r u A 
| SECRET HABITS 
THE FEMALE SEX 
LETTERS ADDRESSED TO A MOTHER ON THE 
! EVILS OF SOLITUDE. 
? 
AND ITS 
SEDUCTIVE TEMPTATIONS 
TO 
YOUNG GIRLS 
(From tjjp tftencb of Jjcan Sabots, ,fU. ®. 
New Hork: 
CHARLES S. ATTWOOD, 
24 ANN STREET. THE 
SECRET HABITS 
0 F 
THE FEMALE SEX; 
letters addressed to a mother on tub evils »v 
SOLITUDE, AND ITS SEDUCTIVE TEMPTATIONS 
TO YOUNG QjrLS, THB PREMATURE 
VICTIMS OF A PERNICIOUS PASSION 
WITH ALL ITS FRIGHTFUL CONSBQ.UBNCS3 I 
DEFORMITY OF MIND AND BODY, DESTRUCTION OF 
BEAUTY, 
I 
AND ENTAILING DISEASE AND DEATH; 
Wr FROM WHICH, BY ATTENTION TO THB TIMELY WUHIIW 
■BRE GIVEN, THB DEVOTEE MAY BE SAVED, AND BECOME 
AM ORNAMENT TO SOCIETY, A VIRTUOUS WIFB, 
AND A R3FULGBNT MOTHER ! 
This Work should be read by all classes; while it forcibly describe* 
Jhe Misery attendant upon Solitude, it prescribes a Medical Treatr 
Rent and regimen which has never failed of success. 
>rom tje IFrencb ot IBubots JH- ®. 
New Cork: 
CHARLES S. ATTWOOD, 
24 ANN STREET. THE 
SECRET HABITS OF FEMALES. 
Wi have already had occasion, thus early in out 
career,* to say more thin once, that of all the cansea 
of disease, there was none more fruitful than that se- 
cret vice to which the name of onanism or self-psllu- 
tion has been given. Among young females, more 
particularly, does this vice exist to an alarming ex- 
tent ; and it is scarcely possible for an unprofessional 
person to conceive the long train of ills it engenders 
It is the knowledge of this fact that induces us to pre- 
sent to the world a series of essays on this all-impo* 
tant topic. 
To the mothers of England we address them, with 
the two-fold view of furnishing them with the means 
of preserving the morals of their daughters, and of 
sparing them the pain and sorrow of seeing them with- 
er and perish at an age when they ought to be the or- 
nament of their domestic circle, when they ought to 
enjoy health and happiness. These essays, which 
were originally addressed, in the form of letters, by a 
celebrated French physician, to a young invalid, who 
had brought on her illness by addiction to this very 
life-destroying habit, will enable the parents or guardi- 
• Firrt published Id the People's Mtsdie'd AAvImc, 4 
ano of youth to recognise, by numberless symptoms 
the gradual disease which day by day is hurrying them 
to the tomb ; and it is hoped, that by the means which 
we shall speak, many a Fife may be saved. These let- 
ters we have translated, adding to or altering them ac- 
cording to the result of our experience, and in the 
words of the original author himself, we would say, 
"Let every mother of a family (I address equally those 
to whom the education of the young is entrusted), read 
this work,-let her learn from it whether her children 
or charge are chaste and free from this vice; if they 
have strayed from the paths of honor, let her counsel 
them to read these letters." 
LETTER J 
Mt toung friend,-If satisfaction of the purest kind, 
-satisfaction most grateful to the heart of man,-such 
satisfaction as results only from acts of benevolence,- 
frequently accompanies the practice of the medical 
ait, it is alas! too frequently also accompanied by 
sorrow and anxiety Much pain does it oft-times 
cost the physician, when he is compelled to speak that 
which he knows or thinks. How difficult and deli- 
cate is the task too often imposed on him. Of such a 
nature is that which I am called upon to fulfill to- 
wards you. 
I wisn to call virtue and morality to the rescue wf 
health, reason to the succor of reason herself. In s 5 
word, I would wish to save you from dishonor, diaaast 
and death. 
I shall speak to you as I would speak to my own 
daughter, whom I love excessively; but 7 shall 
also speak as to a daughter who errs without know- 
ing it. 
You would wish to enjoy health. In every way, in 
all your natural functions, symptoms of disease are 
manifest. Your color might, nay should, in freshness 
and beauty, emulate the rose. It has vanished ; you 
are pale and sickly. High spirits, gaiety, and vivacity 
were once your companions. You are now only fee- 
ble and languid ; and there is nothing to justify sogrea 
a change. What then is it? 
There is an error-there are some who even call i 
a crime, but a word so harsh is not needed for you- 
an error which, secrectly produced by perhaps natura. 
desires, but opposed to chastity and honor, seduces the 
mind, overpowers reason, and drags those who yield 
to it, often when they themselves least fear it, from 
innocence and virtue. 
Terrible, dangerous! fatal error ! And perhaps-• 
there are symptoms which induce me to fear it- 
perhaps you are the victim ot this error. It may be 
that it is your feelings, the warmth of your tempera- 
ment, which should bear the blame ; but allow me to 
beg that you would not lay this flattering unction to 
your soul. Why should you, when your own reason 
and judgment teach you that it is an error you commit, 
suffer yourself to become a sad and miserable victim ! 
No, I am sure you will not. Society must not thus 
be deprived of one of its ornaments;-it will lose too 
much, it will lose the example of those virtues with 
which you are blessed. 
Have you ever seen a lovely flower, when the leas 
breath would scatter its leaves to the wind, and yet 
retaining all its original loveliness! Such a flowei 6 
are you ; unless you are warned in time, like it you 
will perish, and leave your sorrowing relatives tomur- 
mer at your loss. Listen, then, to the warning voice. 
Read, attentively read, these letters. Health and 
beauty are not the only blessings I wish to preserve 
for you. The error into which I fear, you have fallen, 
takes from you, slowly, but surely, all moral feeling, 
all proper sentiments: it annihilates the happiest gifts 
of intellect; it deprives you of all esteem of yourself; 
and destroys every hope of happiness. 
These are the reasons which lead me to hope that 
you will grant me your best attention. I demand it for 
those letters which shall follow this, and which I shall 
write for your sole interest 
LETTER II 
My young friend,-I shall proceed in this letter to in- 
form you what alterations your health will undergo 
from the effect of that error which may possibly have 
led you astray. The description of them may appear to 
you frightful, but remember hope must not be entirely 
banished. She has not yet flown, if you have not al- 
together fled from virtue. 
Those individuals who yield themselves up to the 
enjoyment of solitary pleasure, to secret pernicious 
habits, soon exhibit, more or less, the symptoms of 
tabes dorsalis (a species of consumption). At first they 
are not troubled with fever; and, although they may 
•till preserve their appetite, their bodies waste away, 7 
and they have a sensation as though insects were creep- 
ing along the spine. Walking more particularly i* 
uneven places, wearies them and produces copious 
perspirations, head-ache, and ringing in the ears, de- 
rangement of the brain and nerves supervenes, ter- 
minated by stupidity. The stomach becomes deranged 
the patient is pale, dull, and indolent. If young, they 
assume the appearance and have all the infirmities of 
decripid old age; their eyes are hollow, their bodies 
thin and flawed, their legs can no longer sustain them, 
they are totally unhinged, they are incapable of 
any exertion, and in some cases are attacked with 
palsy. 
The weakness and constitutional injury thus pro 
duced are the reasons that such patients bear less easily 
those diseases which are common to all. The chest in 
particular becomes easily affected. Even the most ro- 
bust girls are soon rendered weak; and sometimes a 
slow fever, sometimes a rapid consumption, terminates 
the acene. 
Such are some of the evils produced by solitary 
imprudence-evils which have attracted the atten- 
tion of some of the most celebrated physicians of an- 
tiquity, as Hippocrates, Coden, Celsus, Aretus, and 
Atius. 
Many other physicians who have enjoyed great cele- 
brity in more modern times, confirm these observations 
of the ancients, and even increase the frightful cata- 
logue of ills, which the medical writers of antiquity 
had described in their works. The names of men of 
such celebrity as Sanctorious, Lommius, Hoflman, 
Boerhave, Van Sweiten, Kloehof, Mechel, Huller, and 
Harvey, all of whom have described in vivid and fear- 
ful colors the diseases of those who are addicted to 
solitary vices, must convince the most sceptical. But 
enough, my dear young friend, for the present. Let 
me for the present, conclude with the words of Hofflb 8 
land, who speaking generally of those young girls 
who are the victims of this fearful vice, says-" Sho 
is a withered rose, a tree whose bloom is dried up ,* she 
is a walking spectre." 
LETTER In 
I cannot avoid commencing this let«A -with a reflec 
tion. You are young, beautiful, and clever ; and 1 
am talking to you of infirmities. You ought only to 
hear the tributes of admiration and affection, and I am 
calling your attention to the most frightful particulars 
There appears to be no connection between such dif- 
ferent objects : but if I do present these frightful 
Eictures to you, it is, that they may not in your case 
e realized, that they may not rob you of all that im- 
parts to you beauty and happiness ; it is, that a far 
greater misfortune may be in time avoided by you. 
I will continue, then, the quotations I commenced io 
my last letter. 
Lieutand, in speaking of the causes, ordinary and 
extraordinary, of atrophy, says, that there is no more 
possible cause for it than the habits of solitary in- 
dulgence. 
" The want of sufficient nourishment,'' says he, 
" great losses of the vital fluids, long continued fluxes, 
excessive labor, immoderate study, bad and debauched 
habits, and above all solitary indulgence-the moot 
filthy and the most murderous vice-all give rise to 
•trophy. This disease has many stages and degrees ; 
it is sometimes light, but often severe and fat*]. Gens 9 
ral exhaustion is the principal symptou which charac- 
terises it. The legs refuse their office; the senses 
are rendered dull, and the patient appears stupid. The 
greater number have fever, sometimes transient, but 
more frequently of long continuance and irregular, ac- 
companied with swoons, delirium, and other severe 
symptoms; respiration is quick, hurried, and often 
times restrained. Death too frequently terminates the 
sad scene; sometimes a sudden syncope takes off the 
patients before they are aware that they are seriously ill, 
while others drag on an unhappy life, whose close is 
indeed miserable. The sufferings of some' are termi- 
nated by a copious hcemorrhage. 
" I have seen patients even thus seriously affected- 
leaving out of the description the syncope and mortal 
haemorrhage-whose health was re-established, despite 
all outward appearances, by returning toproper habits; 
but it is absolutely necessary that these evil ways 
should be early discontinued. 
" The body of those who die of atrophy," continues 
the same physician, " presents inflamatory obstruc- 
tions, suppurations, and different kinds of effusions. 
Symptoms of suppuration in the brain have sometimes 
been discovered, and its appendix, the fair, (which ia 
one portion of that membrane of the brain which is 
called the dura mater) is ossified. The lungs are of- 
ten rotten, adherent to the ribs, and to that membrane 
which separates them in the middle of the chest. 
There has been also found effusions of blood within the 
bronchia (or the cartilaginous tube, which conveys the 
air to the lungs) and the heart itself full of lymphatic 
concretions. In this latter organ suppuration has been 
found to have commenced, and strong concretions to- 
wards the orifice of its cavities, while its valves are os- 
sified. The stomach is frequently inflamed, filled with 
blood, ulcerated and gangrenous ; the liver obstructed 
and rotten, besides many alterations-such as effu 10 
at on a, dilations of the atweries, and other tumours is 
the belly." 
How many young persons," exclaims a venerable 
physician, Portal, in a work entitled, ' Observations 
on Pulmonary Consumption,' " have been the vic- 
tims of their unhappy passions. Medical men every 
day meet with those who by this means are rendered 
idiotic, or so enervated both in mind and body, that 
they drag out a miserable existence, others perish with 
marasmus, and too many die of a real pulmonary con- 
sumption." 
And in another work, upon a very terrible mala- 
dy-rickets-speaking of a particular form of the 
disease, says, that young persons who yield themselves 
up to the seduction of solitary pleasures are often 
the subjects of the disease, and he cites several ex- 
amples- 
" I have seen," he continues, " four or five of these 
unfortunate creatures who are so bent, about the age 
of fourteen or sixteen, that the back was perfectly con- 
vex, and the belly appeared to be completely drawn 
into the chest. The extremities of the long bones, par- 
ticularly those which form the elbows and the knees 
were swelled to an extraordinary degree, the legs were 
thrown out, their muscles were scarcely developed, 
their eyes were hollowed, their faces pale and blanch- 
ed, and their voices harsh and shrill. If one had been 
asked to have named their age, by their bodily de- 
velopment, the reply would possibly have been, about 
twelve years. They were extremely weak, as well in 
body as in mind, and became idiotic a long while be* 
fore death." 
Some pages further on the same author reports the 
case of a young female of seventeen years of age, 
who died rather suddenly of the malady of which the 
above is a description, and of pulmonary consumption 
brought on by an indulgence in solitary habits. Thea* 11 
are his words:-" I saw a young girl of seventeen, 
of puny stature, but who in the space of a year had 
grown considerably, become so rapidly curved, that in 
less than six months she was quite humpbacked. The 
chest was thrust in at the base of the breast-bone. 
There was a complete hollow at the region of the stom- 
ach, while the belly protuded." 
You have, my young friend, seen in my preceding 
letter, that the ancient physicians had already observed 
and recorded this curvature of the body. The young 
girl, of whom mention has been above made, had aban- 
doned herself most horribly to secret habits. Effusions 
of blood supervened, and she perished of pulmonary 
consumption. 
A very justly celebrated physician of Lyons, who 
gave himself up for many years to deeds of benevo- 
lence and humanity, the sensible author of a work 
entitled " Medicine of the Heart," Mark Anthony 
Petit, seeing the number of maladies which the in- 
dulgence of solitary habits produced, thought it was 
necessary to ereet a monument to one of the vic- 
tims of this vice not only to avert its danger, but to 
attest its power in the production of pulmonary con- 
sumption. 
" Let it be known," says he, in the preface of his 
*ittle work " that pulmonary consumption, whose hor- 
rible ravages in Europe ought to give the alarm to all 
governments, has drawn ftom this very source its fatal 
activity." And then in the most eloquent verses he 
•peaks of the last moments of an unfortunate victim, 
whom he himself witnessed, and whom the tomb -of 
Mont Cinyre had closed upon, while yet in the very 
spring of life. This example is one which has. oc- 
curred in our times, and the tomb is placed on one of 
the fertile mountains which border the Saone, on the 
North-West in approaching Lyons, and the unfor- 
tunate victim who has tfiere found her last resting. 12 
place, is not yet, in all probability, become part of 
that dust which has received her. Her miserable er- 
ror had doubtless been of too long duration ; the blow 
fter constitution had received was too deep. 
The Baron Boyer, in his " Treatise on Surgical 
Diseases," believed that this constitutional injury may 
even be prolonged to old age, when this kind of abuse 
allows its victim to attain it; and that is a secondary 
cause of many of those cases of dry gangrene, which 
are at that period of life. 
LETTER IV. 
Th« numberless remarks that I have just brought Be- 
fore you are so affecting, that I have experienced no 
inconsiderable pain in relating them to you. How 
fearful would it have been, had the evils which they 
speak of fallen on you ; how little would they have 
been deserved, since they wonld have been to you a 
matter of complete surprise. You have, happily, as 
yet, nothing to fear-nevertheless, since it is possible 
that you may become their victim, will you not cease 
from the cause ? Continue to give me your attention; 
the counsel I give you will not always be so disagree- 
able as it has hitherto been. I promise you that our 
path shall be strewed with roses. But I could not 
avoid, before that I mingled with my sad lessons some 
pleasant pictures-making you traverse this gloomy 13 
way. Let us hasten from it-let us finish my lengthy 
enunciation 
These solitary habits, in many females, produce ' 
swelling of the neck, from the force and frequency o* 
those convulsions which so often follow the repetition <?f 
this imprudent act, as well as by the arrest of blood, 
which it occasions in the principal vessels of the 
neck, in the same way as is oleerved in epileptic pa- 
tients. The complexion assumes a yellow tint i.» 
some, while others find their skin become covered with 
scurf. 
Professor Richard reports in his " Chirugical Noses 
grapny," a very remarkable example of the power of 
this cause in the production of eruptions. A lady had, 
at the same time this pernicious habit and an eruption 
of blotches. She was advised to discontinue the prac- 
tice. She did so, and the eruption disappeared. She 
again took up with the habit, the eruption again made 
its appearance. Her reason again taught her the er- 
ror of her ways, and she once more conquered the pen- 
chant, and she was never again troubled with thosa 
blotches which had so disfigured her. Some person® 
are troubled with cramp in the stomach and pains in 
the back. A physician of my acquaintance has known 
this cause produce such intense pain in the region of 
the loins and kidneys of a young girl, that she in- 
variably screamed most alarmingly, and was unable, 
for some considerable time, to restore herself or tho 
muscles of those parts to quiet. Others suffer from 
pains in the upper part of the nose, in the summit and 
back part of the head, in the groins as well as in all 
the limbs, leucorrhcea or whites, acrid and irritating 
discharges of different- kinds, fluxes, hcemorrhoge of 
the womb, while some are afflicted for the remainder 
of their life by relaxation and fall of this organ, pains 
in the bones, which shut in as well as in the surround- 
yn'\iscera, at first vague and undefined, then fixed, 14 
•ome times dull, at other times excruciating, are in oth- 
ers but the signs of scherrus or cancer of the womb it- 
self. The belly becomes enlarged, hard, and dis- 
tended ; the eyes are surrounded with a leaden-hued 
circle; the enamel of the teeth assumes a greyish 
white color, and no longer presents that exquisite pol- 
ish nor that ivory tint which has caused them to be 
compared in the language of poets, to pearls encased 
in roses. 
A number of painful ulcers are sometimes found on 
the surface of the tongue and the interior of the mouth. 
The same physician who communicated to me the fore- 
going observation, has also related to me another fact 
he has noticed. A lady had abandoned herself to all 
the intoxication of solitary enjoyment. When she 
gave way to these excesses her mouth was filled with 
ulcers of the most distressing kind ;-when she ceased 
from her imprudent acts, these ulcers altogether dis- 
appeared. The flesh loses its solidity, becomes flac- 
cid. Paleness, wasting, wrinkles, inaptitude for all 
kind of work or exercise, take the place of the fresh- 
ness, the roundness, the grace and activity of the 
body; the bosom, which by its exquisitely develop- 
ed beauty shows that the age of puberty and love has 
arrived-the bosom, whose fulness in the young mo- 
ther shows that it encloses an abundance of that nour- 
ishment so necessary to the tender state of man's 
infancy, in those who yield to this habit exhibits 
nothing but the meagre outline of what it should 
be, and cries aloud the truth-speaks of nothing but 
■eternity. 
Lastly, to sum up as briefly as possible-if such per- 
sons enjoy health, they must lose it; if they are attack- 
ed with illness, their restoration to health is difficult; 
if they are fortunate to recover, they are ever liable to 
be again assailed. Proper habits are no less necessary 
for a perfect restoration to health than proper aliment*, 15 
sleep, moderate exercise, pure air. And, in condn- 
sion of this letter, 1 will mention a striking example of 
the effect of these pernicious secret habits-that is to 
sav, of the relapses they will cause, while the cure ap- 
pears most certain. 
Doctor Valentin, of Marseilles, was attending a lady 
of title for an intermittent fever, which, though seve- 
ral times cured, always returned under a regular inter- 
mittent form preceded by extremely long-continued 
shivers. The physician several times expressed his 
astonishment at the disease, and ultimately received 
from his patient an avowal that she indulged in this 
pernicious habit, although she was both a wife and 
and mother; and, with the aid of a lady whom he 
placed near the bedside of the invalid, he succeeded in 
saving her from the precipice down which she would 
have hurled herself. 
LETTER V. 
Pindar, the celebrated ancient lyric poet, has defined 
life to be the dream of a shadow ; others have describ- 
ed it as a species of flight; while others, more alive 
perhaps to the miseries than to the pleasures which 
accompany it, have feigned, that the gods did not make 
man a present of life, but that they rather sold it 
to him. 
Our life may be truly said to be the dream of a 16 
hadow ; but this shadow has feeling,-is endowed 
with understanding, and by acting wisely, the dream 
may be rendered a long and happy one. 
That our existence is fugitive, the rapid succession 
of years, the flight from infancy to youth, from 
youth to old age, and from old age to the dust 
that follows it, abundantly testify. But we are in 
possession of a means of giving to this varying exis- 
tence, which has so manifest a tendency to its own 
destruction, a more fixed character; and that is, by 
moderation,-the source of all virtue, and of all hap- 
piness. 
The author of our being, in granting us life, appears 
indeed to have surrounded it with numerous duties; 
but duties are not burdensome, when those, by whom 
they are imposed, furnish their tributaries, at the same 
time an inexhaustible treasure, by which they may be 
freed from them; with this treasure, we are well ac- 
quainted, it is deposited within us ; we are allowed 
free access to it, and indeed are enjoined to draw from 
it: and if mankind would only make use of it, if they 
would boldly render themselves subservient to their 
reason, they would soon discover, that nature was really 
desirous that they should be happy. 
It must nevertheless be admitted, that if Heaven has 
granted to man the splendid gift of reason, it has, at 
the same time, rendered it very necessary for him. No 
other animated being is subject to such numerous 
diseases, none die from such a variety of causes, and 
none bear within them so many germs of evil, as him- 
self, if he knows not how to use those means which 
have been bestowed upon him, for preserving himself 
from them. 
But if we may look upon life as the dream of a sha- 
dow, if it be no more than a fugitive existence, if we 
may, in some degree, say, not that the Supreme Being 
has sold life to us, for that would be impious, if takes 17 
liberally, but it would still seem that it may be m 
■aid of those, and that it has been dearly sold, too, 
who have given themselves up as victims of a soli- 
tary vice. 
Independently of the disposition, of which I have 
spoken, of the human species towards so many different 
affections, each individual has a peculiar tendency to 
one or more kinds of destruction, by the unequal divi- 
sion of strength, whereby the organs of which they are 
formed, are endowed. 
And, the truth of this is daily attested in our inter- 
course with the world ; when we hear that such or 
such a one, has a weak stomach, or delicate chest, 
&c. And as the weakest organs are the first to suf- 
fer from the influence of the causes of disease, and as 
there can be none more powerful than evil practices, it 
may be safely predicted of all persons yielding to the 
delirium of solitary vice, the kind of malady their im- 
prudence will bring upon them.* 
In vain ii will be believed, that we do not bear 
within ourselves the "b/au ideal " of human organ- 
isation. And even though so extreme a favor might 
have been granted to some individuals, it neverthe- 
less cannot be contended that such a perfect organ- 
ization is unalterable. Even Thetis herself could not 
render Achilles invulnerable throughout the whole of 
his body. 
Women approximating very closely by their con- 
stitution to that of children, who are eminently lym 
phatic, nervous, and subject to rickets, experience also 
* Bickar, in his general anatomy, advances a similar opinion, and 
which has now for a longtime been established. •* Life," he says, 
" is a great exercise, which keeps, by desires, ths various organs in 
motion, and which leads at length to their repose : this repose ia 
death. But each organ arrives there more or less soon, according is 
the desire of strength with which it is invested, proportioned to the 
greater or less disposition to exhaust it, in the course of thia jreal 
axerciee. 18 
ftom an indulgence in this solitary delirium, a variety 
of nervous disorders, and ricketty affections. Permit 
me to furnish you with some examples of what I have 
here advanced. 
Persons who are derated to secret vicious habits, 
whether they be characterized by the delicacy, or the 
too great activity of their nerves, may rest assured that 
they will become epileptic, subject to fits, to palpita- 
tions and all other nervous affections. 
A little girl, only eight years old, became alarming- 
ly thin ; her lower limbs, such as her thighs, legs 
and feet, were shaken by extraordinary motions, 
which speedily extended to her higher members-the 
impossibility of preventing them was absolute; the 
agitation of the muscles of the face and eyes was ex- 
cessive. 
The child could not be in her bed, and they were 
obliged to keep her continually in an arm-chair with 
a fastening before it. The medical men who attend- 
ed her, thought that the St. Vitus' dance (the name 
by which this disorder was distinguished) might pos- 
sibly be attributed to the green sickness, and adminis- 
tered, without success, all the known remedies to re- 
move it. 
Doctor Marcelot having been consulted in this stage, 
(says Petir, who had it from his friend, the Doc- 
tor himself,) fancied that he recognized the results of 
a secret habit, and was soon convinced that he was 
right. Some sound advice, and the constant watching 
over her by her patents, together with the application 
of cold baths, musk, and camphor, completely effected 
a cure. 
But at eleven years of age. this same young girl, 
having again fallen into similar practices, her disorder 
recurred with still greater intensity; and only, with 
great difficulty yielded to the same restoratives which 
had been successful on the former occasion. 19 
Two years after, this young lady died of a slow 
Chronic inflammation on the pericardium (the mem- 
branous covering of the heart), and which had endured 
so prodigious an enlargement of the liver, that it occu- 
pied nearly the whole of the abdominal cavity, (the 
lower belly). 
I might confine myself to this fact, in reference U 
those nervous affections considered in that point of 
riew to which I would draw attention ; but as such 
disorders are those from which women are most likely 
to suffer, I cannot refrain from adding to the previous 
example the two following cases, too remarkable to be 
omitted. They will abundantly prove the extreme 
nervous susceptibility of which I have spoken, with 
regard to women : and analyze, moreover, the degree 
to which this tendency to nervous diseases may be 
carried among them by secret vicious habits, or solitary 
evil practices. 
The first of these two cases was reported by pro- 
fessor Alibert, at the Hospital Saint Louis, at Paris. 
I, myself, witnessed the second. 
After having described the state of idiotcy of a young 
country girl, a prey to solitary delirium of the most 
deplorable excess, at her own home, the professor 
whom I have named goes on to say-" Her upper ex- 
tremities-arms, hands, head, and chest, exhibited a 
condition of leanness worthy of comparison : while her 
hips, stomach, thighs, and legs, were of so fleshy an 
appearance, as to astonish the spectator. One might 
have said, that life had withdrawn itself and resided 
but in one spot, partk ularly in the uterus, where all 
the impressions she experienced were retained; so 
much so, that, after touching all parts of her body 
successively, her whole frame became violently agita- 
ted, and she would fall into convulsions, in the same 
manner as the works of a clock are set in motion. 
These convulsions lasted about half an hour; and 20 
the patient, during this period, uttered the most fearful 
groans." 
The sufferer whom I attended was affected with 
similar convulsions, arising from the same cause, ac- 
companied by various sensibilities of her hearing. 
She was about forty years of age ; the slightest noise, 
or words spoken in an ordinary tone of voice, were, a 
long time before her death, so sensitive had her nerves 
become, like the noisy shouts of one hallooing at the 
top of the voice. And at a later period, if she were 
touched in the gentlest manner, even by the tip of the 
finger, in any part of the body, she would utter low 
and agonized meanings, without the power of speaking, 
or even articulating, and her whole frame would shake, 
and vibrate, as one may say, for a longer or shorter 
period, in the same manner as the sting of a bee or 
wasp, which one draws and lets go suddenly. The 
unfortunate creature lived about eight days in this 
state. 
Should you at any time observe a woman, who has 
not been irreproachable in such secret practices, of an 
apathetic character, weak and languid appearance, and 
pale complexion, you may be assured that she will be- 
come idiotic. And the two following are examples ot 
the same, which prove it, in a trifling manner, by their 
very dissimilar appearances. Two sisters had exposed 
themselves to the reproaches I have adverted to-one 
was of the appearance and character which I have de- 
scribed. She was not affected, for a number of years, 
oy any other mark, than violet-colored tubercles, with 
which the skin of some part of her body was constantly 
covered. But neither the period of puberty, nor a 
more advanced age, nor society, could ever give any 
freedom to her intellectual faculties, and the moral 
state of her whole life was one of half idiotcy. The 
other sister, on the contrary, was endowed with a very 
Jvely disposition, and was of an affable and agreeable 21 
character; but she, at the same time, was afflicted by 
the rickets, in a very strong degree. She preserved 
all her liveliness, and indeed all her moral character 
notwithstanding the propensity to which she had so 
unlimitedly surrendered herself: but, after some time, 
one of the bones of her womb, already out of order, 
became carious, which would infallibly very soon have 
caused death, if the advice and care of a very able phy- 
sician had not arrested its progress. 
As an uninterrupted lecture of what I propose to 
submit to your reason, touching many other disorders 
which are entailed on those of such vitiated solitary 
habits, would undoubtedly fatigue, I shall make what 
I have to acquint you with on the subject of those other 
disorders the matter of other letters. 
LETTER VI. 
I shall begin this letter by an example of the danger 
to which persons, who may be indisposed to any kind 
of pulmonary consumption, expose themselves, by being 
unmindful of wisdom, in secret. 
In the year 1813,1 was consulted by Mrs. M . 
She was at that precise age when every thing is to be 
•pprehended from affections of the chest She wu 22 
evidently of a scrofulous nabit, and many members of 
her family had already been sufferers from the disor- 
ders incident to that kind of constitution. Her youth 
had been passed in a cold, damp, dull, wooded country, 
surrounded by mountains difficult of approach, &c. &c. 
But notwithstanding all these unfavorable circumstan- 
ces, the person in question had, nevertheless, enjoyed 
a tolerably good state of health, according to all ap- 
pearance, till she had attained her eighteenth year. 
At this period she had a fall, whereby one of her legs 
was much bruised and swollen ; some little time after 
which, the limb became painful and inflamed, and an 
abscess gathered in it, which for some years continued 
to discharge a quantity of purulent matter, notwith- 
standing the application of all the ordinary remedies in 
such cases. 
The ulcers, at last, however, whether from the effect 
of age, or yielding to the remedies, dried up and 
healed, the edges of the wounds cicatrized, and the leg, 
although very thin, appeared to be free from all disease 
if we except its weakness and deformity, which weiv 
accompanied by lameness. 
From this time, that is to say, from her twenty-first 
to her twenty-fourth year, the girl appeared, externally, 
to have recovered a perfect state of health; her dispo- 
sition was lively, and very high spirits. But, at this 
period, she contracted the self-wounding propensity of 
solitary vice. She very speedily suffered from oppres- 
sion of the chest and cough ; and, although fully aware 
that the course she was imprudently pursuing was as 
dangerous as it was wicked, she continued to persevere 
in it, and her chest became decidedly affected. She 
consulted a number of medical men, but without either 
confessing her fatal pursuits, or discontinuing them. 
The obstruction, irritation, and weakness of the lungs, 
increased ; she could no longer get any deep, a hectic 
fever took possession of her, and her complexion 23 
partook of colon that were puite unnatural; she ex- 
pectorated large quantities of purulent, congealed 
matter, of a greyish color, of that species of secretion, 
attaching to a scrofulous pulmonary consumption. 
She at last confessed to me,-shall I call it her 
error? No, the term is not strong enough, because she 
was fully conscious that she was hastening herself to 
the grave. She rather made a full avowal of the gui'ty 
practices in which she was living. In order to divert 
her from them, I urged every possible argument either 
of a touching or persuasive character. I saw her 
again, and questioned her repeatedly, but I found it 
equally impossible to conquer either her disease or her 
propensity. 
She became daily more and more enfeebled, from one 
cause or the other. She was incapable of uttering two 
words, or of moving a step without being nearly suf- 
focated. Her eyes sparkled from the fever, and she 
was not the less remarkable for the striking power of 
ner intellect, the last forerunner of approaching death,f 
just as though her soul was in haste to enable her to 
lay out to the best advantage the few moments that 
remained to her, for the exercise of the brightest facul- 
ties of her mind. 
Sdre died, at last, in her twenty-eight year, of a 
consumption of three years duration, deceived in the 
hope of her recovery, which hope was rendered every 
day more and more vain, on account of the obstinacy 
with which she criminally persevered in her frightful 
vics 
A great many persons are of opinion that pulmonary 
eonsumption is hereditary :-in numerous cases it is 
t Thia feature has been observed both by the ancient and i_.odern 
physicians. 
J Doctor Cart, of M., has also remarked, that the influence of 
solitary vicious habits have frequently had a very great effect in the 
development of scrofulous diseases. " The white swellings which 
appear in various parts of the body,'* writes this excellent physician, 24 
unquestionably so, and more perhaps think it is 
infectious ; and this opinion is almost as well founded 
as the previous one. But it is a fact that cannot be 
too well established, that no existing cause so rapidly 
developes these diseases, as the propensity to solitary 
delirium, however remote the predisposition to these 
In May, 18-17, "and filled with a white transparent humor, enclosed 
in a membraneous bag, formed from the muscular tunicles, are very 
common in our days, and we cannot doubt that this disorder, which 
is a species of scrofula, owes its increase to the misfortunes that are 
Inseparable from war and its attendant privations. But what ravages 
has it not made among persons who have destroyed their constitution 
by the deadly incentives of a vicious solitude? The hospitals teem 
with subjects worn out by the suppuration of these tumors, who owe 
their frightful fate to this habitual vice. The degeneracy of morals, 
the absence of principle, and the contagion of example, united with 
enavoidable privations, have multiplied the forms of scrofulous 
swellings, which heretofore were very rare, and of which the cure is 
attended with the greater difficulty, in proportion as those combining 
causes continue." 
The letter contains many important truths, and they are expressed 
In the tone of a friend, both to humanity and morals. But I really 
am of opinion, that, instead of attributing the frequency of those 
white scrofulous swellings, in our days, principally to the degeneracy 
of morals, it would be more just to limit f hem to those vicious, soli- 
tary habits, which, notwithstanding that other causes may produce 
them, must still have the greatest influence in giving rise to them. 
