Studies in the Psychology of Sex Volume Iii Part 23

"I naturally prefer to satisfy myself with a woman, a friend and a lady of my own cla.s.s; but in the absence of the best I gladly take the next best available, down the scale from a lady for whom I do not care to prost.i.tutes of all cla.s.ses and colors, men, boys, animals, melons, and masturbation. I would as cheerfully have connection with my sister, or any other female relative. I have frequent erotic dreams about the most extraordinary subjects-male and female relations, casual acquaintances of both s.e.xes, and animals. When I have got an intrigue in hand with a woman, I have no wish to m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e, and often restrain myself when I know that I am going to have access before long to prost.i.tutes. After coitus it takes a long time before I am ready for the next, sometimes two hours; and the first is always very quick, nearly always too quick for the woman. With a strange woman I have difficulty in maintaining erection at the instant of penetration, and this has often given me trouble.

"I know that most women like, and few dislike, being touched by me. My favorite colors are green and red, and I can whistle quite well.

"I would be very glad to know whether I may be considered s.e.xually normal or not, but I do not desire any opinion on the morality of my acts, for the simple reason that without knowing all the circ.u.mstances it would be impossible to judge. But I cannot help saying that I do not consider anything I have done is wrong in itself, and I am quite certain that I have never harmed in any way any of the ladies with whom I have had relations. I am certain, if I had made promises which I knew I could not keep, I might have married one of them. But the result would have been great unhappiness to both, quarrels, and ultimate separation or divorce-and she realized that as well as I did. I may seem egotistical in my att.i.tude and a.s.surance toward ladies, but I only speak the honest truth; and I know that No. 6, for instance, has only grat.i.tude and worship to give me for having opened her eyes. I have made her promise to have intercourse with her husband as soon as she can bear it, and I have satisfied myself that I have not started her on the road to s.e.xual perversion. So much in self-explanation. I may add that I do not deliberately seek 'affaires de cur,' and that, when they come my way, I do my utmost to use all consideration for the lady, thinking, as I do, that I owe them a far bigger debt than I shall ever be able to pay."

HISTORY XIV.-J. E., professional man, aged 32. Public school and university education, in which he did well. From age of 6 or 7 had strong s.e.xual emotions, and from 9 s.e.xually pleasurable dreams, though no emission till 12 or 13. He remembers the a.s.sociation of s.e.xual excitement with whipping, either at sight or imagination of it, and this feeling was certainly shared by boys aged 9 to 12 at his private boarding-school and others at the public school later on. His nurse-maid used to invent excuses for beating his nates with a long lead-pencil when he was aged about 7, and he saw occasional whippings with clothes removed in the family nursery.

When nearly 16 he was initiated into masturbation, which at once coincided with rapid mental development and success at school. He has practised it ever since under same conditions and restrictions as marital intercourse. Religion has never acted as any restraint, and the best restraint to all young people, in his opinion, is to warn them on hygienic grounds. (He became a freethinker at 17, partly on observing the inconsistency of religious persons in this connection. He was twice set upon by Catholics when 16, who attempted mutual masturbation.) He can vaguely remember some such warning when very young from his mother.

No intercourse with women till age of 19, though strong h.o.m.os.e.xual feelings from 10 upward, a.s.sociated with feminine youths. These feelings were quite distinct from feelings of affection and friendship for more virile youths. An attack of gonorrhea at 21 was followed by an operation for circ.u.mcision, which had beneficial effects, but did not prevent an attack of syphilis at age of 23, caught at a guaranteed state establishment in France. Intercourse almost always with prost.i.tutes, on prudential and worldly grounds, though what he approves would be greater laxity between boys and girls, with proper safeguards against undesired offspring. He is now happily married. He only indulges in masturbation at times when intercourse is impossible (e.g., childbirth). It is then practised once or twice a week in the early morning; overnight it causes troubled sleep, brain activity, and constipation. This seems ethically more desirable unless the wife were to condone physical infidelity, which she would not, and even then there might be risks of venereal disease. His general health and working power are in all respects excellent, as the venereal diseases were speedily and thoroughly cured. h.o.m.os.e.xual feeling has entirely disappeared since marriage.

HISTORY XV.-G. D., English; aged 60. "My earliest essays in juvenile vice were due not so much to unguarded as to unguided ignorance. I slipped where my natural protectors suspected no danger, and I fell because I had never been warned of the treacherous nature of the ground. Before or soon after I was 7 years old, the example of an elder brother, who had lately begun to go to school as a day-boy, initiated me into the mysteries of masturbation, which seemed to me then as harmless as it was fascinating; and the novel pleasure was almost daily indulged in, after I had acquired sufficient dexterity to accomplish the act within a reasonable time, without a twinge of conscience, either in that brother's company or when alone. Decency demanded secrecy in the gratification of what soon became an imperious desire, and the preliminary operations included, almost from the first, mutual f.e.l.l.a.t.i.o and approximation of the excited organs; but similar privacy was very properly sought during the performance of other bodily acts a.s.sociated with those 'less honorable members,' and it appeared to me quite as natural and right for us to amuse ourselves together in that way as for a married couple to hide their most intimate embraces from the observation of others. Indeed, I went farther than that, and even came to regard the absence of all shame between us as akin to the primeval innocence which Adam and Eve exhibited before the Fall. I believed for long that we two were specially privileged and possessed a peculiar sense denied to other boys, for I had never heard of masturbation till I learnt, not the word indeed, but the thing itself.

