ce, there is greater
shyness on both sides, and the parents rarely possess the more technical
knowledge that is now required. At this stage it seems that the assistance
of the physician, of the family doctor if he has the proper qualities for
the task, should be called in. The plan usually adopted, and now widely
carried out, is that of lectures setting forth the main facts concerning
venereal diseases, their dangers, and allied topics.[254] This method is
quite excellent. Such lectures should be delivered at intervals by medical
lecturers at all urban, educational, manufacturing, military, and naval
centres, wherever indeed a large number of young persons are gathered
together. It should be the business of the central educational authority
either to carry them out or to enforce on those controlling or employing
young persons the duty of providing such lectures. The lectures should be
free to all who have attained the age of sixteen.

In Germany the principle of instruction by lectures concerning
venereal diseases seems to have become established, at all events
so far as young men are concerned, and such lectures are
constantly becoming more usual. In 1907 the Minister of Education
established courses of lectures by doctors on sexual hygiene and
venereal diseases for higher schools and educational
institutions, though attendance was not made compulsory. The
courses now frequently given by medical men to the higher classes
in German secondary schools on the general principles of sexual
anatomy and physiology nearly always include sexual hygiene with
special reference to venereal diseases (see, e.g.,
_Sexualpaedagogik_, pp. 131-153). In Austria, also, lectures on
personal hygiene and the dangers of venereal disease are
delivered to students about to leave the gymnasium for the
university; and the working men's clubs have instituted regular
courses of lectures on the same subjects delivered by physicians.
In France many distinguished men, both inside and outside the
medical profession, are working for the cause of the instruction
of the young in sexual hygiene, though they have to contend
against a more obstinate degree of prejudice and prudery on the
part of the middle class than is to be found in the Germanic
lands. The Commission Extraparlementaire du Regime des Moeurs,
with the conjunction of Augagneur, Alfred Fournier, Yves Guy