delicate and difficult idea to convey, liable to be exaggerated and to
produce false attitudes, the answer is that if difficulty is to deter us
we may as well stop the whole task of sex education before we begin; and
moreover that the disasters now resulting from ignorance are ten times
worse than any probable results of instruction.

This sexual difference means not only that the girl must be intolerant of
improper advances, but also that for her own sake and that of her sister
women she must beware of conduct, attitudes, or forms of dress that tend
unduly to excite the sexual impulses in boys and men.

In view of the enormous morbidity and mortality inflicted upon innocent
women and their children by sexual disease, the girl should learn the main
facts concerning the nature, effects, and incidence of gonorrhea and
syphilis. Health certificates of prospective bridegrooms will probably be
more easily enforced if such intelligence becomes general. The time for
such instruction is difficult to state, and would vary with the social
environment; probably late adolescence would be early enough in most
cases; earlier information is indispensable for girls who by reason of
their economic or social status are peculiarly exposed to sexual
temptation and danger.

Training for motherhood, a great gap in our educational system, is a
closely related theme, of incomparable importance, but beyond the scope
of this work.

(2) Boys should learn early the rewards of continence: that the
conservation of the sexual secretions is the indispensable condition of
manly growth in stature, muscular powers, voice, heart, and brain. They
should learn the possibility and healthiness of continence--always