"My curiosity about the real nature of s.e.xual union in the case of human beings set my intelligence to work at the interesting problem, and by carefully studying certain parts of the Bible, Lempriere's cla.s.sical and other dictionaries, as well as by persistently watching when I could the amorous proceedings of domestic animals, I learnt enough to make its most prominent features pretty clear before I was 11 years of age. I was then all eagerness to have the opportunity of inspecting at close quarters the genitals of women or young girls, and a stay at the seaside when I was 12 made the latter at least feasible. When the sh.o.r.e was nearly deserted, between 1 and 2 P.M., the daughters of the fisherfolk used to besiege the bathing machines and disport themselves in the water, bathing and paddling in various stages of nudity. I would pretend that my whole attention was being given to the making of miniature tunnels in the sand, while all the time I slyly peeped at what I most desired to see, whether in front or from behind, as the dancing damsels stood upright or stooped till their haunches were higher than their heads. I had already read something somewhere about the c.l.i.toris, and wanted especially to see it, but indistinct glimpses were all that I could obtain; nor was it until I visited an anatomical museum, which then existed at the top of the Haymarket in London, that I learned, a good many years later, from several life-sized models there displayed, the characteristic features of that part, as well as the abnormal modifications to which it is subject, either congenitally or in consequence of profligate habits. I was 15, I think, when I first came to know that girls can m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e as well as boys.

"Long after I had realized why the terms male and female are so distinguished, my imagination was occupied with the possible postures in which the act of copulation may be accomplished by a man and woman; from Horace, Lucretius, Martial, Aristophanes, and, above all, from Ovid's Ars Amatoria I obtained much, but not always very clear, information while still a schoolboy. This was supplemented later by photographic pictures from Pompeiian brothels and photographs from life, purchased at Florence and gloated over one night, with twice-repeated masturbation, and afterward destroyed in a revulsion of shame.

"But while continuing to practise self-abuse (with a certain degree of restraint indeed, but seldom less often than once or even twice a week), after I had been made fully aware of its perils by Dr. Adam Clarke's alarming comments on Genesis x.x.xviii, 9, when I was about 12 or 13, I never had connection with a woman until I married somewhat late in life. This abstinence was not due to any frigidity of disposition, but from prudential and religious motives, and, to some extent perhaps, from the imperfect but genuine satisfaction afforded by solitary indulgence. My imagination, like that of young J. J. Rousseau, as set forth in his Confessions, was allowed free scope for its exercise, but in practice I confined myself to what seemed to me comparatively innocent as compared with fornication. I was never an unreserved 'exhibitionist' like Rousseau, but I have on more than one occasion turned toward a hedge and pretended to make water, when a girl had just pa.s.sed me on the road, showing a turgens cauda if she should chance out of curiosity to look back, as once, at any rate, happened.

"I watched with interest the first indications of p.u.b.erty in my own person. I had, of course, seen the pubic hair on many of my own s.e.x, but I was 17 when I first saw a naked woman. She was standing at the door of her machine, wringing out her bathing-dress, as I swam past, and her face was hidden by the awning then used, so that she could not see me. A slight effusion of limpid mucus began to characterize the o.r.g.a.s.m, at the age of 12 or 13 (before any e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n of s.e.m.e.n was experienced), such as exuded later from the urethra when salacious excitement reached a certain pitch, even though the final climax might be postponed or prevented altogether. I found it a refinement of luxury to prolong the period of tumescence as far as possible, by frequently checking a too rapid progress toward the goal. By this practice of repeated arrest when the o.r.g.a.s.m was imminent, and the mental debauchery which was its habitual accompaniment, I believe I did my nervous system more damage than by anything else-even the early age at which the dangerous indulgence became established. Nocturnal emissions (the sequel of lascivious dreams) commenced when I was about 15, at which age I had my first experience of an involuntary discharge when awake, under the influence of purely mental emotion; but this latter mode of escape did not often happen, and later on ceased altogether. My muscular strength was not impaired by too frequent indulgence, and I acquired some athletic prowess on the football field and on the running path, both as a boy and as a young man. Walking tours were for long my favorite recreation, even after the bicycle became an increasing attraction. My health, however, suffered in other ways from too constant absorption in l.u.s.tful thoughts, which found vent in erotic verses and tales, generally destroyed soon after they were written. I have been subject since I was a boy to more or less prolonged fits of mental depression. How far I have inherited this tendency (my father and his father both married first cousins, and a neurotic diathesis has been characteristic of our family), or how far it has been aggravated by pernicious habits, I cannot say; cause and effect have no doubt acted and reacted on each other.

