THE SOCIAL EVIL CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM OF PROSTITUTION PROSTITUTION is a phenomenon coextensive with civilised society. Barbarous and semi-barbarous peoples have at times been free from it. The ancient Germans, we are told, tolerated no prostitution in their midst; and there are said to be Siberian and African tribes to-day of which the same thing is true. But no sooner has a people attained a moderate degree of civilisation than this social curse has fallen upon it; nor has any race reached a point of moral elevation where this form of vice has disappeared. The most venerable traditions, the most ancient records, all bear testimony to the antiquity of prostitution. Even a careless reader of Scripture knows how constantly it beset the ancient Hebrews, and how vain were the efforts of sages and lawgivers to stamp it out. Nurtured by a vicious religion, it flourished throughout Asia Minor; and when civilisation moved westward to Greece and Rome, prostitution followed as its shadow. The rise of the medieval cities in Western Europe was marked by the introduction of the brothel. The great development of trade and commerce that ushered in modern times was also responsible for the universalising of "the social evil." Glancing at present conditions, we find that no important nation is free from the taint. The great cities of the world vie with each other in the vast numbers of those who gain their living by immorality. Nor is there reason to think that this condition is transitory. He would be an optimist indeed who could believe that a time will come when the problem of prostitution shall cease to be important. Like the pauper, the prostitute is a creature of civilisation, and, like the pauper, will continue to thrust her undesir able presence upon society. The fact that prostitution is practically universal has impressed itself strongly upon the numerous writers who have dealt with the subject. The inference has frequently been drawn that all efforts to suppress or restrict vice must be vain, and that the only rational course to pursue is to recognise its existence and to minimise its attendant dangers. There have been authorities who held the view that vice is an essential element in society, hence ineradicable. Others have gone so far as to affirm that what is best and purest in civilisation could not have existed but for the sacrifice of a portion of womankind to immorality." The saner authorities, however, content themselves with stating that vice is the inevitable result of causes which society has never yet been able to control. It is frequently said that vice is a constant and invariable element in social life. This is, however, obviously untrue. So far as one can judge from the fragmentary history of morality, periods of gross licentiousness have alternated with periods of comparative decency. The degrading influence that intercourse with a lascivious nation has exercised upon a people of comparatively pure morals is well known to every student of history. The Romans were disciples of the Greeks in immorality as well as in ars and sciences. The renewal of intercourse with the East that followed the Crusades was attended by a serious deterioration of European morals. On the other hand, the spread of Christianity, the Reformation, and the rise of chivalry, it is generally admitted, brought about a decided improvement in the moral tone of Europe. Social and economic changes have frequently been marked by an increase or a diminution in 'Lecky, History of European Morals, ii., 299; Hügel, Zur Geschichte, Statistik und Regelung der Prostitution, 76. |