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BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 FOR 
 
 Parents and Teachers 
 
 BY 
 
 T. W. GALLOWAY, PH. D. 
 
 // 
 PROFESSOR OP BIOLOGY, JAMES MH.T.TKTN UNIVERSITY, DECATUR, ILL. 
 
 AUTHOR OF Elementary Zoology; Text Book of Zoology, etc. 
 
 D. C. HEATH AND COMPANY 
 
 BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO 
 
.WTU 
 
 
 \ 
 
 C.^, 
 
 Copyright, 1913, by 
 D. C HEATH & COMPANY 
 
 IG7 
 
^0 
 MY WIFE 
 
 AT ONCE MY MOST SYMPATHETIC 
 
 AND EFFECTIVE CRITIC, — THIS 
 
 BOOK IS DEDICATED. 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
 482349 
 
Digitized by the Internet Arciiive 
 
 in 2008 with funding from 
 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/biologyofsexforpOOgallrich 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 When those meet who have given much thought to the 
 question of the need of proper sex instruction for our 
 children, there is little time taken in arguing that such 
 instruction is desirable or necessary at the hands of parents 
 and teachers. The questions which are now being con- 
 sidered by teachers are rather these : — What subjects should 
 be included in this instruction? In what order should they 
 come? Where should the emphasis be put? At what 
 period in the child's life should each topic be presented for 
 best results? Who should do the teaching, and imder 
 what circumstances? 
 
 In every discussion of the matter, after pointing out 
 what may be done in college and in high school, or even 
 in the grades, by teachers properly equipped with knowl- 
 edge, earnestness, and insight, the attention is always 
 brought back to the fact that all this comes too late, if 
 nothing has been done before. Before any outside teacher 
 can come to the help of the child, important work must 
 be done by the parent. If sex instruction is to amount 
 to anything worth while, it must begin, and all its founda- 
 tions be laid, in the home. Furthermore, at every stage 
 in the life of the youth the parents should have a closeness 
 of approach which no one else can gain, and should supple- 
 ment the work of others at every step. 
 
 It is the purpose of the writer in the present book, the 
 material of which was first delivered as a series of talks 
 
Vi BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 to meetings of mothers and teachers, to bring before t 
 parents and teachers some idea of the biological, social,/ 
 and moral foundations which must underlie all this work and J 
 something of the spirit which must characterize it. ItJ 
 is not the purpose of the writer to give in detail all the / 
 facts for which a parent may find need. There is an in- 
 creasing literature in which these may be found. i 
 The problem at the present moment is one of method 
 and spirit rather than of matter; — "how" rather than 
 "what." How can we take the facts, which are easy 
 enough for any adult to get, and use them in such a way 
 as to do good rather than harm to the boys and girls at 
 the various stages of their development? Because the 
 writer believes cordially that there is a sane solution to the 
 problem, and that parents and teachers have, in the 
 phenomena of sex, some most valuable and constructive 
 pedagogical materials, which in the past have been either 
 neglected or used spasmodically, he presents this brief 
 study of the subject. 
 
 T. W. G. 
 James Millikin University, 
 Decatur, Illinois, June 30, 1913. 
 
CONTENTS 
 AND SYLLABUS OF CHAPTERS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Foreword v 
 
 Contents and Syllabus of Chapters vii 
 
 List of Illustrations * ix 
 
 Chapter I. The Actual Conditions i 
 
 I. Introduction, i. 2. Increased understanding of the meaning 
 of sex, I. 3. Two kinds of human facts, 2. 4. The normal 
 up-building values of sex, 3. 5. The destructive and unwhole- 
 some aspects of sex, 4. 6. The redemption of the sex idea, 5. 
 7. The policy of silence and its failure, 5. 8. The value of 
 soimd knowledge, 7. 9. The limitation of mere knowledge, 7. 
 10. Summary, 8. 
 
 Chapter II. An Investigation 11 
 
 ' I. Introduction, 11, 2. The questions, 11. 3. The results, 12. 
 
 4. Discussion of results, 13. 5. Summary of conclusions, 15. 
 
 Chapter ni. Some Principles Which Must Guide in Sex 
 
 Instruction 17 
 
 I. Introduction, 17. 2. The first necessity is the "motivation" 
 of the teacher, 18. 3. Sex instruction must be properly graded, 
 18. 4. Sex instruction must be different for boys and girls, 19. 
 
 5. Sex instruction should follow curiosity, 20. 6. Sex instruction 
 should precede the actual need of it, 21. 7. Use of the favoring 
 qualities of personality, 22. 8. Sex instruction should be inciden- 
 tal to other teaching, 23. 9. Knowledge of the biology of sex not 
 enough, 24. 10. There must be a sane and wise division of labor 
 in sex instruction, 25. 
 
 Chapter IV. Reproduction and Unselfishness 28 
 
 I. Biology of sex for parents and teachers, 28. 2. The construc- 
 tion of the individual, 28. 3. Relation of reproduction to this 
 process, 29. 4. Illustrations of reproduction, 30. 5. Further 
 sacrifices growing out of reproduction, 32. 6. Summary, 33. 
 
 vii 
 
viii BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 PAOB 
 
 Chapter V. Sex and Selfishness • ' • - 35 
 
 I. The introduction of fertilization, 35. 2. The introduction of 
 sex, 36. 3. The meaning of the sexes, 38. 4. The attraction 
 of the sexes, 39. 5. The selfishness of sex, 40. 6. Relation 
 between reproduction and sex, 40. 7. These principles applied 
 to human life, 41 . 
 
 Chapter VI. Sex in Relation to Normal Human Physical 
 
 AND Mental Development 43 
 
 I. Introduction, 43 . 2. The differences between male and female 
 in humans, 44. 3. The relation of sex to these bodily and mental 
 developments, 46. 4. Relation of sex to the normal development 
 of the human male, 47. 5. The relation of sex to normal de- 
 velopment in the human female, 48. 6. The abnormal aspects of 
 sex in human beings, 48. 7. Special abuses of sex in men, 49. 
 
 8. The abnormal aspects of sex in women, 52. 9. Summary, 56. 
 
 Chapter VII. The Social and Moral Bearing of Sex .... 57 
 I. R66um6 of the relation of sex to mental life, 57. 2. Sex and 
 social life, 58. 3. Abnormal influences of sex in society, 59. 
 4. The moral bearings of sex, 62. 5. Hiunan standards to pro- 
 tect social morals, 63. 6. The inner personal morals, 63. 7. 
 Incentives leading to self-control, 65. 8. Sex and religion, 67. 
 
 9. Summary, 68. 
 
 Chapter VIII. Time and Manner of Inbtrijction 69 
 
 I. Introductory, 69. 2. The matter of instruction, 69. 3. 
 The periods of the child's life as they relate to sex instruction, 70. 
 4. The early stage: from birth to 4 or 5 years, 71. 5. The early 
 stage: from 4 to 6 or 7 years, 72. 6. The prepubertal stage: from 
 7 to 10 or II, 72. 7. The pubertal stage : from 10 or 11 to 14 or 15, 
 74. 8. Post-pubertal or late adolescent stage : from 15 to 18 or 
 20, 76. 9. Summary, 78. 
 
 Chapter IX. Eugenics 79 
 
 I. Introduction, 79. 2. The essential contention of the eugenist, 
 79. 3. The things that influence birth, 81. 4. Hereditary 
 transmission of taints, 82. 5. Congenital infections, 83. 6. 
 Social or economic incapacity, 84. 7. Relation of these consider- 
 ations to human marriage, 84. 8. Other reforms made necessary 
 by these facts, 85 . 
 
 Appendix. The Problems of Parents 89 
 
 I. Questions of early childhood, 90. 2. Special problems of ado- 
 lescent boys, 97. 3. The problems of the adolescent girl, loi. ' 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGK 
 
 Figure i. Reproduction by simple cell division (ParawcaMw) . .30 
 
 Figure 2. Reproduction in simple cell by budding {Yeast) . . .31 
 
 Figure 3. Reproduction by budding in many-celled organism . .31 
 
 Figure 4. Many-celled organism reproducing by similar, one-celled 
 
 offspring (Spores) 32 
 
 Figure 5. Many-celled organism reproducing by similar, one-celled 
 
 offspring which unite (Gametes) 36 
 
 Figure 6. Reproduction in which a single parent produces two 
 
 kinds of offspring, — eggs and sperm ..... 36 
 
 Figure 7. Reproduction in which the male parent produces one kind 
 
 of offspring and the female parent another kind. . .37 
 
 Figure 8. The sex glands and ducts in the male 50 
 
 Figure 9. The position of the pelvic organs in the female; side view 54 
 
 Figure 10. The relation of ovary and uterus; ventral view ... 55 
 
 Figure II. Flower oilily (Section) 95 
 
 Figure i 2. Fertilization in the lily 96 
 
 IX 
 
BIOLOGY OF SEX FOR PARENTS 
 AND TEACHERS 
 
& 
 
C;V LJi'^'^i^i^HA 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 THE ACTUAL CONDITIONS 
 
 1. Introduction. — A new book on a subject like this 
 must first justify its existence to the reader. This chapter 
 undertakes to do this. In the meantime the writer wishes 
 to make a few simple statements of fact for the encourage- 
 ment of the serious reader. 
 
 (i) The problem of sex, as it bears on human education, 
 conduct, and welfare, is one of the most practical and 
 important that we are called on to solve. 
 
 (2) On the whole it has been the most neglected, ignored, 
 and abused side of our human education. 
 
 (3) There is now on foot a very definite and promising 
 movement among educators, social workers, and other 
 thoughtful people to take up the problem in a scientific and 
 humane way. This is one of the most hopeful educational 
 movements of the new century. 
 
 2. Increased Understanding of the Meaning of Sex. — 
 During the last seventy-five years science has been discov- 
 ering the principles that have made it possible for our invent- 
 ors to construct the telegraph, the telephone, the phono- 
 graph, and other devices that mean so much in our material 
 progress. In just the same way, science, working with the 
 
 I 
 
2 . ' ... ; .\ blOLpGy OF SEX 
 
 principles of life, has' shown lis the great part that sex has 
 played in all the life of the earth, including that of man. 
 Because of this knowledge of sex, and by means of it, 
 the plant breeder has produced wonderful new and im- 
 proved varieties of fruits, grains, daisies, and roses. By 
 means of the same knowledge, the animal breeder has pro- 
 duced a marvelous improvement in all the domesticated 
 animals. Thus, through the biologist, we have learned 
 that there is no more universal and important thing in life 
 than the matter of sex and reproduction; and, through 
 the practical work of the breeders of plants and animals, 
 we are learning to ask the question whether we can not 
 use this knowledge in such a way as to improve human 
 Hfe, quite as much as we have improved the character of 
 roses and chickens. 
 
 3. Two Kinds of Human Facts. — In the past those 
 educators and reformers who have worked at this problem 
 have been inclined to dwell on the degrading, abnormal, 
 destructive side of the question, as though this were the 
 whole of it. The great social vices and diseases that have 
 blighted civilization throughout human history are indeed 
 important things. They are fearful to contemplate, and 
 form a most serious and menacing problem. They are 
 not, however, the real problem which the human student of 
 sex must keep before him, any more than the army hospital 
 and caring for the wounded is the real problem of a com- 
 manding general in warfare; or than crime and treatment 
 of criminals is the real problem of progressive civilization. 
 Disease is not the chief problem of life; sound, wholesome 
 living and growth are the real problem. 
 
 Any study of this matter of sex, then, which pretends to 
 
THE ACTUAL CONDITIONS 3 
 
 have any permanent and constructive value, must take 
 care of two aspects of the matter — (i) the deep, fundamen- 
 tal, natural, positive, stimulating, upbuilding role of sex 
 in human life; and (2) the abnormal, destructive, and dan- 
 gerous perversions that are such a blot on our human his- 
 tory. Deeper still, a student of this problem must find out 
 the biological and social connections between the normal 
 and the abnormal, and bring the whole of it to bear on the 
 proper education of young people. 
 
 4. The Normal, Up-building Values of Sex. — It must 
 be understood, at the very beginning, that sex and all that 
 it implies is a perfectly natural, normal fact of Hfe, with 
 nothing unholy or perverse about it. It is true that the 
 sex impulses and desires are very powerful; but to the 
 biologist this is just a sign that they are very important in 
 life. As will be seen later, sex is responsible for certain 
 great principles of growth and development in all organ- 
 isms, from the lowest to the highest. 
 
 Without stopping at this point to go into details, we 
 know that the differences between men and women, — in 
 body, in mind, in disposition, in temperament, — are not 
 just mysterious, created differences; but are the direct 
 result of the development of the sex nature of the individ- 
 ual. Just to illustrate what a wonderful and vital influence 
 sex has in life, one only needs to remember that all that is 
 meant by the following words grows out of sex and its 
 results, — manliness, womanliness, love, courtship, marriage, 
 home, father, mother, family life, parental care and edu- 
 cation, filial devotion, brotherhood. These facts, ideas, and 
 relations, — and the human virtues that grow up in connec- 
 tion with them, — could not have existed but for that which 
 
4 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 we call sex. These are the normal and natural fruits of 
 sex. Such fine and beautiful fruits cannot spring from 
 something essentially bad and unholy. Undertake to re- 
 move from our Hves and minds the ideas and facts for 
 which these words stand, and nothing worth while would 
 be left in human civilization, history, literature, poetry, or 
 happiness. 
 
 5. The Destructive and Unwholesome Aspects of 
 Sex. — While it is true that we must come to know that 
 the above-mentioned quahties and relations are the natural 
 and most important facts of sex, and that the abnormal is 
 the exceptional, — it is also true that the abuses of sex are 
 great and deep in their evil effects. The abuses, diseases, 
 and immoraHties of sex are the most distressing of all that 
 confront the modern helper of humanity. Merely to men- 
 tion the great contagious sex-diseases and the inherited 
 troubles that come from them, the numerous children born 
 out of wedlock and the p>ersonal and social disgrace and 
 grief occasioned thereby, public prostitution, the white 
 slave traffic and all the loathsome immoralities and heart- 
 lessness that cluster about it, and the wrecked Hves of many 
 boys and girls, is enough to convince anybody that too 
 much cannot be said, nor too much done to help the race 
 purify these ancient evils. These must be studied by 
 reformers, must be preached against by preachers, must be 
 fought against through legislation by all statesmen who 
 love their kind, must be met and fought by parents and 
 teachers. But, terrible and prevalent as these perversions 
 are, they are none the less perversions. All our study and 
 effort will be hindered if we forget for a moment that the 
 thing perverted is bigger and more important than the 
 
THE ACTUAL CONDITIONS 5 
 
 perversion; that the normal, rather than the abnormal, is 
 basal; and that knowledge of disease and its cure depends 
 on the understanding of the fundamentally healthy struc- 
 ture and function. 
 
 60 The Redemption of the Sex Idea. — It is because of 
 the facts noted above that the recent movement to educate 
 all, especially the young, in the problems of sex seems so 
 wise and sane to thoughtful teachers and social workers. 
 This education involves the idea that we accomplish two 
 things. We must restore the thought of sex to its real 
 biological place, as a wonderful, vital, stimulating and holy 
 endowment of human Hfe, to be treasured and invested as 
 we treasure bodily health, mental abiHty, and attractive 
 disposition; and in doing this we must cease to think of the 
 facts of sex and its desires as vicious and depraved, and as- 
 shameful elements in life, to be avoided or ignored or 
 abused. Only when we grasp the whole of the problem, 
 with the constructive as well as its disastrous possibilities, 
 can we use it as a real part of human education and inspira- 
 tion. The word sex must come to mean to us fine and high 
 things rather than bestial and low, before we can afford to 
 bring it to the education of our children. 
 
 7. The Policy of Silence and Its Failures. — For many 
 years there has been a prejudice against any real education 
 of young people in the great underlying facts that have so 
 much to do with our development and social relations. 
 Parents have neglected to treat the matter in a serious and 
 straightforward manner with their boys and girls, and have 
 been unwilling to allow the schools to do so. Teachers have 
 felt that it was the duty of parents, if of anybody, to do 
 this work. Text-books, to which the subject naturally 
 
6 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 belonged, have carefully avoided any mention of the mat- 
 ter, or out of respect to these prejudices have touched upon 
 it in the most superficial and apologetic way. Physicians 
 have given no help until too late, when disease or fear of 
 disease and social disgrace, has brought the young people 
 to them. 
 
 The reasons for this silence are largely (i) cowardice, 
 (2) ignorance on the part of parents of the facts and of the 
 best way to present them, and (3) an easy-going creed 
 (arising largely from both cowardice and ignorance) that 
 it is better to keep children in ignorance of such things 
 just as long as possible, that innocence and purity belong 
 to this ignorance, and that knowledge of the facts of sex 
 must bring hurtful results. There are two important 
 fallacies in this line of behavior which make it both futile 
 and criminal. In the first place, ignorance of fundamen- 
 tally important facts in Hfe cannot, in the long run, help to 
 meet those facts in the most satisfactory way. In the 
 second place, parent and teacher have not the choice 
 between ignorance and knowledge of this subject, in the 
 child. The only choice is between the incomplete and 
 distorted information that may be picked up from com- 
 panions, and the sound, accurate knowledge given by those 
 who know; between secret and open knowledge; between 
 suggestive knowledge given in impure and vulgar ways 
 and clean, pure information, graded step by step to the 
 needs of the child as it advances, and connected in the 
 child's mind with the great normal human values. The 
 sex-impulses are too powerful, the facts of sex are too 
 wonderful and too widely known, and human curiosity is 
 too great for the policy of silence to secure its end, even if 
 ignorance were best. The very conditions that make it 
 
THE ACTUAL CONDITIONS 7 
 
 certain that children will get some sort of knowledge make 
 it necessary that they should have it in the best possible 
 form. They need it and are entitled to it. 
 
 8. The Value of Sound Knowledge. — One of the values 
 of sound knowledge is that it displaces half -knowledge and 
 false knowledge, which are the very worst sort of ignorance. 
 But deeper still is the fundamental confidence and optimism 
 about the order of the universe which says that truth is 
 always better than error, and that knowledge of truth is a 
 first essential -step toward ordering one's conduct aright. 
 It would need to be a very haphazard universe before igno- 
 rance could guide as well as knowledge. Knowledge may of 
 course not cause us to do right; but ignorance of facts can 
 never secure conscious rightness of choice. It is conceiv- 
 able that occasionally ignorance might save a weak individ- 
 ual; but where one person is saved by ignorance, thousands 
 are lost through ignorance and inaccurate information. 
 Thus it has come about that the modern educator feels 
 that the right knowledge of sex is more likely, in the long 
 run, to help than to harm, — and is infinitely better for the 
 salvation of youth than the vulgar half -knowledge derived 
 from sHghtly older companions. 
 
 There is one other point to be mentioned. It is prob- 
 ably true that information given by parents and teacher 
 may have a stimulating effect and make the child want 
 to know more; but for that matter the partial knowledge the 
 child gets from its companions does the same thing, and 
 makes it even more morbid. 
 
 9. The Limitation of Mere Knowledge. — No educator, 
 who has observed carefully and has given serious thought 
 to his observations, will claim that it will solve all the prob- 
 
8 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 lems of sex and sex relations merely to impart to youth 
 in a perfect way all the facts of sex and its place in 
 human development. The teaching of the facts and 
 hygiene of nutrition has not eliminated abuses of diges- 
 tion among us; but who is prepared to say that the teach- 
 ing of the hygiene of eating, the new "domestic science/' 
 and the agitation for pure and uninfected foods, do not 
 produce year by year their effect in increasing the proper 
 use of foods? 
 
