Part 12 (1/2)

In such cases, tact, which cannot always be taught, and a desire for the best interests of the child, must show us the right path. It is obvious that each case will require individual consideration and treatment. An intelligent mother, who const.i.tutes half the child's world and more, can describe these matters to her child, can even describe the s.e.xual act, whose existence most persons prefer to conceal from children. It is by no means impossible to present even this act to the child's mind in a tactful way. It can be done in a poetical manner, and yet without departing from the strict truth. The same considerations apply to the act of birth. In a book dealing with this subject, a mother is asked by her child where children come from, and she answers as follows: ”You see, little one, how fruit grows upon a tree; in just the same way, little children grow within the body of the mother.” Beyond question, there is no justification for the a.s.sumption that s.e.xual enlightenment can be effected only in a repulsive manner; and this view depends merely upon the fact that through a perversion of moral ideas certain persons regard as unclean things which are essentially clean. Everything depends upon the person who effects the enlightenment, upon finding a suitable opportunity, and upon choosing words and phrases adapted to the child's intelligence. Success will often follow upon replying in an illuminating way to some chance question of the child. In other cases, there may be indications for making the enlightenment part of a festival occasion--a method described in an old book, in which the father effects the enlightenment of his children to the accompaniment of public prayers.[146] The description shows a truly religious spirit, and a genuine love for children; it shows, further, that natural processes may be described truthfully to children without wounding in any way their sense of shame. There is no ground whatever for the belief that to a fairly advanced child a serious person cannot suitably describe all the natural processes of the human body, including s.e.xual intercourse. The child to whom these things are described in a well-considered way, will receive no kind of injury to its moral sentiments; nor will such a description, once more, if it is couched in well-chosen words, provoke in the child any tendency to laughter. The secrecy with which the s.e.xual life is surrounded, confused by many with the sentiment of shame, often gives rise to the belief that the child has the same feelings about the s.e.xual life as the adult. But the unspoiled child has absolutely no feeling that the s.e.xual life is in any way unclean; and for this very reason, no great difficulty arises in the s.e.xual enlightenment of such an unspoiled child--an enlightenment which includes a description of the s.e.xual act. I have myself on several occasions been asked by parents with a proper care for the future morality and health of their children, to undertake the necessary enlightenment of these latter. I am absolutely convinced that when the child has complete trust in the person who effects the enlightenment, the explanation of _everything_ is fully possible. In this book, I have more than once proved that a description of s.e.xual intercourse, appealing as it does rather to the intellectual side of the child's mind, need have no bad influence at all upon its emotional life; and in the further course of this chapter I shall have to speak of the matter once again. I may add here that there are books written specially for the purpose of a.s.sisting parents in the instruction of their children in these matters.[147]

From what I have written it will have been obvious that I regard the s.e.xual enlightenment of the child as very desirable; but it does not follow from this that I regard it as something that _must_ be undertaken. Not everything is practicable which may seem desirable. We must not forget that there are dangers a.s.sociated with the s.e.xual enlightenment. It will not be right simply to ignore a reason often alleged against the desirability of s.e.xual enlightenment, namely, that in this way it is possible that the child's thoughts will be turned in the s.e.xual direction. This is unquestionably possible, and the danger can only be avoided by great adroitness. But when we remember that such adroitness is not found everywhere, we shall have to admit, however much we may wish that the s.e.xual enlightenment of children should invariably be effected, that it will often be necessary to dispense with it, because the person suitable to undertake the enlightenment of a particular child is not forthcoming.

