rubbed myself with the
wash-rag while bathing, waiting for a result, and having the same
peculiar feeling I had so often experienced. I am not aware of
any ill effects having resulted, but I felt degraded, and tried
hard to overcome the habit. No one had spoken to me of the habit,
but from the secrecy of grown people, and passages I had heard
from the Bible, I conceived the idea that it was a reprehensible
practice. And, while this did not curb my desire, it taught me
self-control, and I vowed that each time should be the last. I
was often able to keep the resolution for two or three weeks."
Some four years later she gradually succeeded in breaking herself
of the practice in so far as it had become a habit; she has,
however, acquired a fuller knowledge of sexual matters, and,
though she has still a great dread of masturbation as a vice, she
does not hesitate to relieve her physical feelings when it seems
best to her to do so. "I am usually able to direct my thoughts
from these sensations," she writes, "but if they seem to make me
irritable or wakeful, I relieve myself. It is a physical act,
unassociated with deep feeling of any kind. I have always felt
that it was a rather unpleasant compromise with my physical
nature, but certainly necessary in my case. Yet, I have abstained
from gratification for very long periods. If the feeling is not
strong at the menstrual period, I go on very well without either
the sensation or the gratification until the next period. And,
strange as it may seem, the best antidote I have found and the
best preventive is to think about spiritual things or someone
whom I love. It is simply a matter of training, I suppose,--a
sort of mental gymnastics,--which draws the attention away from
the physical feelings." This lady has never had any sexual
relationships, and, since she is ambitious, and believes that the
sexual emotions may be transformed so as to become a source of
motive power throughout the whole of life, she wishes to avoid
such relationships.

OBSERVATION V.--Unmarried, aged 31, in good health, with,
however, a somewhat hysterical excess of energy. "When I was
about 26 years of age," she writes, "a friend came to me with the
confession that for several years she had masturbated, and had
become such a slave to the habit that she severely suf