Plain Talks on Avoided Subjects Part 4

Speedy cures cannot be made in these cases. Strong determination to improve aided by proper medication can, in bad cases, only restore a healthful condition in from two to three years. The system requires to be made over anew as it were. The current of life must be turned into new channels. New thoughts and new blood must be made to take the place of what were wrong and polluted. This will take time and perseverance; and then, little by little the old enemies will be overcome and driven out. But progress for the better must be measured only from month to month and even then there may be apparent relapses. Let me however a.s.severate, from my abundance of experience in these cases, that there is ultimately, after a reasonable time, every hope of becoming sound and healthy again.

Many young persons are rendered quite distracted by the s.e.xual instinct being too strong. It infests them and goads them on to the commission of further unseemly acts--though suffering much from past transgressions--which it seems almost impossible to avoid. The sensation haunts and clings to them day and night, in spite of every attempt to rise superior thereto. Sometimes nocturnal pollutions, or "wet dreams,"

as they are commonly termed, result from these or other causes. There must be some cause for this state of things and a rigid examination into one's mode of life should ascertain the same. It may come from errors in diet, in eating or drinking; in the use of highly seasoned food; or the taking of some medicinal drug substance. It is well known that many drugs have the power of producing such a condition. Should any of the above seem to act as causes, a change should be made at once. The plainest diet and simplest mode of life is always best in sickness or in health. Again, one may take too little exercise in the open air. If so, an abundance of physical exertion should be made daily, to insure a natural and healthy condition of all organs of the body. Or, uncomfortable conditions may arise, as they often do, from some morbid condition of the vital forces. If diet and exercise are insufficient, the judicious physician should be consulted and every symptom or unnatural sensation from the crown of the head to the soles of the feet, should be carefully described to him. In all probability he will remedy the trouble, thus restoring peace and happiness. The generative organs are as liable to be affected by a morbid state of the vital forces, as are any other organs of the body; and when so affected they are just as amenable to treatment.

The above condition of affairs is not, however, confined to the male s.e.x. Females often suffer equally and in the same way. Many young persons, of both s.e.xes, have fallen victims to these disorders who could have been cured by proper medical treatment. A female suffering from the ill effects of any bad habit contracted in youth, or from any s.e.xual or venereal disorder, should seek medical aid with the same promptness and openness of heart as a male. To overcome the vicious habit of self-abuse is no trifling matter; it will require the persistent application of indomitable will, aided by Christianity--by oft repeated appeals to the Lord for aid, who lends a willing ear and a helping hand to the poor and needy. When reformation is determined upon, it is better to consult a physician at once and act under his advice. Besides directing the proper diet and plenty of vigorous exercise in the open air, he will prescribe the proper medicament.

Cases of real syphilitic poisoning are most serious affections, and everyone should know of the fearful effects of this poison--how searchingly it infests the whole system, and how it contaminates the blood and every tissue in the body. Such cases, therefore, should not be trifled with in any way. Advertised nostrums should be particularly avoided. For, if this poison be simply smothered in one's blood instead of being wholly eradicated and cured, it will be sure to seize upon the offspring and either destroy them before birth or during dent.i.tion. The bare fear of such contamination should be amply sufficient to deter everyone from exposing him- or herself to the risk. But, having fallen, by all means seek the aid of a judicious physician. An experience of nearly forty years in the treatment of these cases, in both s.e.xes, has given me the power to know whereof I speak; and I do declare that a very large percentage of these cases can be cured in a safe manner; and so perfectly cured too, that there will be no danger of transmitting the infection to the offspring. I, by no means stand alone in this statement; many other physicians, after long years of experience a.s.sert the same truth.

Therefore, let no one be discouraged, no matter how far he, or she, has strayed from the paths of virtue or how much suffering has been entailed thereby. In connection with the physician's help, aid yourself. Have courage! Let the invincible will lead on unflinchingly--upheld by pure thoughts, and good actions will surely follow. "Desire is really dangerous only when it brings voluptuous pictures incessantly before the imagination. It thus holds a thousand conflicts with virtue which it conquers in the end; it installs itself in the bosom of the intelligence of which it becomes the habitual pre-occupation." Seek therefore for only pure thoughts.

