SEXUAL. HYGIENE 201 



to ruin. A moral contagion is abroad in the world. 

 The troops of boys of all ages, from five to twenty, 

 seen upon the streets of every city, sitting on the curb- 

 stones, loitering about the corners, gathering here and 

 there in little knots from which the ears of passers-by 

 may easily catch words and phrases which bring the 

 blush to virtue's cheek, are evidence that parents are 

 by no means generally awake to the danger which lies 

 in evil companionship. Many boys, especially in the 

 cities, are allowed after they reach the age of ten or 

 twelve years, to select their own associates; and it is 

 generally the case that the association most easily 

 formed is with some foul-minded youth, who is only 

 too anxious to impart to an innocent lad the evil knowl- 

 edge which he has in like manner gained from some 

 other boy-missionary of evil. 



Growing up thus, with an abnormally developed 

 sexual appetite, it is not strange that young men very 

 readily imbibe current notions respecting the hygienic 

 necessity for incontinence, and that they find in their 

 own experience an apparent evidence of the correct- 

 ness of this most pernicious doctrine. It is therefore 

 highly important that .a warning voice should be raised, 

 and with no weak or uncertain sound, against this im- 

 moral and incontinent teaching. If the young man 

 finds a continent life extraordinarily difficult or a cause 

 of suffering, he should be informed that the apparent 

 necessity is purely an artificial and an abnormal one, 

 and is either the result of a sensuous imagination or 

 of morbid conditions which require medical treatment, 

 and which will be certain to be aggravated rather than 

 alleviated by the gratification of the desires. The 

 young man should be taught so to order his habits of 

 life, his diet, his regimen, his exercise, that he may 



