of a delicate woman, and the father of a family, in
conversation upon this subject, stated that his wife was the mother of
two children—that since the birth of the last, she had suffered from
five abortions, which had so impaired her health, that he had found it
necessary to abstain from all intercourse with her. Numerous cases of a
like nature come under his observation almost daily. Shall we be told
that it is immoral and unbecoming for the physician to provide a remedy
for cases of this description? Will any pretend that the delicacy of the
subject should prevent us from directing the proper course to be pursued
to insure health and happiness? Away with such mockery—let us speak
plainly upon all subjects that equally concern the health and happiness
of our fellow beings. It comes within the province of the physician, to
investigate this matter in a philosophical manner, and to let nothing
but a sense of duty to his patients, and to the public guide him in his
determination.
The only thing that is a matter of surprise to the Editor is, that this
subject should have been so long neglected by the profession. He is
convinced that this little book and the means of prevention herein
recommended, will do more to prevent that moral evil, abortion among
married females, than all the penal enactments of our legislators, and
the criminal courts which enforce them. Yes, it is his firm conviction
that a moral check to reproduction, will do what judges and juries have
in vain attempted. It will put an end to the occupation of the
abortionist by removing the cause and thus striking at the root of the
evil. The want of the means of prevention has lead to the commission of
a crime revolting to our feelings. How many lives of mothers would have
been spared, had the power of preventing conception been known to them!
the feelings of the community would not be so often shocked by those
horrid tales, which are so frequently related in the daily papers, of
child murders: and the incensed feelings of the community, ready to
burst forth in mobs, and other demonstrations of popular indignation,
against those who commit such crimes. I here quote a paragraph which
recently appeared in one of the New York daily papers, for the purpose
of showing the feeling of the community on this subject: “The residence
of Madame Restell, in Greenwich street, was beset yesterday afternoon by
a vast concourse of people of all classes, many of them, doubtless,
drawn thither by curiosity, or a vague idea that something extraordinary
was about to be enacted in reference to this notorious woman, and not a
few who came apparently with the intention of being actors in some scene
of violence and popular outbreak. There were very many of our most
respectable citizens noticed among the mass—a result unlooked for, and
certainly ominous of a deep and abiding feeling of abhorrence and
detestation among the better classes, for the practices of this
miserable female, which may yet prove of fearful import to her, and to
those who countenance and support her in the vile and unholy occupation,
the known existence of which in our midst, in defiance of all law, and
outraging every sense of decency and morality, has been suffered so long
to rest, as a foul plague-spot upon our city. We learn that in
anticipation of some energetic demonstration in the course of the day,
Madame Restell early left her house, and secretly repaired to the
dwelling of some unknown friend, seeking a shelter from her fears in a
hiding-place, far from the scene of her iniquitous practices. Meanwhile
although the Chief of Police, aided by a strong body of officers, were
upon the ground of the disturbance, it seemed for some hours as though
the neighbourhood was slumbering upon a volcano, which a mere breath
would inflame into fierce and terrible action. Curses loud and deep upon
Restell and her coadjutors, were rife amid the crowd, and cries of ‘Haul
her out!’ ‘Where’s Mary Applegate’s child?’ ‘Where’s the _thousand
children_ murdered in this house!’ ‘Where is Miss Munson!’ ‘Throw her in
the dock!’ ‘Hanging is too good for the monster!’ ‘Who murdered Mary
Rodgers!’ and other inflammatory exclamations of a like nature, were
continually uprising from the excited multitude. Through the whole
vicinity, the windows on both sides of the street were upraised, and
filled with anxious faces, intently watching the movements of the mass
below; and there were not wanting those, among the inmates of the
neighbouring houses, and those inmates too, females of respectability
and refinement, who joined in the universal cry for vengence and
retribution. It did indeed seem as though the strong feeling of popular
indignation was about to be manifested in an outbreak of a serious
character, and that the unhappy object of their dislikes was about to
realize that there is in this land, a power above all law, whose
mandates would—when the arm of justice became paralysed and
insufficient, and was daringly sneered at by those who depend upon their
ill-earned wealth, _and certain peculiar influences_ for impunity from
the just reward of crime—be suddenly executed in violence and confusion.
Owing, however, to the prompt exertions of the Chief of Police, under
whose directions one or two arrests were made of the most active spirits
among the assembled mass, the threatened disturbance was finally put
down, and at this time, (late in the evening) order and quiet are
restored to the neighbourhood.
“We do not envy the feelings of the wretched woman during the existence
of the threatening outbreak, for although at some distance from the
scene yet she well knew what was going forward, being made acquainted at
short intervals with the position of affairs. We trust that from the
experience of yesterday, Madame Restell is now convinced of the
necessity of immediately closing her unlawful business; otherwise, there
seems to be a most fearful certainty that _the end is not yet_.”
See, what a mass of evil arises from bastard children, from
child-murder, from deserted children, from diseased children, and even
where the parents are most industrious and most virtuous, from a
half-starved, naked, and badly housed family, from families crowded into
one room, for whose health a house and garden is essential. All these
matters are a tax upon love, a perpetual tax upon human pleasure, and
upon health; a tax that turns beauty into shrivelled ugliness, defaces
the noble attitude of mankind, and makes their condition worse than that
of the cattle of the field.
Then comes the consideration—what a dreadful thing it is, that health
and beauty cannot be encouraged and extended, that love cannot be
enjoyed without the danger of a conception, when that conception is not
desired, when it is a positive injury to the parties and to society.
This circumstance has been a great bar to health, strength, and beauty.
What is to be done to remedy this evil? There is something to be done: a
means has been discovered, a simple means, criminal in the neglect, not
in the use. The destruction of conceptions have been sought by acts of
violence, by doses of poison, that injure, and sometimes destroy the
mother, to reach the fœtus in her womb. This is dreadful, truly
dreadful. Yet custom has made it a common matter. Every village has its
almost yearly cases of the kind. In this country, hundreds of infants
are yearly destroyed at birth: some cases are discovered, but many pass
undiscovered. We condemn and shudder at the infanticides of China and
other countries: yet it is a question, if infanticide ever prevailed in
any country to a greater extent than in our own. Here, then, as in every
other case of disease or other evil, _it is better to prevent than to
cure_, and here _prevention is most simply practicable, a means within
the reach of all_.
Those who have no means of arriving at a knowledge of the extent of this
evil, could scarce realize it; since the investigation of this subject
was commenced and since mention has been made publicly of the instrument
before alluded to, numerous facts have come to the Editor’s knowledge
which would be sufficient to convince every candid reflecting person,
that the utmost extent of the credulity of those who have taken but
little pains to inform themselves upon this part of the subject is not
half equal to the extent of this vice. He is inclined to believe that
his statement would be doubted were he to relate the number of calls he
has received from persons seeking this kind of medical service under a
misapprehension of his notice. The number is not confined to such as
cannot legitimately become mothers, but what is most surprising, parents
who move in what is called respectable society, appear to feel no
delicacy in asking relief, in these cases, at the hands of the
physician.
