Celestial Bed
In June 1781 Graham launched the Temple of Hymen in new premises at Schomberg House, in Pall Mall, designed to house the newly-built Celestial Bed. His "wonder-working edifice" was 12 by 9 feet (37 by 27 dm), and canopied by a dome covered in musical automata, fresh flowers, and a pair of live turtle doves. Stimulating oriental fragrances and "aethereal" gases were released from a reservoir inside the dome. A tilting inner frame put couples in the best position to conceive, and their movements set off music from organ pipes which breathed out "celestial sounds", whose intensity increased with the ardour of the bed's occupants. The electrified, magnetic creation was insulated by 40 cut glass pillars. At the head of the bed, above a moving clockwork tableau celebrating Hymen, the god of marriage, and sparkling with electricity, were the words:
"Be fruitful, multiply and replenish the earth!"
At Schomberg House, Graham gave his famous Lecture on Generation, a frank explanation of how to conceive which saw sex as a patriotic act and procreation as a national duty. Cold water washing of the genitals was recommended as essential to good sexual health, and prostitution and masturbation were castigated. Graham gave more discreet marriage guidance in a pamphlet called "A Private Advice."
Graham’s excessive spending soon got him into financial difficulties. He vacated the Adelphi Temple of Health in July 1781, and concentrated on trying to recoup his costs at Schomberg House. He found it hard to keep out of debt, however, and although he made a succession of spectacular comebacks, by March 1784 he was forced to sell most of his possessions. He returned to Edinburgh, his reputation ruined, to display the remains of his apparatus in a temporary Temple of Health on South Bridge Street.
Read more about this topic: James Graham (sexologist)
Famous quotes containing the words celestial and/or bed:
“Such is always the pursuit of knowledge. The celestial fruits, the golden apples of the Hesperides, are ever guarded by a hundred-headed dragon which never sleeps, so that it is an Herculean labor to pluck them.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“There is grey in your hair.
Young men no longer suddenly catch their breath
When you are passing;
But maybe some old gaffer mutters a blessing
Because it was your prayer
Recovered him upon the bed of death.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)