Sex Talk Through the Ages

"At this point, dear reader, let me concede one shocking truth. Some young women actually anticipate the wedding night ordeal with curiosity and pleasure! Beware such an attitude! One cardinal rule of marriage should never be forgotten: give little, give seldom, and above all give grudgingly." --RUTH SMYTHERS, Instruction and Advice for the Young Bride (1894)

"During intercourse, once a woman's genitals are vigorously rubbed and her womb titillated, a lustfulness (an itch) overwhelms her down there, and the feeling of pleasure and warmth pools out through the rest of her body." HIPPOCRATES, physician (circa 460--377 B.C.)

"I see silk clothes, if these qualify as 'clothes,' which do nothing to hide the body, not even the genitals ... Our women have nothing left to show their lovers in the bedroom that they haven't already revealed on the street." SENECA, philosopher (circa 4 B.C.--A.D. 65)

"The Holy Spirit leaves the room when a married couple has sex, even if they do it without passion to make new virgins for the kingdom of heaven." PETER LOMBARD, theologian (circa 1100-1164)

"I find there is nothing but godliness in marriage. To be sure, when I consider marriage, only the flesh seems to be there. Yet my father must have slept with my mother, made love to her, and they were nevertheless godly people. All the patriarchs and prophets did likewise. The longing of a man for a woman is God's creation." MARTIN LUTHER, theologian (1531)

"[Higher education threatens to produce women who are] functionally castrated ... deplore the necessity of child rearing ... and abhor the limitations of married life." G. STANLEY HALL, educator (1904)

"The desire to suck includes within it the desire for the mother's breast, which is therefore the first object of sexual desire; I cannot convey to you any adequate idea of the importance of this first object in determining every later object adopted, of the profound influence it exerts." DR. SIGMUND FREUD, General Introduction to Psychoanalysis (1920)

"The average adolescent girl gets along well enough with a fifth as much sexual activity as the adolescent boy." ALFRED KINSEY, sex researcher (1948)

"If you have never masturbated and want to, we invite you to try. You may feel awkward, self-conscious, even a bit scared at first. You may have to contend with voices within you that repeat, 'Nice girls don't ... ' or 'A happily married woman wouldn't want to ... ' Many of us have these feelings, but they change in time." THE BOSTON WOMEN'S HEALTH BOOK COLLECTIVE, The New Our Bodies, Ourselves (1992)

"There's a cultural presumption that couples are having sex all of the time, and people are embarrassed if they are not. The fact is, sex is like golf. More people talk about it than do it." "DR. PHIL" MCGRAW, TV psychologist (2003)

"ANYONE WHO IS TOO PASSIONATE A LOVER OF HIS WIFE IS AN ADULTERER." ST. JEROME, theologian (circa 341-430

Many of these quotes and more are collected in New Expectations: Sexuality Education for Mid and Later Life by Peggy Brick and Jan Lunquist (SIECUS; 2003)