for an ounce of prevention
is certainly worth in this regard a whole pound of Koch's lymph as a
curative agent.

CHAPTER XVII.

SOME REASONS FOR BEING CIRCUMCISED.

The surgical and medical history of circumcision is intimately connected
with the remotest ages, this being, in fact, the earliest surgical
procedure of which we have any record. From the same records we obtain
hints as to two conditions for which circumcision probably was
suggested, either as a preventive or as a remedy.

Jahn, in speaking of the people by whom the early Hebrews were
surrounded, mentions their idolatrous practices, and that their peculiar
forms of Pagan worship were accompanied by indulgence in fornication,
lascivious songs, and unnatural lust. Others of their neighbors
worshiped the "_hairy he-goat_," with which they also practiced all
manner of abominations. Sodomy, or pederasty, seemed a sort of religious
ceremony with some of these heathen nations; from a religion it
necessarily became a social practice; this, in connection with the
phallic practices and worship, necessitated frequent exposure of the
male member. The evil results, to say nothing of the disgusting and
demoralizing tendency of these practices of the Pagan, were evidently
well known to the Jews. The contrast between the physique and health of
the pastoral habits, out-of-door life and simple diet of the Jews, and
the necessary opposite condition of health and physique due to luxury
and to these practices among their neighbors, could not have escaped
their attention. How much onanism had to do with the establishment of
circumcision may well be conjectured. Again, the other hint is in
reference to procreation, as some stress is laid to the connection
between the conception of Sarah and the circumcision of Abraham. Here we
have suggestions of a preventive to onanism, and a cure to male
impotence when due to preputial interference.[79]

Strange as it may seem, these two important results, due to
circumcision, seem to have been lost sight of for some thousands of
years, as even the able works of the physicians of the latter part of
the last century have nothing to say connecting onanism and
circumcision. Neither the works of Tissot on male onanism nor the
pioneer work of Bienville on nymphomania speak of the presence of the
prepuce in the male, or of the nymphar or clitorian prepuce in the
female, as being causative of, or their removal curative of, either
masturb