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.