SEX AND THE INDIVIDUAL 195 



the sex instinct, however regrettable, is something 

 that may at any time be checked by growing intel- 

 ligence and improved self-control. The necessity 

 for the acceptance of money cuts off this possibility 

 of restraint and operates as a fixative for a danger- 

 ous habit of life. It also has the effect of rendering 

 the expenditures of sex energy a deliberate act rather 

 than one of impulse, which is only pardonable where 

 its object is the production of children. These condi- 

 tions lead to a loss of self-respect, which can but 

 reenforce the depressing effects of the perversion of 

 instinct. Thus is accelerated the spiritual degrada- 

 tion of the habitual prostitute. 



Prostitution is a practice of such antiquity that 

 its abolition appears hopeless. In consequence of 

 this humanity has grown to accept it with little 

 question, as if it were but a part of the inevitable. 

 The attention given to it has for its chief purpose the 

 control of the evils that result from venereal disease, 

 and some progress has been made in the direction of 

 protecting the community from such disease. A 

 moderately efficient aid in this direction is the 

 licensing of professional prostitutes by the state, 

 the right to practice this calling being revoked from 

 those women who develop disease. But this method 

 involves the official recognition of prostitution by 

 the state, as in Germany and France. Anglo-Saxon 

 countries have hesitated to follow this plan, partly 

 because state recognition is far from being a thor- 

 oughly effective means of limiting disease, partly 



