diverberantur, spiritus vitales revelli, adeoque salaces
motus ob vicinam partium genitalium et testium excitari,
qui venereis ac illecebris cerebrum mentemque fascinant ac
virtutem castitatis ad extremas augustias redigunt."
From out of almost innumerable instances of the efficacy of flagellation
as an aphrodisiac, the following are selected.
Cornelius Gallus, the friend of Virgil, Horace, Tibullus, and Catullus,
and who, according to Pliny, died the most delightful of deaths by
expiring in the embraces of the fondest object of his affections,[172]
was solely indebted for the delicious transports he enjoyed with her to
the scourge with which her severe father chastised her for the faults
that originated in too warm a temperament, a punishment which, instead
of counteracting, furthered the wishes of the voluptuous Roman.
Jean Pic de Mirandole relates[173] the case of a person known to him
who, being a great libertine, could not consummate the act of love
without being flagellated until the blood came, and that, therefore,
providing himself for the occasion with a whip steeped in vinegar, he
presented it to his _inamorata_, begging her not to spare him, for "plus
on le fouettait, plus il y trouvait des délices, la douleur et la
volupté marchant, dans cet homme, d'un pas egal."
Meibomius mentions the case of a citizen of Lubeck who, being accused
and convicted of adultery, was sentenced to be banished. A woman of
pleasure with whom this man had been for a long time intimate, appeared
before the judges as a witness on his behalf. This woman swore that the
man was never able to consummate the act of love with her unless he had
been previously flogged,--an operation which it was also necessary to
repeat before each successive indulgence.
That this was a means employed by Abelard in his commerce with Heloisa,
appears from the following passages in two of his letters to her;
"Verbera quandoque dabat amor non furor, gratia non ira quæ
omnium unguentorum suavitatem transcenderent."[174]
"Stripes which, whenever inflicted by love, not by fury but
affection, transcended, in sweetness, every unguent."
"Nosti quantis turpitudinibus immoderata mea libido corpora
nostra addixerat et nulla honestatis vel Dei reverentia in
ipsis diebus Dominicæ passionis vel quantarumque
solemnitatem ut hujus luti volutabro me revocavit. Sed et te
nolentem aut dissuadentem quæ natura infirmior eras, ut
sæpius minis ac flagellis ad consensum trahebam.[175]"
"Thou knowest to what shameful excesses my unbridled lust
had delivered up our bodies, so that no sense of decency, no
reverence for God, could, even in the season of our Lord's
passion, or during any other holy festival, drag me forth
from out that cesspool of filthy mire; but that even with
threats and scourges I often compelled thee who wast, by
nature, the weaker vessel, to comply, notwithstanding thy
unwillingness and remonstrances."
The renowned Tamerlane, the mighty conqueror of Asia, required a like
stimulus,[176] the more so perhaps from the circumstance of his being a
monorchis.[177]
The Abbé Boileau, in his well known and entertaining "Histoire des
Flagellants," partly attributes the gross licentiousness of that period
to the strange practice then in vogue of doing penance by being scourged
in public; and his brother the celebrated poet and critic, defending the
Abbé against the animadversions of the Jesuits, remarks very forcibly:
"Non, le livre des Flagellans
N'a jamais condamné, lisez le bien, mes pères,
Ces rigidités salutaires
Qui, pour ravir le Ciel, saintement violens,
Exercent sur leurs corps, tant de Chrétiens austères;
Il blâme seulement ces abus odieux
D'étaler et d'offrir aux yeux
Ce que leur doit toujours cacher la bienveillance,
Et combat vivement la fausse piété,
_Qui sous couleur d'eteindre en nous la volupté
Par l'austérité méme, et par la pénitence
Sait allumer le feu de la lubricité_.[178]"
Flagellation, indeed, as well as the custom of wearing the hair-shirt,
so common with the monks, and even with religious lay catholics, was, by
the stimulus it imparted to the skin, and hence to the internal viscera,
much more likely to increase the energy of the physiological functions,
and _thus excite the commission of the very acts they are intended to
suppress_.