For the purpose of illustrating still more forcibly, the extent to which
the business of the abortionist is carried on in this city, and likewise
the dangers to which the victim is exposed, we propose to make some
extracts from a case reported by Dr. Bedford, the eminent Professor of
Midwifery in the University of the city of New York. Several physicians
had been called in, the patient had been in labour for twenty-four
hours, and they severally professed their ignorance of the nature of the
case. Dr. B. then goes on to say:—
“Mrs. M. had been taken in labour Monday, Dec. 18th, at seven o’clock,
P. M. and on Tuesday at seven o’clock, P. M., I first saw her. Her pains
were then almost constant, and such had been the severity of her
suffering that her cries for relief, as her medical attendants informed
me, had attracted crowds of persons about the door. As soon as I entered
her room, she exclaimed, ‘For God’s sake Doctor, cut me open or I shall
die: I never can be delivered without you cut me open.’ I was struck
with this language, especially as I had already been informed, that she
had previously borne two children. At the request of the medical
gentlemen, I proceeded to make an examination per vaginam, and I must
confess that I was startled at what I discovered, expecting every
instant, from the intensity of the contractions of the uterus, that this
organ would be ruptured in some portion of its extent. I could
distinctly feel a solid, resisting tumor at the superior strait, through
the walls of the uterus, _but could detect no opening in the womb_. In
carrying my finger upward and backward toward the cul-de-sac of the
vagina, I could trace two bridles, extending from this portion of the
vagina to a point of the uterus, which was quite rough and slightly
elevated; this roughness was transverse in shape, but with all the
caution and nicety of manipulation I could bring to bear, I found it
impossible to detect any opening in the womb. In passing my finger with
care, from the bridles to the rough surface, and exploring the condition
of the parts with an anxious desire to afford the distressed patient
prompt and effectual relief, I distinctly felt cicatrices, of which this
rough surface was one. Here, then, was a condition of things produced by
injury done to the soft parts, at some previous period, resulting in the
formation of cicatrices and bridles, and likewise in the closure of the
mouth of the womb. At this stage of the examination, I knew nothing of
the previous history of the patient more than I have already stated, and
the first question I addressed to her was this: ‘Have you ever had any
difficulty in your previous confinements? have you ever been delivered
with instruments?’ &c., &c. She distinctly replied, that her previous
labors had been of short duration, and that she had not been delivered
with instruments, nor had she ever sustained any injury in consequence
of her confinements. This information somewhat puzzled me, for it was
not in keeping with what any one might have conjectured, taking into
view her actual condition, which was undoubtedly the result of direct
injury done to the parts. On assuring her, that she was in a most
perilous situation, and at the same time, promising that we would do all
in our power to rescue her, she voluntarily made the following
confession:
“About six weeks after becoming pregnant, she called on the notorious
Madame Restell, who, on learning her situation, gave her some powders
with directions for use; these powders did not appear to produce the
desired effect. She returned again to this woman, and asked her if there
was no other way to make her miscarry. ‘Yes,’ says Madame Restell, ‘I
can probe you; but I must have my price for this operation.’ ‘What do
you probe with?’ ‘A piece of whalebone.’ ‘Well,’ thought the patient,
but without expressing it, ‘I cannot afford to pay your price, and I
will probe myself.’ She returned home, and used the whalebone several
times; it produced considerable pain, followed by a discharge of blood.
The whole secret was now disclosed. Injuries inflicted on the mouth of
the womb, by these violent attempts, had resulted in the circumstances
as detailed above.
“It was evident from the nature of this poor woman’s sufferings, and the
expulsive character of her pains, that prompt artificial delivery was
indicated. Accordingly, without loss of time, (she then having been in
labor twenty-nine hours,) I performed the operation. In a short time,
Mrs. M. was delivered of a vigorous, full grown child, whose boisterous
cries were heard with astonishment by the mother, and with sincere
gratification by her medical friends. The expression of that woman’s
gratitude, in thus being preserved from what she and her friends
supposed to be inevitable death, was an ample compensation for the
anxiety experienced by those, who were the humble instruments of
affording her relief. This patient recovered rapidly, and did not during
the whole of her convalescence, present one untoward symptom. It is now
ten weeks since the operation, and she and her infant are in the
enjoyment of excellent health.
“At my last visit to this patient, with Dr. Forry, she made some
additional revelations, which I think should be given not only to the
profession, but to the public, in order that it may be known that in our
very midst, there is a monster who speculates with human life with as
much coolness as if she were engaged in a game of chance. This patient,
with unaffected sincerity, and apparently ignorant of the moral
turpitude of the act, stated, most unequivocally, to both Dr. Forry and
myself that Mad. Restell, on previous occasions, had _caused her to
miscarry five times_, and that these miscarriages had, in every
instance, been brought about by drugs administered by this trafficker in
human life. The only instance in which medicines failed, was the last
pregnancy, when at the suggestion of Madame Restell, she probed herself,
and induced the condition of things described, and which most seriously
involved her own safety, as well as that of her child. In the course of
conversation, this patient mentioned that she knew a great number of
females, who were in the habit of applying to Madame Restell, for the
purpose of miscarrying, and that she scarcely ever failed in affording
the desired relief. Among others, she cited the case of a female
residing in Houston-street, who was five months pregnant; Madame Restell
probed her, and she was delivered of a child, which, to use her own
expression, ‘kicked several times after it was put into the bowl.’ It,
indeed, seems too monstrous for belief that such gross violations of the
laws, both of God and man, should be suffered in the very heart of a
community professing to be Christian, and to be governed by law and good
order. Yet these facts are known to all who read. This creature’s
advertisements are to be seen in our daily papers; there she invites the
base and the guilty, the innocent and the unwary, to apply to her. She
tells publicly what she can do, and without the slightest scruple, urges
all to call on her who may be anxious to avoid having children. Here,
then, is a premium offered for vice, to say nothing of the prodigal
destruction of human life, that must necessarily result from the
abominations of this mercenary and heartless woman.”
There is an erroneous impression upon the minds of a certain class of
the community. They make no distinction between the commission of crime,
and the means that are used to diffuse information, and remove the
inducement to commit moral offence. Ignorance and prejudice—the parents
of vice—have blinded or misguided those who have not or would not
properly investigate the subject matter of this discussion. However, we
are consoled by the reflection that the day is dawning which shall
dispel the mist and vapours which have heretofore clouded and benighted
the human understanding, upon matters that infinitely concern the
happiness of the great mass of the human family.
We take pleasure in stating that since the publication of Mr. Owen’s
little work, (now ten years,) we have good reason for believing that the
public mind is better prepared for the reception of the Editor’s amended
edition of his book. As each revolving year passes over, and as truth
overcomes error, and as the diffusion of knowledge dispels ignorance, so
will the subject elicit additional inquiry, and the merits of the work
be more justly appreciated by the enlightened portion of the community.
A further discussion and investigation of the subject will cause it to
be better understood, and a public opinion favourable to the subject
will be formed, of immense moral utility.
As in the language of the author,—How mighty and how beneficent the
power which such an influence might exert, and how essentially and
rapidly it might conduce to the gradual, but thorough extirpation of
those selfish vices, legal and illegal, which now disgrace and brutify
our species, it is difficult even to imagine.
