st risks of impregnation and
against prostitution are especially in question, we have also, as far as
sexual enlightenment in the school is under consideration, to recommend
the time when they are about to leave school. But if we prefer that
sexual enlightenment, or at any rate a part of such enlightenment,
should be effected at home rather than in the school (a course which I
regard as essentially preferable), it will be impossible to lay down a
fixed rule as to the age at which this should take place. To a lively
girl of twelve or thirteen years, a great deal can be said far better by
the mother, than can be said to a girl considerably older, say at
fifteen, by the school physician, schoolmaster, or schoolmistress.
Speaking generally, in the case of girls, the enlightenment may well
begin at a somewhat earlier age than in the case of boys--at any rate as
regards the subjective processes of the sexual life.

On the whole, it may be regarded as definitely established that the
child may well receive information about the objective processes at a
very early age, and this long before the time commonly regarded as
marking the commencement of puberty. But as regards the subjective
processes, it is better that there should be some delay. It may, indeed,
be asked whether it would not be preferable that in the case also of the
subjective processes, the child should be instructed before they
actually make their appearance in the child's own consciousness, to
render possible the adoption on the child's part of a more objective
attitude towards these phenomena. But in reality such a course offers no
advantages. The child is quite unable to understand the dangers of the
sexual life, as long as it has no actual experience of sexual feelings.
For this reason, it is better to accept the view of those who contend
that, as far as the subjective processes of the sexual life are
concerned, we should wait till near the end of the second period of
childhood before beginning the enlightenment. But we must not forget
what has previously been pointed out, that the puberal development may
begin at a time when nothing of the sort is apparent to the eye of the
observer; and we must also bear in mind that the first seminal emission
and the first menstruation are by no means so important, as marks of the
puberal development, as is commonly believed. For the fulfilment of the
aims of the sexual enlightenment, however, it does not so much matter
when