SEX BIOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY 157 



because they believed that to accept man's simian 

 origin was a repulsive degradation, so many of the 

 opponents of psycho-analysis oppose it because they 

 believe that to ascribe this huge role to sex in the 

 genesis of our psyche is a repulsive degradation. 



To my mind there are two very general questions 

 which the student of human sex psychology now 

 has to face, if he takes not necessarily the whole but 

 the central theses of psycho-analysis, however much 

 pruned, as proven. The first is this — granted that 

 sex does play such a large part, especially in early 

 years, in the genesis of our mental organization, 

 is it desirable that the average adult or adolescent 

 should, by analysis, be given full self-knowledge 

 on the subject ? And the second is this : granted 

 that sex does penetrate into more corners of mind 

 in man than in lower organisms, is this really a 

 regrettable thing, or can we find any grounds 

 for believing it to be desirable or biologically pro- 

 gressive ? 



To answer this we shall have to go back a little 

 to first principles, and consider, however briefly, 

 certain facts as to the march of evolution. 



Evolution is essentially progressive. It proceeds 

 on the whole in a certain direction, and that direction 

 is on the whole towards a realization of what seems 

 to us to have positive value. The direction, how- 

 ever, as a matter of fact, is most striking when we 

 consider the maximum level attained, much less so 



