466 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



The effect of celibacy upon women has often elicited the remarks 

 of gynaecologists. Dr. Tilt says of marriage: "It is easier to prove 

 the benefits of marriage than to measure accurately the evils of celi- 

 bacy, which I believe to be a fruitful source of uterine disease. The 

 sexual instinct is a healthy impulse, claiming satisfaction as a natural 

 right." l Again : " An enlarged field of observation convinces me 

 that the profession has not in any wise exaggerated the influence of 

 marriage on women, and that its dangers are infinitesimal as com- 

 pared with those of celibacy." 2 Nearly every treatise upon gynaecol- 

 ogy may be quoted to establish the same fact. It is upon the mind 

 of woman that the defeated sexuality acts reflexly in a morbid man- 

 ner. Dr. Mauclsley, who has had abundant opportunities for observa- 

 tion, says : " The sexual passion is one of the strongest in Nature, and 

 as soon as it comes into activity it declares its influence on every pulse 

 of organic life, revolutionizing the entire nature, conscious and uncon- 

 scious ; when, therefore, the means of its gratification entirely fail, and 

 when there is no vicarious outlet for its energy, the whole system feels 

 the effects, and exhibits them in restlessness and irritability, in a mor- 

 bid self-feeling taking a variety of forms." 8 While it is true that the 

 engrossing cares of professional life, or of a skilled labor, will serve as 

 a partial " vicarious outlet for its energy," in contrast to an idle life, 

 yet this will in no manner act as a substitute for the natural expres- 

 sion of this physiological want. Its constant suppression will tinge 

 the thought and manner of the woman. This is not an unreasonable 

 statement, when we reflect that bodily derangements, not at all serious, 

 will often account for changes in the mind and manner, as well as for 

 the entire mental habit of men otherwise strong. If we contrast her 

 with man in this respect, the chances are infinitely against woman in 

 professional life. The penalty of sex is an episode in man's life. The 

 tribute to his sexuality once paid, he is practically unsexed, and the 

 trained intellectual man moves among women and men with scarcely 

 more than a consciousness of his reproductive faculty. But sex in 

 woman is a living presence. From the age of fifteen to that of forty- 

 five, her life is crowded with startling physiological acts. Ovulation, 

 impregnation, conception, gestation, parturition, lactation, and the 

 menopause, contend with each other for supremacy each act a mys- 

 tery ; each attended with its peculiar peril ; and most of them evoking 

 in its behalf the highest efforts of which her physical organization is 

 capable. It will demand genius indeed to enable woman to rival man 

 in the field of labor, and, at the same time, contend with the inexorable 

 law of reproduction. 



Having shown that women are not free agents in the matter of 

 marriage, but do so in obedience to a primal law of their sexual life, 

 we will next consider what are the chances for the married women in 



1 " Uterine Therapeutics," p. 224. 2 Loc. cit., p. 127. 



3 " The Physiology and Pathology of the Mind," p. 203. 



