200 BIOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF HUMAN PROBLEMS 



or pleasure, or by the intellectual satisfactions that 

 arise from concentration of effort, but it is unsus- 

 ceptible of compensation. When the world once 

 realizes this, it will teach its rising generations to safe- 

 guard jealously and deliberately the most precious 

 and potent powers, instead of trifling with them. 



Thus it happens that as a preponderance of the 

 sex instinct over the instinct of self-preservation 

 tends to the destruction of the individual, so the un- 

 due preponderance of the somatic instincts over the 

 sex instinct leads to the fatal break in the racial 

 line. Both fatalities are due to that imperfection in 

 the balance of antagonistic (but also cooperative) 

 forces which is the distinguishing feature of the 

 normal, in body and in mind. Instinct tends to 

 guard the individual against either of these fatalities. 

 It makes him self-conscious and cautious or timid in 

 entering on the exercise of the sex functions. By 

 some disregard of the natural mentor (a disregard 

 often fostered by education of an imperfect kind) 

 man falls into the error of excess. On the other 

 hand, the excessive inhibition of the sex impulse, 

 or its undue feebleness as compared with the power 

 of the instinct of self-preservation, may result in the 

 extinction of a human line, and all that this implies. 

 So it is clear that the best and most satisfying results 

 in human destiny are likely to be found where the 

 somatic instincts maintain a well-balanced relation 

 to those of sexual origin neither suppressing the 

 latter nor unduly releasing them from inhibition. 



