Charles Knowlton

“ Let us say, then, if we will, that the youth who thus sacrifices the present for the future, chooses wisely between the two evils, profligacy and asceticism. This is true. But let us not imagine the lesser evil to be good. It is not good for man to be alone. It is for no man or woman's happiness or benefit that they should be condemned to Shakerism. It is a violence done to the feelings and an injury to the character. A life of rigid celibacy, though infinitely preferable to a life of dissipation, is yet fraught with many evils. ”

“ Not one of our instincts perhaps affords larger scope for the exercise of disinterestedness, or fitter play for the best moral feelings of our race. Not one gives birth to relations more gentle, more humanizing and endearing; not one lies more immediately at the root of the kindliest charities and most generous impulses that honor and bless human nature. It is a much more noble, because less purely selfish, instinct than hunger or thirst. It is an instinct that entwines itself around the warmest feelings and best affections of the heart"—Moral Physiology. ”

“ Second—In a social point of view.—"Is it not notorious that the families of the married often increase beyond which a regard for the young beings coming into the world, and the happiness of those who give them birth, would dictate. In how many instances does the hard-working father, and more especially the mother, of a poor family remain slave throughout their lives, tugging at the oar of incessant labor, toiling to live, and living to toil; when, if their offspring had been limited to two or three only, they might have enjoyed comfort and comparative affluence? ”

“ But if we limit the sense of the word Nature so as not to include what we mean by art, then is civilized life one continued warfare against Nature. It is by art that we subdue the forest; by art we contend against the elements; by art we combat the natural tendency of disease, etc.
As to the outrageous slander which here and there one has been heard to utter against the fair sex, in saying that fear of conception is the foundation of their chastity, it must be the sentiment of a "carnal heart," which has been peculiarly unfortunate in its acquaintances. "To the pure, all things are pure." ”

“ But surely no instinct commands a greater proportion of our thoughts or has a greater influence upon happiness for better or for worse. "Controlled by reason and chastened by good feelings, it gives to social intercourse much of its charm and zest, but directed by selfishness or governed by force, it is prolific of misery and degradation. In itself it appears to be the most social and least selfish of all instincts. It fits us to give even while we receive pleasure, and among cultivated beings the former power is even more highly valued than the latter. ”

“ The foregoing measures for sterility are also suitable in cases of impotency. This term, I believe, is generally con-lined to, and defined as a want of desire or ability, or both on the part of the male; but I see no good reason why it should not comprehend the case in which there is neither desire nor pleasure with the female. Such females, it is true, may be fruitful; but so, on the other hand, the semen may not have lost its fecundating property. Impotency, at a young or middle age, and in some situations in life especially, is certainly a serious misfortune, to say the least of it. ”

“ For this reason it has, by some, been regarded as a low, degrading and "carnal" passion, with which family life must be ever at war. But in the instinct itself the philosopher sees nothing deserving of degrading epithets. He sees not that nature should war against herself. He believes that in savage life it is, and in wisely organized society of duly enlightened and civilized beings it should be the source of ten-fold more happiness than misery. ”

“ I admit that human beings might be so constituted that if they had no reproductive instinct to gratify, they might enjoy health; but being constituted as they are, this instinct cannot be mortified with impunity. It is a fact universally admitted, that unmarried females do not enjoy so much good health and attain to so great an age as the married; notwithstanding that the latter are subject to the diseases and pains incident to child-bearing. A temperate gratification promotes the secretions, and the appetite for food; calms the restless passions ”

“ We advocate scientific checks to population, because, so long as poor men have large families, pauperism is a necessity, and from pauperism grow crime and disease. The wages which would support the parents and two or three children in comfort and decency, is utterly insufficient to maintain a family of twelve or fourteen, and we consider it a crime to bring into the world human beings doomed to misery or to premature death. ”

“ Consciousness is not a "principle" or substance of any kind, nor is it, strictly speaking, a property of any substance or being. It is a peculiar action of the nervous system, and the system is said to be sensible, or to possess the property of sensibility, because those sentient actions which constitute our different consciousnesses may be excited in it. The nervous system includes not only the brain and spinal marrow, but numerous soft white cords, called nerves, which extend from the brain and spinal marrow to every part of the body in which a sensation can be excited. ”