We should at all times exert all the power within us to live correct and blameless lives in every respect, but particularly so in s.e.xual matters.

The happiness, the health, and the lives of families and communities are far more largely dependent upon these matters than is commonly supposed.

Those who have led lives of blameless purity, will continue to do so after reading this book; while those who have gone astray will here find every encouragement to set about their reformation at once. If faithful to the teachings recorded in these pages they will bless the day and the occasion that inspired the writer to put his hand to this work. The G.o.d of Heaven and Earth knows that the motive that led me to this undertaking was pure, and as solely for the good of humanity, as that purity which prompts a human being to live a blameless life in the sight of his Maker.

CHAPTER X.

ORIGIN OF THE s.e.x.

From Whence does the s.e.x Proceed and What Determines It?

So much has been written about this matter, and so many foolish, low, and really debasing theories and speculations have been advanced in relation thereto, that I deem it expedient at this time, and in this place, to put forth the true theory of the reproduction of the s.e.xes, one that can endure the test of the most rigid scientific investigation.

The only theory upon this subject worthy of notice, must be based upon a principle that will hold good and true throughout all animated nature, not only in the animal, but in the vegetable kingdom as well.

The earth is the common mother of the vegetable world; seeds of all kinds fall into her and she brings forth male and female plants according to the seeds planted. The _earth_ certainly does not give the s.e.x to plants for they come forth according to the life inherent in the seed; if this life-force be male, the plant must be male; and if the life-force of the seed be female, the product must be a female plant.

The earth can possibly bring forth no other s.e.x than that which the life-force of the seed impels.

This is true in the animal creation. Within the female grows the seed given her by the male, be it male or female, and she can grow none other. In other words the male as is very evident on mature reflection gives the soul or the inmost vital principle, and the female clothes that soul, or gives it a body in which to operate. What else can the male do; what office does he perform, if it is not strictly this: to impart of his life-giving spirit! The mother in clothing this germ of life commingles, intertwines, and insinuates her own spirit, at the same time educating, instructing, and determining its development according to the influence she imparts to it. So the offspring partakes largely of the nature of both its parents. The determination as to whether he begets a male or female depends entirely upon the inmost vital state of the male at the time of giving, although he is unconscious of the fact, so that he can have no choice and no regulation, as some writers most absurdly claim, in the matter of the forth-coming s.e.x. He determines or produces it unconsciously and involuntarily, the mother simply receiving, clothing, and issuing from her body what the father has given her.

It must not be forgotten when exploring these deep subjects that man is a spiritual being, clothed with a material body, that his spirit is his inmost, and that what proceeds from him in the generative act has life from his inmost; consequently the life-giving principle of his s.e.m.e.n is from his inmost, which const.i.tutes its life-giving power. This inmost from the male, the begetting power, is clothed by his seminal fluid for an All-wise purpose; it is not the gross material, the clothing, that begets, but the living power which this material contains, which fructifies, or becomes conjoined, or commingled with the vital force of the ovule of the mother,[K] so that she can clothe it; and when so conjoined the germ, or seed, is planted in congenial soil. Conception has thus really taken place by virtue of this act, and the animal mother proceeds with her reproduction precisely upon the same general principles that mother earth reproduces corn from a single kernel.

[K] See Guernsey's Obstetrics, 3d edition, on Reproduction.

It is universally acknowledged that the Lord creates, that we owe all to Him, that He gives us our children, etc., etc. This is true, and it is also true that He makes use of the parents, through whom he operates to this end. By the constant influx of his Divine Love and Wisdom He gives us life, and by virtue of this constant influx into the father who begets, the mother's conception becomes doubly sacred. She conceives from her husband, and at the same instant the Lord by virtue of His Divine Power breathes into that conception the breath of life, whereby it becomes a living soul. By the light of this truth we see that it is not the parents who give life to their offspring. They only supply the pure material substances which are organized into the human form by the living and life-giving forces which constantly flow in from the Lord who is life itself and from whom all life constantly emanates.