"As I grew toward adolescence I endeavored to make self-abuse as close an imitation as possible of s.e.xual intercourse by such methods as may be easily imagined. My biological studies (I won a scholarship and took honors at my university) were directed with most intent predilection toward the reproductive system, particularly the modifications of the copulatory organs in different animals and the diverse manner of their employment. The s.e.xual instinct, whether in its normal or abnormal manifestations, is a subject which has always had a strong attraction for me, nor has it lost its fascination with the growth of years (I am now 60) nor the compet.i.tion of other interests.

"My very limited experience of the s.e.xual system in women would lead me to believe that the c.l.i.toris is the only peculiarly sensitive part of the female genitalia, coition giving no pleasure unless 'the trigger of love' is simultaneously manipulated, as can be done when intromission is effected a tergo; that the mind of a normally healthy maiden is altogether free from s.e.xual excitement of a physical kind, and that little curiosity is felt about the precise modus operandi of conjugal intercourse; but, nevertheless, I have good reason to believe that this, if not an unusual type, is by no means the only one that exists.

"As to s.e.xual inversion my personal experience has been confined to two or three grandes pa.s.sions for boys, the first of which possessed me when between the ages of 16 and 18, and involved, when I was 17, the most intense mental emotion, of a romantic kind, tinged with poignant jealousy and vexation at comparative coldness toward myself. These love pa.s.sages never led me into indelicate behavior (I was once threatened with such treatment myself by a stranger whose acquaintance I made one day at the British Museum, when a lad of 15. He took me to his bedroom at an inn, locked the door, and showed me a collection of coins, giving me some, and, while doing so, attempted to take indecent liberties; but I pretended that I must catch a certain train, unlocked the door, and made a hasty escape), nor was any gratification sought beyond occasional kisses and other innocent endearments, though such caresses would sometimes excite an erection, which I carefully concealed. These amours were, however, no outcome of perverted instinct, nor were they any bar to fancies for the opposite s.e.x which affected my imagination rather than my heart."

HISTORY XVI.-This history is given in the subject's own words: A. N., 34 years of age, a university graduate, devoted to learning and interested in philosophy and theology. He is happily married and the father of an only daughter. Since p.u.b.erty he has enjoyed excellent health.

"Looking back he finds the beginnings of s.e.xual feeling obscure. This feeling is by no means identical in its progress with the knowledge of the phenomena of s.e.x generally. The latter he acquired thus: His mother told him at a very early age the outlines of the phenomena of birth and explained to him (perhaps at that time unnecessarily) that the genital organs of little girls were different from his own. This piece of knowledge led to his asking, when 9 years old, a little girl cousin who came to live with the family (he was an only child) and who shared his bed to let him see her genitalia. This she readily did and also invited him to coitus, which she described as a 'nice game.' He complied, but without, of course, any feeling of pleasure or any understanding of the nature of what he was doing. Shortly after this he went to a day school, where, amid the extraordinarily coa.r.s.e conversation of the boys, he was initiated into all the more obvious phenomena of s.e.x. But still it was only a matter of intellectual curiosity. As such it had a strange fascination for him, and to this day he remembers many of the obscene words and phrases, as, for example, a set of indecent verses beginning 'William, the milkman, sat under a tree,' describing coitus, though some of the details were yet misunderstood by him. That up to his tenth or eleventh year no real s.e.xual desire was awakened is plain from the fact that there was no desire for any repet.i.tion of attempts at coitus with his cousin, though he did indeed, again out of curiosity, finger her genitals sometimes, a thing which she, grown evidently more fastidious, reported to his mother, who gravely reprimanded him, telling him that it was the 'beginning of all evil.'

"Desire was awakened gradually and, as I have said, obscurely. Not only at school, but among his own cousins, especially two girls (other than the one above mentioned) and a boy, the conversation was lascivious in the extreme, though words never proceeded to deeds as between the boys and the girls. He was soon, however, about his fifteenth year, so far as he can remember, initiated into the practice of masturbation, first, sleeping with his boy cousin, the two used to play at 'husband and wife,' and then, more directly, a neighbor, a heavy, sensual type of boy, took him aside one day and drawing out his own p.e.n.i.s asked him 'if he knew how to make some b.u.t.termilk.' Out of curiosity at first, and to obtain the new and voluptuous sensation afterward, he began a.s.siduously to practise this vice, which, as he afterward found out, was very common, if not universal about him. That it was morally reprehensible he had not at that time the ghost of a notion; he considered that it belonged to the category of the 'dirty' only. His father quite neglected this development, believing, I suppose, in the superst.i.tion of the 'innocence of childhood.'

"This practice of masturbation went on a.s.siduously to his sixteenth year, when its true nature and danger were revealed to him by a good clergyman who prepared him for confirmation. He had at this time gone far, in both solitary vice and vice 'a deux,' with his male cousin, with whom he practised even 'f.e.l.l.a.t.i.o' and 'intromissio in anum.' But now he began to struggle against it and made some headway, but never entirely shook it off before his marriage at 26, so deeply rooted was the hold it had on him. Especially at the time between sleeping and waking, or while lying sleepless at night-when the monks prayed 'ne polluantur corpora'-did its attacks come insidiously upon him. He would struggle for weeks and then would come a relapse. On one occasion he slept with a young uncle who amused himself, thinking he was asleep, by playing with his p.e.n.i.s until he had an emission. A. N. hailed the occasion with keen joy-he caustically argued that he experienced the pleasure without being culpable in its production! Then on 'coming to himself' he would agonize over his vice, remembering, for example, that, while he had rejoiced in what had been done, the very cousin who some time before used to share his sin was genuinely annoyed at the same uncle's attentions when it was he who suffered them.

