Men, Women, and God

This book has been written at the request of the Student Christian Movement, and is addressed in the first place to men and women of the student age. I have undertaken the task with great gladness because my long and happy contact with men and women through the Student Movement has taught me how great is the need for a fuller understanding of the problems of sex, and how possible it is that men and women should find help through the timely suggestion of right and wholesome thoughts.

My brother, Dr. Charles Gray of London, has contributed a very valuable appendix dealing with certain facts in a way which is only possible to a medical man, and I am very greatly indebted to him for thus enriching this volume.

It will be apparent to all who read it that I also owe a great deal to many who have shared with me their knowledge and experience. In particular I owe much gratitude to a number of generous-hearted women who have enabled me to write the chapters which are more especially addressed to their sex.

I have deliberately omitted from these pages any reference to disease. I do that not because I am not impressed by the terrible penalties with which nature visits certain sins, but because I do not believe in the power of fear to deliver us. Though there were no such thing as venereal disease, immorality would still be a way of death, and morality would still be the way of life and joy. Till we perceive that we are not on the path of progress.

Books of this sort have generally been addressed specially either to men or to women. I write to both alike because I am quite sure that until men and women understand and help each other, there is going to be no happy solution to the problems of sex. When they do so learn to co-operate I believe we shall as a race find our way out into that larger and happier life which can only be ours when we have accepted the facts of sex and learnt to use them to the enrichment of human life and the glory of God.

A. HERBERT GRAY.

Glasgow, 1922.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRODUCTION

I. KNOWING THE FACTS

II. COMRADESHIP

III. LOVE

IV. FALLING IN LOVE AND GETTING ENGAGED

V. OUR MORAL STANDARDS

VI. A MAN'S STRUGGLE

VII. PROSTITUTION--A CHAPTER FOR MEN

VIII. A GIRL'S EARLY DAYS

IX. INVOLUNTARY CELIBACY

X. THE ART OF BEING MARRIED

XI. UNHAPPY MARRIAGES

XII. THE INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL CONDITIONS

XIII. FORGETTING THE THINGS WHICH ARE BEHIND

APPENDIX--SOME OF THE PHYSIOLOGICAL FACTS. BY A. CHARLES E. GRAY, M.D.

INTRODUCTION

In the following pages I propose to write simply and plainly about the social, personal, and bodily relations of men and women, and about the ways in which their common life may attain to happiness, harmony, and efficiency.

I shall deal with matters often handled only with much diffidence, and thought of with uncomfortable reserve. And I address myself to men and women alike.