If the right person is not to be found, the idea of the s.e.xual enlightenment must be abandoned. However unsympathetic and even dangerous the manner in which, as a rule, children mutually enlighten one another about s.e.xual matters, even more serious dangers may attach to the enlightenment of a child by an adult unsuited for this difficult task. Inept enlightenment may entail extremely serious consequences, and more especially it is likely to bring about the particular evil results that we are most eager to avoid, that is to say, it may direct the attention of the child to its own s.e.xual inclinations. We have also to take into account the fact that there are persons who cannot discuss s.e.xual topics without themselves becoming s.e.xually excited; and we cannot afford to ignore the danger that among those who undertake to effect the s.e.xual enlightenment of children there may be persons who will gladly seize every opportunity of speaking to the children upon s.e.xual matters, intoxicating themselves the while with their own s.e.xual imaginings. The grave danger of allowing an unsuitable person to undertake the s.e.xual enlightenment is obvious from the existence of those persons who teach that h.o.m.os.e.xual inclinations occurring in children indicate that they are permanently h.o.m.os.e.xual--a view which, as has been shown, is utterly erroneous. But let us suppose that one who holds such a doctrine is the person who has undertaken the s.e.xual enlightenment of a child, and we can hardly doubt what the result will be, namely, to foster h.o.m.os.e.xuality. The greatest possible care must therefore be exercised in the selection of the person who is to undertake the s.e.xual enlightenment.

Nor must we expect too much from the s.e.xual enlightenment. Although to adults the way in which one schoolboy instructs another about matters of s.e.x may appear to be extremely unpleasant, yet, as a matter of practical experience, this method has not had the disastrous results that some believe to attach to it. Unquestionably, the Germans and other civilised races have done much very important work, not only in the intellectual field, but also in that of ethics and in that of social life. Still we have learned that disadvantages are entailed by the rough-and-ready methods of s.e.xual enlightenment hitherto commonly practised. Will these ill-effects disappear with the realisation of the modern efforts for a purposive and deliberate s.e.xual enlightenment? Even though the modern ideas on the subject are to be preferred, it must not be supposed that their adoption will immediately result in the disappearance of all the unfavourable aspects of the s.e.xual life. We shall not thereby transform children into little angels; and I doubt very much if the new methods of enlightenment will have much effect in diminis.h.i.+ng the frequency of masturbation among children. I am led to this conviction by my experience that at the time when the process of s.e.xual ripening begins, a child does not usually possess an adequate sense of the dangers of such malpractices. I am certainly afraid that nothing we can do will greatly lessen the prevalence of masturbation among children. I would rather venture to hope for a diminution in the prevalence of venereal diseases, as a result of the newer methods of s.e.xual enlightenment; but even here there will be many cases in which pa.s.sion will gain the victory over all possible prudential considerations. The same remarks apply also to pregnancy, and to the other consequences of the s.e.xual life.

I am, moreover, sceptical _because the very persons to whom to-day we have to look to effect the s.e.xual enlightenment of children, are themselves to a great extent also in need of enlightenment_; and in respect of many of the questions about which the child has to be enlightened, no general harmony of scientific opinion can as yet be said to obtain. Take, for example, the question whether masturbation during the period of s.e.xual development is or is not a physiological act; or the question whether s.e.xual abstinence can do any harm to the health. It is true that such differences in scientific opinion are not so extensive as gravely to affect the question of the s.e.xual enlightenment of the child. In the matter of s.e.xual abstinence, for example, the majority of physicians are to-day agreed upon the view that such abstinence in general does no harm; and that those, if any, whose health may be unfavourably influenced by s.e.xual abstinence, const.i.tute at most a very small minority. In my own view, the persons who may suffer from this cause are those affected with hyperaesthesia of the s.e.xual impulse, and in whom the impulse is dominant to such a degree that it interferes with all their alternative activities. But it is certainly only an extremely small percentage of persons about whom, among medical men able to speak authoritatively, that there is any difference of opinion.

