Chapter II: Letter I

In times, when every winter brings scenes of prostitution from the privacy of darkness into the public light of day; when our ladies of quality, and women of fashion, instead of being as remarkable for their virtue, as for their beauty, openly cast aside every sense of shame, and barefacedly encourage the addresses of men, who, avowedly, can have no intention but to involve them in guilt; it is the duty of every honest man to endeavour to trace the evil _to its source_, in order that, by pointing out _the foul spring_ which corrupts the stream, _the fountain may be cleared_, and the contagion which rages from it, lessened, if not entirely removed.

Boarding schools are, beyond doubt, seminaries, where the minds of girls are early polluted. Let the mistress of the school be ever so virtuous, prudent, and attentive, the vicious girls (and some such there always must be among a number) will find sufficient opportunities to taint the tender minds of unsuspecting innocence. Nothing can be more destructive than bad example; and, unfortunately, the human mind is too ready to copy those which are vicious—and _the vicious_ are more importunate and solicitous _to corrupt_, than _the virtuous_ are to gain proselytes to goodness.

Though I believe _the first seeds of vice_ are imbibed at a boarding school, yet I _by no means_ look on that education as the great cause of these frequent adulteries. If principles of virtue have been inculcated in infancy, they may yet, with proper care, bud out afresh under good culture—and flourish under the influence of good advice, when those noxious weeds are choaked up, which were planted by bad examples, but which may wither on the cause being removed.

_It is to the almost universal custom of EMPLOYING MEN-MIDWIVES, that I attribute the frequent ADULTERIES which disgrace our country._

_Ignorance_ has spread this _shameless_ custom. Ignorance leads people to suppose men _safer_ than women—Ignorance of _what_ the _Men_-midwives _do_, leads modest women _at first_ to submit to employ men; and _it is ignorance_ which leads husbands [who love their wives] to recommend, nay even sometimes force them on their wives. They know not what stripes they are preparing for themselves—they know not that they are removing the corner stone on which the virtue of their wives is founded—and all this on _a mistaken_ principle—_the idea that men are safest_.

The Almighty, through kindness to his creatures, has so ordered the labours of women, that even the honest part of the Men-midwife tribe confess, that, in thirty years practice, a person might probably never meet _with a single case_ where a good woman might not have done the business. This confession was made to me by an eminent man-midwife, after a practice of thirty-six years. How else would the world have been peopled? The men have _but lately_ come into fashion. In praise of _Scotland_ and _Ireland_ be it spoken, _the women of those countries are still too modest to employ them_. What is the consequence? _Adulteries_ happen _very seldom in those countries_; and every farm-house swarms with strong, healthy, _well-limbed_ children. If Men-midwives were requisite to bring children into the world, what would become of the wilds of America—the plains of Africa? Even the _Hottentot women_ are too modest to employ men—they leave that abandoned custom _to our English ladies_—yet they are so fruitful they furnish slaves to the globe. It is a notorious fact, that more children have been lost since women were so scandalously indecent as to employ men, than for ages before that practice became so general. Women have _a tenderness of feeling for their own sex_ in labour, which _it is impossible men can ever equal them in_. By _having felt_ the pains, and the anxieties attending child-birth, they know how to sympathize in a woman’s sufferings. _Their_ feelings, therefore, are _natural_. They lead them to be patient—they prompt them _to allow nature to do her own_ peculiar work. They never dream of having recourse to force—the _barbarous, bloody crotchet_ never stained _their_ hands with _murder_. There _never really_ can be occasion for a male operator, but when a deed must be done which my soul shudders at the idea of, and which I shall not mention—but thanks to God, such instances do not occur in a century!—To my knowledge, a lady was twice delivered in different parts of the country of England, by common women-midwives, and both those cases were _as unnatural_ and difficult as it is well possible to imagine—she and the children did well—if she had employed men, it is more than probable, _the children, at least_, would have expired under the crotchet—or been maimed by the forceps!

And how should this be otherwise! a long _un-impassioned_ practice, _early_ commenced, and _calmly_ pursued, is absolutely requisite to give men _by art_, what women attain _by nature_.—Dr. Hunter, very wisely, very justly has said, that “Labour is nature’s work.”—Nature _ought to be suffered_ nine hundred and ninety-nine times out of a thousand, _to do her own work_. All the knowledge _young_ men can possibly obtain, must be from _dead_ bodies—for is it in common sense to suppose, that a young lad can explore the secret recesses of Venus, so as to be _physically_ well acquainted with those parts in _living_ females? No—fires must quickly be raised, which unavoidably will confuse all his discerning _reasoning_ faculties—and _ART must instantly be lost in NATURE_. Dr. Hunter, indeed, and one or two men besides, _may perhaps_, by the help of _cold_ constitutions, and dint of very long practice, do their business _nearly as well_ as women—by leaving all _to nature_—but, if my life and fortune here, and salvation hereafter, depended on the life of any pregnant woman, and that of her infant, I would stake all I held valuable on her being attended by any old woman midwife in England, in preference to any man in the world. Whoever reads Nihel’s Midwifery, will be satisfied of this truth, that _women are infinitely safer than men_.