In the silent, but resistless progress of human improvement, such a
change is fortunately inevitable. We are gradually emerging from the
night of blind prejudice and of brutal force; and, day by day, rational
liberty and cultivated refinement, win an accession of power. Violence
yields to benevolence, compulsion to kindness, the letter of law to the
spirit of justice; and, day by day, men and women become more willing,
and better prepared, to entrust the most sacred duties (social as well
as political) more to good feeling and less to idle form—more to moral
and less to legal keeping.
It is no question whether such reform will come: no human power can
arrest its progress. How slowly or how rapidly it may come, _is_ a
question; and depends, in some degree, on adventitious circumstances.
Should this little book prove one among the number of circumstances to
accelerate, however slightly, that progress, its author will be repaid,
ten times over, for any trifling labour it may have cost him.
In conclusion, the author remarks, that a knowledge of the check to
population spoken of, and recommended by him, with other preventive
means was for many years extensively disseminated in most of the
populous towns in Great Britain; not only through the medium of “Every
Woman’s Book,” but, previously to its publication, by hundreds of
thousands of handbills, which were gratuitously distributed from
benevolent motives. The men who were first instrumental in making them
known in England, are all elderly men, fathers of families of children
grown up to be men and women; men of unimpeachable integrity, and of
first rate moral character; many of them men of science, and some of
them known as the first political economists and philanthropists of the
age. Besides the allusion to the subject already given from the
Encyclopædia Britannica, it is adverted to in Mill’s “Elements of
Political Economy;” in Place’s “Illustrations of the Principle of
Population;” in Thompson’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and probably in
other works with which I am unacquainted. It was also (disguisedly)
broached in several English newspapers, and was preached in lectures to
the labouring classes, by a most benevolent man, at Leeds. I do not
believe the subject has ever been touched upon, in one single instance,
except by men of irreproachable moral character, and generally of high
standing in society. The chief difference between this little treatise,
and the allusions made by the distinguished authors above mentioned, is,
that what public opinion would only permit them to insinuate, I venture
to say plainly.
My readers may implicitly depend on the accuracy of the facts I have
stated. Though in the present state of public opinion, I may not, for
obvious reasons, give _names_ in proof, yet it is evident that I cannot
have the shadow of a motive to mislead or deceive. I shall consider it a
favour if any individuals who can adduce, _from personal experience_,
facts connected with this subject, will communicate them to me.
_Note._ The enlightened Condorcet, in his well-known “_Esquisse des
progres de l’esprit human_,” very distinctly alludes to the safety and
facility with which population might be restrained, “If reason should
but keep pace with the arts and sciences, and if the idle prejudices of
superstition should cease to shed over human morals an austerity
corrupting and degrading, not purifying or elevated.” See his
_Esquisse_, _pages_ 285 to 288, _Paris_ Ed. 1822.
Malthus (See his “_Essays on Population_,” _Book_ 3, _chap._ 1)
“professes not to understand” the French philosopher. No Frenchman could
misunderstand him.
CHAPTER VII.
ADDITIONAL REMARKS.
That most practical of philosophers, Franklin, interprets chastity to
mean, _the regulated and strictly temperate satisfaction, without injury
to others, of those desires which are natural to all healthy adult
beings_. In this sense, chastity is the first of virtues, and one most
rarely practiced, either by young men or by married persons, even when
the latter most scrupulously conform to the letter of the law.[29]
The promotion of such chastity is the chief object of the present work.
It is all-important for the welfare of our race, that the reproductive
instinct should never be selfishly indulged; never gratified at the
expense of the well-being of our companions. A man who, in this matter,
will not consult, with scrupulous deference, the slightest wishes of the
other sex; a man who will ever put his desires in competition with
theirs, and who will prize more highly the pleasure he receives than
that he may be capable of bestowing—such a man appears to me, in the
essentials of character, a brute. The brutes commonly seek the
satisfaction of their propensities with straight-forward selfishness,
and never calculate whether their companions are gratified or teased by
their importunities. Man cannot assimilate his nature more closely to
theirs, than by imitating them in this.
Again. There is no instinct in regard to which strict temperance is more
essential. All our animal desires have hitherto occupied an undue share
of human thoughts; but none more generally than this. The imaginations
of the young and the passions of the adult are inflamed by mystery or
excited by restraint, and a full half of all the thoughts and intrigues
of the world has a direct reference to this single instinct. Even those
who, like the Shakers, “crucify the flesh,” are not the less occupied by
it in their secret thoughts; as the Shaker writings themselves may
afford proof. Neither human institutions nor human prejudices can
destroy the instinct. Strange it is, that men should not be content
rationally to control, and wisely to regulate it.
It is a question of passing importance, “How may it best be regulated?”
Not by a Shaker vow of monkish chastity. Assuredly not by the world’s
favourite regulator, ignorance. No. Do we wish to bring this instinct
under easy government, and to assign it only its due rank among human
sentiments? Then let us cultivate the intellect, let us exercise the
body, let us usefully occupy the time, of every human being. What is it
gives to passion its sway, and to desires their empire, now? It is
vacancy of mind; it is listlessness of body; it is idleness. A
cultivated race are never sensual; a hardy race are seldom love-sick; an
industrious race have no time to be sentimental. Develop the moral
sentiments, and they will govern the physical instincts. Occupy the mind
and body usefully, intellectually; and the propensities will obtain that
care and time only which they merit. Upon any other principle we may
doctor poor human nature for ever, and shall only prove ourselves
empirics in the end. Mortifications, vestal vows, mysteries, bolts and
bars, prudish prejudices—these are all quack-medicines; and are only
calculated to prostrate the strength and spirits, or to heighten the
fever, of the patient. If we will dislodge error and passion from the
mind, we must replace them by something better. They say that a vacuum
cannot exist in nature. Least of all can it exist in the human mind.
Empty it of one folly, cure it of one vice, and another flows in to fill
the vacancy, unless it find it already occupied by intellectual exercise
and common sense.
Husbands and fathers! study Franklin’s definition of chastity. Your
fears, your jealousies, have hitherto been on the stretch to watch and
guard: reflect whether it be not pleasanter and better, to enlighten and
trust.
Honest ascetics! you have striven to mortify the flesh; ask yourselves
whether it be not wiser to control it. You have sought to crucify the
body; consider whether it be not more effectual to cultivate the mind.
Have you succeeded in spiritualizing your secret thoughts? If not,
enquire whether all human propensities, duly governed, be not a benefit
and a blessing to the nature in which they are inherent.
Human beings, of whatever sex or class! examine dispassionately and
narrowly the influence which the control here recommended will produce
throughout society. Reflect whether it will not lighten the burdens of
one sex, while it affords scope for the exercise of the best feelings of
the other. Consider whether its tendency be not benignant and elevating;
conducive to the exercise of practical virtue, and to the permanent
welfare of the human race.
The following remarks are addressed to the reasonable and considerate
among mechanics, the most numerous and most useful class of society.
It is a great truth, often told, and never denied, that when there are
too many working people in any trade or manufacture, they are worse paid
than they ought to be paid, and are compelled to work more hours than
they ought to work.
When the number of working people in any trade or manufacture, has for
some years been too great, wages are reduced very low, and the working
people become little better than slaves.