Human nature will be always human nature; and must necessarily 
be mixed up both with vice and virtue. It is not a very easy matte* 
to the greater or less morality of ages, without a deep and well divided 
consideration of those that have long since past away. The past is 
forgotten, the present only strikes us. Was not that vice, of which I 
am in these letters tepresenling the danger, very common among th* 
Jews, since it so forcibly drew down the attention of their legislator, 
who felt himself compelled, in order to restrain its progress, to bring 
home to the imagination of bis people the terrible example of OnanJ 
The celebrated Joubert, Chancellor of the University of Montpelier 
150 years ago, complained also, in his treatise of popular errors, o» 
the calamities that this very vice entailed on its votaries of Loth 
sexes. And finally, was it not. in this present nineteenth century, 
that the generous phys ician of Lausanne, composed and published hi* 
well known Dissertation. The vicious solitary habits are still then 
beyond a doubt, unhappily too common. But who can say that they 
were less so in by gone times? But however that may be, there is no 
abatement in their effect. For if we except poisons, and some few 
frightful maladies, the human system has no greater causes of ds- 
Mniction to dread than their sinfdl secret vices. 25 
affections may be ; and I am fully persuaded, that that 
has often been attributed either to hereditary disease 
or to contagion, which has had its origin solely in an 
adherance to this practice: and that many children born 
of delicate parents, and who have even been delicate 
themselves, have had their chests and constitutions 
strengthened, by their mere continuance in a chaste 
and innocent course of life, although, in their infancy, 
they may have been regarded as consumptive ; which, 
in reality, they were not. Is it then to be wondered 
at, that so many persons die of consumption, attributing 
their death to delicacy of their constitutions, if they 
waste, as soon as they have the power, the little 
strength that nature has bestowed upon them. 
According to one of the most observing physicians 
that ever existed (Sydenham), the organs of respiiation 
are the weakest of all those belonging to the race ; two 
thirds of mankind die of diseases of the lungs ; and the 
most common period in which young persons resort to 
these vicious habits, is precisely that wherein the chest 
exhibits the greatest susceptibility. There is, more- 
over, a species of consumption to which women are 
greatly exposed by the very nature of their constitution; 
such as tuberculose and lymphatic consumption. 
That particular manner of opposite living, that is, 
by leading a chaste life, is, on the other hand so favor- 
able to the system, that I have seen persons of an 
extremely weak ana languid constitution, not only 
uninjured in the chest, but who have, by time and care, 
acquired a strength of body that surprised me when I 
have met them, after having lost sight of them for a 
great or less period. I knew one in particular, who 
had always been considered decidedly consumptive 
but, from a regular manner of living during her lan- 
gour and debility, and by happily guiding her judgment 
by the admonition of her wisdom, be-came subsequently 
w hearty and strong, as to be enabled sometimes te 26 
■walk fourteen miles a day. Ah! if yale and sickly 
children could only be preserved in their early inno- 
cence, if those whose parents have fallen victims to 
pulmonary complaints could only be kept chaste, if per- 
sons who are subject to consumption would only lead a 
life of purity, we should soon discover that such disor- 
ders of the chest are neither so hereditary nor infectious 
as they are supposed to be. 
Every animated thing,-the plant, the brute, the 
human species, are born delicate and fragile, and grow 
up in strength ; the tender shoot of the oak becomes a 
hardy tree ; the weakest infant, a soldier, a laborer, a 
vigorous man. if nothing be done to prevent it. If 
nature sleeps, languishes, or is deceived, it knows when 
to awaken and retrieve each errcr, if it be not inces 
santly thwarted or crushed, no matter by what means 
The author of nature has traced out its steps, has 
dictated its laws, and a premature death, the melancholy 
consequence of evil vices, is only one of the rules of his 
immortal code. 
How much it were to be desired, that persons would 
not so frequently despise themselves in the world, and 
that they would not invariably, falsely, attribute to 
family diseases, or the contagious nature of consump- 
tions, that which is traceable alone to vicious habits. 
The person of whom I was speaking to you, who 
for a long time w'as looked upon, as one not to enjoy 
life for any lengthened period, but as specially destined, 
oy the untoward appearances of her chest, very speedi- 
ly to be called upon to pay the great debt of nature, 
has frequently attended people afflicted with complaints 
of the chest, has held, within hers, their arms and 
hands, damp with the perspiration of their protracted 
agonies; and has now, at the age of thirty-five years, 
not a single wish to form with respect to her health. 
And do we not frequently see young persons, equally 
interesting by their devotion and their youth, performing 27 
Atse generous attentions in the hospital*, and preserv- 
ing better health, and finer complexions than many 
moving about in the world! I assure you, that I have 
seen them in these affecting retreats of charity, so fresh 
and healthy, that their modest demeanor, and neat 
white dresses, might easily lead you to mistake them 
for real angels of salvation in the midst of the sick. 
But sometimes persons born of healthy parents of 
sound constitutions, and who themselves are quite ro- 
bust, and always breathing a fine air, find the chest 
affected by their evil habits, and the grave opening 
before them, long before their time; while, on the 
other hand, they on whom Heaven seems only to have 
bestowed a very short life, are preserved, by a purity 
of conduct, to the limits of extreme old age. 
The spring and autumn, especially, impose on those 
whose chests are delicate, or have a tendency to those 
affections, the greatest necessity for irreproachable 
morals; for they are the two seasens principally fatal 
to consumptive people. 28 
LETTER VII. 
If good air and nourishment are as essential te 
persons subject to any description of consumptiv 
complaints as chastity, the same may be said of those 
who are subject to scrofula or rickets. 
When scrofulous symptoms are found in person 
addicted to this solitary weakness, that terrible dis 
order never fails to spread rapidly in such cases. If 
disposed to attack the neck more than any other par* 
independantly of some other signs, it will exhibit first, 
in those parts of it least provided with glands, smal1 
tumors yielding to the touch but without color, and 
causing no pain ; these tumors will increase in size, 
become soft, tender, more or less red, and then assume 
k violet tinge ; in time, they will fester and turn to 
so many scrofulous ulcers, more or less considerable, 
difficult to cure, easily returning, and even when fortu 
nately healed, leaving unsightly scars. 
Should this disease thus develop itself in those 
organs which constitute the joints, rottenness and ex- 
ostosis (swelling of the bones) consecutive taxations 
(slow and successive displacing of the extremity of the 
bones and their cavities,) together with tameness, and 
often loss of limbs, by amputation, become the conse- 
quences. 
A pulmonary phthysic, such as I have described 
in the preceding letter, the swelling of the glands 
in the lower part of the stomach-the part most im- 
mediately connected with the digestive system, may 
also be the result of a scrofulous habit operating on the 
chest and stomach, already irritated and exhausted by 
dangerous and immoral practices. 
These numerous affections are not the only ones, 
inch a temperament engenders when brought to ttu 29 
last stage ot vitiation by such irregularities. A 
crowd of other evils will arise from the same source, 
(such as wandering pains, ophthalmia or inflammation 
of the eyes) of the same nature, that is to say essentisJ- 
ly scrofulous. 
The patient will also be subject to many infirmities 
in youth, in age, when residing in valleys, or damp 
places situated to the north or west. 
A soft white skin, blue eyes, ruddy complexion, 
together with a lively turn of mind, are generally found 
to be the personal qualities which announce a scrofu- 
lous habit. 
The constitution of women, as I have already ob- 
served, is essentially lymphatic, and renders them 
peculiarly liable to this disease. Tuberculous phthy- 
sic is more frequently met with in the female than in 
the other sex. 
With respect to rickets, if the bones have a tenden- 
cy to become soft, they soon bend. If this change 
takes place in the bones of the chest, it curves, becomes 
arched beyond proportion, and deformed before, behind, 
and at the side. 
If it takes place in the bones of the leg, haunches, 
thighs, arms, the parts or the members whose good 
condition they so powerfully influence in a healthy 
State become deformed and weak to a degree more or 
less inconvenient and disgusting in proportion to ths 
deterioration of the bone. 
1 have quoted for you five examples of such a change 
in the whole skeleton, observed by Professor Portal, a> 
the consequence of dangerous habits, and inserted in 
his " Traite sur la rachitisme, ou la Noueure des cn- 
fans." 
Doctor Richard, also quoted by Retih, once saw 
similar deformity of the ribs, in an extreme degree 
arising from the same cause. 
I was oice consulted by a woman who had becona 30 
deformed, that is to say, had co insisted the proceM 
that rendered her so in a moment, while carrying a 
bucket of water; her appearance excited strong sus- 
picions respecting her morals. 
But if this accident was not in her case the result of 
immoral habits, how much such propensities would 
have facilitated it! 
Two-of the most eminent surgeons of our day, 
professors Labaher and Boyer, place this imprudence 
tn the first rank among the causes of rottenness and 
bending of the bones, and give some authentic instan 
ces of it in their valuable treatises on surgery. 
More quotations on this description of malady 
would be superfluous. I shall close this letter with 
two remarks. 
First, rickets, like pulmonary phthysic, has more 
often, probably been considered as the fatal gift of pa 
rents to their children than it really is, and its sure 
cause, the habit which brought it on, has often been 
passed over. 
Secondly ; all gibbosities are not however to be at 
tributed to vicious habits. They may be occasioned 
in early infancy by a bad curse, taken in later life, by 
bad nourishment, and unwholesome dwelling, want of 
exercise, and hereditary disposition for the gout, rheu- 
matism, or other diseases; by eruptive fevers, falls 
on the back, and other causes, and all that may gen- 
erally weaken and oppose the, natural and regular 
growth of the body. 
Far then from asserting that persons thus afflicted 
are to be despised or blamed, I think on the contrary, 
that with some it is more the result of an unhappy 
destiny than merited; and that every motive of benev 
•■•ace urges to vify ami nslier* tbsir csaditiao. 31 
The blame we may feel disposed to attach to some 
persons for their bad conformation, can only be addres- 
sed with justice, to those whose childhood and youth 
have not always been free from reproach. 
It is easy to distinguish between those whom we 
ought only to pity, and those whom we ought at the 
same time to blame. 
The former have the head large relatively to the rest 
of the body, and the arms long, and as it were drawn 
out. The latter do not show these peculiarities. 
The first are usually gay, lively: while the second, 
®n the contrary, combine with their deformity extrema 
stupidity and inertness. All functions, except respirar 
tion, are well discharged by the former, with the oth- 
ers all are accomplished badly and languidly. 
These appeaar always to be laboring under a severe 
malady, and are incapable of any toil; while those are 
wholly free from this appearance, and daily engage in 
occupations more or less difficult-in study, in the cul- 
tivation cf science and the practice of the arts. 
LETTER VIII. 
You have just seen, my interesting patient, that per- 
rons merely liable to convulsions, pulmonary phthysie, 
and rickets, have by indulgence in solitary vice brought 
•n these disorders themselves. You have seen the 32 
ample dispositions for painful diseases become the 
a use of the most distressing consequences, when they 
might have remained without such results, and even 
been repaired by time, had not the unfortunate victims 
stood in the way of their cure. 
The following is the invariable fate of persons whose 
stomachs are naturally weak, ropy, cold or irritable. 
That organ becomes the seat of much pain, accompani- 
ed by vomiting ; and digestion is effected with more 
difficulty. The food they take is not reduced with 
sufficient speed, or in a proper manner, to a state of 
assimilation ; it neither restores nor nourishes them ; 
and does not invigorate their power. They grow 
thin daily, though generally eating heartily. A slow 
fever, arising chiefly from the disordered state of 
this part of the body, seizes them, and they die of ex- 
haustion. 
A young person was frequently afflicted with pains 
in the stomach. She had quite lost her appetite and 
become extremely melancholy (a state rendering the 
patient very liable to pains in the stomach), and Doc- 
tor Federigo describes her as endeavoring to persuade 
him that purgatives were the only remedies suited to 
her condition. 
This physician having questioned her respecting 
her mode of life, she tried to avoid exciting his sus- 
picions that pernicious habits might be the cause of 
her inconvenience. But the pains in the stomach in- 
creasing, she confessed, with much reluctance, that she 
had for some time been the victim of a secret passion, 
which she dared not divulge. Strengthening medi- 
cines and the care she took to conquer weakness cured 
her perfectly. 
If the temperament of such a woman is weak, if any 
members of her family, of her own sex, have at any 
time been afflicted w'ith a white discharge, the impru- 
dent and unhappy victim of solitary habits, hoping it 33 
will extenuate her own case in similar circumstance*, 
privately violates the laws of chastity. 
In the treatise on the dangers of this vice by the 
physician of Lausanne, we meet with the following ex- 
tract from a letter of Professor Stehlin, a physician at 
Bale in Switzerland: 
" I also know a young lady, about twelve or thir- 
teen years of age, who has brought on consumption 
by this detestable habit. Her stomach is large and 
dilated, and she is affected with a discharge and ina- 
bility to retain her urine. Remedies have relieved her 
partially, but she is still languishing, and I fear the 
consequences." 
Doctor Federigo, whom 1 have already quoted, re- 
lates the subjoined case in the same work. " I have 
he says, " known for several years a woman subject to 
great debility and loss of appetite. A slow nightly 
fever had reduced her to a state of extreme thinness ; 
her eyes were pale and sunken; she suffered from a 
burning skin, and could scarce stand : an abundant 
discharge increased her weakness, which had attain- 
ed an advanced stage of marasmus. The most active 
remedies, such as decoctions of quiquma, taken in milk 
and the waters of Recovara, were useless, bne died 
in a deplorable state of consumption. In vain I ques- 
tioned her respecting her past life, in the hope of as- 
certaining the cause of her malady; I could not suc- 
ceed. Only a month before her death she confessed, 
with tears in her eyes, that she had contributed to her 
own ruin, by giving herself up constantly, for several 
years, to a secret and destructive weakness." 
I was consulted, not long since, by a person rapia- 
ly approaching the same state, through the same fault. 
She will furnish here a third example of chloride, or sal- 
low complexion mdthe white discharge, and will, by 
and by, if she continue the fatal practice, be tn instanc* 
of dorsal and mucous consumption. 34 
bne told me, that nearly all her family were sub- 
let to white discharges. She lived a very indolent 
rife, was about thirty-three years of age, decidedly 
lymphatic, and tall and thin. The color of her face 
might be well compared to a piece of white satin, slight- 
ly discolored. Her deportmant was wholly destitute 
of grace and firmness, and she had constantly a white 
discharge. 
I told her, with all possible precaution, what I con- 
ceived to be the true cause of this discharge. She 
protested it was not the case ; but afterwards informed 
me, inlirectly, that she was addicted to this wretched 
habit 
LETTER IX. 
But what will become of a young person's beauty 
when the health is thus deeply impaired? It can only 
oloom and disappear like the withered form and faded 
solor of a flower nipped in the bud ; or to make use of 
another comparison, like the ruins of a temple des- 
troyed by profane hands, it loses the elegance and ma- 35 
jesty which delighted the imagination and inspired 
respect, long before years and decay would have im- 
paired those qualities. i 
The young woman, or girl, is this temple, and must 
expect to lose all the attributes of beauty when once 
she gives herself up to this most destructive of all pas- 
sions. 
The growth of the body, the development of the 
figure, all grace and freshness, will disappear ; for this 
error spares no charms. 
No doubt the words of the celebrated physician I 
have already cited occur to your mind. Respecting a 
votary to this solitary vice he observed-" She is a 
tree withered while blossoming ; a perfect walking 
skeleton." 
What a different picture those young females pre- 
sent who display so agreeably all the charms of their 
sex! 
Consider a girl at the age when the attractions of 
youth succeed the grace of infancy. Happy is the 
maiden who preserves her primitive purity, when, 
like an unknown lake in the bosom of a lovely 
country, her imagination, as yet, has only reflected 
the heaven above and the verdure and the flowers 
around. 
She appears to unite in her person the rarest charms 
of the universe. 
How noble an aspect those women presented who 
furnished Virgil with the following portraits ! In the 
first, he describes Venus appearing to ; in the 
second, Dido starting for the chase 
A ces mots 
Elie qultte son fils; m»is aux yeaux theros 
Elie otfre en detournant si tete embloinssanU, 
D'un cou seme de lie. la beauts ravissant. 
De see cheveuxd irins les parfums precieux 
Swnblent en ('exhalant retourner rers lei ciMUfa 36 
8a robs en pis flottans jusqu'a ses pieds s'abaisea , 
Bile marche, et son port revelve une cfcesse. 
Didon enfin parait: d'un air majesteaux 
Elie fend de sa cour lea flots respecturews. 
Eneide, lir. I.-Delille'i translation. J 
If man be lord of the creation, such a woman is sure- 
ly the queen. But this grace and this fresh and fail 
complexion are never to be met with in persons con- 
sumed by disease; and these portraits, presented to us 
under the name of goddesses, are those of persons who 
have really existed. 
In the same way Recine described the interesting 
Lavalliere, in his Berenice. Thus Fontaine, when 
he covered with roses and lillies the Venus whom 
Homer, three thousand years before, had begirt with 
the enchanting zone, was no doubt thinking of the 
young and virtuous La Sabliere. And probably Vir- 
gil was indebted to some princess to the court of Au- 
gustus for the majestic air which excites our admira- 
tion in his Dido. 
In this latter it was my intention only to point out 
the charms health imparts to women, and I perceive 
that the examples I have chosen furnish instances of 
moral as well as physical beauty. Is not the one, then, 
inseparable from the other! Can health and grace 
exist without innocence and modesty! Chastity is the 
daughter of Modesty, and therefore health cannot be 
long enjoyed without Chastity. 
Socrates said long ago that a handsome body gave 
promise of a noble soul; and the painter, Des Jardins 
author of the " Three Reins," has said : 
" Ah ! qui pent separar la pudeur de la grace ? 
Pon silence nous plait, so froideur meme enflamme, 
Et la pudeur enfin la grace de 1'amme." 
Virtue adorns women with every grace. It gives 37 
them not only the beauty that attends health, but be- 
stowes on them still more powerful attractions: that 
is the expression of every amiable sentiment. The 
power of fascinating, so often ascribed tojhem, is no 
fiction ; and a modern poet has very aptljMkaid, while 
speaking of the Author of Nature, in the praise he is 
bestowing on your sex- 
Pour»on dernier ocTr«'_ .c.eaia beaute; 
L'on sent qu'ace chefd'ceuvre il dut s'etre arrete." 
What, in fact, could he create more charming than 
'«n being destined to reign over the heart of man 
>mself 
LETTER X. 
We owe to your sex the admission, that in all ages 
of the world there have been a number of excellent 
women. They had acquired so high a degree of es- 
teem among our ancestors, the Gauls and Germans, 
that they regarded them as divine. With the former, 
there was no excuse for failing in respect towai J them ; 
the Gauls were allowed to say anything at their feasts 
except to speak ill of women. 
No doubt, this was a personal homage they paid to 
worthy partners; but it was also assuredly rendered to 
modesty and chastity, as virtues. 38 
Doubtless, they also considered modesty the grace 
of the soul, and would not have it attacked even in 
common conversation. 
Have women lost this almost divine influence 
which, according to all historians, they enjoyed among 
the Gauls! No; those who combine chastity and 
modesty with beauty, still retain it; and this kind 
of empire will ever be the natural heritage of such 
women. 
1 have often heard a person observe-a person who 
knew how to esteem these qualities,-that he never 
felt more confidence in the divinity, or more certainty 
respecting the immortality of the soul, than when in 
the society of a lovely and virtuous woman. I have 
often met with this sentiment in more than one writer. 
Some ancient philosophers, and even the best, 
have supposed the soul to be a kind of divinity en- 
closed in our bodies. I will not decide the truth of 
this opinion, but certainly the sweetest rays of the 
Divinity are found nowhere so conspicuously as on the 
brow of a woman worthy the esteem and confidence of 
her husband. 
A celebrated man of the last century observed-"AL 
the gentle and sublime ideas, full, as it were, of tho 
Divinity, assemble at the image we form of a Socrates 
and a Fenelon." 
I think we might express ourselves in the same way, 
if we wished to describe all we experience at the sight 
of a maiden, bride, or mother, endowed with all the 
virtues of the age and sex. 
But why do 1 dwell on the praises of modesty! It 
is indisputable that it cannot be separated from beauty. 
It is the most aflectihg of all graces ; it is, as a cele- 
brated woman (La Marquise de Lambert) observed to 
her daughter, a great lustre in a young person ; but it 
is no more unknown or strange to you than graceu 
Besides, ought we to praise what is plainly so admirs* 39 
ble! ' The beautiful (remarks one of the wisest men 
that ever existed, end he certainly would not have 
omitted modesty in this maxim) the beautiful of every 
description is beautiful of itself. It exists in and of 
itself. Praise forms no part of it. Thus nothing 
becomes better or worse from the opinions of 
ethers." 
We admit this with respect to all that is beautiful in 
the productions of nature or art; but is there anything 
wanting to that which is naturally beautiful 1 No ; nr 
more than to justice, truth, humanity, or modesty; 
what is there in these qualities that becomes beautiful 
by praise, or loses its beauty through blame! 
Well, these amiable traits, these lovely colors- 
lovely maidens in the spring of life and innocence- 
this elegant and flexible waist, the grace which Na- 
ture only bestows on your sex,-these are not the 
only advantages of the young person who is chaste. 
Among the means of pleasing so liberally bestowed 
on women-for it is Nature's design that they should 
please,-the voice is not the least disagreeable and 
powerful. 
If the Supreme Being seems to have imparted the 
grave tone of command to the voice of men, we cannot 
doubt that he has given to that of woman the more 
delicate but not less useful accent, which seduces and 
disarms; and is not seducing or disarming in effect to 
command 1 Is it less commanding because accomplish- 
ed by pleasure and fascination ? Has not the mouth 
of a virtuous woman also its eloquence! Can there 
be any eloquence more peruasive than hers, going 
more directly to the heart, or more rapidly inspiring 
the most honorable and generous sentiments-courage 
and humanity. 
It is said that the Israelities experienced a kind o» 
holy delirium when they listened to their women sing- 
ing their psalms. 40 
" They imagined," says M. Segur, " In these pious 
moments, that the exhilirating influence on the mind 
was owing to the divine power of their wives." 
Sterne, the author of the " Sentimental Journey," 
says of Eliza, 
" She spoke, ami her voice resembled the sound 
of a lute." 
A learned professor has acknowledged, that he was 
obliged to forego the pleasure of seeing a celebrated 
actress perform, to check the violent passion her voice 
inspired him with. 
Such is a portion of the lovely dower which the 
young female who has yielded to, and has no longer 
power to resist, the most dangerous of all errors, loses ; 
for the voice of those addicted to solitary habits often 
becomes harsh, weak, and sometimes is lost. These 
letters furnish several examples. 
If it be not entirely lost-if it do not become very 
feeble,-it never fails to lose one of its principal qual- 
ities-its clearness; that agreeable sonority which 
made Sterne compare the voice of his Eliza to that 
of a lute. 
Who shall restore charms thus lost-what shall re- 
place them? Dress? This hope cannot be indulged. 
The charm of innocence cannot be received twice ; 
there is no adorning for the immoral vicious woman, 
were she more lovely than the Greek who, fearing the 
loss of a suit, unveiled, that her judges might be moved 
by her beauty. 
No, that is ornament which really adorns; aid a 
sage has said that " It is not gold, jewels, emeralds, 
precious, nor purple robes, that adorn a woman, but 
that which makes her honest, virtuous, humble, and 
modest." 
Ah, if women wko forget their duties could see ths 41 
advantages arising from observing them, they wouk 
never determine to make such sacrifices ! 
Yet they make them ; the young devotees of solitary 
fleasures without knowing it, are no longer chaste 
nnocence has ceased to be their charm, and modesty 
will soon cease to be their grace. 
LETTER XI. 
As you have seen, my dear young patient, that the 
physician acquainted with the constitution of any one 
addicted to solitary weaknesses can forsee exactly the 
maladies they will give rise to, so they can also pre- 
dict the alteration of feature that will ensue according 
to the natural countenance of the patient. If the un- 
fortunate victim of sensuality and corruption has an 
oval face, a well-proportioned brow, eyes full of digni- 
ty moving beneath handsome lids, and shaded by long 
lashes, the curve of the nose gracefully formed, the 
cheeks full, and a noble and pleasing demeanor,-the 
temples will become depressed ; the cheek-bones prom- 
inent ; the cheeks hollow; the nose appear longer than 42 
it was, from the g-rowing thinness of the surrounding 
parts , the eyes will get hollow, and assume a livid and 
languid look; and the face, formerly so beautiful, have 
the appearance of deformity, suffering, and decrepi* 
tude. 
While I was writing these reflections, a funeral- 
bell announced to the town that two unfortunate pa- 
rents were about to render the last duties to a poor 
girl, who, though scarcely four-and-twenty, made 
me think during a visit I lately paid her that I be- 
held a woman born down by the weight of nearly a 
century. 
She was sinking-bent forward-and, as is often 
observed, broken down. Her face seemed lengthened 
and singularly wasted ; her large eyes wandered wild- 
ly ; her cheek-bones were extremely prominent; the 
extremity of the nose blue and livid as in many old 
people ; two large and deep wrinkles descended from 
each side of the nose to the chin ; the mouth and cor- 
ners of the lips were drawn downwards, which impart- 
ed an appearance of extreme age to this worn coun- 
tenance ; while the half-opened mouth and bewildered 
eyes gave it a character of stupidity. The slightest 
movement was attended with a feeling of suffocation; 
she could only utter a few words in a whisper and at 
long intervals ; all the upper part of her body, her 
arms and chest, were terribly thin, and the rest watery 
and dropsical. 
I had only time to pay her a few visits. Every tol' 
of the bell made me groan for the unfortunate crea- 
ture. I wrote down the history of her disease to her 
ead dictation. 
When other features distinguish a victim of the same 
error-if her face be round rather than oval, her nose 
•lightly raised at the point instead of being convex, 
her mouth small, her complexion generally pale, her 
•kin white, the solitary weakness will soon deprive 43 
her of the embonpoint and the freshness of health 
which she possessed while she continued chaste. Fe- 
ver, which always brightens the eyes of the consump- 
tive, will singularly enliven hers ; in short, it would 
be difficult to find a face so resembling the usual repre- 
sentations of death. This reflection has often been sug- 
gested to me by the aspect of one woman in particular, 
(among others who were in this state), from whom 1 
trace this portrait. 
If their dangerous habit drew its devotees to the 
grave by means of a pulmonary phthysic, or the cruel 
pains of a cancerous affection-in the first instance, the 
sunken cheeks and all the appearance of consumption 
will combine w'ith the characteristic features of the 
homicidal passion, and take the place of the natural 
physiognomy ; while, in the second case, the sallow 
complexion and the air of extreme suffering which ac- 
company cancerous complaints, will conspire to efface 
the natural expression of the patient, and substitute 
one peculiar to her case. 
It is the same in scrofulous and scorbutic cases, and 
in organic affections of the heart, as well as in many 
other diseases. They disfigure the face with all these 
peculiar deformities, when the errors and constitutions 
of the patients have produced and developed them. 
The particular organic affections I have just men- 
tioned do not declare themselves to the imprudent vic- 
tim of solitary habits; a certain discoloring thinness 
and irreparable loss of strength are sometimes the only 
fruits of their degrading propensity. They often lan- 
guish a long time, surviving, as it were, themselves. 
What, then, is the existence of persons who have fal- 
len into that state 1 It resembles the last stage of life, 
the most decrepid age; for, as soon as a woman has 
lost her strength, voice, and freshness, age has incon- 
teetibly arrived for her, did she only number four-and- twenty years ! Such a woman is essentially old, sines 
she retains none of the charms of youth. 
One of the authors who have described most agree- 
ably the moral and physical qualities of woman, repre- 
sents her in the following way :- 
" The eye cannot trace," observes Roussel, " all the 
phases of a tree, from the moment when the warmth 
of spring restores it to vegetation untill the first severi- 
ty of winter deprives it of the advantages of the fine 
weather, and again delivers it over to inertness and 
death ; but it is easy to remark the most striking cir- 
cumstances of its development. It seizes with pleasure 
the moment when the buds begin to burst the bark and 
mingle their green and tender verdure with the brown 
or greyish color of the branches, that seem as though 
they were weary of the cold repose wherein Nature had 
for so long a time buried them ; there give the first 
signal of their awakening, and proclaim that the whole 
is about to revive, and put on a smiling face. Our 
hearts are enlivened on beholding them, and we feel as 
if we ourselves had received an increase of life, and par- 
ticipate in the joys that give them birth. And this 
agreeable impression is prolonged by turning our eyes 
to the progress which they make insensibly every day, 
until the moment when the leaves confounded with the 
blossoms, strike our senses, begetting a soft ecstacy at 
the sight of so singular an union of such enchanting 
beauties. This state of things is dispersed as rapidly 
as the causes that produced it; the leaves speedily ac- 
quire a more decided color, taking a less tender and 
less touching tint, though still becoming more precious 
in themselves, and more interesting by the advantages 
of which they give promise ; the blossoms wither, and 
are succeeded by the fruit which consoles us for their 
disappearance. 
This third epoch opens our minds to new sensations; 
the liveliness of our first impressions subsides, and is 
44 45 
displaced by a satisfaction of a less impetuous but more 
permanent nature, resembling a peaceful enjoyment. 
The fruits, at length, in their turn, disappear, and the 
dead void announces that that tree, which but a few 
months before, had charmed us as much by its sweet 
odors as by its fecundity, will speedily be nothing more 
than a sterile trunk. 
Nevertheless, we are delighted to enjoy that soft shade 
which it still furnishes, though we cannot help con- 
templating its approaching decrepitude with a regret 
that is only softened by the remembrance of the past 
enjoyments imparted to us. 
Such is the type of woman. Although a constant 
state of change, from her birth to the close of life, it is 
hardly possible for us to trace it, but at some of 
the principal epochs of her career, equally remarkable 
by the various characteristics exhibited by each, as 
by the different impressions produced on us at such 
periods. 
Nothing is, in fact, more true than this gradual and 
imperceptible pi ogress of a woman, if one could only 
follow it from grade to grade, from the moment when we 
see her burst forth as a tender shoot, until that where- 
in time should have deprived her of all those graces 
which made her an ornament of the earth, and she 
should cease to exist. 
Her various lustres are no more than so many short 
solstices : and although, from one day to another, we 
cannot define any change in her, still she is never sta 
tionary, and nothing can be more just than the parallel 
of the enchanting phases through which she passes, in 
her gentle progression, with the different phenomena 
and modes of existence which time and the seasons pro- 
duce in a tree, from its first budding, its blossoms, its 
fruits, and its apparently permanent state ; its various 
shades, and successive tints of the leaves as compared 
with the shades and tints of a woman and between their fading, old age, and fall; nothing more exact 
than the tracing the different feelings one experience* 
not only when keeping the eyes constantly fixed on 
the tree, but viewing it also from interval to in- 
terval. 
Well, then, suppose this lovely tree henceforth to 
be undermined by the secret influence of some cause 
eminently destructive, this series of touching aspects 
that itf offered before, is speedily interrupted, and it 
now presents nothing beyond a thin and withered foli- 
age ; it languishes, becomes barren and perishes, 
after having saddened for some time, by its gloomy 
appearance, that ground which it ought to have em- 
bellished. 
Such, alas ' is the promised existence of the young 
girl who follows indiscreet habits and practices. Only 
let her east her eyes on the first of these pictures, and 
she will there in some measure find depicted the un- 
happy victim who has shortened her days and blighted 
the noble character she was destined to fill from the 
very moment she has yielded to solitary enjoyment. 
Thenceforth they are no longer the tints of the rose and 
the lily ; no longer the beauteous flower ; no more sea- 
sons, no more solstices, no more imperceptible grades 
from one stage of delight to another still more delight- 
ful; and, instead of fulfilling the number of years for 
which Nature destined her, she frequently will only 
graduate from one state of decay to another, more de- 
ciduous than that which preceded it, and from one fall 
to a deeper one ; for, as everything is continually 
changing, Nature has willed that there should be no 
exception in those imperceptible determinations which 
;he victims of solitary vice have exposed themselves 
o ; thus really inviting and anticipating old age, with 
.11 its melancholy attributes, which even with care 
tomes quite fast though, particularly with females. 
Knd thus, in fact, the unfortunate victims to this vice 
46 47 
do not, and have no right to, participate in the real en- 
joyments of life : being like that man who was ex- 
cluded from the royal marriage feast, because he was 
not clad in a wedding garment; that is to say, in the 
sense of holy writ, because he was not adorned with 
the virtues 
LETTER XH. 
Hitherto I have only acquainted you with the frtalTr. 
consequences of solitary habits from the reports of those 
celebrated men whose testimony I have set before you ; . 
I will now, therefore, subjoin some of the melancholy 
confessions of the victims themselves, who have been ' 
led into these dangerous errors. 
Before exhibiting them, however, I would wish to 
observe, that if unfortunately you should have occurred J 
the dangers to which these letters refer, by a continu > 
•nee in solitary practices, the only way to get out a. & them is by quickly showing sufficient strength of mind 
and wisdom to tear yourself from the indulgence of a 
, passion that is attended by such dreadful results. 
These letters themselves furnish some instances of a 
cure, though I must at the same time state that they 
; ire very few 
48 
A LETTER 
i FROM 'A VICTIM TO THE DEPLORABLE FAULT OF 
SOLITARY HABITS, TO DR. TISSOT, WHOSE 
ADVICE SHE IS SEEKING. 