 We know that knowledge — even perfect knowledge — 
 will not successfully meet the case. There must come in 
 addition, through the sanest sort of teaching, — as in all 
 such realms of human character and behavior, — ideals, 
 standards of purity, chivalry, regard for others, self- 
 restraint, and all such things, which are better than mere 
 knowledge. But into all of these knowledge must go; 
 and there is no firmer foundation for these clean motives 
 '^J than a pure and wholesome knowledge of all the facts. 
 
 It is true that mere knowledge does not insure right 
 conduct in any department of life; but there is a correlation 
 between knowledge and right conduct. That is to say, a 
 larger percentage of individuals who know the facts in a 
 given situation make right choices than of a selection of 
 informed and ignorant persons, made at random. This 
 has been worked out experimentally in respect to a nimiber 
 of human relations, and has been found to be true in 
 practice. 
 
 10. Summary. — Three very different streams of human 
 influence have been operating to convince us of the need 
 for real education in regard to reproduction and sex. First 
 among these are the reformers, sensitive to the hideous 
 
THE ACTUAL CONDITIONS 9 
 
 aspects of the social evil in its various forms and to the 
 moral degeneration that accompanies the perversions of 
 sex. Their point of view, though urgent and compelling, 
 is narrow and partial, since it deals with the abnormal and 
 destructive rather than with the constructive; their work, 
 however, has aroused our consciousness of the problem. 
 
 In the second place, a certain group of students has 
 approached the question from the purely biological and 
 scientific side. Their interests have centered in the pos- 
 sibility of race improvement through better breeding, — 
 through heredity. These students are called eugenists. 
 They are not moved, primarily, by sensitiveness to social 
 and moral abuses of sex. They think rather in terms of 
 the loss of present and future social and industrial efficiency 
 through the hereditary transmission of incompetence and 
 of criminal tendencies. This scientific contention has 
 played a large part in arousing our interest in sex instruc- 
 tion, and greatly broadens the scope of it. 
 
 Thirdly, students of education have been coming to 
 realize that reproduction and sex are among the most 
 important human functions; that the impulses connected 
 with them are as natural and clean as any we have; that 
 these impulses are both general and powerful; that their 
 power is a measure of their importance in the life of the race 
 and of the individual; that they underlie and give character 
 to all social conditions; and that such vital qualities cannot 
 fail to be useful in educating normal human beings if we 
 but learn how to use them aright. 
 
 The reformer would educate in respect to the facts of 
 reproduction and sex, in order that youth may be pure and 
 may escape vice and the personal and social diseases that 
 grow out of it. The eugenist would educate in this field in 
 
lo BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 order that we, as a race and as individuals, may secure 
 better matings and more perfect offspring and thus build 
 up the stock. The educator would seek to use the facts, 
 instincts and impulses of reproduction and sex in their 
 due course, in order to stimulate the right and soimd per- 
 sonal and social development of the individual. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 AN INVESTIGATION 
 
 1. Introduction. — Following a series of perfectly frank 
 talks by the writer, first to college men and later to college 
 women of the Christian Associations, an effort was made 
 to get the opinion of the young people with respect to cer- 
 tain points. A brief series of questions was arranged, and 
 the students were requested to answer them. The answers 
 were not signed, were entirely confidential, and were left 
 wholly optional with the students. There were ninety-six 
 answers from the young women, and seventy from the 
 young men. These students represent quite normal col- 
 lege young people, undoubtedly from the rather better 
 classes of homes. The statistics are believed to be fairly 
 representative of conditions in the average homes of the 
 grade represented. Doubtless other inquiries, and a larger 
 number of individuals would show somewhat different 
 percentages in the different groups; though the main 
 conclusions are so pronounced that it is inconceivable that 
 more extended testimony would largely change the results. 
 
 2. The Questions. — The following were the questions 
 asked: 
 
 1. At about what age was the subject of sex first brought 
 in a striking way to your consciousness, that is, in such a 
 way as to make a permanent impression ? 
 
 2. Through whom was it thus brought? 
 
 II 
 
12 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 3. What, in general, was the effect of the informacion 
 upon you, as you look back on it now? 
 
 4. Indicate, if you are willing, in what way this infor-' 
 mation was good or bad for you, as the case may be. 
 
 5. Do you think that fuller and more authoritative infor- 
 mation, given in the right spirit, would have been of any 
 help to you? 
 
 6. If so, in what way? 
 
 3. The Results. — The following is a tabulation of the 
 
 answers: 
 
 Question i 
 
 TABLE I. MEN (70) 
 
 Age (years) 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 8 
 
 9 
 
 10 
 
 II 
 
 12 
 
 13 
 
 14 
 
 IS 
 
 
 Number .... 
 
 4 
 
 9 
 
 8 
 
 8 
 
 8 
 
 3 
 
 • 
 
 II 
 
 3' 
 
 7 
 
 2 
 
 (remainder 
 uncertain) 
 
 
 
 
 TABLE 2. 
 
 WOMEN 
 
 (96; 
 
 
 
 
 
 Age 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 8 
 
 9 
 
 10 
 
 II 
 
 12 
 
 13 
 
 14 
 
 IS 
 
 16 
 
 17 
 
 Number 
 
 2 
 
 6 
 
 8 
 
 12 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 18 
 
 15 
 
 9 
 
 4 
 
 2 
 
 I 
 
 Questions 2 cmd 3 
 
 . TABLE 3. MEN 
 
 Through Whom 
 
 Number 
 
 Effects 
 
 Good 
 
 Bad 
 
 None 
 
 Boy Companions 
 
 Parents 
 
 47 
 II 
 
 I 
 
 2 
 
 I (in 
 
 I 
 9 
 
 2 
 
 class) 
 
 32 
 I 
 
 I 
 
 4 
 
 I 
 
 (Quack Doctor . . . 
 ^f^M Family Doctor . . . 
 ^^^ ( School Teacher . . . 
 Y. M. C. A. pamphlet . . . 
 
 
AN INVESTIGATION 
 
 TABLE 4. WOMEN 
 
 13 
 
 
 
 
 Effects 
 
 
 Through Whom 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Good 
 
 Bad 
 
 None 
 
 Girl Companions .... 
 
 57 
 
 8 
 
 26 
 
 16 
 
 Parents, or 
 
 Elder Sisters 
 
 ?} 
 
 26 
 
 
 7 
 
 Books 
 
 3 
 
 2 
 
 I 
 
 
 Patent Medicine Circular . 
 
 I 
 
 
 I 
 
 
 Question 5 
 
 TABLE 5 
 
 
 Yes 
 
 No 
 
 Doubtful 
 
 Men 
 Women 
 
 46 
 60 
 
 I 
 7 
 
 6 
 3 
 
 4. Discussion of Results. — Tables 3 and 4 show 
 very clearly that both the young men and young women 
 think that the information that came to them from 
 their mates did more harm than good; and that the infor- 
 mation that came from their maturer friends with whole- 
 some purposes helped them. Table 5 shows very general 
 agreement that more and better information would have 
 helped them to solve their individual problems to better 
 advantage. 
 
 By comparing tables i and 2 it will be seen that 58 per 
 cent, of the boys, who gave the age at which they received 
 instruction, learned enough of these matters to make an 
 impression on them before they had completed their 
 tenth year; whereas only 50 per cent, of the girls had 
 received it by the close of their eleventh year. Thus the 
 boys are more than a year ahead of the girls in getting at 
 these facts, in spite of the fact that girls mature more 
 
14 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 rapidly than boys. This is exactly what we should 
 expect from our knowledge of the manner of Hfe among 
 boys. 
 
 A comparison of the ages at which information was 
 received with the sources from which it came shows that in 
 nearly all the cases (forty-four out of forty-seven) in which 
 boys got their information from their mates, it came at an 
 early age. Parents gave information to their boys as fol- 
 lows: two at eleven years; two at twelve; two at thirteen; 
 four at fourteen. The same conditions are found for the 
 women, but not quite in the same degree; mates among the 
 girls were a little more reticent, and mothers a little more 
 prompt in performing their duties than the fathers. A 
 considerably larger percentage of the women got help from 
 mothers and older sisters, than of the young men from their 
 fathers. 
 
 The answers to the fourth question as to ways in which 
 information proved helpful or hurtful are not quite so 
 definite nor so capable of tabulation; but they are very 
 illuminating. The young women were more disposed to 
 answer the question than the young men. Of those who 
 thought the early information from mates was hurtful, six 
 thought it created a morbid interest in the subject; ten 
 said it caused them to dwell on the subject and take a 
 wrong attitude toward it; eight said it gave them false 
 ideas; others said it "caused shrinking, depression, and un- 
 happiness," "was improperly given," "not pure," "feared 
 to go to mother about such things." Among the answers 
 of those who got their knowledge from better sources and 
 thought that it had helped them, the following are represen- 
 tative reasons: — "It produced a strengthening of princi- 
 ples," "recognized need of careful action," "led to preserva- 
 
AN INVESTIGATION 15 
 
 tion of health/' ^^brought content, and freedom from 
 dwelling on it," *' better attitude," "made life seem more 
 beautiful and sacred." 
 
 These answers are so sane and so clearly what an observ- 
 ant educator would expect the facts to be, that one has 
 no difficulty in believing that they really represent the 
 personal convictions of the writers. 
 
 While there were exceptions, the overwhelming convic- 
 tion of these young people was that better information, from 
 the right people and given in the proper way, would have 
 been of much value to them both in their attitudes and 
 their actions. Of course, it is quite natural for us to think 
 that we might have done better if we had possessed more 
 knowledge; and it is not always true that we should have 
 done so. On the whole, however, these are the separate 
 judgments of people who are in the best position to know 
 what would have influenced their lives, and how. While 
 the answers are not scientifically conclusive they have a 
 distinct presumptive value. 
 
 5. Summary of Conclusions. — An inquiry among a 
 thoughtful group of mature young people, who probably 
 represent homes and parents above the average, reveals 
 definitely the fact that only about 20 per cent, of the fathers 
 and about 30 per cent, of the mothers had made an effort 
 to reach these young people with sound information about 
 this most important influence on their bodily and moral 
 welfare. The general average of homes would undoubtedly 
 be much less than this. The chief training which comes to 
 the minds of the young is the inaccurate, morbid, vulgar 
 training of mates, which is unquestionably worse in its 
 effects than ignorance. 
 
i6 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 It is very clear that, if parents and teachers are to get to 
 the youthful mind first, and establish an open and pure 
 channel for sex knowledge, they must approach children 
 much earlier than they are doing at present and continue 
 their teaching systematically at all points where it is 
 needed. 
 
 
 h 
 
CHAPTER m 
 
 SOME PRINCIPLES WHICH MUST GUIDE IN SEX- 
 INSTRUCTION 
 
 1. Introduction. — In the two preceding chapters an 
 effort has been made to justify, first in theory and then by a 
 concrete example the view of the modern educator that the 
 best equipped people in the community should undertake 
 the task of giving our children adequate sex-instruction. 
 This instruction should enable them to avoid the pitfalls 
 that beset them at various crises in their lives; and, what is 
 still more important, should inspire them with an idea of 
 the far-reaching influence of sex as one of the most power- 
 ful impulses and characteristics in human life. In this 
 chapter it is purposed to anticipate some things which 
 will be treated at greater length later on; here, however, in 
 a brief and somewhat dogmatic way, will be put down 
 without argument certain conclusions that seem to be 
 justified from our general knowledge of education and of 
 the methods that have proved successful there. The 
 effort to provide systematic sex-education is new, and 
 until more experiments have been conducted and the 
 results reported we cannot be absolutely smre of the best 
 methods to be followed. We cannot, however, afford to 
 withhold all sex-education, if we are right in contending that 
 it is essential, until the way has been completely surveyed 
 and charted. We must start with the best principles we 
 know, and correct them as they are shown to be imperfect. 
 
 17 
 
i8 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 2. The First Necessity Is the "Motivation" of the 
 Teacher. — It is a common experience that reforms, or 
 educational movements of any kind, do not progress until 
 the rank and file of those who must do the work become 
 thoroughly convinced as to the necessity and possibility 
 of moving. Our teachers, whether parents, school-teachers 
 or Sunday-school teachers, physicians, or ministers, will 
 not take up this delicate and difficult work until they have 
 an overpowering conviction of its necessity and value to 
 humanity. Among teachers, the act of arousing in their 
 pupils purposes and motives that will produce action is 
 called "motivation." This is what teachers themselves 
 need now in respect to sex-education. To bring home to 
 parents and to other teachers this conviction of the duty 
 of giving sex-instruction to the young, and to inspire them 
 with the interest and motives that will induce them to 
 undertake this duty is the first task of those who are them- 
 selves convinced of the importance of the subject, as well 
 as being one of the greatest necessities of the present day. 
 
 Among students of the question, as has been intimated, 
 the more alert teachers and parents are beginning to feel 
 that something must be done; but for the most part, even 
 the best teachers are generally feehng that the first respon- 
 sibiHty rests with some one else. The motivation of teach- 
 ers and parents must become complete and personal. It( 
 is the purpose of this book to assist in the task. j 
 
 3. Sex-Instruction Must Be Properly Graded. — If it is 
 
 important to grade our instruction in EngHsh and mathe- 
 matics and adapt them to the capacity of the child it is 
 doubly necessary to grade instruction in sex. Instruction 
 in English and mathematics seeks information chiefly, 
 
GUIDING PRINCIPLES IN SEX-INSTRUCTION 19 
 
 while sex-instruction seeks to influence attitudes of life 
 and conduct. It is always a more delicate and difficult 
 task to mold conduct than to impart knowledge. It is 
 for this reason that instruction in sex should be most 
 carefully and accurately graded. 
 
 Grading in sex-instruction includes the following points: 
 (i) It should be different for boys and girls. 
 
 (2) It should be guided by, and follow, the progress of 
 the natural curiosity of the child, and not precede it. 
 
 (3) It should precede, at each step, the actual per- 
 sonal needs of the child and youth in respect to life and 
 conduct. 
 
 (4) This teaching should be adjusted to, and take ad- 
 vantage of, the fact that the development of children offers 
 certain favorable conditions for certain parts of the neces- 
 sary teaching. 
 
 (5) There should never be an idea that all necessary 
 instruction can be reserved until the child is thirteen or 
 fourteen and then given all at once. 
 
 4. Sex-Instruction Must Be Different for Boys and 
 Girls. — There is much that is common in the information 
 that should be given to boys and girls, and each sex should 
 in time know and appreciate the main facts about the 
 development of the other; yet the sex development and 
 the impulses of the two sexes are so different and the special 
 practical problems that confront the boy and girl are con- 
 sequently so unlike, that the material and the point of view 
 must be properly suited to the peculiar nature and needs 
 of each. This makes it necessary that boys and girls 
 shall be taught separately in these matters, — though this 
 is probably not necessary in the broad, impersonal studies 
 
20 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 of the question undertaken in the classes in physiology and 
 biology. There are teachers, however, who believe that 
 better results are possible, even in these classes, if only one 
 sex is present. 
 
 We all know that the sex impulses of males are strong 
 and violent as com-pared with those of females; hence the 
 problems of the boy are largely problems of self-restraint, 
 while, on the other hand, the problems of the girl are rather 
 those of resistance of external temptation to do wrong, and 
 of behaving in such a wise and discreet way that no such 
 temptation will arise. These differences in the nature of 
 the sexes lie at the bottom of all our efforts to educate, 
 and must have a large part in molding the character of our 
 teaching and the method of it, if we are to get from it such 
 real personal results as we seek to achieve. 
 
 5. Sex-Instruction Should Follow Curiosity. — Curi- 
 osity, in its broadest sense, is the chief internal thing that 
 drives us to seek knowledge. The desire to know is at the 
 back of all our investigations. Curiosity begins early in 
 the Ufe of the child, and is responsible for the great progress 
 that is made during the first years of life, — a much more 
 rapid progress than we ever make at any subsequent period. 
 The wise educator of youth tries to take advantage of this 
 natural curiosity, to keep it alive, to increase it, to guide it, 
 and to prevent it from becoming morbid and narrow. In 
 matters of sex the problem is, not to increase curiosity, but 
 to prevent it from becoming unhealthy and morbid. If not 
 enough information is given, the mind is likely to dwell on it 
 and to wonder; if too much is given, so that the child is 
 unable to understand or assimilate it, practically the 
 same results follow. 
 
GUIDING PRINCIPLES IN SEX-INSTRUCTION 21 
 
 If the parents take an open and frank attitude toward 
 the little child in the home, the active curiosity of the child, 
 as shown by its natural questions, indicates at what in- 
 tervals information should be given and how much should 
 be told. This is especially true of younger children^ who 
 are much with their parents. If this curiosity does not 
 express itself spontaneously, the parent, by a little discreet 
 questioning, can readily find out the state of the child's 
 mind. If, when the child seeks information, it is withheld 
 or is given falsely and evasively (as is so often the case) 
 the child will very naturally lose some of the confidence 
 which the parent should make every effort to hold, and 
 will go elsewhere to get his questions answered. If, on 
 the contrary, the parent, at the first question, gives the 
 child a mass of facts for which he is not prepared and for 
 which he has felt no need, the child will be confused and 
 unable to profit by the knowledge. Both sets of results 
 are unwholesome. The best teaching rule is: follow 
 curiosity closely, with carefully graded information. 
 
 6. Sex-Instruction Should Precede the Actual Need 
 
 of It. — The strong point of the modern plea for sex-educa- 
 tion is that it is badly needed. If this plea be true, it 
 follows that the needed information, to be of value, must 
 be received and assimilated by the child before the critical 
 points appear that make the information necessary. This 
 need furnishes the only exception to the preceding rule. 
 In the case of children of a certain disposition, or of those 
 who have been peculiarly sheltered from contact with the 
 facts of life, it may be true that ciiriosity will not be alert; or 
 it may sometimes happen that the parent will know of some 
 approaching sex crisis that the child has not asked about. 
 
22 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 It may be in such cases the duty of the teachers, — parents 
 or others, — to arouse curiosity and give the needed help. 
 
 For example, it is important that the child of either sex 
 should know beforehand the real nature of some of the 
 bodily and mental changes that come at the age of puberty. 
 This is peculiarly necessary for girls, in order that they 
 may take proper precautions to protect themselves from 
 the lung troubles that often follow exposure during men- 
 struation, in girls under twenty. Similarly, the awkward- 
 ness of boys, their change of voice, seminal emissions, and 
 the like, would not produce the embarrassment and mental 
 distress which they do, if the boys knew that these are per- 
 fectly natural steps to manhood. The physical, mental, and 
 moral catastrophes so frequent at this period are largely pre- 
 ventable if the child can be made acquainted in a general and 
 inspiring way, with the nature of the facts and their meaning. 
 
 7. Use the Favoring Qualities of Personality. — We 
 
 have learned that all the elements that go to make up our 
 personal character do not begin nor mature at the same 
 time. We have seen above that curiosity comes early in 
 life and stays with us long. On the other hand, there are 
 certain periods in our childhood growth when certain 
 characteristics and states of mind dominate us, only to 
 decline later and give place to others. Some of these 
 states favor one kind of method of sex-instruction, and other 
 states demand some other method. It is necessary to good 
 teaching to know something of the succession of these 
 qualities and impulses of youth and to use them to reinforce 
 our instruction on sex, just as wise teachers are using them 
 in other sides of education. 
 
 For example, the strong bond that usually exists between 
 
GUIDING PRINCIPLES IN SEX-INSTRUCTION 23 
 
 the young child — whether boy or girl — and the mother; 
 the growing boy's admiration for his father; and the 
 chivalrous spirit which comes to normal boys in late 
 adolescence when they begin to admire the girls, — are 
 all illustrations of what is meant. These all make cer- 
 tain steps in the sound education in facts of sex and 
 sex ideals peculiarly possible and timely. There are 
 many such critical points in individual development when 
 special appeals should be made, appeals which would 
 not have equal weight either before or after. These facts 
 will show how mistaken is the practice of some parents, 
 who keep back all they have to say imtil some convenient 
 time and then try, with no special relation to anything 
 that they know of in the child's Hfe, to tell all they 
 think should be known. It would be more sane to adopt 
 this method in teaching mathematics than in giving sex 
 information. 
 
