in the urine, and one so far juggles with anatomy as to say the vital fluid can be lost through the bowels. Every detail of form of each organ is described as abnormal, and every flush, twinge, pain, palpitation, freak of appetite, becomes a symp- SEXUAL DEVELOPMENT 4^1 torn of debility. No healthy man can reid this " scare " liter- ature without finding in himself a dozen ominous symptoms. The victims thus enmeshed are sometimes sold placebos or harmless drugs, and if made well are really healed by faith or by alleviation of worry. Perhaps suggestion is never so po~ tent as for those in this case. For many it may be true that as they believe so they are, and this leads me to think that the bread-pill theory and practise would often be benign here with the added psychic treatment suggested below. Bromides are sometimes given or general tonics sanctioned by the regular practise. Quacks well know the power of a name, and so call their nostrums by such suggestive names as sexine tablets, nerve seeds, Paris vital sparks, etc. Sometimes the drugs used are powerful erotics that aggravate and bring the hapless youth still more under the power of his blind and greedy guide. Most of the apparatus also is sold at exorbitant prices, that consume the savings of years and sometimes prompt to theft. Some are pencils, some catheters or tubes, the use of which may in rare medical cases do good, but the stated use of which is very exciting. Others sell wire springs, rubber, etc., to be wound about and prevent erethism or make it painful, which are always dangerous and frequently harmful; others ofifer so- called electric belts or suspensive apparatus. One " company " sells a glass cone and a rubber suction bulb, the vacuum thus produced causing an excitement, called by a physiologist far greater than that possible by any other known means, normal or abnormal.^ A friend of the writer, an unusual specimen of physical purity and manhood and a physician, wrote recently in answer to an advertisement, that while he was otherwise thor- oughly well, a hard worker, never had a doctor, and had an unusually healthy family, he had a marked feeling of inertia every morning when it was time to get up, and if he lifted a great weight with his maximal effort and in a stooping posi- tion, his eyes were sometimes momentarily blurred. The let- ter in response stated that the physician had called a special council for his case, which was a striking one of crypto-sper- matorrhea, which perhaps might be not past cure if certain expensive medicines and apparatus were vigorously used within * Here again I am indebted to Dr. Seerley.
462 THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ADOLESCENCE thirty days. A visit later to this address revealed on a squalid house the name of a physician, on whose sign it was stated that his practise was by correspondence only and he could not be seen. A medical expert informs me that in some thousands of patients, not one thought they had received any benefit, but many confessed that their fear was so great that no price what- ever would have deterred them.
It is painful to dwell upon such details, which could be easily multiplied indefinitely. Like many disagreeable themes, it is very rich for science, but the sole effort and desire here must be ethical, and to this end the extent and the reality of the evil must be understood. I will only briefly indicate a few cases believed to be typical. A young convert felt that he was losing his mind from nocturnal experiences, but found a motive to ex- ceptional and incessant religious activity, so that in the short time left before he became an utter wreck he might do so much good and cling so close to God that it would be possible for him to be saved after his mind was gone. Another struggled for three years in the state above described before he could mus- ter courage to write the doctor, had abandoned his purpose of entering the ministry because he felt unfit, finally staked the question of suicide on the results of the examination and con- ference that followed, and was found perfectly normal. An- other, who had sought religion as a refuge and been converted, found that prayer and service for others could not help him, and so dropped out, gave up hope of ever having a home or family of his own, thought he had lost virility, and at last, after long brooding, visited a vile house to make the one experimen- tal test of his life; nausea and high-keyed tension combined seemed to confirm his worst fears, but he was saved by a long, frank talk, and is now the proud and happy head of a promising young family. Another, who had not realized his ambition for studying in the high school, felt his intellect enfeebled from this cause, abandoned his plan of going to college, and enlisted as a common seaman in the navy, hoping to be cured by a life of hardship. His friends thought him a youth of singular ability and promise. A freshman, balked in his aspiration for purity, threw away his hopes of a career and resolved on a short life and a merry one, and, having means, became in fact the wreck he at first only fancied himself to be. One sought cure by SEXUAL DEVELOPMENT 4^3 early marriage, faltered and fled, almost at the church door, feeling his unworthiness. The honeymoon could not over- come the distaste for normal sexuality so often developed in some of these cases. A sound and' vigorous talk by a medical sage at an opportune moment may vanquish these fixed obses- sions of impotence and all be well.