"I had the misfortune, sir, Jn my earliest youth, I be- 
? lieve when between eight or ten years of age, to con- 
i tract a very pernicious habit, that soon undermined my 
health, which has been particularly bad for some years. 
I labor under most extraordinary dejection ; my nerves 
are very weak; my hands always in a state of tremor; 
and I am in a constant perspiration, with violent and 
frequent pains in the stomach, arms, legs, loins, and 
chest: with a perpetual cough. My eyes are dull and 
weak; my appetite ravenous ; but yet 1 continue to 
get thinner, and always look very ill." 
SECOND LETTER.-FROM ANOTHER VICTIM. 
When quite young I contracted a frightful habit that 49 
M8 destroyed my health. I am frequently overwhelm 
ed with confusion, and suffer from such swimming in 
the head, that I am under the perpetual fear of apo- 
plexy. My chest has become narrowed, and my breath- 
ing consequently difficult. I have frequent pains in the 
stomach, and suffer throughout my whole frame, daily 
becoming more anxious and enfeebled. My sleep dur- 
ing the night is agitated and disturbed; and I am quite 
unrefreshed by it. I have constant itchings; am very 
pale, with weak and painful eyes, yellow complexion, 
and bad breath." 
THIRD LETTER. 
" I cannot walk two hundred steps without resting 
so extreme is my weakness. I have continual pains 
in my body, particularly the shoulders, and suffer 
greatly from those in the chest. My appetite is good, 
but this is rather a misfortune, as I have dreaded pain* 
in the stomach after eating. If I read a page or two 
my eyes fill with tears, and create great suffering; and 
lam constantly sighing involuntarily." 
FOURTH LETTER. 
" Had I not been restrained by religion, I should 
jong ere this have terminated a life that has become 
burdensome, to me by my own fault. 
"In fact, it would be impossible to conceive a 
more hopeless state of existence, than that of which 
I am about to describe the last scenes; and the fear 50 
•f adding one crime to another, was no doubt the 
only feeling that constrained the person who was so 
cruelly punished from closing her mortal career thus 
early." 
It is still the celebrated Doctor Tissot who re- 
lates the fact, and I will leave him to speak for him- 
self. 
" The disease at first only showed itself in this 
young woman by slow and daily progress; but for 
many months antecedent to her death, she could not 
stand upon her legs, nor even bear the weight of her 
arms and hands: the disease of her tongue increased, 
and she so lost her voice that you could hardly hear 
her speak. The extensor muscles-those that support 
the head-allowed it constantly to droop on her chest. 
She was never without a pain in the loins; and ap- 
fietite and sleep both gradually left her ; and for the 
ast months of her life she had the greatest difficulty 
in swallowing at all. At about Christmas she was 
overtaken with oppression and intermittent fever, and 
her eyes sunk in, in a most singular manner. When 
I saw her, she wTas supported day and night in an arm 
chair, with her feet extended on another-though even 
then her head every moment wrould fall upon her bo- 
som ; and she never wTas without, some one close at 
hand to change her attitude, raise her head, feed her, 
give her snuff, and listen attentively to all her requests. 
The last days of her life she was reduced to speak 
letter by letter, which were written down as she uttered 
them." 
In order not to fatigue you too much with such 
afflicting discourse, I have never given you any of the 
letters from these unhappy patients at full length, 
but only such extracts as I wished to impress upon 
you. 
I will therefore as shortly as possible submit aal ex- 
tract or two from oth& letters addressed by the patient* 51 
themselves to their physicians, and published by 
Doctor Doussin Dubreuil, who in so doing was guided 
only by the best feelings. 
The first extract is that of a letter written to 
Doctor Doussin Dubreuil himself, and gives an instance 
where epilepsy was the result of the error of soli- 
tude. 
" When about twelve years of age, I was troubled 
with pains in the head, and the sensation of a weight 
upon the brain, for which I was bled, and kept on 
low diet without experiencing much relief, and soon 
after I was surprised by an attack of epilepsy, tc 
which I then became subject, having had a'very se- 
vere one recently. Indeed, Sir, I cannot doubt but 
that it is owing to an evil habit which I contracted 
when very young, that I am so nervous that I can 
hardly move, and the smallest object terrifies me, even 
the threats of a child not more than ten years of age 
quite unnerves me, and I am unable to apply myself 
to anything, as the ' least constraint' of mind brings on 
a fit. " 
The next extract furnishes an example of repeated 
nervous attack, with the falling down, and rigidity of 
the nerves of the patient. 
" The following is the description that has been 
given to me of my fits. I stamp violently on the floor 
and then fall, with my limbs stiffened, teeth clenched, 
and the end of my tongue thrust between the incisive 
teeth. My face and hands become livid, and no doubt 
Sir, my unfortunate fate is the result of those murder- 
ous self-indulgencies with which I frequently sought 
to gratify myself, as before that, I enjoyed an excellent 
state of health, which was evinced by the freshness of 
my complexion." 
The third shows the probability of a diseased peri* 
tardiutn, the membrane that encloses the heart. 52 
" i am very thin, but should nevertheless be in 
the enjoyment of good health, were it not for sundry 
pains I feel, one in particular, in the interior of the 
body, near the left shoulder, which I fear will cause 
my death, since it is in that part that surrounds the 
heart." 
The fourth extract gives an example of excessive 
pains : - 
" As I mentioned to you before, my morals were 
entirely pure, and my health seemed to be unaltera- 
ble, till I was fifteen years of age, and never can I 
reflect on the happiness I then enjoyed, without feel- 
ing the bitterest remorse. Had I but listened to the 
good counsel of another young girl whom I myself 
wished to corrupt, and who at once repulsed the pro- 
positions I made to her, I should never have fallen 
into the pitiable state I have been in for the last ten 
years. When lying full length on my bed or the 
sofa, the pains I experience in all my limbs makes 
me scream out in such a manner, as to set the per- 
sons about me shuddering, frequently involving the 
dear relatives who surround me in constant alarm, 
and no doubt my presence is fatiguing to them. J 
am 50 thin that you may count all my bones, in- 
deed I have scarcely the appearance of a human be- 
ing." 
fifth extract shows an affliction of the bowels 
and stomacn:- 
" My stomach is always grumbling as if the bowels 
were detaching themselves from each other. The 
principle disease is in the stomach, which as I told you 
before, will not digest anything." 
And the sixth extract is to the same effect, 
showing the probable nervous affection of the bow- 
els :- 
" At other times there is a numbness, and pains in 53 
the stomach, as if my bowels were all tightened up atU 
strongly compressed." 
The seventh extract is an example of internal heax 
and the feeling of insects gnawing :- 
" When in my dreams, I become involuntarily 
guilty, on awakening, I begin to feel an internal dis- 
ease, imparting the most horrid pains which increased 
more and more. As besides feeling a dreadful heat 
which appears to be consuming the spine of my back, 
my stomach and ribs have the sensation of being gnaw- 
ed by insects, and justly alarmed at so deplorable a 
condition, I think it my duty to acquaint my Doctor 
with it." 
And a little further on. hi the same letter, she 
says :- 
" My voice is hoarse, and I cough night and day, 
with a slight fever that is always increased on a repe- 
tition of my errors. I have moreover ague fits, and I 
can neither read, write, or walk, and my memory is 
entirely gone." 
Many other letters have been written to me on 
the same subject, that is, seeking immediate advice 
and assistance ; amid an immense number that have 
been written by the same person, I will only show 
you a few passages from three, the first and the last 
particularly, written at seven months' intervals, by 
which the duration, and the degree of resistance, of 
those diseases which spring from such causes niav he 
seen. 
Extract of a letter 2d December. 1816 
" This habit has reduced me to a most frightful 
condition, I have not the slightest hope of living for 
another year, and I am in constant alarm, as I see 
death approaching with rapid steps. I trust howev- 
er, to you for any prolongation of life I may obtain, as 
may be, the few healthy germs that are still left to ma 54 
will be revived by your skill, and my zeal in following 
your advice strictly." 
«••••••• 
" I have for a long time past been affected with 
a weakness, that has been constantly increasing. 
When I get up in the morning, I am for a short 
time exposed to a giddiness, and all the joints of 
my bones rattle just like the shaking of a skeleton, and 
occasionally on getting out of bed my nose bleeds, andl 
am seized with a spitting of blood, and this notwith- 
standing every care and caution ; the blood on such oc- 
casions being sometimes free and sometimes clotted; 
and this is followed by such nervous attacks, that lean 
scarcely move my arms, and then my limbs become as 
(it were numbed, accompanied by pains of the heart; 
the quantity of blood which I discharge, as I have 
mentioned, has latterly increased. My limbs are 
small, and I am neither fat nor tall. I derive but little 
nourishment from what I take, and frequently feel a 
sharp pricking pain at the pit of my stomach, and be- 
tween my shoulders, which creates great difficulty in 
breathing. For three months past I have suffered a 
constant agitation in my limbs which seems to be pro- 
duced by the circulation of the blood. Going up only 
a few stairs, or walking the shortest distance is follow- 
ed by great fatigue, and I am troubled with shivering 
fits, especially in the morning." 
Extract of a further Letter from the same Patient, 
in the following February :- 
"I am now in my twenty-first year, and dread 
he effects of spring ; my skin, however, is not so 
parched and heated as heretofore. My arms are 
very thin, and my veins almost imperceptible, they 55 
■eem no longer to have any blood in them. Not- 
withstanding all my care I fear I neve': shall recover 
• healthy constitution, or get any flesh upon my 
bpnes. 
" It appears to me that for some time past I have be- 
come bent and stooping, and I suffer from constant 
perspirations at the back. 
" My blood is still strangely agitated, and whether 
lying down or standing, the circulation of it and my 
pulse create constant excitement, particularly about my 
limbs and head, and when I lean down at all, I am im- 
mediately troubled with deafness. I have also a slight 
cough, but I think very little of that." 
This young girl deceived herself, that which she 
mistook for a mere cough, was the commencement of 
an affection of the chest, and organs of the voice, which 
so seldom fail being injured, particularly with young 
girls who have fallen into those fatal habits which re- 
duced this lady to the deplorable condition she so strik- 
ingly and energetically has depicted. 
She had previously acquainted me that her 
stomach had discharged, for some time, small con- 
cretions, similar to crumbs of bread, that were of 
exceedingly bad odor. These came very probably 
from the chest, and are sometimes the forerunners of 
consumption. 
Fearing that her letters might miscarry, and that 
it would thereby become known, that she was cor- 
responding with me, (a fear that is always carried to a 
great extent, especially in such complaints) this young 
girl always resorted to some artifice in writing to me, 
that she might not be known to any one but myself. 
Sometimes she did not limit herself to writing anony 
mously, but sometimes wrote as from an anonymous 
person. 
A.nd it was in this manner tint she last wrote to aso 56 
It «lvice. An innocent artifice which eloquently 
at tpenly condemns the vice, and is the best eulogi- 
nm if good morals. 
\ irtue neithet seeks to show nor to conceal herself. 
But to act as the person in question has done, is a plain 
proof that she does not despise virtue, and at the same 
time exhibits a sorrow that she ever forsook hex 
paths. 
Letter of the 26th of July of the same year : 
" Sir : Since last writing to you, some little change 
for the better has taken place with regard to Mad- 
amoiselle , whom you have been attending. I 
saw her a few days ago, and she requested me to ac- 
quaint you that she had regained some strength, by 
carefully attending to your advice. She is still 
however troubled with bleedings at the nose, though 
she has only had two slight irritations of the descrip- 
tions she spoke of, within the last fourteen weeks, 
which disappeared without having recourse to medicine. 
She does not complain so much of fatigue now, though 
her shivering fits and loss of blood by the nose, contin- 
ue almost the same, and she has some apprehensions 
that she will never be entirely free from them. Sho 
tells me, that her lips when she gets up in the morning 
are very white, and that sundry red spots are percepti- 
ble in her eyes, which sometimes speedily disappear, 
while at others, they last the whole day, that she 
generally looks very ill, and is also very hoarse ; also, 
that whenever she eats fruit, she has unpleasant 
twitches in the stomach, that impede her freely breath- 
ing. The spots in her eyes annoy and disturb her very 
much." 
The shivering and agitation of which this person 
makes frequent complaint, and which she seems to at- 
tribute to the circulation of her blood, are merely 
symptomatic of a nervous irritation, and the extreme 57 
weakness of the nerves. Her bleeding n the nose and 
spitting of blood, notwithstanding its diminution, and 
some other symptoms, though betokening the return of 
strength, and the red spots in the eyes, may yet have 
some remote tendency to a scorbutic complaint: and 
as this complaint exists in her family, it has no doubt 
oeen developed in her by her unhappy secret prooensi 
ties 
LETTER XIII. 
In the preceding letters, I have cited a comparison 
that two physicians have made between a female and 
a young tree in blossom, and you may have remarked 
how much truth and judgment there is shown in this 
approximation. But there is one point (without now 
referring to many others) that singularly elevates one 
of these trees above the other. It is that of thinking, 
at one time with dignity, at another with delicacy. 
That fatal passion which strikes so deeply at health, 
as well as beauty, does it even respect understanding 
and wisdom ? The answer has been already given in 
the course of these letters, both by skilful doctors and 
nnhappy victims. But we will again for a moment 
listen to them. 58 
" If I again ask observing physicians what is ths 
most dishonoring result of solitary vice," observes the 
first, Dr. Danipe, " to a being born for the proper use 
of the mental faculties, it is the rapid and entire de- 
struction of all the mental powers. Even those young 
persons in whom all the love for mental occupations if 
not extinct, have not the power to reflect or to fix their 
attention on any one object. Their memory which at 
such an age is generally so tenacious, is so weakened 
that they can no longer remember what they have read 
or heard; their imagination is so disordered, that whether 
walking or sleeping, it is occupied with nothing but 
impure thoughts-every feeling of good and beautiful 
in Nature which produces for us so many moments c< 
enjoyment is effaced from their hearts. No longer is 
any impression made upon them, either by the sight of 
a beautitul landscape or the appearance of a beautiful 
summer's night, nor of the rising sun. The knowl- 
edge of their own incapacity for all useful occupations 
drives them more and more from society ; perhaps they 
may even fear that their crime may be read branded on 
their brows." 
This physician is here but the faithful interpreter of 
the truth ; and one day the following was part of a 
letter written to him : " The powers of my mind, 
among other failings, have suffervd a decline which I 
cannot conceal from myself, my imagination was live- 
ly-it is now nearly nothing ; my memory was good- 
I have no longer any."* 
" The unfortunate victims of this habit," says 
another observer, Dr. Vogel, "insensibly lose all 
moral faculties, they possess; they acquire a besotted, 
drinking, embarrassed, melancholy, and stupid look; 
they become idle, inimical to and incapable of all in- 
tellectual effort; all presence of mind is lost; they am 
* Letter quoted by Dr. Doussin Dubreuil. 59 
put out of countenance, uneasy, troubled the moment 
they enter into society ; they are unprepared and at a 
loss if compelled to speak even to a child. Their 
enfeebled mind gives way under the slightest exertipff* 
their memory daily growing worse, they cannot >rfider- 
stand the commonest things nor oorrecuihe Simplest 
ideas ; the most sublime talents and the 
ers are soon destroyed. All formerly accpfired knowl- 
edge, the meet perfect understanding, no longer 
produce any fruit; vivacity, pride, all the faculties 
of the soul by which they were formerly distinguish- 
ed, abandon them and leave no other feeling for 
them but scorn ; the power of imagination has ta- 
ken its flight-there is no longer any pleasure for 
them; but on the contrary, all that is miserable 
and distressing appears congenial to their feelings; 
unhappiness, fear, terror, which are the only pas- 
sions, banish every agreeable sensation from their 
minds; the last crisis of melancholy and the most 
fearful suggestions of despair ordinarily precede 
their death, or else they sink into a complete apathy, 
and fallen below the animals possessing the least in 
stinct, they retain nothing of their species but its form, 
it sometimes occurs that the most perfect idiotev or 
madness first manifest themselves." 
A letter, among many others, written on this subject 
to the celebrated physician of Lausanne; fully proves 
the exactness of this fresh evidence 
The following passage occurs in it; 
" My mental energy is considerably weakened ; the 
ardor of my imagination nearly destroyed ; the love of 
life much less strong : all that occurs now appears like 
a dream to me ; I have more difficulty in thinking, and 
lees power of mind." 
These pictures are not exaggerated either on the 60 
part of the physician or the invalid. The brain being 
the organ-or if the expression be preferred-the 
sanctuary of thought we can easily conceive that the 
destruction of intellect might result from vicious hab- 
its ; either the irritated nerves first transmit their irri- 
tation to the brain, and it changes with them ; or, the 
stomach, weakened or depraved by this madness, no 
longer maintains the brain in an healthy state. In 
either case, how can it be expected that those functions 
should not be disturbed ? 
We may perceive to a certainty by the enumera- 
tion of the causes of all kinds of mental alienation, 
by which Professor Pinel, chief physician of a 
hospital which contains 1800 mad people, commen- 
ces the history of each of these maladies: that one 
of the most common causes is an attachment to vicicts 
habits. 
Lewis, an English physician, in describing the ef- 
fect of the same crime on the moral faculties, expresses 
thus : 
" The urinal is effected by all the ills of the body, 
but particularly of those which spring from this cause 
The deepest melancholy, aversion for all pleasures, 
incapability of taking part in any subject of conversa- 
tion ; a feeling of their own misery, and the despair 
felt from knowing that they have brought it on them 
selves; the necessity of renouncing the happiness ol 
marriage-are he wretched thoughts which compel 
these unfortunate men to separate themselves from 
the world, and to seek, too often, an end for their mis- 
ery in suicide." 
" I do not think that any human being was ever 
■fflicted with so many evils as I am," writes a person 
'abituated to this crime, to Tissot; " without a special 
help from Providence, I shall have great difficulty in 
Searing so heavy a load." 
If nothing so soon takes from life its enchantment *» Immorality, the observation is partit ularly true when 
that immorality is secret. Tender feelings, glorious 
hopes, sweet illusions, from which youth somdimet 
borrows its name, so often its happiness (youth is fre- 
quently the age of illusions); voluptuous admiration 
of the universe ; delightful imagination ; mysterious 
and affecting return of the seasons; shadows and si- 
lence of the woods, so fitted for the perusal of the 
words of wisdom; sweet and innocent satisfaction of 
our self-esteem, in daily acquiring something new and 
something excellent-all disappear, all vanish. But 
should we be astonished? The foreseeing author of na- 
ture appears to have given to the human race, to watch 
over its happiness, two amiable divinities-Imagination 
and Hope. 
To one has been entrusted the duty of painting-at 
leant, at times,-in brilliant colors, the dark landscapes; 
the other of the various horizons of our life : and yet 
nothing so completely destroys all imagination and 
hope as the secret breach of chastity. 
How can a body, overwhelmed with infirmities, and 
everywhere failing, contain a vigorous and contented 
mind? And what, I ask, is life, when there is noth- 
ing that can delight, neither the language of poetry, 
the pleasures of flowers; hope, which to others is an 
enjoyment at once consoling and sustaining,-what 
is life in such a case!-An agony in the middle of 
« desert. 
Woman, more sensitive than robust, whose con 
stitution renders her bodily organs more active than 
strong, whose mind is rather characterized by quick 
penetration and delicacy of tact, than by firmness- 
woman appears precisely organised to experience 
with the greatest facility, those deep depressions of 
•oul, beyond which there only exist despair, or entire 
destruction of the intellectual faculties 
61 62 
True it is, that if by the nature of their organization, 
the saddening passions produce great impressions on 
woman ; on the other hand, they are less durable, 
but when this solitary crime is the cause of such 
passions with them, this cause will continue to pro- 
duce the same effects, whether moral or physical; 
the imprudent individuals who abandon themselves to 
it will meet with no diminution, and much less will 
they escape entirely from their miseries by that partic- 
ular flexibility of their constitution. No other support 
is left them but their natural weakness and delicacy, 
and medical statistics show a far greater number of 
women than men, affected with mental diseases. 
LETTER XIV. 
If it can be said with some degree of justice of 
a female who once enjoyed health, beauty and all 
the graces which can enchance them, and who has 
been actually deprived of them-that she has sur- 
vived herself-how shall we give expression to the 
•tate of that person, who not only has lost these first 
named advantages, but, in addition, all her mentai facn.ties ; who is utterly different to all that she wu 
before, and who possesses no moral existence. Tha 
chief mode of existence-that is to say, physical exis 
tence-being no longer the same, that which princi- 
pally constitutes moral existence-the feeling or 
reasoning perception of self-no longer remaining, we 
cannot even say that she survives, and yet she has not 
ceased to exist. 
The following are some further examples of tha 
power of the unhappy passion we are discussing : they 
are the proofs of the truth of what was contained in the 
last letter. 
" Secret habits had produced such disorder in the 
reason of Mademoiselle , twenty- two years of 
age, and of great personal attractions,-that she was 
compelled to be placed in an asylum. She had been there 
for some time when Doctor Bienville, who had pre- 
viously been on terms of intimacy with the family of 
the young lady, but who had been absent for some 
time, returned to his native place. He went to pay a 
visit to the family, but not perceiving Mademois- 
elle , he asked to be allowed to pay his respects 
to her. The unhappy father replied that he could 
see that he was ignorant of the extent of his affliction, 
for he had also lost his wife. But as he soon found 
that the doctor, his old friend, imagined that his daugh- 
ter was also dead, he told him that she still existed, 
and added that she had lived too long, being in such 
a state as not to be thought of without a shudder. The 
physician broke off this sad interview. He called on 
an individual, through whom he knew he could obtain 
information of the cause of his friend's sufferings. He 
at once conjectured, from all that was communicated 
to him, that the state of Mademoiselle was the 
result of solitary crime, carried on to the greatest ex- 
treme. He understood that the t fro servants of the 
bonse were not always strong enough, or perhap* 
63 64 
•efficiently vigilant to restrain her ; that soraetimes she 
escaped and fled, and even at times gave rise to fears 
that she had plunged into one of the many ponds of that 
country. 
Deeply affected by all that had been told him, Dr. 
Bienville begged Mr. not to despair of the cure 
of his daughter. 
The asylum in which she had been placed was a 
convent of Tours; there she was treated in a most 
brutal manner ; he proposed that' she should be re- 
moved. 
As the delirium of the young girl was accompanied 
by an excessive fury, during which she bit and tore 
with her nails whoever approached her, the superior 
of the convent asserted that she could not be removed, 
unless she was chained in a vehicle which was capable 
of being completely closed. The physician replied 
that he had thought of evetything, and that he would 
ot suffer her to be chained. He sent for a convenient 
carriage; administered a soothing drink to her; had 
her clothes taken off, and caused her to be wrapped up 
m a strong and large linen bandage, fixing her arms to 
her sides. 
The unfortunate girl exhibited all the signs of the 
most frightful fury : her shrieks and the grinding of 
her teeth were only interrupted by the attempts she 
made to bite her keepers; but at length they got hei 
away. 
Tie doctor meditated over and prescribed for het 
case with the greatest solicitude, taking care that all 
his views, whether of medicine or health were carried 
Vito effect. He watched over, and himself saw them 
carried into execution, for some months. He com- 
menced this treatment on the 12th of May. On the 
sixth of the following August he observed some amend 
ment in the state of his patient. He noticed a greatei 
degree of tranquility in her; that her insane w ander 65 
mgs were less frequent; she did not so often reject thb 
medicines prescribed for her , a sense of decency re- 
sumed its empire over her odious passion. 
Dr. Bienville had hitherto constantly opposed the 
desire entertained by her father to see her. Up to 
this time she had only seen her keepers and her physi- 
cian. For some days, when her father was mentioned 
to her, she appeared to fall into a profound reverie, just 
as any rational person would have done. Dr. Bienville 
concluded from this that the remembrance of her father 
was beginning again to be the subject of her thoughts, 
Jiat consequently the different organs of her brain were 
resuming their natural tone and functions; and so, 
on the last day of August, that is to say, about 
four months after the commencement of the treat- 
ment, he introduced Mr. - into the apartment of 
his daughter. 
It was agreed that he should not give way to any 
symptoms of tenderness which might excite him to 
tears, in order not to communicate to the patient im- 
pressions too strong and dangerous in the state of 
weakness in which the mental faculties yet were. 
With the same view, he had announced to Mademois- 
elle the intended visit of her father. She had 
made no farther reply to this announcement than to 
anything else which had been said to her since she had 
been deprived of her reason. 
This interview, then, so long desired by her unhap- 
py father, and whose result was expected with so much 
interest by all who were in the secret; this interview, 
so long expected, at length took place. But paternal 
love had not yet suffered enough. The perseverance 
of the physician was not crowned with its reward. 
Mademoiselle gazed fixedly on her father, ut- 
tered a sigh, and then turned away, as if to avoid an 
object which give her annoyance The physician did not expect sj quiet an interview : he persuaded her 
father not to prolong it: he even advised him only to 
pay her rare and short visits, and to do nothing on hie 
part which might fatigue her. Nevertheless, from thia 
moment he himself conversed with her daily, not only 
of her father, but of the country where she lived, of her 
walks, her old friends, in fact, of everything he thought 
likely to restore her memory. 
She continued obstinately silent, not only to him, but 
to her father, whom she always regarded with the same 
astonishment. This continued silence rendered the 
doctor much more uneasy, for the reason that her gen- 
eral health was gradually being re-established, that an 
ulcer which had made its appearance on the uterus 
appeared cicatrised, and that all the excoriations had 
entirely disappeared. 
Mademoiselle was quiet with her keepers- 
She took, with the greatest docility, the medicines 
w'hich were given to her, and for three w'eeks there 
had been no occasion for the restraint of which we have 
spoken. 
At length, on the 22nd of October, one of the keep- 
ers went to the doctor, requesting him to see her as 
soon as possible, telling him that Mademoiselle had 
slept all the night; that she had just w'oke ; that, hav- 
ing looked at her and her companion attentively, she 
had asked who they were, and where she was ; that 
she had replied, that Mademoiselle was with a friend 
of her father's, and that they had been kept near her 
by the advice of a doctor, to help her in her ill- 
ness. 
Dr. Bienville ran to her apartment. She received 
him with a cold and languid air which she had always 
exhibited, even during the amelioration of her health. 
She entreated him at once to send for her father to 
fetch her away, as she no longer desired to be trouble- 
66 67 
gome to him. Mr. immediately repaired to hit 
friends house. 
His daughter received him in the same way that she 
had always done the doctor; she received his embraces 
with very little emotion, saying to him : " I have just 
waked from a very long and very fatiguing dream 
This dream must have caused me to commit much fol- 
ly, since you were forced to send me from you. If I 
have yet any claim on your love, I beg that you will 
this day remove me home, there to enjoy all the com 
forts you have ever conferred upon me. 
I request, also, that your house will be closed against 
every one, except this gentleman" (pointing to the 
physician to whom she owed her life and the restoration 
of her health) " and Mademoiselle Beaudeduit, whom 
I beg you to send for. The services of this woman" 
(pointing to her attendant) " will be very acceptable 
to me : she is the only one who has not troubled my 
imagination during my dream." 
It would be difficult to express the replies and the 
delight of the fond father, continues Dr. Bienville; 
" he consented to all she asked, and I was cautious not 
to oppose her."-Treatise on Nymphomania. 
Dr. Doussin Dubreuil states in the letters already 
quoted, that he went to see, in an establishment situa- 
ted near Paris, a female seventeen or eighteen years 
old, whom solitary habits (to which the attendants 
could not tell him how long she had been addicted), 
had rendered so stupid, that she had lost all recollec- 
tion of her father, who could not get her to recognize 
him, notwithstanding all his efforts. 
This deplorable situation, which had already cost 
her parents so many tears, did not prevent her from 
taking her meals, and she eat voraciously, as is gener- 
ally the case with the victims of this habit. 
In the same coLection of letteus, is the repcrt o ftS 
toother physician, Dr. Vogel, couched in the folic wing 
words: 
" There is, to my knowledge, in a certain town, 
in unmarried female, twenty-three years of age, 
whom this solitary vice at first rendered raving mad, 
but who some time past has sunk into a state of the 
most absolute imbecility. She never utters a single 
word. She allows herself to be treated as though she 
were lifeless. She closes her eyes the moment she 
sees any one. During the greater part of the day her 
head is sunk forward, and she constantly retains this 
attitude, when seated on a chair." 
I will here make a passing remark, for I am de- 
sirous to hurry over these afflicting cases, that this 
tendency of the head to fall forward and to roll 
about through the weakness of the muscles and 
ligaments about the neck on to the chest, right or 
left, or forward, is one of the results, and the most 
frequent sign, of that solitary weakness carried to a 
certain extent. 
Lastly, I myself have observed this third example. 
An unhappy mother, whose child w'as suffering at 
owe and the same time from mental alienation and 
solitary habits, begged me some months since to call 
and see what she told me was the object of her greatest 
grief; she was not aware which of these two maladies 
had preceded the other, or else she would not tell me 
notwithstanding the great desire and the reasons I ex- 
pressed to know. 
It was a winter's evening; very dark and cold. 
She conducted me to the window of a little room 
which looked out into a garden. " See if I am not 
to be pitied," said she, softly opening one of the 
■hutters. I observed a female, about thirty years 
old, seated near a table with a lamp on it; her 
neck and breast uncovered, her hands mechanically 69 
mipported on her thighs ; her feet naked, her hair hi 
disorder, her features wild, her complexion sallow 
her shoulders and all her extremities starting convul- 
sively beneath her dress ; and, lastly, to complete all 
the horror of this picture, she sat in a state of marble 
like immobility. 
" The sight frightens me," added, in a low tone, 
and with great emotion, the tender mother, at the 
same time gently closing the shutter. This did 
not astonish me ; she was a mother, and the spec- 
tral appearance of this wretched creature, whom wo 
had just seen in the obscure light of the lamp, 
which appeared indifferent to her-the silence which 
reigned around her-were well calculated to create 
alarm. 
We entered ; I approached her-I spoke to her, but 
I could obtain no satisfactory answer, She never made 
any other reply than by the monosyllable " yes," to 
whatever question was put to her; never changed her 
position, whatever invitation or entreaty was made. 
When it was necessary for her to retire to rest, they 
were obliged to use force; and it was the same wher 
they wished her to rise. She remained in this state 
iiany years; frequently, particularly at night, she ut- 
tered loud and frightful shrieks, which I frequently 
heard, and which were in all respects similar to what 
would be uttered by a perse n violently seized by the 
throat. LETTER XV 
The histories (well authenticated) of the unfortunate 
beings, which I have just communicated to you, must 
have sufficiently proved to you the deplorable influence 
of a fault than which nothing is more fatal and terrible 
in its influence over the mental faculties. What lovely 
verses, what interesting stories, are due to you to re- 
pay you for the fatigue that letter caused you-for the 
sadness with which it naturally filled you. And here, 
doubtless, it behoves me to mingle with my advice the 
flowers of which I have already spoken to you. I will 
endeavor to make you amends by dwelling on the 
mental beauty with which your sex is endowed 
when no evil influence prevails. Traits of an 
agreeable nature cannot fail to present themselves in 
crowds. 
What delicacy! what elegance! what attractive 
influence, in fact, does the mind of woman present! 
It appears to me to be, in reference to talent and gen 
ius, what grace is to the health, and beauty to the 
body. If the grace of the body imparts to it in the 
highest degree the power of pleasing, the mind of wo- 
man embellishes all it touches-throws over it a charm 
of delicacy and ease which is ever seductive. It is 
concerning that grace which characterises her, and 
which the least change may wither or destroy, that the 
French Zeuxis has said : 
" Nothing so fleeting as these delicate tints : 
Yet we delight to seize such transient forms." 
The natural weakness of our whole being-the facility 
with which our senses are blunted under the constant 71 
impression of objects, induces me, more or less quickly, 
to see almost with indifference a lovely woman or a 
pretty face. Features, and a complexion which at 
first struck us remarkably, soon possess nothing extra- 
ordinary or attractive to us. They please us; they 
are still in harmony with our souls ; but there ends all 
their power. 
At the end of a certain time they no longer cause 
either that surprise-that agreeable emotion, nor that 
delicious agitation with which they filled us the first 
time we saw them. The mind, on the contrary, is an 
attraction which increases in power, and which never 
ceases to please. 
That author formed a just appreciation of the power 
of beauty who remarked, "that it resembled odors, 
to which, when accustomed, we no longer smelt 
them." 
An old writer very wisely said, that it was a short- 
lived tyranny ; but when in a female it was united 'o 
wit and an amiable character, this tyranny, otherwise 
so transient, was soon changed into a long and mild 
empire. It is only under such auspices, and under 
such an empire, that constancy is to be found. More 
than beauty is needed for a woman to be spoken of as 
Titus spoke of Berenice: 
" For five whole years have I jean her each day ( 
Yet each day do I believe I see her for the first lime." 
The female who is only beautiful, soon ends as every 
other indifferent object does, by only striking the eye. 
The woman, on the other hand, who is gifted with 
mind and virtue, is one to please for ever. If she is 
beautiful, her mind adds to her beauty; if she be not 
lovely, it supplies its place. 