 8. Sex-Instruction Should Be Incidental to Other 
 Teaching. — One of the main errors of parents and teachers 
 in dealing with this topic, lies in separating it from other 
 teaching so as to make it stand out unduly. In reahty 
 the facts of sex are in nature closely related to the other 
 facts of life. Sex teaching that corresponds naturally 
 and incidentally to events that are occurring in the home, 
 the farm, or the community, or is given in connection with 
 other lessons in school, will have a more natural and less 
 disquieting effect, as a rule, than that which is given 
 separately and independently in the form of a lecture or 
 talk. 
 
 It is much better, for example, to connect the early teach- 
 ing of the child concretely with the birth of a baby in the 
 
24 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 home or neighborhood, or with the birth of pets, than it is to 
 deal with it as a general or abstract truth. 
 
 Furthermore, much of the instruction which will lead 
 to proper ideals and behavior in relation to sex, need not 
 be called sex-instruction at all. Chivalry, respect for 
 women, the meaning of the home in the organization of 
 society, and many other topics which serve to give right 
 views of life can do their work without any conscious 
 attempt to denote them as a part of the sex problem. Yet 
 they are none the less a part of it, and teachers should 
 realize this fact. 
 
 9» Knowledge of the Biology of Sex not Enough. — 
 
 There is a tendency on the part of some enthusiastic peo- 
 ple to think that a thorough knowledge of the facts of sex 
 will meet all the needs of the young. There is no doubt 
 that this biological information is the foundation, and that 
 such knowledge will greatly enlarge and purify the child's 
 ideas of reproduction and sex. But this is not enough. 
 We want our children to be healthy animals, but we also 
 require of them behavior quite different from that of the 
 healthy animal. We want them to get a knowledge of 
 sex, but to get with it such a disposition that they will have 
 within themselves something which will control and guide 
 the powerful sex-impulses in the interest of all the fine and 
 holy ideals they have built up. To do this, mere biology is 
 not enough; we must have in addition all the help that we 
 can get from those kindred fields of human inspiration and 
 discovery which we call psychology, sociology, ethics, and 
 religion. The child must know the meaning of sex; he 
 must know what are the best standards of the race about 
 the use of sex; he must be willing to choose to use it in 
 
GUIDING PRINCIPLES IN SEX-INSTRUCTION 25 
 
 accordance with these standards; and he must have the 
 internal power of character which will enable him to carry 
 out this choice in his conduct. He cannot reasonably be 
 expected to attain this disposition in ignorance and without 
 expert help. 
 
 10. There Must Be a Sane and Wise Division of Labor 
 in Sex-Instruction. — If we may hold that the principles 
 laid down in the foregoing paragraphs are reasonably true, 
 we have a few groups of people whom society must make 
 responsible as classes, for this work of sex-education. Chief 
 among these are parents, school-teachers, Sunday-school 
 teachers, social workers, physicians, and ministers. In 
 individual cases, there may be persons better fitted than 
 any of these to do the needed work; but generally speaking, 
 the above classes of people, rather than youthful mates 
 or vulgar-minded servants, must assume the task. 
 
 (i) Parents are, or should be, much the best fitted of 
 all these by their natural position and close relation to 
 the children. This is particularly true of yoimger chil- 
 dren, of whom the mother is the natural instructor. 
 On the other hand, parents are usually the least fitted 
 by information and training to do this work in the best 
 way. 
 
 (2) The physician is possibly best fitted of all in the 
 knowledge of the facts; but his opportimities are not sufii- 
 cient and usually his knowledge of the proper methods of 
 teaching is poor. 
 
 (3) The pubHc-school teachers are best prepared of all 
 in the knowledge of methods of teaching, and next to the 
 parents themselves have the children in their direct care. 
 Most of these, however, lack information, just as parents 
 
26 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 do, as to the exact facts which should be given and the 
 possible results of these facts. Furthermore, they have to 
 teach the children in such numbers that another very 
 difficult feature is introduced. In somewhat the same 
 plane, but with less opportunity, come the Sunday-school 
 teachers. 
 
 (4) The other classes mentioned have some opportuni- 
 ties; but are for various reasons limited in what they can do 
 directly. For example, athletic directors in Christian 
 Associations can render special service to adolescent boys 
 and to young men, as can these directors in high schools, 
 colleges, and universities. 
 
 It is probable that the teachers will be the first of these 
 groups to be aroused to do their proper part. There are 
 those who believe that we cannot rely on parents at all and 
 must depend almost wholly on the schools. This, however, 
 neglects the truth that the time of starting to school is too 
 late for some of the simple facts which children must know, 
 if they are to come from, pure sources. In the opinion of 
 the writer the mothers will be inspired and educated by the 
 teachers to give the children the instruction they should 
 have before school age, and to assist the teachers in guiding 
 their development beyond that time. 
 
 Physicians can assist the movement by appropriate 
 lectures to teachers, parents, and nearly mature young 
 men and women, giving the technical facts which bear 
 on their various problems. In a similar way, ministers who 
 are sufiiciently informed can present to the community the 
 social and moral bearing of the work. 
 
 The accompanying scheme will at least suggest a 
 general division of responsibifity suitable to the average 
 community. 
 
GUIDING PRINCIPLES IN SEX-INSTRUCTION 27 
 
 SCHEME SUGGESTING DIVISION OF LABOR AND LOCATION 
 
 OF RESPONSIBILITY IN SEX-INSTRUCTION 
 
 jPre-school Period:^ 
 '"I From birth to 6 years of age 
 
 (School Grades: — 
 ^7-14 years. 
 
 % 
 
 Teachers / 
 
 General Instruction I 
 HYsicAL Directors V J High School 
 
 / / Development ^K i^.jg years. 
 
 1/ / Physicuns >^ i 
 
 1/ / Social Diseases/ y 
 
 {Colleges : — 
 (Regular Courses for Future Parents). 
 Schools of Education: — 
 (Regular Courses for Future Teachers) 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 REPRODUCTION AND UNSELFISHNESS 
 
 1. Biology of Sex for Parents and Teachers. — We 
 
 have concluded that society rightly places on parents and 
 teachers a large part of the responsibility for educating the 
 rising generation so that sex may be an inspiration and a 
 blessing rather than a blight. If this conclusion is right, 
 it follows that these leaders of youth must be acquainted 
 with the broad biological facts, in order that they may have 
 a background, as well as with the details of human develop- 
 ment, in order that they may meet particular cases. In a 
 brief discussion such as this it is impossible to enter into 
 all the details of what shall and what shall not be taught, 
 even if we knew. The purpose of the present book is 
 rather to give to the parent and teacher some information 
 about the fundamental biological principles which we must 
 respect, accompanied with outlines of the general kinds of 
 knowledge that the pupil should have. With these in 
 mind the teacher will be able to seek successfully the special 
 facts that may be of most service. 
 
 2. The Construction of the Individual. — No matter 
 how simple or how complex is the individual, the building 
 up of its life is much the same. The one-celled plant or 
 animal, in order to be successful, must take just about the 
 same steps as an oak or a man. It must begin its life, it 
 must be nourished; it must grow and protect what it gets; 
 it must upbuild itself through its own powers, desires, and 
 
 28 
 
REPRODUCTION AND UNSELFISHNESS 29 
 
 appetites. In one way or another, all these things look 
 toward getting , toward an income for the individual. They 
 maybe described in a word as selfish — because they minister 
 to self-construction. There is no purpose to suggest that 
 these selfish qualities lack in fineness or dignity, merely 
 because they are selfish. They are at the very foundation 
 of successful individual life, and the later qualities would 
 be quite impossible without them. The natural, normal 
 result of these basal things, when allowed to have full 
 sway, is to produce sound, healthy, self -centered individuals. 
 This we may say is the first and most important power of 
 living things, and the higher powers depend on it. 
 
 3. Relation of Reproduction to this Process. — Some- 
 where at the climax of this emphasis on the self, even in the 
 very simplest organisms, there comes a complete reversal 
 of the behavior of the organism. In some way or other, 
 by a process that may seem quite simple or may be very 
 complex, the old individual, whose whole energy hitherto 
 has been given to building itself up, divides. In this way 
 the substance so carefully brought together is distributed 
 to two individuals. (See Fig. i). This process is called 
 reproduction. It is easy to see that it is just the opposite 
 of the self-building processes described before. It divides 
 up and scatters the living matter at the expense of, and 
 often with the complete destruction of, the original indi- 
 vidual. This represents outgo where the former process 
 meant income; this means extending the species where the 
 other meant strengthening the individual; this means self- 
 sacrifice where the other meant self-seeking. Biologically 
 speaking, reproduction is next in importance to, and just 
 as universal as, nutrition and growth, and is directly opposite 
 
30 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 to them in nature and results. This description is a 
 brief picture of all life, which consists of a period of 
 selfish growth in which the individual is built up to its 
 maturity, followed by a period of unselfish reproduction 
 of new individuals, which must in their turn grow and 
 mature. 
 4. Illustrations of Reproduction. — While it is impor- 
 tant to remember 
 that all reproduc- 
 tion means sacri- 
 fice of the individ- 
 ual, the form 
 and degree of the 
 sacrifice differs in 
 different kinds of 
 organisms. The 
 accompanying 
 diagrams will 
 help the reader to 
 appreciate some- 
 thing of this dif- 
 ference. 
 
 In Fig. I, we 
 have a simple or- 
 ganism that 
 grows to its full 
 size (i) by the 
 process of nutrition; and after a period it divides (2) into 
 two equal, half-sized offspring just like the parent except 
 for size. These grow to the size of the parent (4) and the 
 process is repeated. In this case neither of the resulting 
 offspring can be called the parent; the parent is completely 
 
 Fig. I. Reproduction by simple division in a single-celled 
 animal (Paramecium): i, an adult organism; 2, the same in pro- 
 cess of dividing into two daughter organisms; 3, a later stage 
 of the same; 4, the two daughter animals mature. The sac- 
 rifice of the mother cell is complete here. 
 
REPRODUCTION AND UNSELFISHNESS 31 
 
 Fig. 2. Reproduction by budding in a single-celled 
 plant (Yeast): i, an adult cell; 2, and 3, stages in budding 
 in which new outgrowths from the mother cells produce 
 daughters. These grow up and may become independent 
 or remain attached in a chain. The sacrifice of a mother 
 cell in this case is not complete. 
 
 sacrificed in the act 
 of reproducing. The 
 mother cell has 
 given its Hfe for the 
 two daughter cells. 
 
 The sacrifice is 
 not usually so com- 
 plete as this. In 
 Fig. 2 we have a 
 scheme by which 
 the parent can pro- 
 duce one or more 
 smaller members of 
 its kind without be- 
 ing completely destroyed in doing so. Reproduction in 
 this case merely checks the individual, selfish processes of 
 the mother, temporarily. This is also a kind of division, 
 just as in Fig. i; reproduction is always division. This, 
 however, is more economical, and leaves the parent in such 
 
 form that it may repro- 
 duce again. This allows a 
 more lengthened life, and 
 thus a greater possibility 
 of developing a higher in- 
 dividual. 
 
 Fig. 2 represents repro- 
 duction by budding in an 
 organism of one cell. 
 
 Fig. 3. Reproduction by budding in a many- 
 celled organism, in which the daughter is also Flfif. % illUStrateS a manV- 
 many-celled. M, Mother; D, daughter. The ° ^ , "^ 
 
 degree of sacrifice is similar to that in Fig. 2. celled Orgaulsm whlch, m a 
 This figure is ideahzed and might stand for such o ' 
 
 animals as Hydra and many of the worms, or oitvitIot* -wra-^r Knric rkfF q 
 
 any of the multicellular plants that produce SimUar Way, DUQS OH a 
 
 buds, runners, tubers, and the like. It is a very cTntillpr Hnncrlif-pr nrcrfln- 
 
 common method of reproduction. SmailCr QaUgncer Olgdn- 
 
32 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 ^^ 
 
 ism; but the daughter in this case consists of many cells at 
 the start. 
 Fig. 4 represents reproduction in a still higher organism, 
 
 — one made up of many 
 .■R cells, — such as a moss 
 
 or a fern, or some 
 worms. In this case the 
 difference between the 
 parent (many-celled) and 
 the offspring (one-celled) 
 is still greater than we 
 have had before. It will 
 be clear that reproduc- 
 tion is still division, but 
 is still more economical 
 and less of a sacrifice than it was in the other cases. 
 The parent therefore has a still better chance to go on 
 with its own Ufe history and perfect itself to a degree 
 impossible in Figs, i and 2. Usually such organisms, 
 which have come to economize by reproducing through 
 a single cell, are able to produce many offspring during 
 their life. In this way the species, as well as the individ- 
 ual, profits by the economy. 
 
 Fig. 4. Reproduction in which a many-celled 
 mother (P) produces many one-celled reproductive 
 bodies or offspring {R and S), which are all alike. 
 This may be taken to illustrate any many-celled, 
 spore-bearing plants, such as ferns, mosses, and the 
 hke. It will be seen that reproduction, while still 
 meaning division and sacrifice, is much more eco- 
 nomical than it was at the beginning. 
 
 5. Further Sacrifices Growing out of Reproduction. — 
 
 Reproduction has been shown above to be the first and 
 most fundamental form of sacrifice which we find in nature. 
 It is not merely a sacrifice to produce offspring. This is 
 but a beginning. The care of offspring in order to bring 
 them safely to the point where they can care for themselves 
 is also very common among plants and animals. This is a 
 tax on parents which oftentimes means more sacrifice than 
 
REPRODUCTION AND UNSELFISHNESS 33 
 
 reproduction itself. As in the case of reproduction there 
 are all degrees of sacrifice from the lower animals up to 
 birds, mammals, and man. In some (as birds) it is merely 
 the storing of a large amount of food in the eggs; in some (as 
 insects) it means the placing of the young in special places 
 where food is abundant; in some (as birds) it means nests 
 and incubation of the eggs; in some (as mammals) it means 
 carrying the young in the body of the mother; in some, 
 particularly in man, it means the building of homes, nour- 
 ishment, protection, training, education, conscious sym- 
 pathy and devotion and sacrifice. Reproduction is thus, 
 not merely itself the first, most fundamental form of sacri- 
 fice shown in nature, it is the beginning and inspiration 
 of the richest line of sacrifice and unselfish instincts and 
 acts found in men or animals. 
 
 Save for reproduction there would be no offspring to care 
 for; yet the connection is closer than this. The very 
 instincts of reproduction are so closely intertwined with 
 those of love and care for offspring that it is impossible to 
 distinguish them. We often fijid that the mother's love for 
 her offspring is immediate and unthinking and instinctive, 
 — following at once on the fact of reproduction. 
 
 6. Summary. — Reproduction is a perfectly natural 
 and normal thing in life. It is next in importance to 
 nutrition. There is nothing in it which should bring shame 
 and aversion. This is not all. While nutrition is individ- 
 ual and selfish, reproduction is unselfish and looks to the 
 future of the race. It is the bridge over which individual 
 selfishness and energy were first transformed into social 
 unselfishness. It is the avenue by which we are led to the 
 most unselfish acts of which we are capable, — as expressed 
 
34 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 in the devotion of the mother to her child. It is thus the 
 foundation of the most altruistic and spiritual qualities 
 we possess. It is nothing less than sacred. Indeed we 
 have never found any better, more convincing way to pic- 
 ture the relation of God to man than by parental love. Can 
 we afford, then, either to ignore or to abuse the sources 
 of it in the education of our children? 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 SEX AND SELFISHNESS 
 
 I. The Introduction of Fertilization. — In Section 4 of 
 Chapter IV a series of illustrations is given to picture some 
 simple steps in reproduction. In Fig. i, which is the 
 simplest, a simple one-celled organism divides into two 
 equal, one-celled offspring. In the last of the series, Fig. 4, 
 we have a many-celled organism reproducing by dividing 
 off a number of single cells. This makes reproduction more 
 easy; but it can readily be seen that it leaves a larger task on 
 the offspring after reproduction. The offspring must grow 
 up from its simple state into a complex form like its parent. 
 The daughter cells in Fig. i have only to increase in size to 
 be like the original parent, and they already possess one- 
 half the original parent's material to do it with. The off- 
 spring in Fig. 4 must do more than grow; it must change in 
 other ways from its simple structure to the complex make- 
 up of the parent. 
 
 Quite low down among organisms an interesting device 
 appears^ which helps in some way to secure this develop- 
 ment. It often happens, among the similar offspring of an 
 organism like that in Fig. 4, that two of the young after 
 swimming around for a while will unite completely into one 
 cell (Fig. 5). After this the large cell formed by the 
 union will grow into an organism like the parent. Just 
 what the gain from this union is we are not sure. Many 
 things have been suggested; and biologists are agreed that 
 
 35 
 
36 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 it must serve some interesting and valuable purpose because 
 it is found all through the plant and animal kingdom alike. 
 
 This act of unit mg two 
 offspring is called con- 
 jugation or fertilization. 
 It is easy to see that ,it 
 is just the opposite of 
 reproduction, — which 
 is always division. Con- 
 jugation is always the 
 union of two organisms 
 into one. The offspring 
 which unite are called 
 gametes. The result of 
 the union is an embryo 
 
 Fig, 5. Reproduction in which a many-celled 
 mother produces numerous, similar, one-celled off- 
 spring. These offspring swim about together and 
 finally unite two by two {conjugate) to secure the 
 development of the adult, i, a mother cell produc- 
 ing the reproductive bodies {gametes); 2, offspring 
 {gametes) escaping; 3, gametes conjugating; 4, the 
 new embryo organism resulting from the union of the 
 gametes and capable of development into the mature 
 plant. 
 
 with the power of developing into the adult. 
 
 2. The Introduction of Sex. — Another advance in this 
 interesting biological series is shown in Fig. 5, where the 
 gametes that are 
 reproduced by the 
 many-celled parent 
 are of two kinds. 
 One class is large 
 and sluggish, and 
 the other is smaller 
 and active. The 
 first are known as 
 eggs (Fig. 6, £); 
 the second, as 
 sperm-cells (Fig. 
 6,5). Usually 
 
 Fig. 6. Reproduction in which the single parent planfl 
 has two kinds of offspring; — that is, the parent is both 
 father and mother at once. E, the egg, produced in tb« 
 special female organ A ; 5 the sperm, produced in the male 
 organ M. The sperm swims down the channel in the 
 female organ and unites with the egg to produce the em- 
 bryo of the new generation. Here the gametes and the 
 organs that produce them show the male and female quali- 
 ties, but the parent itself must be regarded as of both sexes. 
 
SEX AND SELFISHNESS 
 
 37 
 
 
 an egg and a sperm-cell must unite before any development 
 will take place. Each will die unless united with the other. 
 This union is called fertilization, as in Section i of this 
 chapter and apparently means the same thing here that it 
 did there. The egg is known as a female gamete, and 
 the sperm is known as a male gamete. This difference of 
 the gametes we call sex. This is the first time that the 
 differences of sex 
 have appeared in 
 our series. In Fig. 
 6, however, the par- 
 ent itself is neither 
 male nor female, or 
 if one prefers, it is 
 both male and fe- 
 male. It may pro- 
 duce both kinds of 
 offspring. 
 
