men Sometimes Essential for Health of the
Girl--Certificate from Physician who has Ruptured Hymen.

I have mentioned in a previous chapter that the absence of the hymen
was no proof of unchastity, just as the presence of the hymen was no
proof of perfect chastity. Chastity and virginity are not synonymous,
and a girl may possess physical virginity, that is, an intact hymen,
and still be morally unchaste. She may be in the habit of indulging in
unnatural sexual practices. But the laity does not know these facts or
does not want to know them, and the intact hymen is still worshipped
like a fetish. This would be of little consequence, if it did not
often result in unnecessary suffering to the female child or girl.
Much disease and a good deal of sterility result from the fear of
tampering with the hymen.

When a boy gets some trouble with his genital organs, such as
phimosis, or balanitis or whatever it may be, he is at once taken to a
physician, who institutes the necessary treatment. When a little girl
complains of itching around the genitals or of some discharge, the
mother will hesitate long before taking her to a doctor. She will be
afraid he will do something to the hymen. And so she will temporize,
using salves and washes, and the disease will in the meantime be
making progress, that is, getting worse. When she does take her to a
physician, and he says that in order to treat the case thoroughly the
hymen has to be stretched or opened, the mother will withhold her
consent, and the disease will be allowed to progress. I know of many
such cases. This is wrong. When the health of the girl demands and her
future child-bearing power is at stake, no hesitation should be felt
in sacrificing the hymen.

Though in the future the fuss which is now made about the hymen, the
excessive veneration in which it is held, will appear ridiculous, and
though I consider it foolish and rather humiliating to the girl,
nevertheless, now, when the average husband does lay so much stress on
the presence of an unruptured hymen, a physician who in the course of
an operation or treatment has occasion to cut or rupture the hymen,
will do well to give the patient a certificate to that effect. In case
any question regarding the girl's chastity comes up in the future, she
can prove by the doctor's certificate that her loss of virginity was
not due to sexual relations. Of course the relations between husband
and wife, or between prospective hu