The present subject may be summed up in two great questions—viz., First, is Virtue desirable? Secondly, is Virtue practicable?

We have shown in the preceding investigation that the control of the sexual passion and its guidance by Reason—which we name Virtue—is of fundamental importance; that it is essential to individual health, to the happiness of the family, to the purity of Society, and the growth of a strong nation. Virtue, therefore, is desirable. It remains to consider whether it be practicable. No vagueness or doubt should exist in relation to fundamental principles of education. Methods may change; no inflexible rule can be laid down. Enlarging experience, enlightened by love, will vary infinitely the adaptations needed in the education of infinitely varied children, but the aim of education should not vary. Sound knowledge, as well as a steadfast faith and hope, must guide every intelligent parent from the beginning of family life, or confusion, perplexity, and endless difficulties will be added to the inevitable difficulties of education.

One of the most serious questions to be understood and practically answered by parents in the education of their sons is this: If in relation to sex Chastity be the true moral aim of a young man’s education, can it be secured without injury to his health? Is morality an advantage to the health of young men?[32] It is impossible to over-estimate the importance of this question, both to men and women. It touches the most vital interests of both. The family, the relations of husband and wife, the education of children, the rules and customs of society, and the arrangements of practical life will directly depend upon, or be affected by, the answer which we give to the question, Is virtue an advantage to all human beings? Can one moral law exist for all?

Truth must always be accepted. No personal prejudice, no habit of education, must stand in the way of clearly established truth. It is the greatest sin we can commit to try to believe a lie because the truth seems unpleasant, difficult, or contrary to prejudices. If it be true that chastity is a right thing for women, but a wrong thing for men, then the truth, with all its consequences, must be accepted. If, however, this statement be false—if it be a prejudice of education, a result of evil customs, the most fruitful source of misery to the human race—then the truth, with all its consequences, must equally be accepted. In seeking truth on this subject it is indispensable to examine its practical aspect closely, to study the facts on which existing customs are based, and disentangle the confused web of truth and falsehood, out of which has grown the present widespread belief that a young man cannot lead a chaste life to the age of twenty-five without injury to his health.

That some limit to the indulgence of natural instinct is necessary in both sexes will be evident from the early age at which the sexual movement commences, as well as from the length of time required for its completion. It is not only in children of twelve and fourteen that this instinct is already strongly marked, it may be observed at a much earlier age. Numberless instances of juvenile depravity come under the observation of the physician, and such gross cases are only exaggerations of the refined instincts veiled by modesty and self-respect, which are gradually growing in all healthy children. That this mental instinct tends to express itself in the unformed bodies of children corrupted by evil example, we have only too abundant proof. A chronic evil of boarding-schools, of asylums, and of all places where masses of children are thrown together without wise moral supervision, is the early habit of self-abuse. Long before the boy or girl is capable of becoming a parent, this dangerous habit may be formed. It is not necessarily the indication of a coarse nature. It is observable in refined, intellectual, and even pious persons, as a habit carried on from childhood, when it was begun in ignorance, or taught, perhaps, by servants, or caught from companions. Many a fine nature in both man and woman has been wrecked, by the insidious growth of this natural temptation, into an inveterate habit. The more common result, however, of this vicious practice is a premature stimulation of the sexual nature, which throws youth of both sexes either into habits of early licentiousness or into a morbid condition of mental impurity. An experienced physician[33] writes: ‘The earliest and most frequent cause of disorder of the generative apparatus is the practice of self-abuse, the tendency to which is strongest about the age of puberty.... Excitement is increased by the conversation and thoughts which are indulged in, and it is apt to be unchecked by the moral control which has not yet acquired its proper influence. Moreover, lads are often induced to the pernicious practice by their companions, who may be as ignorant as themselves of the wrong and mischief they are doing. It would be a very good thing if those who have the charge of boys were less scrupulous in giving warning upon this matter. Much trouble and anxiety might be spared by timely advice seriously and kindly given.... An extensive acquaintance, through years with those who have just come from our schools, has impressed the importance of this matter upon me.’