"Looking back over the whole period of his youth and adolescence, he can trace the psychological effect of what was going on secretly, in his relations to girls and women. In a word, these relations were sentimental only. He often imagined himself in love; but it was imagination only. He was in love with a wraith, not a girl of flesh and blood. He hesitated to regard in any s.e.xual way any girl of whom he had a high opinion; s.e.xual desire and 'love' seemed for him to inhabit different worlds and that it would be a pollution to bring them together. In hours of relaxation from the very hard intellectual work which he was at this time engaged on at school and at the university, he was quite content with the society of quite young girls or even children when most of his friends would have sought out females of their own age. Nothing could have been farther from his desires or intention than any lascivious or, indeed, unseemly act toward any female in whose company he might be: no mother need have hesitated to trust her daughter in his company. I firmly believe that the discipline of the same bed which Gibbon (Decline and Fall, ed. Bury, vol. ii, p. 37) makes so merry over could have been endured by him without difficulty. His outward conduct was in all these respects most seemly and decorous, yet night after night he could m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e, his imagination glowing with visions of female nakedness.

"Curiously the one and only actual female for whom he felt any desire at the earlier period (aged 14 to 16) began to be the cousin who lived in the house. On one occasion he touched her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, on another her naked thighs-and that was all! As she grew to p.u.b.erty, she would have allowed far more liberties, but he contented himself with a sly glance now and again, when he could procure it, at her swelling bosom. The fear of putting her with child was ample to keep him away from her bed. Later on even so much as the foregoing occurred no more, and, as I have said, his outward life became absolutely decorous.

"Consequently he was in no danger of having dealings with prost.i.tutes. The preliminaries, the conversation of such women, especially their drinking habits, would have been disgusting and repugnant to him in the extreme. He would have shunned the possibility of acquiring venereal disease like the plague. But he was never free from solitary vice; he secretly envied those who had occasions for coitus in what I may call a seemly and cleanly manner, friends in the country with farm girls, etc., of whom he had heard. He indulged also in lascivious reading, the obscene when he could procure it, rather than the merely suggestive, which has never been to his taste. He was familiar with quite a large number of Latin and Greek indecent pa.s.sages, knew the broader farces of the Canterbury Tales and of the Decameron, and, later, the 'contes' of La Fontaine and the Facetiae of Poggio. As Ste.-Beuve says of Gibbon, I think, he acquired an 'erudite and cold' sort of obscenity in this way.

"All this, of course, is only one half, and by no means always the dominant half, of his nature. He was often repentant for these delinquencies, and he was sincerely religious. He was also fond of serious learning and contrived to take a first-cla.s.s university degree. Yet, ever and anon, the deeply sensual side of his nature made itself felt. Scotched for a time it could be, but killed never.

"Yet, I do not think it could be said that he had the s.e.xual instinct in any really high degree. It was more like a small fly that makes a large buzz than any considerable factor in his const.i.tution. He had a companion about this time of whom such a remark is even more true. This man's mind was replete with all manner of risky stories, all sorts of s.e.xual details. He would take long walks with girls of loose character, talk with prost.i.tutes at home and abroad, and yet, I believe, he never proceeded to coitus.

"Such then, was the subject of this notice up to the time of his marriage. Two men, one might say, in one skin. One learned, one merely obscene; one a pattern of decorousness, the other a self-polluter.

"On the s.e.xual side he was as one knowing everything there is to know-yet knowing nothing. Like the boy-hero in Wedekind's Fruhling's Erwachen, he had been long in Egypt, yet he had never seen the pyramids. He began to distress himself with questions as to whether he was yet capable; whether his recurring vice had not permanently injured him; whether he had made himself unfit for marriage. So shy and reserved was he about his secret that he could never have brought himself to mention it to a medical man. 'What! he! the good, the religious! the wholly moral and decorous!' (such was, indeed, the reputation he had among his friends); 'he, the victim of a vice so black!' No, no! 'Secretum meum mihi,' he cried.

"Fortune, however, was kind to him. He was at an early age free from financial worries, which had almost crushed him earlier in his career, and he met in course of time the family from which he selected his excellent wife.

