en by one who has proudly
and nobly filled the station of a wife and mother, and whose children and
grandchildren surround her and crown her life with tenderest love and
respect:

"It has often been a matter of wonder to me that men should, so heedlessly,
and so injuriously to themselves, their wives and children, and their
homes, demand at once, as soon as they get legal possession of their wives,
the gratification of a passion, which, when indulged merely for the sake of
the gratification of the moment, must end in the destruction of all that is
beautiful, noble and divine in man or woman. I have often felt that I would
give the world for a friendship with man that should show no impurity in
its bearing, and for a conjugal relation that would, at all times, heartily
and practically recognize the right of the wife to decide for herself when
she should enter into the relation that leads to maternity."

6. TIMELY ADVICE.--Here let me say that on no subject should a man and
woman, as they are being attracted into conjugal relations, be more open
and truthful with each other than on this. No woman, who would save herself
and the man she loves from a desecrated and wretched home, should enter
into the physical relations of marriage with a man until she understands
what he expects of her as to the function of maternity, and the relation
that leads to it. If a woman is made aware that the man who would win her
as a wife regards her and the marriage relation only as the means of a
legalized gratification of his passions, and she sees fit to live with him
as a wife, with such a prospect before her, she must take the consequences
of a course so {261} degrading and so shameless. If she sees fit to make an
offering of her body and soul on the altar of her husband's sensuality, she
must do it; but she has a right to know to what base uses her womanhood is
to be put, and it is due to her, as well as to himself, that he should tell
beforehand precisely what he wants and expects of her.

Too frequently, man shrinks from all allusion, during courtship, to his
expectations in regard to future passional relations. He fears to speak of
them, lest he should shock and repel the woman he would win as a wife.
Being conscious, it may be, of an intention to use power he may acquire
over her person for his own gratification, he shuns all interchange of
views with her, lest she should divine the hidden sensualism of his soul,
and his intention t