A more serious matter is the extent to which erroneous views about s.e.xual questions still prevail among the populace. A father who starts with the false a.s.sumption that his son must inevitably have intercourse with so many prost.i.tutes and must seduce so many girls--in a word, a father who regards s.e.xual abstinence as unmanly, or as necessarily dangerous to health (and fathers who hold such opinions are no rarity)--such a father must himself be s.e.xually enlightened before we give him the right to enlighten his son. Those also themselves greatly need enlightenment who, for instance, advise a young bridegroom who has always lived a chaste life to visit a prost.i.tute before marriage, in order to prove his s.e.xual potency. As if potency in intercourse with an experienced prost.i.tute, skilled in all the tricks of her trade, were a proof that the bridegroom will prove s.e.xually potent in intercourse with a chaste woman; or as if, on the other hand, the fact that a man proves impotent when he attempts intercourse with a prost.i.tute whose embraces are repulsive to him, were in any sense whatever a proof that the same man will fail to effect intercourse with the woman he loves. Thus, many full-grown men are in need of enlightenment about this matter of s.e.xual potency, and especially need information regarding the extent of the individual variations in this matter. We hear of young men who believe themselves to be ill, simply because they are not s.e.xually potent to a degree that enables them to effect complete s.e.xual intercourse several times in brief succession. Their error often depends upon the fact that they have been told by other young men that normal s.e.xual potency enables a man to have repeated intercourse at intervals of a few minutes. As regards the informants, it may be that, having had such exceptional potency on one or two occasions, they really believe it to be a normal requisite of full manhood; more often, however, the mistake originates from a young man taking at its face value the boasting of one of his comrades who has lied freely about his own ”virile potency.” I have known similar things happen in the case of women, among whom boasting about the intensity of the voluptuous sensations experienced during s.e.xual intercourse is by no means uncommon. There are a great many women in whom voluptuous sensations during intercourse are entirely lacking, and in whom even s.e.xual desire may be in abeyance. Sometimes this is a matter of no great importance. But wives whose women-friends have boasted to such an extent of the intensity of the voluptuous sensations experienced in s.e.xual intercourse, are apt to overestimate the importance of the lack of such voluptuous pleasure in their own experience of the s.e.xual act; and it is therefore desirable that women should know the true facts of the case. We have further to remember that many of the disillusionments of marriage depend upon the fact that before marriage girls have allowed their imaginations to run riot concerning the intensity of enjoyment they will experience in s.e.xual intercourse; all the greater is their disillusionment if they are among those who fail, after all, to experience s.e.xual pleasure to the full.

In conclusion, I may refer to another instance of the way in which the importance of the s.e.xual enlightenment is apt to be over-estimated, namely, as regards the effect of the enlightenment in furnis.h.i.+ng protection against the venereal diseases. It is by this very error attaching to so much of what is said about the s.e.xual enlightenment, that attention is readily diverted from a far more important field.

Namely, in moral questions, a child is far more easily influenced by good example, than by any amount of good instruction by word of mouth.

Example arouses a stimulus towards imitative action, whilst, in countless cases, the listener has no inclination whatever to do what he is merely told. This applies even to very little children, who adopt for themselves the practices they observe in their elders to a far greater extent than is commonly believed--although, as Bleuler[148] has shown, in this imitativeness the conceptual life may play a comparatively small part. If, therefore, from the first the princ.i.p.al stress is laid on giving a good example, the subsequent s.e.xual enlightenment would be rendered far easier, and its success to a large extent a.s.sured. In a pure household, it is not so necessary that a child should be fully enlightened; or rather, the child's enlightenment will be extremely easy. Conversely in the case of an impure household. Unless the greatest care is taken that children shall never be exposed to the contagion of bad example, how readily may it happen, that the child, after it has received the s.e.xual enlightenment, and has been cautioned against any kind of obscene talk, is allowed to watch all sorts of improper acts and to listen to obscenities! Such mischances may occur, not only, as self-satisfied parents are apt to imagine, through the misconduct of servants or strangers, but often the members of the child's own family may be the persons at fault. Adults believe that a child hears nothing, when in reality it is paying careful attention to that which is not intended for childish ears, and to that which gives the lie to what the child has just been told in the form of the s.e.xual enlightenment. And this may happen without the grown-up persons having made any indiscreet connected speeches in the child's presence. Various slight indications, gestures, a stolen laugh, &c., may be interpreted by the child after its own fas.h.i.+on, which is often one directly conflicting with the sense of the lesson previously given. How easily may it happen that a boy is taught that the seduction of a girl is a wicked thing, or a girl is told that she must never be so ignorant or so stupid as to become the victim of a seducer, and yet a few minutes later the child may overhear the instructor relating the heroic deeds of a cousin, who has seduced so and so many girls of the lower orders!

Thus the importance of the s.e.xual enlightenment must on no account be over-estimated. Rather should the words of the old proverb always be kept in mind: ”As the old birds sing, so will the young birds chirp.”

