Page:The rights of women and the sexual relations.djvu/72

56 would preserve the health which he poisons in the arms of the harlot. He would respect women, because he would not have had the opportunity of making their acquaintance in the most contemptible of all states, and his untainted mind would not change into that unscrupulousness which, as Jean Paul says, does not hesitate to pluck to pieces the noblest woman like a bee, only for the sake of getting hold of the honeysack.

With all our civilization we are put to shame even by the savages. The savages know of no fastidiousness of the sexual instinct and of no brothels, because their nature need do no violence to itself and can satisfy its needs in a natural manner. They show us at the same time that health, as well as morals, is less endangered when nature is allowed free play than when it is driven into by-ways through obstacles.

We are, indeed, likewise savages, but in quite a different sense. Proof of this is especially furnished by our youth. But that our students, and young men in general, usually pass through the school of corruption and drag the filth of the road which they have traversed before marriage along with them throughout life, is not their fault so much as the fault of prejudices and of our political and social conditions. Nature demands, as has been said, the satisfaction of the sexual instinct when the age of puberty has been reached.