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detriment to the individual. This is particularly true in the marriage state, where there is the continual contact and sexual stimulation. If this stimulus is not responded to sufficiently to satisfy the normal and reasonable craving of the sexual organism, a nervous crisis sooner or later is apt to develop. Neurasthenia in the man, and hysteria in the woman, is too often the price of an unnatural and irrational asceticism, regardless of what name it goes under or what the motive may be.
Sexual well-being as reflected in harmony and reciprocity is the key to happiness in marriage. The results are not only spiritually inspiring to the couple, and in that respect a boon to the institution of marriage, but there are beneficial results to the individual, in each case, of a biological nature, which manifest themselves in improved physical and mental health, a hopeful reaction to life, and in a most fitting sense of well-being.
Kisch, one of the greatest authorities on the sexual life of woman, has commented upon the beneficial effects of wedlock upon the health of ailing women.
Notwithstanding the unfavorable sexual experiences of a considerable number of women in the marriage state, the greater longevity of married women than the unmarried indicates that even partial gratification is better than complete inhibition of the sexual life.
Matthews Duncan declares there can be no doubt of the value of intercourse in regulating the sexual life of woman. Anstie states that unappeased natural desire is a frequent source of neurasthenia in the female sex, and that digestive disorders and anemia are often cured by marriage.
Rohleder is also of the opinion that various neurasthenic symptoms disappear in successful marriage, and that suppressed desire may cause depression of spirits, irritability and