Personal and social hygiene in matters of sex are, in very important ways, dependent upon moral and religious training. On the other hand, morals and religion are in important ways dependent upon forces set free by the growth and activity of sex instincts and powers. One of the most significant facts in modern social progress is its recognition of this interdependence of mind and body. We have learned that physical health depends upon peace of mind, hopefulness, courage, and many other things that have seemed in the past to be purely mental or spiritual; and we have learned also that the character of people and the spirit in which they do their work depend upon their health, upon conditions of food and warmth and shelter, things which in the past have been regarded as affecting only the physical man. It is now somewhat out of date to set physical conditions over against moral and religious; every great human problem is more and more clearly seen in this day to involve all these conditions in its rise, and to require thoughtful consideration of them all for its solution. As we face the problems of sex, we must recognize the importance of fresh air, exercise, wholesome food, clean cups and clean towels, and we must also recognize the importance of clean thoughts and high purposes. We must know clearly the facts of biological and medical science, and with them in mind we must touch the springs of conduct in affection and imagination. Our aim must be to achieve that mastery over the forces of life finely expressed by Browning's Rabbi ben Ezra: "Nor soul helps flesh more, now, than flesh helps soul."
We may consider, first, how, in matters of sex, flesh helps soul; second, how soul helps flesh; and third, how in normal childhood and youth soul and flesh grow together in mutual help.
The first great outstanding fact is that the physical powers of sex reach maturity in the same years in which the moral and religious instincts are greatly quickened. If we recall our youth, we must realize that, in the years between twelve and twenty, our lives were greatly disturbed and perplexed, and also greatly exalted and inspired by desires and impulses partly toward the opposite sex and partly toward the service of God and our fellows. In the normal adolescent boy or girl there is a powerful expanding and enriching of sex thoughts and desires and purposes. There is also a rapid development of social sympathy and passion; the revolutionary movements of all lands are recruited from those who like Shelley have in their youth vowed,—
"I will be wise,
And just, and free, and mild, if in me lies
Such power, for I grow weary to behold
The selfish and the strong still tyrannize
Without reproach or check."
And there is a wonderful flowering of the young life in religious feeling and aspiration; a large majority of religious conversions take place in adolescence.
We can scarcely escape the conviction that these are not different awakenings, but rather different phases of the one great awakening of the young life as it prepares for the tasks and responsibilities of manhood and womanhood. The part that sex development plays in this awakening has been variously stressed by different special students of the physiology and psychology of adolescence. Some scientists have not hesitated to give it first place and to treat social passion and religious enthusiasm as secondary manifestations of sex energy.[59] However that may be, we know that each speaks naturally in terms of the other. The religious mystic of the Middle Ages was devoted to the Divine Lover or the Heavenly Lady, and the modern revolutionary is wedded to the Cause. On the other hand, the lover naturally adopts the language of religion to express his devotion to the lady of his heart. The water-tight compartment theory of life is in these days thoroughly discredited. We know that the various powers of soul and body are related and interdependent, and we feel sure that the developing powers of sex do have very vital relation to developing powers of moral purpose and religious aspiration. In support of this relation we recall the unfortunate effects upon the character of those who by chance or the barbarity of men have been desexed in childhood. We must allow for other factors at work here, yet the clearly established facts of the stunting of mental and moral growth in desexed children reinforce our own experience and observation, and indicate that the energies that are developed with sex and maturity are largely available for moral and religious growth. The youth with full sex consciousness and impulse is normally the youth of abundant energy for moral and religious activity. It seems, therefore, quite fundamental to the right understanding of sex that we consider the body, not the enemy of the soul, but its friend; not a clog upon the spiritual growth of boy and girl advancing into manhood and womanhood, but an important source of energy for the upward climb.
When we turn to the second part of our discussion and ask how in matters of sex soul helps flesh, the need and the fact are clearer and perhaps more urgent. Dante found the souls of the lustful in the second circle of hell, driven hither and thither by warring winds,—
Here we have clear recognition of the two great characters of sex impulse, its violence and its fitfulness. In the one character it needs to be subdued that it may not destroy; in the other it needs to be directed that it may build up.
As we look back through history, and as we look abroad through our land and through all civilized lands, one of the most conspicuous facts concerning the powers of sex is their frightful destructiveness. The spectacle of wasted manhood and womanhood, of depleted powers in body, mind, and soul, is in history and in present society appalling. It is so oppressive that it has driven many thoughtful men and women to despair. Men otherwise hopeful and purposeful here become gloomy and fatalistic; they have no hope that lust will ever be effectively controlled.