OF THE GENITAL FUNCTION IN MAN. 337 



is recorded to have embraced his wife but once in his life, and 

 then out of mere politeness. 



Zenobia, the celebrated Queen of Palmyra and the East, was 

 as extraordinary a wife. She never admitted her husband's em- 

 braces but for the sake of posterity, and, if her wishes were baffled, 

 she reiterated the experiment in the ensuing month.* 



Epicurus, Democritus, &c. were nearly of the same opinion 

 with Zeno, and the Athletse, that their strength might be un- 

 impaired, never married. The Rabbies, in their anxiety to 

 preserve their nation, are said to have ordered, with the view of 

 preventing the loss of vigour, that a peasant should indulge but 

 once a week, a merchant but once a month, a sailor but twice a 

 year, and a studious man but once in two years. 



* slugustau History, quoted by Gibbon, Decline and Fall, fc. Vol. ii. p. 33. 



