presented a step
forward in civilization; it revealed love not as a mere animal instinct or
a mere pledged duty, but as a complex, humane, and refined relationship
which demanded cultivation; "_arte regendus amor_." Boccaccio made a wise
teacher put Ovid's _Ars Amatoria_ into the hands of the young. In an age
still oppressed by the mediaeval spirit, it was a much needed text-book,
but it possessed the fatal defect, as a text-book, of presenting the
erotic claims of the individual as divorced from the claims of good social
order. It never succeeded in establishing itself as a generally accepted
manual of love, and in the eyes of many it served to stamp the subject it
dealt with as one that lies outside the limits of good morals.

When, however, we take a wider survey, and inquire into the discipline for
life that is imparted to the young in many parts of the world, we shall
frequently find that the art of love, understood in varying ways, is an
essential part of that discipline. Summary, though generally adequate, as
are the educational methods of primitive peoples, they not seldom include
a training in those arts which render a woman agreeable to a man and a man
agreeable to a woman in the relationship of marriage, and it is often more
or less dimly realized that courtship is not a mere preliminary to
marriage, but a biologically essential part of the marriage relationship
throughout.

Sexual initiation is carried out very thoroughly in Azimba land,
Central Africa. H. Crawford Angus, the first European to visit
the Azimba people, lived among them for a year, and has described
the Chensamwali, or initiation ceremony, of girls. "At the first
sign of menstruation in a young girl, she is taught the mysteries
of womanhood, and is shown the different positions for sexual
intercourse. The vagina is handled freely, and if not previously
enlarged (which may have taken place at the harvest festival when
a boy and girl are allowed to 'keep house' during the day-time by
themselves, and when quasi-intercourse takes place) it is now
enlarged by means of a horn or corn-cob, which is inserted and
secured in place by bands of bark cloth. When all signs [of
menstruation] have passed, a public announcement of a dance is
given to the women in the village. At this dance no men are
allowed to be present, and it was only with a great deal of
trouble that I managed to witness it.