MAURICE A. BIGELOW

PROFESSOR OF BIOLOGY AND DIRECTOR OF THE SCHOOL OF PRACTICAL ARTS, TEACHERS COLLEGE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1916

All rights reserved

Copyright, 1916, By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.

Set up and electrotyped. Published June, 1916.

Norwood Press J.S. Cushing Co.—Berwick & Smith Co. Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

To THE MEMORY OF

DR. PRINCE A. MORROW

WHOSE GREAT FAITH IN THE ESSENTIAL GOODNESS OF HUMAN NATURE LED HIM TO BELIEVE THAT THE PROBLEMS OF SEX HAVE ARISEN FROM IGNORANCE AND THAT EDUCATION IS THE KEY TO THEIR SOLUTION

PREFATORY NOTE

Many of the lectures printed in this volume have formed the basis of a series given at Teachers College, Columbia University, during the summer sessions of 1914 and 1915, and during the academic year 1914-1915. Others were addressed to parents, to groups of men, to women's clubs, and to conferences on sex-education. In order to avoid extensive repetition, there has been some combination and rearrangement of lectures that originally were addressed to groups of people with widely different outlooks on the sexual problems.

Several years ago the late Dr. Prince A. Morrow announced that a volume dealing with many of the timely topics of sex-education was to be prepared by the undersigned with the advice and criticism of a committee of the American Federation for Sex-Hygiene; but even before Dr. Morrow's death it became evident that this plan was impracticable. Three members (Morrow, Balliet, Bigelow) of the original committee collaborated in a report presented at the XV International Congress on Hygiene and Demography. Since that time the writer, working independently, has found it desirable to reorganize completely the original outline announced by Dr. Morrow.

In accordance with a declaration made voluntarily in a conversation with Dr. Morrow, the author considers himself pledged to devote all royalties from this book to the movement for sex-education.

Among the many persons to whom is due acknowledgment of helpfulness in the preparation of this book, the author is especially indebted for suggestions to the late Dr. Prince A. Morrow, to Dr. William F. Snow, Secretary of the American Social Hygiene Association, and to Dr. Edward L. Keyes, Jr., President of the Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis; for constructive criticism, to his colleagues, Professor Jean Broadhurst and Miss Caroline E. Stackpole, of Teachers College, who have read carefully both the original lectures and the completed manuscript; and to Olive Crosby Whitin (Mrs. Frederick H. Whitin), executive secretary of the Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis, who has suggested and criticized helpfully both as a reader of the manuscript and as an auditor of many of the lectures delivered at Teachers College.

M.A.B.

Teachers College, Columbia University, December 28, 1915.

SUMMARY OF CONTENTS

PAGE

I. The Meaning, Need, and Scope of Sex-education 1

§ 1. Sex-education and its relation to sex-hygiene and social hygiene. § 2. The misunderstanding of sex. § 3. The need of sex-instruction. § 4. The scope of sex-education.

II. The Problems for Sex-education 28

§ 5. Sex problems and the need of special knowledge. § 6. First problem: Personal sex-hygiene. § 7. Second problem: Social diseases. § 8. Third problem: Social evil. § 9. Fourth problem: Illegitimacy. § 10. Fifth problem: Sexual morality. § 11. Sixth problem: Sexual vulgarity. § 12. Seventh problem: Marriage. § 13. Eighth Problem: Eugenics. § 14. Summary.

III. Organization of Educational Attack On the Sex problems 90

§ 15. The task of sex-education. § 16. The aims of sex-education. § 17. The aims as the basis of organized sex-instruction.

IV. The Teacher of Sex-knowledge 108

§ 18. Who should give sex-instruction? § 19. The child's first teachers of sex-knowledge. § 20. Selecting teachers for class instruction. § 21. Certain undesirable teachers for special hygienic and ethical instruction.

V. Books as Teachers Concerning Sex and Life 121

§ 22. Value and danger of special sex-books for young people. § 23. General literature and sex problems. § 24. Dangers in literature on sexual abnormality.

VI. Sex-instruction for Pre-adolescent Years 133

§ 25. Elementary instruction and influence. § 26. Hygienic and educational treatment of unhealthful habits.

VII. Sex-instruction for Early Adolescent Years 146

§ 27. The biological foundations. § 28. Scientific facts for boys. § 29. Scientific facts for girls.

VIII. Special Sex-instruction for Adolescent Boys and Young Men 156

§ 30. Developing attitude towards womanhood. § 31. Developing ideals of love and marriage. § 32. Reasons for pre-marital continence. § 33. Essential knowledge concerning prostitution. § 34. Need of refinement of men. § 35. Dancing as a sex problem for men. § 36. Dress of women as a sex problem for men. § 37. The problem of self-control for young men. § 38. The mental side of a young man's sexual life.

IX. Special Instruction for Maturing Young Women 184

§ 39. The young woman's attitude towards manhood. § 40. The young woman's attitude towards love and marriage. § 41. Reasons for pre-marital continence of young women. § 42. Need of optimistic and æsthetic views of sex by women. § 43. Other problems for young women.

X. Criticisms of Sex-education 203

§ 44. A plea for reticence—Agnes Repplier. § 45. A plea for religious approach—Cosmo Hamilton. § 46. The conflict between sex-hygiene and sex-ethics—Richard Cabot § 47. The arrogance of the advocates of sex-education—William H. Maxwell. § 48. Lubricity in education—W.H. Taft. § 49. Conclusions from the criticisms of sex-education.

XI. The Past and the Future of the Sex-education Movement 227

§ 50. The American movement. § 51. Important steps. § 52. The future of the larger sex-education.

XII. Some Books for Sex-education 238

Index 249