Note 31 — PREVENTION TO CONCEPTION; CONSIDERED IN ITS SOCIAL BEARINGS.

For a vice so unnatural as onanism there could be no possible temptation, and therefore no existence, were not men unnaturally and mischievously situated. It first appeared, probably in monasteries; and has been perpetuated by the more or less anti-social and demoralizing relation in which the sexes stand to each other, in almost all countries. In estimating the consequences of the present false situation of society, we must set down to the black account the wretched consequences (terminating not unfrequently in incurable insanity) of this vice, the preposterous offspring of modern civilization. Physicians say that onanism at present prevails, to a lamentable extent, both in this country and in England. If the recommendations contained in these pages were generally followed, it would probably totally disappear in a single generation.