for this remarkable reaction
and volte-face which has characterized Christianity, and, perhaps to
a lesser degree, other both earlier and later cults like those of the
Buddhists, the Egyptians, the Aztecs, (1) and so forth.

(1) For the Aztecs, see Acosta, vol. ii, p. 324 (London, 1604).

It may be said--and this is a fair answer on the SURFACE of the
problem--that the main reason WAS something in the nature of a reaction.
The excesses and corruptions of sex in Syria had evidently become pretty
bad, and that very fact may have led to a pendulum-swing of the Jewish
Church in the opposite direction; and again in the same way the general
laxity of morals in the decay of the Roman empire may have confirmed the
Church of early Christendom in its determination to keep along the
great high road of asceticism. The Christian followed on the Jewish
and Egyptian Churches, and in this way a great tradition of sexual
continence and anti-pagan morality came right down the centuries even
into modern times.

This seems so far a reasonable theory; but I think we shall go farther
and get nearer the heart of the problem if we revert to the general clue
which I have followed already more than once--the clue of the necessary
evolution of human Consciousnss. In the first or animal stage of
human evolution, Sex was (as among the animals) a perfectly necessary,
instinctive and unself-conscious activity. It was harmonious with
itself, natural, and unproductive of evil. But when the second stage set
in, in which man became preponderantly SELF-conscious, he inevitably
set about deflecting sex-activities to his own private pleasure and
advantage; he employed his budding intellect in scheming the derailment
of passion and desire from tribal needs and, Nature's uses to the poor
details of his own gratification. If the first stage of harmonious
sex-instinct and activity may be held as characteristic of the Golden
Age, the second stage must be taken to represent the Fall of man and his
expulsion from Paradise in the Garden of Eden story. The pleasure and
glory of Sex having been turned to self-purposes, Sex itself became the
great Sin. A sense of guilt overspread man's thoughts on the subject.
"He knew that he was naked," and he fled from the voice and face of the
Lord. From that moment one of the main objects of his life (in its inner
and newer activities) came to be the DENIAL of Sex. Sex was conceived
of as the great Antagonist, the old Serpe