The Abbé Chuppe d'Auteroche, member of the Académie des Sciences, and
who died in California a few days after the observation of the Transit
of Venus in 1760, remarks that the stripes given to persons frequenting
the vapour baths in Russia impart activity to the fluids and elasticity
to the organs and gives additional stimulus to the venereal
appetite.[179]
M. Serrurier records the following curious case. "One of my
schoolfellows, who found an indescribable pleasure in being flogged,
purposely and wilfully neglected his duty in order to draw upon himself
the correction, which never failed to produce an emission of semen. As
may easily be imagined he soon began the practice of masturbation, in
which he indulged to so frightful an extent that rapid consumption
ensued, and he died, a most horrible and disgusting object, affording a
melancholy example of that fatal vice."[180]
The case of Jean Jacques Rousseau is well known. When a child he was by
no means displeased with the corrections administered to him by a lady
considerably his elder, he even frequently sought for a whipping at her
hands, especially after he perceived that the flagellation developed in
him the manifest token of virility. But he must be allowed to give his
own account of it. "Assez long temps," says he, "Madame Lambercier
s'entint à la menace, et cette menace d'un châtiment tout nouveau pour
moi me semblait très effrayante, mais après l'exécution, je la trouvai
moins terrible à l'épreuve que l'attente ne l'avait été, et ce qu'il y
a de plus bizarre est qui ce châtiment m'affectionna davantage d'elle
qui me l'avoit imposé. Il fallait même toute la vérité de cette
affection et toute ma douceur naturelle pour m'empêcher de chercher le
retour du même traitement en le méritant, car j'avais trouvé dans la
douleur, dans la honte même, un mélange de sensualité qui m'avait laissé
plus de désir que de crainte de l'éprouver derechef, par la même main.
Il est vrai que comme il se mêlait, sans doute, à cela quelque instinct
précoce du sexe, le même châtiment reçu de son frère, ne m'eut point du
tout, parut plaisant."[181]
As flagellation is practised by striking the skin with a rod formed of
twigs, until the heat and redness become more intense, so if the twigs
be replaced by fresh nettles, the operation will become,--_urtication_.
The employment of urtication is of great antiquity, for Celsus as well
as Aretæus mentions the use of it, it being in those times, a popular
remedy. That the Romans had frequent recourse to it in order to
arouse the sexual appetite, is proved by the following passage from
Petronius Arbiter, which for obvious reasons, we shall content
ourselves with giving in the original only. "Oenothea semiebria ad me
respiciens;--Perficienda sunt, inquit, mysteria _ut recipas nervos_.
"Simulque profert scorteum fascinum quod, ut olio et minuto pipere, atque
_urticæ_ trito circumdedit semine, paulatim cœpit inserere ano meo.
Hoc crudelissima anus spargit subinde femina mea Nasturcii[182] succum
cum abrotono miscet, perfusis que inguinibus meis, viridis urticæ fascem
comprehendit omnes que infra umbilicum cœpit lenta manu cædere."[183]
Menghus Faventinus assures us that nettles have "une propriété
merveilleuse pour allonger, tendre, grossir et ériger le membre viril,
qui, par une parsimonie de la nature, feroit craindre la
stérilité."[184]
Urtication appears to have been well known in France during the time of
Rabelais, who alluding to this mode of procuring the vigour necessary
for the amorous conflict, says, "se frotter le cul au panicaut (a
species of thistle) vrai moyen d'avoir au cul passion."
Une femme en mélancholie
Pour faute d'occupation,
Frottez moi le cul d'ortie
Elle aura au cul passion.[185]
The irritation caused by nettles produces effects analogous to those
which are observed in persons afflicted with the itch, the ring-worm and
leprosy. The lubricity of those unfortunates is sometimes uncontrolable;
they suffer violent priapisms, which are followed by ejaculation,
whenever a severe itching forces them to scratch themselves with a kind
of furor or madness.
