Studies in the Psychology of Sex Volume I Part 18

[258]

Glafira Abricosoff, of Moscow, in her Paris thesis, L'Hysterie aux xvii et xviii siecles, 1897, presents a summary of the various views held at this time; as also Gilles de la Tourette, Traite de l'Hysterie, vol. i, Chapter I.

[259]

Edinburgh Medical Journal, June, 1883, p. 1123, and Mental Diseases, 1887, p. 488.

[260]

Hegar, Zusammenhang der Geschlechtskrankheiten mit nervosen Leiden, Stuttgart, 1885. (Hegar, however, went much further than this, and was largely responsible for the surgical treatment of hysteria now generally recognized as worse than futile.) b.a.l.l.s-Headley, "Etiology of Nervous Diseases of the Female Genital Organs," Allb.u.t.t and Playfair, System of Gynecology, 1896, p. 141.

[261]

Lombroso and Ferrero, La Donna Delinquente, 1893, pp. 613-14.

[262]

Charcot and Marie, article on "Hysteria," Tuke's Dictionary of Psychological Medicine.

[263]

Axenfeld and Huchard, Traite des Nevroses, 1883, pp. 1092-94. Icard (La Femme pendant la Periode Menstruelle, pp. 120-21) has also referred to recorded cases of hysteria in animals (Coste's and Peter's cases), as has Gilles de la Tourette (op. cit., vol. i, p. 123). See also, for references, Fere, L'Instinct s.e.xuel, p. 59.

[264]

Man and Woman, 4th ed., p. 326. A distinguished gynaecologist, Matthews Duncan, had remarked some years earlier (Lancet, May 18, 1889) that hysteria, though not a womb disease, "especially attaches itself to the generative system, because the genital system, more than any other, exerts emotional power over the individual, power also in morals, power in social questions."

[265]

Gilles de la Tourette, Archives de Tocologie et de Gynecologie, June, 1895.

[266]

Rivista Sperimentale di Freniatria, 1897, p. 290; summarized in the Journal of Mental Science, January, 1898.

[267]

From the earliest times it was held that menstruation favors hysteria; more recently, Landouzy recorded a number of observations showing that hysterical attacks coincide with perfectly healthy menstruation; while Ball has maintained that it is only during menstruation that hysteria appears in its true color. See the opinions collected by Icard, La Femme pendant la Periode Menstruelle, pp. 75-81.

[268]

Krafft-Ebing, "Ueber Neurosen und Psychosen durch s.e.xuelle Abstinenz," Jahrbucher fur Psychiatrie, vol. iii, 1888. It must, however, be added that the relief of hysteria by s.e.xual satisfaction is not rare, and that Rosenthal finds that the convulsions are thus diminished. (Allgemeine Wiener Medizinal-Zeitung, Nos. 46 and 47, 1887.) So they are also, in simple and uncomplicated cases, according to Mongeri, by pregnancy.

[269]

"All doctors who have patients in convents," remarks Marro (La p.u.b.erta, p. 338), "know how hysteria dominates among them;" he adds that his own experience confirms that of Raciborski, who found that nuns devoted to the contemplative life are more liable to hysteria than those who are occupied in teaching or in nursing. It must be added, however, that there is not unanimity as to the prevalence of hysteria in convents. Brachet was of the same opinion as Briquet, and so considered it rare. Imbert-Goubeyre, also (La Stigmatisation, p. 436) states that during more than forty years of medical life, though he has been connected with a number of religious communities, he has not found in them a single hysterical subject, the reason being, he remarks, that the unbalanced and extravagant are refused admission to the cloister.

[270]

Parent-Duchatelet, De la Prost.i.tution, vol. i, p. 242.

[271]

It may not be unnecessary to point out that here and throughout, in speaking of the psychic mechanism of hysteria, I do not admit that any process can be purely psychic. As Fere puts it in an admirable study of hysteria (Twentieth Century Practice of Medicine, 1897, vol. x, p. 556): "In the genesis of hysterical troubles everything takes place as if the psychical and the somatic phenomena were two aspects of the same biological fact."

[272]

Pierre Janet, L'Automatisme Psychologique, 1889; L'Etat mental des Hysteriques, 1894; Nevroses et Idees fixes, 1898; Breuer und Freud, Studien uber Hysterie, Vienna, 1895; the best introduction to Freud's work is, however, to be found in the two series of his Sammlung Kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre, published in a collected form in 1906 and 1909. It may be added that a useful selection of Freud's papers has lately (1909) been published in English.

[273]

We might, perhaps, even say that in hysteria the so-called higher centres have an abnormally strong inhibitory influence over the lower centres. Gioffredi (Gazzetta degli Ospedali, October 1, 1895) has shown that some hysterical symptoms, such as mutism, can be cured by etherization, thus loosening the control of the higher centres.

[274]

Charcot's school could not fail to recognize the erotic tone which often dominates hysterical hallucinations. Gilles de la Tourette seeks to minimize it by the remark that "it is more mental than real." He means to say that it is more psychic than physical, but he implies that the physical element in s.e.x is alone "real," a strange a.s.sumption in any case, as well as destructive of Gilles de la Tourette's own fundamental a.s.sertion that hysteria is a real disease and yet purely psychic.