"The society in which he lived was of all English cla.s.ses, I should suppose, the most reticent in matters of s.e.x-the respectable, lower middle cla.s.s; shopkeepers and the like, with a tradition of homely religion and virtue. The cla.s.ses a little higher in the scale (to which, by the way, his mother had belonged) could far better sympathize with one in his position. Well, the family of his future wife was of a higher cla.s.s and, what is far more, of foreign origin, for whom a large number of our English 'convenances' do not exist. To them s.e.x was frankly recognized as a factor in life, and the mother of this household, as he grew more intimate, broached subjects which he had never, in such a manner, discussed before. It is unnecessary to give here any general history of his relationships with this household, as they have nothing to do with the matter in hand. After some time he became engaged to the youngest daughter, two years his senior, a woman of remarkable beauty and splendid development, one who attracted him as none other had done, both on account of her intellectual and social qualities and her physical beauty (he had hitherto despaired of finding the two combined in one person), for she is certainly the most beautiful woman with whom he has ever been acquainted.

"He now began to make the practical acquaintance of a woman-and one who, in impulses, temper, manner, and habit of thought, differed toto caelo from the girls he had known in his old home. Her s.e.xual nature was ripe and developed, and it is lucky that the engagement was of short duration, or the strain and antic.i.p.ation of that time might have been injurious to the health of both. As usual, in his outward relations toward women, so toward his fiancee, he was prepared for chaste caresses only. This, however, did not suffice for her hot and pa.s.sionate nature. They went as far as possible short of actual coitus.

"After a few months, however, the marriage took place, and, at first, this brought him bitter disappointment and seemed to confirm his worst fears. He found himself quite unable to have pleasure or satisfactory coitus; quite incapable, with any erection that he could command, of introducing his well-developed p.e.n.i.s into his wife's extremely narrow and contracted v.a.g.i.n.a. About a fortnight after the marriage, however, on his return from their short wedding tour, he felt much stronger and copulated with her, especially in the early mornings, so satisfactorily that she soon found herself with child. Coitus now began to be much more pleasurable for him, but to his wife still attended with pain.

"After nine months of married life, the child, the only offspring of the marriage, a healthy girl, was born. The stress of this time, the upsetting of his wife's health, her nervous breakdown and consequently uncertain temper, seemed for a period of nearly two years effectually to repress any s.e.xual desire in the husband, and this period is perhaps the chastest of his life. Desire seemed to be the one thing absent. The revulsion of feeling in his wife was remarkable. The erstwhile amorous fiancee, who could hardly wait until marriage to test her lover, became now the wife and mother who hardly wished to be touched by her husband.

"Her health, however, gradually improved and a more normal state of affairs was brought about, which has continued to the present day, broken only by periods of abstention, chiefly caused by the attacks of anemia and menstrual irregularities from which his wife suffers from time to time. Ordinarily, he enjoys coitus once or twice in the month, hardly oftener, taking one month with another. At one time he exemplified in his own person the saying omne animal post coitum triste, but now happily this depression of spirits is rarely felt. Sometimes he has felt a depression of spirits, a general discontentedness, before experiencing a strong erection; in these cases coitus has cleared his spirits. He would naturally look upon coitus as an evacuation, although he recognizes the imperfectness of that view. For one thing he is constantly sorry, viz., that the act gives no pleasure to his wife, and that he has never been able to induce a crisis with her by normal means. In this state of affairs, knowing that 'apres coup' she was still unsatisfied, he slipped into the practice of rubbing the c.l.i.toris with his fingers until the emission takes place. To do this, they a.s.sume the position 'ille sub, illa super.' From his own limited marital experience, he has never been able to understand the stories of women who m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e several times a day, as his wife would be physically incapable (so he believes) of anything of the kind, and only easily reaches the crisis in any circ.u.mstances during the first few days after the menstrual flow has ceased. In fine, while agreeing theoretically with Sir Richard Burton and others that the eastern style of coitus (directed with a view to the pleasure of your partner) is the right one, it is one of his standing regrets that he is unable to practise it. In the place of the twenty minutes required by the women of India (according to Burton) he is happy if he can give two or three at the most, much as he would wish to prolong a pleasure as keen to himself as he could desire it to be to his dear and excellent spouse."

HISTORY XVII.-R. L., American; aged 43; height, 5 ft. 7 in.; weight, about 145 lbs.; occupation, teacher; somewhat neurotic; a slight myopia a.s.sociated with acute astigmatism and muscular weakness of the eyes, producing a tendency to migraine. Uric acid diathesis, producing occasionally severe neuralgia, particularly in the intestines. These symptoms have been more or less constant since very early childhood. General health very good. Not inclined to indulge in athletic sports, but prefers sedentary occupations and recreations.

"My early ideas of s.e.xual things are not very clear in recollection. I think that when 7 or 8 years of age I had a knowledge of the common or vulgar terms for intercourse and for the genital organs. Boys of my own age and slightly older would discuss s.e.x relations, and I had a general knowledge that, in some way connected with the s.e.xual act, 'babies were made.' We would tell, occasionally, lewd stories, and a few times attempted s.e.xual practices with one another. Not till after p.u.b.erty did I ever attempt masturbation. I must have been 9 or 10 years old before I learned that there was a difference in the s.e.x organs of boys and girls. Up to this time I had supposed that intercourse was per anum. I attended a public school with both s.e.xes. Talk among my boy a.s.sociates was often nasty and concerned the s.e.xual act with girls. At about 12 years I began to have erotic day dreams. I always had a sentimental attachment for some girl acquaintance whom I would idealize and with whom I would imagine myself having s.e.x relations. As a matter of fact, there was no real s.e.xual feeling about this. As I was very shy and timid naturally, I never made any kind of advances toward any of them, and they were entirely ignorant of any sentiments of affection in me.

