Men, Women, and God | Page 5

right tone and emphasis to them. I would quite gladly

attempt to put them all down here could I only be assured that my words would only be
read by men or women when alone and in a reverent mood. That being impossible I can
only begin by insisting that they ought to be known. And this I can also do--I can assure
all young people who read these pages that there is nothing whatever in the facts of the
case to be afraid of--nothing that they cannot know with perfectly clean minds. There are
no terrible mysteries in the matter. There are no horrors in normal sex life. The truth even
about the ultimate intimacies of body between men and women is that when truly
achieved they are beautiful, and holy, and happy.
But how are young people to get the right knowledge? The worst possible way in which
to get it is to pick it up bit by bit in connection with evil stories, the reports of divorce
cases, and the hints of vice which lurk in life's shadowy corners. Yet that has been the
most common way in the past. Quite little boys have passed on mysterious stories from
mouth to mouth defiling the whole matter. Many girls have first begun to wonder and to
ask questions when they first heard of an illegitimate child. Words in the Bible, such as
"lasciviousness" and so on, have started mere school children asking questions to which
probably they only got distorted answers from other school children. Just because their
parents did not tell them anything, they have assumed that there must be something to be
ashamed of in the truth. And so ninety per cent of boys, and I know not what proportion
of girls, have the subject of sex spoiled for them even before adolescence. Sex, sexual
experience, passion, and so on are things they think half unclean and yet annoyingly
interesting. They are half ashamed, and yet remain curious. Some are half afraid. Some
rather more than half disgusted. Some indeed try to banish the whole subject from their
minds. This may seem to be a refined thing to do; but, as we know with a new
definiteness since the psychologists have explored the matter, it is really a disastrous
thing to do. For to adapt ourselves to sex is one of the problems that cannot be escaped.
In this world we cannot live the disembodied life. What we may do is to live a clean and
happy bodily life, but only if we build our house of life on knowledge.
Wherefore to all young men and women I would say--Get to know the real truth from
someone you can trust. Go to some older man or woman with a clean mind and a large
heart, and learn about yourself. Of course the best people in the world to go to are your
own parents; but if for any reason that resource is not open to you, go to a doctor or a
minister or some senior friend. It is worth while to take a lot of trouble to find the right
person, and it is still more worth while to take trouble to avoid the wrong person. Find
someone who has seen the hand of God in the facts of sex and who can therefore talk
about them without embarrassment. And do not let yourself be deterred by the fact that
you may have made mistakes already of which you are ashamed. Most of us made
mistakes in our early years just because of the same ignorance which has been your fate.
And therefore we are not shocked. We are just sorry, and would like to help. It is not true
that mistakes inevitably spoil the future. Forgiveness, recovery, and new life are
possibilities for us all. And if you have already made mistakes through ignorance, that is
but one reason more why you should know the truth without delay. When you are told the
truth you will be learning something about God as well as about yourself, for He made
you.
Nor is it only for your own sake that you ought to know. If you want to achieve helpful

relations to men or women, and ultimately to achieve a right relation to husband or wife,
you need to know the plain facts about our incarnate life. Men and women often make the
right way of life more difficult for each other by mere ignorance. You need to know if
you are to be really kind.
I cannot forget that when young men and women of sensitive and refined natures come to
this knowledge all at once, when already adults, it may at first create a sense of repulsion.
It does not do so for those who