d's training: and it should be proposed on the authority of
God, and explained so as to check not only sinful acts, but also
covetings, prurient curiosity, improper reading, immodest looks and
thoughts, in a word, whatever paves the way to the walks of sin. The
greatest of teachers has Himself laid down the law in this matter: it
must be proposed as coming from His divine lips, as it did: "I say to
you that whosoever shall look on a woman to lust after her has already
committed adultery with her in his heart" (St. Matt. v. 28). The lesson
is enforced by these words of the great Apostle: "Neither fornicators,
nor adulterers, nor the effeminate ... shall possess the kingdom of God"
(1 Cor. vi. 9, 10).

True, the child will not realize the full import of such lessons; but he
will understand it in due time; and already in early years he will be
warned against indulging his nascent passions. It is well that the
conscience should be early awakened in this matter; for the more this
passion is indulged, the more it craves for further indulgence till it
becomes almost uncontrollable.

III. No possible evil to any individual man or woman can result from the
firm control that one may acquire over the passion of lust. On the
contrary, if it should be controlled all through life, this would only
add to a man's strength of mind, firmness of will, soundness of body,
and length of life. For in the school of morality, in which every
Physician should be educated, the leading principle is: "Contraries are
cured by contraries," "_Contraria contrariis curantur_." On this
principle, lust is most efficiently controlled by aiming, at least in
youth, at total abstinence from its indulgence. You know that, in the
Catholic Church, priests and religious lead a single life, and pledge
themselves for life to practise the most perfect control of the sexual
passion. What do you think is the result of their total abstinence on
this point with regard to their length of days? As a rule their life is
much longer, in normal circumstances, than that of the other learned
professions. Here are a few proofs. In France, during the twenty years
from 1823 to 1843, 750 priests died in the diocese of Paris. Of these
only 200 were under sixty years old; there were 554 between sixty and
seventy years old, 448 over seventy, and 177 over eighty. Again, of 202
Carmelite nuns who died in a large convent of Paris, Dr. Descuret, the
attending physician, states that 82 had