 Fig. 7 introduces 
 us to the next step 
 in the development 
 of sex among organ- 
 isms. Hitherto there 
 has been no difference in the parents. Here there are two 
 dif event kinds of parents. One kind (F) produces only the 
 large gametes or eggs; the other {M) produces only the 
 small, active gametes or sperm. In this case we call the 
 parent which produces eggs a female, and the parent which 
 produces the sperm, a male. This is the condition in all 
 the higher animals, including man. The reproductive cells 
 show very striking sex differences, and the parents of 
 these different kinds of cells are as different as the cells. 
 
 Fig. 7. An idealized figure which may illustrate the 
 condition in any of the higher plants and animals. There 
 are two kinds of multicellular parents, — F, the female, 
 producing ova, or the female offspring (0) within, and M , 
 the male, producing male offspring or sperm (5). The 
 offspring show sex-differences and the parents no less. 
 1-4 illustrate stages in the union of the gametes, sperm 
 and ova, to produce an embryo. 
 
38 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 3. The Meaning of the Sexes. — Since we find fertili- 
 zation, or the bringing together of the one-celled offspring, 
 so universal in nature, we conclude that it is for some reason 
 necessary. In proportion as it is important a new problem 
 arises: How can these two separate sexual cells be brought 
 together with enough certainty and regularity to insure their 
 union and thus insure the new generation? As long as any 
 one of these offspring could go on and make the adult 
 without union, as in Figs. 1-4, the problem was a very easy 
 one. 
 
 In the first place, in making a success of the new method, 
 it is necessary that more of both kinds of cells be produced 
 by the parents than would be necessary if the cells could 
 settle down and grow at once without union; because in the 
 very nature of the case many of them can never find mates. 
 In the second place, some way must be devised whereby 
 the cells may be brought together, whereby one of them at 
 least may recognize the presence of the other, and may if 
 necessary move so that the two cells may actively unite. 
 
 Even in the simplest organisms these conditions are ful- 
 filled. The smaller male cell, of which a great many are 
 usually formed, is active and usually able to swim freely 
 in- fluids. It is also sensitive to chemical changes produced 
 by substances secreted by the egg, and is caused by these 
 to seek out the egg, to enter it, and thus unite with it. 
 The egg^is passive except for making this secretion which 
 attracts and guides the sperm in its active pursuit of the 
 egg. This is the meaning of the different qualities of the 
 two sexes in organisms as simple as those figured in Figs. 
 5 and 6. The meaning is practically the same for such organ- 
 isms as that in Fig. 7, and clear up to man, where the par- 
 ents that produce the mating cells are also different. 
 
SEX AND SELFISHNESS 39 
 
 The differences between the male and female parents are 
 for the same purpose as the differences between the cells: 
 viz., to bring together with the greatest certainty the male 
 and female cells. The special organs and instincts of males 
 and females exist to insure fertilization. The parents are 
 brought together in order that the cells may be brought 
 together. The bringing together of male and female 
 parents may be known as mating. 
 
 4. The Attraction of the Sexes. — The simple conditions 
 described above show why, biologically, the sexes must 
 attract each other. It was seen that this attraction is a 
 purely chemical one between the two cells in the simplest 
 cases. This chemical attraction is found also between these 
 cells in the higher forms; but there is much more than this. 
 As we come up the scale of life to the animals, in which- 
 maleness and femaleness is found in the parents as well as 
 in the reproductive cells, and the parents have complex 
 nervous and sensitive powers, the attractions of sex become 
 more complex and powerful. 
 
 In the main it is still true, as it is with the egg and sperm, 
 that the female attracts the male, and the latter actively 
 seeks out the female. In the higher animals we know that 
 the attraction of the female may be exerted through odor, 
 sound, color, or form. In addition to these attractions 
 through the senses, there are in both parents, but in the 
 male especially, powerful internal instincts and appetites 
 that make them seek one another. These tremendous 
 desires and attractions between the parents, whether con- 
 scious or unconscious, have the one biological purpose: — 
 they insure the bringing together of the two kinds of cells 
 in order that they may unite and thus make reproduction 
 
40 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 more effective. These mental attractions between the par- 
 ents leadjthe way for the chemical attraction of the cells. 
 They secure fertilization and an improved method of re- 
 production by making mating attractive. 
 
 5. The Selfishness of Sex. — It will be clear to the 
 reader that we have in some way come again into a realm of 
 selfishness and gratification. It is quite as much so as that 
 we spoke of in connection with getting food and individual 
 growth. The presence of food arouses the desires of the 
 organism and it responds to it; or the absence of food pro- 
 duces hunger, — an internal desire or appetite of a purely 
 selfish character, — which drives it to seek its food. Just 
 so the presence of the egg or the female may arouse the 
 seeking action of the sperm or male; or internal desires and 
 appetites, looking toward self -gratification, may drive the 
 male to seek the female. We have seen that reproduction 
 is a drain on the parent. It is itself unselfish and accom- 
 panied by a beautiful series of sacrifices. It would seem that 
 we have, in following the process of reproduction, fallen 
 again to a plane of extreme selfishness and individual gratifi- 
 cation. There is no gratification so keen nor selfishness so 
 deep as the gratification and selfishness of sex-indulgence. 
 
 6. Relation Between Reproduction and Sex. — Is there 
 any solution for this seeming paradox? Reproduction is 
 the great biological foundation of unselfishness and sacri- 
 fice of the self for the species; fertilization, although just 
 the opposite of reproduction, is for some reason a strong 
 agency for making reproduction effective by uniting two 
 offspring into one; sex in parents is a very satisfactory 
 means of securing fertilization and of selecting the mat- 
 ings; around sex, and making fertilization still mo^e sure, 
 
SEX AND SELFISHNESS • 41 
 
 is the most remarkable series of attractions, desires, appe- 
 tites, passions, and gratifications known in biology. They 
 seem to be as general and practically as powerful as hunger 
 and thirst. We believe this to be an evidence and measure 
 of their importance in life. 
 
 The connection seems to be something like this: This 
 powerful set of selfish passions has grown up about the 
 unselfish act of reproduction, and thus helps to insure 
 that the sacrifice shall continue. If it were not for the 
 gratification that attends sex-indulgence, fertilization might 
 fail, and the efficiency of reproduction — even the very 
 sacrifice itself of reproduction — ^migh t cease . The sacrifice is 
 insured by coupling with it a selfish impulse and 
 gratification. 
 
 7. These Principles Applied to Human Life. — All that 
 has been described above as belonging to sex life in the 
 higher organisms is equally true of human beings. Con- 
 sciousness comes in and makes the appetites stronger and 
 more difficult to control; but the fundamental facts are the 
 same. All of this shows that reproduction is as natural 
 and as imiversal as the taking of food; that some sort of 
 fertilization is almost as prevalent as reproduction; that 
 sex differences are found in well-nigh all animals and plants; 
 and that attractions and appetites and gratifications always 
 accompany sex. The first and most wholesome deduction 
 which we must make from these facts is this: Methods 
 and conditions so universal in nature must be an important 
 part of the plan of God himself, and cannot be vulgar nor 
 vile in themselves. They are as important and as sacred as 
 life itself, since on these foundations all higher life has 
 arisen, held its own, and advanced on its way. 
 
42 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 These broad truths are presented to parents and teachers 
 not so much with the thought that they will furnish 
 material to present directly to the pupils; but rather to give 
 them as teachers a fuller consciousness of the greatness of 
 the place of reproduction and sex in life, and thus form a 
 background for the particular instruction. It will help to 
 lift sex out of the vulgar connections into which it has come 
 through human abuses, if we can realize that it has this 
 wonderful and universal constructive side. It ought, too, 
 to aid us in banishing the embarrassment and false modesty 
 which have so often prevented us from doing our duty in 
 respect to our children. 
 
 There is matter in these chapters which should be brought 
 in the teacher's own time and way to the knowledge of the 
 pupils; but the method employed here is that of adults talk- 
 ing to adults, and not to children. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 SEX IN RELATION TO NORMAL HUlVrAN PHYSICAL 
 AND MENTAL DEVELOPMENT 
 
 8. Introduction. — We have seen that in animals the 
 task of producing and caring for eggs is the work of the fe- 
 male, just as producing sperm and bringing them where they 
 can unite with the eggs is the work of the male. The 
 nature, structures, and instincts of the female are deter- 
 mined by the task that is hers. In the same way the pecu- 
 Har organs and passions of the male have arisen in connec- 
 tion with forming sperm cells and with caring for them. 
 In other words, the essential fact of maleness and female- 
 ness consists in the sexual cells. The peculiar features of 
 the male and female parents, which we recognize exter- 
 nally, are purely dependent on the kinds of cells they pro- 
 duce. These features are secondary. 
 
 This fact is the explanation of those we shall next under- 
 take to give, and it is important that the reader should 
 recognize the difference between this statement and the 
 ordinary view. We usually think that a female animal 
 produces eggs because she has the normal external char- 
 acteristics which, we find in the female of that species. In 
 other words, we think of a kind of mysterious principle of 
 maleness or femaleness in an individual, and that by virtue 
 of this principle it develops certain foreordained organs, 
 and these organs naturally produce eggs or sperm. As a 
 matter of fact the essential sex character resides in the sex- 
 
 43 
 
44 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 cells, and the peculiar organs and instincts of the parents are 
 the outcome of these. The character of the body of the 
 parent is determined by the kind of offspring it is develop- 
 ing within it. 
 
 2. The Differences Between Male and Female in 
 Humans. — In the early embryonic stages, human males 
 and females are so much alike externally that the sex can- 
 not be prophesied. Later and before birth, however, the 
 fundamental internal differences begin to stamp them- 
 selves on the body and the sexes can be distinguished by 
 certain definite quahties and organs. Still later in Ufe, 
 during adolescence, the internal sex organs further influence 
 both males and females so that they come to differ still 
 more. 
 
 In man, as in other animals, the fundamental female organ 
 is the (yoary (in which the eggs develop); and the funda- 
 mental male organ is the testis (in which the cells develop). 
 In connection with this internal difference, and because 
 of it, there arise such well-known differences between 
 males and females as the following: the external sexual 
 organs in the pelvic region; the smaller size and more 
 delicate construction of the female as contrasted with the 
 greater size, muscular strength and activity of the male; the 
 softness and smoothness of the skin in females as compared 
 with the rougher skin and greater tendency to develop hair 
 on the face and body in the male; the broader pelvis of the 
 female; the greater development of the mammary glands; 
 the tendency to deposit fat beneath the skin especially 
 about the breast and hips. 
 
 One other special organ characterizes the female, and is 
 connected with the fact that the human mother, as is true 
 
RELATION TO NORMAL DEVELOPMENT 45 
 
 of other mammals also, cares for the developing embryo 
 within her own body after fertilization. This organ, 
 known as the uterus or womb, is one of the most wonderful 
 devices found in all biology for the care of the young in the 
 early, helpless stages of its growth. The possession of the 
 uterus and the carrying of the young for so long a period 
 powerfully modifies the activities and habits of the female, 
 and is the biological foundation of a great deal of our 
 human social customs and behavior. See Figs. 9 and 10. 
 
 In no less degree are the mental and spiritual differences 
 between men and women recognizable. These also arise 
 not because of some mystical tendency of maleness or 
 femaleness, but from the fundamental differences in the 
 task of producing and caring for the two kinds of sexual 
 cells. It is not intended here to make a careful analysis of 
 these differences. In the female mind there is naturally 
 somewhat more of conservatism, more of reserve, more of 
 emotion, less willingness to take chances; and her disposition 
 is more quiet and less vigorous. In the male, on the con- 
 trary, the impulses of sex, of adventure, of combat are 
 more powerful and radical; his mind is, perhaps, somewhat 
 more judicial. There are numerous exceptions, and 
 the primary physical and mental capabilities are the same; 
 yet we all recognize perfectly definite physical and mental 
 quahties which we describe by the words masculine and 
 feminine, virile and effeminate. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to say that to the biologist there 
 is no suggestion of inferiority or superiority in these 
 terms. They merely express the specialization which ac- 
 companies sex, — and each type is specialized to do 
 particular necessary tasks. Each is superior in its own 
 specialized powers. 
 
46 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 3. The Relation of Sex to These Bodily and Mental 
 Developments. — One of the most important things for 
 human beings to realize is the vital and profound influence 
 which reproduction and sex have on the whole of the 
 developing personaHty. In order to make this clear it will 
 again be best to illustrate from some of the higher animals. 
 As is well known, a male horse, or cat, or chicken, if allowed 
 to develop its testes until maturity, is wild, vigorous, active, 
 fiercely combative of other males, easily aroused by the 
 presence of the female, does not readily take on fat, but is 
 muscular and converts its food supply into action. This 
 development involves its whole bodily and mental nature, 
 its disposition and instincts as well as its structures. In 
 the case of the cock, spurs, wattles, and other well-known 
 "secondary" sexual structures appear. 
 
 If any such male animals are taken when young, before 
 they show these mental and physical effects of their sex, 
 and the testes are completely removed by a surgical opera- 
 tion, these qualities do not arise. The animal is sluggish, 
 develops fat instead of muscle, is mentally torpid, takes no 
 special notice of the female. 
 
 The male fowl, so treated, does not develop the spurs and 
 other male marks. If, however, a piece of the healthy 
 testis of another fowl is later grafted successfully into the 
 tissues of the castrated bird, the development of these 
 ordinary male characters will occur. 
 
 Something similar to the above takes place in female 
 animals whose ovaries are removed in early Hfe. There is 
 very little difference physically or temperamentally be- 
 tween males and females when both have lost their essen- 
 tial organs early in life. The developing ovaries and testes 
 are responsible for the special sexual characteristics of the 
 
RELATION TO NORMAL DEVELOPMENT 47 
 
 parent animal, and the removal of these internal organs 
 makes male and female much alike. It is believed by biolo- 
 gists that the sex-organs, — ovaries and testes, — manu- 
 facture certain specific substances, which on being poured 
 into the blood-current pass to the muscles, the brain, the 
 skin, and other organs. These substances, by their pres- 
 ence, stimulate the particular growths that we have noticed 
 as belonging to the various sex-organs. In other words, 
 the natural, healthy condition of the internal sex-organs, 
 through their direct action on the blood, modifies most pro- 
 foundly the body, mind, and nature of the organism to 
 which they belong. 
 
 4. Relation of Sex to the Normal Development of the 
 Human Male. — If the facts of the preceding paragraph 
 were true of the higher animals only, they would still be 
 interesting; but since they are just as true of human beings, 
 they become of most far-reaching importance. It is well 
 known that the boy changes in important ways as he be- 
 comes sexually mature. The body grows greatly; the 
 muscles become firmer; the vocal cords increase in length, 
 and the voice falls from the pitch of a woman to that of a 
 man; beard develops on the face; the sex-organs increase in 
 size; and the temperament, mental quaHties, and ambitions 
 become those of the mature man. If, however, the testes 
 are removed by disease or operation, these changes do not 
 come, but the man keeps the more feminine quaHties of 
 boyhood. In this way the voice remains a soprano, the 
 muscles do not become vigorous and manly, fat is deposited 
 in greater amount, the mental traits come to be dominated 
 by stealth and cunning rather than by openness and 
 strength. The eunuchs of the orient are examples of this. 
 
48 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 From the human point of view, the practical conclusion 
 of the whole matter is this: — In order to get a strong, 
 normal, manly body and mind, the first essential is the 
 full, sound development of the internal organs, — the testes. 
 Conversely, anything that interferes with the full, sound 
 development of the internal sex-organs will to that extent 
 prevent the boy from developing into his full manhood. 
 The effect of such knowledge as this upon the average boy 
 in restraining him from lines of action that would interfere 
 with manly development is clear, and the use we should 
 make of these facts in the training of boys is equally 
 apparent. 
 
 5. The Relatron of Sex to Normal Development in the 
 Human Female. — Without going into details, it will 
 serve the present purpose to say that the same general 
 laws hold for the development of women as are pictured 
 above for men. The loss of the ovaries early in life, by 
 disease or operation, prevents the normal development of 
 the female body, and does not allow the mental and tem- 
 peramental qualities to come to their proper maturity. 
 As is true for other animals, each sex tends to become more 
 like the other, in the absence of the internal organs. Thus 
 in women, the hips may not enlarge, and the outlines of the 
 body resemble those of men. The presence of healthy 
 ovaries is necessary to produce the ^stinctive and attrac- 
 tive feminine characteristics. 
 
 6. The Abnormal Aspects of Sex in Human Beings. — It 
 has been the effort to suggest in the preceding paragraphs 
 how profound and beneficial is the effect oJ[ healthy, normal 
 sex development on bodily and mental development, both 
 in men and women. The long series of attractive qualities 
 
RELATION TO NORMAL DEVELOPMENT 49 
 
 which each sex admires in the other is dependent upon this 
 healthy sex life. This, as we have said, is the important 
 and positive foundation of sex-education, as it is that on 
 which human society is itself erected. These are the most 
 important and valuable facts of sex. Home, family, love, 
 and the numerous ideas to be associated with these words, 
 rest upon it. 
 
 But there is another side that cannot be ignored. This is 
 abnormal, pathological, diseased, and secondary, but it is 
 important, and must be met fairly and squarely by the 
 teachers of boys and girls. It is important, however, that 
 they shall not be allowed to think of the abnormal things as 
 meaning more than the normal. It is not possible in these 
 brief chapters to make a complete statement of the dif- 
 ferent forms of abnormal sexual life, and of the resultant 
 general life, for which the parent and teacher must be on the 
 lookout. All that can be hoped is to suggest some of the 
 main places where the results of experience should be 
 brought to the aid of young people. 
 
 7. Special Abuses of Sex in Men. — We have seen that 
 the removal of the testes makes men abnormal and imper- 
 fectly developed in body and mind; but this is not all. 
 Premature and excessive sexual indulgence interferes with 
 sex development and thus with the whole development. 
 Breeders of stock, who wish their males to come to their 
 best, guard this point and do not allow too early or too 
 frequent intercourse or excitement. From the standpoint 
 of bodily and mental health the following things should be 
 held in mind by teachers and impressed on boys : — 
 
 (i) Total abstinence from sexual indulgence does not in 
 any way retard or prevent perfect development of the sex 
 qualities. 
 
 1 
 
so 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 (2) Early or excessive or abnormal forms of indulgence 
 do interfere with normal sex growth and with the strong 
 manly qualities which depend on it. 
 
 (3) Promiscuous indulgence is sure, sooner or later, to 
 
 Fig. 8. A diagram of a sectional view of the essential sex organs of the male, seen from 
 the right side. The section is supposed to pass chiefly through the middle plane of the 
 body. B, the bladder; P, the urethra passing through the penis; Sc, scrotum containing the 
 testis, T; S.T., sperm tubules where sperm is formed. E. epididymis, a much-coiled tube 
 which receives the sperm through tubes from all parts of the testis and conveys it to V.D.' 
 the vas deferens. This tube leads to a reservoir (S.V.) and finally to the outside world through 
 the ejaculatory duct, D, and the urethra, F; G, the prostate gland. 
 
 Each testis contains about 800 of the much coiled sperm-tubules. These delicate tubes 
 average more than two feet each in length. They unite into about 20 tubes, each some 
 8 inches in length. All these communicate with the epididymis (£) which has a length of 
 20 feet when unravelled. The vas deferens takes a circuitous route of some two feet before 
 it comes to its vesicle, S.V., just beneath the bladder. The germ infections may penetrate 
 to the most internal parts of this structure, and hence it is easy to see why complete cure 
 is so difficult and uncertain. 
 
RELATION TO NORMAL DEVELOPMENT 51 
 
 bring infection by one or both of the venereal diseases, — 
 gonorrhea and syphilis. These diseases arrest develop- 
 ment, and may destroy the whole sex functions. These 
 diseases are not merely communicable from adult to adult, 
 but the germs may penetrate to the ovaries and testes, and 
 the eggs and sperm thus become infected. In this way 
 unspeakable disease and misery are brought to the next 
 generation, as well as to this. 
 
