Married Love: A New Contribution to the Solution of Sex Difficulties

Appendix

Note 1.—(See p. 24.)
For suffering and even death of unmated females, see e.g. MARSHALL, in Quarterly Journal Microscopical Society, Vol. 48, 1904, p. 323.
PARSONS, in British Medical Journal, October, 1904.

Note 2.—(See p. 31.)
A frequent mistake (made even by gynÆcologists) is to confuse menstruation with the "period of desire," which is generally called "heat" in animals. Even in the most authoritative recent text books, such phrases as "heat and menstruation" are very common, thus coupling heat and menstruation as though they were equivalents, while the older books quite explicitly look on the menstrual period in women as corresponding to desire of "heat" in animals. This error has even been repeated very recently in the Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine.[13]
Some physiologists have studied this subject in several of the higher animals, and now realise that the time of desire is physiologically distinct from the phase which is represented by menstruation in women. It seems to be fairly well established that in women menstruation is caused by an internal secretion of the ovaries (c.f. p. 61), and is not directly due to ovulation, though it must have some connection with it.[14]
The most that modern science appears to have attained is briefly summarised in the following quotation from Marshall ("The Physiology of Reproduction," p. 69): "According to Martin and certain other writers, the human, female often experiences a distinct post-menstrual oestrus [Modern research has recognised a period when the female animal is ready for impregnation, which is called the oestrus, and a preparatory series of physiological changes called the pro-estrous phase.—M.C.S.], at which sexual desire is greater than at other times; so that, although conception can occur throughout the intermenstrual periods, it would seem probable that originally coition was restricted to definite periods of oestrus following menstrual or pro-estrous periods in women, as in females of other mammalia. On this point Heape writes as follows: 'This special time for oestrus in the human female has very frequently been denied, and, no doubt, modern civilisation and modern social life do much to check the natural sexual instinct where there is undue strain on the constitution, or to stimulate it at other times where extreme vigour is the result. For these reasons a definite period of oestrus may readily be interfered with, but the instinct is, I am convinced, still marked.'"
In nearly all wild animals there is a definite period for sexual excitement, very commonly just at that time of the year which fits into the span of gestation, so that the young are born at the season which gives them the best chance to grow up. In animals the period of desire, the ovulation (or setting free of the female germ or unfertilised egg-cell) and the time of the birth of the young, are all co-related harmoniously. The male animal is only allowed to approach the female when the natural longing for union is upon her. Among human beings, the only race which seems to have long periods of sexual quiescence at all comparable with those natural to the animals are the Esquimaux, who appear to pass many months without any unions of the men and women.

A BOOK THE WORLD HAS BEEN WAITING FOR

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A NEW CONTRIBUTION TO THE SOLUTION OF SEX DIFFICULTIES.
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By Dr. MARIE STOPES

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"Like all Dr. Stopes's writing, it is clear, thoughtful, penetrating, and undoubtedly is a scientific contribution towards a subject which a decade ago would have been taboo.... Our advice is for women to read it and for men to read it, for there is here stated a real problem which is specifically English."—English Review.

"Dr. Marie Stopes has endeavoured to meet the need of healthy young people of the educated class for information as to the sexual responsibilities of marriage. Though not a medical woman, the author has special qualifications for this task: with high scientific attainments she combines literary skill, sympathetic insight, idealism, and more than common courage.... To the married and to those about to marry, provided they are normal in mind and body and not afraid of facing facts, this should prove a most helpful book."—British Medical Journal.

"It is probably the most important contribution to the sex problem that has ever been made really accessible to the English public."—Cambridge Magazine.

"In saying that, unless the art of love is studied, marriage cannot bear its full fruits, she sees, as the greatest thinkers have always seen, that marriage is a symbol of transcendental significance.... In exquisite quality of understanding the book is a contribution to its subject, which in time will receive the recognition that it deserves."—The Hospital.

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London: A. C. Fifield, 13 Clifford's Inn, E.C.4

By the same Author

ALREADY IN ITS SECOND EDITION

WISE PARENTHOOD

A SEQUEL TO "MARRIED LOVE":
A BOOK FOR MARRIED PEOPLE

By MARIE CARMICHAEL STOPES, D.Sc., D.Ph.
WITH INTRODUCTION BY ARNOLD BENNETT
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As not only individual inquirers, but the world at large, and even the medical profession, lack a rational, scientific and critical consideration of the effects of the birth-control methods now used by millions of people, this little book seems urgently needed. It is hoped that it will help materially to improve our race and to check the spread of nervous and other injuries so prevalent as a result of ignorant attempts to obtain that wise and health-giving control of parenthood which all who think must crave.

