Читать книгу The Physical Life of Woman: Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother - George H. Napheys - Страница 42

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Very few words are necessary here. We have already said we speak as physicians, not as moralists. But there are some false and dangerous ideas abroad, which it is our duty as physicians to combat.

None is more false, none more dangerous, than that embodied in the proverb, 'A reformed rake makes the best husband.' What is a rake? A man who has deceived and destroyed trusting virtue—a man who has entered the service of the devil to undermine and poison that happiness in marriage, which all religion and science are at such pains to cultivate. We know him well in our capacity as physicians. He comes to us constantly the prey to loathsome diseases, the results of his vicious life; which diseases he will communicate to his wife, for they are contagious, and to his children, for they are hereditary; and which no reform can purge from his system, for they are ineradicable.

Is this the man a pure woman should take to her arms? Here repentance avails nothing. We have witnessed the agony unspeakable which overwhelmed a father when he saw his children suffering under horrible and disgusting diseases, the penalty of his early sins.

Very few men of profligate lives escape these diseases. They are alarmingly prevalent among the 'fast' youths of our cities. And some forms of them are incurable by any effort of skill. Even the approach of such men should be shunned—their company avoided.

A physician in central Pennsylvania lately had this experience: A young lady of unblemished character asked his advice for a troublesome affection of the skin. He examined it, and to his horror recognised a form of one of the loathsome diseases which curse only the vilest or the most unfortunate of her sex. Yet he could not suspect this girl. On inquiry, he found that she had a small but painful sore on her lip, which she first noticed a few days after being at a picnic with a young man. Just as he was bidding her good-night, he had kissed her on the lips.

At once everything was clear. This young man was a patient of the physician. He was a victim to this vile disease, and even his kiss was enough to convey it.

The history of the sixteenth century contains the account of an Italian duke, who on one occasion was forced by his ruler to reconcile himself with an enemy. Knowing he could not escape obedience, he protested the most cheerful willingness, and in the presence of the king embraced his enemy, and even kissed him on the lips. It was but another means of satisfying his hatred. For he well knew that his kiss would taint his enemy's blood with the same poison that was undermining his own life.

How cautious, therefore, should a woman be in granting the most innocent liberties! How solicitous should she be to associate with the purest men!

Would that we could say that these dangerous and loathsome diseases are rare! But, alas! daily professional experience forbids us to offer this consolation. Every physician in our large cities, and even in smaller towns, knows that they are fearfully prevalent.

We have been consulted by wives, pure, innocent women, for complaints which they themselves, and sometimes their children, suffered from, the nature of which we dared not tell them, but which pointed with fatal finger to the unfaithfulness of the husband. How utterly was their domestic happiness wrecked when they discovered the cause of their constant ill-health!

Nor are such occurrences confined to the humbler walks of life. There, perhaps, less than in any other do they occur. It is in the wealthy, the luxurious, the self-indulgent class that they are found.

Are we asked how such a dreadful fate can be averted?

There are, indeed, certain signs and marks which such diseases leave with which physicians are conversant. As if nature intended them as warnings, they are imprinted on the most visible and public parts of the body. The skin, the hair, the nose, the voice, the lines on the face, often divulge to the trained observer, more indubitably than the confessional, a lewd and sensual life.

Such signs, however, can only be properly estimated by the medical counselor, and it would be useless to rehearse them here. Those women who would have a sure guide in choosing a man to be their husband, have they not Moses and the prophets? What is more, have they not Christ and the apostles? Rest assured that the man who scoffs at Christianity, who neglects its precepts and violates its laws, runs a terrible risk of bringing upon himself, his wife, and his children, the vengeance of nature, which knows justice but not mercy. Rest assured that the man who respects the maxims of that religion, and abstains from all uncleanness, is the only man who is worthy the full and confiding love of an honorable woman.