TABOO AND GENETICS 247 



Modern psychological knowledge enables us 

 to understand the mechanism of this last method 

 of social control as the building up of the con- 

 ditioned emotional response. If our civilization 

 is to endure it must learn to apply this method 

 of control to the sex Hfe of the individual so that 

 reproduction will fall to the lot of the most 

 desirable eugenic stock instead of being left 

 to the workings of chance as it is at the present 

 time. 



From the viewpoint of individual psychology, 

 one of the principal problems of the erotic life 

 is to find a smooth transition from the romantic 

 love of the courtship period to the less ethereal 

 emotions of the married state. Indirectly, this 

 is also socially significant, because of the over- 

 whelming effect of the home environment in 

 shaping the reactions of the next generation. 

 As a rule, only the children who have grown 

 up in a happy and wholesome atmosphere of 

 sincere parental comradeship and affection can 

 have an entirely sane and healthy reaction to 

 their own erotic functions in later years. 



Although romantic love in its present ex- 

 pression may often lead to uncongenial marriages 

 and even involve dysgenic mating, its aesthetic 

 and refining influences are such as to make it 

 desirable in spite of these drawbacks. Its 

 influence upon literature has been noted by 

 Bloch (2) while its potency in the formation of 