When wages have been thus reduced to a very small sum, working people
can no longer maintain their children as all good and respectable people
wish to maintain their children, but are compelled to neglect them;—to
send them to different employments;—to mills and manufactories, at a
very early age.
The misery of these poor children cannot be described, and need not be
described, to you who witness them and deplore them every day of your
lives.
Many indeed among you are compelled for a bare subsistence to labor
incessantly, from the moment you rise in the morning, to the moment you
lie down at night, without even the hope of ever being better off.
The sickness of yourselves and your children, the privation and pain and
premature death of those you love, but cannot cherish as you wish, need
only be alluded to. You know all these evils too well.
And, what, you will ask, is the remedy?
How are we to avoid these miseries?
The answer is short and plain; the means are easy. You have but to use
the_ Electro-Galvania_ as directed and previously explained; it will
prevent conception, and thus, without diminishing the pleasures of
married life, or doing the least injury to the health of the most
delicate woman, both the woman and her husband will be saved from all
the miseries which having too many children produces.
By limiting the number of children, the wages both of children and of
grown up persons will rise; the hours of working will be no more than
they ought to be; you will have some time for recreation, some means of
enjoying yourselves rationally, some means as well as some time for your
own and your children’s moral and religious instruction.
At present, every respectable mother trembles for the fate of her
daughters as they grow up. Debauchery is always feared. This fear makes
many good mothers unhappy. The evil when it comes make them miserable.
And why is there so much debauchery? Why such sad consequences?
Why? But because many young men, who fear the consequences which a large
family produces, turn to debauchery and destroy their own happiness as
well as the happiness of the unfortunate girls with whom they connect
themselves.
Other young men, whose moral and religious feelings deter then from this
vicious course, marry early and produce large families, which they are
utterly unable to maintain. These are the causes of the wretchedness
which afflicts you.
But when it has become the custom here as elsewhere, to limit the number
of children, so that none need have more than they wish to have, no man
will fear to take a wife, all will be married while young;—debauchery
will diminish:—while good morals, and religious duties will be promoted.
CHAPTER VIII.
TO THE MARRIED OF BOTH SEXES IN GENTEEL LIFE.
Among the many sufferings of women, as mothers, there are two cases
which command the utmost sympathy and commiseration.
The first arises from constitutional peculiarities, or weakness.
The second from mal-conformation of the bones of the pelvis.
Besides these two cases, there is a third case, applicable to both
sexes; namely, the consequence of having more children than the income
of the parents enables them to maintain and educate in a desirable
manner.
The first named case produces miscarriages, and brings on a state of
existence scarcely endurable. It has caused thousands of respectable
women to linger on in pain and apprehension, till, at length, death has
put an end to their almost inconceivable sufferings.
The second case is always attended with immediate risk of life.
Pregnancy never terminates without intense suffering, seldom without the
death of the child, frequently with the death of the mother, and
sometimes with the death of both mother and child.
The third case is by far the most common, and the most open to general
observation. In the middle ranks, the most virtuous and praiseworthy
efforts are perpetually made to keep up the respectability of the
family; but a continual increase of children gradually, yet certainly,
renders every effort to prevent degradation unavailing, it paralyzes by
rendering hopeless all exertion, and the family sinks into poverty and
despair. Thus is engendered and perpetuated a hideous mass of misery.
The knowledge of what awaits them deters vast numbers of young men from
marrying, and causes them to spend the best portion of their lives in a
state of debauchery, utterly incompatible with the honorable and honest
feelings which should be the characteristic of young men. The treachery,
duplicity, and hypocrisy that they use towards their friends and the
unfortunate victims of their seductions, while they devote a large
number of females to the most dreadful of all states which human beings
can endure, extinguishes in them, to a very great extent, all manly,
upright notions; and qualifies them, to as great an extent, for the
commission of acts, which, but for these vile practices they would
abhor, and thus, to an enormous extent, is the whole community injured.
Marriage in early life is the only truly happy state, and if the evil
consequences of too large a family did not deter them, all men would
marry when young, and thus would many lamentable evils be removed from
society.
A simple, effectual, and safe means of accomplishing these desirable
results has long been known, and to a considerable extent practiced in
some places. But until lately has been little known in the United
States.
Accouchers of the first respectability, and surgeons of great eminence,
have in some peculiar cases recommended it. Within the last two years, a
more extensive knowledge of the process has prevailed and its practice
has been more extensively adopted. It is now made public through the
medium of this book; and to those who deem its use expedient, may not
only prevent much unhappiness and physical inconvenience, but will be of
incalculable benefit to society.
The great utility and importance of the use of this instrument, may be
summed up under the following heads:
1st. That no married couple shall have more children than they wish to
have and can maintain.
2nd. That no unhealthy woman shall bear children, that cannot be reared,
and which endanger her own life in the parturition:
“Women, for no other crime than having followed the dictates of a
natural appetite, are driven with fury from the comforts and sympathies
of society. It is less venial than murder! and the punishment which is
inflicted on her who destroys her child to escape reproach, is lighter
than the life of agony and disease to which the prostitute is
irrecoverable doomed. Has the woman obeyed the impulse of unerring
nature;—society declares war against her, pitiless and eternal war; she
must be a tame slave, she must make no reprisals: theirs is the right of
persecution, hers the duty of endurance. She lives a life of infamy; the
loud and bitter laugh of scorn scares her from all return. She dies of
long and lingering disease: yet _she_ is in fault, _she_ is the
criminal, _she_ the froward and untameable child—and society, forsooth,
is the pure and virtuous matron, who casts her as an abortion from her
undefiled bosom! Society avenges itself on the criminals of its own
creation; it is employed in anathematizing the vice to day, which
yesterday it was the most zealous to teach.
“Young men, excluded by the fanatical idea of chastity from the society
of modest and accomplished women, associate with the most vicious and
miserable beings, and thus destroy those exquisite and delicate
sensibilities, whose existence cold-hearted worldings have denied; thus
they annihilate genuine passion, and debase that to a selfish feeling
which is the excess of generosity and devotedness. Their body and mind
become a hideous wreck of humanity; idiocy and disease are perpetuated
in their miserable offspring, and distant generations suffer for the
ignorance of their forefathers.”
It has also been objected, that if the physical means of preventing
undesirable conceptions were to become general, debauchery, immorality,
and misery would be increased, and society would be much more degraded
than it is. But this is a fallacy easily exposed, and those who conclude
that dissolute conduct would be increased, are but ill-formed as to the
actual amount of such conduct, and it is more than probable that if the
facts were disclosed to them as they are known to exist by magistrates,
overseers, and medical men, they would be astounded.
Multitudes of men never marry, a still greater number refrain from
marrying until they grow comparatively old; yet most such men are
practiced debauchees, and the mischief they do by the fraud and
hypocrisy they produce is incalculable. This would not be so were a
freer intercourse permitted and physical means adopted to prevent
conceptions.
But the great good which would result from physical preventives, would
be, that alliances would be early formed and in most cases would be
lasting. Girls would not then surrender themselves to the caprice and
injustice of men as they do now; men would not then be able to practice
upon them as they do now.
A girl would then tell her lover that there was no impediment to their
submitting to the form whatever it was that society had established, and
as she would be sure to make a match, she would take care to keep
herself in that state which would induce the man she liked to conform.