How could it be otherwise than certain to please for 
* long time? fir then we love in her what is most dura- 72 
He, and what is leant likely to inspire satiety. It was 
this privilege by which the Tenaiers, the Lafayettes, 
<Jhe Sevignes, La Sablieres, Gooffrius, Dutriven, and 
many other celebrated women, arrived at an advanced 
age without having, if we may so express ourselves, 
grown old, nor ceased to be the sovereigns of the most 
brilliant and aristocratic circles of their day. Such 
merit, acquired and preserved, forms, as has been re- 
marked with as much truth as wit, a charm which is 
not exposed to wither as the lilies and the roses, and 
which prolongs the reign of a pretty woman till the 
autumn of her days. 
Alas ! how different, how sadly different is the life of 
the female secretly consumed by the most fatal of the 
passions. 
She reigns too ; but it is only in the most distressing 
solitude. She may be beautiful, witty, amiable, loved; 
but she most assuredly will not be so long. We may 
also say of her, that she never grows old ; but here we 
use the word in its literal sense ; for she either dies in 
the flower of her age, or else she arrives at old age 
without ever having been young. 
But I return to the intelligent powers with which 
nature has so richly gifted your sex. Indeed, there 
may be named a very great number of women who have 
possessed them to a very high degree. 
History presents us with recitals of the greatest for- 
tunes, and even the most powerful thrones, having been 
gained by the genius of women whose comparatively 
low origin and complete indigence would appear to 
have completely precluded them the chance of such a 
dignity. 
Thus, although beautiful, Catherine the 1st. owet 
more to her superior genius than to her charms, the ti- 
tle of wife to the Czar Peter and the vast empire to 
which she succeeded. The glory of her roign i» well 
known. 73 
Francoise d'Aubigne, widow of the poet Scar* 
ton, afterwaids Duchess of Maintenon, inspired so pro- 
found an esteem in the heart of Louis 14th, and ao 
reigned over him that after having secretly considered 
her brow worthy of the diadem, she, considering such 
tn honor beneath her if it was not publicly conferred, 
demanded and obtained a promise from the monarch 
that he would publicly announce his marriage with 
her.* 
Fenelon in fact said of her that it was wisdom ex- 
pressing herself by the mouth of the graces. 
It has often occurred in circumstances of the greatest 
importance, when success depended on address and 
finesse that women have been selected in preference to 
men of known skill. 
According to Voltaire, Augustus King of Poland, 
finding his crown tottering equally from the victories 
of Charles the 12th of Sweden, and the ill-will of the 
senate towards him, preferring rather to receive the 
harsh commands of his conqueror than of his subjects, 
determined to solicit truce from the king of Sweden, 
and wished to sign a secret treaty with him. It wag 
necessary to conceal this step from the senate, whom 
he regarded as a more intractable enemy. 
The affair was a delicate one; he therefore reliou 
upon the Countess of Konigsmark, a Swedish lady 
• " Louie, finding that he could not combat with her-says M. da 
flagur, on tha merit, character, and condition of women-fi ll the need 
of summoning to his aid two men of genius, Bossuet anl Fenelon. 
Hare we see this powerful king full of nobleness, resisting all Europe 
unable to resist a woman. We find so much glory and majesty uni- 
ted to eu much weakness; we see lastly intimidated glory seeking 
refuge with eloquence and virtue to preserve himself from the empire 
of beauty." 
I would remark here as connected with this last expression, beau- 
ty, that the triumph ofMadame de Maintenon was rather due to het 
('anius and the high esteem with which she had inspired Louie the 
4th, than to her beauty, since at that time she was more than fifty 
years old of high birth, to whom he was at that time at- 
tached. " 
In the 13 th century, the daughter of a Bologneoe 
gentleman gave herself up entirely to the study of the 
Latin language, and of law. At the age of twenty- 
three, she pronounced in the grand church of Bologna 
a funeral oration in Latin. At twenty-six she public- 
ly read the Institutes of Justinian. At thirty she ob- 
tained a chair from which she taught the law to a audi- 
ence from all nations, and her eloquence caused not 
only her sex, but even her beauty to be forgotten, and 
for nearly four consecutive centuries, at Bologna wo- 
men were mistresses of the learned languages and pro- 
fessors of the highest sciences. 
At Verona one Nogaralla, in the 15th century made 
for herself so great a reputation by her eloquence, 
that kings and celebrated men desired to see and hear 
her. 
Jane Grey, whom a cruel queen caused to be mur- 
dered on the scaffold, at seventeen read in Greek be- 
fore going to death, the sublime dialogue of Plato on 
immortality. 
Mary Stuart wrote and spoke six languages, com- 
posed very fair verses in our own, and while very 
Jroung, pronounced at the French court, which shecal- 
ed her second country, a Latin discourse, in which she 
proved that the study of literature was equally proper 
for women as for men. 
The virtues of Margaret Moore,* the eldest daugh- 
ter of the famous English chancellor, Sir Thomas 
Moore, alone raised her above her cotemporaries. Her 
father was beheaded under Henry the 8th, in 1535* 
74 
• This magnanimous heroine of filial piety had caused it to ba 
transported in a leaden box, to Canterbury, to the tombs of the Ropot 
family, (the family other husband), the head of her father, and dr 
•toad that at her death it should be placed between her arms. 75 
After having by great address succeeded in paying Mm 
in prison the most' affectionate attention ; having pur- 
chased, at a high price, the right to render him funeral 
honors; after having been reduced to obtain at the 
price of gold, the sacred head of her parent from the 
hands of the executioner, she was herself accused and 
dragged in chains to prison for two crimes (it is thus 
that the wicked designate good actions); the one for 
having preserved as a sacred relic that head so dear to 
her-the head of her father, the other for having pre- 
served his books and manuscripts. 
She appeared before her judges with the intrepidity 
of a great mind, justified herself with all that eloquence 
inspired by unfortunate virtue; she commanded the 
admiration and the respect of all, and trampling over 
her barbarous accusers, wore out the rest of her life in 
solitude, grief and study. 
The brow which was bound with the first coronet 
granted by the French Academy, was that of a wo- 
man, Mademoiselle de Scuderi, who has the honor of 
having obtained the first prize of Eloquence which this 
learned society delivered. 
Madame Dacier has acquired for herself a species of 
immortality by her numerous translations of the an- 
cients, Homer, Terence, and others ; and which for a 
long time were the best we had; as well as by other 
literary works. 
She was honored by receiving the praises of Bayle, 
La Motte, Voltaire, and a g.eat number of other cele- 
brated writers. 
Taneguy, her father, a very erudite man, used to 
give lessons to his son in tne same apartment in which 
she when twelve years of age, was engaged in em- 
broidery. 
She listened attentively, but in silence, and thus pro- 
fited by these lessons without its being suspected; one 
day when her brother made a false reply, she told him 76 
tn a low tone what he ought to have said. Their fa 
ther heard with as much surprise as joy, and from thia 
moment he divided his attentions equally between hit 
son and daughter. 
The Duke of Montansier placed on the list of the 
commentators on the ancient authors, w hich w'ere se- 
lected for the education of the dauphin, Madame Da- 
cier, who took precedence of all who were charged with 
this laborious task.* 
I myself, owe to a celebrated woman, Madame 
de Genlis, from one of her numerous works, the 
knowledge of some of those particulars w hich I have 
related. 
But who could tell all concerning the mental pow- 
ers, and the literary merit of women in a letter, 
even though it were a long one. I will not under- 
take it, and I demand permission to devote at least anoth- 
er to what I had proposed to say on this interesting 
subject. 
• F!oru« appeared in 16S*. Aurelius Victor, in 1681. Eutropius 
in 1683, and another work in 1684. "Thus," says Bayle, " was our 
MX completely conquered by this clever woman, since durinf a Unas 
in which several men did nut produce a single author, Madams 'Aar 
tier published four. LETTER XVI 
1 havx already told you, in speaking of some of the 
qualities of your sex, that it was one of the intention! 
of nature in creating them to impart to them in a high 
degree the art of pleasing. 
What did nature really intend in creating woman ? 
Two things, principally:-that they should be amiable 
beings and tender mothers; that they should be amia- 
ble beings in order to attract the regards and aflections 
of their husbands ; that they should be good mothers in 
order that both should survive in their children. We 
can well imagine that the woman who is not amiable is 
not natural but artificial. 
Women, indeed, have been richly endowed by na- 
ture, and whoever culls from the world of letters as well 
as from society generally, all the productions and chief 
discourses of women will have culled from it all that 
is really most delicate and elegant, leaving only the 
heavier portion behind. 
It is needless for me to add that I do not comprehend 
in this assertion the writings of a very small number 
of privileged hands-such as those, of some ancient, 
and some modern poets; of Voltaire, of La Fontaine, 
Gresset, Delille, as well as the witty flights which 
sometimes proceed from the mouths of some men. 
And what has produced these flowers if not nearly 
always the inspiration of women. 
Madame de Caylus wrote some memoirs which were 
w admired when they appeared for the first time that 
all the wits of the day seemed to strive whicn should 
bestow op the most ui«d and most flattarlaq nraiaes 
The Marquis Lt Fare wrote, *n tne tribute he paid her 78 
9n this work, that to console him for his old age th* 
youthful master of the universe had said to him 
'IComplain no more, 
I promise thee a glance from Cajlus." 
Who knows not the elegant poetry, often verging on 
the domains of philosophy of Madame Deshouliers ? 
her rivulets, her flowers, her tender sheep 1 
" Without wisdom, without science, 
Happier and wiser than we." 
1. would be easy, besides the name of this illustrious 
lady and her daughter, to name a host of females who 
all recal to mind the most delightful and most elegant 
productions, not only in one class of literature but in 
all, almost without exception. 
That of Madame de Sevigne will scarcely give me 
time to write it ere the thousands on thousands of lively 
and attractive narratives in her inimitable letters will 
present themselves to your mind. 
That of Madame de Graffigny will also recal to youi 
mind all the delicacy of sentiment of the Peruvian let 
ters which you have perhaps read. Biographies, per 
feet memoirs, novels, delicious romances, are im- 
mediately brought before me by the names of Mont- 
pensier, Nemours, Stael, La Fayette, Givri, Flahaut, 
Riccoboni, Genlis, and many other celebrated wo- 
men. 
Lastly, poetry will dictate to sensibility and the 
graces, to engrave for ever in their annals the names 
of Mesdames Dubocago, Beauharnais, Verdier, Bour- 
die, Montauclos, Geoffray. But vainly wou.d I allow 
myself to be led away by the charm of the recollections 
which all these names successively and mutually 
awake ; in vain would I name and praise all those 
who deserve it; I could not do it, and my intention 79 
In this place ia not to write a literary history of 
women. 
They have sometimes been accused of want of judg- 
ment ; I think it would be more correct to accuse them 
of weakness and faithlessness in their determinations, 
and not of inability to recognise the connection of ob- 
jects with each other. It would not be difficult to name 
a great number of females who have shown that they 
have possessed this faculty in as great a degree as wit. 
They generally have great taste, and is not this very 
quality the effect of exquisite judgmen , may it not be 
regarded as the greatest embellishment. Aspapsia, a 
celebrated Grecian, flattered herself that Socrates, De- 
mosthenes, and Pericles, all men of the most transcen 
dant genius had brought to perfection, while with her. 
the beauty of their discourses. 
Did not our immortal fabulist, La Fontaine, so full 
of instinct, of good sense, and even of wit, regard to 
your sex this testimony of judgment and good taste in 
the following verses, addressed to Madame de Mon- 
tespan in dedicating to her one of his charming 
apologies:- 
"Ha who the pool's ways would gain, 
Must first secure your praise; 
Oh let this verse a smile obtain ; 
For there's no beauty in our lays 
But you do know and judge it well." 
And La Fontaine has proved both by his writings and 
by his conduct that he was no flatterer. 
The taste and the sure judgment of Madame de Main- 
tenon, at least in this circumstance, led her to main- 
tain, against the opinions of the age, that ' Athalie ' 
was a sublime tragedy; and posterity, ever impartial 
and discerning, has confirmed her judgment. Bosseut, 
when aged sixteen, was led into a saloon in the Host5! 80 
de Rambouillet; the marchioness had the glory of 
predicting that he would become a great orator. 
Madame de Guercheville discovered in Richelieu, 
when very young, and while certainly very far from 
promising, the seeds of a superior genius. She caused 
him to take the first step towards that high fortune 
which rendered him the arbiter of the destinies of 
Europe, and of kings themselves. 
" Women," says M. Dampmartin, " do not confine 
themselves to discerning merit, and to granting it to 
that barren homage with which the greater part of 
men believe they recompense it: they encourage, they 
/port and foster it. Their sensibility and their van- 
-«y are equally gratified by seeing talent obtain its 
reward through their care; and moreover they at- 
tach themselves to literature with an ardor unknown 
to men."* 
But what protection can be given-by what judg- 
ment can be manifested-of what importance can be- 
come those females who willingly condemn themselves 
to exiles from the other world ? 
What amiable qualities can be manifested by those 
women who are mad enough, daily to destroy in secret 
all the means of pleasing, given to them by Nature. 
Entirely absorbed by their filthy habit, equally capable 
of creating as of appreciating, never are the songs ef 
glory or the avowal of any sentiment, the tender presage 
of approaching union, heard by them. Austere in- 
dividuals, who read their guilt upon their brow, re- 
proach them harshly for it in their ewn hearts: those 
whom generosity and benevolence never abandon- 
pity them; can any other sentiment be entertained or 
them! 
But every one turns away his gaze, as though he 
had passed a flower which had withered and dried up 
• Essay on the Literatura of Woman 81 
before it had become developed, and before it had 
bloomed in its beauty. Never will be given to them, 
is was done to the Duchess of Valentinois, the surname 
of the wisest of beauties, and the most beautiful of the 
wise." 
Voltaire could not say to them as he did to Madame 
Dubocage, who visited him at Ferney, that " there 
was something wanting in her head-dress," placing on 
her brow at the same ttme a crown of laurel. 
To be ill, or in suffering : such is the whole of their 
existence: to be unknown or despised ; such is their 
fate. And what felicity, in fact, can be merited by a 
girl whose fearful vice has reduced her to a state in 
which she cannot recognize her own father. But if it 
be afflicting to humanity to speak of such beings, our 
picture is indeed a bright one when we behold the 
genius and wit, the arts, talents, and virtues, which en- 
circled the grace and amiability of a Se vigne and a La 
Sabliere.* 
• Some persons will perhaps reproach me for appearing to impose 
too much on females the obligation of cultivating the arts and scien- 
ces ; I will explain myself on this matter: I do not think that they 
sught to occupy themselves with them to the extent of neglecting the 
duties which ought to hold the first rank, and engage the attention of 
all reasonable women. But I do not coincide with the opinion of 
those who believe that it is improper for women to cultivate litera 
ture; if there have been pedants among literary women, have there 
never been pedants among men ? As to family cares, from which 
study man draws them, are they not attracted from them by pleasures 
fat more frivolous, and far more reprehensible, which are not con- 
sidered improper, although they, are daily followed up. 
We find the following expression in the Eulogium of Madame ds 
Sevigne, by Madame the President of Brisson, who carried off ths 
prize at the Academy of Marseilles, in 1777, " that during the youth 
of Madame de Sevigne, there were brought up in the domestic 
schools, excellent wives and mothers, but that this kind of merit 
did not exclude these ladies from superiority in many branches of 
literature. 
Madame de Sevigne was erudite; was she at all the leas a good 
author er a good wife? LETTER XV 0 
Harcus Aurelius gives it as an axiom in hia 
" Thoughts," that high-spirited and excellent minds 
Become attached to virtue from taste for virtue, by the 
sole feeling of its sublimity ; while common minds only 
follow it as courtiers follow a sovereign, attracted by 
the hope of the benefits that it may shed on them.f 
I should be despised had I persuaded myself that 
wisdom would only have pleased you from the con- 
siderations I had presented to you-beauty, health, and 
wit; this was far from my thought, and I am about to 
•peak to you of the real reasons for attachment to it, 
which hold, I doubt not, the first rank in your estima 
tion : I mean morality and virtue. 
Some one has very judiciously remarked, that wo- 
men are not solely destined to charm the eye; that 
they have been created for a nobler end than merely to 
be a pleasing sight; that their charms should be but 
the prestige of more touching qualities, and that to re- 
duce them to depend only on their charms is to degrade 
them. 
If, in fact, we desire to discover what is the cause of 
that lively satisfaction of that species of enchantment, 
f This maxim in a manner naturally arises oat of that baaatifal 
chapter of this excellent emperor on vain glory; or rather thia whole 
chapter is but a one paraphrase of this maxim, which forms one o. 
its paragraphs: " W hen you hsve desired to do good, and bare sow 
caeded, why, like a man without judgment, seek for anything elsa 
such as the reputation of benevolence or gratitude I 83 
■o to speak, which takes possession of the heart when 
a lovely woman appears, we shall soon find that it ha* 
its source at least in honorable minds, in those deli- 
cate and affectionate sentiments, of which her beauty 
only appears, if I may so express myself, the seductive 
emblem. 
Benardio St. Pierre says, speaking of men of the 
world-that they know women under no other title 
than that of the fair sex; but if they are only beauti- 
ful to those who have nothing but eyes, for those who 
have a heart they are also that sex which for nine 
months, at the peril of her life, carries man in her 
womb, and the sex that nourishes and cherishes him in 
his infancy. 
They are the pious sex which carries him when 
young to the altar, that inspires him with the love of 
a religion which the cruel policy of men too often ren- 
ders odious to him. 
They are the peaceful sex which never sheds the 
blood of its equals ; the consoling sex which watches 
over the sick and touches without wounding.J 
But if at first we are tempted to cherish as well a* 
esteem such a person, she only inspires indifference or 
disgust when we learn that she is devoid of morality, 
and incapable of feeling any of those holy affection*, 
filial love, conjugal affection, maternal love, virtuosi 
tnd tender friendship, pity, and compassion. 
In the absence of these sentiments, we no longer ro- 
jognize the characteristics of a pious daughter, of a 
wife or a mother; and yet such are too frequently the 
individuals who give themselves up to this solitary pa* 
sion. When once-and she, too frequently is subject 
to so great a degree of tyranny-this fatal erroc ha* 
established it empire in the imagination of the young 
girl, and even of the woman, the last relics of mode*- 
JStudie* of Nat or*. 12mo trillion, 11 volt. ty, of filial piety, of conjugal love, or maternal affoo 
tion, so powerful in the heart of a mother, all disap- 
pear-all are extinguished: of the torch of Love, of 
the torch of Hymen, not a spark remains. 
The nuptial couch now only receives the miserable 
and stranger body of a female who was once a tender 
and faithful wife, and perhaps a mother. 
What sad objects here present themselves to us. 11 
I have been unable to pronounce before you the word 
crime, how shall I dare to unveil pictures which repre- 
sent it in all its most horrible forms ; for I speak, par- 
ticularly at this moment, of the conduct of those fe- 
males whose excesses are much more the effects of a 
depraved appetite, than of a simple error, or any other 
cause ? 
How, I say, shall I dare to unviel to you such pic- 
tures ! 
Besides, such lessons cannot be understood by every- 
body ; a virgin mind, such as yours, cannot even con- 
ceive of such monstrosities; innocence and ignomifty 
cannot understand each other. 
The horror of the facts which I am about briefly to 
speak of, spite of myself, arrests my thoughts. 
We sometimes see in woman whose strength of con- 
stitution has carried off the victory over this homicidal 
▼ice, and has not as yet permitted that they should pay 
with their lives, or by maladies more bitter than death, 
those horrible symptoms which they have themselves 
■ought;f we see that after having for a long time obey- 
ed and satisfied this frightful passion, that it suddenly 
breaks out in its full power, stifles all reason, violates 
all moral principle; and these same women, with in- 
flamed eye-balls, with haggard features, sometimes 
84 
f This i« only when there is but • simple and pejheps obscure in- 
fammation of the womb, or of some of its appendages, such as the 
•varies, *.c. 85 
furiously animated, pollute their paternal roof or con- 
jugal hearth with their horrid frenzy ; with disordered 
garments, sometimes they fly about like perfect Bao- 
chantes, and both by their discourse and actions, they 
become the most vile and degraded of beings. 
I saw, at Paris, three of these deplorable exam- 
ples ; two in the hospital, the Hotel Pieu, where they 
were obliged to bind two w'omen like two mad peo- 
ple ; and one in a public place, in a young girl who 
was rushing i bout, and uttering the most horrible ob 
scenity. 
Under what head shall I describe the following phe- 
nomena 1 Under that of immorality or madness! Sin- 
gular perplexity! I am about to speak again of the 
peasant girl to whom I have already alluded. This un- 
fortunate girl, according to the account of Professor 
Alibert, was accustomed to retire into thickets and the 
most sequestered localities, to gratify her horrible pen- 
chant. Two w'hole years rolled over, and her intel- 
lectual faculties were observed gradually to become 
weaker. 
She almost appeared an idiot, and she was at length 
removed to the Hospital Saint Louis, where, under the 
most frightful delirium, she perpetually exhibited 
the most indecent actions, having no command over 
herself, despite the constant remonstrances addressed 
to her.} 
These examples are not so rare as might be imagin- 
ed ; every kind of forgetfulness, every species of per- 
version, both physical and moral, may be tne fearful 
consequences of this horrible predilection. It some- 
times exhibits to us a woman the mother of a family, 
perishing in the fiftieth year of her age,-a victim of 
f Work already quoted. The fruitleeaness of the reproach** of 
those who attended her can scarcely produce astonishment. Her 
state was in reality one constant delirium, and the frightful acta la 
which she constantly yielded, but a species of brain fever. 86 
all the evils which she o>red to this shameful habit, 
amidst suffering, borne down by the- greatest agoney ; 
surrounded by fearful thoughts of the punishment 
awaiting her crimes ; perfectly aware of the vice which 
killed her; and with death, as a result, lingering over 
her before he struck the fatal blow.* 
I myself saw a woman whose situation presented the 
closest and most afflicting resemblance to the above. 
She was forty years of age. This unnatural passion 
had brought on such excessive and constant irritability, 
and rendered the disgusting gratification so mechanical, 
inasmuch as reason and intelligence had no longer any 
power over her, that although a strait waistcoat was 
placed on her, without any openings, through which 
her arms could pass, and though she was surrounded 
by many persons, who kept her in,a bath, in which she 
was daily placed for convulsions which attacked her ; 
every moment they were obliged to place her arms in 
an attitude different to that which they obstinately and 
incessantly assumed, as though it was the only one na- 
tural to them. 
As to feelings, these revolting words are contained 
in some letters published by Doctor Doussin Dubreuil, 
and unveil one of the frightful effects of this passion on 
the heart; "I had attained such a degree of insensi- 
bility (is this word sufficient to express such corrup- 
tion') that I felt myself able to hear of the death of 
my father and mother, whom I had so dearly loved, 
without shedding one tear."f 
There is in existence a letter from a female, who 
eonfessed that this fatal vice had so worked upon her 
heart, as to have rendered her husband an object of de- 
testation and horror. J 
Lastly, (for I cannot too soon finish this enumera 
• Fact communicated to Petit by Dr, Etienne Martin, one of th 
moet celebrated physicians in Lyons. 
t Letters already quoted.' I English Letters 87 
tion), I had the opportunity of seeing the mother of > 
family, who had lived long in this criminal indulgence, 
and by paying no more attention to her own children 
than if they had no longer existed ; while she showed 
the most complete affection towards the infamous au- 
thors of her excesses. I know that she had it in con- 
templation to make over a part of her property to these 
vile beings. This project was partly accomplished : 
she perished, and crime received the inheritance of in- 
nocent orphans. 
LEITER XVIII. 
What character and what morals, what virtues and 
what affections, can be the portions of the husbands of 
such companions !-of wives who are no longer wives, 
of mothers who are no longer mothers; or of the un- 
happy parents of girls in madness? Is it amongst them 
that the former (husbands) can find the rivals of those 88 
Immortal women whose names recal all the noa el 
quisite of the domestic virtues 1 
An Epponina, who for nine years shared with her 
proscribed husband an obscure cave, and there render 
ed him more than once a father, in order that he might 
have a greater number of suppliants to his prince : an 
Arria, who, shuddering at the prospect of her hus- 
band's public execution, showed him, by plunging a 
sword into her own bosom, that there was nothing 
easier than to escape the executioner; and assured him, 
as she drew it forth again, that it gave no pain! thus 
did her generous solicitude for her husband deprive her 
of every other feeling. 
Is it necessary, then, that we should seek for a 
Paulina, the wife of Seneca, whose attachment to her 
husband was so great, that when he was compelled to 
kill himself, she opened her own veins with him, and 
w'ho, not having died, bore upon her countenance, for 
the few years she survived, the honorable palor which 
attested that a part of her blood had flowed with that 
of her husband's. 
An Agrippina (to cite an example of another kind of 
virtue), who while still young, shut herself up in an 
obscure retreat, and who, without suffering her pride 
to yield to the most formidable of tyrants, nor her man- 
ners to be corrupted by the vices of her age; as im- 
placable towards the murderer of her husband, as she 
was faithful to that husband , and passed her life in 
weeping for the one, and hating the other. No; as- 
suredly such women possess a supernatural greatness 
of mind; while the weakened bodies of those who 
indulge in solitary habits only contain souls, like 
themselves, without vigor, and incapable of any great 
action. 
Oh, days of antiquity! oh, ages in which so many 
virtues and such noble sentiments were displayed I with 89 
what an admirabl* example of filial piety do you pre- 
tent us. 
The magistrate oi Rome condemned a father to the 
horrible punishment of death by starvation ; he was 
closly confined; orders were issued, and measures 
taken, that he might receive no nourishment. Out of 
respect to the gods, his daughter alone obtained per- 
mission to see him once a day ; being, however, mi- 
nutely examined before she could reach his cell. The 
time in which famine should have slain its victim ap- 
proaches-it has come-it has passed ; and yet the old 
man still exists !-his features are unaltered. Sur- 
prise caused the precautions already taken to be re 
doubled ; the daughter of the prisoner is secretly watch- 
ed, and her virtue discovered. 
Filial piety and religion taught her daily to uncover 
her breasts-the blood of a pious daughter daily re- 
turned to its sources ; the unfortunate father from that 
fountain drew back the life he had given ! 
What cannot virtue do? She had prolonged the 
days of the old man-she had saved him ; he did 
not die ; his pardon was granted-who could refuse 
it to him? 
More than this was done : the deed of Pero (for such 
was the name of this virtuous daughter) was so great 
and so admirable, that a recompense was even adjudged 
to herself.f 
If from our own history I seek for noble actions, and 
proofs of affection and sublime feeling manifested by 
women, it presents me with numbers of all descrip- 
tions. I take the first from the life of Madame de 
Sevigne, whose letters you well know. 
Madame de Greignan was attacked with a severe 
disease; Madame de Sevigne never quitted the bed- 
side of her daughter. 
There was but one feeling in her soul, and this was 
t This deed i> known under the name of Roman Charity. 90 
th > most tender and painful anxiety for the lire of 
M«dame de Greignan. Her adored daughter recover- 
ed her health, and the most devoted of mothers soon 
died; her strength not having been equal to her af- 
fection. 
Marie Dezinska, wife of Louis XV., was as sensi- 
ble as she was virtuous. Death having deprived her 
of several children, and at one time of the dauphin her 
son as well as her father, Stanislaus, King of Po- 
land, she fell into so deep a grief as to sink beneath 
it. In the last days of her illness, the physician pro- 
posed to her some new remedies:-" Give me back," 
replied she, " my father and my children, and you will 
cure me." 
Will you not here exclaim, my young patient,- 
"Oh, hearts, a hundred times divine!-oh, admira- 
ble daughters, devoted wives, tender and affectionate 
mothers!" 
But with what disdain such conduct,-deaths so af- 
fecting,-must fill you at the same time for those per- 
sons to whom we may no longer speak of father or 
mother, of husband or children, who cannot even shed 
tear if they lose them. 
Such, nevertheless, is the contrast at once so flatter- 
ing on one side, and so afflicting on the other, that this 
most furious of all the passions establishes between 
women secretly chaste, and those who are not so. 
Indifference, ennui, a heart withered and dried up, 
ill temper, languor, without calling to mind all the 
fearful infirmities with which the human race can be 
afflicted, are all that remains to those imprudent per- 
sons of whom these letters speak. 
Feelings of tenderness, delicacy, and sublimity, have 
all fled their hearts; they no longer shed joy and 
happiness on their homes, their families, and them- 91 
•elves; no longer do such feelings render them kind 
towards their servants, affable in society, tender 
and affectionate to their children,-and, lastly, capa- 
ble of the most admirable devotion towards their hus- 
bands. 
LETTER XIX. 
You will know, and one lay experience the tender 
feelings of love, a sentiment which attaches you as de- 
votedly to another person as filial affection attaches you 
to the parents you cherish most. You are made both 
to inspire and to feel this celestial emotion. 
If you await it in the bosom of innocence and chas- 
tity, it will surely fill your heart with delightful and 
exquisite emotions, which will one day be the happy 
ness of a husband as well as your own. 
But when it is reared, on the contrary, amidst pas 
sums which honor disapproves-it disgraces, it is dan 
gerous, and is productive only of regret and torture 
sometimes it is nourished at the expense of the hear* 92 
•nd the imagination, over which it tyrannize* an» 
which it misleads ; it then becomev what the French 
call amorous melancholy. At other times it exists en- 
tirely at the expense of honor and is not true love- 
cannot be conjugal love. 
A Latin poet, Catullus, has written a beautiful nup- 
tial chant, commencing with these words :- 
" Vesper adest, juvennes,"-Ac. 
An admirable hymn, which shows us the value which 
is ever attached to female virtue, by depicting the re- 
gret felt by a young girl, even at the altar of Hymen 
for the moment when she will cease to be a virgin, un- 
der the dread of being despised when she is no longer 
such. 
An estimable error, but still an error, since the 
chaste and faithful wife is no less worthy of our regard 
and esteem than when she was a virgin; since the 
young girl who becomes a wife only adds to her duties 
and virtues, dvaes and virtues more to be respected. 
The ancients sonsidered love in general as the soul 
of the universe; in this sense they esteemed it as a 
principle essentially divine and caused it to be repre- 
sented in their temples by the sacred fire of Vesta. 
You are aware that it was guarded by a certain 
number of virgins, as much, doubtless, to indicate the 
idea they formed of their purity; as, because they could 
imagine no beings more worthy to keep it up than vir- 
ginity and chastity ; and thus to encourage these vir- 
tues. You know, also, that it was considered a very 
great evil if it were extinguished. 
1 will not tell you, as many persons doubtless will 
to stifle in your hearts that tender flame which Heaven 
implants there ; no, this would also be an evil; keep 
there that virgin love-that precious flame from which 
•uch happy and such tender feelings may spring up- 93 
but let not its destiny by changed-let it find a temple 
in yoirr heart and let innocence and chastity continue 
to guard it. Thus kept, it has in all ages attracted the 
greatest respect, the greatest honors! 
At Rome, the principal magistrates, even the con- 
suls, in meeting a vestal virgin were compelled to turn 
from her path. The least injury done to a vestal was 
punished with death. 
As though virtue carried with it in these times a 
kind of holy unction, capable of purifying bad actions, 
just as herbs and plants and heavenly balms were em- 
ployed by the gods, suddenly to cure mortal wounds ; 
the vestals absolved from crime and delivered from 
death the criminal who was conducting to his doom 
whom they met, provided they would swear that chance 
alone had caused their meeting. 
They were the only females whose evidence was ad- 
mitted in courts of justice; their priestesses were se- 
lected as arbitresses of differences. 
It was in their hands that wills and precious family 
documents were deposited, chastity being ever attended 
by other virtues. 
The ancient Britons, transported with rage at the re- 
cital of the outrages which had been committed upon 
the daughters of the Queen, Boadicea, resolved to con- 
quer or die. 
Among the Angles, he who insulted a virgin was 
punished with a double penalty to that which he would 
nave suffered if he had insulted a married woman ot 
the same rank. 
Happy the people among whom the privileges of 
virtue are known, reason will never dispute them. 
And these honors, my dear reader, can be traced to 
the remotest antiquity ; they were paid among the most 
anciently enlightened people ; and also, among people 
emerging from barbarism, which proves, without the 
fear of contradiction, that the esteem entertained for 94 
morality is neither the esteem of caprice or taste, but 
that it has its source in the advantages which men ever 
desire from it. 
The poems of Homer, which are so ancient that as 
yet their date has not been satisfactorily fixed, often 
celebrate chastity.* Nowhere, indeed, have finer elo- 
giums been bestowed upon it; there is no picture 
which equals that of Andromache and Nausicaa. 
The period when the interesting fable of Daphne 
changed into a laurel tree, while seeking to avoid the 
pursuit of the most handsome of the gods, had birth, ia 
•Iso lost in the mists of antiquity. 
" Her feet she found 
Benumbed with cold and fastened to the ground. 
A filmy rind about her body grows, 
Her hair to leaves, her arms extend to boughs. 
The nymphs is all into a laurel gone, 
The smoothness of her skin remains aloi> " 
Men could not express their love for morality m a 
more ingenious or more honorable manner. Cannot 
we recognize in this agreeable fiction the smile and 
pledge of the most complete approbation, the desire in 
a word, of immortalizing virtue. 
And how could these judicious ancients have avoided 
perceiving that without chastity there could no longer 
be in marriage, esteem, confidence or love. That the 
most sacred unions would otherwise be but a mockery 
-the most tender link but a galling chain, that hus- 
bands would no longer have true companions, children 
no longer a bosom to receive nor arms to clasp affec- 
tionately around them. 
How wise then were these legislate tes aud these 
• According to some chronologists and historians, this prince of 
Kts lived near the coast of Asia Minor, in the year of the world 
0, or 950 years before the Christian era.-[ Bouaseut, Betrayer and 
Wtewyl guardians of morality, in taking such care to rendet 
honor to chastity and virtue. 
