here is almost no other talk, are not mere
voluntary impressions of apprehension and fear; for I know, by
experience, in the case of a particular friend of mine, one for whom I
can be as responsible as for myself, and a man that cannot possibly fall
under any manner of suspicion of insufficiency, and as little of being
enchanted, who having heard a companion of his make a relation of an
unusual frigidity that surprised him at a very unseasonable time; being
afterwards himself engaged upon the same account, the horror of the
former story on a sudden so strangely possessed his imagination, that he
ran the same fortune the other had done; and from that time forward, the
scurvy remembrance of his disaster running in his mind and tyrannising
over him, he was subject to relapse into the same misfortune. He found
some remedy, however, for this fancy in another fancy, by himself frankly
confessing and declaring beforehand to the party with whom he was to have
to do, this subjection of his, by which means, the agitation of his soul
was, in some sort, appeased; and knowing that, now, some such
misbehaviour was expected from him, the restraint upon his faculties grew
less. And afterwards, at such times as he was in no such apprehension,
when setting about the act (his thoughts being then disengaged and free,
and his body in its true and natural estate) he was at leisure to cause
the part to be handled and communicated to the knowledge of the other
party, he was totally freed from that vexatious infirmity. After a man
has once done a woman right, he is never after in danger of misbehaving
himself with that person, unless upon the account of some excusable
weakness. Neither is this disaster to be feared, but in adventures,
where the soul is overextended with desire or respect, and, especially,
where the opportunity is of an unforeseen and pressing nature; in those
cases, there is no means for a man to defend himself from such a
surprise, as shall put him altogether out of sorts. I have known some,
who have secured themselves from this mischance, by coming half sated
elsewhere, purposely to abate the ardour of the fury, and others, who,
being grown old, find themselves less impotent by being less able; and
one, who found an advantage in being assured by a friend of his, that he
had a counter-charm of enchantments that would secure him from this
disgrace. The story itself is not, much amiss, and therefore you shall
have it.

A C