subject of maternal
impressions, it is because I pity the poor mothers and want to spare
them as much as possible unnecessary worry and anxiety. Besides I want
them to believe in the truth and not in error.

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

ADVICE TO THE MARRIED AND THOSE ABOUT TO BE

Marriage as an Ideal Institution--Monogamic Marriage--Some Reasons
for Husbands' Deviations--Importance of First Few Weeks of
Married Life--Necessity for Understanding at Beginning--
Preventing and Breaking Habits--The Wife's Individuality--
Husbands Who are Childish, Not Vicious--Wife's Interest in
Husband's Affairs--The "Slob" Husband--The Well-groomed Husband--
Bad Odor from the Mouth--Odors from Other Parts of the Body--
Treatment for Bad Odor from Perspiration--A Beneficial Powder--
Advice Regarding Flirting--Dainty Underwear--Fine External Clothes
and Cheap and Soiled Underwear--Delicate Adjustments of Sex Act
Required with Some Men--Wife Who Discusses Her Husband's Foibles--
A Professional Secret--A Case of Temporary Impotence--The Wife's
Indiscretion--The Disastrous Result--A Big Stomach--The Wife's
Attitude Towards the Marital Relation--Behavior Preliminary to
and During the Act--Congenital Frigidity--Prudish and Vicious
Ideas About the Sex Act--Sexual Intercourse for Procreative
Purposes Only--Fear of Pregnancy on the Part of the Wife--The
Remedy--Other Causes--Wife who Makes too Frequent Demands--
Sacrificing the Future to the Present--Esthetic Considerations.

Whether marriage in its present form is an ideal institution destined
to endure forever, whether it is in need of radical reforms before it
can be considered ideal, or whether it has fundamental irremediable
defects, are questions which we are not going to discuss here. The
fact is that at the present time the greatest part of the adult
population of the world is married; and the part that isn't would like
to be. And the greater part of civilized humanity living in a state of
monogamic marriage, it behooves us to make the best of it, to get out
of it the greatest amount of happiness that we can, obviate as much
unhappiness as possible, and to do everything in our power to make it
permanent. Separation or divorce are remedies of last resort, and
people have recourse to them when they are at the end of their tether.
But the proper thing to do is to avoid the necessity of having to have
recourse to them. And I believe that a careful, tho