Psychology of sex - Total No. of Records in System :: 2032

MARRIAGEfood, cold bathing, the absence of luxury, avoidance ofall strong physical or mental excitations, no evil companionship,abundant occupation and ample exercise inthe open air, etc. The child who, being well born, is thusbred from his earliest years however willing we may beto accept, in the abstract, the doctrine of infantile sexualityhas a fair chance, in the absence of unavoidableaccidents, of prolonging sexual unconsciousness, eventhough sexual instruction may have been imparted, for along time. But when once the organic sexual impulseshave become irresistibly present to consciousness, all theseexcellent rules of regimen are no longer so effectual asthey are sometimes represented to be. They are good tofollow, in any case, and they are not sometimes withouteffect in subduing the activity of the sexual impulse, butwe must not expect from them what they cannot give.Healthy physical moderate exercise, so far from repressingsexual desire, much more often, both in men and women,acts as a stimulant to evoke it, and only has a subduinginfluence when carried to an unhealthy and immoderateexcess producing exhaustion. Mental work, likewise, sometimeseven when of a purely abstract nature, is liable tocause sexual excitement. It is, indeed, obvious that therules of general hygiene, being conducive to vigor, cannotfail to impart vigor in the sexual sphere; we cannot takemeasures to generate vigor in the system, and then impedeits overflow into sexual channels.We may,it is true, transmute sexual energy into othermore spiritual forms; but only a small proportion of sexualenergy can thus be sublimated; as Freud well says,itis with sexual energy in the human organism as it is withheat in our machines, only a certain proportion can betransformed into work. Certainly we may resort to drugs,of which the bromides are the most generally employed,[263]