Those who guide their own conduct in accordance with this principle, will find the s.e.xual enlightenment of their children an easy matter; but in other houses, the theoretical enlightenment may be effected as carefully as you please, and yet it will do but little good. It is evident that the earlier movement in favour of the s.e.xual enlightenment, to which I referred on page 8, failed because the expectations of its advocates were pitched too high, and because the emotional life of the child was ignored--an error rightly pointed out by Thalhofer. I have no doubt that in a few decades the efforts of our own day on behalf of the s.e.xual enlightenment, in so far as they lay the princ.i.p.al stress upon the theoretical enlightenment, and expect its enforcement to initiate the golden age, will arouse similar feelings of amus.e.m.e.nt to those with which we ourselves now contemplate the failures of the past.

The above is all I have to say about the psychical aids to the s.e.xual enlightenment of the child, I turn now to consider the hygienic measures--those with a direct effect upon the body. Speaking generally, these are identical with those which are recommended for the treatment of masturbation.

When the child awakes in the morning, it should not be permitted to lie in bed too long, above all, not in a hot feather-bed. To send children to bed, or to keep them in bed all day, as a punishment, as a means of depriving them of liberty, is, from this point of view, a practice which must unreservedly be condemned. Very dangerous, from this outlook, is also the rule common in boarding-schools and similar places, in accordance with which the children are sent to bed at a fixed time, and are not in any circ.u.mstances allowed to leave their beds before a fixed time in the morning. Everything must be done strictly according to the rules. Now although we may admit that no such inst.i.tution can be carried on without some discipline, yet it is necessary to point out that when there is a rule in a boarding-school that no inmate shall get out of bed before seven o'clock in the morning, children that are wide awake and lively at an earlier hour are exceedingly likely to take to masturbation. The dangers attendant upon prolonged lying in bed arises from a combination of mental and physical influences. Among the physical influences, the warmth of the bed is the most important; among the mental influences, we have to consider the lack of occupation, and the ease with which the genital organs are handled.

We have further to take steps to allay as far as possible all kinds of local irritation of the genital organs. Among these may be mentioned: phimosis and skin-eruptions of the genital region, which latter may lead to scratching, and so give rise to masturbation, even apart from the fact that the itching itself may favour the occurrence of voluptuous sensations. In addition, we have to think of the clothing. I pointed out before that breeches which pressed on the perineum sometimes led to the practice of masturbation. Hence this article of dress, breeches, knickerbockers, or trousers, should be made loose and comfortable. With regard to the proposal to do away with breeches altogether in the case of children, a recommendation which, as previously explained, has been made by several authorities, I cannot think that we should gain much thereby, for, to be effective, this measure would have to be continued up to a comparatively advanced age, and would thus involve a complete remodelling of our customary dress. It may be doubted however, if attention to this point will do much to prevent premature s.e.xual stimulation; for the danger is not so great as has sometimes been suggested. Still, a careful mother will take care that the tailor does not cut her little boy's breeches so as to fit too closely: for though this may please the parental eye, it is undoubtedly dangerous to the child. I have previously referred to the dangers attendant upon climbing the pole in the gymnasium; and here will merely add that a number of teachers of gymnastics regard pole-climbing as an exercise of very great value, whilst they believe that the danger of s.e.xual stimulation in climbing results from the use of too thin a pole, and does not occur in climbing a thick pole, or in climbing a rope. It has been suggested, in this connexion, that the rocking-horse should be eliminated from the list of permissible toys. Objections have also been made, on the ground of the possibility of improper s.e.xual stimulation, against bicycling and horseback-riding; but I think these objections are largely unfounded, for, as far as bicycling is concerned, a well-shaped saddle cannot improperly stimulate the genital organs; and just as little does such stimulation occur in horseback exercise unless when the lower part of the trunk is pressed forward against the front peak of the saddle, as in halting, or in pa.s.sing from a faster to a slower pace. Of course, for horseback exercise, the breeches must be properly cut, as otherwise they may exercise injurious pressure on the genital organs when the rider is in the saddle. Intestinal stimulation may also give rise to reflex excitation of the genital organs; for example, intestinal worms may initiate such reflex disturbance. Mantegazza[149] lays especial stress upon stimulation of the r.e.c.t.u.m, being of opinion that stimulation of this region is very likely to lead to the development of paederastic inclinations. There are no grounds for such an a.s.sumption; but it is quite true that stimulation of the a.n.a.l or gluteal region will very readily irradiate to the sphere of the genitals. For all these reasons, constipation, and more especially the acc.u.mulation of large scybalous ma.s.ses in the r.e.c.t.u.m, are above all to be avoided.

