attracted him to the natural sciences more than to the social sciences, which are not cultivated primarily for economic advancement. Inasmuch as women are strongly interested in persons, and as they have acute sympathies and interest in racial betterment, they are more active in the social than in the natural sciences.

No general statement can be made concerning the relative position of the sexes in moral attainment, for morality, like intelligence, is complex and a general comparison would not be feasible. To be sure, we do estimate individuals with regard to general morality just as we judge them with regard to general intelligence; but detailed investigation would show that moral standards vary in different lines of conduct just as ability varies in different lines of mental activity. The attempt to treat morality as a single character is probably responsible for the divergent opinions writers express concerning the relative morality of the two sexes. If moral tests could be made after the manner of intelligence tests they would probably show that each sex excelled in those lines of activity in which it was most interested. However, successes are always accompanied by failures. Wherever the struggle is keenest the unprincipled will inevitably try to gain their ends by vicious methods, so that immoralities are more pronounced, just as virtues are, with each sex in those activities in which its average standards are highest. And, inasmuch as failures are the more obvious, the impression might be gained that each sex showed inferior instead of superior standards in its particular field of action. Yet such is not really the case. Men have probably acquired higher standards in those virtues essential in business relations, such as honesty, honor, and truthfulness; but the reverse qualities are also more common among men. Similar virtues among women appear to conform more closely to the average, but women are, so to speak, unseasoned. They have not been tested by trial and experience and are therefore more negative in character. Women probably have higher standards of morality in matters relating to the family, though even here the frequency of lapses from virtue is impressive. Virtues of an aesthetic nature reach higher levels in women than in men. The test is the general judgment of society, which is much more shocked at a display of rudeness or vulgarity in women than in men. It expects a greater degree of refinement in women, and it relies upon them to defend and conserve our scant accumulation of the social graces. Much of the objection to the spread of the so-called male vices among women is based on aesthetic rather than on moral grounds.

Conclusion. A study of sex differences leads to the conclusion that they are fundamental and permanent, though modern investigations lend no support to the idea that the sexes represent different degrees of endowment or ability, nor do they furnish any foundation for the theory that the female is an undeveloped male, intermediate between child and man. The modern theory is rather that male and female represent a similar quality of raw material, but that this material has been thoroughly tinged or permeated with sex, just as a fabric may be dyed one color or another. Furthermore maleness and femaleness are not widely distinct and contrasting qualities. They are rather endowments of varying degrees of intensity, so that gradations of sex are to be found showing varying degrees and combinations of the original qualities. It is as though the extreme manifestations of sex were represented by two distinct colors, such as yellow and blue; but that there were other intermediate manifestations such as would be represented by varying shades of green.

Original sex differences may be emphasized and developed by dissimilar training and modes of life, or they may be diminished, though not effaced, by means of similar education and occupation. The original sex impulse in individuals tends to make of them dissimilar and complementary beings, and dissimilarities appear to strengthen sex attraction. Therefore if the modes of life of the two sexes grew to be so similar that differentiation in traits seemed to be gradually disappearing, the relationship would readjust itself through sexual selection. Women possessing the more masculine qualities would be rejected in favor of those with feminine traits. In the long run sexual attraction, and the choices due to it, will serve to perpetuate sex differentiations in spite of any temporary influences tending to diminish it.

REFERENCES FOR COLLATERAL READING

ELLIS, H., Man and Woman.

Essays in War Time.

GEDDES and THOMSON, Evolution of Sex.

HALL, G. S., Adolescence, Vol. II, Ch. 17.

JASTROW, J., The Psychology of Conviction.

KNIGHT, PETERS, and BLANCHARD, Taboo and Genetics.

THOMAS, W. I., Sex and Society.

THOMPSON, H. B., Psychological Norms in Men and Women.

THORNDIKE, E. L., Educational Psychology.

Individuality.

WOLF, A. B., Readings in Social Problems, Ch. 17.

CHAPTER XVII

SEX AND PROGRESS

The differentiation of the human species into two sexes with dissimilar characteristics has had a marked effect both on the social organization and on the method of progress. Sex differentiation, not of noteworthy advantage among the lower organisms, appears increasingly beneficial as the sexes become more and more specialized in the higher grades of animal life, until in the human species it becomes an indispensible condition of survival and progress. The advantages are both biological and social,

Biological Effects of Sex. Produces homogeneity in the species. From the biological point of view bi-parental reproduction has a different effect upon the species from what it has on the individual. The effect on the species is to produce homogeneity. Variations from the ancestral line of each parent are combined in the offspring; and the continual crossing of lines generation after generation tends to distribute variations throughout the species. If inheritance were through one parent only, characters existing in that line alone would be transmitted. One valuable variation might occur in one family and another in a different family, and each family would transmit its peculiar characteristic directly to its offspring; but several advantageous variations could not be combined and transmitted to the same individual. Unless all the variations happened to occur spontaneously in each family line, families would come to possess quite different characteristics; and a species would tend to become broken up into innumerable sub-species or varieties, just as isolation causes a language to be broken up into dialects. Sexual reproduction is the connecting link between family lines. spreads variations and produces general uniformity within the limits of free association.

Accelerates progress. This process of combining several favorable variations in the same individual through bi-parental reproduction obviously accelerates progress enormously. Efficiency in human beings depends upon the possession of a combination of favorable traits; but if ancestral lines possessing varied traits could not be crossed, the fusion of several characteristics would have to wait for spontaneous variations, which might never occur. In providing a certain and comparatively rapid method of disseminating desirable traits throughout the species, bi-parental reproduction assists progress by increasing enormously the number of individuals endowed with a multiplicity of useful characters. Further progress is aided also through the very uniformity which bi-parental reproduction creates in the species, because comparative similarity in individuals favors association, while dissimilarity checks it. The diversities in family lines which would arise from a sexual reproduction would be so great as to interfere with normal association.

Limits the range of variations. In addition to producing homogeneity in the species sexual reproduction tends to limit the range or extent of variations. Under a-sexual reproduction a variation once started might continue indefinitely, limited only by the possibility of adaptation to the environment. sexual reproduction, however, variations from the norm are checked by crossing with other individuals who do not possess the exceptional trait, or who possess it in a small degree. Extreme variations in bi-sexual reproduction are obtained only by continual selection of the same trait through both parents, and this does not happen in nature where random mating is the rule. A-sexual reproduction therefore favors extreme variation and the production of new species, while bi-sexual reproduction resists excessive variations and continually forces diverging individuals back to the normal. The former type is the more variable, the latter the more stable.

Produces heterogeneity in the individual. Heterogeneity in the individual, in contrast to homogeneity in the species, is the product of sexual reproduction. It is evident that children inherit characters from both parents and in varying combinations, so that they differ from one another as well as from their parents. Con