 The highly complicated character of the sex glands 
 and the ducts connected with them makes infection 
 of the male by these germs a most insidious and difficult 
 trouble. The accompanying figure (Fig. 8), which is 
 diagrammatic, will give the teacher an idea of this com- 
 plexity. The whole series of tubes and organs may become 
 diseased. 
 
 (4) Naturally, the male has more powerful sex-desires 
 than the female. This is associated with the more active 
 male function of finding and pursuing the female. The sel- 
 fish appetites and passions are at their highest with him. 
 Because of this fact it is especially easy for the minds of 
 boys to become poisoned and diseased by early and excessive 
 sexual indulgence, or by excitement through conversation, 
 pictures, and the like. This disease of the mind is just as 
 real a thing as the blood-poison of syphilis to the body, and 
 even more deadly to personality. 
 
 Because of these more intense passions of boys, and of 
 other facts which bear so directly on their development, the 
 pedagogical problems in rearing boys to pure, healthy 
 maturity are much more taxing than for girls. This makes 
 it all the more necessary that boys and young men be 
 given a chance to know the meaning of the right use of sex 
 and the dangers of its abuse or neglect. 
 
52 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 8. The Abnormal Aspects of Sex in Women. — The 
 
 impulses towards sex-gratification are less powerful in the 
 female than in the male, and in consequence her abnor- 
 malities tend less toward excesses and abuses. There is, 
 however, enough of such tendency to make it necessary 
 for mothers of daughters to see that they are not subjected 
 to unnecessary temptation. If subjected to it, they should 
 see that the girls know the real nature of the temptation, 
 and why it is not be to yielded to. 
 
 Since women arouse sexual appetites in men, it is thus 
 possible for them to increase, quite unconsciously, the 
 dangers in which they stand. They should be taught how 
 their dress or conduct may, without their intention, arouse 
 impulses dangerous to themselves and others. It is prob- 
 ably true that no normal woman deliberately seeks to 
 produce these effects; but many girls and women do thus 
 contribute to make the problems of both sexes more diffi- 
 cult. 
 
 Since the female carries the developing embryo and 
 nourishes it, her biological work in reproduction involves 
 more of self-sacrifice than does that of the male, and less 
 of gratification. While the woman is not so subject to 
 the impulses and the consequent temptation to excesses, 
 yet the evils arising from abuses of sex seem to fall most 
 heavily upon her nevertheless. The communicable diseases 
 are even more disastrous to women than to men. We are 
 all too familiar with the cruel way in which society holds 
 women more responsible for lack of virtue than it does 
 men. Just how severe is public condemnation and how 
 destructive is overindulgence and disease to women is 
 shown by the social ostracism and the short life of public 
 prostitutes. 
 
RELATION TO NORMAL DEVELOPMENT 53 
 
 In general, then, the unhealthy and abnormal things in 
 respect to sex from which young girls should be guarded 
 are: — 
 
 (i) Forwardness and lack of reserve. This is the danger 
 point with girls as overpowerful sex-desires are with boys; 
 and must be regarded as abnormal and pathological. The 
 very fact that sexual desires are not so strong in women as 
 in men is doubtless the reason why girls often fail to realize 
 that very small indiscretions on their part may lead to 
 disastrous consequences. 
 
 (2) Lack of experience; small wages; dance halls and 
 wine rooms. There are many things, in our cities par- 
 ticularly, that make the position of unprotected girls ex- 
 ceedingly difficult: the lack of experience of country girls 
 who go to town to earn a livelihood; the small wages that 
 do not allow for any comforts or relaxations in life ; organized 
 vice working to entrap girls through the dance halls and wine 
 rooms. All these things tend to break down the natural 
 restraints and lead girls to unwholesome sex-relations. 
 
 (3) Ill-health — A large part of the sex abnormalities 
 of women are matters of ill-health which cluster about 
 the uterus. 
 
 {a) The monthly loss of blood, associated with the 
 period of formation and escape of eggs, is in civilized 
 women abnormally severe, and is the source of much 
 distress and sickness. The debilitating character of 
 the function is shown by the openness to colds and 
 . other ills at this time. The proper clothing, rest, and 
 care of the body and mind at this period are absolutely 
 essential to health. School girls, working girls, and 
 society girls need to understand fully that they ignore 
 these cautions at their extreme peril. 
 
54 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 s 
 
 Fig. g. A diagram of a mid-section through the female pelvic organs, to show the general 
 position of the uterus. It may fall forward, backward, or sidewise. It will easily be seen 
 why the "knee and chest position" (See page 103) is favorable for replacement; also how 
 compressing the waist must force the organ downward. A, anal opening; B, bladder; /, 
 intestine; R, rectum; S, spinal column; U, uterus; V, vagina. 
 
 (h) In many cases the uterus tends to add to un- 
 healthy bodily and mental states because of its mere 
 weight, particularly at the time of menstruation, and 
 because of its unstable position. The organ is very 
 liable to fall from its natural position (Fig. 9, £/), 
 and may fall in any direction: — backward, which 
 is most frequent; forward; or sidewise. In falling 
 backward, for example, it may bend on itself in such 
 a way that it is impossible for it to return unaided to 
 its original position. In this position it may form 
 adhesions and thus grow to adjacent organs. The bad 
 results of such fallings are numerous. They include 
 
RELATION TO NORMAL DEVELOPMENT 55 
 
 pain, nervousness, and constipation because of pressure 
 on the rectum, and inability to bear children. When 
 such a condition is suspected because of dragging 
 sensations in that region, painful menses, and the like, 
 a girl should be taken to a reliable physician for exami- 
 nation and advice. Years of imperfect physical and 
 mental life may be avoided by care in this particular. 
 Figures 9 and 10 will give the reader an idea of the 
 general position and nature of these internal organs. A 
 knowledge of their relations and functions is necessary 
 to the teacher in order to make a convincing presentation 
 of the matter to the child. 
 
 (4) Unhygienic clothing, — Abnormal feminine dress 
 should be mentioned at this point. There is no doubt 
 that this has improved in recent years; but there is still 
 necessity for sane care. Corsets and other compresses that 
 
 Fig. to. Section of internal female organs, viewed from the ventral svirface. V, section 
 of vagina, which communicates with outside world; tA, muscular wall of uterus; IP, the vas- 
 cular portion of the wall; Od, the oviduct, of which F is the inner opening; O, the ovary; 
 L, various ligaments supporting the womb. The eggs are formed in the ovary from which 
 they escaf>e into the body cavity; they are taken up by the fimbriated processes at the open- 
 ing of the oviduct and pass down the latter to the cavity of the uterus. In the oviduct or 
 uterus they may unite with the sperm which ascends from the vagina after copulation. The 
 fertilized egg attaches itself to the vascular wall of the uteriis and is nourished there. At 
 birth the child is forced through the neck of the uterus by the muscles of this organ and 
 passes to the outside world through the vagina. 
 
56 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 bind the waist only or chiefly, diminish the space of the 
 organs at the waist Hne, force them down upon those below, 
 and almost certainly cause the uterus to fall in one direc- 
 tion or another. This result is made still more certain by 
 the flabby abdominal muscles of most women. Abdominal 
 corsets that leave the waist loose and support the abdomen 
 from beneath, are advantageous if the muscles cannot be 
 exercised enough to make them do the work themselves. 
 
 9. Summary. — The discriminating teacher or parent 
 will see that the argument in this chapter does not deal 
 directly with the social and moral issues, but only with the 
 biological. On these biological grounds we can go to our 
 children, in the proper way and at the proper times, and 
 say: — "Your development into the manly man or womanly 
 woman that you should become, will depend, in very large 
 degree, on the health and perfection of your sex-nature. 
 This is true both of your mind and body. If your sex- 
 development goes awry, the result wifl certainly show itself 
 in your general qualities of body and mind. The things that 
 are most Hkely to produce such a result and keep you from 
 reaching your best are: — too early use of the sex-function, 
 abnormal uses of it, displacement of organs, neglect to 
 care for health at critical times, loss or injury of organs 
 through disease or abuse. Even undue thinking of sex 
 matters, or yielding to the sex impulses, brings a kind of 
 morbid regard for them, and a mental weakness which is not 
 healthy. Total abstinence from sexual indulgence will have 
 no ill effects on the development you are seeking. There- 
 fore total abstinence is wise. The purpose of sex-knowledge 
 is to enable you to let yourself develop normally without 
 giving the matter any unnecessary thought." 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 THE SOCIAL AND MORAL BEARING OF SEX 
 
 1. Resume of the Relation of Sex to Mental Life. — 
 It does not help us at all in our efforts to fight wrong sex 
 attitudes to shut our eyes to the fact that matters of sex 
 naturally have a large place in the feelings and mental life 
 of all animals, including man. It is equally true that these 
 feelings and mental states and relations, growing out of the 
 contrasts and attractions between the sexes, greatly refine 
 and enrich our whole higher life. Sex fiJls even a larger 
 place in the Kfe of man than it does in that of the lower 
 animals because, owing to the higher development in his 
 case, of consciousness, memory and reflection, he gives 
 more attention than they do to pleasures and pains. This 
 is illustrated by the care and trouble we take to make 
 our food especially tasteful and attractive. We deliber- 
 ately increase the pleasures connected with eating by dwell- 
 ing upon them, and thus make the act of food-taking more 
 agreeable, and consequently we render ourselves more 
 liable to overeating and to the abuse of the function. Just 
 the same thing is true of the sex-Hfe in man. Consciousness 
 and memory greatly strengthen the hold of sex on the 
 mental Hfe of mankind, and at the same time increase the 
 tendency to abuse it and to give it an unduly prominent 
 sway over conduct. 
 
 The original purpose of sex instincts is to insure repro- 
 duction, and they are strong enough to accomplish this 
 
 57 
 
S8 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 in the lower animals. When in man the mind comes to 
 dwell upon the sex gratifications the impulses may easily 
 become unnecessarily strong and lead to abuse and per- 
 version. 
 
 2. Sex and Social Life. — Since reproduction and sex 
 lie at the foundation of marriage, home, family, and the 
 like, it is inevitable that they should profoundly color the 
 whole of human society, both as to its ideals and as to its 
 structure. We have seen that sex is a very selfish thing, 
 and that none of the human appetites is more merciless 
 and destructive when allowed to run riot; but we have also 
 seen that it is linked with reproduction, which is the very 
 basis of human self-sacrifice and unselfish devotion. From 
 this deep joining of self and society, appetite and sacrifice, 
 it is inevitable that there must be a struggle to determine 
 which will be supreme and rule the motives, as soon as the 
 mind of man comes to dwell on the conflict. Sex must be 
 deeply imbedded in social affairs. Will sex be allowed to 
 dominate and prey upon social health or will it be forced 
 to take a subordinate place, merely stimulating and minis- 
 tering to social health? 
 
 The foregoing is the theoretical statement of matters; 
 but we all know that it is equally true in practise. We 
 know that the sex bond which brings men and women to- 
 gether as mates, may normally ripen into the richest men- 
 tal and spiritual companionship and love. We are familiar 
 with the inspiring history of this sound family relationship, 
 extending back in various peoples beyond the very begin- 
 nings of recorded history. We know that this ideal bond 
 between a man and a woman makes the home the most 
 favorable place for the appearance, the support, and the 
 
SOCIAL AND MORAL BEARING 59 
 
 social and spiritual education of children. Human in- 
 genuity and resource have never found an3rthing that can be 
 successfully substituted for it. It is unnecessary to enlarge 
 on these normal bearings of sex on the social life of man- 
 kind. It would be possible to show that all social organi- 
 zation and standards are influenced in the most profound 
 way by sex, and by the special way in which mating 
 problems are met. 
 
 3. Abnormal Influences of Sex in Society. — It has been 
 insisted throughout these studies that the normal effects of 
 sex on the individual and on society are those with which 
 we are most concerned. We are not merely trying to keep 
 our children out of pitfalls; we want them to enter into the 
 purest and richest Ufe possible to them. It is, however, 
 necessary to guard against the pitfalls. 
 
 It is not possible in a brief survey to give any real notion 
 of the horrible perversions of sex that exist, nor their dis- 
 tinctive and anti-social effects. They are as low and ter- 
 rible as the purity and fineness of love and home Ufe are 
 high and holy. These things should not be over-em- 
 phasized in the education of youth, but it is necessary to 
 make them serve their part in holding youth upright. 
 
 The social evils growing out of the abuse and wrong 
 use of sex impulses may be enumerated as follows: — 
 
 (i) The breaking up of homes. Unfaithfulness is one 
 of the common causes of the destruction of what might 
 otherwise be normal homes, contributing to the health of 
 society. There is nothing which so strikes down the home 
 and all it stands for. 
 
 (2) Prostitution. In every town and city the lust of 
 men creates a demand which results in the ruin of thou- 
 
6o BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 sands of women, in the aggregate, and in condemning them 
 to social ostracism, bodily disease, degeneration of mind 
 and morals, and speedy death. These victims are recruited 
 from young girls of every rank in society, who fall usually 
 through ignorance or poverty or love of unworthy men. 
 There is to-day no more terrible blot on our Christian civili- 
 zation than this sacri&ce of women, and the organized 
 machinery by which girls are lured to this certain death. 
 No words are strong enough to condemn the unrestrained 
 men who create the demand nor the inhuman creatures, 
 men and women, who draw women and exploit them in the 
 traffic. Prostitution in all its aspects is revolting to pure 
 minds, and whenever it is portrayed to young people, its 
 cruel and unsocial character should be made so clear that 
 they will never outgrow their first horror of its inhumanity. 
 For this reason, the portrayal should be made to them at 
 that impressionable age when youth is all alive with chival- 
 rous feelings and is expanding into social enthusiasm. 
 
 (3) Venereal diseases. These so-called social diseases 
 are extended through society largely through prostitution. 
 They are extremely communicable and insidious, and men 
 and women who lead impure lives sexually are certain to be 
 infected with them sooner or later. It is difficult to get 
 statistics that are reliable, but even conservative physicians 
 have estimated that fully one-eighth of all the disease 
 which affiicts humanity comes from unclean sexual life. 
 The two most dangerous of these sex-diseases are gonorrhea 
 and syphilis. 
 
 Gonorrhea is caused by a germ which attacks the mucous 
 membrane of the reproductive passages and may ascend to 
 the very remotest organs, — the ovaries and testes. It 
 may produce entire sterility. Impure husbands thus in- 
 
SOCIAL AND MORAL BEARING 6i 
 
 feet their wives and may render them invalid and barren. 
 Children bom of such mothers are readily infected, and 
 the disease often produces blindness dating from birth, 
 i In many institutions for the blind it is known that no 
 less than 50 per cent, of the inmates have lost their sight 
 through gonorrhea. It is uncertain whether this disease 
 I is ever completely curable, infection often occurring long 
 after patients have believed themselves cured. 
 
 Syphilis, also caused by a germ, is less prevalent than 
 gonorrhea, but is more dangerous in that it may be trans- 
 ^ mitted in more ways, and is furthermore capable of being 
 inherited. It is not confined to the sex-organs, but be- 
 comes a blood disease, reaching the whole system. Be- 
 cause of this it may be communicated through any mucous 
 membrane or any abrasion on the body. Aside from its 
 loathsomeness and infectiousness, the children of syphi- 
 litic parents who may have recovered from the disease itself, 
 are liable to be weak and open to bodily and mental diseases. 
 The parents themselves are liable to paralysis and other 
 permanent nervous troubles. 
 
 These diseases are more than individual matters; they 
 are social evils. They break up families, they destroy or 
 make innocent wives invalid or barren, they maim and 
 weaken unborn children and put them as a burden on 
 society, and thus in numerous ways strike at the health 
 of the community. 
 
 (4) Illegitimacy, Among the distressing social results 
 of unbridled sex-indulgence is the large number of children 
 bom out of wedlock. In many instances the mothers of 
 these children are mere girls who cannot possibly have 
 known in full the results of their acts. Such mothers 
 and children are not able to become normal members of 
 
62 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 society. The child has a great handicap and may become 
 the ward of the public, and the mother is rarely given the 
 chance to regain her place in society even if she so desires. 
 It is believed by many students of the question that 
 births out of wedlock are on the increase. Whether this 
 is true or not, illegitimacy is so common that it is a 
 social threat, and it is time that all who care for the 
 future of the children of the land should use every effort 
 to check it. 
 
 4. The Moral Bearings of Sex. — From what has been 
 said in the former paragraphs, one must feel that such in- 
 dividual and social disasters necessarily make this matter 
 of sex behavior one of the most crying moral questions of 
 human society. Who will doubt for a moment that ideals 
 of a pure home and regular marriage bond, the rearing of 
 healthy children as offerings to a sound society, the devo- 
 tion of the whole family in sacrifice for the betterment 
 of human conditions are high moral enterprises? Who will 
 not say that high morahty belongs to the young man who 
 in spite of all temptations keeps himself as pure as he 
 wants his wife to be? Or who will not brand alike the 
 prosperous man who lures, for his own lust, the poorly paid 
 work girl by the glitter of the comforts he can give her, and 
 the prosperous man who pays the work girl so poorly that 
 she falls an easy victim to such lures? Most immoral of 
 all is the unspeakable "cadet" who earns his livelihood 
 by winning the affections and ruining the lives of unpro- 
 tected girls in order to turn them over to a life of prostitu- 
 tion by the proceeds of which he is supported. 
 
 There is no realm of social morals in which good and 
 bad, high and low, are so possible as in the sex relations. 
 
SOCIAL AND MORAL BEARING 63 
 
 5. Human Standards to Protect Social Morals. — It is 
 
 very clear that young and inexperienced people cannot 
 always find within themselves the necessary strength and 
 knowledge to guide properly their sex-behavior amidst the 
 complex temptations that society has thrown around them. 
 Not all young people have normal home Hfe. It is for 
 this reason that protecting standards and conventions 
 are valuable, and that all teachers should uphold such 
 standards and conventions. The institution of monog- 
 amy, and its safeguarding by legal sanctions, — as com- 
 pared with polygamy or other experiments which the race 
 has tried, — has done more than anything else to build up 
 sure foundations for society and social morals. All efforts 
 to break it down should be resisted to the utmost; and our 
 children should be trained to regard it as sacred. In the 
 same way the standards that respect and insist on purity 
 in the home are of vital importance and should be equally 
 binding on both sexes. The salvation of society has been 
 the increasingly high standard held up for women. If 
 society would rigidly apply the same standard to men it 
 would greatly strengthen the moraUty of sex-behavior. 
 When' we appeal for one standard of sex morality for men 
 and women we mean the standard we have for women. 
 It is not t(5o high; that demanded of men is too low. 
 
 6. The Inner Personal Morals. — It is quite possible 
 that some parent or teacher may ask: "If it is true that 
 sex is normal and sex-desires are implanted in order that 
 reproduction may occur, how can it be said that sex-in- 
 dulgence can have anything immoral in it, — any more than 
 eating or any other natural act?" This is a natural and 
 legitimate question. 
 
64 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 If we were not different from the animals, no wrong would 
 attach to sex-indulgence. If the door is thrown open it 
 must be opened to all. This would mean promiscuous inter- 
 course without restraint. The social effect of this would 
 be to destroy confidence in virtue and even ideals of virtue, 
 to leave no place for the home and the emotions that 
 belong to it, to make impossible the effective care of 
 children, and to destroy completely the conception, and sen- 
 timents of fatherhood. In a word it would thwart, so far 
 as humans are concerned, all effective mating and care of 
 offspring, and break up the most basal unit of human 
 society, — the family. 
 