Dangers thus existing which may threaten the youngest child, the necessity of guidance, the formation of good habits, and the inculcation of self-respect even in childhood is evident. At an early age self-control can be taught. It is a principle which grows by exercise. The more the brain asserts its power of Will over the automatic actions of the body, the stronger may become the control of reason over sensations and instincts.

The neglect of children at this early age is a direct cause of the corruption of the next stage of life. The lad of sixteen or seventeen is in the first flush of early manhood. He is physically capable of becoming a father, although entirely unfit to be so. Some years are required to strengthen his physical powers. The advantage of the self-control of absolute chastity at this period of life is unquestionable; every physiologist will confirm this statement. But chastity is of the mind as well as of the body. The corruption of the mind at this early age is the most fruitful source of social evil in later life. The years from sixteen to twenty-one are critical years for youth. If purity of life and the strength of complete self-control can then be secured, there is every hope for the future. Every additional year will enlarge the mental capacity, and may confirm the power of Will. The strong man is able to take the large views of sex, its uses, aims, and duties, which are considerations too abstract for the child-man, impelled by bewildering sensations. If at this early age he falls, he is too often lost. Physical passion, which reaches its maximum (roughly speaking) at twenty-seven, can only be controlled and exalted if, at the age when chastity is a positive physical benefit, the great mental principle of self-control has gained mastery over the nature. If at this period the power of Will has been gained to retain self-respect and resist temptation, such habit of self-government is the safeguard of youth. It is the only foundation on which the early years of life can be safely based, the only way by which those habits of virtue can be established which strengthen the constitution and enable it to grow into the fullest vigour of manhood. If, however, the child has been injured by habits or associations which produce precocity and irritability of function, he will inevitably fall into vice in the earliest years of manhood; his power of resistance is gone, and every temptation drags him down.

One of our ablest surgeons has left on record the following weighty advice:[34] ‘The boy has to learn that to his immature frame every sexual indulgence is unmitigated evil. Every illicit pleasure is a degradation to be bitterly regretted hereafter.... If a boy is once fully impressed that all such indulgences are dirty and mean, and, with the whole force of his unimpaired energy, determines he will not disgrace himself by yielding, a very bright and happy future is before him.... Where, as is the case with a very large number, a young man’s education has been properly watched, and his mind has not been debased by vile practices, it is usually a comparatively easy task to be continent, and requires no great or extraordinary effort, and every year of voluntary chastity renders the task easier by the mere force of habit.... It is of vital importance that boys and young men should know, not only the guilt of an illicit indulgence of their dawning passions, but also the danger of straining an immature power, and the solemn truth that the want will be an irresistible tyrant only to those who have lent it strength by yielding; that the only true safety lies in keeping even the thoughts pure.... It is easier to abstain altogether than to be occasionally incontinent, and then continent for a period.... If a young man wished to undergo the acutest sexual suffering he could adopt no more certain method than to propose to be incontinent, with the avowed intention of becoming continent again when he had “sown his wild oats.” The agony of breaking off a habit which so rapidly entwines itself with every fibre of the human frame is such that it would not be too much to say to any youth commencing a career of vice: “You are going a road on which you will never turn back. However much you may wish it the struggle will be too much for you. You had better stop now. It is your last chance.”’

Our early neglect of youth is, then, one of the great causes of social immorality. The most earnest thought of parents should be given to the means of securing influences which will strengthen and purify their children in the early years of life. Evil outward temptations abound, but they must not be allowed to exercise their effects unchecked; they must be counteracted by more powerful influences for good.

The physical growth of youth, the new powers, the various symptoms which mark the transition from childhood into young manhood and womanhood, are often alarming to the individual. Yet this important period of life is entered upon, strange to say, as a general rule, without parental guidance. Parents shrink from their duty. They have failed to become their children’s confidential friends. In every other respect the physical and mental wants of their children are attended to. Suitable food is provided, and the various functions of digestion and assimilation carefully watched; the healthy condition of the skin, of the muscles, of all the various functions of the body provided for, and intellectual education carried on, but the highest physical and mental function committed to the human being, whose guidance requires the wisest foresight, the most delicate supervision, is left to the chances of accident or the counsels of a stranger. Measureless evil results from the neglect of parents to fortify their children at this age.