Guard well then, my dear reader, these moral feel- 
mgs, deserve thereby that the consuls, if such existed, 
should turn aside for you as they did for the august 
guardians of tne sacred fire at Rome. 
95 
LETTER XX. 
I have already told you that the excesses of love were 
often the results of secret vicious habits in persons cor- 
rupted early. I do not confine myself to those excesses 
in which all moral feeling is lost. As to amorous me- 
lancholy, it has also been named by many physicians, 
amorous madness. The mind, is in fact more or less 
affected; many of its faculties are indeed so highly ex- 
cited, that the patients then only really differ from oth- 
er maniacs as regards the cause of their madness. The 
female constitution disposes to it. Almost entirely 
destined by Nature to conceive and cherish nought but 
tender affection; intended for a life rather of comfort 
than of piin, of tranqnility than of agitation and die- 96 
traction, there is for woman-and particularly for some 
women-but one step from a vicious secret habit to 
amorous madness; that disease, in fact, which may be 
called the madness of the heart. 
This new exvess is not less hurtful to the general 
health, than to the mind, and is equally productive of 
forgetfulness of all moral duties. 
The following are two examples which will give 
you a sufficient idea of some of these different affec- 
tions ; but particularly the last, on which account 1 
chiefly cite them. 
" C de G was so smitten with love 
that she could neither work, nor w'alk, nor sleep, nor 
keep herself upright, nor even speak. According to 
her, every man and every woman would run and throw 
themselves into the sea, if the sea had been that love. 
Absorbed in the depth of that passion, she would fre- 
quently go into the garden and confide to the trees and 
flowers her hysterical passion; or else she rushed all 
over the house, exclaiming, ' Love, love /' and then 
would roll on the ground. The violence of her passion 
destroyed her health to such an extent that she could 
not swallow a drop of water, and took no nourishment: 
she burned without and within ; she could not sleep ; 
sometimes she was seized with the most agonizing con- 
vulsions ; sometimes she fell into a complete stupor. 
At length she spit blood, became dumb, and died."f 
These different affections were all nervous. The 
patient could not swallow a drop of water because her 
throat was closed. The blood probably burst from her 
f Zimmerman: Treatise on Medical Experience, vol. 3. 
1 have seen a female subject to spitting blood, and very irritable, 
•xperience paralytic convulsions in all her limbs, particularly in th* 
anus ; a painful tightness, as though of a ligature at the epigastrium 
and round the lions ; a sensation of weight in the chest , and spitting 
*f blood; at a period of sudden moral affection, without having pro 
■o«ac*d anything but two or thrse words ip a low tone of voice. 97 
ehesi from the same cause. She became dumb and 
blind from the paralysis of the muscles, of the voice 
and the optic nerves, or that which produces vision ; 
doubtless after the spasms, which took place to an ex- 
cessive extent, and which had too frequently occurred 
in these organs as well as in many other parts < f the 
body. 
Second example :-A lady thirty-two years of age, 
of fine stature, a strong constitution, with blue eyes, 
white skin, chesnut-colored hair, had been placed in an 
educational establishment-where the most brilliant fu 
ture, where the brightest prospects were always offer 
ed to those who entered it. 
Some time after her marriage, she saw a young 
man of a more elevated rank than her husband. She 
was immediately smitten with him ; she murmured 
against her lot, and only spoke of her husband with 
contempt. She refused to live with him, and at length 
took a decided aversion, not only to him, but to her own 
parents, who vainly endeavored to cure her of her 
caprice. The disease increased : it was necessary to 
separate her from her husband ; she spoke incessantly 
of the object of her passion ; she became difficult to 
please, capricious and passionate. She escaped her 
parent's house to run after him. She watched him 
everywhere; she called for him in her impassioned 
songs ; he was the greatest, the most witty, the most 
amiable, the most perfect of men. She asserted that 
she was his wife; that she had never known another 
husband. It was he who lived in her heart, who ruled 
over its actions. She had had a child by him, which 
should be as accomplished as its father. She was fre- 
quently surprised in a kind of ecstacy of ravishing 
thought; then her gaze was fixed, and a smile was or, 
her lips. She frequently addressed letters to him 
She made verses, which she filled with the most amor 
»ui expressions; she copied them frequently, and witi 98 
great care. Though they expresses the most violent 
'>assioii, they were at the same time a proof of the most 
{terfect virtue. When she went out she walked brisk* 
y, as if she were engaged on business; or else she 
would walk slowly and haughtily. She avoided men, 
all of whom she despised and placed far beneath her 
lover Nevertheless, she was not always indifferent to 
any mark of interest displayed towards her; but any 
ardent expression offended her; and to any overtures 
made to her, she opposed the name, the merit, the 
qualities, and perfections of him whom she adored. 
Often during the day and night, she would talk to her- 
self, sometimes aloud and sometimes in a low tone. 
Sometimes she wept, sometimes she smiled; sometimes 
she was angry with herself in her solitary conversa- 
tions. If she was told of her loquacity, she assured 
them that she was compelled to speak. Most fre- 
quently it was her lover who conversed with her, by 
means only known to herself. Sometimes she believ- 
ed that some individuals, jealous of her happiness, en- 
deavored to mar it by breaking up these interviews, 
and by striking her (I have seen her almost furious, 
shrieking and declaring that she had just been struck.) 
Under other circumstances, her face became red, her 
eyes sparkling ; she could not recognize her parents or 
her friends: she was furious and attempted to commit 
the greatest injuries. This state sometimes continued 
for two, three, eight, or fifteen days ; she would then 
feel most agonizing pains at the epigastrium, and about 
the heart. These pains, which were concentrated at 
the precordial region (the pit of the stomach), which 
she could not support without the strength communi- 
cated to her by her lover, were, as she said, caused by 
her parents and her friends-although they were 
several leagues distant-or by those who attended 
aer 
Any great appearance of compulsion or force over' 99 
•wed her, she would then turn pale, tremble, a fit » of 
tears would terminate the attack. 
This lady, reasonable under all other circumsta'- res, 
worked; was perfectly capable ol managing he? do- 
mestic arrangements ! she did justice to her husba id's 
merit, and to her parents' affection: but she could not 
see the former nor live with the latter. This state was 
not brought on in her by any previous derangemen* of 
health. The paroxysms of fury sometimes took pUce 
at the period of menstruation, but not always. 
Her appetite was capricious, and all her actions ptr- 
ticipated in the disorder of her delirious passion. 5 he 
slept but little ; her slumber was disturbed by drea ns 
and nightmare. She had frequent fits of watchfulne <s 
and when she did not sleep, she walked about, tall id 
to herself, and sung. This state of things continu 'c 
for many years. A year's course of treatment, isol i- 
tion, tepid and cold baths, douches, anti-spasmodics, - 
both externally add internally,-nothing could resto e 
her to reason .J The physicians who report these tv o 
cases do not say whether the patients were guilty * f 
sacret breaches of the vows of modesty; more than or» 
fact, however, makes us think this to be the case wifi 
the former. 
t Dictionary of Medical Science.-Article Erotemaine, bi tn. Ob LETTO XXI. 
Car the young girl who is a victim to secret pernici- 
ous habits, knew anything of the charms of friendship! 
Such is the question I propose to examine in this let* 
ter, but I ought first to justify women against some re- 
proaches which have been directed against them with 
regard to this noble affection. 
It has been asserted that it has only been given to 
your sex to experience the sentiment of love, and not 
that of friendship. Nature, reason, history, all prove 
that such a maxim is a most unjust assertion. What! 
t sentiment, the most honorable and the most delicious, 
to be refused to the heart of woman ; she alone to be 
incapable either of inspiring or enjoying it! A wo- 
man even has repeated this assertion ; and, what is al- 
most inconceivable this lady has written a treatise oa 101 
friendship, which in the judgment of connoisseurs, is s» 
perior to all the treatises written on the same subject 
by men,-whom she nevertheless assures to be the 
only heroes of friendship. No, this is noucredible; 
when a woman is reared in the bosom of her family, 
like a plant amidst the parterre which gave it birth, in- 
nocent and pure, entirely exempt from all vice; in a 
word, as Delille remarks : 
" And Hill stamped with the image st Divinity," 
there is no delicate or exquisite feeling, whose happy 
seed may not be dropped in her heart. 
A woman, I repeat, assures us that women are not 
capable of friendship , and yet this same woman gives 
us a better account of friendship, teaches us better all 
its secrets and its laws, in an excellent treatise, than 
any man has yet done. How are we to explain this? 
And yet the same things ought to be true of the heart 
and feelings, as of colors ; they must be felt to be ex- 
pressed, just as we must see to be enabled to paint. 
But it is absolutely impossible for any work of the ha- 
man mind to be perfect, and the sentence of the Mar- 
chioness of Lambert against her sex is, doubtless, the 
mark of humanity w'hich is imprinted on her chef- 
d'oeuvre. "Women," says she in it, "have the misfor- 
tune to be incapable of relying upon friendship among 
themselves; the faults with which they are fitted form 
an almost insurmountable obstacle to it." 
In the first place do we find so many real friends 
among men themselves? Aristotle, who ought to 
know them, since he has written treatises on morals 
and politics, observes, " Oh, my friends ! There are 
no friends !" As to their duration, are there no friend- 
ships among men which are broken ? or, do we not o* 
the contrary rather see that this is, unfortunately, a 
most common occurrence ? 102 
M The faults with which women are filled are at 
most insurmountable obstacles to the duration of friend- 
ship amongst them." Are they, then more filled with 
faults than men 1 And tvhat are the obstacles opposed 
to their eternaWfriendship 1 This same female writer 
imagines she has discovered them in those faults which, 
like envy, break off any close connection! But how 
long is it since envy ceased to actuate men! will they 
pause before a holy and tender friendship 1 will they 
fear to wound it 1 Ah! such examples may have oc- 
curred, may still occur, I believe in friendship; but 
how many men have really tasted and followed its laws, 
oven unto death 1 
* Woman " still continues in her moment of error- 
the Marchioness of Lambert (for I will not dissimulate, 
but desire to your sex all your titles to friendship), 
" women unite from necessity, and never from taste." 
And let me ask again what most frequently unites men, 
the immense majority of men, if it be not ambition, in- 
terest, or their own safety. Is their mutual taste, t at 
taste which is said to be wanting to women, for the 
fountain of constant friendship-is it anything else than 
the attraction of gratified vanity; but the identity of 
taste tor some art or science; and lastly but the same 
desire, as is said of your sex, to escape often from soli- 
tude and ennui. 
I do not wish by these reflections, to underrate men> 
but to establish the fact, that they are not more exempt 
from those failings which destroy friendship than are 
women, and that of two things, one is true; either 
friendship never exists, or that women are as capable 
of enKytng its delights among themselves as men. 
Observe, dear reader, that in refusing this feeling 
to woman, we are establishing it as a fact that they 
can be neither good sisters, good relations, nor even 
grateful for what ought to constitute amongs'. women a 103 
perfect friendship; if they cannot experience it for a 
sister, a relation, or a benefactress, for whom they en- 
tertain all that love which ordinarily are attached to 
these different titles. 
These are surely assertions whose truth you will 
never admit. 
A.gain, although to reason correctly, is under all cir- 
cumstances an excellent method of judging correctly ; 
yet, facts when they are faithfully related constitute the 
best of all judgment. 
In the subject of friendship, here is the creed of 
another authoress, as talented, and as celeorated. the 
Countess of Beauharnais 
" Life indeed is sad a nd drear, 
When friendship's voice we never hear ; 
On rank and wealth what joys attend ? 
They ne'er can buy a faithful friend." 
The more severe this reproach made against your 
sex, the more persuaded I am of its injustice ; the less 
avaricious ought I to be of proofs to demonstrate its 
falsehood. 
And so I shall present you with a number of incon- 
testible ones. 
Madame de Bouffiers, the mother of the chevalier of 
that name, wrote to the Marchioness of Chatelet, and 
recalled to her recollection the verses in which Vol- 
taire, praising her amiability, her wit, her talents, her 
knowledge, told her that everything pleased him, ev- 
erything was agreeable to his vast genius: 
" Book*, trinket*, compasses, trifles, 
Verses,diamonds,** &c. &c. 
The Marchioness who looked upon friendship, u flu 
above science and diamonds, thus replied:- 104 
•• Alas you've forgotten 
In all that you've told 
Friendship, more precious 
Than science or gold." 
Had I been desirous of following out chronologic*! 
order, as is usually done when erudite works are pen- 
ned, I should first have allowed to plead their cause, 
those females who have preceded the latter, but chro- 
nological order is of little importance in this place, and 
this slight digression will only prove to you how much 
facts press on us when it is a question of eulogising 
your sex for their virtues or feelings. 
I therefore ask pardon of Madame de Sevigny who 
well deserves to be first heard, since 1 do not deem it 
necessary to select my examples from ages more re- 
mote than that in which she flourished, and I hasten to 
let her explain herself. 
" I know," says she, " that there are a thousand 
things to say, a handled things to be done, in order 
that those we love may not fancy it broken. I know 
that there exists an infinity of circumstances in which 
we make them suffer, and in which we might relieve 
their pains, if we always possessed those opinions and 
thoughts which we ought to have for all that apper- 
tains to the heart. Lastly, I can prove that there are 
a hundred methods of exhibiting friendship without de- 
claring it, or by which we may tell by actions that 
we possess no friendship, although it contradicts the 
assertion. " 
Thus speaks Madame de Sevigny in the eulogium 
which gained the prize. 
Let us leave to Madame de Sevigny all her glory; 
let us in no wise decrease the homage due to her ; let 
u admire her wit, but still more her heart; nothing is 
more sublime than her affection. These are expres- 
sions repeated a thousand times, yet ever new, ever tn- 105 
foresting, it is an imperishable eloquence. How much 
does every feeling, every passion in her create a lively 
impression! 
How in her do we behold the charms of friendship. 
We there see that candid and active affection, which is 
the true foundation of love, because it is deprived of all 
self-love, and only considers the happiness of others. 
Let us only call those true friends, who yielding up 
everything to the object of their affection, only seek its 
happiness and utility. 
This constant and animating feeling enlightens them 
as to the true interest of those whom they love, and 
causes them often to sacrifice their dearest tasks, and 
feelings. 
Ingenious in seeking the means of obliging, arden" 
in following them out, if the power is wanting to them, 
they invite, exhort, solicit; and if they be condemned 
to inaction, what expression do they not give to their 
regrets and wishes. 
Permit me to ask you, whether it would be possible 
for men to feel more strongly the duties of friendship, 
to carry it to a greater extreme; are there many in 
fact, who would go so far. For myself, I believe it al- 
most beyond their capacity, their hearts appear to me 
to be with difficulty touched by such tender senti- 
ments. 
This is not the nature of man, it is too hard for that ( 
it is only the tender and delicate organization of woman, 
which can give to any being the power of feeling, in 
such an exquisite manner, and it would assuredly be 
doing the greatest injury to the lovely soul of the wo- 
man I have just named, to suppose that they had only 
in view, individuals of the other sex when they expres- 
sed such noble sentiments. 
I should never finish my task were I to recall ah 
the delicious mysteries of friendship unveiled by wo- 
men I allow that men go far in such a country, but I persuaded that women alone can discover all in it. 
I* has been asserted that envy was an obstacle to the 
existence of friendship in women. 
The following passage from the memoirs of Madame 
de Stael, is a sufficient answer to this charge. In it 
she relates, while yet she was only Mademoiselle de 
Launay, to the prior of St. Louis at Rouen, all her 
feelings for Mademoiselle de Sillery :- 
"No thought presented itself to my mind which I 
did not communicate to her. I loved her as I loved 
myself, nay, more indeed than I loved myself, at least, 
so it appeared to me. I would have suffered any evil 
designed for her, if it would have relieved her. At 
length, I actually went so far as to take an aversion 
to several persons because they appeared to have more 
esteem and friendship for me than for her."-Is this 
envy 1 
Another question has been raised-it has been asked 
if friendship could exist between persons of the oppo- 
site sex. 
It appears to me, that their trouble of putting this 
question might have been spared if a little reflection had 
been made on the matter. 
Independently of the numberless proofs of the possi- 
bility of the existence of such a friendship which are 
unknown to the world in general-for friendship sel- 
dom troubles itself by seeking renown-have not the 
merits and the fame of many persons, presented us with 
numerous examples thereof. 
The names of Madame de Sevigne and the Duke of 
Rochefoucault, of Madame de la Fayette and Cardinal 
Retz, of Mesdames Evrard, De la Sabliere, and our 
immortal fabulist, loudly speak in favor of this kind of 
friendship. 
The Marchioness of Lambert, a worthy historian of 
this lovely sentiment, generally speaks of its charms in 
reference to persons of.opposite sexes. 
106 107 
Many letters of Madame de Sevigne are filled 
with the grief with which she was overwhelmed at 
the death of the duke, her friend: and Madame de 
Sevigne was a virtuous woman in the strict sense of 
that term. 
Philocletus, in 2Edipus, speaking of Hercules, 
says: 
* ' Ths friendshi p of a great man, is a blessing from the godi. " 
Mademoiselle Montpensier and Madame de la Fay- 
ette, Madame Evrard and Madame de la Sabliere, 
have proved-the two first to the poet Segrais, the two 
second to their fabulist (so they call La Fontaine), that 
it would not have been tjpo presumptive of them to have 
applied these words of Philocletus, and that heaven 
might in its benevolence also grant the friendship of 
women. 
Mademoiselle de Montpensier attached to herself in 
the capacity of her attendant gentleman, the poet Se- 
grais ; he lived in her house twenty-four years, during 
which time she overwhelmed him with marks of es- 
teem, of confidence, and friendship. This princess 
having projected an union with Count Lauzon, and 
Segrais having offered her some advice on the matter 
which was not accepted, deemed it his duty to retire 
from her house. 
The friendship of an estimable woman Madame de 
la Fayette, procured for him another useful and agree- 
able retreat. 
Do you known the much celebrated reply of La Fon- 
taine, and which, perhaps was the means of rendering 
the names of La Sabliere and Evrard immortal? It 
may be called the " Reply of Friendship," so much is 
it characteristic of its simplicity, its frankness, and 
■ever swerving reliance. 108 
Death had just deprived the witty fabulist of the 
friendship of the first of these two females, and of all 
the resources he had derived from her, and which his 
indolence and carelessneas had rendered indispensable. 
He went towards the house of the second, who, having 
met him, said to him-" I have just heard of the mis- 
forture which has occurred to you ; and I was coming 
to beg of you to take un you abode with me." " I was 
coming," replied La Fontaine. 
If all this does not prove sufficiently that the purest 
friendship, and that most worthy of praise, may exist 
between persons of different sexes, 1 should like to 
know what truth can ever be proved. 
But now let us see wiat its most eloquent priest- 
ess says on this subject. " It is both rare and diffi- 
cult," observes she, " but it is friendship which 
possesses the most charms. It is more difficult, because 
it requires more virtue and discretion. Women who 
only think of, and understand ordinary love, are not 
worthy of it; and the men who only seek another kind 
of gratification in women, and who imagine that they 
do not possess any amiable qualities of heart and mind, 
and are consequently only attracted by beauty, are not 
fit for the friendship of which I speak. It is necessary 
to endeavor to be united by virtue and personal merit 
Sometimes such attachments begin in love and end in 
friendship. When women are faithful to the virtue of 
their »ex, friendship being the recompense of virtuous 
love, they flatter themselves in attaining to it. When 
women sacrifice their duty to their love, and offer to 
you in exchange the charms and feelings of friendship; 
when, besides, you find in them the same merit as ex- 
ists in men, can you do better than to accept their 
friendship? It is certain, that of all unions this is the 
most delightful. There is always a degree of vivacity 
which is never found among persons of the same sex." 
To this point I listen with entire confidence to the 109 
lessons of the amiable priestess of frieadsliip, but it i> 
here that I cease to follow her-it is here that I cease 
to believe her ; for it is in this place that I find the fail- 
ing which is to be discovered in all human productions, 
even the most exquisite, that is to say, it is here that 
she asserts that women cannot enjoy among themselves 
the delights of friendship. I will not repeat her words 
here, since I have discussed them in the course of this 
letter, and I flatter myself that I have completely ab- 
solved your sex from them ; I therefore purposely omit 
them, and I give all credit to the woman who ought to 
be so worthy of the feeling which she describes so 
well. 
She thus continues, with all the justice, and all hex 
usual delicacy of mind :- 
" When their hearts are not occupied or torn by 
passion, their friendship is tender and touching to be- 
hold. It is women alone who know how to extract 
from virtuous feeling all that is to be derived therefrom. 
Men speak to the mind, women to the heart. And 
further, as Nature has established certain connections 
and ties between the individuals of different sexes, eve- 
rything is prepared for friendship. The works of Na- 
ture are ever the most perfect; those in which she 
Joes not take a prominent part, are less agreeable. 
The friendship of which I speak is recognized as her 
work. Those secret ties, that sympathy, that touching 
fascination which cannot be resisted, are all found 
therein. So desirable a blessing is ever the reward of 
merit; bnt we must be on our guard against ourselves, 
lest a virtue should ultimately be converted into a fu- 
rious passion." 
Though women really deserve that on this subject 
entire homage should be rendered to them, an estima 
ble writer (Thomas) has at least been more just to- 
wards women than the philosophers who preceded him. since he tays : " It raay be perhaps necessary todeaire 
a man as your friend on all great occasions; but, for 
daily happiness, one must desire the friendship of a 
woman."* 
In this place I would have you remark, that in re- 
fusing this second species of friendship to women, it 
will be a natural consequence to assert that, after a 
little time, during which they have enjoyed the happi- 
ness of the most durable of all passions, husband and 
wife only feel towards each other the greatest indiffer- 
ence ; this is an absurdity. The greatest part of mar- 
ried life, on the contrary, is an enjoyment of friendship: 
it is the best and most effective recompense for virtuous 
love; and women should make every effort to merit 
this reward. For friendship's reign is longer than that 
of love ; it consoles for the loss of the latter, and as- 
sures us that at least we are still loved. 
It is impossible better to express this truth than has 
been done by the Marchioness historian of friendship : 
and I shall be careful not to omit her evidence in this 
place: 
" The more we advance in life, the more do we feel 
our need of friendship. In proportion as the reason be- 
comes matured, the mind increases in delicacy of feel- 
ing and the heart is purified, the more necessary 
becomes this feeling." 
In admitting, too, the above principle, it must be 
asserted that friendship cannot exist between a brother 
and sister. Such an assertion is equally disgusting 
from its falsehood as from its immorality; and affecting 
examples of this friendship can readily ba collected to 
give the lie thereunto. 
Yes, the hearts of women are constituted to feel 
and nourish the tender sentiments of love, just as 
the brain is formed to think, to conceive, and to remem* 
110 
• Essay on the Character and Manners of Women. 111 
bet past events ; as the ear is made to be affected by 
agreeable or unpleasant sounds. 
But friendship is no stranger to it-it cannot be ; for 
in both cases it is a matter of loving, cherishing, and 
feeling with tenderness and without bounds. 
But as friendship is one of the noblest feelings, on< 
of the most grand privileges of humanity, it can only 
be found in connection with noble souls, of merit and 
virtue united, to which cause we are to attribute the 
rarity of friendship in all ages of the world. In fact, to 
possess true friends needs the most complete and nice 
power of discrimination in selecting them, a natural gift 
to cherish them with the most perfect unselfishness, all 
the natural qualities necessary to keep them, an insur- 
mountable courage to defend them when they are 
unjustly accused; and, when they are so justly, still 
to excuse them without approving their error (for who 
of us never falls'?) a delicate and unlimited liberality 
in relieving them witbout afflicting them, intelligence, 
understanding, and complacency, and modesty to advise 
and instruct them, without wounding their pride, when 
they are in error, or less talented than oneself. 
The Memoirs of Madame de Stael record the name 
of a female who was this perfect model. 
After having stated in the most interesting manner 
a host of good qualities with which Madame de Bus- 
sy, her friend was gifted, Madame de Stael thus con- 
tinues :- 
" But that which more than all else attached her 
to her friends was, that she possessed that true and 
perfect friendship so often deemed but a vain idea 
The confidence she inspired was such as one feels 
tor oneself, and willingly would they have told to 
her w'hat they would not have confessed to themselves. 
The affectionate interest which she always seemed to feel, her great attention to what was said to her, pen- 
etrated the very depths of the heart. The wisdom of 
her advice, her manner of inculcating it, added real 
utility to the charms of that confidence reposed in 
her." 
The feeling which I have just described to you, and 
which requires the union of the noblest qualities in 
those who experience it, is extremely appropriate in 
turning my attention from those unfortunates who only 
have a penchant for a frightful vice, and thus I have 
lost sight of them for some time ; but there is so little 
connection between them and those individuals who de- 
vote themselves to delicate and sublime friendship, that 
it w'as difficult not to forget them. 
In fact, what community is there between them and 
this virtue? Where could they obtain such virtues and 
such merit? How' could they fulfil such sweet and no- 
ble duties? 
A true friend is a being who feels, who thinks, who 
acts from excellent motives ; he is a perfect philoso- 
pher. True friendship can only spring from the most 
happy nature or from the most pure philosophy. What 
a distance from that happy situation in which these two 
conditions place both the heart and the mind, is that 
ignoble and most polluting of all passions! 
Virtue and taste have given rise to friendships 
whose memorial has descended even to us. In friend- 
ship the purest morals are necessary: you will not lose 
too much in risking an union with an individual of 
badly regulated morals. 
The first merit you must seek for in a friend is vir- 
tue :♦ it is this that assures us he is capable of friend- 
ship, and is worthy of it. 
112 
* Nec sine virtute umieitia esse ullo pito protest. (Cicero de And 
eitia, cup. 6.) 113 
Hope nothing from your connections as long a* they 
have not this foundation." 
Thus do we read in the " Treatise on Friendship. ' 
And yet, is there a single word in these precepts which 
can be spoken of these sad lovers of solitude? Are 
they virtuous? 
If a frightful habit can drive from the heart all the 
amiable and honorable feelings, and substitute for 
them only those which excite our disgust or pity ; if, 
as we have seen, it can alter human nature, to such an 
extent as not to allow a tear for filial piety to be shed 
over the loss of the most beloved parents ; to such an 
extent as to substitute for conjugal love, not merely in- 
difference, but absolute aversion, how could friendship 
with all its delights and charms, reign in the heart! 
It is really difficult to relate, without being ao 
cused of exaggeration, such misfortunes, such evils 
the imagination itself recoils before such pictures ; they 
are too hideous for me, in this place, to increase their 
number; I will confine myself, therefore, to the fol- 
lowing. 
I open the letters published at Paris by Dr. Doussin 
Dubreuil, and there I read these words :- 
" Giving myself up solely to this passion, every- 
thing around me was a burthen to me. I avoided 
every connection which could take me from it; my 
dearest friends had become odious to me; according to 
the definition of a friend by an ancient philosopher, it 
a one soul living in two bodies." 
Thus then, it is but too trne, when we observe all 
* An expression of Aristotle, equivalent to that of Pythagoras, on 
the same subject,-" Our fiend is but another self; a paraphrase in 
many ways. When I am with my friend, we are no longer two, etc. 
etc." And Montaigne appears to have meant the same thing when 
he says:-" When I am asked whence comes that joy, that etn, 
that repose which I feel when I see my friend, it is because it is bt- 
because it is mycelfthat's all I can say." 114 
die healthy functions n j body altered; all the 
charms of beauty vanish under the dominion of this sol- 
itary passion, we in the same way see all noble feelings 
disappear likewise, under its mortal influence. We 
must not, therefore, seek among its victims heroines of 
friendship, filial piety, conjugal affection or maternal 
love. 
Vainly on the marriage day, by the side of love, 
friendship is promised and reserved for old age. Vain- 
ly do love and friendship together swear and make up 
the happiness of life. If vice is first there, all else is 
hopeless.* 
* The lame axiom may be established in morality as » medUl'M 
" Of two aimulumeoua mmiom, the moat powerful Uacum U» 
wsskasL" LETTER XXm 
You will remember, doubtless, the verses in which 
a lady says on the subject of friendship, " that we are 
nothing without the heartshe is in the right-but 
we are also nothing if a wise rule over ourselves does 
not render us worthy of our own esteem as well as that 
of others. " A beautiful woman is, as has often been 
affirmed, the chef-d' oeuvre of nature, but this noble 
work is unfinished," says the author of very excellent 
advice to women, in a little treatise entitled, " The 
Friend of Women if there is anything wanting in 
the soul, and it is to this consideration that the ambition 
of women should be directed. When beauty is added 
to solid merit, it may be said to honor humanity; virtue 
renders a woman more lovely, while beauty in its turn 
adds a new lustre to virtue, which is in a measure per* 
sonified and rendered visible with all her charms in an 
amiable and wise woman." 116 
This alliance appears to exist so naturally, these 
charms are so well suited to virtue, that they are al- 
most always mistaken for her. How unfortunate when 
beauty presents itself alone ! What amiable feelings 
their union would have inspired, and of which honor 
and reason prevent us having any conception. 
And vet, if persons by their actions leave them- 
selves so little self-esteem, if they know themselves to 
possess so little virtue that they dare not even name 
themselves, what consideration can they expect from 
others. For on all occasions, that these unfortunate 
victims are compelled to demand aid, and to explain the 
cause of their sufferings to physicians, they almost al- 
ways do it by letters, which they retain power to write 
and without exposing their names. 
But whither am 1 carried in my advice 1 What ia 
there strange in your being neither esteemed nor ro 
spected 1 
These are not the only feelings to which you have a 
right; you ought also to be honored and cherished- 
cherished ! this word recals to you all the tenderness 
of your parents for you. What grief, what tears, if it 
be decreed that a painful death-young yet , but 
no-this will not be you fate, your own wisdom wil 
long preserve you to their love. 
It has been also said that a beautiful but vicious wo- 
man is a monster, and nothing is more true. She ia 
no chef-d'oeuvre of nature, since she brings into alliance 
things most completely at variance-personal beauty 
with mental ugliness. 
All that is most fitted to charm with all that is ab- 
ject. If we meet with such a woman she cannot do- 
serve our admiration. 
We can only consider her as a lovely plant or a 
beautiful vase escaped from the hands of the graces, 
which in lieu of being filled with exquisite perfumes, 
•nly encloses a dangerous poison. 117 
The honest man, whose first impressions are gen» 
erally favorable, seeks her; but if she be such as ta 
merit the title of monster, in the sense I have just spo 
ken it; that is to say, if she have only beauty without 
manners, she soon discovers that the most fascinating 
charms, even if they be united to the gifts of high birth 
and wit, are far from constituting what is called solid 
merit, or from attracting consideration. 
There was anciently, at Rome, two temples, so dis- 
posed that it was necessary to pass through the first to 
arrive at the second; the first was dedicated to virtue, 
the second to honor. 
In this we can see the actuating motive of their foun- 
ders ; they desired to teach the lesson that there was 
no honor without virtue. 
If the assertion of Bruyere has been considered true, 
up to a certain point, viz; - 
" Caprice is always close to beauty to serve as an 
antidote to her;"-that is to say, to prevent her too 
powerful effect, what must it be when we only meet in 
women with the most absolute insensibility-ill temper, 
ugliness,* immoral conduct, which are almost al 
ways the result of vicious habits; in a word, when we 
meet with women whom we can esteem. 
* Softness and grace of character appeared eo indispensable le 
Plutarch for the happiness of persons united in marriage, that with- 
out them a woman can never trust to her wealth, the no'leness of 
her descent, nor her beauty, but must rely on all that most closely 
affects the heart of her husband; that is to say, in his reception, in 
her manners, and in her conversation; taking care that, as far a* 
possible, nothing shall be unpleasant, disagreeable, or an injury te 
her husband ; but that all should be pleasant, agreeable, and in as- 
tordance with his taste. For just as physicians dread more those 
fevers which are engendered by unseen causes, which are slow and 
gradual in their approach, than those which proceed from apparent 
and manifest causes, so there are often little quarrels and disturban 
cos daily continued between husbat d «nd wife, of which strangers 
know and see nothing, which separates them and more completely 
destroys the happiness of their conjural state than any other cmm 
P8BCKTT8 0N MattUlAOX. 118 
And yet it is indispensable to create esteem, if ws 
wish to please. The esteem accorded to qualities 
which the interest of society has caused to be honored, 
carries with it a favorable prejudice towards those per- 
sons who are characterised by them. 
If w'e bear any esteem towards another, be assured 
that that person pleases in many ways. Individuals ot 
delicate minds, more particularly, have as much need 
to esteem as to admire; it would be impossible for 
them to love without esteem. 
To love and not to esteem are two feelings which 
cannot be separated ; is not the idea of the separate 
existence of these two sentiments repugnant to the 
mind 1 
If it be true that we cannot long love a person who 
has only beauty without mental worth, we are likely to 
love less long a woman whom we cannot esteem. If 
we do not esteem a woman, be assured that no charms 
will be left her-be assured that she will even give us 
cause for dissatisfaction in many other ways ; but a few 
short months and the feeble ties which attached us to 
her will soon have ceased to exist. 
'But how different is she ; how worthy, on the con 
trary, of praise and love is woman, whose lovely face, 
and her whole life, always in accordance with each 
other, had never exhibited but mildness, wisdom and 
innocence; on whose features and in whose eyes we 
can only read the purity and beauty of her soul. She 
speaks, she smiles, she moves: every thing inspires 
confidence and banishes suspicion. 