 We have then in human society this dilemma: — Shall 
 we indulge the sensuous gratifications of sex as animals 
 do? Or shall we exercise self-control in the interest of 
 the higher social values? It is always at this point 
 that personal morals appear. As soon as it is clear that 
 the choice lies between individual self-indulgence and 
 self-restraint in the interest of a higher and more general 
 good, the issue becomes a moral one. This is true even 
 if the proposed act itself be otherwise natural and harm- 
 less. 
 
 It did not take the voice of God, saying, "Thou shalt not 
 commit adultery' ' to make irregular intercourse wrong. 
 Neither do our laws nor our public opinion and social stand- 
 ards make it immoral. Its immoraHty is much deeper 
 than these, and these prohibitions have come out of that 
 deeper thing. That thing is, that all human society and 
 its fineness and inspirations and sacrifices are automatically 
 destroyed by self-indulgence when the individual refuses to 
 restrain this impulse in accordance with these social stand- 
 ards. Sex-indulgence is not merely a blow at the present 
 
SOCIAL AND MORAL BEARING 65 
 
 orm of society; it strikes at the foundation of all society 
 based on home and family, 
 
 7. Incentives Leading to Self-Control. — With a tre- 
 mendous selfish impulse such as the sex-appetite, self -Qontrol 
 means what the psychologist calls an inhibition. An in- 
 hibition means back-fires to check the impulse; it means 
 bigger impulses to overwhelm the evil one; it means a "will 
 to do without, overcoming the desire to do." 
 
 Now there are various incentives which may serve as 
 inhibitions to the boy or girl coming up to face this ques- 
 tion of personal behavior. Some of these are named be- 
 low, and each should be used at the time and in the way 
 which will bring the best result in immediate conduct and 
 in permanent character: 
 
 (i) "Thou shalt not'' of human or Divine command. 
 
 (2) Fear of injury and arrest of development. 
 
 (3) Fear of disease. 
 
 (4) Respect for public opinion. 
 
 (5) Disgust at the grosser phases of sex abuses. 
 
 (6) Respect and consideration for other personality, 
 passing in the case of boys into a chivalrous attitude toward 
 women. 
 
 (7) Positive personal standards of judgment, ideals of 
 conduct, and habits of action. 
 
 These are stated somewhat in the order in which they 
 appeal to youth, beginning with the lowest. The first 
 three are negative appeals, and are to be used sparingly 
 in early Kfe, and at critical points, and held permanently 
 over those whose moral growth does not advance them to 
 the point where the higher motives appeal. Disgust is 
 a somewhat more personal and lofty quality than fear. 
 
66 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 and can often be inspired before a child can give all 
 the grounds for its feelings. This feeling arises from the 
 fundamental instincts of right and fairness, which many 
 children possess in a degree much beyond their powers of 
 reasoning: — "For of such is the Kingdom of Heaven!" 
 
 Respect for public opinion and public conventions is 
 somewhat higher and more complex and is very important. 
 It should be worked into the nature of the child's thoughts 
 of sex until it forms a kind of permanent background to its 
 consciousness, so that the child can do no act without 
 asking himself how this act will affect the feelings of those 
 who love him best. The known demand of a family or 
 community for chastity and purity is a great stimulus to 
 right action in young people. Lax public ideas of modesty 
 and restraint are a prelude to the breaking over of 
 stronger barriers by the young. United demands on the 
 part of young women of a community and their parents for 
 clean lives in the young men will be to them one of the 
 strongest possible inhibitions of loose living. 
 
 A greater help still to a young man in enabling him to 
 fight his worst impulses, is to have been trained in such 
 real respect for the personality of a woman that he would 
 realize how she would be wronged by his act, and in such 
 consideration for women in general, that it would become 
 a chivalrous desire to protect them from himself as well as 
 from others. In this connection it ought to be recognized 
 that pure love for a young woman is to most young men 
 a clear call to chivalry; and ought to be used to appeal 
 to self-control. It is a remarkable evidence of Divine 
 wisdom that the same period of development in life 
 that brings JuaL. brings also chivalry, its most effective 
 antidote. 
 
SOCIAL AND MORAL BEARING 67 
 
 In practice, any one of these incentives which will effect- 
 ively do the work of checking the impulses to self-in- 
 dulgence is as good as any other for the moment; but in 
 personality it makes a world of difference. Our objective in 
 education is to secure the internal standards of right thinking 
 and acting which will safely inhibit wrong action, — using all 
 the others as aids whenever necessary. This is the highest 
 of all. "Only nobler impulses and good ideals can inhibit 
 the lusts of the flesh." Therefore, as teachers, we must 
 secure these with our teaching. 
 
 8. Sex and Religion. — It is well known to students of 
 childhood that the nature undergoes profound changes 
 during the period in which the sexual powers mature. 
 This is not an accident. It is the result of the developing 
 sex qualities. During this period the child is highly impres- 
 sionable both by good and by bad. Love opens the way for 
 the highest and the lowest. If the animal impulse tempts 
 to abuse and indulgence, there are other instincts, equally 
 associated with the maturing nature, that lead to purity 
 and to spiritual control. It has been shown by statistics 
 that this is the general period of youth in which religion 
 makes its strongest appeal. In early and again in later 
 adolescence, more than at any other age, young people take 
 their stand for religious life, and can be aroused to 
 enthusiastic philanthropic work, which should always 
 accompany religious profession. It is- not an accident 
 that love of God and love for mankind and the matur- 
 ing of the reproductive impulses come together. They are 
 all part of the fundamental unselfishness of the reproductive 
 process. It is the privilege and duty of teachers to bind 
 them together for the improvement of all. 
 
68 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 9. Summary. — The teacher who aspires to assist the 
 child in sound sex-development must keep in mind the 
 general path over which the wonderful impulse has come 
 and the contributions it has made to personality, in literally 
 molding the physical nature; giving pecuhar quahty to the 
 mental life and to disposition and temperament; laying 
 the foundations for social instincts and conduct in mating, 
 home-making, care of children, and the like; furnishing one 
 of the mpst remarkable and trying arenas in which every 
 life must fight out moral battles to determine whether 
 self-indulgence or the higher things shall rule the life; even 
 heightening the sensitiveness of the early life to the call of 
 God in the individual soul. The teacher must remember 
 also that at every step this great constructive factor 
 threatens to take control of the nature, and to break down 
 and destroy all that has been so laboriously built up. 
 
 Tl^s is not wliat is to be taught the children; it is the 
 kind of thing the parent and teacher must feel while they 
 bring to the child the graded facts of his Hfe and relations. 
 And yet the youth should somehow get the sense of these 
 big agencies which he may invoke in helping to make his 
 knowledge practical, in forming ideals, and in establishing 
 habits of action. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 TIME AND MANNER OF INSTRUCTION 
 
 1. Introductory. — Up to the present we have been 
 making a statement of the problems confronting con- 
 scientious parents and teachers, and have tried to give 
 the subject the bigness and dignity to which it is entitled 
 because of its biological importance and its pedagogical 
 and moral possibilities. An effort has been made to 
 furnish the point of view the teachers should have in their 
 approach to the actual work of mastering the problem and 
 of instructing and inspiring youth, rather than to suggest 
 just the information which the pupil must have at the 
 various stages of his development. This book is an effort to 
 supply the first of the pedagogical needs mentioned in Chap- 
 ter III, Section 2, — the "Motivation of the Teacher." 
 
 2. The Matter of Instruction. — It is undoubtedly true 
 that the educational world is now awakening to the duty 
 that rests upon it, and that the indifference and hostility 
 of parents toward this more thorough instruction are grad- 
 ually passing away. Our next need is to know what is to be 
 taught, and when, and by whom. These are more difficult 
 pedagogical problems, and it is not pretended that they 
 are completely or even reasonably worked out in what 
 follows. What is put down here is merely tentative and 
 suggestive. It is believed, however, that the general 
 principles followed in the analysis are sound, and that 
 
 69 
 
70 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 some of the special suggestions will prove essentially 
 correct. It is fully expected that we shall, with fuller 
 facts derived from experience, be compelled to modify it 
 radically, at many points. The suggestions as to age will be 
 found to be made broad and elastic, purposely. There will 
 be many individual exceptions to even the best of these 
 suggestions. Indeed the chief objection to proposing a 
 scheme like this is that parents or teachers may take it as 
 final, suspend the use of their own insight and common 
 sense, and in consequence make a failure of the whole 
 effort in cases they may be working with. Education, in a 
 complex realm Hke this, is as varied and uncertain a task as 
 that in any moral matter that strikes down to the very cen- 
 ter of personahty. It is not capable of being put in any sim- 
 ple formula which will meet all the cases; but must be made 
 the subject of continuous study and readjustment by the par- 
 ent or teacher who wishes to secure high character in children. 
 
 3. The Periods of the Child's Life as They Relate to 
 Sex-Instruction. — The division of the life of the child for 
 the purpose of grading properly the instruction in sex 
 depends on several things : first, and chiefly, on the progress 
 of his own development intellectually and sexually; second, * 
 on the transitions in his social life — from home to school, to 
 high school, and the like; third, on the age, sex, and 
 character of his companions; fourth, on his reading; and on 
 other similar considerations. 
 
 For the purposes of this chapter the following general 
 divisions will be used: — 
 
 A. The Early Stage. 
 
 (i) From birth to 4 or 5 years. 
 (2) From 4 to 6 or 7 years. 
 
TIME AND MANNER OF INSTRUCTION 71 
 
 B. The Early Adolescent Stage. 
 
 (i) Prepubertal Stage: from 7 to 10 or 11. 
 (2) Pubertal Stage: from 10 or 11 to 14 or 15. 
 
 C. Late Adolescent or Post-pubertal Stage: from 15 to 
 
 18 or 20. 
 It is not intended to make the time limits of the 
 terms used above accord exactly with their meaning in 
 standard works on adolescence. The terms are applied to 
 describe the most dominant facts of the periods. 
 
 4. The Early Stage: from birth to 4 or 5 years. — 
 
 {a) The teacher: Without any doubt this should be the 
 mother. 
 
 (6) Spirit and purpose for the period: All that can be 
 done is merely anticipatory, protective, and formative of 
 good habits. i 
 
 {c) Contents and matter: Cleanliness and care of parts; 
 regular and prompt attending to the bodily functions; 
 habits of keeping hands and attention off the organs; no 
 differentiation of sex matters from other matters; use of 
 proper scientific names, and not vulgar nicknames for the 
 pelvic organs and processes. 
 
 {d) Remarks: Any unnecessary sense of shame or 
 embarrassment about such matters should be avoided. 
 This does not mean that the child is to be encouraged to 
 talk freely of these things to strangers. They are family 
 matters, to be treated freely among the family, but 
 not mentioned to strangers, because they are private 
 affairs. ) 
 
 The child should preferably sleep alone, should rise 
 promptly on awaking, should not be dressed too warmly 
 nor with tight-fitting garments nor in such a way as to 
 
72 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 favor putting the hands in the region of the organs, and 
 should have plenty of active play. 
 
 5. The Early Stage : from 4 to 6 or 7 years. — 
 
 (a) The teacher: The mother, possibly supplemented by 
 kindergarten or primary teacher. 
 
 {h) The spirit and purpose: A frank meeting of the 
 natural questions of the curious child in such a way as to 
 avoid a sense of shame or a cessation of confidence in his 
 teachers; to arouse a sense of reverent wonder at the 
 mysteries of life, and a feeling of the sacredness of the body. 
 
 (c) Contents and matter: Continuation of everything 
 begun in the former period; also the general facts of repro- 
 duction in the animals best known to the child, — as 
 chickens, mammal pets, man; where the baby animals and 
 baby human beings come from. 
 
 {d) Remarks as to manner, etc,'. The questions of the 
 child should be answered frankly, meeting the intellectual 
 needs of the child just so far as they are felt; the information 
 about reproduction should not be abstract generalizations, 
 but should be related to the child — as his chickens, his 
 kittens, babies of his own acquaintance. Broad generali- 
 zations are not usually necessary. If this period is prop- 
 erly dealt with, much of the vicious information may be 
 anticipated and rendered less harmful. A sense of part- 
 nership with his parents in this knowledge is valuable. 
 The average child learns more during these years than at 
 any other period of equal length in his life. Much will be 
 gained if the sex facts can take their place normally and 
 without shock in this growing knowledge. 
 
 6. The Prepubertal Stage: from 7 to 10 or 11. — 
 
 (a) The teachers: Parents and all the teachers. The 
 
TIME AND MANNER OF INSTRUCTION 73 
 
 parent is still in the best position to do the work, if possessed 
 of the necessary knowledge; but all possible agencies need 
 to be used during this and the next period, — often unob- 
 trusively. 
 
 (b) Spirit and purpose: To secure good habits, as in 
 preceding periods; watchfulness, on the part of all, that 
 the child be kept well nourished and be well supplied with 
 physical exercise in wliich he is interested, — be kept busy 
 and the surplus physical energy be used up. Keep vacant 
 time full of good books, good play and good companions. 
 Ideals of strong, healthy bodies should be formed. 
 
 (c) Contents and matter: Somewhat as in former 
 period, but may be extended. The direct sex-teaching is 
 at its minimum in this stage. Most of the teaching 
 should be indirect and connected with health of body, with 
 nature study, plant breeding, and other similar topics that 
 come up in school. In the case of especially precocious 
 children some of the precautionary teaching of the next 
 stage may be given. 
 
 (d) Remarks as to manner, etc.: Children of this age, 
 who have been taught properly will have had their curi- 
 osity satisfied with respect to the first mysteries that have 
 raised questions in their minds. If this has been done 
 properly and not evasively, it will tend to keep their minds 
 off matters of sex. They are not yet stirred up by their 
 own sex-development, and normally at this age they are 
 little concerned with its questions. Boys are interested 
 chiefly in playing with other boys. They want to be big 
 men. They are not usually much attracted to the girls. 
 The manner of approaching them should be through these 
 physical ambitions. Boys of this age should be taught of 
 the fine bodily and mental traits of strong men; and 
 
74 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 girls of the normal and vitally attractive traits of woman- 
 hood. All of this should be quite indirect and incidental, 
 letting them discover, and imitate such things under the 
 spur of their own ambitions and admirations. A series of 
 measurements of a boy's chest, and thigh, and biceps 
 during these years, with suggestions that he is above normal 
 here or not up to standard there, and how to remedy such 
 matters, will lay the foundations of pride in his own bodily 
 future that may keep him from various dissipations later. 
 The relation of normal sex-development to normal manly 
 strength and vigor may be suggested. Though the boy does 
 not yet know what is coming to him in development, the 
 teacher does; and every incidental opportunity in any sub- 
 ject of study or conversation should be used quietly to 
 appeal to the manly, self-respecting and other-respecting 
 quaUties which will serve as inhibitions later. 
 
 7. The Pubertal Stage: from 10 or 11 to 14 or 15.— 
 
 (a) Teachers: For the girls: the mother, or some close 
 woman teacher (school or Sunday-school). For the boys: 
 the father or mature personal friend, teacher, athletic 
 director, etc. 
 
 Teachers at this age need to be very intimate and close 
 personally, and capable of giving exact and reliable infor- 
 mation without arousing embarrassment or antagonism, 
 and without over-emphasis. 
 
 (b) Purpose and spirit: To secure mental preparation for 
 the sexual changes that come to the body, mind, and mor- 
 als; to guard against the temptations to dwell on licentious 
 mental pictures and ideas, or to indulge in experiments 
 with the organs and in secret self-abuse; to sublimate and 
 spiritualize the tremendous impulses of sex, and to trans- 
 
TIME AND MANNER OF INSTRUCTION 75 
 
 form them into sound ideals and habits of self-controlled 
 sex-conduct. 
 
 (c) Content and matter: The elementary facts of repro- 
 duction and sex in organisms, and the changes that come 
 in human beings at puberty; the facts concerning seminal 
 emissions, menstruation, ^etc, — their naturalness, their 
 meaning, and the methods of self-care that are necessary 
 to prevent unnaturalness and harm from them; the bodily 
 value of sex health in later life; the mental and passional 
 characteristics of this period quite as much as those of the 
 body; the meaning of the changes in temperament and of 
 the sex longings and appetites; definite warnings with 
 sound reasons (but not overstressed) against masturbation; 
 the physiological connection of all these conditions and 
 changes with genuine, fine manhood and womanhood; 
 examples of chivalrous attitude of men toward women and 
 the meaning of it (preparatory to the next stage where this 
 sense of chivalry must function to strengthen self-restraint 
 in young men) ; formation of purity ideals and standards in 
 relation to girls, and the reasons why these standards are 
 sound for human beings; nature-study, biology, physi- 
 ology, and religion. Among girls ideals of modesty in 
 behavior, need of avoidance of loudness and forwardness, 
 and the beauty of chastity should be made as appealing as 
 possible. 
 
 {d) Remarks as to manner, etc.: A division of labor is 
 called for in this period. Some of the above instruction can 
 best come from the parent or close friend. Other parts of it 
 can be given better in the schoolroom, in the Sunday-school 
 class, in the gymnasium talk, or elsewhere. Sometimes, 
 possibly, it is direct teaching, sometimes it ought to be very 
 incidental to the general teaching. A little examination of 
 
76 BIOLOGY OP SEX 
 
 the above list of topics, in the light of this suggestion, will 
 readily reveal the general division of the work that will 
 usually meet the needs best. The school courses in nature- 
 study, physiology and biology ought to furnish the big 
 foundation in information and the general background. 
 These teachings are authoritative, and in large degree 
 impersonal. For this reason they strengthen greatly the 
 more individual work of the parents and personal advisers. 
 This is a tremendously important age, and the sex yearn- 
 ings are not to be ignored or suppressed, but are to be 
 organized and directed so that their energy may be used to 
 drive the child into sound attitudes and courses of activity. 
 One or two talks by physicians to boys and girls, separately, 
 may be very valuable, especially if there is no other formal 
 teaching. 
 
 8. Post-pubertal or Late Adolescent Stage: from 15 
 to 18 or 20.— 
 
 (a) Teachers: High school and college teachers, parents 
 and ministers if well informed, physicians, athletic 
 directors, and books. 
 
 (b) Attitude and purpose: To fill the life with high 
 purposes, ideals, and ambitions which will absorb the 
 thoughts, strength and purposes; to give the beginning, 
 at least, of personal vision as to how these ambitions 
 are to be carried out and a conception of the personal 
 qualities which alone will bring full success; to develop 
 further the finer sense of respect for self and for others 
 which will tend to inhibit low actions; to enlarge the sense 
 of chivalry in boys, and admiration for chastity in girls; 
 to stimulate interest in life, its possibilities, its work, 
 its opportunities; to make very clear the effects on all con- 
 
TIME AND MANNER OF INSTRUCTION 77 
 
 cerned of improper sex-relations; to convince of the futility 
 of the weakling in the struggle for any sort of success that 
 counts; to utilize the love motive, which is large in most 
 youths of this age, in order to inhibit improper sex-conduct; 
 to form and to appeal to reEgious ideals and motives for 
 the same purpose. 
 
 (c) Content and matter: Meaning of love, marriage, and 
 the home, and the progress made in human history in the 
 purification of it; the racial value of this as compared with 
 general indulgence; the facts of prostitution and of the 
 venereal diseases as they bear on health and personaUty; 
 the value of purity as a personal asset to the individual; 
 the obHgation of purity assumed by young men and young 
 women alike in marriage; the iniquity of the "double 
 standard,'* and the role of young women in insisting that 
 men shall have the same standard of sex-conduct which 
 women practise; eugenics, and its biological foundations. 
 