In cases of obstinate inclination to m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e, all kinds of local measures have been recommended to prevent manipulation and artificial stimulation of the p.e.n.i.s or the v.u.l.v.a. But speaking generally, no great reliance can be placed in any of these local measures. Moreover, casual local stimulation, especially towards the end of the second period of childhood, has no very profound etiological significance. The chief stimuli giving rise to reflex excitement of the genital organs are of an organic nature, and are therefore but little influenced by external measures. Besides, the fact that among races who never wear breeches, the boys m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e freely, and perhaps even more freely than do boys in Europe, proves that such external stimuli as the pressure exercised by breeches on the genital organs play no decisive part in the causation of masturbation.

I purposely refrain from further reference here to such measures as a methodical ”hardening” by hydrotherapeutic procedures, and the like. In special text-books, whether upon masturbation, or upon hydrotherapeutics, ample information will be found about these matters.

The suggestion has also been made that from the s.e.xual outlook the diet of children is a matter worthy of the most earnest attention. Nothing should be given to the child which may exert a s.e.xually stimulating effect; especially we must avoid giving heavy foods late in the evening.

More detailed directions are also given as to the use of particular kinds of food, some of which may be consecrated by tradition, and yet seem to have but small reasonable foundation. To this category belong the prohibition or limitation of flesh-foods, and the prohibition of asparagus, celery, and other articles of diet. There is no proof that such things have a stimulating influence upon the s.e.xual impulse, either in children or in adults. We might more readily incline to believe that certain spices may have such an influence; but even as regards these, no great anxiety need be felt. As regards alcohol, many maintain it has an exciting influence upon the s.e.xual life, and thus gives rise to all kinds of excesses. This is true of a good many cases, but the rule is by no means so general as is commonly a.s.sumed. I recall that in my own student days we often cla.s.sified the students into two groups, the alcoholic and the s.e.xual; those of the former group spent their money upon alcohol, those of the latter group upon women. My own experience of these days certainly leads me to dispute the a.s.sertion that those addicted to alcohol are generally more inclined than others to indiscriminate s.e.xual intercourse. But this reservation is necessary, that at that time actual abstainers were almost unknown among the students, and we cla.s.sified in the alcoholic group those who consumed very large quant.i.ties of alcohol; whilst the members of the s.e.xual group certainly also consumed alcohol, though not very much. Beyond question, the common belief that there is an a.s.sociation between the free use of alcohol and s.e.xual excesses is one which lacks foundation. This view is to too great an extent based upon criminal statistics, and upon the records of the perversions to which the s.e.xual perverts among alcoholics have been inclined. But think of the countless normal persons in whom the enjoyment of alcohol induces no tendency to s.e.xual excesses; and, on the other hand, abstainers from alcohol have been personally known to me whom no one could venture to call moderate in their s.e.xual relations.

But although I make all these reservations with regard to the effects of the use of alcohol by adults, I am in full accord with the view that the use of alcohol should be prohibited to children. Alcohol cannot do any good to children, and the possibility that in individual instances it may stimulate the s.e.xual imagination, is one which cannot be denied. But this fact does not justify us in advising against the moderate use of alcohol by adults.[150]

Pa.s.sing to consider the general mode of life, we certainly agree with Hufeland, who, in his _Makrobiotik_, recommends vigorous bodily activity. He contends that children who go to bed at night healthily tired out, will not be likely to think of masturbation. In the present age of sports and games it will not be found difficult to fulfil this indication; and we see as a matter of fact that a great deal of trouble is taken to give children every opportunity of keeping in active movement. Even in our large towns, in which, owing to the lack of a sufficiency of open s.p.a.ces, great difficulties have arisen in this respect, much has of late been done to improve matters. For many years past in England special efforts have been made to provide such playgrounds for children and adults.