The great obstacle to marriage under its present form, is the fear of a
large family, and the poverty which results therefrom. This removed,
marriages would become much more common. People would form alliances
while young and unpracticed in deceit and hypocrisy, and would live
virtuously and happily all their lives.
Whoever will examine the statements here put forth, will assuredly be
convinced that a physical preventive of conception, if in general use,
would put an end to an immense quantity of debauchery, and its
attendant—misery; and would greatly improve the condition of the whole
body of the people. Women, if we may be allowed the expression, would
then be in much greater demand, as every young man would take a wife,
and women would be all but infinitely more respected, than they are now.
It is not possible to anticipate the happiness which would result from
the physical check, if once brought into general use.
CHAPTER IX.
THE PURPOSES AND OBLIGATIONS OF MARRIAGE.
It is a strange world and man is a strange animal. It may appear
wonderful that with such passions and powers as he possesses he should
be so controllable, that he should become tamed down into a civilized
being, and submit to such impositions on his desires, that make him a
mere creature of circumstance; and yet from this very submission does he
secure to himself the greater amount of joys and delights: so that what
he partakes of by tolerance, or call it the unanimous consent of his
fellow-men, is absolutely and infinitely more gratifying to him than
would be the unrestricted indulgence of his appetites. The world abounds
with inexhaustible sources of enjoyment, and man has capacity for all;
but were it not for civil and wholesome restraints, it would be one
continued brute struggle for possession. For no one circumstance have we
more reason to rejoice in our civilization, than for the regulations
regarding marriage. It is the basis of a nation’s prosperity and of
individual happiness. It gives legal and strong possession of the object
of our most earnest wish. It establishes regulation and order, forms
ties of relationship, and makes each country one family. A happy
marriage is the alpha and omega of every man’s hopes, nor is it less
momentous to our companion. There is no pleasure in this life comparable
to it where it is unalloyed by physical or mental disqualifications: but
alas! how rarely is such a consummation to be found. It is a happy state
indeed “when the fountain is blessed, and he rejoiceth with the wife of
his youth, and she is to him as the loving hind and the pleasant roe,
and he delights in her continually.”[30]
Although this marriage is but a civil contract, it should not be
forgotten that if injudiciously made or its obligations be not
fulfilled, the most calamitous results oftentimes ensue. Imagine a
bargain, made between two persons, in which both parties have assumed
more or less disguise or dissimulation towards the other, and which are
only discovered when the treaty cannot be annulled. The lady’s dower may
be handsome, or the gentleman’s prospects good and his pursuits most
thriving; their respective families and connexions may be equally
respectable, and neither consort nor husband have reason to regret that
part of the arrangement, which the world only sees or hears of. It may
be a love match, a match of many years’ making, a match in which the
most delicious of all anticipations assumed every likelihood of being
realized, and yet which one hour’s possession has destroyed. If the
denouement be not so sudden, there may grow up a secret sorrow, a sorrow
that has its source, like any other feeling, in some cause, just or
evil, by the discovery of some concealed hindrance to mutual love. There
may arise some justifiable personal dislike, there may be found to exist
some impediment to the full and proper enjoyment of those connubial
delights which instinct has taught each party to expect from the other.
It is true, and well it is so, that all marriages have not hidden
griefs, but that renders not those which have, the more endurable.
Marriage mostly is a matter of love, policy, or convenience; it ought no
less to be a matter of conscience. The legal right which the ceremony
gives to the man, of his wife, which alienates her from the world, which
enslaves her to his person and passions, or shuts her for ever out from
the indulgence of her own, should not be sought without reflection; for
although the law awards its punishment for infidelity which is sure to
follow such dissimulation, it is a poor compensation for the
mortification and distress which accompanies it. The very proceeding may
prove alike that nature, as well as honour, have been outraged. Love is
not the parent of sexual desire—it is the offspring; and if that
instinctive passion be frustrated or deprived of its just entitlement,
love soon loses its name, and goes one knows not whither. Yet there are
proper bounds to every thing, an excess is frequently attended with more
unhappy results than want.
The end of marriage, then, is to afford the legitimate use of amative
enjoyments; to regulate the procreation of children; to ensure
succession, and thereby transmit one’s property and identity; to
cultivate domestic happiness, and thereby give all an equal incentive
to aspire to the same possession; and also to afford protection when
so obtained. If any deception be practiced towards each other the
culpable party will incur, sooner or later, the rarely failing
punishment—disappointment in their pleasures, their domestic
anticipations, and their hopes of hereditary succession.
Women have their disqualifications for the marriage bed—many from causes
which we have already enumerated, and many from others over which they
have no control. Among the latter, absolute fear of the consequences
imbibed through early intuition of some disappointed maiden-aunt—some
from acquired notions of the immorality of the proceeding—others from
personal disrelish—a total absence of desire;[31] and many, although an
ungenerous world may be sceptical of the truth hereof, have not the
least idea of the difference even of the sexes; at least the use and
purposes of that difference. There are ways of preparing females for
what they will have to encounter at all periods of life; and no mother
should fail to instruct her child, as circumstances demand, of the
expectancy of each succeeding era of her coming existence. It is not
intended thereby to be urged, that females cannot be too early initiated
into the mysteries of matrimonial ceremonies and consequences; but there
is a time, and an age, when such intelligence should be conveyed to
them, and by no means should they be allowed to form alliances without
such knowledge. The reader, I repeat, may possibly express a doubt
whether such an event ever did occur;—he may be assured that many such
have, and do still occur, and are productive of much distress. Nor is it
intended that the physiology of reproduction should form part of the
preliminary education of a boarding-school young female; but no woman
ought to become a mother without knowing something of the phenomena of
conception. It is really astonishing to see the very great ignorance of
these matters entertained by woman in general: it may be constructed
into a specimen of American modesty: but it occasions many needless
fears and anxieties that sometimes prove of serious consequence to a
lying-in woman. At the hour of peril, as it is called, how few women,
except those in humble life, and who have earnt their little knowledge
by dear-bought experience,—have any idea of aiding their fellow-sister
at the moment of their affliction: indeed by the ignorance, fear, and
impatience they display, they unnecessarily alarm the patient or
themselves, and put a whole family into confusion; whereas, by the help
of a little information on this subject, they might allay the fears of
the timid and assist the weak, and not unfrequently be the instruments
whereby the life itself of the infant, or mother, might be saved.
We have before stated, that persons subject to hereditary diseases ought
not to become parents, because by so doing they will bring into the
world a progeny, whose issue will eventually become extinct. And it is
to these persons that we now more particularly address our remarks.
The same laws which regulate the perfection of plants, the growth of
corn, the fleetness of the greyhound, and the symmetry of the horse,
govern the physical and mental culture of man. In the vegetable kingdom,
the agriculturalist is aware that the success of his crops depends upon
the condition of what he sows, and the fertility of the soil wherein it
is sown. It is precisely the case with the propagation of the human
species. The race may be improved, or deteriorated, accordingly as the
laws which govern the continuance of mankind are more or less observed.
But we are digressing from the subject of which we intended to
speak—that of the transmission of diseases from parent to child. Parents
exercise a mighty influence over the physical condition of their
offspring,—the general constitution, mental and physical qualities, and
even individual peculiarities, being transmitted from sire to son.