 {d) Remarks as to manner, etc.: This is the first period 
 in which, in anything Hke normal conditions, there is much 
 danger of young men indulging in illicit sexual intercourse. 
 A wholesome fear to propose such a thing will ordinarily 
 deter them from soliciting this in the earlier years. The 
 danger, however, lies chiefly in an ignorant forwardness on 
 the part of otherwise normal girls which will destroy this 
 natural fear on the part of companions of their own age, and 
 may also subject them to the advances of older men. 
 
 The manner of imparting the information and ideals 
 suggested above should be such as to leave no possible 
 ground for a girl exposing herself to danger by breaking the 
 bounds of ladylike conduct; and should make it exceedingly 
 difficult for a young man to take advantage of such a lapse. 
 
 After all is said, assuming that information respecting 
 
78 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 sex and sex-relations is wholesome and accurate, the writer 
 believes that high standards of modesty and womanly 
 virtue in girls, and chivalrous respect for such in women 
 on the part of young men, will do more to bring self- 
 control to men than fear of disease or any of the abnormal 
 outgrowths of sex-indulgence. My own observation is that 
 a chivalrous wish to protect women and to keep them pure, 
 together with the feeling of obligation to be just as pure 
 as he wishes his sister or his wife to be, will do more 
 than any other thing to tide a young man safely over this 
 period of Kfe. 
 
 If this can be coupled with, and intensified by, strong 
 personal moral and religious convictions, it is the crown- 
 ing of a very strong line of teaching. 
 
 9. Summary. — A httle attention to the foregoing sug- 
 gestions will reveal the fact that the course of instruction is 
 progressive toward higher and higher types of knowledge, 
 and the motives to which appeal is made are of a more and 
 more lofty sort. It should be remembered by teachers 
 that it is often possible to use in small degree qualities and 
 motives before the period in which they function most fully. 
 For example, the religious motive seems to reach its climax 
 in late adolescence, but it may be used in some degree 
 before this time. It is important, however, that we should 
 not prematurely stress these higher motives in our treat- 
 ment of the child. This is often disastrous, both to the 
 quality of the religion (or other influence) and to its effects 
 in furnishing sex-control. The point to be kept in mind 
 at every step is that the instruction should be graded as 
 completely as possible to the child's mental capabilities, to 
 his emotional development, and to his sex needs, — both 
 individual and social. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 EUGENICS 
 
 1. Introduction. — There is an increasing disposition 
 for careful students of human affairs to hold that children 
 have a right to be well born; to insist that society should 
 take steps to see that those who bring children into the 
 world are fit to do so. It is held that human beings, by 
 applying the same principles which are now in common 
 use in breeding and selecting the best plants and animals, 
 could improve the stock of the human race, physically, men- 
 tally, and morally, as much as wheat and horses have been 
 improved. This science which looks to the improvement 
 of the human race by breeding is known as Eugenics. It 
 proposes a better race of man through selective mating, 
 and is supplementary to, and in contrast with, Euthenics, 
 which refers to making the most of the Hf e of the individual, 
 by giving it the best possible chance after birth. Eugenics 
 has to do with "blood" rather than with culture. 
 
 2. The Essential Contention of the Eugenist. — On 
 
 analyzing the above program, we find that the problem 
 presents itself to the student of eugenics in about the follow- 
 ing way: 
 
 "Our humanity and our moral standards will not allow 
 us, when a child has once been brought into the world, to 
 subject the unfit to the rigors of competition which in the 
 lower animals eliminate the weaklings and keep up the 
 
 79 
 
8o BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 average of the stock. Instead, in theory at least, we take 
 even these defectives and apply our resources to give 
 them as nearly a normal individual life as is possible. 
 In doing this, we subject the race to the handicap of 
 propagating and supporting an unnatural number of 
 defective strains. By artificial protection, we are pouring 
 back into the stream of human life the unsound elements 
 which nature eliminates in other species. We believe that 
 the moral and altruistic quahties we cultivate in saving 
 the weak more than compensate for the other loss. When, 
 however, this individual right to life is admitted (and 
 consequently our obligation to enrich this life), it should not 
 carry with it the right to reproduce. Reproduction is 
 not an individual right. It is primarily a social phe- 
 nomenon. Human society in the interest of its own 
 advancement and soundness has the right to deny the 
 privilege of propagation to those who are for any reason 
 unfit to reproduce. 
 
 "In, the second place, in order to get the best results in 
 offspring, there are certain principles of selective mating 
 which should be respected. Individuals, who under proper 
 conditions might marry and produce sound offspring with 
 one mate, may not do so with another. We now know 
 enough of heredity to be able to say that some individuals 
 should not be allowed to reproduce at all. We are grad- 
 ually gaining the kind of information that will enable us to 
 say that certain particular matings should not take place 
 and thus give some guidance in selective mating, in order 
 to get the very best results for the race." 
 
 It is estimated that about one per cent, of the total popu- 
 lation of these United States is cared for by society in 
 institutions — as insane, feeble-minded, epileptic, blind, 
 
EUGENICS 8i 
 
 deaf, criminal, and paupers — at a cost of one hundred 
 million dollars per year; and that six to eight per cent, of 
 the mature population is so unproductive and inefficient as 
 to be a standing menace. The knowledge that many of 
 these characteristics, or the qualities of mind that made the 
 conditions, are inheritable, is the basis for the plea that 
 enlightened society should prevent unfit marriage and 
 propagation. 
 
 3. The Things That Influence Birth. — The above con- 
 tention may be somewhat new to our ears; but it is certain 
 to be brought more and more to the attention of society in 
 the years to come, because we are learning as never before 
 the facts about the inheritance of human traits. These 
 illuminating studies of heredity, which have been made in 
 the last twenty years, make it necessary for us to consider 
 briefly the elements that help to determine how a child 
 may be "well born," — or whether prospective parents are 
 fit to propagate their kind. Broadly speaking there are 
 three elements or aspects of parental fitness or unfitness to 
 add to the population: (i) physical and mental and moral 
 disqualifications, which are certainly transmissible to 
 children through heredity; (2) qualities, such as infection 
 by the venereal and other diseases, which while not strictly 
 heritable are yet capable of being transmitted to offspring 
 at or before birth; and (3) inabiHty, personal or economic, 
 to give children a chance to enter into the world's activities 
 with a reasonable hope of normal success. Classes i and 
 2 fall properly in the realm of eugenics. Class 3 includes 
 some phases of euthenics, but in all probability it will be 
 found that much of this inability is a matter of hereditary 
 structure belonging to i, and not purely of social conditions. 
 
82 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 4. Hereditary Transmission of Taints. — There is much 
 about heredity of which we are still ignorant. Our experi- 
 mental knowledge of just what may or may not be inherited, 
 and of the chances for its actual inheritance is mostly the 
 result of the work of the present generation of scientists. 
 Our knowledge is as yet very incomplete; but we know that 
 inheritance extends to mental, temperamental, and moral 
 qualities just as certainly as to physical. We know that 
 epilepsy, feeble-mindedness, idiocy, insanity, shiftlessness, 
 criminal tendencies — including those toward sexual indul- 
 gence — selfishness, laziness, and other similar weaknesses 
 of mind and morals are subject to inheritance. Simi- 
 larly we know by careful study of statistics that poor resist- 
 ance to tuberculosis, weak heart, poor qualities of blood 
 and of the internal secretions, and many other weaknesses 
 which serve as the foundation of diseases, are clearly trans- 
 missible. The children of inebriates are very liable to ner- 
 vous weaknesses, epilepsy, imbecility, etc. On the other 
 hand it is fully demonstrated that traits of strength ^ 
 well as taints are secured through heredity. General 
 bodily strength, resistance to diseases, mechanical abil- 
 ity, memory, cheerfulness, musical and artistic anfl 
 literary ability, and strong moral qualities, such as 
 unselfishness, conscientiousness, etc., are capable of direct 
 transmission. 
 
 Students of eugenics are able to tell with some exactness 
 the probability of the inheritance of both the strong and the 
 weak qualities, if the condition of the parents in respect to 
 these qualities is known for one or two preceding genera- 
 tions. The principles underlying these conclusions are too 
 complex for statement here, but an illustration may be used. 
 The following statements relate to imbecility, but they 
 
EUGENICS 83 
 
 apply broadly to any of the traits that are subject to in- 
 heritance, both good and bad. 
 
 (i) If both parents are normal and come from normal 
 parents all the offspring will be normal, so far as inheri- 
 tance is concerned. 
 
 (2) If both parents are mentally lacking and come from 
 parents of the same kind, all the offspring will be defective. 
 
 (3) Between these two extremes will be aU sorts of pos- 
 sibiUties too complex to discuss at length here. For 
 example, two affected parents may have 50 per cent, or all 
 normal children, depending on the grandparents; two normal 
 parents, if they belong to strains having the same defects, 
 may have approximately 25 per cent, abnormal children; 
 if one of the parents be normal and of strong ancestry, all 
 the children may be normal, though some of these may 
 have defective children under certain circumstances; or a 
 normal person, with a defect in his ancestry and with a 
 feeble-minded mate, may have 50 per cent, of his children 
 defective. 
 
 f- It will be seen that both the individuals concerned and 
 their families must be considered; for no individual shows in 
 his own body all the quaHties which his germ cells may 
 possess. Only a study of several generations will deter- 
 mine the latter. 
 
 5. Congenital Infections. — It is known that syphilis 
 and gonorrhea, if not inherited, — at least infect at or be- 
 fore birth a very large percentage of the children of infected 
 parents. In this way thousands of children are bom blind, 
 diseased, or so arrested or disordered in nervous develop- 
 ment that they may be epileptic, imbecile, or insane. 
 
 In a manner that is similar but not hereditary, parents 
 
84 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 with tuberculosis and some other diseases of skin and 
 mucous membranes, may infect their children at or after 
 birth. This may give them little or no chance in life and 
 render them a burden to society, as well as centers of 
 infection for later generations. This is in addition to 
 the known inheritance of weak organs that may predispose 
 to the diseases. 
 
 6. Social or Economic Incapacity. — This is a very com- 
 plex thing and we do not yet know what elements enter into 
 it in any case. Undoubtedly there are often elements of 
 physical, mental, or moral weakness not yet identified, 
 which are inheritable. But apart from these transmissible 
 weaknesses, it not infrequently happens that persons 
 able to produce perfectly healthy, normal children find 
 themselves beset by such economic conditions that they 
 could not properly care for them. Such persons should not 
 evade their debt to society; still, many things besides he- 
 reditary qualities are necessary before such children can 
 become helpful members of society. It would seem, there- 
 fore, that society has a duty here in furnishing such condi- 
 tions that sound children shall have a fair chance to come to 
 efficient maturity. This is a point where eugenics and eu- 
 thenics must meet in the effort to solve a difficult problem. 
 
 7. Relation of These Considerations to Human Mar- 
 riage. — Growing out of these discoveries concerning 
 heredity during the last twenty years are several conclu- 
 sions for the improvement of the human race: — 
 
 (i) Human reproduction is a social and not an individual 
 matter;hence human marriage should beguided,in large part 
 at least, by scientific facts and in the interests of society. 
 
 (2) Unfit individuals, who have themselves inherited 
 
EUGENICS 85 
 
 taints such as those mentioned in Section 3 of this chapter 
 should not be allowed to marry unless it can be shown by 
 scientific investigation that their marriage is not likely to re- 
 sult in tainted offspring. If there is a probability that it will, 
 these defectives should either be segregated during the repro- 
 ductive period or be made sterile by the removal of the glands. 
 
 (3) Society should require male applicants for marriage 
 licenses to produce a certificate of complete freedom from 
 all venereal diseases, signed by a competent and reputable 
 physician. In the meantime, parents should demand this 
 freedom from disease on the part of the young men who 
 would marry their daughters. 
 
 (4) Young people should be trained in a thoughtful 
 attitude toward the qualities of £heir mates and of the 
 famines to which they belong. They should be allowed the 
 widest possible acquaintance with different kinds of suitable 
 people in order that the range of their selection may be as 
 wide and sane as possible. There is no desire to replace 
 love and congeniality with stem, emotionless scientific 
 selection even if we could know absolutely the results of 
 unions; but there is no question that some knowledge of 
 eugenics on the part of young people would tend to di- 
 minish the haphazard marriages of the present day, and give 
 to the selection of mates at least a flavor of intelligence. 
 
 8. Other Reforms Made Necessary by These Facts. — 
 It is not enough to prevent marriage and reproduction on 
 the part of defective and habitually criminal individuals. 
 It is incumbent on society, and our young people should 
 be educated so as to imderstand that it is their duty, to 
 handle in a sane and scientific way the physical and 
 moral plagues that cluster about sexual immorality. The 
 
86 . BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 venereal diseases, which are strongly communicable, are 
 much more harmful and dangerous to the human race 
 than small-pox or scarlet fever. Strict measures should 
 be adopted requiring physicians to report such cases to 
 the health officers, who should isolate them, whether 
 prostitutes or men of loose morals, just as in other 
 infectious and communicable diseases. All this is de- 
 manded purely on hygienic grounds and has no direct 
 reference to moral necessities, although these latter may 
 properly reinforce the former. 
 
 Prostitution, the white slave traffic, and their horrible 
 accompaniments of immorahty and disease, must be dealt 
 with just as vigorously and scientifically; so must, for that 
 matter, the social and economic conditions that minister 
 to these things by making it difficult for girls to support 
 themselves honestly in our cities. Thus the ideals of the 
 advanced scientist and the dreams of the reformer point 
 in the same direction : — to the eHmination of the individual 
 transmission of hereditary taints wherever possible, to the 
 elimination of the great centers and avenues of dissemina- 
 tion of th.e commimicable and transmissible diseases; and 
 to the elimination of economic conditions of Hfe that make 
 purity imnecessarily difficult. All this is for the double 
 purpose of removing from the human stock physical and 
 mental degeneracy due to birth, and of checking the moral 
 disintegration of our young men and women through un- 
 necessary and unnatural temptation. 
 
 While the scientists are working out the facts on which 
 eugenic progress depends, we as teachers and parents 
 should be educating a generation of men and women who 
 will appreciate them and will do their part in applying 
 them to human betterment. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
APPENDIX 
 THE PROBLEMS OF PARENTS* 
 
 It often happens that parents or other teachers, who are 
 quite willing to admit the need of adult help to youth in 
 matters of sex, do not see a way to meet the particular 
 problems that confront them in practical dealing with 
 children. To such it may be said that there are not a 
 great many of these critical problems. Furthermore they 
 are much more easy to meet than they seem on the surface. 
 The young child is open-minded and quite innocently 
 desirous to know ; it has none of the embarrassment which 
 older people have allowed themselves to acquire; we only 
 need therefore to be quite natural and sympathetic in 
 order to get a sympathetic hearing from the young child. 
 The parent should meet each situation that arises in such 
 a way that the child will feel that he may go to the parent 
 freely when he desires to know anything about this or 
 related subjects. 
 
 The sole purpose of this appendix is to deal somewhat 
 concretely with certain of the more common problems 
 which parents should help their children meet. These 
 questions, especially the early ones, will usually come out 
 of a clear sky. It is the part of wisdom therefore for the 
 parent to be prepared beforehand. Hence it will be 
 
 *The writer feels that the time has not yet come to present a definite program of instruc- 
 tion for various ages. This must be built up as the result of experimental work by good 
 teachers in the next few years. A very tentative outline is suggested in Chapter VIII. 
 Notwithstanding this uncertainty as to the best way to get the results we want, and the 
 conviction that we must not make the mistake just now of going too fast in this delicate 
 matter, it has been deemed wise to give some concrete suggestions for particular cases, par- 
 ticularly directed to parents. This appendix is such an effort to deal in the concrete with a 
 few of the things which the parent must meet. In the nature of the case it repeats some of 
 the more theoretical statements in the body of the book, but does so in the effort to adapt 
 the point of view given there to the actual necessities in practice. It will be understood 
 that the appendix is written for the guidance of adults and not for children. 
 
 89 
 
90 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 greatly to the parentis advantage to have observed and 
 talked with the child about some of the interesting nature 
 study topics which the garden and field suggest. There 
 are a number of simple books available on nature study. 
 Among these may be mentioned: "Plant and Animal 
 Children" (Torelle); "Transmission of Life" (Naphey); 
 "Life's Story" (Mrs. Hall); "Truths" ( Lowry); the reading 
 of which will help the parent to make these talks lay the 
 foundation for more personal answers. 
 
 I. Questions of Early Childhood. 
 Problem i. The Differences between Boys and Girls, 
 Probably the first question which parents have practical 
 trouble in answering to their own satisfaction relates to 
 the differences, and the reasons for the differences, between 
 the brothers and sisters of the family. When the question 
 is first raised it will not be necessary to go to the founda- 
 tions of these differences. At first it will probably be 
 sufficient to make it clear that males and females are 
 different in all higher animals. Of course it is no real 
 explanation of a particular case to put it as a general one; 
 but it is a temporary resting-place for the human mind 
 if it can realize the general character of a particular truth. 
 For example, suppose a small boy or girl in the family has 
 for the first time become really observant and conscious 
 of the external physical differences between the sexes. 
 The poignancy of this discovery can be made much less 
 by calling attention to the fact that one is called "brother," 
 "boy," "he," and the other "sister," "girl," "she," and 
 that all men and boys are different from women and girls. 
 They dress differently, they do different parts of the family 
 work, and the like. There is thus a gain in bringing all 
 the common differences into view at once. This includes 
 
APPENDIX 91 
 
 and swamps, so to speak, the special differences without 
 obscuring or ignoring them. At this stage the problem 
 is not that of imparting to the child the whole mass of 
 information in an exact way, but rather of making him 
 feel that it is a well-known matter about which he may 
 talk freely to his mother, and that she will tell him all 
 that he wants to know as fast as he can understand it. 
 This process of early education will be easier and less 
 attended by abnormal curiosity and embarrassment if 
 there is a good deal of openness and freedom in the early 
 years when children of both sexes in a family are of nearly 
 the same age. Artificial secrecy and too early separation 
 of the children in the nursery and bath makes the problem 
 of satisfying curiosity much more difficult, than if free 
 natural companionship were allowed. Furthermore, the 
 particular form of modesty that it strives for is often 
 apparent rather than real. 
 
 Problem 2. The Origin of the Baby, — One of the 
 earliest questions to come into the child mind is of the 
 origin of the new baby in the home. The feverish haste 
 with which impossible explanations are devised is at 
 once a proof of the persistence of the question and our 
 perverted ingenuity in evading it. Possibly something of 
 the same wonder has arisen in the child's mind in its 
 efforts to account for its own origin; but this curiosity is 
 sure to become acute in the child of from 4 to 6 years of 
 age, if a baby is bom in the circle of its acquaintance. 
 As has been said before, when the parent is satisfied that 
 the question is clearly present in the child's mind it should 
 be met even if the child should hesitate to ask the question 
 without encouragement. Some children are more diffident 
 than others about asking questions. 
 
92 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 Two special things should be aimed at in answering 
 this question: first, to give the information in such a way 
 as to prevent a morbid dwelling on the subject; and, 
 secondly, to make this information give the child a con- 
 ception of motherhood. The first task may best be done 
 by the mother herself; and the second by the father, if 
 he is the right sort of man. 
 
 It is important, however, for parents to realize that these 
 two phases of the subject should be so handled as to secure 
 more than a formal, satisfying answer to the young child's 
 questionings. By means of this information the parent 
 must try to give the child the beginnings of a fine and 
 reverent outlook on life and the nature of the home. It 
 should take the form of the most intimate confidences. 
 If it were merely information, the child would sooner 
 or later stumble upon it in some way. We are seeking to 
 use information to develop wholesome attitudes and re- 
 spect for life. 
 
