After all, there is no reason to ruin a
boy's prospects because he is a little beast at sixteen; there
are very few hopeless incorrigibles at that age.
"As regards the other two classes, I should begin by giving boys
very much fuller enlightenment on sexual subjects than is usually
done, before they go to a public school at all. Either a boy is
pitchforked into the place in utter innocence and ignorance, and
yields to temptations to do things which he vaguely, if at all,
realizes are wrong, and that only because a puzzling sort of
instinct tells him so; or else he is given just enough
information to whet his curiosity, usually in the shape of
warnings against certain apparently harmless bodily acts, which
he not unnaturally tries out of curiosity, and finds them very
pleasant. It may be undesirable that a boy should have full
knowledge, at the time he goes to school, but it is more
undesirable that he should go with a burning curiosity, or a
total ignorance on the subject. I am convinced that much might
be done in the way of prevention if boys were told more, and
allowed to be _open_.
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