Should a man who for three to six years of his boyhood
practiced masturbation think of wedlock?_

(b) _If one has not lived a pure life but has reformed, may he ask a
pure woman to be his wife?_

Such questions as these are very frequently asked and with most
serious motives. A vast majority of boys and young men who practice
self-abuse, do so either wholly ignorant of the fact that it is wrong
or cognizant only in a vague way of the evil of the practice.

To consign a man to the Hades of homelessness and the sorrow of
childlessness because through ignorance he lapsed from purity during a
few months or years of his life, would be meting out a retribution far
in excess of the sin. If nature intended such a retribution to be
meted out she would have led the way by causing an atrophy or some
other form of disease in the subject who had abused his sexual organs.
But nature does not do that. If the young man who, from his twelfth to
his eighteenth year, has practiced masturbation, is shown the error of
his way and breaks the habit absolutely, nature quickly comes to his
rescue and rehabilitates his virility completely, unless he has been
guilty of extreme excess in the habit. This rehabilitation of virility
after self-abuse is usually experienced in from one to three years,
according to the case and the extent of the practice.

The complete mastery of a habit after it has through years been
forging its chains about the youth, is in itself no small victory and
should go a long way towards extenuating his lapse. The young man who
can conquer himself and learn to lead a pure life, free from his early
habit and above reproach not only in his acts toward womankind but
also in all his thoughts of woman deserves his well-earned reward. He
deserves the respect of all pure women and should be able to win the
love of one whom he may with clear conscience ask to be his wife, and
with whom he may confidently expect to build a typical home.

7. _Should a man have intercourse for any purpose other than for
procreation?_

In the normal course of events, if intercourse is indulged in for
procreation only, it would come as often as once, perhaps twice in a
month; that is, either just before the menstrual period of the woman
or just after, the woman being most easily impregnated at these two
periods.

A man who has led a continent life before marriage should have no
difficulty in controlling his sexual appetite to that extent. If the