 If the child lives in the country, and knows something 
 of chickens and birds and the eggs that they produce, and 
 perhaps also, something of young mammals, such as pigs 
 and calves and colts, it is quite possible to lead him to 
 understand the steps in reproduction by showing him first 
 the eggs in the body of a hen dressed for table, and then 
 eggs after they are laid such as he has been in the habit 
 of seeing and from which, as he knows, yoimg chickens are 
 hatched. He may be told that all animals come from 
 such eggs; and all eggs are formed in the body of the 
 mother. From this he may be led to understand that, 
 in the case of hogs and cows and dogs, the eggs remain 
 in the body of the mother and grow and "hatch'* there, 
 instead of hatching in a nest outside, as in birds. It can 
 
APPENDIX 93 
 
 be shown that the little mammal is much safer within the 
 body of its mother, and that it finally comes to the outside 
 world in somewhat the same way as the large eggs of the 
 birds, — but through a separate opening, — the vagina. 
 The position of this organ can be shown the child in these 
 animals without any occasion for embarrassment whatever, 
 at this early stage. See Figs. 9 and 10. It can then be ex- 
 plained that the human mother produces just such eggs 
 and carries the little child in her body in just the same 
 way until it is strong enough to live outside and breathe 
 and take its nourishment as the other mammals do. The 
 very fact that this is true of so many other animals will 
 help to make the knowledge seem less personal. 
 
 After this information is given to the child by the mother, 
 the father should refer to the difficult and dangerous task 
 which the mother performs in carrying and supporting 
 the baby; should indicate how much discomfort and weari- 
 ness and even sickness it often involves; should refer to the 
 terrible pains and danger to the mother's life that accom- 
 pany birth; and should show how all this prepares her to 
 love and care for her baby. The father and child, whether 
 boy or girl, can on the strength of this private understand- 
 ing enter upon a conspiracy of thoughtfulness for the 
 mother which may mean the most beautiful things in the 
 character of the child and with no trace of morbidness or 
 grossness. 
 
 Problem j. The Father^s Part in Reproduction. — A 
 third question, the dread of which often makes parents 
 hesitate to answer the earlier ones, relates to the part the 
 father plays in the reproductive process. Ordinarily, this 
 question will occur to the child some years later than the 
 first two mentioned. There is danger, however, that older 
 
94 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 children in advance may seek to impart the information, 
 and if this is done, the knowledge often comes with an 
 exaggerated emphasis, and in such a way as to stimulate 
 a morbid interest and to encourage secrecy rather than 
 the frankness we are seeking. By withholding instruction 
 on this point, parents thus lose the opportunity to keep pure 
 the idea of the f ather^s part by connecting it with the finer 
 facts of family structure and life, and lose, also, the chance 
 to bind the child to them in the bonds of this common 
 family knowledge. We have here again a much bigger task 
 than the giving of information. It is, indeed, that of using 
 a delicate piece of information to cement the family bonds, 
 and of making the facts of sex contribute to the child's 
 admiration and respect for human life and its relations 
 and thus spiritualizing them, rather than allowing the 
 whole phenomenon to become a mere by-word and subject 
 for suggestive and vulgar reference. 
 
 In practice it is again much easier to give this infor- 
 mation to the country child, in an incidental way, than to 
 the child unacquainted with animal life. It is quite 
 possible however, anywhere, to show the child, by a series 
 of gradual steps, the parts played by the male and female 
 in reproduction, and to do this in such a way that the 
 mind will come to the main facts in human life without 
 shock. *For example, any flower of which the child is fond 
 may be taken. The lily is a good illustration, because it 
 is a large flower and its parts are conspicuous. While 
 what we see in the lily is not, in a strict scientific sense, 
 exactly parallel to fertilization in animals, it is sufficiently 
 so for our present purpose. Deep within the tissues of 
 
 • There are now available to parents numerous booklets dealing with this phase of the 
 subject and couched in simple termsi One such is " Plant and Animal Children " by Ellen 
 Torelle, published by D. C. Heath & Co. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 95 
 
 the flower occurs a process exactly similar to that which 
 we seek to explain. 
 
 The accompanying diagrams (Figs, ii and 12) will help the 
 reader to follow the process. The pistil {p) in which the 
 seeds, or young 
 plants, develop 
 contains the 
 mother organs. 
 The pollen, or 
 powdery material 
 produced by the 
 stamens {s), sup- 
 plies the father- 
 elements. It can 
 be shown that the 
 seeds will not be 
 developed if the 
 male, or father- 
 element is not 
 added. This is 
 known 2i?> fertiliza- 
 tion. This process 
 of fertilization is 
 necessary also in 
 all the animals the 
 child knows. The 
 
 character of the process may be followed in Fig. 12 
 also Fig. 7. 
 
 The mother-fish swims along and lays numerous small 
 eggs in little hollows in the sand, or in similar places. 
 The father-fish then swims over the eggs, and pours out 
 from his body other bodies much smaller than the eggs, 
 
 Fig. II. The flower of the lily. 
 i\o\ 
 
 E is the egg, which is 
 developed in a cavity inside the pistil (P); S is the stamen 
 which produces the powdery pollen. This falls on the 
 pistil (P) and produces a male cell that fertilizes E. (See 
 next figure.) 
 
 See 
 
96 
 
 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 and similar to those produced by the pollen in the lily. 
 
 These must unite with the eggs in order to make them 
 
 develop into little 
 fish. 
 
 In chickens, these 
 cells of the father 
 must be placed in 
 the body of the 
 mother because 
 they must unite 
 with the young egg 
 before the hard shell 
 is formed about it. 
 Because of this shell, 
 chickens cannot be- 
 have like fish in 
 fertilizing the egg. 
 
 For still another 
 reason, the same is 
 true of mammals, — 
 as horses and cats 
 and hogs and "hu- 
 mans." The young 
 in these animals, as 
 we have seen, are 
 kept in the mother's 
 body, and therefore 
 the eggs must be 
 
 fertilized within just as in the birds, although they have 
 
 not a shell. 
 In the country the child is quite sure at an early age to 
 
 see copulation among animals. This is the act whereby 
 
 Fig. 12. Fertilization in the lily (much enlarged). E, 
 the egg cell, to be fertilized, lying in the embryo sac (5); 
 P, the pollen, which has fallen on the top of the pist'l, 
 sending down a tube (D. This tube penetrates the tissues 
 and finally grows into contact with the egg or female cell. 
 In the tube occur one or more mdle (sperm) nuclei {N) one 
 of which enters the egg and fertilizes it. In this way a 
 new embiyo starts, made up of a male and a female 
 reproductive body (gamete). This is essentially what takes 
 place in all the lugher animals and plants, including man. 
 
APPENDIX 97 
 
 the sperm or male cells are brought into the region of the 
 egg-cells so that fertilization may take place. It is in 
 connection with this act that all the wonderful and power- 
 ful instincts and impulses of sex are developed. This act 
 of copulating is sure to interest and excite the curiosity of 
 the child whenever he sees it. It should not make the 
 act any more objectionable or dangerous to the mind of 
 the child if he is made to understand that this is the 
 process whereby all new lives are begun. Indeed it is 
 much more wholesome so than that he should come to see 
 in it a vulgar incident to be thought of as a secret, sugges- 
 tive, and indelicate jest. Possibly it is well to emphasize 
 three things in connection with all this: (i) The scientific 
 and not the vulgar names should be given to all these 
 -processes and the organs involved; (2) The family and 
 private nature of the information should be stressed in 
 such a way as to make the child feel that these matters 
 are just as pure and open as any other, within the family, 
 but are not any more suitable for public discussion than 
 are other family affairs; (3) The wrongness of fatherhood 
 or motherhood among humans without marriage may very 
 properly crown this teaching. 
 
 n. special Problems of Adolescent Boys. 
 
 Problem i. Masturbation Among Boys. — As boys 
 begin to feel the promptings of sex and to experience its 
 desires and the erections of the organs of copulation, the 
 parent is confronted by a somewhat critical problem. 
 How can we bring proper cautions to the boys about 
 masturbation, before they have begun to indulge in it, 
 in such a way as to do them more help than harm? Are 
 we not in danger of introducing them to the act of self- 
 
98 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 abuse rather than of helping them avoid it? Doubtless, 
 with some boys, there is a real danger here; but the warn- 
 ing may be given by the right man and in the right way, so 
 as to provide real and convincing reasons that will fortify 
 most boys against this vice. This, however, cannot be 
 done if we think of masturbation as the chief thing to be 
 considered, or allow the child to do so. Masturbation is 
 merely a special case, — and a small abnormal one, — under 
 a much more extensive and important head. What we 
 need to do is to show the boy that his desires, the erection 
 of his organs, and the other changes in his body and mind 
 are merely natural steps by which his developing sex- 
 functions give him the qualities of body and mind and 
 temperament that belong to normal and well-developed 
 men. It is of the greatest possible aid to us at this stage 
 that there is nothing that the pre-pubertal boy wants to 
 be so much as a vigorous manly man. 
 
 Masturbation should be treated primarily in its bearings 
 on these ambitions, and in a way quite incidental to the 
 general facts of manly development. In order to do this 
 well, we must be able to give a real, workable reason, — a 
 reason that will appeal to the boy over and above any 
 conviction that masturbation is in itself disgusting and 
 wrong. Something like the following will bring the matter 
 to his knowledge and the state of his aspirations: — It is 
 well established that the destruction of the testes, or male 
 sex-glands, in early life changes very profoundly the male 
 animal. The rooster or cat whose testes have been re- 
 moved in early life will grow fat and soft instead of strong 
 and vigorous; and will tend to be lazy and cowardly in- 
 stead of having the normal characteristics of its kind. 
 Much the same thing happens in men. Eimuchs, made 
 
APPENDIX 99 
 
 so early in life, are not strong, brave, open, virile men, 
 such as every real boy wants to be, with a man's voice 
 and appearance and powers; but are fat, sleek, soft, 
 cunning, often lazy, beardless, — effeminate beings whose 
 voices have never changed to the man's range. This is 
 not an accident. It is in aU cases because the testes have 
 not been allowed to pour into the blood their products, the 
 work of which is to bring about the development of these big 
 qualities that all men want to have. 
 
 It is possible for boys to handle and massage their 
 organs in such a way as to cause the doss of the fluids that 
 enable them to develop muscle, and other masculine 
 qualities. Thus they are in danger of preventing the full 
 development that they most want. Besides all this, 
 masturbation tends to make the organs and the nerve 
 centers that control them sensitive and irritable; and in 
 this way the bodily and mental development is liable to 
 become actually unnatural and morbid. 
 
 A boy should be made to feel that there is something 
 unnatural and abnormal about any companion who ap- 
 proaches him urging him to this act; and it is quite possible 
 so to fortify him in advance, through his conception of 
 normal manly behavior and ambitions, that he will feel 
 only disgust at any such approach. 
 
 In addition to these items of instruction there are cer- 
 tain precautions which will greatly aid parents in this task. 
 Absolute cleanliness of the parts and prompt care for the 
 calls of nature should early become habitual. Boys should 
 be constantly busy with work, with active games, and 
 with wholesome reading. They should go to bed early 
 and always physically weary, so that they will go to sleep 
 at once. If possible each boy should have a separate bed, 
 
loo BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 and should not be allowed to lie in bed after he wakes in 
 the morning. These habits are valuable in other ways 
 than in preventing sex-perversions; but they would be 
 worth while if this were their sole contribution. 
 / ' Problem 2. Seminal Emissions. — All that is necessary 
 ^ here is to show the boy that this is only nature's way of 
 getting rid of any excess, and that such occasional escape 
 of seminal fluid during sleep is normal and natural. The 
 need of reference to it lies in two facts. In the first place, 
 lack of this knowledge may bring uneasiness to the inex- 
 perienced boy, and may drive him into the hands of ad- 
 vertising quacks who first frighten, and then profit by the 
 fright of maturing boys. In the second place, mastur- 
 bation and voluptuous thought and talk tend, by making 
 the nerve centers over-sensitive, to make emissions so 
 frequent as to be a drain on the system, and to check the 
 proper manly development. When there is any ground to 
 believe that this is the case with any boy, a reliable phy- 
 sician should at once be consulted. 
 
 Problem 3. Early Love and Chivalry, — Parents, and 
 older brothers and sisters find much place for fun in the 
 early admirations of the boy for the other sex. These 
 early emotions however, — whether the fondness of a 
 mere child for some mature woman, as is often the case, 
 or the attraction of the boy to girls of his own age, — may 
 be used, and ought to be used, by the parent to stimulate 
 and develop gradually good standards of courtesy and 
 chivalrous respect for women as such. Instead of ridicule, 
 teasing and deprecatory remarks about the object of 
 enthusiasm, and the assurance that it is a short-lived 
 emotion, this is nature's opportunity to bring a very fine 
 boyish impulse to the strength that will serve good purposes 
 
APPENDIX loi 
 
 later. Something of the devotion he has come to have for 
 his mother and his sweetheart may at this time be ex- 
 tended to all women. Furthermore, there is no motive 
 which will so greatly help to keep the boy clean and loyal 
 to a single standard of sex morals as these sentiments for 
 a girl in whom he has confidence. Parents are much in 
 error in their practice at this point. 
 
 m. The Special Problems of the Adolescent Girl. 
 
 There is no reason why these problems should present 
 great difficulty to intelligent parents. The kind of con- 
 fidence which would make it easy for the mother to instruct 
 her daughter effectively certainly ought to be the normal 
 thing. It is, however, very apparent that a large percent- 
 age of mothers do not render this necessary service to 
 their daughters. The problems confronting the mothers 
 at this point are chiefly three: — matters of normal bodily 
 development at this period, and their meaning; matters of 
 health; and the mental attitude necessary for girls to 
 assume. 
 
 Problem i. Matters of Bodily Development. — Some 
 time before the coming on of the normal changes of puberty, 
 the mother ought to make clear to the daughter the nature 
 of the external changes that are to come, so as to avoid the 
 imcertainty and possible shock that may ensue if they 
 come entirely unannounced. The facts are simple enough: 
 —rapid growth and the possible awkwardness and ungain- 
 liness of the pre-pubertal and early pubertal age, the de- 
 velopment of a womanly form in the enlargement of the 
 neck, bust and hips, the appearance of hair in the arm- 
 pits and pubes, and the beginning of menstruation. There 
 is a value to the child in merely knowing these facts and 
 
102 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 in being prepared for them; but the great educational 
 value comes from appreciation of their meaning. It is 
 the privilege of the mother in giving this information to 
 make more real the meaning of motherhood, and to show 
 that all these developments are in preparation for this 
 possibility. Menstruation and all the other changes are 
 symptoms that eggs are ripening, and that the child is 
 becoming a woman. Just as in the case of the boy, the 
 ideal of sound and normal development should be kept to 
 the front and be made to seem desirable; the relation of 
 such development to personal appearance and to happiness 
 should be made dear; and the conditions under which this 
 soundness may be had should be emphasized. 
 
 Problem 2. The Problem oj Health.— k^diXt from 
 the idea of allowing the normal unfolding of the natural 
 powers and functions, there are some particular matters 
 about which a mother should inform herself in order that 
 she may make them very emphatic and clear to the daugh-, 
 ter. These items are treated at some length in the body 
 of the book (Chapter VI, Section 8), and it will be neces- 
 sary here to refer only to two or three points. The ill- 
 health and distress which may come to the young girl 
 through sex, arise chiefly in connection with two things: 
 (i) loss of blood through menstruation, and (2) the falling 
 of the uterus. In both connections, such diet, exercise and 
 promptness in obeying the calls of nature as will prevent 
 constipation are most important. 
 
 In respect to the menses the mother should of course 
 teach and insist on the formation of habits of the utmost 
 cleanliness. The proper regimen of the young girl involves 
 a knowledge of the fact that menstruation means a drain 
 on all the vital resources, and leaves the system weak, de- 
 
 % 
 
APPENDIX 103 
 
 pressed, and open to shock and disease; that the uterus and 
 other sex-organs are at this period highly congested with 
 blood; and that, in consequence, exposure to extremes of 
 any kind, and the undertaking of tasks that overtax the 
 strength are sure to bring evil results. 
 
 In treating this situation mothers are in danger of falling 
 into one of two errors: — either that of neglecting to give 
 any attention to the condition and trusting to nature to 
 care for it; or of coddhng the child and, by a program of 
 over-protection, diminishing the natural ability of the 
 system to recuperate and restore, and at the same time 
 creating an unnecessary and abnormal consciousness of the 
 condition. What should be aimed at is a thorough under- 
 standing of the dangers of exposure and over-activity, a 
 knowledge that extra care must be taken at this time and 
 immediately afterwards and a willingness to take such 
 means as will build up the strength to a maximum between 
 periods. The appHcation of plain common sense is de- 
 manded here, as elsewhere, for health. 
 
 In respect to displacement of the uterus or womb, the 
 first purpose should be to prevent it. This means that the 
 pre-pubertal girl should be encouraged to take all the 
 outdoor and indoor exercises calculated to build up the 
 general system and to strengthen the muscles of the abdo- 
 men and the back. As the age of puberty comes on, 
 special exercises for the back and abdomen should be 
 taken. Such an exercise as lying full length on the back, 
 and raising the legs first alternately, and then both together 
 to a vertical position is excellent for the purpose. At 
 least once a day the adolescent girl should take the *'knee 
 and chest" position for five minutes, simply as a g3annastic 
 exercise. This is done by kneehng on the floor, then 
 
I04 BIOLOGY OF SEX 
 
 bringing the chest and face fully to the floor, placing the 
 arms out sideways from the body. This tends to restore 
 the womb to its natural position, and is a good exercise 
 just before retiring. Whenever there is reason to believe, 
 because of painful menses or of dragging sensations in 
 the pelvic region, that the uterus is displaced, the family 
 physician should make an examination and prescribe 
 treatment. 
 
 Problem 3. The Problem of Right Mental Attitudes, — 
 This is too large a question to treat at length here; but 
 even in the earliest days of a girl's life the mother should 
 find a way so to inculcate those attitudes of self-respect 
 and regard for womanly purity, of reserve and modesty, 
 of dignity, of appreciation of the role of wife and mother, 
 that these things will consciously or unconsciously influ- 
 ence every later act. 
 
 Because of the less strenuous character of female im- 
 pulses the task of the girl is not so much one of self-re- 
 straint as in the case of the boy. Her duty is rather that 
 of conserving and guarding the interests of the race, as 
 well as her own standards and ideals. Her training will 
 be best when we as parents and teachers come to recognize 
 this as her specific function, and bring to bear every pos- 
 sible stimulus to develop her understanding of all it 
 implies. The loss of reserve on the part of girls and 
 women is always the most dangerous door to sex im- 
 morality. 
 
 In all that has been said in the preceding chapters, the 
 meaning of the writer is this: — If parents and teachers 
 can arrive at the point at which they can use sympathetic- 
 ally all the best, which they as teachers know, to cooperate 
 with nature in the upbuilding of their children, they may 
 
APPENDIX 105 
 
 greatly increase the number of those who may be regarded 
 as successful in converting sound knowledge into right 
 sex-conduct. Nature's task is the making of sound men 
 and women able to reproduce their kind. She has an 
 ordered and effective way of accomplishing this from 
 infancy to maturity. Each of her steps adds something 
 vital and worth while to the product. It is to the interest 
 of all that we should understand each of these natural 
 steps and its contribution. We need to know this, both 
 that we may allow it to make its positive contribution, and 
 at the same time not permit it to linger on in abnormal 
 strength, inhibiting the next step. The proper develop- 
 ment of the sex-function, impulses, and their corollaries is 
 the first biological necessity: to develop through them the 
 mental, social, and moral control of them is to-day one of 
 the prime human necessities. 
 
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