“ Malthus, that population has a tendency to increase faster than the means of existence, and that some checks must therefore exercise control over population. The checks now exercised are semi-starvation and preventable disease; the enormous mortality among the infants of the poor is one of the checks which now keep down the population. The checks that ought to control population are scientific, and it is these which we advocate. We think it more moral to prevent the conception of children than, after they are born, to murder them by want of food, air and clothing. ”

“ And in case of a failure of crops in one part of the world, must the other parts withhold the means of supporting life that the far greater evil of excessive population throughout the world may be prevented? Can there be no effectual moral restraint, attended with far less human misery than such physical calamities as these? Most surely there can. But what is it? Malthus, an English writer on the subject of population, gives us none but celibacy to a late age. ”

“ It was long the opinion that the semen was ejected into the uterus in the act of coition, and that it afterward, by some unknown means, found its way into and along the Fallopian tubes to the ovary. But there are several facts which weigh heavily against this opinion, and some that entirely forbid it. In the first place, there are several well attested instances in which impregnation took place while the hymen remained entire, where the vagina terminated in the rectum, where it was so contracted by a cicatrix as not to admit the penis. ”

“ But how foolish it is to suppose that men and women will become as monks and nuns during the very holiday of their existence, and abjure during the fairest years of life the nearest and dearest of social relations, to avert a catastrophe which they and perhaps their children will not live to witness. But, besides being ineffectual, or if effectual, requiring a great sacrifice of enjoyment, this restraint is highly objectionable on the score of its demoralizing tendency. ”

“ Conception.—The part performed by the male in the reproduction of the species consists in exciting the organism of the female, and depositing the semen in the vagina. Before I inquire what takes place in the females I propose to speak of the semen.
This fluid, which is secreted by the testicles, may be said to possess three kinds of properties, physical, chemical, physiological. Its physical properties are known to every one—it is a thickish, nearly opaque fluid, of a peculiar odor, saltish taste, etc. ”

“ A sensation or a thought is consciousness, and there is no consciousness but that which consists either in a sensation or a thought.
Agreeable consciousness constitutes what we call happiness, and disagreeable consciousness constitutes misery. As sensations are a higher degree of consciousness than mere thought, it follows that agreeable sensations constitute a more exquisite happiness than agreeable thoughts. That portion of happiness which consists in agreeable sensations is commonly called pleasure. ”

“ But what can be more obvious than that it is absolutely impossible to explain any process or function of the animal economy, so as to be understood, before the names of the organs which perform this function have been defined, that is, before the organs themselves have been described. Now it is well known to every anatomist, and indeed it may be obvious to all, that in describing any organ or system of organs, we must always begin with some external and known parts, and proceed regularly, step by step, to the internal and unknown. ”

“ Now, as the seminal animalculæ are essential to impregnation, and as the ovum is impregnated in the ovarium, what more probable conjecture can we form than that an animalcule, as the real proper rudiment of the foetus, enters the ovum, where, being surrounded with albuminous fluid with which it is nourished, it gradually becomes developed? It may be noticed that Leeuwenhoek estimates that ten thousand animalculæ of the human semen may exist in a space not larger than a grain of sand. ”

“ Those acts (and intentions are acts of that part of man which intends) of human beings which tend to the promotion of happiness are good, but they are also called virtuous, to distinguish them from other things of the same tendency. There is nothing for the word virtue to signify, but virtuous actions. Sin signifies nothing but sinful actions, and sinful, wicked, vicious, or bad actions are those which are productive of more misery than happiness. ”

“ Who can estimate the beneficial effect which a rational moral restraint may thus have on the health and beauty and physical improvement of our race throughout future generations?"
Let us now turn our attention to the case of unmarried youth.
"Almost all young persons, on reaching the age of maturity, desire to marry. That heart must be very cold, or very isolated, that does not find some object on which to bestow its affections. Thus, early marriage would be almost universal did not prudential consideration interfere. The young man thinks, 'I cannot marry yet; I cannot support a family. ”