Premature marriage, and, consequently too early sexual congress,
although it may not prove detrimental to the parents, except where its
privileges are intemperately exercised, may be, and often is a great
disadvantage to the children, they being generally delicate, imperfect,
and seldom arriving at maturity. The same results follow, where the
parents, or either of them are at the moment of conception in
ill-health. And shall the circumstances of early marriage, or a bad
state of health, debar the sexes from the satisfaction of the holiest
and most ennobling of the passions? Would it not be far more just and
moral, then, to make use of a preventive of conception, when from
motives of economy, offspring is not desired, or, from the reasons
mentioned above, health cannot be given at the same time that life is
imparted? The candid reader will have but one answer.
Physicians, generally, when referring to the subject of the transmission
of disease, lay it down as a law, that persons so affected should not
marry. Here we beg leave to differ from them, and, we think, justly.
Consumptive or scrofulous persons certainly should not beget offspring;
but we cannot see why they should be prevented from enjoying the
pleasures of the married state. It is necessary for the general health
of an individual, that the sexual embrace should be occasionally
enjoyed—indeed it is an established fact, that many of those women who
die unmarried, owe their early death, to a species of consumption,
excited by deprivation of the sexual act. We think therefore, that all
ought to be married, and that those who cannot produce healthy progeny,
should make use of means to prevent conception.
Enough has been said already to remove the maudlin delicacy which some
people entertain on the subject of human reproduction, and as it seems
to us not out of place, we will say a few words on the subject.
Copulation should never be an act of effort. To use a quaint but selfish
phrase, “it should only be used when the man listeth.” Much mischief may
be done by fruitless endeavours; violent palpitations of the heart may
ensue that so quicken the circulation of the blood, and propel it with
such violence towards the brain as to induce apoplexy. I have often had
the question put as to which was the most fitting season for sexual
indulgence. We know that man is omnivorous, and after certain intervals,
is capable of reperforming the procreative act. Some hold morning to be
the most healthy time, as the body is renovated by the night’s rest, but
the lassitude which follows encroaches on the business duties of the
day, and it is more probable that so far as the health is concerned,
night is the preferable; the quietude and secrecy thereby afforded are
additional incentives to love, and the exhaustion of the body is
repaired by the several hours sleep that follows. Too frequent
indulgence in venereal pleasures are strongly opposed to the procreation
of children. Abstemiousness in sexual pleasures is a physical virtue
where issue be desirable; and probably the period when conception is
most likely to occur, is to refrain from intercourse till a day or two
after the female has ceased menstruating. Women may be sterile, but they
are rarely impotent. Sterility may depend upon the absence of a uterus,
of which many instances are on record. It may depend upon morbid
conditions of that organ where it exists; such as excessive debility,
frequent floodings, prolapsus or descent of it, eversion or misplacement
of it; from a retention of the menstrual secretion, from the presence of
leucorrhœa, or the debility induced by a long prevalence of that
disorder. Too frequent indulgence in cohabitation, promiscuous
intercourse, &c., as with those unfortunates who gain their subsistence
by such means, are direct causes of infecundity. To bring this subject
to a close, I may observe, that although nature has been apparently thus
freaksome in the constitution of mankind, she is amply generous and kind
to those who choose to study and observe her laws. She pays no
distinction to the past, present, or future. For many of our infirmities
we have to thank those who have gone before us, and many are of our own
producing, the conjoined consideration ought to induce us to reflect how
we are justified in transferring them to those who follow. There are
seasons for all enjoyments, and limits set to all; if we infringe those
limits, we are answerable for the consequences: there is much happiness
in this world and much misery: a skilful pilot will see most of it and
live longest in it.
The Instrument which we have brought before the public, for preventing
conception, depends for its virtue upon the electric fluid. The public
are well acquainted with the common shock of an electrical apparatus;
they are probably aware that many physiologists consider electricity
analogous to the principle of life itself. They know that lightning is a
display of the electric power—that it abounds in all nature, but not in
equal intensity. They may possibly have heard of its efficacy in cases
of Rheumatism, Palsy, and many other diseases—that its property is to
stimulate, and, in excess, to kill. They may be familiar with the terms
Magnetism, Galvanism, &c., but, in fact, they all are the effects of one
cause, differing only in the intensity of their action, and their mode
of development. What is now called electro-magnetism, or magnetic
electricity, is merely electricity in a modified form; the result of its
application is the same. The public may be told of the extraordinary
powers possessed by this fluid in supporting partial life, when it is
established in nervous communications. Digestion depends upon the
uninterrupted nervous communication between the brain and the stomach;
if that is destroyed, digestion ceases; but if electricity or galvanism
be applied to the divided ends of the nervous channels, digestion
proceeds as before, and for a very considerable time. Its usefulness,
therefore, can be fully appreciated when applied through the
instrumentality of the nerves, to those organs or structures, that are
not sufficiently endued with vital influence. The many hindrances
heretofore existing in the employment of electricity, as a preventive,
owing to the circumstance of favourable weather being required for its
exhibition, and it also being difficult and formidable in its
application, are now obviated by the introduction of this instrument.
The advantages are, that it can be used at any time, and under all
circumstances. It is perfectly safe, and that it is certain, is attested
by the fact, that of the large number already sold, not one has been
returned, although the purchasers have had the liberty given them of
doing so, should the instrument fail in effecting its object.
CHAPTER X.
CONCLUDING REMARKS.
After the publication of Mr. Owen’s first edition of this work, several
communications were received by him, approbatory of his book, some of
which I think of sufficient importance to be introduced into this
edition, inasmuch as they contain facts that are worthy of being
treasured up in the recollection of all young married persons. In the
one to which I now allude his correspondent remarks as follows:
“I have read your little work with much interest, and desire that it may
have a wide circulation, and that its recommendations may be adopted in
practice. If you publish a third edition, I could wish that you would
add a piece of advice of the greatest importance, especially to young
married persons. Many women are ignorant, that, in the gratification of
the reproductive instinct, the exhaustion to the man is much greater
than to the woman: a fact most important to be known, the ignorance of
which has caused more than one husband to forfeit his health, nay, his
_life_. TISSOT tells us, that the loss by an ounce of semen is equal to
that by forty ounces of blood;[32] and that, in the case of the
healthiest man, nature does not _demand_ connexion oftener than once a
month.[33]
“How many young spouses, loving their husbands tenderly and
disinterestedly, if they were but informed of these facts, would watch
over and preserve their partners’ healths, instead of exciting them to
over-indulgence.
“I send you a copy of Italian verses, appropriate, like the German
stanzas you have quoted in your work, to the above remarks:
“‘Merta gli alleri al crine
Chi scende in campo armato,
Chi a cento squadre a lato,
Impallidir nun sa:
Ma piu gloria ha nel fronte
Chi, alla ragion soggetto,
D’un sconsigliato astello
Trionfator si fà.’[34]
L. G.”
Mr. Fowler the Phrenologist in speaking upon this subject in his
pamphlet entitled, “Amativeness warning and advice to married and
single,” makes the following remarks, that “a hard day’s work does not
equally prostrate and fatigue. The fallow-buck after his passion has
subsided is tamed down by exhaustion, that he can be approached and
almost caught by hand. 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 forego this indulgence or intellectual exertion or else
die. Powerful constitutions will stand an immense drain before they
finally break, but terrible 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 organised 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 then highly organised must partake rarely, else it
will excite to distraction and proportionally exhaust.”
