One of the greatest evils to mankind is a too free sexual indulgence by young men and boys. It not only injures their vital powers, but affects their intellects. Parents should watch their boys to observe whether they are of amorous temperament. If they are found to be so, a prudent person can find means to persuade or prevent their indulgence of sexual passion. If a boy is allowed free and habitual intercourse with females before he has attained his growth, it will not only prevent the full development of his body, but also of his intellect. This is a well known fact in physiology; and by this very means many youths, who would otherwise become distinguished, have settled down into mediocrity, with scarcely sufficient energy of character to earn a livelihood. In a certain family in one of the country towns on the Hudson River, three sons were born. The two oldest afterwards became distinguished men. It was a family that inherited naturally the fine talents of their father, combined with the extraordinary robust and nervous energy of the mother. It was impossible that such a couple could produce other than intellectual and vigorous offspring. The third son, up to the age of twelve or thirteen years, promised to be the flower of the family. His education was progressing favorably. He was the pride of his parents. Years rolled along, and it seemed as though the boy stood still at thirteen or fourteen. He was amiable, and learned his lessons well enough, but all the energy and fire of youth seemed to have vanished. He did not care to join in the manly sports of his elder brothers, but in a listless and dreamy mood preferred to stay at home. His parents began to have fears for his health, though he did not complain. The father finally took him to New York, and consulted a physician of eminence. The doctor asked some questions relative to his habits, but the simple and candid answers of the lad did not lead to anything explaining the real cause of his malady. At parting, the physician said to his father, that if the lad lived in New York, he should pronounce his case one of too early sexual indulgence, unless he practiced the silent vice of Onanism. “Are there no females in your neighborhood with whom the lad could by any possibility associate?” inquired the doctor. “He never goes in company at all,” was the reply. “What servants have you?” “Two excellent girls who have been years in the family—the idea of an illicit association there is preposterous.” “His mother is positive that he does not practice the solitary habit?” “Yes!” “Well, I can do nothing for him; but yet I would like to see the boy again. With your permission I will run up to your place in a week or two.” “We shall be happy to see you.”

The doctor found out the secret of the boy’s malady within twenty-four hours after his arrival. He had cohabited constantly with one of the maids from the age of twelve and a half years until he was sixteen! The lad was saved only because of his youth. He partially outgrew this severe shock to his nervous system; but yet never fully developed the intellectual powers with which Nature had endowed him. Young men who marry too soon are in the same category. There is not one in a dozen who is fully developed even at twenty-one years of age.

The case of the son of Napoleon I., Emperor of the French, was similar to that above related. At the age of fifteen or sixteen he began his career of sexual indulgence, which ended his life at the early age of twenty-one years. He, too, was an amiable, inoffensive and studious youth—beloved by his grandfather and by the whole Austrian Court; and though the son of the most energetic man that modern times has produced, yet, from his quiet and effeminate life, he scarcely attracted the least public attention.

The present Sultan of Turkey is a living evidence of the effects of too early indulgence in sexual intercourse. He is the son of a brave and vigorous soldier, and with proper culture would doubtless have become a great and good man. Abdul Medjid has been over twenty years on the Turkish throne, and has hitherto impressed those who came in contact with him simply as a weak and indolent young man, with good intentions, but with neither nerve nor energy to carry them out. It was generally believed, and with good reason, that in his case, as in that of so many others of his race, the sensual indulgence begun in his boyhood had destroyed every trace of masculine decision. No one who watched his dreamy, listless expression, and saw his relaxed muscles, and lolling attitude as he rode on horseback through the streets, could help feeling that he reigned rather in virtue of foreign support than of his own ability to command obedience.