[186] In this connection I may quote an observation by Raffalovich:  “It is natural that the invert should very clearly recall the precocity of his inclinations.  In the existence of every invert a moment arrives when he discovers the enigma of his homosexual tastes.  He then classes all his recollections, and to justify himself in his own eyes he remembers that he has been what he is from his earliest childhood.  Homosexuality has colored all his young life; he has thought over it, dreamed over it, reflected over it—­very often in perfect innocence.  When he was quite small he imagined that he had been carried off by brigands, by savages; at 5 or 6 he dreamed of the warmth of their chests and of their naked arms.  He dreamed that he was their slave and he loved his slavery and his masters.  He has had not the least thought that is crudely sexual, but he has discovered his sentimental vocation.”

[187] Leppmann mentions a case (certainly extreme and abnormal) of a little girl of 8 who spent the night hidden on the roof, merely in order to be able to observe in the morning the sexual organs of an adult male cousin (Bulletin de l’Union Internationale de Droit Penal, 1896, p. 118).

[188] I fully admit, as all investigators must, the difficulty of tracing the influence of early suggestions, especially in dealing with persons who are unaccustomed to self-analysis.  Sometimes it happens, especially in regard to erotic fetichism, that, while direct questioning fails to reach any early formative suggestion, such influence is casually elicited on a subsequent occasion.

[189] I may add that I see no fundamental irreconcilability between the point of view here adopted and the facts brought forward (and wrongly interpreted) by Schrenck-Notzing.  In his Beitraege zur AEtiologie der Contraerer Sexualempfindung (Vienna, 1895), this writer states:  “The neuropathic disposition is congenital, as is the tendency to precocious appearance of the appetites, the lack of psychic resistance, and the tendency to imperative associations; but that heredity can extend to the object of the appetite, and influence the contents of these characters, is not shown.  Psychological experiences are against it, and the possibility, which I have shown, of changing these impulses by experiment and so removing their danger to the character of the individual.”  It need not be asserted that “heredity extends to the object of the appetite,” but simply that heredity culminates in an organism which is sexually best satisfied by that object.  It is also a mistake to suppose that congenital characters cannot be, in some cases, largely modified by such patient and laborious processes as those carried on by Schrenck-Notzing.  In the same pamphlet this writer refers to moral insanity and idiocy as supporting his point of view.  It is curious that both these congenital manifestations had independently occurred to me as arguments against his position.  The experiences of Elmira Reformatory and Bicetre—­not to mention institutions of more recent establishment—­long since showed that both the morally insane and the idiotic can be greatly improved by appropriate treatment.  Schrenck-Notzing seems to be unduly biased by his interest in hypnotism and suggestion.