Although direct and impressive instruction and guidance in relation to sex is not only required by the young, but is indispensable to their physical and moral welfare, yet the utmost caution is necessary in giving such guidance, in order that the natural susceptibilities of the nature be not wounded. It is a point on which youth of both sexes are keenly sensitive, and any want of tact in addressing the individual, or any forcible introduction of the subject where the previous relations of parent and child have not produced the trust and affectionate mutual respect which would render communication on all serious subjects of life a rational sequence in their relations, may do harm instead of good. Where the conscience of the parent has only been awakened late in life to this high duty to the child, the attempt to approach the subject with the young adult is often deeply resented by both boy and girl. In such cases the necessary counsel may be better given by a stranger—by the physician, who will speak with acknowledged authority, or by some book of impressive character, when such a one (much needed) shall have been prepared. That this is a very imperfect fulfilment of parental duty is true, but it is often all that the parent can attempt where the high and important character of sex has not been understood at the outset of family life, and thus not guided the past education of the children.

It is important to recognise the parallelism which exists throughout the physical organization of the two sexes, making them equal parts of complete human nature—a parallelism which is too often lost sight of, at this period of a young man’s life. In each of the two halves of humanity, the sexual functions are adapted to the higher nature of the human being. Provision is made in each sex for their control by reason, this provision being made with greater or lesser elaborate preparation in proportion to the relative importance of these functions in each sex. This provision secures their conversion into a human social force, instead of allowing them to remain a blind instinct, as in the lower animals; for everything in humanity is subject to the law of progress and higher growth. The generative function in both sexes must be kept in a state of readiness for use. It has, therefore, its special activity of production, maintaining its tissues in healthy vigour throughout adult life. It is also marked with a certain periodicity, which is stamped on all the more important vital functions. It must, however, at the same time be subjected to reason and converted into a human faculty. To secure this end, it contains within itself natural provisions for its own independent well-being, Nature having established the power of physical self-balance in this important function by the natural, gradual, and healthy removal of unemployed secretions in each individual. It thus becomes the subject of reason, adapted to the higher aims of life, instead of a blind force enslaving the human being.

An important illustration of this subjection of these functions to reason, is referred to by the experienced surgeon, Mr. Acton, who writes: ‘There exists no greater error, or one more opposed to physiological truth, than the fear that atrophy or impotence might be the result of chastity. I have never, after many years’ experience, seen a single instance of atrophy from this cause. It is not a fact that power is annihilated in well-formed adults leading a healthy life and yet remaining continent. The function goes on to old age, sometimes slowly, sometimes quickly, but very frequently only under the influence of the will. No person need be deterred by this apocryphal fear from living a chaste life. It is a device of the unchaste—a lame excuse for their own incontinence, not founded on any physiological law. The organs will take care that their action is not interfered with.’[35]

The very signs, however, of Nature’s provision for raising the lower instinct into a human faculty, often create great uneasiness in the young mind. It is at this important crisis that the delicate and respectful counsel of the wise parent or physician is indispensable to both boys and girls. The youth should be told that Nature will help, not injure him at this important crisis of life, if he will be true to his own higher nature. The young of both sexes should realize that self-control of thought and action is essential. Every means of hygienic, intellectual, and religious influence should be used to direct and strengthen both mind and body. For both young men and young women it is hygiene in its largest sense that should be prescribed and enforced—viz., the guidance of the early vital forces, both physical and mental, into natural beneficial directions. The youth who has been saved from habits of self-abuse in childhood can now be saved from habits of vice in manhood, and helped forward in that life of virtue which alone will strengthen all his powers and make him worthy of marriage.

That this view of the sexual function as a human force, to be governed by reason, is the truth, and the modern theory of its being a blind instinct enslaving the individual a falsehood, is proved in many ways. We have the medical opinion of physicians in large practice, the private and public testimony of individuals, the observation of well-managed schools and colleges, of prisons, of communities, and the social customs of various classes and different races. Let us glance at some of these facts.