VI. Passing now to sexual pedagogy and regimen, the world presents probably no such opportunity to religion, the moralist, teacher, the wise father, the doctor who is also a philosopher. There is no such state of utter plasticity, such hunger for vital knowledge, counsel, sound advice. Young men in other respects headstrong, obstinate, self-sufficient, and independent, are here guided by a hint, a veiled allusion, a chance word of wisdom. The wisest man I know in these mat- ters and the most experienced, a physician and also a religious teacher, goes to audiences of young men at the end of the academic year, who have been unmoved by the best revivalists, who are losing power just in proportion as they neglect to know or prudishly ignore this field, and wins men by the score to both virtue and piety. I have sat at his feet and tried to learn the secret of his method. It is simple, direct, concise, and in substance this: In these overtense cases the mind must first of all be relieved of worry, and it must be explained that ex- cessive anxiety and attention is the chief provocative of noc- turnal orgasms. This is itself often a cure. Then the assur- ance that such experiences, varying greatly with different indi- viduals in frequency, are normal, and that their entire absence would be ominous for sexual health, often comes as a gospel of joy to victims of ignorance, as does the knowledge that their case is common and not unique and exceptional. Personal examination by one who has seen thousands of cases and who can speak with an authority that commands confidence in most cases, reveals none of the grave or even mild ailments that had grown to such alarming proportions in the rank soil of youthful fancy. Diversion to objective interests or tasks that are active and absorbing, confirmation of wills that are not sufficiently established against occasional lapses by showing how funda- mental sexual health and its irradiation are for domestic hap- piness, for a religious life and altruism, a few hygienic pre- 4^4 THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ADOLESCENCE cepts concerning sleep, food, pure air, bathing, exercise and regularity, and perhaps a little carefully selected biological reading, and in many, if not most cases, a wondrous change is wrought. Some describe their experience as having a great burden rolled off, a strain or chain removed, they seem to walk on air, feel themselves men again, their strength renewed, look back with self-pity upon their former folly, etc.
Ethical culture alone is very inadequate, and preaching or evangelistic work that ignores this evil is unsuccessful. Re- ligion best meets these needs because it deals, if true, with what most affects the life of the young and what is the tap-root of so much that is best in them. Youth takes to religion at this age as its natural element. True conversion is as normal as the blossoming of a flower. The superiority of Christianity is that its corner-stone is love, and that it meets the needs of this most critical period of life as nothing else does. It is a synonym of maturity in altruism, and a religion that neglects this corner- stone, that is not helpful in this crisis, that is not entered upon now inevitably, is wanting. He is a poor psychologist of religion and a worse Christian teacher who, whether from ignorance or prudery, ignores or denies all this, or leaves the young to get on as best they may. Sex is a great psychic power which should be utilized for religion, which would be an in- conceivably different thing without it, and one of the chief functions of the latter in the world is to normalize the former. Error blights the Very roots of piety in the heart, atrophies the home-making faculties, and kills enthusiasm and altruism.
Their curves of ascent and decline rise and fall together both in. age and in normality, and very many church communicants are not what they would be but for some psycho-physical handicap of this nature. But ubi virus, ibi virtus. God and nature are benign, and recuperative agencies, in these years so super- charged with vitality, in cases that seem desperate, often act cito, certe et jucunde. The very excess of the physiological fecundating power in man which caused man's fall is so abound- ing that it may work his cure. Grave psychic dyscrasias due to passional states generally seem to be completely outgrown, and even gonorrhea and its sometimes persistent sequel, gleet, can not usually long withstand nature's vis reperatrix if re- enforced by an hygienic habit of life.
SEXUAL DEVELOPMENT 4^5 That this department of sexual hygiene has been almost criminally neglected, none can doubt. Family physicians are almost never consulted by boys, and the great majority of doc- tors know almost nothing about the whole subject save the standard modes of treating a few specific diseases with overt symptoms; while clergymen, who should be spiritual and moral guides, know perhaps still less, and have often come to re- gard as superior ethical purity and refinement the sloth and cowardice that dreads to grapple with a repulsive and festering moral sore. While legislation is sadly needed for the protec- tion of youth, instruction is no less imperative if the springs of heredity are to be kept pure. The blame rests mainly with the false and, I believe, morbid modesty so common in this country in all that pertains to sex. At Williams College, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, and Clark, I have made it a duty in my de- partmental teaching to speak very briefly but plainly to young men under my instruction, personally if I deemed it wise, and often, though here only in general terms, before student bodies, and I believe I have nowhere done more good, but it is a painful duty. It requires tact and some degree of hard and strenuous common sense rather than technical knowledge.
