SEX AND SOCIAL RELATIONS 215 



and more to enjoy the legitimate friendships that are 

 possible between men and women, without the con- 

 stant intrusion of the sex idea and without the risk 

 of arousing jealousy, where one, or both, of the 

 parties to such friendship happen to be married. 

 But that enlightened self-control which alone can 

 make possible the higher friendships between man 

 and woman, and that generosity of feeling between 

 married people which leads each to extend to the 

 other every reasonable liberty, will continue to be 

 rare qualities of the race so long as parents and 

 teachers ignore the simplest biological truths relat- 

 ing to sex, and without a knowledge of which boys 

 and girls are too often the easy victims of curiosity 

 and of passion. 



I 



It has just been contended that the desire for 

 freedom in the marriage relation is natural and 

 beneficial. In actual life there is often between the 

 partners so wide a difference of opinion as to the 

 proper bounds of this liberty that the matrimonial 

 ties are broken. There are few human problems 

 more difficult to solve wisely than legitimate condi- 

 tions for separation of dissatisfied couples. There is, 

 I venture to think, one controlling biological factor 

 which should be recognized in all questions of 

 divorce. This is, of course, no other than the inter- 

 ests of the next generation. If there is a child, or 

 the immediate promise of a child, the conditions 