FINIS.
ADVERTISEMENT.
The readers of the editor’s second enlarged edition of the Hon. R. D.
Owen’s Moral Physiology, are apprized that since the publication of his
first edition of this work, considerable opportunity has been afforded
by the sale of the _Electro-Galvania_ alluded to in this work, for
testing its efficacy as a preventive of conception. Time is required to
test the effect and establish the certainty of every new remedial agent.
Sufficient opportunity has been afforded in this instance, since this
instrument was first introduced to public notice, for proving the
certain control which the electrical influence is capable of exercising
over the nervous system.
The increased demand for the instrument has demonstrated its perfect
adaption to the accomplishment of the important object for which it is
designed, and has most fully established its claim to the confidence
heretofore reposed in its preventive influence. Communications from
abroad, and orders for this work or the article herein alluded to,
addressed to Dr. R. Glover, New York, will meet with due attention.
-----
Footnote 1:
The Greeks and Romans considered that by familiarizing the population
with the exhibition of the human figure completely naked, libidinous
propensities and desires would be less excited. The continence and
chastity of the half-clad Germans, Tacitus highly extols, and
contrasts with the effeminate and luxurious habits of the more
polished nations of his time. The worship of the Phallus, or erect
penis, is of the most remote antiquity, and derived its origin not
from vulgar or obscene notions, but from a consideration that the
generative powers of nature were thus best personified; and to render
the type more complete, the Deities were often made Hermaphroditic or
of a two-fold sex, to show that either alone would be incomplete
without the other, to represent nature engendering and reproducing.
The Phallus was also used as an amulet or charm suspended from the
neck, and its exhibition over a house in Pompeii is explained by the
words “domus felicitatis.” On this interesting subject, Mr. O’Brien’s
learned, but too fanciful work, on the Round Towers of Ireland, will
throw considerable light.
Footnote 2:
See “Memoires de la Court d’Espagne,” by Madame d’Aunoy.
Footnote 3:
See Tournefort’s Travels in Turkey.
Footnote 4:
See Buckingham’s Travels in Asia.
Footnote 5:
See Bruce’s Travels in Abyssinia.
Footnote 6:
One of the English kings, Edward III., in the year 1344, picked up
from the floor of a ball-room, an embroidered garter, belonging to a
lady of rank. In returning it to her, he checked the rising smile of
his courtiers with the words, “Honi soit qui mal y pense!” or,
paraphrased in English, “Shame on him who invidiously interprets it!”
The sentiment was so greatly approved, that it has become the motto of
the English national arms. It is one which might be not inaptly nor
unfrequently applied in rebuking the mawkish, skin-deep, and
intolerant morality of this hypocritical and profligate age.
Footnote 7:
See “A brief exposition of the principles of the United Society called
Shakers,” published by Calvin Green and Seth Y. Wells, 1830.
Footnote 8:
I call them my friends, because, however little I am disposed to
accede to all their principles, I have met, from among their body, a
greater proportion of individuals who have taken with them my
friendship and sympathy, than perhaps from among any other sect or
class of men.
Footnote 9:
By _unrestrained_, Malthus and his disciples mean, not restricted or
destroyed by any incidental check whatever, moral or immoral,
prudential or violent. Thus, poverty, war, libertinism, famine, &c.
are all powerful checks to population. In this sense, and not simply
as applying to preventative moral restraint, have I employed the word
throughout this chapter.
Footnote 10:
Mandeville.
Footnote 11:
Some wag, adverting to the fact, that Mr. Malthus himself has a large
family, remarked, “that the reverend gentleman knew better how to
preach than to practice.”
Footnote 12:
Lawrence, the ingenious author of the “Empire of the Nairs,” says
shrewdly enough, “Wherever the women are prudes, the men will be
drunkards.”
Footnote 13:
It may perhaps be argued, that all married persons have this power
already, seeing that they are no more obliged to become parents than
the unmarried; they may live as the brethern and sisters among the
Shakers do. But this Shaker remedy is, in the first place, utterly
impracticable, as a general rule; and, secondly, it would chill and
embitter domestic life, even if it were practicable.
Footnote 14:
Will our sensitive fine ladies blush at the plain good sense and
simplicity of such an observation? Let me tell them, the indelicacy is
in their own minds, not in the words of the French mother.
Footnote 15:
For a vice so unnatural as onanism there could be no possible
temptation, and therefore no existence, were not men unnaturally and
mischievously situated. It first appeared, probably, in monasteries;
and has been perpetuated by the more or less anti-social and
demoralizing relation in which the sexes stand to each other, in
almost all countries. In estimating the consequences of the present
false situation of society, we must set down to the black account the
wretched, wretched consequences (terminating not unfrequently in
incurable insanity) of this vice, the preposterous offspring of modern
civilization. Physicians say that onanism at present prevails, to a
lamentable extent, both in this country and in England. If the
recommendations contained in this little treatise were generally
followed, it would probably totally disappear in a single generation.
Footnote 16:
See letter of Percy Byssche Shelley, published in the “Lion,” of
December 5, 1828.
Footnote 17:
Every reflecting mind will distinguish between the
unreasoning—sometimes even generous, imprudence of youthful passion,
and the calculating selfishness of the matured and heartless
libertine. It is a melancholy truth, that pseudo-civilization produces
thousands of seducers by profession, who, while daily calling the
heavens to witness their eternal affections, have no affection for any
thing on earth but their own precious and profligate selves. It is to
characters so utterly worthless as these that my observations apply.
Footnote 18:
Jesus said unto her, “Neither do I condemn thee.”—_John_ viii. 11.
Footnote 19:
What is the actual state of society in Great Britain and even in this
republic, that pseudo-civilization, in her superlative delicacy,
should so fastidiously scruple to speak of or to sanction a simple,
moral, effectual check to population? Are her sons all chaste and
temperate, and her daughters all passionless and pure? I might
disclose, if I would, in this very city of New York—and in our
neighbour city of Philadelphia—scenes and practices that have come to
light from time to time, and that would furnish no very favourable
answer to the question. I might ask, whether all the houses of
assignation in these two cities are frequented by the known profligate
alone? or whether some of the most outwardly respectable fathers—ay,
_mothers_ of families—have not been found in resorts supported and
frequented only by “good society” like themselves?
As regards Great Britain, I might quote the evidence delivered before
a “Committee of the House of Commons, on Labourers’ Wages,” by Henry
Drummond, a banker, magistrate, and large land-owner in the county of
Surrey, in which the following question and answer occur: Q. “What is
the practice you allude to of forcing marriages?” A. “I believe
nothing is more erroneous than the assertion, that the poor laws tend
to imprudent marriages; I never knew an instance of a girl being
married until she was with child, nor ever knew of a marriage taking
place through a calculation for future support.” Mr. Drummond’s
assertions were confirmed by other equally respectable witnesses; and
from what I myself have learnt in conversation with some of the chief
manufacturers of England, I am convinced, that the statement, as
regards the working population in the chief manufacturing districts,
is scarcely exaggerated.