"p.u.b.ertal changes commenced, I presume, about the age of 13 years. I place it at this period from the following circ.u.mstances, which are fixed very strongly in my memory: I had, as a child, a soprano voice that was praised considerably by older friends, and about which I was inordinately conceited, I enjoyed greatly taking part in operettas, cantatas, etc. The dramatic instinct, if so it may be called, has always been marked with me, and amateur dramatics are still my chief diversion. When I was about the age mentioned above my voice changed quite rapidly, greatly to my distress of mind, as I was obliged to give up taking a part for which I had been cast in a school entertainment. The memory of that disappointment is still poignant. Other changes, such as the appearance of the p.u.b.ertal hair, must have made no impression on my mind, as I cannot recollect anything in connection therewith. No involuntary emissions occurred. Indeed, during periods of continence in later life, when the s.e.xual tension has been very strong, I have had very few such emissions.

"As a lad of 11 or 12, I had heard frequent allusions to masturbation by other boys who were older, but always in a way that indicated contempt. Yet there is no doubt now in my mind that the practice was very general. I think that I was probably about 15 when I decided to try the act. I think that there was little s.e.x impulse in this decision. The animating purpose was rather curiosity. I succeeded in producing the complete o.r.g.a.s.m and found it pleasurable, though there was a considerable shock of surprise at the e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n of s.e.m.e.n. As nearly as I can estimate in my memory of an event as far back as this was, this was the beginning of definite s.e.xual sensibility in me. I cannot but believe, however, that it would have been aroused sooner or later in some other way. Thereafter I would imagine myself embracing some of the girl friends to whom I have referred above, and, when excited, would m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e. The act was in every instance a psychic intercourse. For some time I did not know that the practice was considered harmful. I indulged whenever I felt the inclination. This at times was rather frequent; again only at considerable intervals. I did know that it was looked upon as being unmanly, and never admitted, except to perhaps two or three boy friends, that I ever indulged. With these boys I practised mutual masturbation a few times. There was no h.o.m.os.e.xual feeling connected with these acts in any of us. It was only that the normal method of gratifying our desires was not available. I know the subsequent history of each of these boys, and there has been nothing to indicate any perverted instinct in any of them. About the age of 16 I heard a talk on s.e.xual matters by a traveling evangelist, who portrayed the effects of masturbation in fearful colors. I now realize that he was an ignorant though well-intentioned man; but the general effect of his talk upon me was a bad one. One of the results of the habit, according to his statements, was insanity. Therefore I expected at any moment to lose my mind. I felt that I must stop the practice at once, but the matter became so great an obsession that again and again I broke my resolutions for reform. I undertook exercise, dieting, the reading of serious literature: all of which I had seen referred to in books as methods of lessening s.e.xual desire. The object of these disciplinary practices was always the thing most prominently in mind, and so they were of no avail. Fortunately I entered college a little later, and the affairs of school life gradually took a commanding place in my thoughts, and the practice was not so much in mind. I did not, however, completely break away from it until almost the time of my marriage. If the present att.i.tude of the scientific medical world toward the subject had been known to me, I do not believe that any evil would have come to me from the practice. At a later period of my life, say between 21 and 24, I would not indulge the habit for a considerable interval. At times I did not notice the presence or lack of desire. But then there would come periods when I would be under a severe s.e.xual tension. This would be marked by intense nervousness, an inability to fix my attention upon any one thing, and a great desire to have intercourse. An act of masturbation at such a time would generally give relief. However, when I yielded to this form of relief, there would always follow feelings of profound self-reproach and of self-repugnance. Had I had nocturnal emissions they might have relieved me; but, as I have said before, they very rarely occurred. When, rarely, one did occur I would be greatly frightened, for I had the old, erroneous idea that they meant serious weakness and always ascribed them to my bad habit. That my habit of masturbation had any relation to the rarity of the involuntary emissions would, of course, be a matter of pure conjecture. In pa.s.sing from the discussion of personal masturbation, I wish to say that my a.s.sociations with boys as a pupil and as a teacher lead me to believe that the practice is practically universal. When discussing the hygienic evils of prost.i.tution with boy pupils I have noted that, whereas not infrequently a boy will voluntarily protest that he has never had intercourse, there has always been a significant silence when masturbation is mentioned. I have never heard a boy make a denial, direct or indirect, that he had indulged in the practice. But it has seldom been a perversion. It has rather been, as in my own case, an available means of relieving a s.e.xual impulse.

