CHAPTER I.

NORMAL FUNCTIONS IN YOUTH.

CARPENTER says, "The period of youth is distinguished by that advance in the evolution of the generative apparatus in both sexes, and by that acquirement of its power of functional activity, which constitutes the state of PUBERTY. At this epoch a considerable change takes place in the bodily constitution: the sexual organs undergo a much increased development; various parts of the surface, especially the chin and the pubes, become covered with hair; the larynx enlarges, and the voice becomes lower in pitch, as well as rougher and more powerful; and new feelings and desires are awakened in the mind. These desires, in Man, are promoted by instinct, which he shares with the lower animals. This instinct, like the other propensities, is excited by sensations, and these may either originate in the sexual organs themselves, or may be excited through the organs of special sense. Thus, in Man it is most powerfully aroused by impressions conveyed through the sight or touch; but in many other animals, the auditory and olfactory organs communicate impressions which have an equal power; and it is not improbable that in certain morbidly excited states of feeling, the same may be the case in ourselves. Localized sensations have also a powerful effect in exciting sexual desires, as must have been within the experience of almost every one; the fact is most remarkable, however, in cases of satyriasis, which disease is generally found to be connected with some obvious cause of irritation of the general system, such as pruritus, active congestion, &c. The seat of this sexual sensation is no longer supposed to be in the cerebellum generally, but probably in its central portion, or some part of the medulla oblongata.'

Roubaud considers that as venereal desires are instinctive in animals at the rutting season, so also are they in young human males, at puberty, after long periods of continence, or after intervals of healthy rural repose. Later in life these desires, he thinks, answer to no appeals but those of sensation or imagination. The sense of smell principally affects animals, the odour of whose sexual organs possesses an extraordinary attraction for the males of the breed; but all the senses have power to influence the desires of man. "There is no doubt," adds this author, "that mere volition, without the aid of the senses, is adequate to engender venereal desires. This takes place through IMAGINATION, which wakens and reanimates the shadowy forms of the past-grasps a conception of the future. Aided by her, the present hour is peopled by delicious forms, which the eyes can feast upon, the lips embrace,

and the arms enfold. Graceful phantoms, combinations of real and ideal loveliness, may at her bidding plunge the soul and the senses into the most complete voluptuous ecstasy of love. Poets, romance writers, artists, all, in fact, who enjoy imagination to a greater extent than others, are justly supposed to have an immense tendency to love, but it does not follow that they should be the more capable of accomplishing the act; for we shall see, by and bye, the unfavourable influence which intellectual employment exercises on virility. Such, however, is the force of imagination, that it alone, without reference to instinct and sensation, is competent to produce not only venereal erethism, but the very act of ejaculation itself.”

As it admits of no dispute that the development of the individual is cared for by Nature before she contemplates the extension of the species, it becomes us, I think, to take measures that her operations should be undisturbed. The young object of our care should be watched, and carefully watched, for the premature development of the sexual inclination is not alone repugnant to all we associate with the term childhood, but is also fraught with danger to his dawning manhood. Extreme youth should be attended by complete repose of the generative functions, unbroken by anything like intense feeling for their employment.

At PUBERTY, when "life is in excess, the blood boils, the desires are impetuous and tormenting-nature is almost an accomplice," we expect to find the young man a reasoning being. If he is not, those who have been about him during his youth are to blame, as they should have directed his inclinations in right channels. The boy, long before this epoch of his life, should have been taught that his mere inclinations and instincts are not to be blindly followed. He should have been informed that the indulgence of sexual desires is (for him) not natural,—that if indulged in, the gratification will be followed by the worst consequences. If he has been so grounded in sexual education, and some active measures be taken for his good during this period of trial — if his thoughts are led away to the amusements, recreations, and exercises natural to his age, and his companions chosen judiciously, Nature will lend her aid, and although the sexual feelings may be now developing themselves, the boy will be able to keep them in abeyance (see pp. 15 and 60).

That the department of the profession I am more immediately concerned in is not the only one that should urge this self-restraint, is shown by the following observations by Dr. Reid, on the—

"Influence of the Will.-Let us, as psychological physicians, impress upon the minds of those predisposed to attacks of mental aberration, and other forms of nervous disease, the important truth that they have it in their power to crush, by determined, persevering, and continuous acts of volition, the floating atoms, the minute embryo, the early scintillations of insanity.' Many of the diseases of the mind, in their premonitory stage admit, under certain favourable conditions, of an easy cure, if the mind has in early life been accustomed to habits of self-control, and the patient is happily gifted with strong volitionary power, and brings it to bear upon the scarcely formed filaments of mental disease.' We should have fewer disorders of the mind if we could acquire more power of

volition, and endeavour by our energy to disperse the clouds which occasionally arise within our own horizon-if we resolutely tore the first threads of the net which gloom and ill-humour may cast around us, and made an effort to drive away the melancholy images of the imagination by incessant occupation."*

The sort of mental gymnasium here referred to is admirably fitted for the development, regulation, and cultivation of those faculties of the mind upon the regular exercise of which depends our intellectual advancement. If I may judge of the generation now growing up, I should say that modern education has not sufficiently attended to these necessary duties; and yet it is this self-regulation and restraint upon which hangs much of our future success and happiness.

