(b) Another duty of the community lies in the fight against the public sources of sensual appeal not merely the houses of prostitution and street solicitation, but the vile shows, indecent pictures and books, and other means by which the greed of money panders to the sex instinct.  The questions concerning the drama, the ballet, and the nude in art will recur when we come to discuss the general relations of art and morality.  Closely parallel are the problems concerning the costume of women; these are phases of the eternal conflict between beauty and morality.  What is pretty is tempting.  How can we have enjoyment without being wrecked by it; how can we make life rich and yet keep it pure?  Some line must be drawn; just where, we have not space to discuss.

(c) Education on matters of sex must probably be attended to in the public schools.  It were better done by parents, perhaps; but parents cannot be depended upon to do it.  The dangers that await indulgence, the cruelty and brutality of prostitution, should be universally but cautiously taught; too many boys and girls wreck their lives for l ack of such knowledge.  It is indeed a delicate task to instruct adolescents in these matters; there is, as Professor Munsterberg has well pointed out, a grave danger of stimulating, by calling attention to it, the very impulse which it is desired to curb, of dissipating the fear of the unknown which may be greater than that of clearly understood, and thereby, perhaps, avoidable dangers, and of breaking down barriers of shyness and reticence, which form one of the most effective of safeguards.  Personal attention to the individual needs of boys and girls of widely differing temperaments and mental condition is imperative.  But in general, it is to be remembered that almost every boy and girl learns, somehow, long before marriage, the main facts concerning sex-relations.  And it is far better that that knowledge should be imparted reverently, accurately, unemotionally, and with due emphasis upon perils and penalties, than that it should be gained in coarse and exciting ways, or remain half understood and with a glamour of mystery about it.

What are the factors in an ideal marriage?

Celibacy is neither natural nor desirable; a happy marriage should be the goal of every healthy man’s and woman’s thought.  The economic situation that prevents so many from marrying till nearly or quite thirty is thoroughly unwholesome and must in some way be remedied.  Marriage in the early twenties is not only an important safeguard against unchastity; it is physiologically better for the woman and her offspring.  The danger and pain in childbirth to a woman of twenty or twenty-five are less than in later life, and the children have a better chance of health.  Moreover, young people are mentally and morally more plastic; they have not yet become so “set” in their ways as they will later become, and are more likely to grow together and make easily those little compromises and adjustments which the fusing of two lives necessitates.  And it is always a pity that the two who are to be life comrades should fail to have these years, in some ways the best of their lives, together.