I take this opportunity of drawing attention to a method recommended by Fere for the cure of masturbation, which I have myself found of good use in several cases, but which appears to be almost entirely unknown. It is that the child addicted to masturbation during the night hours should be watched by a trustworthy person; every time the child puts its hand to its genital organs, or endeavours to stimulate these organs mechanically in some other way, the attendant must immediately intervene, and draw the hands from beneath the bed-clothing. This plan may be adopted whether the child m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.es while asleep or while awake. But good can be expected from the method above all in those cases in which the child m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.es during sleep, and in which it commonly wakes up directly it is interfered with. In most cases the children treated in this way soon give up the practice of masturbation, even though the evil is of long standing. But it will be advisable to continue to supervise the child for some time after a cure has apparently been effected, lest what may have become a nervous automatism should be resumed after a brief intermission. The chief difficulty in the practical application of this method lies in the choice of a trustworthy person to watch the child. As a rule, the mother will be the most suitable, but now and again we shall find a hired nurse to whom this extremely difficult task may safely be entrusted. In a number of cases with which I have had to deal, I have recommended the mother to undertake the duty herself, because she seemed to me the most trustworthy person available. But it is a very regrettable fact that many mothers are altogether unwilling to make the necessary sacrifice for their child's good; and most of them are quite ready to believe that some woman whom they can hire for a few s.h.i.+llings a night will perform the duty which they themselves as mothers have renounced. Such lack of proper feeling is especially common among those who belong to what are termed the upper cla.s.ses of society--to the aristocracy whether of birth or of wealth--whereas among the middle cla.s.ses I have found mothers far more ready to make the necessary sacrifices.

In s.e.xual education, the s.e.xual perversions must receive especial attention. I must first of all refer again to two matters, of which some account has previously been given: the influencing of congenital inborn tendencies; and the undifferentiated s.e.xual impulse. As regards the former, we have to take the following data into consideration. The fact that the indications lead us to believe that a particular s.e.xual perversion is inborn, need not induce us to think there is no hope of counteracting this perversion by well-planned educational influences. I have already written at considerable length about the undifferentiated s.e.xual impulse, and have shown that perverse manifestations during the period of the undifferentiated s.e.xual impulse do not prove that a permanent perversion has developed. But everything possible should be done to guard against the further development of any such perverse mode of s.e.xual sensibility, including s.e.xual qualities in the wider sense of the term. We know, for example, that many h.o.m.os.e.xual men have a tendency to dress in girls' clothing, and many h.o.m.os.e.xual women to go about in men's clothing, and, in both cases, to adopt the inclinations and occupations of the opposite s.e.x. During the period of the undifferentiated s.e.xual impulse, we must not attach too much importance to the appearance of inclinations of this kind; but it would be equally erroneous to ignore them altogether. Boys who adopt a girlish behaviour, should not be encouraged in doing so by treating the matter as a joke.

If a boy frequently dresses up as a girl, or a girl as a boy, and if we observe between two boys, or between two girls, an unduly intimate friends.h.i.+p at an age which corresponds to the period of the undifferentiated s.e.xual impulse, it will be as well to modify the children's education accordingly. A girl with such inclinations should, for example, be thrown as much as possible into the society of lads of an appropriate age. In the case of those who are still quite young, there is no doubt that by the proper measures we can in part check the development of perverse manifestations, and in part completely repress them; notwithstanding the fact that interested agitators, whose princ.i.p.al aim is to secure the repeal of Section 175 of the German Imperial Criminal Code, maintain the contrary, and a.s.sert that h.o.m.os.e.xual tendencies appearing in the child necessarily indicate the future development of permanent h.o.m.os.e.xuality. Parents, tutors, schoolmasters, and physicians, must not allow themselves to be led astray by these agitators, who falsify the data of science. In the interest of truth, in the interest of the children endangered by these perversions, and in the interest of civilisation, these misstatements must be contradicted.

