‘Knowledge alone will never make a people virtuous, but it is an invaluable aid to those who are striving to control their passions. Seeing, on all sides, the terrible physical, mental, and social havoc wrought by sexual vice, we feel that the medical profession should do its utmost to stem the evil, and, at any rate, should give utterance to the truth with no uncertain sound. What are the physiological facts that ought to be proclaimed by the medical profession? Mainly these. In the first place, that occasional involuntary emissions of semen during sleep, and often in association with libidinous dreams, are natural occurrences in unmarried continent men, and are neither the cause nor the consequence of disease. The emissions are most frequent between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five; they vary in frequency in different men, but are favoured by sedentary occupations and by lewd thoughts. The subjects of these emissions sometimes complain of various sensations of malaise, which they attribute to the depressing influence of these losses; but it is a striking fact that such symptoms are only met with in those who have an exaggerated or erroneous conception of the significance of the discharge, and that they quickly disappear when their real meaning and causation are understood. To regard such a physiological occurrence as a disease and name it “spermatorrhœa” is a very serious error. ‘The second fact we wish to insist upon is that sexual continence does not beget impotence, and that the all-prevailing cause of impotence is prolonged sexual excess. In support of the opposite conclusion appeal has been made to analogy. It has been pointed out that unused muscles and bones waste, and therefore, it is urged, it must be true that continence will lead to impotence. Such argument is utterly fallacious, as are most arguments from analogy. Facts in abundance prove the contrary. Common as is sexual vice, continence is not unknown among us, and the truth of our statement is not difficult to verify. The real argument from analogy is drawn from the breast. This gland is generally inactive for many years after puberty, and yet, whenever the call for its activity arrives, it is more or less perfectly responded to. As a matter of fact, impotence does not depend upon the testicle, but upon the spinal cord; the sexual act is a physiological nerve-storm, and not simply an act of secretion. Loss of sexual potency is due to some fault in the nerves of the parts, or more commonly in the centre, in the spinal cord, which presides over this function. It is often a solitary nervous phenomenon, and by itself is not of grave import.