"In a medical point of view," observes Dr. Milligen,
"urtication, or stinging with nettles, is a practice not
sufficiently appreciated. In many instances, especially in
cases of paralysis it is more efficacious than blistering or
stimulating frictions. Its effects, though perhaps less
permanent, are general and diffused over the limb. This
process has been found effectual in restoring _heat to the
lower extremities_, and a case of obstinate lethargy was
cured by Corvisart by a repeated urtication of the whole
body. During the action of the stimulus, the patient, who
was a young man, would open his eyes and laugh, but then
sink again into a profound sleep. In three weeks, however,
his perfect cure was effected."[186]
In 1783, Dr. James Graham, an humble imitator of the celebrated
Cagliostro, commenced giving his sanatary lectures, which he illustrated
by the dazzling presence of his Goddess of Health, a character which,
for a short time, was sustained by Emma Harte, afterwards the celebrated
Lady Hamilton, wife of Sir William Hamilton, English Ambassador at the
Court of Naples, and the _chère amie_ of the immortal Nelson.
After describing various aphrodisiacal remedies, the lecturer thus
proceeds: "But, gentlemen, if all the above means and methods, which I
have thus faithfully, ingenuously, and with the frankest and most
unreserved liberality, recommended, fail, suffer me, with great
cordiality, and assurance of success, to recommend my celestial, or
medico, magnetico, musico, electrical bed, which I have, with so much
study and at so vast an expense, constructed, not alone to insure the
removal of barrenness, when conception is at all in the nature of things
possible, but likewise to improve, exalt, and invigorate the bodily, and
through them, the mental faculties of the human species. This bed, whose
seemingly _magical_ influences are now celebrated from pole to pole and
from the rising to the setting sun! is indeed an _unique_ in science!
and unquestionably the first and the only one that ever was mentioned,
erected, or even, perhaps, thought of, in the world; and I will now
conclude the lecture with giving you a slight descriptive sketch of the
structure of the bed, and the nature of those influences with which it
glows--which it breathes forth, and with which it animates,
regenerates, and transports those happy, happy persons who have the
honour and the paradisiacal blessedness of reposing on it.
"The Grand Celestial State Bed! then, gentlemen, which is
twelve feet long by nine wide, is supported by forty pillars
of brilliant glass, of great strength and of the most
exquisite workmanship, in regard to shape, cutting, and
engravings; sweetly delicate and richly variegated colours,
and the most brilliant polish! They are, moreover, invisibly
incrusted with a certain transparent varnish in order to
render the insulation still more complete; and that
otherwise, properly assisted, we may have, in even the most
unfavourable weather, abundance of the electrical fire.
"The sublime, the magnificent, and, I may say, the
super-celestial dome of the bed, which contains the
odoriferous, balmy, and ethereal spices, odours, and
essences, and which is the grand magazine or reservoir of
those vivifying and invigorating influences which are
exhaled and dispersed by the breathing of the music, and by
the attenuating, repelling, and accelerating force of the
electrical fire,--is very curiously inlaid or wholly covered
on the under side with brilliant plates of looking-glass, so
disposed as to reflect the various attractive charms of the
happy recumbent couple, in the most flattering, most
agreeable and most enchanting style.
"On the top or summit of the dome, are placed, in the most
loving attitudes, two exquisite figures, representing the
marriage of Cupid and Psyche, with a fine figure of Hymen
behind, and over them, with his torch flaming with
electrical fire in one hand and, with the other, supporting
a celestial crown, sparkling, likewise, with the effulgent
fire over a pair of real living turtle-doves, who, on a
little bed of roses, coo and bill under the super-animating
impulses of the genial fire! The other elegant groups of
figures which sport on the top of the dome--the Cupids, the
Loves, and the Graces!--besides festoons of the freshest and
most beautiful flowers, have each of them musical
instruments in their hands, which by the exquisite and most
expensive mechanism, are made to breathe forth sounds
corresponding with the appearance of the several
instruments,--flutes, guitars, violins, clarionets,
trumpets, horns, oboes, kettle-drums, &c. On the posts or
pillars, too, which support the grand dome are groups of
figures, musical instruments, organ-pipes, &c., which, in
sweet concert with the other instruments, at the
commencement of the tender dalliance of the happy pair,
breathe forth celestial sounds! lulling them in visions of
elysian joys! opening new sources of pleasure, and
"untwisting all the chains which tie the hidden soul of
harmony!" At the head of the bed, in the full centre front,
appears, sparkling with electrical fire, through a glory of
burnished and effulgent gold, the great, first,
ever-operating commandment, BE FRUITFUL, MULTIPLY, AND
REPLENISH THE EARTH! under this is a most elegant and
sweet-toned organ, in the front of which is a fine landscape
of moving figures on the earth, birds flying, swans, &c.,
gliding on the waters, a fine procession, too, is seen,
village nymphs strewing flowers before priests, brides,
bridegrooms, and their attendants, who, all entering into
the temple of Hymen, disappear from the delightful eye. The
painting and embellishment of this front are most masterly,
and reflect the highest honour on the artists by whom they
were executed; and the whole view is terminated with
fountains, waterfalls, shepherds, shepherdesses, and other
peasants, as pastoral sports and rural employment, and by a
little church, the dial of which points out truly and
distinctly the hour.