The chief danger a.s.sociated with the appearance of s.e.xual perversions lies in the fact that the child thus affected, whether boy or girl, endeavours again and ever again to revive these pleasurably-toned sensations; and above all in the fact that as soon as the genital organs are sufficiently mature, the boy or girl obtains s.e.xual gratification by masturbating simultaneously with the imaginative contemplation of perverse ideas. Such perverse psychical onanism, accompanied or unaccompanied by physical masturbatory acts, is eminently adapted to favour the development of the perversion. Obviously, the actual performance of the corresponding perverse s.e.xual act will be just as dangerous as is perversely a.s.sociated masturbation. Thus, a boy who is h.o.m.os.e.xually inclined may m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e while allowing his imagination to run riot upon h.o.m.os.e.xual ideas; or he may take to h.o.m.os.e.xual acts with one or more other male persons. Every sort of gratification that is a.s.sociated with perverse images, is dangerous; and no less dangerous is the spontaneous cultivation of such perverse s.e.xual images.

A very real and serious danger to children is to be found in my opinion in the risk of the progressive cultivation of h.o.m.os.e.xuality, if they become victims of a paedophile. The adult h.o.m.os.e.xual will sometimes conceal a perverse inclination directed towards children under the cloak of friends.h.i.+p or of an educational interest. I have previously referred to the danger that the child, at a time of life when its own s.e.xual impulse is still undifferentiated, may sometimes reciprocate such a feeling. When I recall the light-heartedness with which h.o.m.os.e.xual males have acknowledged to me their experiences of s.e.xual intercourse with apprentice-boys, and with pupils attending the higher forms of our secondary schools, and when I think of the readiness with which h.o.m.os.e.xual women seek opportunities of s.e.xual intercourse with immature or partially mature girls, it seems to me that there are good grounds for the utterance of an urgent warning. My experiences in this department further lead me to believe that if Section 175 of the German Imperial Criminal Code is to be repealed, a further alteration in the Code will also be indispensable, namely, that the Age of Protection (_Schutzalter_--equivalent to the _Age of Consent_ in the English Criminal Law Amendment Act) should be raised to the completion of the eighteenth year, and that the protection should apply, not merely to the actions now specified in Section 175 as ”unnatural vice,” but to all acts of s.e.xual impropriety in the widest sense of the term. Recently this proposal has been approved by a resolution of the Reichstag.[151]

There are certain additional points about which it is unnecessary to write here, for the reason that these have all been considered in some appropriate connexion earlier in this book. For example, I have insisted upon the importance of anyone who possesses children's confidence taking steps for the removal of corrupted children from the environment of uncorrupted ones.

Where we have reason to believe, in the case of a particular child, that a perverse mode of s.e.xual sensibility is developing, we shall occasionally find it preferable rather to attempt to hinder the growth of the perversion, than to try to check the general manifestations of the s.e.xual impulse. Thus, in the case of a boy of fourteen, who is continually affected with h.o.m.os.e.xual imaginings, we shall find it far more difficult to repress s.e.xual manifestations altogether, than to divert the h.o.m.os.e.xual sensibility into heteros.e.xual channels. If a boy affected in this way be thrown much into the society of girls, or conversely, a girl into the society of boys (at dances, games of lawn-tennis, &c.), the subsequent effect is likely to be good, because the s.e.xual pervert, even if his perverse tendency be congenital, can nevertheless be educated out of his perversion. It should hardly be necessary to state expressly, that when I speak of finding for the h.o.m.os.e.xual a.s.sociates of the opposite s.e.x, I am not thinking of suggesting intimate s.e.xual intercourse. Apart from moral considerations, we could not, in the cases under consideration, expect any benefit to accrue on medical grounds; my reference was to a purely platonic a.s.sociation.

No one need suggest that all these recommendations are superfluous, for the reason that, according to my own previous account of the matter, the undifferentiated condition of the s.e.xual impulse is spontaneously replaced by the normal heteros.e.xual impulse. For, first of all, the signs that give rise to anxiety may not be manifestations of the undifferentiated s.e.xual impulse, but may be the first manifestations of a developing congenital perversion; and, secondly, it is by no means improbable that, even in the entire absence of any congenital tendency to s.e.xual perversion, unfavourable external conditions may lead to the further development of the perverse manifestations of the undifferentiated period. I may refer in this connexion to what was said upon p. 312 _et seq._