Who can wonder at the profligacy of the times, when it is known that even women of character soon become so callous to the bashfulness which ought to characterize their sex (from being habituated to the familiarities of their Men-midwives) that they will not scruple informing a male visitor, without even blushing, “I was not very well for some days in the country—so I came to town on purpose to be satisfied by Dr. ⸺ that I was in a good way—_the dear man_ has told me that _the child lies right_—and I am perfectly easy.” Monstrous! that a lady can pretend to any degree of modesty, and yet, _not content_ with having _a strange_ man attending her _for hours_ when in labour (most of that time intimately acquainted with _every_ part) she can, without any compunction, send for a man, and admit him without reserve _to the most unbounded_ liberties, at a time too, when she is _as able_ to walk, and _do every other act_ of life, as if she was not pregnant! Pray let me ask her ladyship, _how_ did “_The dear man_,”—“_sweet Dr. ⸺_,” _find out_ how the child lay?—By means _sufficient to taint the purity_, and _fully the chastity_, of any woman breathing!—I will boldly affirm, that, whoever admits a man to those _licentious_ freedoms, cannot pretend to answer for what _may_ be the consequences. If _the last_ circumstance does not take place, it must be owing, either to an extraordinary insensibility in the man, or to the woman’s not suiting his taste, having such choice of beauties to visit. Suppose, for argument’s sake, that the fictitious Goddess of Chastity, Diana herself, was on earth, and employed me to satisfy her doubts, during the months of pregnancy prior to labour—and her mind of course, at first, free from the smallest tincture of guilty ideas—yet, if I chose it, I could _so bewilder her reason_, that she should _lose sight of every principle of virtue_—and not _be able_ to refuse me whatever I chose to desire.—When a man is in free possession of the Citadel, and all the out-works surrendered at discretion, it is then too late to attempt guarding the town from plunder.

But supposing these advantages are not always taken (_which I dare say they are not_) it cannot be denied _with truth_ these visitations from Men-midwives, remove in a great measure, the horror of those intrusions on the advanced posts of virtue, which are its greatest safeguards—and serve _to prepare the way_ for the addresses of gay young men, who make it their business to seduce married women into the paths of infamy.

If any lady, desirous of exculpating herself from my censure, pleads that “she never admits a Man-midwife _to familiarities_ but when _in actual labour_”—I answer, that, even _in actual_ labour—_a woman has many intervals of ease_, for many minutes together quite free from pain—_in those intervals_, her mind _cannot_ maintain _its spotless whiteness_—_in those_ intervals she cannot but _be conscious_, that the _DOCTOR is infringing on the HUSBAND_.

But I believe there are very few women who confine the Doctor’s familiarities to the times of real labour. Lady ⸺, Mrs. ⸺, acquiesce in whatever he thinks right during all the months of pregnancy—and must he not be _MORE than man_, or LESS THAN MAN, who, _roving luxuriously_ through all the _hidden_ charms of beauty, can help being inflamed by passion?—and, _if inflamed by passion_, he may proceed ON CERTAINTIES ... he has an _UNERRING tell-tale under his inspection_, which gives him _an INFALLIBLE cue, when he may safely_ throw aside the mask, fearless of any repulse.

Shew some sense of modesty, ye Duchesses, Countesses, &c. &c. and those inferior women, whom _ye have debauched_ by your bad examples, will again imitate ye, in forsaking these Scandalous practices. Blush, ye women of fashion, to own that any man, besides your husbands, _is admitted to liberties with your persons_. No longer talk of “_dear_ Doctor Hunter,” “_angelic_ Doctor—” “_enchanting_ Doctor—.” ... For my own part, if I was a married man, I declare it would be _a matter of the utmost indifference_ to me, whether my wife had spent the night _in a bagnio_—or an hour of the forenoon locked up with a man-midwife in her dressing room.—Let this _shameless_ custom be abolished, and then virtue will fly back again to our metropolis, with all her train of _genuine self-approving pleasures_—and England be _once more_ as much famed for the chastity, as for the beauty of its women.

Adieu, Mr. Printer—you have received this letter from a sincere admirer of female modesty: Without it “beauty _ceases being lovely_, or wit being engaging.” Whoever possesses it cannot be enough esteemed and regarded—whoever is deficient in it cannot be sufficiently despised and slighted. Ye _English_ fair, _it ought_ to be your characteristic! _but while your fathers, husbands, and brothers are unprincipled, corrupted senators_—you think you have a right to deviate from _your point of honour_, since _they shew you the example in their’s_.

To conclude—_true modesty is incompatible with the idea of employing_

A MAN MIDWIFE[2].

[2] Except when those _very rare instances_ occur, which do not happen once in two thousand labours.