Sex and Sex Worship (Phallic Worship): A Scientific Treatise on Sex, Its Nature and Function, and Its, Influence on Art, Science, Architecture, and ... Sex Worship and Symbolism (Classic Reprint)

Vlll PREFACE giving due credit to everyone and every source of information I consulted, but it does not affect the information itself. When Psychopathia Sexualis by Krafft-E bing, and similar works by Moll, Lombroso, etc., appeared in print, I, at the request of some of my professional friends prepared a series of lectures for them, showing that sexual perversions, described in these works as insanities, were in reality deliberate vices, the results of vicious teachings which had come to us by transmission and teachings from the Greek andR oman schools in which slaves were trained in libidinous arts, to make them more valuable to luxuryloving purchasers, their masters and mistresses. But of this matter little or none is used in this book, which does not pretend to treat of that phase of sexual life and sexual practices. Recently I was asked to write my studies on sex for publication, in order that the work might not be lost. As the views on these subjects have materially changed among the learned among the public since the time when the collection of this information was first begun, I consented, and this book is the result. The facts gathered about phallic religion led me to doubt whether this was ever a religion from all other religions apart; it appeared to me to be merely a phase in the evolution of all religions. Nor was it a real worship of the generative organs, but rather a use of representations of the phallus and yoni as symbols for certain religious ideas which were embodied in nature-worship. Mankind, when it gave expression to its first dawnings of religious thoughts, wove a fabric of myths and theories about religion, the warp of which ran through from earliest historical times to our own days as threads of the warp of philosophies and theories about sex, male, female, love, passion, lust, desire, procreation, offspring, etc.; while the succeed
(Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.)