The medical cures of masturbation that have been pre- scribed are almost without number: bromide, ergot, lupin, blistering, clitoridectomy, section of certain nerves, small mechanical appliances, of which the Patent Office at Washing- ton has quite a collection. Regimen rather than special treat- ment must, however, be chiefly relied on. Work reduces temptation and so does early rising, while excessive mental or physical effort easily fatigues before the power of resistance, caused by rapid growth, is acquired. Good music is a moral tonic. Lycurgus had the girls play before young men to stimulate them to their exercise; the Jesuits in Paraguay pro- vided music to make the daily work of the Indians more toler- able and agreeable. Among the Romans it was forbidden to speak freely of things relating to sex in the presence of young men who still wore the toga prcBtexta, and Senator Manilus was condemned for kissing his wife in the presence of his daughter. Where the attention goes, innervation is roused and plethora may result. 31 466 THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ADOLESCENCE The mystery of sex gives it a great attraction to youth. Kaan ^ thinks the study of sex organs and functions should begin in plants, and that thus the desire of learning is stimu- lated and sexual curiosity given an intellectual direction. Marro holds that young people should not be alone or build air castles, because the latter loosens the mental processes of asso- ciation, while solitude and taciturnity are noxious, and when they appear adults should study their cause, for the latter often covers the slow incubation of morbid impulses. Goudin thinks early betrothal can be relied on to check the allurements of youthful roving loves.
Sexual activity is accompanied by increased internal heat and masturbators can bear surprising exposures to cold, but heat means precocity and exhaustion. Young Orientals who exercise marital functions at thirteen are worn out at thirty, and have recourse to aphrodisiacs. Yet cold is one of the best of all checks upon sexual excess, and in high latitudes venery is both later and less intense. The Spartan boys, when at twelve they exchanged the toga for the man's pallium, slept on straw or hay with no cover, and when fifteen slept on reeds. Marro has accomplished remarkable cures by cold hip baths applied many times a day, serving perhaps the purpose of Galen's lead plates. The strain is greatest upon youth vowed to monas- tic life, in whom sedentary habits and asceticism with insuffi- cient exercise provoke error. Cold washing without wiping has special advantages.
Raciborski well calls this period a court of appeal or a day of judgment. Marro ^ advocates that the proper alimentation for this age is milk, bread, cereals, and vegetables rich in pro- teins and phosphorus, and little meat. Food must provide for the great consumption of hydrocarbonates, must give salt for the skeleton, albumin for the muscles, and fat for respiration; bread, milk, a little meat and fruits are good, while a diet of eggs, venison, aromas, coffee, and alcohol exaggerate disposi- tions now dangerous. He recommends a great deal of bathing and swimming, and even the vulgarized treatment of Kneipp, much of exercise, plenty of society, emulation, and rivalry. Marro also has a very strong belief in song to correct nervous * Psychopathia Sexualis. • Med. Rev., July 22, 1894.
SEXUAL DEVELOPMENT 4^7 tensions and as a great autosuggestive power, and has striven to introduce it into reformatories for the young in Italy. He deems the acquisition of habits of work and the use of muscles, senses, and discipline, helpful; and would correct excessive presumption by due apprenticeship that brings a skill which develops self-confidence and satisfaction, but there must be struggle, effort, and perhaps conflict. Fear for girls at this stage is especially noxious, and, as Mosso has shown, dimin- ishes sensibly the temperature.
There is also much to be said in favor of circumcision, at least for some. Since man assumed the upright position, and especially since he began to wear clothing, the part re- moved by this operation is less needed for protection, and has become a rudimentary organ with all the morbid tendencies these often exhibit. Arnold, an exceptionally experienced " Mohel," urges that the foreskin is a protection from fric- tional stimulation of the clothing, which may become a dan- gerous temptation if this natural covering be removed. The weight of opinion, however, is conversely that removal in- durates the exposed surface, so that excitability is distinctly lessened. While uncleanliness is less common as intelli- gence and civilization increase, while the best medical thought now inclines to the view that its dangers have been much over-rated, and while the percentages of phimosis are less than have been assumed, what may perhaps be called, on the other hand, the psycho-neural arguments for circum- cision, appear to the writer to have great force. The anal, urinal and general reflex disturbances relieved by the opera- tion reduce liability to certain local diseases, while its un- doubted restraining influence on self-abuse, its tendency to withhold from sexual excess, and generally to stabilize and give poise to and probably to prolong the vita sexualis, should still preserve for this rite a unique place among mutilations, unprejudiced by its possibly phallic origin or its historic asso- ciation with barbarism. Moreover, other and more specific reasons in the physiological psychology of the topic, which can not be entered upon in a volume intended for general read- ing, incline me, although a Gentile of Gentiles, to favor circum- cision, if individually prescribed and if safe-guarded by the anesthetics, antiseptics, and other resources of modern surgery.
