[13] I cannot now enter upon a subject most difficult and important, a most prolific source of prostitution--viz., a standing army. I will only state to you for a special reason that my observations on the Continent of Europe have convinced me that the prevalence there of the system of universal military conscription--_i.e._, the compulsory enrolment of the entire male youth of the nation in the military service of a great standing army, where purity of life is not encouraged--is the greatest barrier that can exist to the gradual humanizing of sexual life. Let us, therefore, most gratefully recognise that in our own country we have not the gigantic evil of military conscription to overthrow, and let us ever hold in honour the memory of our ancestors, who have preserved us from that measureless curse. PURCHASE OF WOMEN: THE GREAT ECONOMIC BLUNDER CONTENTS PAGE PREFACE 135 CHAPTER I THE FOUNDATIONS OF TRADE 142 CHAPTER II TRADE IN WOMEN 155 PREFACE The object of this work is to show the real meaning of those relations of the sexes, which are commonly known under the term of ‘ordinary immorality.’ Customs in the midst of which we are brought up often befog the vision. Nations, like individuals, may journey on unsuspicious of danger, if no fresh wind lift the veil which hides the fatal precipice towards which they are rapidly moving. Much has been heard of late respecting criminal immorality--_i.e._, the abuse of the sexual powers, which human law recognises as crime. The boundary of criminal immorality has of late been extended in the hope of protecting young girls. When fathers and mothers begin to realize what the destruction of their children by lust really means, natural horror is felt at the corruption or torture of young children of either sex, and a storm of righteous indignation compels an attempt to provide a remedy. But at the same time the very causes which directly lead to and produce the monstrous crimes, are not clearly seen. Horror at effects, diverts attention from vicious customs which lie at the root of evil, and which inevitably produce crime. Many of those who are most actively engaged in devising safeguards for the very young, draw at the same time a radical distinction between so-called ordinary immorality and what, at that particular epoch, has been labelled criminal by process of law. It is a fatal imperfection of human laws that, being only an endeavour to enforce fragments of Divine Law, they carry the evil of such disruption with them, and whilst checking wrong in one direction strengthen it in another.