In rigid training for athletic sports, for boat-racing, prize-fighting, etc., chastity is enforced as one of the means for attaining the greatest possible amount of physical vigour and endurance. This fact, observed in ancient times, is confirmed by modern experience.

When the health is seriously impaired, the same rule of sexual abstinence is laid down. In a large proportion of these cases the power of sex is not lost; the physical craving may even be increased, from the irritability which often accompanies disturbed health. But the fear of death acts as a counter force on the young mind, and rouses it to unwonted efforts at self-command. No sacrifice is too great to escape death, to regain health, and take part once more in ordinary life. Temptations are avoided, healthy regime adopted, and the young man, taking a great deal of outdoor exercise, leads for months an absolutely chaste life, with the greatest possible advantage to his health. Such cases may be constantly noted in foreign health resorts, and amongst a class of cases the most difficult to reform—viz., dissipated young men who have been perverted from childhood by a state of society so universally corrupt that it cannot happily be paralleled yet, in England or America.

It is well known that the early ancestors of our vigorous German race guarded the chastity of their youth until the age of twenty-five, as the true method of increasing their strength, enlarging their stature, and enabling them to become the progenitors of a vigorous race.

The opportunity of wide observation enjoyed by the headmasters of public schools, and all engaged in education, lends great weight to their testimony. The master of over 800 boys and young men states: ‘The result of my personal observation, extending over a great many years, is, that hard exercise in the open air is, in most cases, an efficient remedy against vicious propensities. A large number of our young men thus make a law unto themselves, and pass the period of their youth in temperance and purity till they have realized a position that enables them to marry.’ Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, has given similar testimony.[36]

In primitive Christian communities, and many country and village populations uncorrupted by the stimulants of luxury, we observe the advantage of chastity to the health of youth. In these simple, healthy societies the strong public sentiment of the village, combined with outdoor life, preserves the honesty of the young men until the time of early marriage. The result is the growth of a vigorous, healthy race.

Our recognition of the possibility, as well as advantage, of chastity to the young is further strengthened by a knowledge of the healthy self-control exercised by men in the prime of life. After the age of thirty, the unnatural life of celibacy is a difficult exercise of mind and body, far more difficult than it is to uncorrupted youth. The intimate experience, however, of every observant man and woman can recall constant instances of the honourable fidelity of husbands to their marriage vow during the protracted illness of their wives; and the majority of our countrymen would consider it an insult to suppose that when a new-born child is laid in their arms, and the wife leans for support during her period of weakness upon her husband’s love, that he betrays her love and trust during those solemn epochs of family life.

To private knowledge is added the weight of solemn public testimony from men of ardent temperament who have reached the full vigour of life in the practice of entire chastity. Every one who listened to the weighty words of Père Hyacinthe, spoken in St. James’s Hall before a crowded audience a few years ago, received the proof of the co-existence of vigorous health with stainless virtue. Similar testimony, called forth by the false teaching and dangerous tendencies of the present time, has been given by many others, proving the principle that the human sexual passion when uncorrupted, does not enslave the man; that the possibility of perfect health and perfect virtue is the natural endowment of every human being.

A modern writer of unsurpassed genius, Honoré de Balzac (whose writings are injurious because they are such wonderfully vivid representations of horrible social disease) was himself a man of singularly chaste life, and attributes his power to that fact. Brought up by his father in strict self-control, his power of Will was not destroyed; he preserved his respect for women, his belief in noble love. His intimate friend thus writes of him: ‘Above all he insisted on the necessity of absolute purity of life, such as the Church prescribes for monks. “That,” said he, “develops the powers of the mind to the highest degree, and imparts to those who practise it unknown faculties. For myself, I accepted all the monastic conditions necessary for workers. One only passion carried me out of my studious habits—it was a passion for outdoor observation of the manners and morals of the faubourg where I lived.”’

Strong testimony as to the compatibility of chastity and health is furnished by the Catholic priesthood. Although it is well known that there are large numbers of men who break their vow, and men who should never have entered the priesthood, it is also well known as a positive fact that vast numbers of men are found in every age and country who honestly maintain their vow, and who, by avoidance of temptation, by direction of the mind to intellectual pursuits and devotion to great humanitarian objects, pass long lives in health and vigour. The effect on the world of enforced celibacy is, of course, disastrous; but the power that has been gained by the institution of the priesthood is indubitable, and the one object here insisted on—viz., the compatibility of physical health with the observance of chastity—is proved by it on a large scale.