I might go on to state, that the spot on which the Foundling Hospital
in Dublin now stands, formerly went by the name of “Murderer’s Lane,”
from the number of child murders that were perpetrated in the
vicinity.
I might adduce the testimony of respectable witnesses in proof, that,
even among the married, the blighting effects of ergot are not
unfrequently incurred; by those very persons, probably, who, in
public, would think fit to be terribly shocked at this little book.
But why multiply proofs? The records of every court of justice, nay,
the tittle tattle of every fashionable drawing-room, sufficiently
marks the real character of this prudish and pharisaical world of
ours.
Footnote 20:
See letter of the Committee of the Typographical Society to Robert
Dale Owen, published in the Commercial Advertiser of the 29th of
September, and copied into the Free Enquirer of the 9th of October,
1830.
For a statement of the circumstances connected with that letter, and
which induced me, at this time, to write and publish the present
treatise, see Preface.
Footnote 21:
I should like to hear these gentlemen explain, according to what
principle they imagine the chastity of their _wives_ to grow out of a
fear of offspring; so that, if released from such fear, prostitution
would follow. I can readily comprehend that the unmarried may be
supposed careful to avoid that situation to which no legal cause can
be assigned; but a wife must be especially dull, if she cannot assign,
in all cases, a legal cause; and a husband must be especially
sagacious, if he can tell whether the true cause be assigned or not.
This safeguard to married chastity, therefore, to which the gentlemen
of the Typographical Committee seem to look with so implicit a
confidence, is a mere broken reed; and has been so, ever since the
days of Bethsheba.
Yet _conjugal_ chastity is that which is especially valued. The
inconstancy of a wife commonly cuts much deeper than the dishonor of a
sister. In that case, then, which the world usually considers of the
highest importance, the fear of offspring _imposes no check whatever_.
It cannot make one iota of difference whether a married woman be
knowing in physiology or not; except perhaps, indeed, to the husband’s
advantage; in cases where the wife’s conscience induces her at least
to guard against the possibility of burthening her legal lord with the
care and support of children that are not his. Constancy, where it
actually exists, is the offspring of something more efficacious than
ignorance. And if in the wife’s case, men must and do trust to
something else, why not in all other cases, where restraint may be
considered desirable? Shall men trust in the greater, and fear to
trust in the less? Whatever any one may choose to assert regarding his
relatives’ secret inclinations to profligacy, these arguments may
convince him that if he has any safeguard at present, a perusal of
Moral Physiology will not destroy it.
’Tis strange that men, by way of suborning an argument, should be
willing thus to vilify their relatives’ character and motives, without
first carefully examining whether any thing was gained to their cause,
after all, by the vilification.
Footnote 22:
Instances innumerable might be adduced. Not one young person, for
example, in twenty, is ever told, that sexual intercourse during the
period of a woman’s courses is not unfrequently productive, to the
woman of a species of fluor albus, and sometimes (as a consequent) to
the man of symptoms very similar to those of urethritis or gonorrhœa,
but more easily removed. Yet what fact more important to be
communicated! And how ridiculous the mischievously prudish refinement
that conceals from human beings what it most deeply concerns them to
know? The following case is related by Dr. Dewees in his work on
Diseases of Females: “We have known a complaint communicated to the
male by intercourse with a woman labouring under _Pruritis_. It was
very similar to that which affected the female in its general
character. When this occurs with the married man, much disturbance is
sometimes created from a supposition that the wife has been
unfaithful, and the contrary. Indeed it has occurred in more instances
than one, within our own knowledge, where the woman has thought
herself the injured party; and in one case, the recrimination was
mutual. In this instance, the friends of the parties assembled to
determine on the terms of separation, when it was suggested, by one of
those who happened to be more rational than the rest, that before they
proceeded to such an extremity, their family physician should be
consulted. We were accordingly sent for. After an attentive hearing of
both parties, and an examination of the parts, we were satisfied that
there was not the slightest ground for either to be charged with want
of fidelity, and we assured the parties that this was the case, and
were fortunate enough to cause all further proceedings to be
suspended.”
Footnote 23:
Le premier serment que se firent deux êtres de chair, ce fut au pied
d’un rocher, qui tombait en poussière; ils attestèrent de leur
constance un ciel qui n’est pas un instant le même: tout passait en
eux, et autour d’eux; et ils croyaient leurs cœurs affranchis de
vicissitudes. O enfans! toujours enfans!
DIDEROT; _Jacques et son maitre_.
Footnote 24:
Some German poet, whose name has escaped me says,
“Tapfer ist der Lowensieger,
Tapfer is der Weltbezwinger,
Tapferer, wer sich selbst bezwang!”
“Brave is the lion-victor,
Brave the conqueror of a world,
Braver he who controls himself!”
It is a noble sentiment, and very appropriate to the present
discussion.
Footnote 25:
See “Historie de l’Académie des Sciences,” for the year 1679, page
279.
Footnote 26:
Hippocrates positively asserts this latter hypothesis, and is
outrageous against all sceptics in his theory. In his work on diet, he
tells us, “_Si quis non credat animam animæ misceri, demens est._”
Tertullian warmly supports the orthodoxy of this opinion.
Footnote 27:
Bonner, I believe.
Footnote 28:
Velpeau defines conception to be, that change which takes place
between the instant of vivification, and the period at which the germ
shows evidence of development.
Footnote 29:
My father, Robert Owen’s definition of chastity is also an excellent
one: “PROSTITUTION, Sexual intercourse _without_ affection: CHASTITY,
Sexual intercourse _with_ affection.”
Footnote 30:
Proverbs v. 18.
Footnote 31:
It is not uncommon to hear of women deriving no pleasure from the
sexual embrace; and however powerful an inducement the expected reward
of the highest sensual gratification may be to encourage propagation,
such a consummation, although much it may be wished for, is not
absolutely necessary for impregnation. I have met with numerous
females who, like [35]the mother of one of Napoleon’s Generals, have
declared: “Qu’elle n’avoit eu que les douleurs d’enfanter.”
Footnote 32:
This, of course, must be rather a matter of conjecture and
approximation, than of accurate calculation.
Footnote 33:
And I doubt whether she _permits_ it, without more or less of injury,
to the average of constitutions, oftener than once a week. Certain I
am, that any young man who will carefully note and compare his
sensations, will become convinced, that temperance positively forbids
such indulgence, at any rate, more than twice a week; and that he
trifles with his constitution who neglects the prohibition. How
immeasurably important that parents should communicate to their sons,
but especially to their daughters, facts like these!
Footnote 34:
For the English reader, I have attempted the following imitation of
the above lines:
Crown his brows with laurel wreath,
Who can tread the field of death—
Tread—with armed thousands near—
And know not what it is to fear.
But greater far his meed of praise,
Juster his claim to glory’s bays,
Who, true to reason’s voice, to virtue’s call,
Conquers himself, the noblest deed of all!
Footnote 35:
Elliotson’s notes to Blumenbach’s Physiology.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
1. Table of Contents added by transcriber.
2. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling.
3. Archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings retained as printed.
4. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
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