[275]

See, e.g., his substantial volume, Die Traumdeutung, 1900, 2d ed. 1909.

[276]

Sammlung, first series, p. 208.

[277]

Studien uber Hysterie, p. 217.

[278]

Sammlung, first series, p. 162.

[279]

Sammlung, second series, p. 102.

[280]

Ib. p. 146.

[281]

Sammlung, first series, p. 229. Freud has developed his conception of s.e.xual const.i.tution in Drei Abhandlungen zur s.e.xualtheorie, 1905.

[282]

As Moll remarks, Freud's conceptions are still somewhat subjective, and in need of objective demonstration; but whatever may be thought of their theories, he adds, there can be no doubt that Breuer and Freud have done a great service by calling attention to the important action of the s.e.xual life on the nervous system.

[283]

Gertrude Stein, "Cultivated Motor Automatism," Psychological Review, May, 1898.

[284]

Charcot's most faithful followers refuse to recognize a "hysteric temperament," and are quite right, if such a conception is used to destroy the conception of hysteria as a definite disease. We cannot, however, fail to recognize a diathesis which, while still apparently healthy, is predisposed to hysteria. So distinguished a disciple of Charcot as Janet thoroughly recognizes this, and argues (L'Etat mental, etc., p. 298) that "we may find in the habits, the pa.s.sions, the psychic automatism of the normal man, the germ of all hysterical phenomena." Fere held a somewhat similar view.

[285]

A. F. A. King, "Hysteria," American Journal of Obstetrics, May 18, 1891.

[286]

M. Rosenthal, Diseases of the Nervous System, vol. ii, p. 44. Fere notes similar cases (Twentieth Century Practice of Medicine, vol. x, p. 551). Long previously, Gall had recorded the case of a young widow of ardent temperament who had convulsive attacks, apparently of hysterical nature, which always terminated in s.e.xual o.r.g.a.s.m (Fonctions du Cerveau, 1825, vol. iii, p. 245).

[287]

There seems to be a greater necessity for such explosive manifestations in women than in men, whatever the reason may be. I have brought together some of the evidence pointing in this direction in Man and Woman, 4th ed., revised and enlarged, Chapters xii and xiii.

[288]

There is no doubt an element of real truth in this ancient belief, though it mainly holds good of minor cases of hysteria. Many excellent authorities accept it. "Hysteria is certainly common in the single," Herman remarks (Diseases of Women, 1898, p. 33), "and is generally cured by a happy marriage." Lowenfeld (s.e.xualleben und Nervenleiden, p. 153) says that "it cannot be denied that marriage produces a beneficial change in the general condition of many hysterical patients," though, he adds, it will not remove the hysterical temperament. The advantage of marriage for the hysterical is not necessarily due, solely or at all, to the exercise of s.e.xual functions. This is pointed out by Mongeri, who observes (Allgemeine Zeitschrift fur Psychiatrie, 1901, Heft 5, p. 917): "I have known and treated several hysterical girls who are now married, and do not show the least neuropathic indications. Some of these no longer have any wish for s.e.xual gratification, and even fulfil their marital duties unwillingly, though loving their husbands and living with them in an extremely happy way. In my opinion, marriage is a sovereign remedy for neuropathic women, who need to find a support in another personality, able to share with them the battle of life."

III.

The Prevalence of Masturbation-Its Occurrence in Infancy and Childhood-Is it More Frequent in Males or Females?-After Adolescence Apparently more Frequent in Women-Reasons for the s.e.xual Distribution of Masturbation-The Alleged Evils of Masturbation-Historical Sketch of the Views Held on This Point-The Symptoms and Results of Masturbation-Its Alleged Influence in Causing Eye Disorders-Its Relation to Insanity and Nervous Disorders-The Evil Effects of Masturbation Usually Occur on the Basis of a Congenitally Morbid Nervous System-Neurasthenia Probably the Commonest Accompaniment of Excessive Masturbation-Precocious Masturbation Tends to Produce Aversion to Coitus-Psychic Results of Habitual Masturbation-Masturbation in Men of Genius-Masturbation as a Nervous Sedative-Typical Cases-The Greek Att.i.tude toward Masturbation-Att.i.tude of the Catholic Theologians-The Mohammedan Att.i.tude-The Modern Scientific Att.i.tude-In What Sense is Masturbation Normal?-The Immense Part in Life Played by Trans.m.u.ted Auto-erotic Phenomena.

The foregoing sketch will serve to show how vast is the field of life-of normal and not merely abnormal life-more or less infused by auto-erotic phenomena. If, however, we proceed to investigate precisely the exact extent, degree, and significance of such phenomena, we are met by many difficulties. We find, indeed, that no attempts have been made to study auto-erotic phenomena, except as regards the group-a somewhat artificial group, as I have already tried to show-collected under the term "masturbation" while even here such attempts have only been made among abnormal cla.s.ses of people, or have been conducted in a manner scarcely likely to yield reliable results.[289] Still there is a certain significance in the more careful investigations which have been made to ascertain the precise frequency of masturbation.