In settling this point, so far as available authorities for the young people to study and consider are concerned, these are all against coitus except for begetting of off-spring.  All the “purity” writers and Purity Societies are ranged together on the negative side.  Likewise are all the books of “advice to young wives and husbands,” especially those addressed to young wives.

Now all these “authorities” base their whole argument upon the purely animal facts in the premises.  Probably a certain Dr. C. is more largely read for information on these matters than any other author, especially among young women.  He has written a large, and from the view-point he takes, a very plausible volume; and it is very extensively advertised, especially in papers which young women read.  The result is that it has come to be almost a standard authority in these affairs.

Dr. C.’s argument is, baldly, as follows:—­(a) Among animals, the universal practice is a single act of coitus for each begetting of off-spring, (b) Human beings are animals, (c) Therefore, human beings should only engage in coitus for reproductive purposes.

To this syllogism he adds a corollary, which is, that, therefore, all sexual commerce in the human family, for any other than reproductive purposes, is wrong. These are his texts, so to speak, and through several hundred pages he preaches, don’t, don’t, don’t, sermons.  The entire volume is one of denial and prohibition.  He proclaims the act, even for the one purpose he allows to be right, as low, and in itself degrading, to be engaged in only after “prayer and fasting” and “mortifying the flesh,” and even then, in the most passionless, and only done-because-it-has-to-be manner; as a mere matter of duty; to be permitted by sufferance; joyless, disgusting in itself; a something to be avoided, even in thought, other than it is a necessity for the continuance of the race.

It is from such data as this that thousands of “innocent” brides annually make up their minds as to what is right or wrong in the matter of sexual intercourse.

In doing this, most of these young women are perfectly conscientious, and want to do the right thing, and there are two items in the count that naturally lead them to accept Dr. C.’s teachings as correct.  The first is, that it coincides with all they have ever heard about such matters; the second, that the Doctor flavors all his text with a religious quality, of the alleged most sacred sort.  He instances saintly women who have lived the most ascetic lives, and whose religious status was achieved because, and by means of, their perfect chastity.  In fact, this word “chastity” (which he translates as entire renunciation of the whole sex nature) becomes the test word of his whole treatise, and its practice is upheld as the true road to all goodness and virtue.

Now, nearly all well-bred and cultivated young women are naturally religious (and not a word should be said against their being so) and they are anxious to time their lives to everything that the highest religious demands prescribe.  It is, therefore, most natural that, being thus taught by an authority for which they have the highest regard, they enter marriage with the fixed opinion in accordance with their teaching.  How could it be otherwise?