But do not let any one, by any means, from this last mentioned observation, conclude against the utility of the precepts of the most skillful masters in the art of surgery, who, grounding it on other observations, strictly forbid coition to the wounded; there is no practitioner that might not easily have convinced himself how pernicious it must be to them. I shall only adduce one example, in which self-pollution was mortal, and of which G. FABRI de Hilden has preserved to us the history. COSMUS SLOTAN had amputated the hand of a young man, that was shattered by a gun-shot wound. As he knew him to be of a very hot constitution, he had strictly forbid him any commerce with his wife, whom he likewise apprized of the danger. But when all fear of the worst accidents was dissipated, and the cure was proceeding in a fair way, the patient finding desires come upon him, for which his wife refused to have the complaisance he wanted of her, he, without coition, procured to himself an emission of the _semen_, which was immediately followed by a fever, by a delirium, by convulsions, and other violent symptoms, of which he died in four days time[144]. I knew a young married man, who, having inconsiderately thrown himself out of the seat of a _cabriolet_, (a chaise,) fell on his side; the hind-wheel went over his foot, between the heel and the ancle-bone; there was neither fracture nor luxation, but a considerable contusion: finding himself recovered at the end of five days, he proceeded with his bride as if he had had no such accident. Two hours afterwards his leg swelled, with the most unsufferable torture, and he had a strong fever, which lasted thirty hours. But return we to the point. It is of great importance early to prevent the progress of habit; and whatever may be the first cause of the pollutions, not to suffer them to grow upon one. When they have been a long while upon one, they are very hard to cure. “There is no disorder (says HOFFMAN) that more torments the patients, nor gives more trouble to physicians, than nocturnal pollutions, when they have lasted a long time, and become habitual, especially if they return every night. The very best remedies are almost always in vain employed; they even often do more harm than good[145].”