"During my college life I a.s.sociated with many boys who had more or less regular s.e.xual relations with prost.i.tutes or with girls who were not virtuous. Their att.i.tude toward the practice was an immoral one. The ethical aspect of irregular s.e.xual relations never concerned them. It certainly did not concern me. What I have learned through my conversations on the subject with my pupils makes it evident to me that this is the common feeling of most boys of the adolescent period. I think of two things which operated strongly to prevent my entering into s.e.xual relations with girls during this period of my life. One was an esthetic repugnance to the average prost.i.tute. These are the women most easily available to the youth whose s.e.xual desires are developed. I do not remember ever having seen an avowed prost.i.tute who did not seem repulsive to me. I confess to an inclination to priggishness. I preferred to a.s.sociate with people whom I called 'nice people.' It was fortunate for me that I was thrown into the society of a rather rough crowd of youths, who knocked a great deal of this sn.o.bbishness out of me. But it did act to prevent my having recourse to prost.i.tution. A second preventive was my natural timidity in making advances to people. This has been a trait that I have never completely overcome. In my professional life this has been some detriment to my advancement. In the matter of s.e.x relationship it tended to prevent my taking advantage of a.s.sociation with and even of advances from girls who, not prost.i.tutes, were nevertheless not virtuous. There were a number of such in the town and neighborhood in which I lived, and I undoubtedly could have had s.e.xual relations with them if I had only been able to overcome my shyness. The desire was not wanting. I really craved intercourse with them. It was simply a matter of cowardice. There was one girl whom I knew very well, with whom I was on friendly terms, who I knew had had s.e.xual relations with other boys. She showed, at times, a marked preference for me, and I am sure would have welcomed any advances that I should have made. A number of times I sought her company with the intention of suggesting intercourse, but my resolution always failed.

"All through my college course I was much in the society of girls. We were in cla.s.s together, a.s.sociated very freely in society, frequently studied together. This is the most usual state of things in the western part of our country. But they were simply comrades: s.e.x thoughts never arose in connection with such a.s.sociation. And I am quite certain that this was the general att.i.tude of the other boys. Although the talk among the boy students was at times, very frankly and crudely, about s.e.xual relations, no breath of scandal ever touched one of the college girls. Again my experience as teacher and student brings a conclusion that coeducation of the s.e.xes does not affect, in one way or the other, the strictly s.e.xual life of the male student. A very intimate friend who has had a varied experience in school work has told me recently that his conclusions are the same.

"When I was about 20 years old I became acquainted with a very beautiful girl, four years my junior. Our acquaintance very rapidly developed into deeper affection, and about five years later we were married. During all this time very little of the physical aspects of love entered into our attachment. My sweetheart had much of the same shyness as was so p.r.o.nounced in my own character. For several years I think that the thought of marriage was never distinctly present in our minds. A formal betrothal between us did not take place until within a year and a half of our marriage. Yet each of us had a very distinct understanding of the feelings of the other. But until our betrothal there were none of even those very innocent expressions of endearment common, I imagine, to all lovers. I am sure that during this period of our attachment no thought of any physical relations between us was ever in my mind; or, at any rate, was promptly banished if it occurred. Yet all this time my s.e.x desires were very strong and at times became an obsession. Never, though, were they directed toward my sweetheart. The first time that we engaged in the endearments and caresses allowed to lovers I became conscious, after a time, of a state of s.e.xual excitement. I experienced an erection. It was absolutely reflex; no thought had entered into it. I was at once overwhelmed with a feeling of shame. I felt that I had been guilty of unthinkable indecency toward my betrothed. Then there arose a fear that it might be noticed. (Men at that time wore abominably tight clothing.) As a matter of fact, I now know that there was no real danger of this, for she was absolutely ignorant of the nature of the male s.e.xual organs. But I made a pretext for withdrawing from the room and tried to adjust my clothing so that no exposure could occur. I was fearful of coming into close proximity to her again, lest there should be a recurrence of the feeling. As a matter of fact it did occur a number of times, but my good sense finally suggested the explanation and after a time it ceased to trouble me. The thought was latent in my mind that s.e.xual excitement was necessarily more or less indecent at all times, and I could not reconcile its manifestation with a pure love.

"I have said that my s.e.xual desire was strong. Up to the time of marriage it was never gratified in the normal manner. My esthetic abhorrence of prost.i.tutes continued to prevent its gratification in that manner. No other opportunity offered. I am positive that moral considerations did not enter into the matter at all. I think now that it was strange that the thought that it would be disloyal to my promised wife to have connection with other women did not affect me. But I am sure that it did not. I am inclined to think that conscientious scruples very rarely enter into the average young man's considerations of contemplated s.e.xual relations.

"As the time of my marriage drew near, thoughts of the physical relationship of husband and wife became, of course, more insistent. The idea of establishing s.e.xual relations was not at all a pleasant one. I dreaded it as an ordeal. I wondered if it would be possible for us to retain the same love and affection for one another after such intimate relations were established. This was a recurrence of the fallacious notion that there was something inherently indecent in s.e.xual things. I am in hopes that other ideas are replacing this wrong one, in the minds of the younger generation, as the result of the saner and franker discussion of s.e.x. By a great effort, I had practically stopped masturbating. At times I felt almost maddened by desire. But never did the prospect of marriage seem desirable from this point of view. Up to the very day of our wedding my affection for my betrothed seemed free from s.e.xual desire. But my physical being was craving s.e.xual companionship.