“ Knowlton's work was written, the very important fact has been discovered that ova are periodically discharged from the ovaries in the human female and other animals, not in consequence of fruitful connection having taken place, as was formerly believed, but quite independently of intercourse with the male. Such a discharge of ova occurs in the lower animals at the time of heat or rut, and in women during menstruation. At each menstrual period, a Graafian vesicle becomes enlarged, bursts, and lets the ovum which it contains escape into the Fallopian tube, along which it passes to the uterus. ”

“ Until men and women are absolved from the fear of becoming parents, except when they themselves desire it, they will ever form mercenary and demoralizing connections, and seek in dissipation the happiness they might have found in domestic life. ”

“ The true answer to the question is not, and never will be, Because the people have become acquainted with certain facts in physiology; it is because there are so many unmarried men and women,—men of dissipation and profligacy, owing to their not having married in their younger days and settled down in life. But why are there so many unmarried people in the country? ”

“ Properly connected with the subject of generation are the signs of pregnancy. Dr. Dewees remarks that "our experience furnishes no certain mark by which the moment conception takes place is to be distinguished. All appeals by the women to particular sensations experienced at the instant should be very guardedly received, for we are certain they cannot be relied upon; for enjoyment and indifference are alike fallacious. Nor are certain nervous tremblings, nausea, palpitation of the heart, the sensation of something flowing from them during coition, etc, more to be relied upon." ”

“ I shall allude to one cause, that of premature, and especially solitary gratification, in another place. Intemperance in the use of spirits is another powerful cause. Even a moderate use of spirits, and also of tobacco, in any form, have some effect It is a law of animal economy, that no one part of the system can be stimulated or excited, without an expense of vitality, as it is termed. The part which is stimulated draws the energy from other parts. And hence it is, that close and deep study, as well as all the mental passions when excessive, impair the venereal appetite. ”

“ Instances have occurred where it was so enlarged as to allow the female to have venereal commerce with others; and in Paris this fact was once made a public exhibition to the medical faculty. Women thus formed appear to partake in their general form of the male character, and are called hermaphrodites. The idea of human beings, called hermaphrodites, which could be either father or mother, is, doubtless, erroneous. The clitoris is analogous in its structure to the penis, and like it, is exquisitely sensitive, being, as it is supposed, the principal seat of pleasure. ”

“ And so it is, that through fear of having a family, before they have made a little headway in the world, and of being thereby compelled to "tug at the oar of incessant labor throughout their lives," thousands of young men do not marry, but go abroad into the world and form vicious acquaintances and practices. The truth, then, is this,—there is so much illegal connection in the land, because the people had not, twenty years ago, that very information which, it would seem, some, doubtless through want of due reflection, are apprehensive will increase this evil. ”

“ A woman being impregnated while she is already impregnated constitutes superfoetation. It is established beyond a doubt that such instances have occurred, yet those who have supposed that it is necessary for the semen to pass through the mouth of the uterus to produce conception have urged that superfoetation could not take place, because, say they—and they say correctly—"so soon as impregnation shall have taken place, the os uteri closes and becomes impervious to the semen ejected in subsequent acts of coition." ”

“ To excite agreeable sensations to a degree not exceeding this certain extent is temperance; to excite them beyond this extent is intemperance; not to excite them at all is mortification or abstinence. ”

“ This again calls for more spirits; and thus two vicious habits are commenced, which mutually increase each other. Strange as it may appear to those unacquainted with the animal economy, an intemperate indulgence sometimes gives rise to the same disease—so far as the name makes it so—that is frequently cured by a temperate indulgence; viz, nocturnal emissions.
Every young married woman ought to know that the male system is exhausted in a far greater degree than the female by gratification. It seems, indeed, to have but little effect, comparatively, upon some females. ”

“ I content myself with a few lines. "But when it has become the custom here as elsewhere to limit the number of children, so that none need have more than they wish, no man will fear to take a wife; all will marry while young; debauchery will diminish; while good morals and religious duties will be promoted."
It has been asked if a general knowledge of checks would not diminish the general increase of population? ”