"In the celestial bed no feather bed is employed; sometimes
mattresses filled with sweet new wheat or cut straw, with
the grain in the ears, and mingled with balm, rose leaves,
lavender flowers, and oriental spices, and, at other times,
springy hair mattresses are used. Neither will you find upon
the celestial bed linen sheets; our sheets are of the
richest and softest silk or satin; of various colours suited
to the complexion of the lady who is to repose on them. Pale
green, for example, rose colour, sky blue, black, white,
purple, azure, mazarin blue, &c., and they are sweetly
perfumed in the oriental manner, with otto and odour of
roses, jessamine, tuberose, rich gums, fragrant balsams,
oriental spices, &c.; in short, everything is done to assist
the ethereal, magnetic, musical and electric influences, and
to make the lady look as lovely as possible in the eyes of
her husband and he, in hers. But to return, in order that I
might have for the important purposes, the strongest and
most springy hair, I procured, at a vast expense, the tails
of English stallions, which when twisted, baked and then
untwisted and properly prepared, is elastic to the highest
degree.
"But the chief elastic principle of my celestial bed is
produced by artificial loadstones. About fifteen hundred
pounds' weight of artificial and compound magnets are so
disposed and arranged as to be continually pouring forth in
an ever-flowing circle inconceivable and irrestibly powerful
tides of the magnetic effluxion, which is well known to have
a very strong affinity with the electric fire.
"Such is a slight and inadequate sketch of the grand
celestial bed, which, being thus completely
insulated,--highly saturated with the most genial floods or
electrical fire!--fully impregnated moreover, with the balmy
vivifying effluvia of restorative balsamic medicines and of
soft, fragrant, oriental gums, balsams and quintescence, and
pervaded at the same times with full springing tides of the
invigorating influences of music and magnets both real and
artificial, gives such elastic vigour to the nerves, on the
one hand, of the male, and on the other, such retentive
firmness to the female; and, moreover, all the faculties of
the soul being so fully expanded, and so highly illuminated,
that it is impossible, in the nature of things, but that
strong, beautiful, brilliant, nay, double-distilled
children, if I may use the expression, must infallibly be
begotten."
A digression may, perhaps, be here pardonable, in order to give some
notice of the latter and last days of the beautiful, highly accomplished
and fascinating woman mentioned above.
She had been presented to Nelson by her husband, who had previously told
her that he was about to introduce her to a little _thread-paper_ of a
man, who could not boast of being very handsome, but who would become,
some day, one of the greatest men that England ever produced. After the
battle of the Nile he again visited Naples, and was now little better
than a perfect wreck. At Calvi, in 1794, he had lost an eye. At
Teneriffe his right arm was shattered and amputated close to the
shoulder. At the battle of the Nile he was severely wounded in the head.
Incessant anxiety and watchfulness for his country's honour and welfare
had blanched his brow, and shattered the "little thread-paper of a man"
at the outset, till, on his return in triumph to his mistress, he seemed
to be on the verge of an early grave.
Yet she proved herself a true woman, if an erring one, in her reception
of the man she loved, and unhesitatingly and unequivocally forsook her
all, to attend upon and worship him.
Not far from Merton turnpike stood the house of Nelson and his mistress.
It was left with all its liabilities to Lady Hamilton, but she was
obliged to take a hasty departure, and, harassed by creditors, in
sickness of heart and without funds, the unhappy woman escaped to
Calais.