"Theoretically I knew a great deal of the nature of intercourse. Practically I was absolutely ignorant. In some ways I was better informed, on matters that a new husband should know, than the average man entering the married life. A physician's library had been at my disposal, and I had read somewhat extensively on physiology and hygiene. My chosen lines of study had given me a theoretical knowledge of the anatomy of the female genital organs that was fairly thorough. I knew a little about the physiology of reproduction and rather less of intercourse. Fortunately, I learned in the course of my reading that the first s.e.xual approaches were likely to be quite painful to a woman, and that great care should be exercised at this time. I tried to put into practice what little I had learned in theory and I imagine that we got through the introductory attempts with less than the average difficulties. Our first efforts were not satisfactory to either of us. My wife was absolutely unprepared so far as any definite knowledge of the act was concerned. I sincerely hope that the prudish notions of the past generations will give way to more sensible views in the future, and that the girl becoming a wife will be just as chaste, but wiser in matters of such importance to her happiness. I presume that my timidity was a valuable a.s.set at this time; for I was afraid to force matters in any way, and time and repeated attempts finally overcame our difficulties. And when our s.e.xual relations were once established, the whole tenor of my life was changed. All the former s.e.xual unrest disappeared. My former feeling toward s.e.xual relations was altered. They no longer seemed that which, though very desirable, was yet necessarily indecent. Fortunately, after the first few weeks, they have been quite pleasurable to my wife. I am sure that our s.e.xual life since marriage has been a large factor in deepening the love that has made our married life an ideal one. As I look back at the first year of marriage, I wonder that we got through it so well. My knowledge of s.e.xual hygiene was a strange mixture of fact and nonsense. If the frequency of acts of intercourse advocated by some of the authorities I have lately read is correct, then we must have pa.s.sed the bounds of moderation. But it is certain that our general health has been very good: better in both cases than before marriage.

"In reviewing these phases of the development of my s.e.xual life, one or two conclusions seem to me to be strongly emphasized. It was unfortunate that the real s.e.xual desire was aroused as early and in the manner that it was. Whether this would have been prevented by more definite education in the hygiene and the purpose of the function, I can only conjecture. I believe that mine was and is the common experience of boys. I am decidedly of the opinion that there should be instruction given of the anatomy of the genital organs and of the hygiene of intercourse, and this shortly after the youth has reached p.u.b.erty. How this is to be done is a grave question. It will require tact and knowledge not possessed by the average teacher and parent. However it is done, it should be honest, frank, and free from piosity.

"I am certain that, in my own case, rather frequent intercourse is decidedly beneficial. Any prolonged abstinence always brings about the same nervous disturbances that I have referred to above. It is fortunate for me that this repet.i.tion of the act is satisfactory to both concerned."

HISTORY XVIII.-E. W., dentist, aged 32, of New England Puritan stock. Height, 5 ft. 10 in.; weight, 144 lbs. Spare and active, of nervobilious temperament.

"My earliest recollection is being punished for 'playing with myself' when I could not have been more than 3 or 4 years of age. I distinctly remember my exultation on discovering that I could excite myself (while my hands were tied behind my back for punishment) by rubbing my small but erect p.e.n.i.s against the carpet while lying on my stomach. At this time, of course, I knew nothing of s.e.x or of what I was doing. I did what my desires and instincts at that time prompted me to do. However, punishments and lectures failed utterly to break up this habit, and, though I always wished and tried faithfully to obey my parents, I soon grew to indulge quietly in bed when I was thought to be asleep. The matter apparently pa.s.sed out of the minds of my parents as soon as they ceased to detect me further in the act, and they regarded it as abandoned. I now feel reasonably certain that this precocity was due to an adherent foreskin which covered the glans tightly almost to the meatus, and so kept up a continual irritation.

"I have no recollection that anyone ever taught me the habit, and I know beyond a doubt that no one ever learned of the habit or even a word as to the possibility of autoexcitement through word or deed of mine. My recollection of the sensations is that there was a short period of excitation, usually by rubbing, which was not particularly, often not at all, pleasurable, and this was followed by a single thrill of pleasure that extended all over my little body. The curious thing was, however, that there seemed to be no limit to the number of times I could consecutively produce this sensation. My recollection is perfectly clear of how I would lie in bed of a morning and thus excite myself time after time. As I grew older this condition, of course, changed. Masturbation was not a consuming pa.s.sion with me at this or any other time. I enjoyed it and felt that in it I had a means of entertainment when other sources of enjoyment were not at hand.

"By the time I was 6 or 7 I had figured out the difference in s.e.x in animals and suspected that 'all was not as it should be' in some portions of a girl's anatomy. This suspicion was suddenly confirmed one never-to-be-forgotten morning, when I induced my dearest playmate, a little girl, to urinate in my presence. I was more thunderstruck than excited over this discovery, and it led to no results in any other way, nor did we ever again unveil ourselves to each other. At this time I began to learn from the older boys the pitiful, childish vulgarities and common terms of s.e.x, and to invent and exchange rhymes and stories that were pathetic in their attempts at vulgarity.