34 Journal of Comparative Neurology. 



soberness, duty, we shall find ourselves in the presence of a 

 new class adapted for celebacy, for study, for religion (since the 

 realization of their desires is not of this world.) Like the ideal 

 physician of Plato, the best of them will be of sufficiently weak 

 character to understand the sins of their fellows, and of suffi- 

 cient strength of will to make themselves useful. 



Meanwhile (and this is meant for those who think that 

 every Utopian scheme is vain, and they would not be wrong if 

 such uranists had not always existed) the chastity of certain great 

 men (whatever be the cause of it) has contributed greatly to 

 civilization. The study and the furtherance of the education of 

 uranists would have immediate results. Not only could many 

 little beings now already begotten or wailing in their cradles be 

 benefitted, but many new facts would be learned. 



The causes of uranism (I speak of first causes) are prob- 

 ably as mysterious as those of the difference of sex ; they prob- 

 ably do not lie within the province of our science, but we may 

 be able to attain a knowledge of their mechanism, their ascen- 

 dency, their heredity. 



In the following pages I shall not attempt to study the 

 prenatal causes of uranism, that I may not be embarrassed by 

 hypotheses. After some observations which have appeared in 

 the Archives d'anthropologie criminelle and which have been 

 received with an interest very gratifying to me, I shall trace 

 to the best of my ability (with some necessary digressions) the 

 psychological history of a superior uranist under certain condi- 

 tions, one who, however, begins his life enslaved by his vice ; 

 then I shall indicate my theory of sexuality ; and I shall con- 

 clude by urging scholars, teachers and parents to attend to the 

 moral education of uranistic children. 



PREFACE. 



Some Observations upon Inversion: 



In my capacity as an observer and living much in the 

 world, I have known many inverts and noted others. Their 

 confessions, serious, sad, trifling, shameless — their lies and their 



