An additional fact, as stated by physiologists, is that, under normal conditions, the human female experiences sexual desire immediately after menstr… - John Harvey Kellogg

Disparity of Age.-Both nature and custom seem to indicate that the husband should be a little older than the wife. Several reasons might be given for this; but we need not mention them. When, however, the difference of ages reaches such an extreme as thirty, forty, even fifty or more years, nature is abused, good taste is offended, and even morality is shocked Such ill-sorted alliances are disastrous to both parties, and scarcely more to one than the other. An old man who forms a union with a young girl scarce out of her teens-or even younger-can scarcely have any very elevated motive for his action, and he certainly exposes himself to the greatest risk of sudden death, while insuring his premature decay. A king once characterized such a course as “the pleasantest form of suicide.” It is doubtless suicidal, but we suspect there are some phases of such an unnatural union which are not very enjoyable. One reason of the great danger of such marriages to the old is the exhaustive effects of the sexual act. As previously noted, in some animals it causes immediate death. Dr. Acton makes the following pertinent remarks:- “So serious, indeed, is the paroxysm of the nervous system produced by the sexual spasm, that its immediate effect is not always unattended with danger, and men with weak hearts have died in the act. Every now and then we learn that men are found dead on the night of their wedding.” “However exceptional these cases are, they are warnings, and should serve to show that an act which “may” destroy the weak should not be tampered with, even by the strong.” “There are old men who marry young wives, who pay the penalty by becoming martyrs to paralysis, softening of the brain, and driveling idiocy.”

Not a Modern Crime.—Although this crime has attained remarkable proportions in modern times, it is not a new one by any means, as the following paragraph will suffice to show:— "Infanticide and exposure were also the custom among the Romans, Medes, Canaanites, Babylonians, and other Eastern nations, with the exception of the Israelites and Egyptians. The Scandinavians killed their offspring from pure fantasy. The Norwegians, after having carefully swaddled their children, put some food into their mouths, placed them under the roots of trees or under the rocks to preserve them from ferocious beasts. Infanticide was also permitted among the Chinese, and we saw, during the last century, vehicles going round the streets of Pekin daily to collect the bodies of the dead infants. To-day there exist foundling hospitals to receive children abandoned by their parents. The same custom is also observed in Japan, in the isles of the Southern Ocean, at Otaheite, and among several savage nations of North America. It is related to the Jaggers of Guinea that they devour their own children.” The Greeks practiced infanticide systematically, their laws at one time requiring the destruction of crippled or weakly children. Among all the various nations, the general object of the crime seems to have been to avoid the trouble of rearing the children, or to avoid a surplus, objects not far different from those had in view by those who practice the same crimes at the present time. The destruction of the child after the mother has felt its movements is termed infanticide; before that time it is commonly known as abortion. It is a modern notion that the child possesses no soul or individual life until the period of quickening, an error which we have already sufficiently exposed. The ancients, with just as much reason, contended that no distinct life was present until after birth. Hence it was that they could practice without scruple the crime of infanticide to prevent too great increase of population. "Plato and Aristotle were advocates of this practice, and these Stoics justified this monstrous practice by alleging that the child only acquired a soul at the moment when it ceased to have uterine life and commenced to respire. From hence it resulted that, the child not being animated, its destruction was no murder."

37. Epileptic fits in children are not infrequently the result of vicious habits. 38. Wetting the bed is an evidence of irritation which may be connected with the practice ; it should be looked after. 39. Unchastity of speech and fondness for obscene stories betray a condition of mind which does not exist in youth who are not addicted to this vice. As previously mentioned,, so single one of the above signs should be considered as conclusive evidence of the habit in any individual ; but any one of them may, and should, arouse suspicion and watchfulness. If the habit really exists, but a short time will elapse before other signs will be noticed, and when several point in the same direction, the evidence may be considered nearly, if not quite, conclusive. But persistent watching will enable the positive signs to be detected sooner or later, and then there can no longer be doubt. It is, of course, necessary to give the individual no suspicion that he is being watched, as that would put him so effectually on his guard as, possibly, to defy detection.