468 THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ADOLESCENCE Trousers should not be too highly drawn up Dy suspenders, as boys are so prone to do, but should be left loose and lax. They should be made ample, despite fashions often unhygienic. The irritation otherwise caused may be an almost constant stimulus. Undergarments for both sexes should be loose and well cut away, and posture, automatisms and acts that cause friction should be discouraged. Too great thickness of gar- ments here is harmful in another way, for coolness is no less essential. Pockets should be placed well to the side and not too deep, and should not be kept too full, while habitually keeping the hands in the pockets should be discouraged. Modern garments are less favorable to health in this respect than those of classical antiquity, the Orient, or even to a great extent those of savage races. In some institutions certain, and in others all, boys must wear pants open only at the sides. The body in general, and especially the head, hands, and neck, should not be too warmly dressed in cold weather. Of course, the ungrown body has more surface in proportion to its bulk than that of a larger adult, but sufficient cold sends the blood inward to nourish the internal organs, stimulates greater activity and generates warmth. Rooms, too, should not be kept too warm. With plenty of good out-of-door air, high temperature is far less deleterious than in close rooms, where the atmosphere is not in motion and is loaded with carbon dioxide.
Beds should be rather hard and the covering should be light, because too much not only produces excessive heat, but presses upon the body and reduces the effectiveness of circula- tory and respiratory processes. Too soft a bed develops a di- athesis of sensuous luxury and tempts to remain too long after awakening, and just this hour is probably the most dangerous time of all. We may not agree with a recent Italian writer who says, boys that lie abed late are almost sure to be mas- turbators, but the habit of retiring and rising early is by far the best for eyes and nerves as well as for morals. One or more windows should always be open at night in the sleeping- rooms of adolescents, and the temperature kept as low as is compatible with health. Each should have at least a bed, if not a room to himself, but it should not be too remote and not too secluded from adult observation. Everything possible SEXUAL DEVELOPMENT 4^9 should be done to favor sleep as deep and sound in quality and usually as long in quantity as possible, and everything that seriously interferes v^ith this end should be sedulously avoided, for in normal natures this conditions and is in direct proportion to the vigor of waking activities.
Some think, at least for girls, all that is needed can be taught by means of flowers and their fertilization, and that mature years will bring insight enough to apply it all to human life. Others would demonstrate on the cadaver so that in the presence of death knowledge may be given without passion. This I once saw in Paris, but can not commend for general use. An evil of such dimensions will be cured by no newly discovered method or specific, but only by courageous application for generations of the many means already known for strengthening the physical and moral nature. Some would merely give simple, direct, and honest answers to honest ques- tions, being careful to go no further than to satisfy so much curiosity as had been aroused. Others would begin at eight or ten, before passion had awakened, and with no reserve tell everything by charts about the origin of life. Others would make it all mystic and symbolic, and some would leave all to nature or accidental sources of information. It seems clear and certain that in our modern life something should be taught, and that betimes. This should, I believe, be chiefly personal, and by fathers to sons and by mothers to daughters. It should be concise and plain, yet with all needed tact and delicacy in well-chosen words. It should be very brief, and not spun out like the well-meant and goody books on the subject that should be boiled down to about one-fiftieth their size and cost. This probably ought to be the most inspiring of all topics to teach, as to the truly pure in heart it is the most beautiful of all. In twilight, before the open fire, in the morning, in some hour of farewell, on a birthday, or any opportune confidential time, this most sacred topic could be rescued from evil or be given abiding good associations. The self-knowledge imparted that makes for health is perhaps almost the culminating function and duty of parenthood. It may be that in the future this kind of initiation will again become an art, and experts will tell us with more confidence how to do our duty to the manifold exigencies, types and stages of youth, and instead of feeling baffled and 47° THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ADOLESCENCE defeated, we shall see that this age and theme is the supreme opening for the highest pedagogy to do its best and most trans- forming work, as well as being the greatest of all opportunities for the teacher of religion.
A physician, who does not betray his identity, elaborates in a pamphlet an address he gave at the fifty-ninth session of the American Medical Association * which was heartily approved by eight well-known practitioners who discussed it. It was in the form of an address to adolescent boys. He says, if a boy friend boasts to you of his sexual experience with girls, " drop acquaintance with that boy at once; he is trying to corrupt your mind by lying to you." If a boy in an unguarded moment tries to entice you to masturbatic experiments, he insults you. " Strike him at once and beat him as long as you can stand," etc. Forgive him in your mind, but never speak to him again. If he is the best fighter and beats you, take it as in a good cause. If a man scoundrel suggests indecent things, " slug him with a stick or a stone or anything else at hand." Give him a scar that all may see, and if you are arrested, tell the judge all and he will approve your act, even if it is not lawful. If a villain shows you a filthy book or picture, snatch it and give it to the first policeman you meet and help him to find the wretch. If a vile woman invites you, and perhaps tells a plausible story of her downfall, you can not strike her, but think of a glittering, poisonous snake. She is a degenerate and probably diseased, and even a touch may poison you and your children. He explains briefly the working of gonotoxin, when it begins and when it reaches heart, kid- neys, joints, eyes, brain, etc., describes buboes and chancre, and explains the hor- rors of the latter, warns against all doctors who advertise, and tells of their methods.