t themselves to this task--to take the boy or girl in hand,
not with any special and obtrusive reference to the sexual impulses but
for the purpose of assisting the development and manifestation of this
psychic puberty, of indirectly aiding the young soul to escape from sexual
dangers by harnessing his chariot to a star that may help to save it from
sticking fast in any miry ruts of the flesh.

Such an initiation, it is important to remark, is more than an
introduction to the sphere of religious sentiment. It is an initiation
into manhood, it must involve a recognition of the masculine even more
than of the feminine virtues. This has been well understood by the finest
primitive races. They constantly give their boys and girls an initiation
at puberty; it is an initiation that involves not merely education in the
ordinary sense, but a stern discipline of the character, feats of
endurance, the trial of character, the testing of the muscles of the soul
as much as of the body.

Ceremonies of initiation into manhood at puberty--involving
physical and mental discipline, as well as instruction, lasting
for weeks or months, and never identical for both sexes--are
common among savages in all parts of the world. They nearly
always involve the endurance of a certain amount of pain and
hardship, a wise measure of training which the softness of
civilization has too foolishly allowed to drop, for the ability
to endure hardness is an essential condition of all real manhood.
It is as a corrective to this tendency to flabbiness in modern
education that the teaching of Nietzsche is so invaluable.

The initiation of boys among the natives of Torres Straits has
been elaborately described by A.C. Haddon (_Reports
Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits_, vol. v, Chs. VII
and XII). It lasts a month, involves much severe training and
power of endurance, and includes admirable moral instruction.
Haddon remarks that it formed "a very good discipline," and adds,
"it is not easy to conceive of a more effectual means for a rapid
training."

Among the aborigines of Victoria, Australia, the initiatory
ceremonies, as described by R.H. Mathews ("Some Initiation
Ceremonies," _Zeitschrift fuer Ethnologie_, 1905, Heft 6), last
for seven months, and constitute an admirable discipline. The
boys are taken away by the elders of the tribe, subjected to many