And how can it be otherwise if she be but a perfect 
assemblage for grace, chastity, candor, and nobleness 
Titus might indeed say of such a woman : 
** Pleat Ln* without art- 
Beauty . c <»ry rirt it -[ find all that*." 119 
Verily such a woman is nature's chef-d'oeuvre, whul 
honest heart would not strive for the possession of such 
supreme happiness. 
If we compare such a lovely life with that of the wo- 
man whom we cannot esteem, it is most truly, the 
lovely shining day in a delicious country compared to 
« most stormy day, making of the same country a field 
of desolation and wretchedness .f 
" King Philip," says Plutarch, " loved a Thessa- 
lian woman who was believed to have bewitched and 
charmed him with sorceries; for this cause his queen 
Olympias contrived to get her into her hands; but 
when she had gazed upon her and considered her 
thoroughly, as she was beautiful and graceful, and as 
her discourse proved that she was well educated and of 
noble extraction, ' away,' she said, ' with all these 
calumnies, for I feel that the charms you use are in 
yourself.' " 
" It is therefore," adds this great moralist, " an in- 
herent knowledge that could teach a legitimately mar- 
ried woman that it was grace, virtue, and tenderness 
only that could win the love of her husband." 
I have said but a little while since, that when even 
a vicious woman unites in her own person the seductive 
charms of beauty with those of the mind, she cannot 
expect any consideration if she do not conciliate es- 
teem. 
Hence are many examples out of a much larger num- 
ber that 1 could have printed. 
History and literature have given you a knowledge 
•f Sappho, born at Lesbos, an island in the JEgeaa 
Sea in Greece. 
She is reputed not to posses the gift of beauty, but 
• Bacine-Tragedy of Berenice - Act 11, acen«2d. 
f Sitnilie u»ed by Kousseau and Zirnmetnian, quoted in the pr«Mb ■ 
inf tetters. 120 
■she was endowed with so great a genius, and sc rare a 
talent for poetical composition, that tho Greeks, who 
were the most civilized nation on the earth, surnamed 
her the tenth muse;* she must, therefore, have acquired 
the greatest esteem and respect. 
And yet she contracted a mad passion for Fhaon, a 
voung Lesbian ; she was not beloved of him, knew not 
how to conquer her passion, nourished it rather than 
endeavor to fight against it. 
And at length, yielding to her despair, she threw 
herself from a rock into the sea, leaving behind her 
but the reputation of a woman of very common moral- 
ity. 
" From Leucadia's promontory 
Flung herself headlong for the Lesbian boy. 
(Ungrateful he to work her euch annoy.) 
Hut time hath, as in sad requital, given 
A branch of laurel to her: and some bard 
Swears that a heather god or goddess gave 
Her swan like wings wherewith to fly to heave*, 
And now at limes, when gloomy tempests roar 
Along the Adriatic, in the wave 
She dips her plumes, and on the wat'ry shore 
Sings, as the love crazed flxpphosung of yore."t 
The Empress Julia, wife of Septimus Severus, placed 
in even more favorable circumstances for obtaining true 
glory, did not succeed better. 
Born in Syria, daughter of a Priest of the Sun, she 
had received from nature a most transcendent mind. 
" As a stateswoman," says Thomas, " she obtained the 
confidence of her husband, who, though he did not love 
her, still governed by her advice. She cultivated lit- 
erature, passed her whole life in acquiring knowledge 
and divided her time between pleasure and business. 
Having men of knowledge in her cabinet, and the mo* 
• Vcyage of A nacbar«l«. 
* Barry Cornwall. 121 
amiable people of Rome in her palace, engaged m ear 
rying out the greatest projects for her throne, she 
obtained a somewhat well-merited celebrity. Under 
the reign of her son, she had the same influence as uj»- 
der her husband. 
But though she had received so many great gifts, 
yet as she did not possess that which should be ths 
first of her sex, and that her philosophy did not bring 
with it morality, she was more boasted of than re 
spected ; and her memory is more brilliant than venei 
ated.* 
A lady of distinguished birth brought her two 
daughters to Ninon de 'Lenclos; her visit was finished, 
and she was about to take her departure ; Ninon, taking 
her on one side, said to her :-" Madame, you have 
done me much honor in bringing to me your daughters; 
but their birth, their fortune, and their beauty, entitle 
them to honorable and advantageous connections; in 
coming to me they may do themselves injury." And 
yet Ninon had exhibited proofs of a rare probity. She 
was possessed of as much elevation of soul as wit and 
beauty. 
She often collected around her the greatest men of 
the age ; the Condes, the Turennes, Vivonne, Villar- 
ceaux, Moliere, La Fontaine, etc. 
Voltaire was presented to her when very young.) 
But she did not possess the proper morality of her sex. 
The generous remark which she made to the lady who 
had brought her daughters, proves she knew how im- 
portant, and w hat a delicate thing, is the reputation of 
women, although she had taken but little care of her 
own ; and it is with reason that Madame de Maintenon 
says in one of her letters,-"nothing requires more 
• Essay on the Character, Manners, and Mental Qualifications W 
(Toman. 
t Condorcet - Life of Voltaire i 122 
■kill than to preserve an irreproachable tharaitet. ' All 
the policy of women, indeed, appears to me contained 
in these few words. It may be replied in favor of Ni- 
non, that she only made this observation to this lady 
because her house was frequented by a great number of 
men. But did not Mesdames Sevigne, De la Fayette, 
La Sabliere, also admit into their social circles Roche- 
fbucault, La Fare, La Fontaine, Racine, and many 
other most amiable men ; and yet would they have an- 
ticipated that young girls must be ruined by merely 
being presented to them ?-No, certainly not. And 
you would neither be compromised or thought little of 
in the society of men who were distinguished for mor- 
ality. 
It is impossible to deny it; Ninon felt truly that her 
own morals could not merit esteem; and that the thou- 
sand amiable qualities which she did possess could not 
make up for that failing.* 
It is said that the Marchioness of Lambert had thia 
celebrated woman present in her mind when she said 
to her daughter, in the little treatise entitled " Advice 
to My Daughter,"-" You have two inflexible tribu- 
nals before whom you must constantly appear-Consci- 
ence and the World. You may escape the wo'ld, but 
you will not escape your conscience : to yourself you 
owe the testimony of your honor." 
Young people, then, cannot attach themselves too 
strongly to chastity, which gives them the right of 
self-esteem, w hich renders them so amiable, which pro- 
cures for them the highest consideration ; and, on the 
contrary, avoid all that even fora moment would expose 
their morals to corruption. 
• If we may judge from a letter inserted in the works of Saint 
Erremont, she found no more happiness in the mode of life she had 
adopted, than esteem. She confesses, in this letter, that she was 
■ever happy ; and to give greater assurance of it, she adds-" If such 
• life had beer, proposed to me, I wou.d have hung inyeelC" 123 
Chastity is secret modesty ; forgetfulness of it lead* 
to that of all modesty ; and those men vv nose judgment 
from the earliest ages has had the gieatest weight, 
have ever spoken of it as the most honorable and sa- 
cred thing. Aristotle, Galen, Plutarch, Valeriola, 
who were all philosophers, historians, or physicians, 
all agree in saying, that where it exists in young men, 
it appears to indicate a particularly honorable feeling ; 
that it is a proof of a nature full of promise for the fu- 
ture ; others call it the armament of life ; and Cicero, 
the guardian of all the virtues. 
A king of France said, that if honor was banished 
from all the rest of the earth, it ought to be found in 
the heart of kings.* 
It appears to me that it may also be said, " If chas« 
tity could abandon the rest of the earth, it ought to be 
most surely discovered among women.§ 
It must also be allowed, that if among men the point 
of honor consists in valor and probity, it consists among 
women in decency and chastity. 
But I pause here; I have spoken enough of es- 
teem to persons to whom it will be accorded in the 
highest degree, and of decency, to decency itself. 
• An expression said to ba very common with John, King ot 
France, surnamed the Good 
J I cannot avoid, in this place recorning a most remarkable attach* 
ment to modesty, exceedingly honorable to the female character. 1 
was called, in 1815. to a young girl attacked with gastritis, which 
had been preceded by a suiiden cessation of the flow of milk. The 
disease advanced so rapidly towards an unfavorable termination, 
notwithstanding all the prudence and xeal with which it was com- 
batted by myself and colleagues, that in a very few days the patient 
could not rise or be raised ; black and dry tongue came on, and she 
had no longer strength to open her eyes or put out her tongue. Shs 
lay on her back, ma le no reply to any one, appeared to hear noth- 
ing; the sensibility ot the skin was almost extinguished. With the 
Intention of rousing her, and of recalling life-so ready to escape- 
by exciting the last sparks which might yet remain, I advised the 
application of rapidly acting blisters on the legs, the inei4e of the 
tbtghs, and the soles of the feet They were first placed on he legal the patient appeared utterly indifferent to them, they produced ne 
appreciable effect. We prepared to place fresh ones on the second 
region to which I hare above alluded, namely, the thighs: the body- 
linen which covered them was raised, in order that the blistering 
plasters might be applied.-How was I struck with astonishment I 
This patient, who for ninny days appeared to hear nothing, who 
had not the power to raise her eyelids, who constantly remained in 
one position, in whom even the skin only retained a semi vitality- 
•jrider the action of the rubefacients which were brought into con- 
tact with it,-this patient contracted her fingers immediately over 
that part of her clothing on which they were resting, held it fast, 
opposed several times her weak hand to those which desired te call 
her back to life. This most unexpected circumstance recalled hope 
to our hearts; we perceived, with joy. these feeble movements or 
»ur patient, the only ones she bad exhibited for many days: we 
took every precaution relative to the fear she thus silently expressed, 
and yet we were compelled to carry out the plan of treatment, in 
the hope of saving her. But we deceived ourselves; there absolutely 
remained in this interesting state, nothing but the feeling of modes- 
ty ; that alone had outlived all others: the fresh blisters found no 
vital spark to rally ; when removed, a very slight redness only o< 
ths skin had been produced. This was in ths evening - the m* 
at dawn, the patient was no more* 
124 LETTER XXIV, 
Riligion, no lees than reason, condemns the habits ot 
solitudinarians. She requires the constant exercise of 
all the virtues. The habits spoken of are but the re- 
sults of the most horrible and condemnable weak- 
nesses. 
Religion requires of every one to preserve, as far 
as depends on ourselves, the gift of life which has been 
made to us by the Author of Nature. When it occurs 
that a young person, dying from a perseverance in these 
vicious habits, leaves her friends to deplore her death, 
brought on by her own free will, I fancy I hear the 
Author of Natuoe, when this unfortunate girl appears 
at his tribunal, ask of her wrhat had become of the in- 
nocence and purity with which He had adorned her, 
as well as with the charms which he had been willing 
to give her with so much munificence? 
All things, even to her funeral obsequies, appear to 
speak loudly of the penalty reserved for such habits ; 
not that we need add to the vengeance of Nature-she 
has been severe enough already ; but truth appears to 
interdict the crown of lilies and white roses always 
destined for the tomb of virginity. We may not even 
depose upon her last resting place the branch of myrtle 
destined for the tomb of the youthful bride-for she 
has never known marriage. A gloomy scabino grow- 
ing beside it as though out of pity, will announce per- 
naps that a single tear may be shed for her. 
Happy the girl who is truly pious and truly wise ' 
the future will smile on her, even as the present. i>rrrER xxv 
Th* youthfu. solitudinarian, th' , »nows nchappinem, 
Every day does she wander from it. Once deprived of 
all the gifts of Nature-when once there is no return 
to cure nor to the restraint of the will, and there is a 
limit to both-how can she be happy ? Can it be 
making herself the pride and ornament of her family ? 
No! for she has neither wealth, beauty, mental ac- 
complishments, nor virtue. Can it be by exemplary 
piety 1 She possesses not sufficient to sacrifice the 
weakness so dangerous to herself. Her vice is the god 
which entirely occupies her thoughts. Can it be by a 
brilliant alliance? What man of worth would deign to 
seek her, ill and bowed down by infirmities ? Is it re- 
served to her to give birth to lovely children ? No! for 
if, before she falls a sacrifice to her fatal passion, a 
tMiiu snouiu demand of her the happi ness of becoming 
a father, he will in all probability but have the misery 
of being so, a misery which she must also feel, for the 
same day will shine npon the birth and the sad destiny 
of her children-too weak to struggle against the new 
elements amidst which they will henceforth have to 
struggle, or at least to live exempt from infirmities.* 
What signs, as I have already told you, had, it is 
true given fear to your parents (you were so dear to 
them) that you might one day be reduced to such a 
state of misery. But was not this fear but the result oi 
error ? 
On the contrary, you will in your turn fulfill with 
all that satisfaction that follows them, the duties of * 
loving and watchful mother: 
" Ere yet her child has drawn its earliest breath 
A mother's love begins-it glows till death; 
\ives before life, with death not dies, but seems 
The very substance of immortal dreams." 
But what evils would have followed such a fault! 
How dearly would it have cost you ! What other m»« 127 
temal pleasures do not exist, which you could not hare 
tasted! To the gift cf life which you would have 
made to your child, how could you have added that of 
a strengthening and salutary nourishment! What bo- 
som, what proper milk could you have offered him, 
what strength could you have communicated to him, 
who were yourself always suffering ? Whilst we ob- 
serve virtuous mothers acquire, during lactation, charrz 
which they did not possess before,f as though Nature 
had reserved them to make them one day the amiable 
and just recompense for their excellent conduct and ten- 
derness. Under such an error, you could not have 
poured out your love for your offspring in tender cares- 
ses ; without virtue or merit of your own, how could 
you have brought them up 1 Finally, if nothing of this 
kind could have destroyed in you the feelings of a good 
mother, of a good wife, you would have been indeed to 
be pitied, since the very means of accomplishment was 
denied you. 
Not only would you have been deprived, by your 
crime and the destruction of your health, these inno- 
cent objects of your life, from long enjoying the bles- 
sing of life ; but you yourself, already bearing in your 
bosom a disease of your lungs, death, pale death march- 
ing with you to the temple of Hymen, beneath pompous 
habits, to the torch of this god, to this garland so flat- 
tering to the hearts of mothers, would have added hia 
miserable symptoms; and in despair, having scarcely 
the time to press your in his arms, your husband, his 
eyes filled with tears, bis hands still clasping the flowers 
intended for quite another use, your husband, your un- 
happy husband, would have been compelled to exclaim 
over your tomb, his breast heaving with sighs, his eyes 
tamed towards heaven- 
I thought to ting a *org of joy, 
But nil my j' y is flown ; 
Thus dofR the tiling blast destroy, 
Th* rtoo rally blown 
It loads th* air with odorous breath, 
Boaeaih tue cheering tun, 128 
Bat night's cold winds assured its death, 
When this bright course is run.''* 
But this mournful hymn, though well worthy of 
you, will not yet be heard ; nuptials which will bo 
celebrated under happier auspices, where reason, 
the graces, and happiness will forever bind Hy- 
men and Love with bands of flowers ; delicious 
nuptials await you; your husband, like Pliny, will 
write to the authors of your mutual felicity-that 
is to say, from the parents from whom he will have 
xceived you-" We thank you-I, that she is my 
wife ; she, that I am her husband ; both, that you 
have united two persons formed for one another."! 
Your husband too, will never have experienced 
from you any other grief than that of having lost 
you ; if, after a long wedded life you go first to 
await him in eternity. 
But if those, who like you, have been so favored 
by Nature, have nevertheless, need of so much 
wisdom and good qualities, both of head and 
heart, how much ought they who appear, on the 
contrary, to have been forgotten ; to be, so to 
speak, orphans of Nature, ought they not to en- 
deavor to obtain from constant watchfulness those 
charms and those means of pleasing which have 
been refused them. 
Socrates was accustomed to advise those young 
men who gazed at themselves in mirrors, if they 
were ugly, to alter that by virtue ; and if they 
were handsome, not to soil their beauty by vice. 
• GrHset.-Epistle to & lady to console her for the loss of a pioua 
daughter. 
f I'liny th* younger to his aunt, Letter 19. Book IV. 129 
" And in the same way it would be honest," says 
Plutarch, " if the married woman, when she holds 
her mirror in her hand, would thus speak to her- 
self if she be plain-' What should I have been, 
if I had been wicked also ?' And if she be hand- 
some, ' What would have been my value if I had 
not been noble and chaste?' For if plainness of 
features is loved for its grace and good morals, 
that is much more honor than if it were for beauty." 
"If friendship," as the Marchioness Lambert 
has said, " is the reward of virtuous love, marriage 
is, in general, if not always, the recompense of 
virtuous youth." 
Esteem as frequently draws tighter the bonds of 
that happy social compact (marriage) as immorali- 
ty breaks them. Daily may we see women, de- 
prived of the advantages of beauty, inspire strong 
and double passions, because they deserve and 
give rise to esteem, and thus justify that lovely 
sentiment of one of the ancients, " Zeuxis, would 
have presented me with a perfect beauty, the 
masterpiece of his pencil, but I love better to con- 
template the virtue of a woman.* 
" You are not born without agreeable qualities," 
said the Marchioness Lambert to her daughter, 
" but you are not a beauty, this should induce you 
to make a provision of meiit." 
The women then who have not received grace, 
or wisdom, or charms of face, nor the precious fas- 
cinations of virtue and morality are as much to lx 
pitied as those who are only beautiful. 
• X»nophon, Acouom, Word* of Ischonaachus to SocritM. 130 
It has been remarked that after a certain age, 
women live much longer than men. * Those who 
escape the dangers which ordinarily accompany 
that age, may almost rely on about eighty years. 
Now, if a young girl, whose morals become corrupt 
at eighteen or twenty years does not fall beneath 
them, or drag out a weary existence, overburdened 
with infirmities, for the sixty years which may 
belong to her, she must thank destiny, for her laws 
have been changed for her. 
I shall terminate all that I proposed to say to you 
in these letters on the dangers of vicious habits, 
with that illustrious homage rendered to morality 
of all kind by the presidentess de Brission, in her 
eulogium of Madame de Sevigne. "How easy is 
it," says the lady orator, to be happy with simple 
manners, and how sweet it is to find happi- 
ness in the love of our duties, in study, in toil. 
Amiable sex ! who pass your lives in a dissipa- 
tion miscalled pleasure, and who destroy your 
sensibility by exhausting all frivolous amusements. 
Are you ignorant that there is a bright and sacred 
joy which ever satisfies the soul and never dis- 
gusts, the joy of self esteem. Ah, if ever you 
shut yourself up in a circle of fruitless distrac- 
tions or capricious opinions, you will lose your 
best rights, and your empire will be destroyed. 
• Although the village of Clery, in Clermrmtois. contained only 
twenty-five inhabitants, there were at the close of the year 1768, 
twelve persons in good health, who between them reckoned nine 
hundred and ninety-three years, two months. Of these there were 
three men and nine women."-Journal £>tcj/cloj)edij'ie. See Kich- 
erund's I'hisology, vol. 2. 131 
Aspire, rather, at the same time, to give a tone 
to manners, customs, and tastes. Observation, my 
young patient, will show you the excellence of 
such advice." * 
♦ Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, that philosophic emperor, whoso 
rank and power gave him so excellent an opportunity of appreciating 
What ia called HarriSESS of voluptuarians and real joys, which are 
the offspring of virtue and simplicity of manners ; this prince, who 
was himself so virtuous, to whom the love and gratitude of the Roman 
people erected a temple, and of whom it was asserted that his friends 
divided his tablets at his death, whose leaves were regarded as pre- 
cious and sacred relics. Marcus Aurelius conceived simplicity of 
manners and chastity so important to happiness, that the finest axiom 
relative thereunto, meet us every moment in his " Collection of 
Thoughts. 
"The love of pleasure is often an illusion to us ; but examine 
well, if we do not derive more satisfaction from nobility and tran- 
quility of the soul, liberty, simplicity, and sanctity of manners."- 
Chapter 18. 
" Ornament your soul with humility, chastity, and indifference is 
everything neither good nor bad."-Chap. 27, par. 1. 
"Tou will soon die, and you have not yet attained morality,"- 
Ibid. par. 0. 
"Silence yonr imagination, restrain your desires, avoid covetuoua- 
ness, let your heart be master over itself."-Ibid. par. 12. 
"Let ao man be able to say of you that you are not humble nor 
honorable. Give the lie to whom shall entertain such an opinion ; 
for all depends on yourself. Should any persuade you to renounce 
humility, or should prevent you from being good, only muster up a 
strong resolution rather to renounce life than virtue ; for reason 
permits nothing else."-Ibid. par. 16. 
''Avoid thinking yourself superior to all law, like the vicious em- 
perors ; take care you are not w recked, there are too many examples 
Persist then in desiring to be humble, good, moral grave, an enemy 
to foolish jesting, just, religious, benevolent, humane and firm in 
the practice of your duties ; make constant efforts to become what 
philosophy will render you Venerate the gods and become service- 
able to men, life is short, the only advantage in living on is in living 
there in sanctity and being of utility to society."-Ibid. par. 22. 
" Purify your imagination ''-Par. 33. 
" They slay, they massacre, they curse their emperors. Will thia 
firevent me from preserving a pure heart, wisdom, moderation and 
ustice ; just as a stream of pure and clear water, which a passer-by 
ehoses to curse, continues still to offer a salutary draught to him. 
What would you do to be able to have within yourself an inperish- 
able stream of happiness You will have it if you ever cultivate in 
Sour heart a love of liberty ot benevolence, of simplicity and chast- 
iy."-Chap. 29, par. 11, 132 
LETTERS TO MADAME * * ♦ 
LETTER I. 
Madame,-It is not sufficient, as you tell mo, to 
have saved from a great danger one of your 
daughters ; you ask me now, how you can for the 
future prevent a similar evil from attending your 
other children ? 
This solicitude is honorable to you. Nothing 
more merits praise than the attention of a mother 
to keep and to bring up her children in the way of 
virtue. No ; it is not sufficient to love them ; you 
must be vigilant; your love must shed a light 
upon your duty; and the latter, in its turn, must 
aid your love. 
I shall on this subject give you all the advice in 
my power. 
1 he vice to which we refer, frequently commen- 
ces at a very early age, that is to say, sometimes 
exists in young girls who would appear most un- 
likely subjects for it. 
Many ages back, the father of medicine remark- 
ed that children was subject to a species of itching, 
" Yes, what is respected moat in thia life is vanity, littleness, 
fashion. Faith, chastity, justice truth, have quitted ths earth ant 
winged their way to heaven."-Chap. 33, pur. 20. 133 
or burning of the sexual organs. ITe even noticed 
it as one of the peculiarities of their age.* 
I- have heard it said by a very high physician, 
that imprudent nurses, who were ignorant of the 
danger of these unnatural irritations, had often 
declared to him that, taking advantage of this fact 
noticed by the father of medicine, they frequently 
had recourse to such practices to still the cries of 
their little charges. 
Sabatier, whom Petit justly calls the Nestor of 
the French surgery, and to whom he had written, 
when he proposed to direct the attention of young 
people to the tomb of Monte Cindre, to entreat him 
to acquaint him with the observations with which 
his long career in the art of cure had furnished him, 
touching solitary habits. Sabatier, I say, replied 
thus, amongst other things, to Petit: The most 
frequent and terrible results of this vice that I have 
seen, have been curvatures and distortions of the 
spine. My opinion has always been regarded as 
erroneous, on account of the youth of the sufferers; 
I know, from many recent confessions, that many 
have given away to it before the sixth year of their 
age." And he adds, that a young girl of this age, 
presented him with a frightful example thereof. 
This young girl, twice cured by Doctor Moulot, 
• After haring detailed the affections of children of an early age. 
Hippocrates say, "Simioribus antem fientibus. tonsilla, verticil li 
in occipitio, intro luxationes, anhelationes calculorom generation** 
himbrici rutundi, ascaiides, seiructe, triniores glanduiarum circe 
aure* oblougi, urtyriasmi, tlvucuue st alia tubercula laaxiipa vart 
prHicta. 134 
and who at length fell a victim, was eight years 
old. (Preceding Letters.) 
According to Doctor Campe, there died of this 
cause in the town of , a child of nine years, 
after having become also blind. 
Tissot cites many very young victims. 
Professor Moreau says, that he has had the 
opportunity of observing two little girls of seven 
years, whom a culpable negligence had left to 
indulge in solitary excitement, whose frequency 
and excess ultimately brought on exhaustion and 
consumption 
Lastly, I have myself seen, in the children's 
hospital at Paris, in 1812, a little girl of seven 
years old, who gave herself up to this habit to the 
greatest extent. She was deprived of nearly all 
her intellectual faculties. 
Age, therefore, must not deceive you. There is 
no age in fact, which may not present us with 
examples of this imprudence. It is frequently 
observed in adolescence, at the period when nature 
is laboring for the development of the body ; and 
again, when secretly she is preparing the organs 
of fecundity; and how pernicious it must be in 
these two last instances. We observe this in 
youth and the following ages. 
Its first cause is in the natural constitution ; it 
is truly in them a physical failing. With others, 
it is an acquired depravity ; it is a fault converted 
into a habit, and, consequently, into a vice. 
With others, again, this imprudence is the result 
of a disease more powerful than reason, and in this 135 
case, perhaps, only deserves the name of weakness. 
Lastly, there are those with whom this excess 
becomes the most deplorable, as well as the most 
humiliating of all evils, by whom it has been spon- 
taneously sought, or brought on by chance cause. 
In all cases, however, what is it but a species of 
madness ? But, whatever name we may apply to 
this great evil, it is a matter of moment to prevent 
and stop it. 
You have not waited for this advice, so much 
are you attracted by the liveliest motives ; and you 
have made to yourself these austere reflections:- 
that the indifferent and careless mother, who neg- 
lects those things which one day may be of the 
greatest importance to the morality of her daught- 
er, is the direct cause of her destruction, and, if 
the expression may be allowed, makes the first 
attempt against her honor. 
Alas! if filial piety does not recognise the ne- 
cessity of respecting and cherishing their parents, 
when they are rather to be pitied than blamed, do 
not those, who by a culpable carelessness allow 
their children to fall to vice which must ruin them, 
expose themselves one day to hear the despairing 
cry of their child, who perished from the crime:- 
Woe to her who destroyed me! woe to her that 
destroyed me!'" 
" How barbarous!" will another unfortunate 
more calmly exclaim; " the parents, the masters, 
the friends, who did not warn me of the danger to 
which this vice leads " 
It is so indisputable a fact, that the happinew 136 
of children depends on the attention paid to keep 
them in innocence and virtue ; that we frequently 
hear in society, young persons who were born to 
be estimable woman, complain, and express the 
greatest regret at their neglect of knowledge and 
morality after the loss of the mother, who would, 
doubtless, have inculcated their laws, and exclaim 
that they have lost all when they lost their mother. 
I have heard such a complaint. I have heard it 
from the mouth of a young lady, twenty-two 
years of age: " Alas! my mother, my poor 
mother; I lost all when I lost my mother !" cx- 
exclaimcd she ; confessing by these words that, 
had Heaven preserved her, she would have watch- 
ed over, and kept her from a crime which had in 
fact decided her doom. 
Is it criminal thus to regret virtue ? A mother, 
negligent on this point, is so much the more rep- 
rehensible, since, generally, everything smites 
against the innocence of her daughter: hei heart, 
her inexperience, and perfidious advice. 
The loss of that gem of price, innocence, or 
virtue, always follows closely on the habit concern- 
ing which you seek my advice, that you may watch, 
like a worthy mother, over the purity of your 
children. It lights up in young persons the most 
imperious and tempestuous passions. It, in a 
measure, brings puberty in infancy, and what a 
forture is promised by such a derangement of ages! 
That of possessing no youth, as I have already 
• Latter* published by Dr. DoHiialn DubrouU. 137 
shown; after having had no infancy, that of eter- 
nal celibacy, or the not less horrible destiny of 
being infallibly the victims of husbands who do 
not love them, for the reason that they are without 
charm or attraction for him. For, according to 
the very just reflections of a learned physician: 
t: In order that a woman shall be the true com- 
panion of man, that she may ensure to herself that 
loving empire over her family, which Nature wills 
that she should have, it is neccessary that all her 
faculties should have had the opportunity of ma- 
turing themselves by observation, by experience, 
and by reflection ; it is necessary that by nature 
she should have gone over all that chain of im- 
pressions, whose entire forms, if I may so express 
myself, the true provision for the voyage of life. 
Without this, passing from premature adolescence 
to an old age still more premature, there is scarcely 
any interval between the childishness of the first 
age and that of the last; and in both she is equally 
a stranger to the true blessings of life; she only 
knows its bitterness and sorrow." 
The natural arrival of purberty, on the contrary, 
leaves to the body both the time and means *0 
perfect itself, to offer itself such as it should Je 
found, and to bring with it, as a recompense, vi- 
gor, energy, and so to speak, & freshness of feting 
(another expression of the phiolsophcr I have just 
quoted), from which the whole life obtain iia 
happiness. 138 
LETTER II. 
The signs which would betray the habit of im- 
proper irritation in children of a tender age, have 
not I believe, attracted much the attention of 
physicians, and the effect of such irritation on 
such young subjectsis not generally known. The 
precaution of occasionally visiting those tender 
beings during their sleep, and the forbidding nurses 
or servants to whom they are entrusted, to allow 
them, under any pretence, to irritate themselves in 
the manner of which I shall speak : such are near- 
ly the only means for preventing in their origin a 
habit which, insignificant in appearance at first, 
may in the end produce the most melancholy con- 
sequences, 
But the .same is not the case in the more ad- 
vanced stages of life ; numberless signs announce 
the fatal habits; its results are as evident as they 
are terrible ; and the difficulty of its cure demands 
much care and much art. Warm climates, a too 
liberal diet, an unoccupied life, and certain tem- 
peraments, predispose to it. 
Peculiarity of constitution, the mode of life, and 
temperament, are the fields for all the passions. 
They there are sown, there they abound, there they 
develop with all their energy, or only show them- 
selves there rarely or feebly, according to whether 
their soil is or is not propitious. 
The efieot of this natural law may in truth bs 
advantageously modified by education, religion, 139 
habit, and the example of virtue, and by a proper 
mode of living, but this law exists none the less. 
Three species of temperament appear particu- 
larly to dispel the most seductive as well as the 
most dangerous of the passions, and consequently 
to its excesses, its errors, and consequently the 
error of solitude. 
The first is in the female, (of whom I particu- 
larly speak here); and is that which physicians 
have named the uterine temperament. This tem- 
perament results from the influence of the organ 
of gestation, over the physical and moral habits- 
particular predilections,'sometimes only give us 
notice of it. 
The second; is the sanguine bilious tempera- 
ment ; the third, the sanguine melancholic. 
Beauty or plainness, tallness or shortness of 
stature are not part cularly peculiar to either of 
these two latter temperaments. With regard to 
the signs which characterize them, (I only speak 
of females,) the female of sanguine bilious tem- 
perament has blonde or chestnut hair, blue or light 
brown eyes, a quick and bold gaze, full face, 
cheeks and lips highly colored, teeth good, and 
well disposed, and covered with so pure an enamel 
as nothing seems to tarnish; the bosom is well 
formed and developed, without being too much so; 
her body and limbs unite flexibility with strength, 
her hips are far apart, her physiognomy announ- 
ces health, vivacity, gaiety, candor, generosity, 
wit, and the love of pleasure; but at the same 
time an aptitude for useful and serious occupa- 140 
dons ; but little disposition for grief, and power to 
support it, without, however, being insensible to 
it, if she finds that she must meet it. 
Thus, by the happy alliance that nature has 
made, in her advantages of the simple bilious tem- 
perament, with those of the simple sanguine, the 
virtues the most important to society, the condi- 
tions most necessary for her happiness form her 
portion. 
The female or young girl destined to live under 
the influence of the sanguine melancholic temper- 
ament, has received from nature, brown or black 
hair, eyebrows, and large eyes, also either brown 
or black. The eyes are usually somewhat set in 
their orbits, and not prominent or on a level with 
the face. The color of the features is much less 
than in the preceding case; her skin seems of a 
mere loose tissue, of a less lively tint, sometimes 
of the color of milk, which contains a certain 
quantity of water, at other times, somewhat dull, 
her face is rather thin than full and oftener oval 
than round, ordinarily, she has neither too much 
or too little of embonpoint, nevertheless, her 
"bosom is usually more fully developed ; the periodi- 
cal evacuations are longer and more abundant with 
her than with those of the sanguine bilious tem- 
perament, because, according to physicians, sho 
perspires more than the latter; she is as witty as 
the other, but she makes use of this gift less fre- 
quently and less familiarly. Genius, with her is 
often united to wit; on her countenance we may 
read that she possesses both; we read too, there 141 
the elevation of feeling and the predominance of 
reason, and her heart, in fact, generally possess 
them. She has graces, but they are of noble qual- 
ity, more severe than lively, more reserved and 
sentimental than brilliant, very sensitive, very irri- 
table ; modesty, circumspection and high feeling 
always accompany her ; nothing appears to her a 
greater happiness than to love and to be loved with 
all the powers of the soul, without end or change ; 
she is fidelity itself, she is all love and yet there 
are none who so tardily give away their affections, 
or are so wary of confidence ; none fear to be de- 
ceived or abandoned more than she ; none would 
be more deeply nor more profoundly affected. In 
grief, her sorrows are more silent than expressed, 
her gaze pierces the very depths of her heart. 
Without principle, without education, or in the 
road to vice ; a person of this character does not 
pause at ordinary faults-on the other hand, when 
favored by a virtuous education she is not half 
virtuous, she is the honor of humanity. 