When anxious parents express to me their fears and doubts on these matters arising probably from the quicksands they themselves have passed in their youth-I tell them, the best preventive step to be taken is to watch their children, if not actually to warn them against what it is hoped they are ignorant of, and to develope all the muscular powers of their charges by strong gymnastic exercises. For, as any one may observe, it is not the strong athletic boy, fond of healthy exercise, who thus early shows marks of sexual desires: but your puny exotic, whose intellectual education has been fostered at the expense of his physical development.†

Little do parents know or think of what they sacrifice in unnaturally forcing the intellectual at the expense of muscular development. Our ancestors valued a man for his muscle-we go into the other extreme; and, unfortunately, many of the attempts of modern education tend only to the development of intellectual superiority, and children are confined to the school-room for hours that, at an early age, had better be passed in the open air.

If such parents would read the biographies of eminent characters who have succeeded in the highest walks of their various professions, they will find that one of the most necessary means of success is a strong constitution. If on this be engrafted superior intellectual endowments, accompanied by that energy of character which usually attends the strong, success in after life may be nearly ensured. Such are not the youths whom we see cut off in the prime of life, just as they are giving promise of great distinction, and whose parents look back with regret, and ask themselves, with justice, if they have not sometimes been instrumental in causing these intellectual suicides. I fear what I am writing may surprise not a few of my readers, and I may be thought to travel out of my province; but I feel it my duty to allude to very delicate questions in this chapter, and treat of matters that must be no longer shirked.

I feel, too keenly, perhaps, that the times in which we live are remarkable, as impugning many of our most fondly-cherished conceits, and especially our very prevalent ideas of having, somehow or other, attained to an indescribable pitch of physical, moral, and intellectual excellence. But a few years ago, who would have thought or dared to give utterance to an opinion that our universities were not the best public schools of learning in the world, or that the system in the British army was not the best calculated to nurture heroes, and to train professional * "Hypochondriasis," by Dr. Reid. + See Appendix A, p. 107.

soldiers? He would have been a bold man who asserted that our morals could be improved, or that even the most perfect systems of education were not in many quarters thoroughly well known, if not positively in practice. Free discussion during the last few years has, however, shaken this self-complacency, and in all branches of education we seem all at once to have become aware that great improvements are still required, if we would march in the van of civilization. It may be galling to English pride to acknowledge our shortcomings; but, once satisfied that progress is necessary, we set our national shoulder to the wheel, and start afresh the somewhat lethargic machine of public opinion. The force of progress seems to me to act uniformly in all directions, and we learn from day to day that an advance in one art or science is contemporaneous with, if it does not influence, a similar amount of expansion in others. The most conservative amongst our profession cannot but admit that improvement has forced its way, in spite of all hindrances, when it has been backed by observation and true hygienic principles. If, then, as medical men and as parents, we can in aught contribute to the better training of the rising generation, it is our unquestionable duty to express ourselves, without fear of offending false delicacy, in such language as cannot be misunderstood. (See Appendix A.)

The spirit of progress has happily encouraged the attempts originated within the last few years in this metropolis and other large towns, to direct the leisure of young men into intellectual channels, by affording them opportunities of spending their evenings in singing schools, mechanics' institutions, lecture-rooms, and popular science classes. I could have wished that greater efforts had been made to popularize V gymnasia and other healthy exercises, and I think great good might be done in these associations, by alluding, in well-considered terms, to the sexual feelings and their proper management. On these subjects, the young men are now left in great ignorance. In the first place, they might be told (I think) that early marriage, to the hardly-worked metropolitan population, cannot be advisable, for the social reasons stated at p. 21. On the highest moral grounds, unmarried intercourse should not be sanctioned. But should we stop here? I think not. The audience should be informed that, in the present state of society, the sexual appetites must not be fostered; and experience teaches those who have had the largest means of information on the matter, that selfcontrol must be exercised. This, however, can be greatly assisted by bodily and mental fatigue, as practice teaches us the proverbially idle are often the most dissipated, and that in accordance with natural laws the expenditure of vital force in one direction diverts it from others. So with the secretion of seminal fluid: if the mind be (as it too often is) constantly devoted to sexual thoughts, semen will be secreted; and if secreted, the sexual organs will react on the brain, to the exclusion of other ideas; and out of this vicious circle it is very difficult for the patient, unaided by experience, to extricate himself. It is in this emergency that conscientious but kind advice is of the greatest value, when aided by determination on the part of the young man: for at the critical period of adolescence, their absence favours when it does not induce, in a multitude of cases, unrecorded except in the annals of the profession, that hopeless state of body from which recovery is doubtful,