Now for the sad, sad finale. From the portal of a house, as cheerless
and dreary as can be imagined, in the month of January, with a black
silk petticoat stretched on a white curtain thrown over her coffin for a
pall, and an half-day Irish dragoon to act as chaplain over the grave,
which was in a timber-yard, were the remains of Nelson's much-adored
friend removed to their final resting place, under the escort of a
_sergent de ville_.
She died without the common necessaries of life, and was buried at the
expense of the town, notwithstanding Nelson's last words, "_Blackwood,
take care of my poor Lady Hamilton!_"
"Whatever the errors of Lady Hamilton may have been," says Doran, "let
us not forget that without her aid, as Nelson said, the battle of the
Nile would never have been fought, and that in spite of her sacrifices
and services, England left her to starve, because the government was too
virtuous to acknowledge the benefits rendered to her country by a lady
with too loose a zone."
The remarks of honest old Burton[187] upon Aphrodisiacs, though quaint,
are so judicious and pertinent, that we cannot better conclude this part
of our essay than by quoting them:--
"The last battering engines," says he, "are philters,
amulets, charms, images, and such unlawful meanes: if they
cannot prevail of themselves by the help of bawds, panders,
and their adherents, they will fly for succour to the devil
himself. I know there be those that denye the devil can do
any such thing, and that there is no other fascination than
that which comes by the eyes. It was given out, of old, that
a Thessalian wench had bewitched King Philip to dote on her,
and by philters enforced his love, but when Olympia, his
queen, saw the maid of an excellent beauty well brought up
and qualified: these, quoth she, were the philters which
enveagled King Philip, these the true charms as Henry to
Rosamond."[188]
"One accent from thy lips the blood more warmes
Than all their philters, exorcismes, and charms."
With that alone Lucretia brags, in Aretine, she could do more than all
philosophers, astrologers, alychmists, necromancers, witches, and the
rest of the crew. As for herbs and philters I could never skill of them.
_The sole philter I ever used was kissing and embracing, by which alone
I made men rave like beasts, stupefied and compelled them to worship me
like an idol._[189]
ANTI-APHRODISIACS.
The means best calculated to produce effects contrary to those just
treated of are of several kinds, but such as are derived from hygiene
are entitled to be considered as the most powerful. Previously, however,
to describing the medicinal substances that may be efficaciously
employed in moderating, or rather checking, too violent a propensity to
venery, some notice must be taken of the diet adapted to insure such a
result.
The use of milk, vegetables, such as lettuce, water-purslain, cucumbers,
&c., and especially of fruit in which the acid principle predominates,
slackens the movement of the heart and of the sanguineous system; it
diminishes the animal heat, the chief source of which is in the activity
of the circulation; it produces a feeling of tranquillity and of
coolness; the respiration being more slow, occasions the absorption of a
less quantity of oxygen, add to which, as a less quantity of reparative
materials is contained in this description of aliments, there result a
less active nutrition, the loss of embonpoint and the complete
prostration of every principle of irritability; in short, it is of all
diets the one least capable of furnishing fuel to the passions. For
common drink mere water, and, if the impulse of passion should increase,
a small quantify of nitre, vinegar, or vitrolic acid, may, occasionally
be added to the water to make it more cooling.
Other means conducive to the same end are a laborious life, much bodily
exercise, little sleep, and a spare diet, so that the fluids may be more
easily conducted to other parts, and that there may not be produced a
greater quantity than is requisite for the support of the body. Equally
valuable
"When there's a young and sweating devil
That commonly rebels,"
will be found what Shakespeare recommends--
"A sequester from liberty, fasting and prayer,
Much castigation, exercise devout."[190]
Should the desire of committing excesses rise to any height, immediate
recourse must be had to some serious and mind-absorbing occupation, less
nutritious food and drink should be taken, all dishes peculiarly
stimulating to the palate avoided, as well as the use of wine and other
spirituous liquors.
A cool regimen in every respect was particularly insisted upon by the
ancients: hence Plato and Aristotle recommended the custom of going
barefoot as a means of checking the stimulus to carnal desire, a
suggestion which appears to have been acted upon by some of the monkish
orders. The cold bath was considered equally efficacious, while some,
among whom may be reckoned Pliny and Galen, advised thin sheets of lead
to be worn on the calves of the legs and near the kidneys.