But how dearly does nature sell her these great 
advantages. If reason or other favorable circum- 
Btances do not promptly come to her aid in the 
various adversities of life, no one more easily suf- 
fers the violent attacks of despair. If she be not 
properly educated in religion, no one more easily 
passes the limits of veritable piety ; lastly, no kind 
of organization appears more likely to produce the 
vice of which I am writing, than this sanguine 
melancholic temperament. 
Nevertheless, nature, without ceasing to be the 142 
came, presents itself under so many forms, that we 
frequently cannot recognise it without a constant 
habit of observation. 
Assisted by fatal circumstances, the solitary vico 
may also take its victims from amongst those of 
other temperaments than those I have just des- 
cribed ; certain climates, the mode of living, some 
species of temperament, are in truth causes which 
may predispose to dangerous secret habits; although 
these causes may be insufficient of themselves to 
produce them ; but there are others who gave the 
fatal impulse ; these are the corrupt advisers, the 
criminal seducer of miserable wretches, who are 
themselves a prey to them, and whose destiny ap- 
pears to be corrupt, and to be corrupted. 
But from whatever cause the crime originates, 
these are the ordinary signs by which we may re- 
cognise them. 
The young girl who gives way to it loses her 
color, grows emaciated, does not increse in propor- 
tion to her age ; from time to time she complains, 
of pains in the chest, stomach and back ; of las- 
situde, without there being any known cause to 
give rise to such symptoms. She grows weak, her 
color alters more and more; her eyes, mouth, 
her walk, her mode of speaking, all her features, all 
her carriage in fact bespeak languor and indiffer- 
ence. Menstruation comes on either too much 
or too little, amidst nervous affections, and other 
serious derangements of health, with which it 
would not have been accompanied if the patient 
had been moral in her conduct; the periods of this 143 
periodical evacuation are prolonged or become too 
frequent; sometimes, they are changed into true 
haemorrhages, and generally are much more in 
quantity than ordinarily. From this may result in 
a longer or shorter period of time, an habitual 
deranged State of the womb, and consequently a 
sufficient cause for all the affections or accidents to 
which this organ is liable.* Some solitudinarians 
save nervous affections, blue devils, pains in the 
lower part of the belly, and the whites ; their eyes 
appear sunk; they are encircled with a black ring, 
sometimes they approach to that state which we 
call strabismus, or appear improperly turned from 
the alteration of the nerves which are distributed 
to the muscles which move them-in fact they 
partially squint; all their face assumes a sombre 
aspect, an old and care-worn expression; from 
weakness they cannot hold themselves upright; 
at other times their body does really curve, at first 
insensibly, but afterwards very manifestly; they 
have fever, their hands are almost always damp 
with perspiration, burning, or else icy cold; in the 
end they become dry, cracky, trembling and with- 
out power; their arms are characterized by the 
same peculiarities; the skin is rigid and crepitant; 
they daily lose that soft and elastic roundness 
which one feels in touching the skin of persons 
• Alphonse Servi, remark* in hi* excellent Treatise on t\e lou of 
Bleed that when menstruation u excessive in young girls, it is of 
great importance not to allow this affection to establish itself, for 
that it may in the end, be productive of sterility or abortion.-Zea- 
km on tke Lost Blood, pape 1, and seq. 144 
who enjoy health; they are also often bathed in 
perspiration during the whole night. 
The teeth of some break ; the enamil looks as if 
it were cracked, or it is broken into small notches 
like those of a fine saw, results of their close 
pressure and grinding one against another, oc- 
casioned by the convulsions which almost always 
accompany the acts of solitary indulgence. 
This grinding of the teeth, sometimes takes place 
with a very great noise. One of the patients whose 
history I have reported in the former letters, and 
whom I shall designate under the title of the bath 
patient, exhibited this peculiarity in an extreme 
degree, in the convulsions which came on every 
moment, that one could not listen to it without 
shivering. 
Everything bespeaks in these persons exhaus- 
tion,and is indicative of sadness, ennui, and disgust, 
they are timid ; but it is not the amiable timidity 
of modestity and chastity, which is very different 
from what they display. 
The timidity natural to a young person is an 
ornament to her-theirs overwhelms them; they 
are more confused than timid, nothing pleases or 
interests them, neither the society of their relations 
or companions, nor dancing, nor the occupations of 
their sex and age. Repose, indolence, and soli- 
tude, of which they are at once the sad lovers and 
victims, alone have charms for them. Not only do 
we not observe in them a desire for marriage, but 
on the contrary, wc remark a prejudice against that 
happy state, so conformable to the laws of nature, 145 
•nd the weakness of women, who appear so much 
to need support. Numberless pustules sometimes 
make their appearance and inscribe in hideous 
characters their passions on their brow, when one 
would only expect to read soft modesty and decent 
amiability. 
They frequently avoid the gaze of visitors ; they 
are often embarrassed when one suddenly ap- 
proaches them. ' 
There are others on the contrary in whom this 
habit inspires a determined love for the most dis- 
sipated life, and who plunge into the most fearful 
debaucheries. 
These unhappy persons do not certainly always 
present all the symptoms I have enumerated. 
There are many, as is the case in other diseases, 
who do not exhibit always, or in so marked a man- 
ner, all the symptoms of this morbid state into 
which they are not a whit the less brought; but the 
appearance of the symptoms, the long catalogue of 
which I have just traced, ought to be sufficient to 
call the attention of a mother who knows the ex- 
tent of her Holy Ministry ; and her vigilance will 
soon tell her whether her daugher is still virtuous. 
But I ought not to omit to say also, that though 
solitary vice can give rise to the alterations of 
health, and present all the symptoms which I have 
named, they may also be the result of many af- 
fections, altogether independent of this predilec- 
tion. Convulsions, determined by worms, natural 
attacks of hysteria, and many other causes can for 
example be the cause of rupture and grinding of 146 
th® teeth, or of inequalities in their edges, but 
some notice should always be taken of them until 
we are are assured of their true cause. 
A mother cannot therefore have too much pru- 
dence in verifying her suspicions, by herself watch- 
ing her daughter, or consulting a physician. 
Sometimes a disease and the fatal habit may to- 
gether threaten the life of a young girl; the danger 
is then still greater-let her parents hasten to reme- 
dy both the disease and the habit, or else let them 
prepare her fuperal. , 
This complication has often been the cause of 
the inutility of medical skill and fruitless regrets. 
But if the fatal habit exist-how may we suc- 
ceed in destroying it ? I will reply to this question 
in succeeding letters. 
LETTER II. 
I shall only speak in this place, Madame, of the 
moral and bygeinic means, by the aid of which the 
mother of a family may eave her daughter from 
the peril in which I have supposed her to be ; for 
these are the cnly means to which she can conve- 
niently have recourse. From what I have already 
told you in one of my preceding letters, as the 
kind of constitution with which a young girl is 
gifted, may prove the first cause of her passion, it 
is important in the first place to get her under the 
most favorable conditions for the design conceived. 
In fact, if the young solitudinarian is particularly 
remarkable for one of the temperaments I have de- 147 
scribed, if she owe her error to that, what can we 
reasonably expect from morality alone, against a 
passion, or to speak more correctly, against an 
affection whose source is in, and may be exclusive- 
ly in, the physical organization ? We may employ 
in vain, to obtain the desired result, observations, 
reproaches and entreaties of all kinds; in vain in 
such entreaties may we cite the most convincing 
examples ; if we do not endeavor to quiet the fluids, 
to bring back the sensibility of the nerves to a 
more moderate type, the passion will certainly re- 
main, spite of all the moral powers called in to op- 
pose it.* 
I do not deny that religion and morality may 
exercise the most powerful and useful influences on 
the passions; but I beseech you to remark, that 
religion and morality will most generally be power- 
• Are not the different physical constitutions and the different mo- 
ral qualities of man, at the different epoch's of his life, incontestable 
proofs of the influence of organization on the origin of the passions, 
Feeble and lymphatic infancy is timid and without virtue; fiery 
youth is affectionate and courageous ; mature age, called the age of 
consistency, is judicious and ambitious ; cold old age observes and 
judges; the patriarch, arrived at the extreme of life, withered and 
debilitated, is as fearful and unfitted for the labor of the mind, as 
Infancy. We rarely view men with such privileges as Sophocles, 
Saint Evremond, Fontenelle, and Voltaire The greatness of soul 
Which distinguished these men is no more the due of the centenarian 
than vigor of body. I do not believe, either, that we have ever seen 
two examples like that of the .King of Portugal, who, in person, at the 
age of ninety, gained a victory in which fifty thousand of his enemies 
for ever bit the dust. A man was yesterday a sage, to-day he is a 
fanatic ; and why ? A burning bilious fever has seized him. or per- 
haps a very slight portion of one of the membranes is slightly injec* 
ted, and this injection cannot be even seen after death. (Vepftr de 
Apoplexia, Morgagioi, Epistle 7.) And, lastly, how often has been es- 
tablished the dependence of the passions and habits on constitution 
since the immortal " Treatise on Air, Water, and Localities," up to 
our own days. 148 
less, if medicine-to which, besides, morality is so 
closely united-did not prepare the way for their 
triumph, by first giving her advice as to the mode 
of modifying the temperament. 
W e cannot easily changea primitive organiza- 
tion, but we may hope to amend it by time and 
necessary care ; and we have always this advan- 
tage, in doing what is necessary, that if we do 
not evidently change a constitution already vicious, 
we may at least set some bounds to its influence 
and excitements. 
The different antiphrodisacs, so puffed up by 
some persons, have rather been vaunted by credu- 
lity than from prudence and experience. They do 
not moderate the temperament, they destroy it; 
they do not regulate Nature, they stifle her. If we 
have recourse to them, save to prevent very great 
evils, their use may give rise to others no less se- 
rious. 
When, then, in a young solitudinarian, all an- 
nounces that predominance of the uterine, sangui- 
no-bilious, or sanguino-melancholic disposition, wo 
ought to renounce almost absolutely the employ- 
ment of the dangerous preparations of lead, opium, 
aconite, hemlock, and all of this class. These sub- 
stances, act through the brain, exercising over it, 
the heart, and the general system, the most nox- 
ious influence. 
Bleeding, judiciously employed-that is to say. 
if the patient be not too much weakened, or low 
-may prove a useful auxilliary to simple hyge- 
inic means, but the necessity or inutility of its em- 
ployment can only be decided by physicians. 149 
The diet of such an individual should be bread, 
a little fresh, containing, if possible some rye 
flour; mild, dilutent, and refreshing vegetables, 
such as spinach, beet-root, sorrel, roots of scoroma, 
radishes, &c.,: melons, gourds; fruits perfectly 
ripe, such as cherries, plums, pears, red goose- 
berries, oranges, should, in their seasons, form 
part of their diet. 
She should drink, frequently during the day, 
water containing a sufficient quantity of syrups of 
some of these fruits, and particularly the syrup of 
gooseberry, orange, and citron ; buttermilk, also, 
from the cow, in every pint of which should be put 
twenty grains of nitre-nitrate of potash ; occasion- 
ally, some orgeat, emulsions prepared without heat 
from seeds, and sufficiently flavored with acidula- 
ted syrups of citron, gooseberry, and pomegranate. 
The ordinary drink at meals should be a cold 
and light infusion of liquorice-root water slightly 
sweetened, or spring water alone. She should ab- 
stain from eating acid vegetables, such as celery, 
cabbage, artichokes, asparagus, as well as some 
other vegetable substances in which this property 
exists; such for example, as mustard, &c. 
Among fruits she should avoid peaches and 
strawberries; of roots, garlic, onions, black truffles, 
skirret. She should also abstain from fish, shell- 
fish, craw-fish, and other Crustacea. 
Nevertheless, as too frugal and too temperate a 
diet will not suit exclusively a person necessarily 
already enfeebled by so powerful a cause of dis- 
ease and exhaustion ; and as, moreover, too debili- taring and too severe a diet, far from extinguishing 
the passions or regulating the imagination, often 
only produces opposite effects, in increasing the 
action of the brain-some animal substances mnst 
be added to the above diet-even beef itself; but 
generally, roast or boiled white meats would be pre- 
ferred, such lamb, veal, chicken ; nevertheless, 
proportionately, to the vegetable substances which 
the patient takes, which should be much more in 
quantity than the former. 
She must particularly abstain from all the meats 
called black, from game kept too long, for they 
are acrid, strong, and irritating. 
As the principle effect which we seek in these 
cases is to soothe and calm, it may readily be con- 
ceived that we ought not in any way to permit 
the use of spirituous liquors, coffee, nor any aro- 
matic substance, and nothing of the kind should 
enter into the preparation of their dishes. 
In general, the diet of young girls, however 
pure may be their morals, and whatever may be 
the nature of their constitution, (their age being 
that of puberty, and they being in the plentitude 
of their functions and vigor of health) should be 
full and sufficient, rather than delicate ; temperate, 
rather than stimulant; unless they are naturally 
debilitated or invalids. A simple and well-regu- 
lated mode of living is not only of groat importance 
in disease ; it is so in every position in life. 
For, if it assists in restoring health when it is 
lost, it also preserves it when it is possessed. 
If it produce a return to morality when it is 
neglected, it preserves it before it is destroyed. 
150 151 
It gives firmness to and recalls reason, just as it 
prevents or disperses madness in a patient. 
" Let those who deny," observes one of the 
princes of medicine, " that the difference of diet 
renders some temperate, others dissolute ; some 
chaste, others incontinent; some mild, others 
qarrelsome; some diffident, others arrogant; let 
those, I say, who deny this truth come to me ; let 
them follow my advice in eating and drinking, and 
I promise them that from it they shall draw great 
assistance for moral philosophy; they shall feel 
their mental faculties increase, they shall acquire 
more genius, better memory, more prudence, and 
more diligence." * 
The patients of whose diet I have just spoken 
should, as often as possible take a bath, for about 
half an hour, of tepid water, or of water simply 
with the chill off, and particularly in rivers, when 
situation and season will permit. 
The water of the bath, by dissolving and carrying 
off the saline particles, as well as other organic mat- 
ter which both the insensible and visible perspira- 
tion deposits on the pores and cxhalent and absorb- 
ent orifices of the skin, thus take from them a 
cause of irritation which, sympathetically, might 
excite other organs. In this way, baths arc not 
less preservers of chastity than they are the first 
of cosmetics. 
The patients, however, should not take cold 
baths, if they cough, and if they feel pains in the 
• Galen, tranilatad Cron th* French of Tiaaot. 152 
chest; they should take them at long intervals if 
they produce such effects, or replace them by 
baths of about 95 or 96 Farenheit. 
" Tepid baths may be productive of a result as 
advantageous as prompt, (says a physician who 
specially employed himself in ascertaining the 
advantages of baths for females) that of dissipating, 
as though by an enchantment, a nervous state 
amidst which the economy seems to be preparing 
in secret the storm of passion. And," he contin- 
ues, "when hesitating between the suggestions 
of voluptuousness and the honors of virtue, the 
young girl with her pallid tint, her discolored lips, 
her eyes moistened with involuntary tears, seeks 
solitude and yields to melancholy reveries ; a long 
tepid bath weakens the causes of this organization, 
moderates rather than opposes the prematurely 
excited powers, until, in accordance with duty, 
modesty permits her yielding to the most delight- 
ful and tender of all passions." * 
The effect of these means would be considerably 
strengthened by the application of a few leeches to 
the seat of the irritation, previously to the use of 
the bath; and where no inflammatory symptoms have 
as yet exhibited themselves, either in the chest 
or other sensitive part, the patient should be in- 
duced to take gentle exercise in the open air, which 
has an equally beneficial influence on the mind 
and health ; and it appears to me, that these two 
• Marie de Paint Urnlin-T.ettera of a phyiician concerning th* 
influence of the dree* of Women on their Manner* and Health, and 
the neceaaitjr of the habitual u*e of Bathe. 153 
latter remedies-the bath and exercise,-tend 
strongly to the preservation of good morals; as it 
may be recollected that the chaste Susanna is rep- 
presented at her bath, and that goddess, also, who 
among the ancients was said to preside over chas- 
tity, is generally drawn either in the enjoyment of 
chase, or partaking with her nymphs in the pleas- 
ure of the bath. 
A change of climate, also, where attainable, 
should not be omitted, particularly if the one to 
which the patient has been accustomed should 
have been a warm one, and consequently disposed 
to excite passions. 
Hippocratas, who, after a lapse of twenty-two 
centuries, is still regarded as the chief of physi- 
cians, has remarked, that childhood is of longer 
duration, and puberty more greatly protracted, 
where hot winds do not prevail, and where the 
breeze is cool in spring and autumn ; but that the 
eastern climes tend to raise immoderate passions.* 
Finally, those young persons whom it may be 
presumed are subject to violent excitement, or 
who may have already experienced their effects- 
particularly the solitary,-ought not to sleep on 
feather beds, for such indulgence induces and en- 
courages lacivious feelings. 
• In ■warm climates puberty eomes on st a very early age. Ma- 
hornet married Fatima when she was only eight years of age, and 
at nine she was a mother. A common occurrence in the eastern 
regions-Anna les des Voyages. 
According to some medical authorities, the furor uterus and un- 
eeasing erections appertain only to eastern climates ; and Cabania 
reports, that such diseases are very frequent in hot and dry coun- 
tries, while they are never met with in moist and cool ones-Eap- 
pori du Phyriqe st du Moral Influences dss Climates. 154 
Their beds, on the contrary, should be as hard 
ns they can well bear, stuffed, indeed, with horse- 
hair, or straw, and this almost immediately in 
contact with their bodies. It should be large, so 
as to enable them frequcntly'to change their posi- 
tion ; and, by such means, avoiding a prejudicial 
heat. This precaution is neither so ridiculous 
nor minute as may at first appear, since it has 
been recommended by the most celebrated physi- 
cians. A cool bed strengthens, while a warm one 
enervates. And, lastly, invalids of this descrip- 
tion should remain in bed as short a time as pos- 
sible. 
LETTER IV. 
Ringworms, and sundry other cutaneous disor- 
ders, as well as those affecting the mucuous mem- 
branes, with which and the external skin there is 
a very great affinity, sometimes engender passions 
of a factitious and exciting nature, utterly inde- 
pendent of the mind, and consequently produce, 
occasionally, those secret habits among young wo- 
men, who, but for that, would be exceedingly 
chaste. I have met with more than one example 
of this description, and even some women advanced 
in years, and divested of those feelings which at- 
tached them in youth, have complained of these 
irritations, when it has happened that their skins 
have been subjected to similar disorders. 
Pains should be taken to ascertain whether such 
affections exist in a girl whose morals have been 155 
vitiated, or should she ever have been subjected to 
them, if she has only been partially cured, and in 
all such cases, the remedy ought to be directed 
solely to their entire removal, and the virtuous 
morals of the patient would add greatly to the 
efficacy of the prescription. For this purpose, 
leeches might be successfully applied where the 
inflammation is violent; a bath might be used of 
a moderate heat, in which also, a small quantity 
of sulphur of potash might be beneficially infused; 
also the frequent use of mild lotions, together with 
a diet of aperient vegetables, such as spinach, 
beet-root, chicory, chervil and watercresses, all of 
which are anti-scorbutics ; and form an admirable 
substitute for medicine. Change of air too, and 
if necessary of country; attention to the clothes 
best fitted to respiration ; exercises, and those 
amusements most agreeable to the mind, are 
admirable elements in the art of healing these 
diseases. 
A secret impulse to imprudent excitements is 
sometimes to be accounted for in irregular men- 
struations, where the hemorrhoidal flow is re- 
strained ; in the acid and stimulating ichor of the 
whites; or in some peculiar internal disorganiza- 
tion, all which, however, have yielded to the pro 
per treatment of these various accidents. It is. 
however, essential in all such derangement to take 
the advice of the best physicians, as they require 
different modes of treatment, and such as the quack 
is unable to prescribe, not only on account of their 
various natures, but also by reason of their causet 156 
and results, as for instance, in judging of ring- 
worms, it is necessary to determine whether they 
' owe their origin to a scrofulous or scorbutic habit 
< on the body, &c. 
These observations on the dispositions which 
may lead to secret habits, and on the regimen to be 
observed in the effect to allay such dispositions, as 
also in reference to those excitements from which 
such habits sometimes spring,-these remarks, I 
repeat, are nearly all that lie within the province 
of the medical man to acquaint a mother with. But 
there is still another class of considerations that 
belong solely to her, and which are not a whit less 
important than those which I have been discussing, 
but these must form the subject of subseqent letters. 
LETTER V. 
While we are bestowing the best attention on the 
temperament, the regimen, and the particular af- 
fections (should any exist) of the young solitary, 
the chief remedy which it is advisable to impress 
on her, is that she should form a resolution to resist 
secret excitement, and avoid those impure thoughts 
that so constantly beset her; as without such a 
determination, all other efforts would bo vain. Oh, 
may she form and adhere to such resolution ; she 
would be sure of her reward; and what triumph 
can be so worthy of a young girl, as that of 
chastity. 
The mother herself must supply the next necea- 
Mry description of aid on a point, wherein she is the 157 
best and most powerful arbiter, namely, in the 
marriage of her daughter ; and it is devoutly to be 
wished that she may be enabled to effect this, if the 
decay of the young patient be not already too far 
advanced, and if she be yet free from any serious 
inflammation of the chest, or any other organic af- 
fection arising from such deplorable habits. Mar- 
riage would offer a desirable refuge to her, if she 
be capable of attaching herself to a husband. And 
the parent who loves her child ought to do all in 
her power to promote such a union, provided there 
be a fair promise of happiness, and that it would 
bear the approving test of reason. If the best of 
our physicians so frequently recommended this 
how much more is it to the interest of the mother 
to prescribe it. Should, however, the union of tho 
daughter be impracticable, it would then be a 
parental duty to point out to the unhappy child, 
how extremely pernicious and immoral is the 
course she has been pursuing, and that it is not 
only an error, but a henious crime in her to give 
way to such indulgences, forbidden alike both by 
decency and reason. 
When such a vice has so far possessed itself of 
the faculties of those who indulge in it, they ought 
never to be left alone, until time and the strictest 
vigilance shall have triumphed over their punish- 
ments. There are numerous instances wherein this 
constant attention and unceasing solicitude have 
been crowned with success; we have seen anxious 
mothers sharing their beds with their daughters 
already on the high road to the grave from such 158 
fatal indulgences, by which means alone, they have 
been snatched from death. The trial is doubtlessly 
one of difficulty, but has had the desired effect, as 
the following case selected from many will attest 
" Miss , a young lady fifteen years of age, 
had, while under her father's roof, fallen insensibly 
into a sort of imbecile idiocy, while the cause of 
her calamity had not even been suspected, she 
had lately lost her ruddy hue of health, together 
with the spirit and vivacity so common to girls of 
her age. Iler parents placed her at a boarding- 
school, in the vain hope that her intellectual 
faculties might be restored in the society and 
companionship of her schoolfellows, and the gover- 
ness was instructed that the parent's object was 
not so much the attainment of further scholastic 
acquirements for their daughter, as her being 
brought forward with that lady-like carriage and 
bearing as might enable them to present her to 
society ; but alas such moderate desires, aided by 
all the cares of the mistress of the establishment, 
herself a woman of the world, were not, for some- 
time to be realized ; the energies of the young lady 
became daily more weakened and obscure ; when 
all of a sudden the governess discovered that her 
young pupil was imbued with a secret and pernicious 
vice. She shuddered at the consequences, and trem- 
bled for the fate of her other pupils. From this 
moment, however, she determined on sleeping with 
her young invalid, and never in day-time suffered 
her to be absent from her, under any pretence, for 
a moment; she reasoned with her in a friendly man- 159 
ner, but with great firmness, and pointed out the 
danger she was rushing into. Her solicitude was 
not altogether unavailing, and still she hoped that 
recovery was possible ; and indeed, after a few 
months exercise of these unceasing precautions, 
the anxious parents were enabled to introduce.into 
society, not merely a common place young lady, 
but a woman really endowed with mind, with health 
and reason, in short, a truly amiable woman. 
The mother of such a girl should not only be as 
it were a part of her wardrobe, but actually her 
shadow; when any danger threatens the young off- 
spring of the fowl, she does not confine herself to 
vain terrors, but actually protects them under the 
covering of her wings. 
After the happy results of the watchfulness of 
which I have just given an instance, the best 
method that maternal tenderness could adopt, 
would be a gentle persuasion to prevent any 
further attack of so dangerous an enemy ; and the 
mother indeed is the only person that could reason 
effectually with her daughter, as it is not likely that 
such a subject could be mooted by any one else. 
It frequently happens that girls of highly sus- 
ceptible dispositions and lively imaginations be- 
come the victims of solitary habits, and in such 
cases it is highly necessary that the mother 
should be particularly watchful, and should the 
child be virtuous, the danger of her falling into 
such a vice might easily be prevented by the pa- 
rents pointing out the sin and indecency of it; and 
in using the language of Buffon, tell her " that she 160 
is constantly working and doing everything, or 
rather leaving nothing undone that may tend to 
her own ruin." Mallebrancbe, too, has described 
this sin as the " domestic madness." 
When this fatal error has been produced by the 
senses alone, it has at least a limit in the senses ; 
but when once it takes hold of the imagination, it 
has no bounds. The senses leave some intervals 
of repose ; but the imagination knows no relaxa- 
tion. 
The young solitary should moreover avoid all 
retirement either indoors or out. Those lovely 
and retired solitudes formed by the hand of nature 
in the midst of flowery valleys or thick shrubber- 
ries are not intended for her. They have too 
great an effect on the imagination for her to trust 
to without imminent danger, and instead of find- 
ing the virtue there, that she is in search after, it 
is more than probable she would lose the little she 
has left. It is the wise alone that safely meditate 
in these natural and unfrequented shades, which 
are only made for the strong-minded, and the use 
of those delightful promenades, and sequestered 
vales, must not be allowed to those young persons 
who have not acquired the mastery of their pas- 
sions. 
LETTER VI. 
The anxiety of a fond mother is naturally awak- 
ened, if she does not daily read contentment and 
happiness in the countenances of her daughters. 161 
Hag she not sometimes perceived in the face of 
one a melancholy and secret sorrow which she 
seems afraid to trust to her, despite her prayers 
and tender feelings to unburthen the cause of, 
opening at the same time her arms and bosom to 
console her. Her stealthy tears will tell her that 
she errs, that she is unhappy, or that she is unwise; 
that she is unwise do I say, doubtless she desires 
to be otherwise, and reproaches herself for not be- 
ing so ; can she be blamed for yielding to her 
weakness,* she has made an open confession of 
her folly, and yet she persists in giving way to it. 
The more one meditates on nature, the more one 
feels convinced that is no fault of her's, if man- 
kind be not happy ; she has abundantly proposed 
it and furnished ample means for its enjoyment. 
All the elements of happiness are to be found in 
her system ; she therefore is not to be blamed ; it 
is we ourselves who judge her too harshly. Had 
she not created mankind weak, and filled him with 
the apprehension of disease, eager as he is for 
enjoyment, intemperance would speedily have de- 
veloped passions that he would no have been able 
to master. Vicoe are now engendered by irregu- 
lar desires, and disordered imagination ; these 
must be obviated, a man still left free from the 
• One cannot help regarding this propensity as the too frequently 
involuntary aciion of the soul, of which Swuvage reports an instance 
A young girl under the dominion of an excessive feeling for solitary, 
habits, was herself aware of both the shame and the danger of it. 
She went to her confessional, and on her knees opened the whole of 
her conduct to the confessor, and implored forgiveness on the pro- 
mise of sincere repentance ; she soon hewever forgot her vow, and 
in her bewilderment fell deeper in her sin. 162 
influence of " Ennui" j nature therefore formed 
him for labor and toil. 
flow reasonably Voltaire expresses himself, when 
he says:- 
" How oft is toil the source of pleasure, 
I pity him o'erprsssed with leisure." 
Next to temperance and soft persuasion, it ap- 
pears to me that " work" is the fittest remedy, 
either to restore to, or to preserve young people 
in virtue and happiness, however high their rank 
may be, this labor ought to be daily, moderate, 
and properly regulated. Daily, in order that one 
may get into the quiet habit of it; moderate, that 
is to say sufficient, so as to leave no room for 
lassitude, and still to keep one from being dis- 
gusted with it; and well-regulated, since it is a 
maxim of both ancient and modern philosophers, 
that the soul is well pleased with order. We 
ought specially to inspire the young melancholist 
(for solitary vice is a species of melancholy, and 
of the most fatal description) with the taste for 
and habit of, daily toil; the object of which might 
be, as far as possible, of a useful and agreeable 
nature, as for instance, botany, embroidery, and 
light dressmaking. Such a use of her time would 
be of great assistance to her, since nothing is so 
pernicious to the youthful mind as indolence, 
which speedily places it on the very precipice oi 
vice. In my opinion, says a very learned Swiss 
physician, the celebrated Zimmerman, fin his ex- 163 
cellent treatise on solitude,) a quiet and moderate 
activity, where the weakness of the nerves has en- 
gendered disgust and apathy, is the surest and 
most effectual method of counteracting lassitude, 
ill-temper, and melancholy. De Lille, also, has 
well observed, that the mind is rendered happy 
and independent by a prudent care, assisted by 
light labor ; that too much leisure vexes and wea- 
ries, and stirs up a host of tumultuous passions ; 
that toil calms our sorrow and overcomes our 
vices, while it strengthens our pleasures and con- 
firms our virtue ; and I might further add, that it 
was while in his corn field, that Ruth succeeded 
in obtaining the love of Boaz. Those pastimes and 
recreations to Tjhich the female mind has a ten- 
dency, might also be followed with advantage, 
such as the study of languages, polite literature, 
history, oratory, poetry, music, and painting. But, 
in directing the tastes of the young invalids to 
their pursuits, care should be taken, as Fenelon 
advises, in bis " Noble and sublime," not to place 
before them any examples of a languishing and 
voluptuous tendency, for fear of adding fuel to a 
mind already kindled by the torch of adverse pas- 
sions. Consequently, such masters as Albini, and 
painters of a similar description, should be avoided, 
while Raphael and Poussin might safely form 
their study, together with Redoate and Waens- 
denonk, for landscape, fruit, and flowers. 
But above all things the proper selection of 
music requires the greatest care on the part of 
those who are interested in subverting the peou- 164 
Ear disposition of which we are now treating; as 
were the choice of musical pieces of a melancholy 
■ature, it would strengthen and establish in the 
mind of the solitary victim, all those low spirited 
and debilitating feelings under which she is 
already suffering ; were it tender and voluptuous, 
it would be unbecoming to the education of the 
young, which should always be based on decency 
and reason, and would be sure moreover to hasten 
the evil we are desirous of destroying, by exerting 
both mind and body, and feeding their fever, which 
we ought to starve. 
A certain musician was forbidden by the Ephori 
to play on a particular string of his lyre, that 
evoked a peculiar kind of languishing notes, and 
which had a tendency to corrupt the mind ; some 
historians have even stated that he was banished 
fbr having touched this chord. 
While music, however, if injudiciously selected, 
may have a pernicious effect, on the other hand, 
when it is of a noble, sublime, fresh, and lively 
character, the greatest advantages will result from 
it, and greatly aid the benefit sought for in our 
present considerations. 
Generally speaking, there is no art, no science, 
and no occupation equal to agreeable music, which 
has the charm of dispelling gross ideas, and substi- 
tuting those of an opposite character ; we might 
almost liken it to a sort of Proteus, which, capable 
of a thousand varying shapes, and possessing, in an 
irresistible manner, the language of every passion, 
whether delightful or painful, finds its way the 165 
inmost recesses of the soul, and raising this or that 
feeling, or this or that idea, excites or soothes, sad- 
dens, or enlivens ; in a word, works upon our 
thoughts and feelings, just as it pleases. There 
are few persons who have not experienced these ef- 
fects, or have not witnessed them in others; and 
how strong must be the power of music, when it is 
so capable of controlling the mind, charming the 
very nature of its thoughts, and freqently silenc- 
ing, if not dispelling pain itself.* 
But one of the principle objects which we ought 
to propose to ourselves, in the moral treatment of 
melancholy in general, is to divert the mind of the 
patient from the vicious direction which the dis- 
ease has created on it; and no change of idea and 
thought can be so salutary as that which would 
result from the choice of such music as I have just 
pointed out, varying from the noble and sublime 
to the soft and lively; but in no case to be suffer- 
• Many authors and examples might be quoted to show the ama»- 
Ing influence of music. Dutrivai, the treasurer of France, who died 
at Monpellier, furnishes us with a remarkable instance of the power 
of music over pain- He had teen for a long time a dreadful sufferer 
from an ulcer in his leg, from the agony of which he could find no 
relief but in music, that invariably sent him to sleep. When on bis 
death-bed, by way of soothing his last moments, the mass for the dead 
was celebrated in his chamber, he himself selected the parts ; and 
thus he quited life without pain. . .. Ernest, Duke of Bavaria, also, 
who had been for years a martyr to the gout, so much so that he 
was obliged to relinquish all public duties,-devoted himself entirely 
to music, and fouud in the study of it a cessation from these dreadful 
pains to which he had ben so long subjectedProfessor Moreau 
de la Sarthe mentions an instance of bis having cured a patient of a 
melancholy of very long standing, and which had reached a period 
of high mental alienatiou, owing to a disappointment in love, by 
merely playing on a harp, the patient remaining in a bath during the 
music. 166 
ed to touch upon the passion we desire to over- 
come ; so that, iu time, oblivion of the passion 
might be produced. Light and pleasing airs 
would seem favorable to persons afflicted with a 
melancholy temperament; or melancholy affections, 
and would act upon them as a specific, or, if I might 
so say, as a kind of vital air, which, as soon as they 
tasted the delights of, the waters of oblivion would 
flow through their souls, and efface all their pains, 
leaving nothing in their stead but flowers, and a 
laughing imagery, and they would at once fancy 
themselves suddenly metamorphosed into new crea- 
tures ; and, indeed, we may have observed that, 
wherever melancholy patients have been made to 
be gay and lively, they carry those opposite feel- 
ings to their highest extent. 