It forms a sequel of practical advice to the same author's book, "Married Love," of which serious and enthusiastic reviews have been published in many medical and popular journals.

"We hope millions and tens of millions of this manual gets into the hands of the younger generation."—Cambridge Magazine.
"I would strongly recommend any who are interested in the practical aspect [the scientific method of birth control] to read a little book which has just appeared, from the pen of Dr. Marie C. Stopes, 'Wise Parenthood,'"—C. Killick Millard (Medical Officer of Health for Leicester) in Medical Officer, Dec. 7th, 1918.
"The method is that which people, including many doctors, want to know.... It meets the immense Æsthetic difficulties.... The work is especially for those happy people who recognise the kindred duty and delight of having, by a healthy mother, healthy children."—The Hospital.

London: A. C. Fifield, 13 Clifford's Inn, E.C. 4

FOOTNOTES:

[1] In this, and in most of the generalisations found in this book, I am speaking of things as they are in Great Britain. While, to a considerable extent, the same is true of America and the Scandinavian countries, it must be remembered all through that I am speaking of the British, and primarily of our educated classes.

[2] The italics are mine.—M. C. S.

This pronouncement of an exceptionally advanced and broadminded thinker serves to show how little attention has hitherto been paid to the woman's side of this question, or to ascertaining her natural requirements.

[3] "Conjugal Rights." Notes and Queries. May 16, 1891, p. 383. "S. writes from the Probate Registry, Somerset House: 'Previous to 1733 legal proceedings were recorded in Latin and the word then used where we now speak of rights was obsequies. For some time after the substitution of English for Latin the term rites was usually, if not invariably adopted; rights would appear to be a comparatively modern error.'"

"Mr. T. E. Paget writes ('Romeo and Juliet,' Act V., Scene III.):

"What cursed foot wanders this way to-night
To cross my obsequies, and true lovers rite?"

"Well may Lord Esher say he has never been able to make out what the phrase 'conjugal rights' means. The origin of the term is now clear, and a blunder, which was first made, perhaps, by a type-setter in the early part of the last century, and never exposed until now, has led to a vast amount of misapprehension. Here, too, is another proof that Shakespeare was exceedingly familiar with 'legal language.'"

[4] Note.—In Leviticus xv. it is the man who is directed to abstain from touching the woman at this period, and who is rendered unclean if he does.—M. C. S.

[5] See PflÜgers Archiv., 1891.

[6] This book is now out of print, but can be seen at the British Museum.

[7] See Prof. Ernest H. Starling's Croonian Lecture to the Royal Society, 1905.

[8] H. Ellis. "Sex in Relation to Society," 1910, p. 551.

[9] See Porosz, British Medical Journal, April 1, 1911, p. 784.

[10] A quotation from Thomas (p. 112 of William Thomas' book "Sex and Society," 1907, Pp. 314) is here very apt, though he had been speaking not of man, but of the love play and coyness shown by female birds and animals.

"We must also recognise the fact that reproductive life must be connected with violent stimulation, or it would be neglected and the species would become extinct; and on the other hand, if the conquest of the female were too easy, sexual life would be in danger of becoming a play interest and a dissipation, destructive of energy and fatal to the species. Working, we may assume, by a process of selection and survival, nature has both secured and safeguarded reproduction. The female will not submit to seizure except in a high state of nervous excitation (as is seen especially well in the wooing of birds), while the male must conduct himself in such a way as to manipulate the female; and, as the more active agent, he develops a marvellous display of technique for this purpose. This is offset by the coyness and coquetry of the female, by which she equally attracts and fascinates the male, and practises upon him to induce a corresponding state of nervous excitation."

[11] See p. 566 of the text-book on "The Physiology of Reproduction," Pp. xvii., 706, 1910.

[12] See his letter to the scientific journal "Nature" in the year 1893, August 24, pp. 389 and 390.

[13] See Dr. Raymond Crawfurd's mistaken statement that "the identity of oestrus, or 'heat' in the lower animals and of menstruation in the human female, admits of no doubt." P. 62 Proc. Roy. Soc. Medicine, vol. 9., 1916.

[14] The best modern account of these complex subjects will be found in the advanced text-book, "The Physiology of Reproduction," pp. xvii., 706, by F. H. A. Marshall. Reference may be made to original papers by J. Beard in the Anat. Anzeiger for 1897; and by Heape in the Philosophical Trans. Royal Society, 1894, 97.

Transcriber's note:

The footnote on page 17 says "The italics are mine.—M. C. S.", however, there are no italics found in the designated paragraph.

Minor typographical and punctuation errors have been corrected without note. Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as printed.

The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

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