Controlling Factors of Sexual Instinct.
In discussing sexual abstinence and its possible injurious effect on health, some very important facts bearing on the question should be brought out.
First, the popular idea that sex is as much a physical necessity as are other instincts of self-preservation, such as hunger, thirst, or sleep, is fundamentally wrong. Hunger, thirst, etc., are imperative at all ages and under all circumstances. The lack of their satisfaction for a very few days leads to wasting, destruction of the body, and physical suffering. The sexual impulse awakens only at a certain age, lasts a certain period of time, and gradually goes down, leaving the physical welfare of the body undisturbed.
Individual Variations.—Another extremely important difference is that hunger, thirst, sleep, and other bodily instincts are implanted in every human being, and individual natural differences in regard to these instincts are so insignificant as to be negligible. (We wish to emphasize the word “natural” in its true sense, as in actual life many people develop so many different habits as to the quality and quantity of food and drink and in their ignorance call them their “nature.”) How different it is with the sex function. People are so different as to their sexual capacity and preferences, commonly called “temperament,” that no hard or fast rules can be enjoined on the average man or woman, and not even approximate limits can be given in an individual case. There are many so-called frigid natures, particularly among women, who feel not the slightest attraction for the members of the opposite sex, and are able to go for years and even thruout life without any active desire for sexual relationship. On the other hand, there are some individuals who, either thru heredity or thru personal unbridled indulgence, are so obsessed by sexual passion that their mind remains shut off to every refined and moral influence, and they turn into low, beastly slaves of their brutal passions. What is sexually exciting and attractive to one man, leaves another man perfectly indifferent, and may be disgusting and repulsive to a third. Surely an instinct that is so changeable and so widely differs with different people is not a physical necessity of our body, and can be held in abeyance for a long period of time.
Psychology of Sex.
It has been pointed out above that besides its primary and main biological function of the transmission of life, sex also has a powerful stimulating and vitalizing influence on the development of the individual, which is particularly conspicuous in time of adolescence and approaching puberty. But the influence of sex is not only limited to the physical sphere; in fact, its influence on the psychology and mentality of the individual is equally powerful, far-reaching, and lasting thru the greater part of life. Sex unquestionably is the greatest emotional power in human life, the greatest and strongest single factor controlling human feelings and emotions. From a mere physical animal instinct of procreation as it is manifested in the animal world, in the man Nature has transformed and has exalted sex into the highest all-pervading function of human life, has spiritualized and beautified this physical impulse into a most ennobling and ecstatic passion of the human soul—the passion of love.
Love between a man and woman and its consummation in marriage and formation of the unit, the family, is the highest expression and development of the primitive sex instinct; it is the only form of expression of the sexual impulse intended by Nature and sanctioned by religion and the social code of morals. Sex, in its spiritualized and purified form of love, has ever been the dominating and controlling factor in the history of the human race. Love has furnished more to the content of the emotional life of human kind than any other emotional force. Love has been at all times the source of inspiration to the greatest creative geniuses of all arts, be it music, literature, drama, pictures, etc. Nothing thrills an average man or woman as much, nothing strikes a vibrating response of a human heart as quickly as an artistically presented romance of love. The only instinct that rivals in intensity the love between man and woman is mother’s love, which is also based on the sex impulse, tho of a wider import. Mother love is, as it were, a continuation of the biological function of sex, a Nature’s provision to protect and to raise the offspring begotten in love.
The power of sex for good or evil in human life is unlimited. A spiritualized sex impulse—love—ennobles the man and renders him responsive to the best and highest sentiments, inspires him to noblest deeds of devotion and self-sacrifice. The sex impulse, not exalted by the divine touch of love, and left unbridled in its primitive form, becomes a destructive and brutalizing force, that not only inflicts the physical punishment of disease and loss of sexual power, but also destroys the best and noblest elements of manhood.
The fact that every man and boy suffering from a venereal disease or a disorder resulting from bad sexual habits feels ashamed, degraded, and deeply disgusted with himself, is due not only to the fear of public disgrace and ridicule, but it is essentially a feeling of guilt against his own physical and moral self.
Besides the emotional sphere, sex exerts an equally far-reaching influence on the sphere of mentality. The faculties of intellect and reasoning are not affected directly by the sexual impulse, but indirectly the intellectual capacity is greatly dependent upon sexual characteristics of the man. A man leading a normal sexual life, that is, being continent if he is below the age of full sexual maturity, and, being married, if he is above the age, commands the best conditions of intellectual efficiency. His mind being undisturbed and unshaken by periodical waves of sexual excitement, of casual indulgences and nervous exhaustions following sexual excesses or abuses, remains steadily in a state of perfect repose and continual freshness, which renders him capable of the greatest mental concentration and vigorous sustained mental effort.