It is only those of an exquisite sensibility who 
are capable of appreciating all the charms of music, 
and we know that none are more sensitive than 
melancholy patients. Bourdelot, likewise, in his 
history of music, has affirmed, that a celebrated 
physician declared to him, that, by means of this 
art, he had completely cured a lady of rank, who 
had been driven mad by disappointment in love. 
Pomme, also, a physician of Arles, has published 
the case of a young g'nl who was never free from 
hysterics, and whose bodi'y and mental health 
were perfectly restored by the same means; and 
transactions of the Society of Arts, at Pari?-, relate 
many similar instances. 
Music not only po.-sesses the advantages of re- 
moving from the minds of those young persons 167 
afflicted with the delirium of solitary vice, the per- 
nicious ideas that are constantly delivering them 
up to the propensity that is secretly destroying 
them-of restoring them to the enjoyment of all 
their faculties-and being slightly applicable in 
the proper direction of them, but it also engenders 
the love of virtue, and regulates their tastes in the 
pursuit of it, so much so, indeed, that it holds a 
high place in our temples, both as the interpreter 
and the charm of prayer, having in all ages been 
consecrated to these uses. The ancients employed 
it especially in the encouragement and support of 
all the separate virtues-courage, honor, coolness, 
reason, moderation, kindness, gentleness, and even 
chastity, and why, indeed, should not such noble 
attributes be conceded to it ? 
Pythagoras, one of the greatest men of antiqui- 
ty, had a high regard for music, which exercised 
an almost divine influence over him, and he con- 
sidered it so necessary in soothing and regulating 
the passions, that he required his pupils to begin 
and finish the day with it, but he at the same time 
required that it should be accompanied by songs of 
a virtuous tendency. 
With respect to the application of the art of 
painting and design in the case of young persons 
who have been led away by solitary vice, I should 
give the same precepts as regards music. All those 
subjects that have a direction to indolence or vo- 
luptuousness should be carefully avoided : flowers, 
landscades, moral' or historical pictures, might ju- 
diciously be selected as furnishing fit employment 168 
for the crayon or the pencil, in distracting the mind 
from the dreadful mania. 
Those pursuits and studies which require a tol- 
erable degree of exercise to carry them out, are 
peculiarly fitted to assist the hints above given, 
as for instance, the study of entomology, botany, 
or mineralogy, when the weather and season ad- 
mit of them, as the exercise which is combined 
with such pursuits gives employment to the mind 
as well as to the body, and furnishes strength to 
both, and while it produces new impressions, it 
changes and eradicates all those evil and immoral 
ones that quiet and indolence have given birth to. 
The study of botany, for instance, followed up 
in fine weather, in a lovely situation, and in the 
company of gay, lively, good tempered, and well- 
educated associates, with whom the relations of 
the invalid may occasionally intermingle, offers 
resourses that very few others can supply. The 
exercise it requires is sufficiently prolonged, and 
the pure morning air, either in the woods or on 
the hills, is particularly refreshing, filling the 
mind and soul, especially in youth, with delicious 
feelings of happiness and liberty, and infusing a 
freshness and purity of thought without parallel. 
What can be more delightful than the opening 
of a fine day, the awakening of the plants and 
flowers, their early perfume, the forgetfulness o! 
the crowded town, the various hues of the land- 
scape, the discovery and examination of objects, 
their characters and the choice of them, together 
with the classifying those plants and insects that 169 
have escaped previous attention, and are not yet 
included either in the book or the picture, and with 
which you propose to enrich them, some of the 
party relating anecdotes while walking, others 
stopping to admire a beautiful prospect, here a 
valley, and there a stupendous precipice, the appe- 
tite excited and allayed at convenient opportuni- 
ties, a fountain offering at the same time pure and 
refreshing draughts, and interesting objects of re- 
search ; a stream well stocked with fish, and last 
of all, the return home, to enjoy sleep without 
dreaming, which though long appears short, pro- 
duced by those agreeable occupations, and undis- 
turbed by any distracting reflections. What a 
source of innocence and happiness is this ! 
It would be wise, therefore, when the oppor- 
tunity permitted it, to enable those young persons, 
whom we might be desirous of curing of this bane- 
ful propensity, to devote themselves to these pur- 
suits, m the manner I have pointed out: not in 
closets with dried flowers or pictures, but in the 
Open air, in the fields, the places where the plants 
end flowers themselves are growing. And we 
Should most likely then very soon find these young 
melancholists playfully descending the hills with 
improved health, better morals and higher spirits, 
tAe happy fruits of the pure air they have been 
inhaling, and the gentle exercise they have in- 
dulged in. Women ought indeed to make botany 
one of their choicest studies, as it would *pre- 
erve them from many inconvenient diseases, and 
trengihen them without further labor than their 
ordinary exercise. 170 
Gardening, on a moderate scale, is very salutary 
for such patients as also for young persons of less 
blameable morals, but let it be understood, they 
must actually cultivate the ground, expending 
time and labor so as to exercise their courage ; the 
produce may be bestowed in charity. 
I am persuaded that almost any solitary sinner, 
who is still susceptible of pleasures in this kind of 
life, may be radically cured both physically and 
morally in a very short time. 
Application to any art will counterpoise the 
greatest moral afflictions. Each vanquished dif- 
ficulty gives pleasure, the soul contemplates with 
satisfaction its finished labor, and reposes in calm 
content. The pleasures of the heart are attainable 
by all who are free, tranquil, and loving, such are 
always self-satisfied and well-disposed to others. 
How far preferable is the happiness of a country 
life to the deceiving felicity of palaces, and the 
most brilliant circles! Lassitude is unknown in 
the Alpine vallies, where innocence abides, and 
which strangers quit with tears. 
But how can young ladies become habituated to 
such a mode of life, it will be asked ? may women 
live by it: they are instructed from infancy, which 
is a state much feebler than that of the young pa- 
tients for whom I am now prescribing. 
Labor was, however, to these rustic women, an 
education to which they were early subjected. 
This is true, and how were they thus inured to 
rural labor ? By a daily task adequate to their 
strength being exacted from them. Patients should 171 
be treated thus: a little fatigue must not be minded, 
they will bear it with sufficient intermissions of 
labor; they must be interested and fatigued that 
their intelligence and courage may be at once ex- 
ercised, and their bodies disposed to sleep at the 
end of the day's labor, so that the need of rest may 
overcome the seductions of the fatal habit. The 
development of the physical and moral powers is 
to be found in a little pain and fatigue, which are 
the elements of happiness both in youth and th® 
rest of life. 
Few mothers would consent that their daughters 
would expose themselves to the weather, so as to 
render their skin coarse, or should harden their 
hands, even for the sake of increasing health and 
vigor; they dread the loss of certain feeble attrac- 
tions, not considering that delicacy is akin to dis- 
ease, and that health, which is indispensable to 
beauty, is allied to strength in robust exercises, and 
is the source of sound and hardy generations. A 
delicate woman is often pretty at the expense of 
true beauty which is rather combined with strength 
than delicacy. Besides, are not the beauties of 
the mind worthy of regard ? and certainly the mind 
Would be benefitted by the mode of life which I ad- 
vise. Agricultural life is a succession of immediate 
relations between God and man, a school of piety, 
simplicity, moderation, and love of labor. The 
softest passions which truly constitute our felicity 
have their birth amid fruits and flowers, whereas, 
those which are the torments of our hearts infest 
cities, with idleness, ambition, luxury, and imagin- 
ary pleasures. 172 
Moreover, I here only propose a mode of. cure 
for a dangerous disease and habit; the habit once 
surmounted, and the disease healed, the patients 
are free to live as they please, and drop the use of 
the remedy. 
Excursions on the water will be found very ad- 
vantageous to young persons afflicted with melan- 
choly ; they might even be taught to manage a 
boat and engaged to exercise their strength and 
skill with much benefit to their health upon the 
water. 
As much may be said of other exercises. Ex- 
cursions in the country also will be very beneficial; 
in botanical researches, for instance, which inter- 
esting study, under wise guidance, will divert and 
instruct the mind, and avert it from ideas of a 
dangerous tendency; for the mind requires care 
as well as the body, and ideas must be studied in 
the former no less than the humors and vital dis- 
positions in the latter. 
Excursions on foot or horseback, all kinds of 
exercises needle work, drawing, music, botany, 
garden work, music, boating-these and the like 
occupations will be found equally efficacious and 
interesting in diverting the miserable victims from 
their secret habit. 
But there is another order of occupations in 
which the solitary victims may find correctives of 
their passion, and this order belongs more espe- 
cially to the mind. The simplest, the most im- 
portant of these is, reading. Hisfory interests all 
ages, and the knowledge it gives is of the most 173 
useful kind. I would recommend such history m 
Rollin's, where entertainment is mingled with in- 
struction. The poets also afford an infinite scop® 
to an ardent imagination, and books of travel sel- 
dom fail to excite a wholesome curiosity, and 
awaken the intelligence to the occurrences of the 
world; a most important effect where the faculties 
have been absorbed in solitary indulgence. 
After reading comes composition. Some of the 
victims of Onanism may be possessed of natural 
talent to qualify them to enter the lists of litera- 
ture. Let such ambition where it exists be stimu- 
lated ; let them write, whether there be any chance 
of their works being printed or read, still let them 
write, for nothing more than composition tends to 
detach the mind from objects foreign to this one 
favorite pursuit. 
I not only advise these pursuits as a means of 
employing the time of young women addicted to 
melancholy and solitary vices, but I would have 
them urged to enter into them with passion and 
ardor. One passion must drive out another, and 
no ordinary inclination or half listless efforts will 
prevail against the most imperious and fatal of all 
habits. The art of the physician is shown here in 
substituting one passion for another. Pope, Bon- 
net and Zimmerman, have wisely said, the pas- 
sions are favorable winds by which man may guide 
his vessel on the ocean of life, but he must watch 
them or he would be in danger of shipwreck. 
Yet there is a period of exhaustion and wear at 
nature when the victims of solitude are insensible 174 
to any external charm. If the arts fail to excite 
their admiration, or boohs to awaken interest, or 
poetry enthusiasm, I fear the evil is without 
remedy. 
But if the mind be sensible to art or beauty, I 
will never despair, but endeavor to strengthen these 
salutary sensations, and profit by what remains of 
life. A devoted attachment to books, music, or 
painting, is one of the most hopeful signs in such 
cases. 
How wonderful is the influence of books on the 
intelligence and the health of individuals ! Pe- 
trarch became ill when he ceased reading and 
writing. One of his friends, the Bishop of Cavail- 
lon, fearing the intensity of his studies might in- 
jure his health, asked him for the key of his libra- 
ry, Petrarch gave it without suspicion, when the 
bishop locked the door and said, " I forbid you to 
read or write for ten days." Petrarch obeyed; 
the first day seemed to him longer than a year, 
the second he suffered with a headache, and on 
the third he was attacked with fever. The bishop 
alarmed at his condition, restored him his key and 
his health with it. 
But we must be cautious what books we place 
in the hands of our patients, whose maladies, es- 
pecially of the imagination, may be terribly en- 
hanced by the suggestions of certain ideas. Then 
I would positively prohibit all romance, and ama- 
tory tales or poems, which would, to persons of 
suceptible and weakened imagination, be like fire 
to flax. Let all seducing pictures and represent*- 175 
tions of the amatory passions be therefore ban- 
ished from the reading-room of my asylum. 
The same line of argument will apply to the 
selection of books for young women of sound mind 
and incorrupt habits. The choice of books should 
be ever exercised with discernment, if not with 
austerity. Be it remembered, that virginity is of 
the mind, as well as of the body, being no less 
moral than physical, and consisting as much in 
purity of thought as in chastity of person :- 
"Ante tirum corpus «piritu« ante Deum." 
I will conclude this advice by observing, that 
great attention must be paid to diet, which must 
always be analogous with the habits of life, or 
occupation, as well as suited to the condition of 
the patient. 
LETTER VII. 
Nothing is more important, if we wish to secure 
our children from bad habits, than to pay attention 
to the society which they frequent, for they are 
no less certain to be taught evil by the bad, than 
to learn to conduct themselves worthily from the 
good. Onanism is an acquired vice, and parents 
should be especially careful of the morals of their 
sei vanfs. also how they entrust their children to 
th m Maid-servants have often corrupted their 
yo< o/ ibi-'resses, and initiated them into the most 
hoiiiblc practices 176 
As certain inertness of character is a peculiarity 
•f persons addicted to solitary indulgence, be es- 
pecially careful that those to whose society you 
entrust your children be possessed of a bold, noble, 
and enterprising nature, which will to a great de- 
gree guarantee their freedom from this vice. 
Religion may be called on for succor in a disease 
as much of the mind as the body. " Wrap your- 
self in the mantle of religion," said a mother to 
her daughter, " and it will be your protection 
against the weakness of youth and the perils of 
age." Women, especially those of a melancholy 
turn, are generally religiously disposed, which may 
thus be taken advantage of, by opposing religion 
to their passion ; and indeed, experience warrants 
«ur conclusion that many, out of regard to religion, 
have been induced to sacrifice their solitary indul- 
gence. 
LETTER VIII. 
Biligion, when invoked with confidence and 
wisdom seems indeed seldom to have disappointed 
the hopes of repentant solitary sinners. 
The collection of letters I have made affords 
■umerous examples. " Such, sir," one of these 
individuals writes to Dr. Doussin Debreuil, " are 
the evils which an afflicted patient requests you 
to heal. Her constitution was good, and she owes 
her life only to religious principles, which could 
not indeed repress her fatal habit in time to avert 
such consequences, that she can never hope for a 
perfect restoration." 177 
Very many others have not had courage to sup- 
port a melancholy existence, and have crowned 
their crimes with suicide. These words are found 
in the second letter :- 
" I should often have yielded to the temptation 
of terminating my miserable existence, if reason 
and religion, which only console me, had not pre- 
vented me." 
We remark, in another instance, that the voice 
of religion was more powerful in the heart of one 
of those victims to a miserable propensity than 
that of Nature herself:- 
"Religion," says she, "alone enabled me to 
gain a victory over my senses, which the love of 
life could not do." 
Dr. Bertrand, having often been struck with the 
alterations of such patients in face and general 
appearance, had effigies made of them in wax, that 
the frightful deformity might terrify and deter 
others from the practice. I have been told that 
nothing could be imagined more distressing than 
the spectacle he thus prepared; and, certainly 
the idea was one of a friend to humanity. 
A young woman who had seen this collection 
was much struck, yet she owned that she owed 
her return to reason and the preservation of her 
life to the terrible impression made on her mind 
by the sight, aided by the influence of religion, 
without which it would not have succeeded. These 
are her words:- 
" The frightful spectacle shown me by Dr. Ber- 
trand much shocked me; but my wretched pae- 178 
<on had so possessed my mind, that had it not 
been for religion, whose aid I sought, I could not 
have renounced it." 
We may here observe, that if religion effected 
the cure, the terrible example offered drove the 
patient to religion. 
Tissot gives many examples of similar cures. 
In fact, no one can doubt but that a profound re- 
ligious sentiment produces the happiest results, yet 
its counsels should be given by humane and intel- 
ligent advisers, who, having studied philosophy, 
know how to adjust the balance between reason 
and the passions, and who also are aware of the 
danger of superstitious ideas and vain terrors on 
weak minds. 
A woman, twenty-five years old, of a strong 
constitution, fell into violent hysterical affections, 
and was subject to alarming nocturnal visions. 
She was convinced that a beggar whom she had 
refused to relieve, and who had threatened to be- 
witch her, had accomplished his menace. She 
imagined herself possessed by a demon, who as- 
sumed various forms, and sometimes uttered cries 
like a bird, at other times lugubrious sounds, or 
piercing shrieks, which filled her with excessive 
terror. She kept her bed for several months, dis- 
regarding all advice, and deaf to the voice of 
friendship. The curate of the place, an enlight- 
ened man, of an amiable, pursuasive character, 
gained an ascendancy over her, and prevailed with 
her to quit her bed, and occupy herself with house 
affairs, then to work in the garden, and take other 179 
salutary exercises. The effect was a cure, which 
continued uninteirupted for three years. At the 
end of this period, the good curate died, and was 
succeeded by a stupid bigot, who, believing the 
woman to have been really possessed, exorcised 
her, and shut her up. " The effect of these absurd 
remedies," says professor Pinel, " may be ima- 
gined." 
I therefore advise a prudent mother to induce 
her afflicted daughter to seek refuge in the arms 
of religion, with dignity, and not in a stupid man- 
ner ; to heal her imagination, and gain the power 
and practice of virtue, but not to become a fanatic 
or fool. 
The young solitary, whose mind is weakened, 
should on no account be allowed to hear violent 
or mysterious preachers. 
Great care should also be taken in the selection 
of religious books. Well or ill chosen as they may 
be, their effect will be very dangerous or highly ad- 
vantageous. By all means interdict such as have 
an ascetic tendency, which are filled with contem- 
plations and extacies. 
Women are very sensitive and excitable, espe- 
cially such of them as are afflicted with solitary 
passions, so bordering on hysteria, that there is 
great reason to fear their minds may be danger- 
ously worked upon by such reading, of which 
many examples might be given. The simple and 
sublime histories of Scripture, especially the Life 
of Jesus Christ, are the best religious reading, in 
such cases, for the purification of the imagination, 180 
the elevation of the mind, and the strengthening 
of religious feeling. The life of Saint Vincent do 
Paul is also an excellent work : his benevolence 
was such, that heaven seems to have sent this 
saint to be a father to the helpless orphans ; such 
reading as this cannot fail to be beneficial. 
If all this fail to eradicate the accursed habit, let 
the mother of the young person represent to her 
the example of the young peasant girl, mentioned 
in the first part of this work, on the subject of man- 
ners; also that of the mother of a family who could 
not refrain from outraging Nature on her death- 
bed, and in her last moments. 
Let her be assured she may fall into a similar 
state, and, notwithstanding all precaution, suffer 
the like infamous public exposure with these mi* 
erable women. 
History reports that a frightful melancholy, of 
an epidemic nature, having attacked the women 
of Milet, a town of Iona, they could not enduro 
existence, but hanged themselves daily, in great 
numbers. The magistrates, to stop the practice, 
proclaimed that the first female suicide should bo 
exposed naked to the view of the populace ; where 
upon the fear of shame overcame the contagion 
of the epidemic, and the suicides at once ceased. 
Let the victims of solitude reflect that they ex- 
pose themselves to still greater infamy, when, af- 
ter a certain time, they lose their reason and aro 
exposed to all eyes as subject, in that state, to the 
tyranny of the habit which consumes their lives. 
The young peasant girl, the solitary of the bath, 181 
and the matron I have mentioned, are melancholy 
examples of such a possibility. 
When all remedies, all advice, have failed, and 
the passion blindly subjugates the individual, who 
is deaf to scorn, wisdom, and decency, force must 
be restored to : a straight-waistcoat must be used, 
and certain bandages applied to the seat of irrita- 
tion ; the habit once forcibly broken, the former 
means must be again applied, and may be hoped 
With success. 
I conclude with advice dictated by reason and 
humanity, and justified by success ; while the pow- 
er remains, sacrifice the accursed vice at the most 
precious altar of Nature, the altar of Hymen. 
SKETCH OF MEDICAL TREATMENT. 
It never entered into my design to give, in this 
Work, a mode of medical treatment for affections 
which ordinarily result from secret habits, the 
moral treatment of which I have explained. I will 
therefore, only subjoin a few medical precepts and 
observations. 
Milk is generally good for such patients, espe- 
cially when taken with certain mineral waters, such 
as those of the German Spa, or Charbonniers near 
Lyons. 
Different tonics, such as quinine, cold baths, 182 
and immersions in cold water, are also very bene- 
ficial. 
Soups made of beef, veal, mutton, flavored or 
not with a little wine or spices, may be very ad- 
vantageously given ; but all inflammable substances 
or ingredients must, in certain cases, be rejected 
altogether in the treatment of these disorders, ac- 
cording to the nature and degree of the disease 
and the temperment and general state of the 
patient. 
Exciting and tonic medicines, in certain cases 
are not advisable, and in some very injurious; as 
when, for instance, irritability has been excited to 
an excessive degree by the fatal habit, or where 
local inflammation my exist,'or fever from the same 
source, with thirst, dryness of the skin, &c. 
Buttermilk, in such cases, is the best internal 
remedy, according to Tissot, whose opinion is con- 
firmed by my experience; milk, whether of the 
cow or the ass is not so good, and is sometimes 
prejudicial. 
Woman's milk drawn from the breast has some- 
times, beyond hope, restored patients who have 
been reduced to extremity. I witnessed, some 
years ago, a remarkable case of this kind; but 
Buch instances are rare. 
Patients have been restored by great circum- 
pection and the use of ordinary milk. 
Tissot gives an example of a cure performed in 
his manner. The patient, who suffered severe 
pains in the breast, and was subject to vomiting, 
and in a state of extreme debility, subsisted three 183 
months upon well boiled milk, two or three eggs, 
and pure water, daily. She drank milk four times 
a-day ; twice hot from the cow without bread, and 
twice with hot bread. Her medicine was an opiate 
of quinine, orange peel, and syrup of myrrh. Her 
stomach was covered with an aromatic plaster; all 
her body was well rubbed with flannel every morn- 
ing ; she took as much exercise as possible on foot 
and horseback, and lived in the open air. Her 
debility and pains in the chest prevented her from 
using the cold bath. These remedies were so 
successful that she recovered her strength and 
stomach, and after a month could walk a league. 
I knew a person who was so reduced by solitary 
indulgence as to be able to live only upon milk, of 
which she consumed all that the village could fur- 
nish in certain seasons of the year. 
When Tissot ordered quinquina with wine, he 
did not restrict his patients to a milk diet, but 
gave them the remedy in the morning, and milk 
at night. He was obliged in certain cases to in- 
vert this order, as wine in the morning with some 
patients causes vomiting, as I have also found. 
Imitating this great practitioner, when I pre- 
scribe milk mixed with mineral waters, I advise 
my patients to begin by drinking several bottles of 
this water before mixing it with milk. 
Quinquina renders milk digestible where it would 
not otherwise be so. I have attended a person 
worn out with this vice, whose stomach absolutely 
rejected all food. She could neither eat bread nor 
any animal substance-even light broths were 184 
vomited up-lastly, any kind of nourishment, fluid 
or solid, occasioned frightful cholics. I advised 
her to boil an ounce of yellow-powdered quinqui- 
na, in a pint of water for an hour, and to mix six 
spoonsful three times a-day, in a bowl of milk, 
adding two spoonsful of distilled water of menthe, 
and two of orange flower, with the yolk of a fresh 
egg and a large spoonful of sugar, and to use the 
milk as much as possible. She did not vomit it 
up. Some time after she could mix a little bread 
with it. I begged her to attend to her morals 
most severely ; she promised, and kept her word. 
I added twelve pills daily, composed of orange 
peel, of bitter extract of chicorie, of cackou and 
syrup. The addition of a quarter of a grain of 
musk per pill, has sometimes very good effects. 
This person every day bathed ten minutes in a 
river. After three weeks she could cat rice soups 
with bread and fowl, also well cooked beef and 
mutton. After five months she was capable of all 
her former occupations and exercises. I lost 
sight of her. I afterwards heard that after nine 
months tolerably good health, she had relapsed 
into the state from which I had rescued her ; that 
a clever physician had again restored her in three 
months, after which she lived four months in ap- 
parent health, and then died, after a short illness. 
Tissot, of whose milk cures I have given an ex- 
ample, also restored by this means partly, and 
partly by tonics, a person who had been entirely ex- 
hausted ; whose stomach, though very weak, was 
still capable of digesting, but whom want of sleep 185 
had reduced to a deplorable state of leanness. At 
six in the morning she took six ounces of decoc- 
tion of quinine with a spoonful of Canary wine ; 
in an hour after, ten ounces of goats new milk 
with a little sugar and an ounce of orange flower. 
She dined on roast fowl, with bread, and a glass 
of excellent Burgundy wine with water. 
This regimen confirms the observations of many 
doctors-that the patients eat heartily, while the 
digestive organs continue undestroyed. 
At six in the evening the patient took a second 
dose of quinquia; at half-past six she went into 
a cold bath, and remained there ten minutes ; on 
leaving it she went to bed : at eight she took the 
same quantity of milk. She arose between nine 
and ten. 
As these patients are generally in a relaxed 
state the cold bath producing a tonic effect, often, 
at the same time, occasions a kind of hemoptysy. 
But this need not excite disquietude, unless the 
spitting of blood continue, or be accompanied with 
pains in the chest and difficulty of breathing: 
I have been confirmed in my opinion by experi- 
ence. I had ordered river baths for a young per- 
son, weakened by the vice of solitude. She told 
me, each time after the first bath, with joy min- 
gled with disquietude, that ns she went to the river 
(she lived rather far from the river, and went on 
foot) she could scarcely support herself; but, at 
her return, she felt herself wonderfully strength- 
ened ; she also observed that, each time on reach- 
ing the river she spat blood. As, however, her 186 
breathing was not interrupted, nor her chest pain- 
ed, I only directed her to continue a shorter time 
in the water, and to bathe twice a-day. She fol- 
lowed my advice; her spittings ceased, and her 
health was restored. 
Obstructions, inflammations, abscesess, or inter- 
nal ulcers hinder cold bathing, and render it pru- 
dent to abstain from all exciting tonics. 
Weak and melancholy solitaries should not be 
made to vomit. I directed, by letters, a person 
much exhausted by secret maladies, whose chest 
was much weakened and irritated. She wrote to 
me one day that her mouth was very unpleasant, 
and that she wished to administer a vomit. As 
the details she gave me seemed not to warrant ur- 
gent remedies, I wrote, forbidding the use of the 
vomit. She wrote to me a few days after, express- 
ing great surprise at being forbidden to vomit 
when she was so disposed, but telling me my let- 
ter had come too late, she having taken a com- 
mon vomit, which had caused her to throw up 
only blood; but, happily, she had thought of 
drinking syrup of Marshmallow, and after a time, 
the vomiting and discharge of blood had ceased. 
Such persons must not be purged without good 
reasons, and great care must be given to the choice 
of purgatives. In certain cases, bleeding may be 
useful; but not as a general principle, and only 
when the system is much inflammed, and the 
strength not exhausted. Those cases are rare, and 
require particular examination, testing the judg- 
ment of the ablest physician. 187 
Local affections, from the same cause, may re- 
quire certain secondary means, but can oniy be 
thoroughly cured by a general mode of treatment, 
and immediate change of conduct. 
These auxiliaries are, for instance, different 
epithemies on the region of the stomach, to reani- 
mate its powers or control spasms. 
Certain local bleedings for local inflammations, 
or for retained menstruation. 
General bleeding, even to a great extent, at the 
period called critical. 
A determination of blood to the uteris may irri- 
tate the sexual organs, of which I gave an exam- 
ple. I was visited by a countrywoman of so pow- 
erful a frame that she looked like a prize fighter 
in woman's clothes. She was forty-eight, and 
every three months had an attack of uterine frenzy, 
when she would break anything to pieces within 
her reach, and three men could scarcely hold her. 
I bled her, and she was tranquil for three months, 
when the fit would return. She was aware of its 
approach by certain tremblings, and would come 
to me to be bled : and with these precautions she 
escaped return of the attack. 
Electricity, and certain powders used as snuff, 
are good in cases of gutta serena. 
Such auxiliaries are very excellent to stop simi- 
lar symptomatic runnings, and they should be tonic, 
relaxing or purgative, according to the nature of 
the flux, independently of the vicious habits of the 
patients. 
The rational and particular remedies in certain 
cases of phthisis may be used. 188 
Also the palliatives applied in cases of cancer 
and the like. The regimen should always be sim- 
ple, and depend upon the therapeutic or medica- 
inentary treatment; tonic, if adynamy prevail, that 
is, failing of excitability and contractility, but mild 
and soothing, if heat, rigidity, and irritability 
prevail. 
Generally, however, the food and beverage of 
such patients should be strengthening, restorative, 
and temperate, easy of digestion, and never sour 
or flatulent. 
The occupation of the patients should be pro- 
portioned to their powers and mingled with amuse- 
ment, to efface, if possible, even the memory of 
their abuses. 
We can only give some general precepts, and 
offer certain examples. The tact to distinguish 
and apply the rules of medicine, can only be im- 
parted by study of the science. 
I will, therefore, not undertake here to give a 
more complete history of the medical treatment of 
these maladies, which can only be properly applied 
by physicians; and, indeed, I published this little 
work for certain members of the profession, who 
may not have been thoroughly initiated into the 
mysteries and difficult art of healing such diseases. 
A simple drink for hemoptysy, or blood-spilling- 
Syrup of orgeat in cold, or luke-warm water if the 
ormer cause spasm. 
Another: Syrup of Marshmallows, used in th*' 
same manner. 
Another: Syrup of lemon ; idem. 
Mitigating remedy for pains in thcchsst and blood- 189 
spitting, also for irritation and sanguinary excretions 
of the digestive organs-Take a calPs foot, boil it 
in a pint of milk four or five hours; add a pound 
of sugar. Take a spoonful of this jelly from time 
to time; assist the effect by drinking a glass of 
whey at each dose. Eight or ten leeches may be 
applied to the parts affected. 
Simple application to calm irritation of the stom- 
ach, resulting from Onanism; also vomitings from the 
same cause.-A hare skin dressed with the hair on 
placed on the epigastrum next the skin. 
Another: Twenty-four grains of camphor, or the 
yolk of an egg, six grains of musk ; make a plaster 
of it, and spread it on the part; drink barley-water, 
or marshmallow-water with syrup of violets. 
Stomachical tonic.-Take a plaster of theriaque 
and place it on the belly. 
Another.-Leaves and stalks of mint, sage, 
melisse, rosemary, hyssop, a handful of each with a 
pinch of lavender; beat them in a mortar, place 
them in fine linen, and apply them to the hollow 
of the stomach. This must be stopped when it 
irritates the sexual organs. 
Frictions.-I knew a person afflicted with daily 
cholic, owing to her bad conduct. The remedies 
which most relieved her were rubbings with a 
coarse cloth over the organs of digestion and the 
corresponding organs. 
Ointment for the boils.-Cinaber one grain, cam- 
phor one scruple; mix it with common war, 
spread on linen, and cover with it the part affected. 
Repeat the treatment twice a-day at least. 
Another (for chronical eruptions of the skin of 190 
syphilitic kind.)-Yellow sulphate of mercury one 
grain, axonge one ounce; mix them together. 
Spread a little on the boils, or other cutaneous 
eruptions. The dose must be regulated by the 
effect it may be found to produce, and the intensity 
of the affection to be combated. 
Pills of Quarin.-For tonic fluxes, or which 
come from the second causes of weakness and re- 
laxations, independently of the attention to be paid 
to the first cause : 
Root of Valerian . . . 1 oz. 
Iron powder, not rusted . . 3 grs. 
Myrrh 
Incense 
Extract of Tormentille 
gr. each 
Make three pills of 3 grains. Take them from 
seven to ten, thrice a day 
The following electuary of Tissot also prevails 
against leucorrhca or white loss of the same nature. 
Conserve of roses . . . 2 oz. 
Conserve of rosemary 
Quinquina Powder 
1 oz. 
Mastic . . . . 2 grs. 
Cachou . . . . . 1 gr. 
Mix with enough orange syrup to make an electu- 
ary, flavor it with three drops of essence of canndk 
and take quarter ounce twice a day. 
Observation has induced Doctor Saint Marie of 
Lyons, to reduce this dose to one grain, morning, 
noon, and evening. Patients, says the doctor, are 
less heated by the remedy and can use it longer. 
Tonic Lotions for Fluxes.-Two spoonfuls of 191 
common brandy with twice as much cold water. 
Wash well the parts affected. 
Soothing and refreshing medicament when the 
organs are inflamed or puffed. 
Local bleeding by leeches-fomentations-baths 
prepared with decoction of marshmallow leaves, 
and others, with nitrate of potassium. 
The boils, as I have observed, sometimes occa- 
sion fluxes in the organs. The disease must be 
treated methodically, and every thing abstained 
from, calculated to change the flux or irritate, which 
is more dangerous than the irritation itself. 
Mixture a gain t softening the bones. 
Powdered oyster shells . . .3 grs. 
Root of garance powder . . 2 grs. 
Mix together and divide in doses of one scruple. 
Patients should take daily, two or three doses in 
sugar-water. 
The following preparation is considered to repair 
the substance of the body when exhaustion has been 
extreme in consequence of the vice we have been 
combating. Beat all together till this form a thick 
mixture. 
The whole is taken in the twenty-four hours in 
poonfuls. If the stomach need stimulating take 
n each spoonful a slight infusion of mint or sole. 
Cream 6 ozs. 
Yolk of egg .... 2 ozs. 
Sugar . . ... 1 os. 
Water of Cannello orgee . . 6 grs. ] <u A 7 A & ® 
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