The Shaker communities of New Lebanon and other settlements contain a large number of middle-aged as well as elderly men, who live an absolutely celibate life and enjoy excellent health.[37] The same is true of Moravians, etc.

The possibility of controlling this great human instinct is further shown by the experience of women. We see that under the effect of training to a moral life and the action of public opinion a great body of women in our own country constantly lead a virtuous life, frequently in spite of physical instincts as strong as those of men, and always in spite of mental instincts still more powerful. That the feeling of sex regarded as a mental passion is even stronger in women than in men must be evident to all who give to the word ‘strength’ its true signification—the signification of mental as well as physical phenomena in proportion to the powers of the individual. The demands of women are greater than those of men; they desire more and more the thought and devotion of those they love. They often display a persistent fidelity, terrible in its earnestness, when they have had the misfortune to become attached to an unworthy object. The weak virtue of the mass of women, exposed to constant temptation, indicates the insatiable craving of the woman’s heart for love. It is never at rest; it always needs its objects, and when these affections are degraded from their high purpose and defrauded of their legitimate objects, they become the greatest obstacle to human progress. No solution of the difficult problem of sexual relationships is possible, until the complete parallelism (not identity) of the sexual nature in the two sexes is recognised, and the significance of woman’s mental necessities understood. Women themselves must learn the meaning of the high nature that God has given them, and perceive how great a responsibility rests upon them in the mighty work of raising the human race out of the old thraldom of lust into the reign of love. That large numbers of women, so richly endowed with the high principle of sex, retain their health whilst leading celibate lives, is one more proof of that adaptation of this principle to the higher character of our nature, which transforms a simple brute instinct into a grand human force.

The foregoing facts distinctly prove that the exercise of the sexual powers is not indispensable to the health of human beings; that men of all ages can live in full vigorous health without such exercise; and that to the young it is an immense physical advantage that they should so live. This is the important principle to be first established. The subjects of temptation, of customs, of artificial wants, etc., are other questions, to be considered by themselves. Thought will be inevitably confused, and the important practical arrangements of the future hopelessly perplexed, if all sorts of questions are jumbled together; if practical difficulties, social phases, temporary phenomena, are allowed to obscure or completely hide the great guide of humanity—Eternal Truth. A principle clearly established is that portion of truth needed for present guidance. It must be thoroughly understood and resolutely held to, as the only clue which can guide us slowly through the dark labyrinth of error, vice, and misery. Such a guiding principle is found in the essential nature of the human sexual faculty—its distinctive power of self-control. The more this principle is considered, understood, and valued, the more it will be found that it contains the power of purifying society, enlightening legislation, and raising our status as a nation.

The aim, therefore, of all wise parents should be to secure those influences which will preserve the purity of their sons until the age of twenty-five, when marriage, as a rule, should be made possible and encouraged. This is the wise practice, derived from experience, applicable to all nations living in temperate climes. Earlier marriage may sometimes be wise, but it is not the broad rule. That the individual may remain in health until a later period and throughout life has been proved, but it is a national loss that the best years of vigorous manhood should not stamp themselves upon the future generation.

The unmarried life after thirty years of age is often injured in mind or body. The exceptions arising from character or occupation, from religious enthusiasm or devotion to some great work, do not refute the general statement. It must necessarily be so. As sex is a natural and most powerful human force, there is risk of injury in permanently stifling it. Marriage being its true method of expression and education, the character is injured through want of this development. It is only through honourable marriage that the beneficial growth of manly character of mind and body can be attained. The illegitimate exercise of the sexual powers is a source of direful social and national evil, and requires those strong restraints of both law and custom which help to educate a nation. No fear that some individuals, unable to marry, may suffer in their private lives, can for one moment justify the establishment of practices or the sanctioning of customs which are destructive to the general welfare. Far more evil, mental and physical, arises to the race from the effects of licentiousness than from any effects of abstinence.