eligious instruction--but not always in
consequence of these--many have been withheld from masturbatory and
other sexual acts. These cases fall into three groups. The first group
consists of cases in which the sexual impulse is very weak, so that very
little is requisite to prevent the occurrence of sexual practices. To
the second group belong the cases of those who are kept in check by the
fear of God's anger, which will be visited, they are taught in their
lessons on religion, upon all unrighteous acts. The third group is
comprised of those rare natures who are really profoundly inspired by
religious ethical sentiments, and in whom even the ordinary unpractical
methods of religious instruction have not been able to inhibit the
development of genuinely religious feelings. These three groups may
readily be recognised among adults as well as among children. But when I
compare the number of the children and young persons making up these
three groups with the number of those to whom religious instruction has
been quite useless, I feel justified in a certain scepticism. I do not
pretend to assert that those who have received religious instruction
have become more immoral than the others; but I am certainly entitled to
contest the assertion that religious instruction induces a loftier
sexual morality. Indeed, a further limitation is needed here, and one to
the discredit of religious instruction. A portion, even, of those
persons comprising the exceptional cases just enumerated, have not
thereby attained to spiritual peace. Tormented, and at times almost
mastered, by the sexual impulse, they struggle unceasingly under the
influence of terror lest they should commit a deadly sin by yielding to
this impulse. The mental condition[139] of such persons--I speak chiefly
of young men--is in some cases such that a doctor may well doubt if he
be not justified in advising them to indulge in illegitimate sexual
intercourse. I have myself never given such advice in these cases, nor
do I intend to give it in similar cases in the future. I refrain from
doing so on ethical grounds, which I have discussed in great detail in
connexion with the sexual question in my work on Medical Ethics.[140]
The physician has no right to advise his patient to the performance of
an act which is regarded by the latter as a deadly sin. But all the more
because I have felt unable to give such advice, do I feel it my duty to
insist here upon the seamy side of the