312 BIOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF HUMAN PROBLEMS 



upon as safe guides to follow. One is that the need 

 of each child is individual, and can only properly be 

 satisfied by a knowledge of his or her personality 

 and intelligence. Another is that no intelligent or 

 sincere question put by the child should be left 

 unanswered so far as the parent is able to answer it. 

 And while it is in general wise to discourage discus- 

 sions of the grosser and more intense phases of sexual 

 passion, I would not say that even these are unfit 

 subjects, provided the adolescent child has a high 

 degree of intelligence and good moral intent (pur- 

 pose). Questions involving problems of sex are 

 often put by children to their parents long before the 

 age of puberty is reached, and hence before there is 

 need for precise knowledge of human sexual anatomy 

 or physiology. Many wise parents introduce young 

 children to the idea of sex by resorting to the processes 

 of fertilization in plants, and this is, in many ways, 

 an admirable method. If such studies lead to embar- 

 rassing interrogations about sex questions or relations, 

 in domestic animals, as horses or dogs, these need be 

 answered only in part, and in a superficial yet truth- 

 ful manner, the justification for this lying in the fact 

 that fuller explanations cannot be really apprehended. 

 Lastly, it cannot be too strongly impressed on the 

 mind of every young child that the sexual instinct is 

 in itself nothing to be ashamed of, but that it is, 

 on the contrary, possessed of the highest biological 

 and sociological dignity. At the same time it should 

 be made clear that whatever is really shameful 



