LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
[Correspondents are requested to keep their letters as brief as is reasonably possible. The most suitable length is that of one of our " News of the Week" paragraphs. Signed letters are given a preference over those bearing a pseudonym.—Ed. Tim SPEC-TA-road MORALS OF TODAY
[To the Editor of '1'nE SeL:CTATOn.]
Sin,—One may suspect that your correspondent, Mr. Richards, in saying that " _sexual irregularities are in reality the regu- larities of nature," is the unconscious victim of the not uncommon superstition that what is natural is axiomatically good. If we may assume, for the present purpose, that by • natural " is meant whatever is not due to conscious volition, there seems to be no sufficient reason for supposing it to be a necessary and -universal truth that the control of human • nature " by human " will " is either impossible or undesir- able. It depends upon many things upon the strength of the " nature," upon the strength of the " will," and upon our conception of the good. There are substantial reasons for thinking that that very artificial thing, civilization, Without which our lives would be " solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short," is itself largely due to the social control of many natural " impulses, including the sexual instinct. It may well be that some people suffer from the process ; similarly we have all known of men who could only realize their true natures in war, and also who are driven by peace into crime or neurasthenia ;. but the case of these sufferers furnishes an insufficient argument for permanent warfare—or so, at least, it would be generally thought.—I am, Sir, &c., Ulpha, near Broughton-in-Furness. M. S. AMOS.
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