82 THE GLANDS REGULATING PERSONALITY 



all been evolved in the sex struggle, surviving because most effec- 

 tive in that struggle. These so-called secondary sexual character- 

 istics are an expression of the influence of the internal secretion 

 of the gonads, or the interstitial glands. Some call them puberty- 

 glands, because their ripening initiates puberty. 



We know that these interstitial glands, to stick to that name, 

 (rather than to the name of the puberty glands, since they serve 

 not only to induce puberty but to maintain maturity) are the 

 actual primary dictators of the process by which male and female 

 are distinguished, if not created. Castration was probably the 

 first surgical operation carried out for experimental purposes, 

 suggested no doubt by a curiosity concerning its effects. Trepan- 

 ning of the skull, the geologic record indicates, wa^ done even by 

 the cave man. But as an experimental operation, castration 

 seems to hold the primary position in the annals of surgery. 



Its effects noted, the satisfaction of one of the lower human 

 instincts, jealousy, popularised it. From the days of Semiramis, 

 eunuchs have been commonplace figures of the East, their func- 

 tion definite: to guard the harems of the powerful. The age of 

 Abdul Hamid witnessed no diminution of the barbaric tortures 

 by which children are prepared for the profession. It is to the 

 credit of England that in its dominions in the Orient the practice 

 has been abolished. But it goes on even today. According to 

 the best authorities, four out of five of these victims at the 

 auto-da-fe of a vicious human instinct die immediately or soon 

 after from exhaustion due to pain and infection. Not all of the 

 ancient nations countenanced the brutal horror. The Hebrews 

 placarded castration an unpardonable sin, making it a sin to cas- 

 trate even animals. Nor was any man so mutilated permitted 

 to worship in the house of the Lord (Deuteronomy xxiii, 11). 

 Yet we have evidence that the latter Jewish kings employed 

 foreign eunuchs in their harems, who often held the most im- 

 portant positions as ministers of the court. 



Besides the eunuchs, another group of people have presented 

 material for the study of the interstitial glands. These are the 

 Skoptzi of Russia and the Lipowaner of Roumania. Among them 

 castration is a religious ritual. Mankind has always been most 

 brutal to itself in the name of the ideal. These sects were founded 

 because in the eighteenth century an antipode of Joseph Smith 

 and Brigham Young discovered this passage in Matthew xix, 12. 



"For there are some eunuchs which were so born from their 

 mother's womb, and there are some eunuchs which were made 



