Sex gland

“ But the sex problem as a whole is one of adaptation as well as of specialization. An incident of the female specialization is a type of body on the average smaller, weaker and less well adapted to some other activities than is the male body, even when reproduction is not undertaken. A great complication is added by the fact that some women, and also some men, are better adapted than others to nonreproductive activities. This is another way of saying that the type of body associated with either type of sex glands varies a good deal, for reasons and in respects already pointed out. ”

“ Not only are the secretions from the male and the female sex glands themselves quite unlike, but the whole chemical system, balance or "complex" involved is different. Because of this dual basis for metabolism or body chemistry, centering in the sex glands, no organ or cell in a male body can be exactly like the corresponding one in a female body.
In highly organized forms like the mammals (including man) , sex is linked up with all the internal secretions, and hence is of the whole body. ”

“ But if one is a male and the other a female, the male secretory balance dominates the female in a very peculiar fashion. The female reproductive system is largely suppressed. She even develops certain male organs, and her general bodily appearance is so decidedly masculine that until Dr Lillie worked out the case she had always been supposed to be a non-functional male. She is sterile. The blood transfusion not only alters the sex-type of her body, but it actually modifies the sex glands themselves, so that the ovary resembles a testicle, though dissection proves the contrary. ”

“ For instance, some women are larger than are some men—have lower pitched voices, etc. The whole bodily metabolism, resting as it does upon a chemical complex, is obviously more like the male average in some women than it is in others, and vice versa. But the average physical make-up which we find associated with the male and female sex glands, respectively, is distinctive in each case, and a vast majority of individuals of each sex conform nearly enough to the average so that classification presents no difficulty. ”

“ Practically it is all right, but medico-legally it is wrong, to make the genitals the universal criterion in the determination of sex. Medico-legally, sex should be determined by the psychical constitution rather than by the physical form. There are thousands of physical females who feel themselves to be men and have the mental traits of men, and there are thousands of physical males who feel themselves to be women and have the mental traits of a woman. Should any blame be attached to such individuals when they conduct themselves according to their psychical sex? ”

“ With this final blow levelled at the corporeal equipment of sex, triumphant Feminism will probably reach its zenith, and in a few generations a kind of woman will appear the only vestige of whose sex will be her smooth face and primary genital glands. Men will then be frankly regarded as quite superfluous. ”

“ Pseudo-Hermaphrodites are humans possessing in part both the male and the female genitalia, or else organs so deformed that even sexologists are unable to determine the sex until puberty. In half such cases, the physician then pronounces the individual to belong to the sex other than that with which he or she has identified him or herself. As a rule, they subsequently live and clothe themselves per prescription. But some, accustomed to the dress and usages of their first sex, choose to identify themselves with it throughout life. ”

“ This indicates that there is no cause-and-effect relation between the feminine secondary sexual characters and the love for the male sex, but that they are twin effects of a common cause, namely, the presence in the male body of the particular kind of governing corpuscles or germs ordinarily found only in the protoplasm of females. ”

“ First, the male sex hormones have not the instability nor cyclic rhythmicity of the female. Secondly, and perhaps consequently, his sex instincts have become overlayered with other more labile instincts, with habits and customs and necessities that appear to oust the sex instinct into an altogether decentralized position. ”

“ This subject, and its numerous ramifications, are well worth the careful research of the most highly-trained physiologists. There is nothing more profound, or of more vital moment to modern humanity as a whole, than is the understanding of the sex nature and sex needs of men and women.
I may point out as a mere suggestion that the man's sex-organs give rise to external and also to internal secretions. The former only leave the glands which secrete them as a result of definite stimulus ”

“ In view of this fact, is it too much to raise the question whether or not sex in woman is designed to fulfill any other purpose than that of the reproduction of the race? True it is, that the only function of sex in all other females is merely that of producing offspring—of perpetuating its kind. Under no circumstances does it ever serve any other end, fulfill any other design. ”

“ A man does not object to being called “masculine,” nor a woman to being called “feminine.” Yet whatever is masculine or feminine is sexual. To be distinguished by femininity is to be distinguished by sex. To be over-feminine is to be over-sexed. To manifest in excess any of the distinctions of sex, primary or secondary, is to be over-sexed. Our hypothetical peacock, with his too large and splendid tail, would be over-sexed, and no offence to his moral character!
The primary sex-distinctions in our race as in others consist merely in the essential organs and functions of reproduction. ”

“ There may be simply a union of the perfect body of one sex with the susceptibility to such sexual charms as ordinarily attract the other sex alone, or with the mental traits of the other sex. Or the individual may possess the male genitals, but be beardless, or else possess mammary glands, broad pelvis, and sacral dimples; or possessing the female genitals, have a rudimentary moustache, or else meagrely developed breasts, narrow pelvis, etc. Instances have been known of human beings with an ovary on one side of the body and a testicle on the other, and of males who were able to suckle infants. ”

“ If we examine the physical phenomenon of sex as it manifests itself in the human creature, we find, in the first stages of the individual’s existence, no difference discernible, by any means we have at present at our command, between those germs which are ultimately to become male or female. Later, in the foetal life, at birth, and through infancy though the organs of sex serve to distinguish the male from the female, there is in the general structure and working of the organism little or nothing to divide the sexes. ”

“ Without that internal secretion of the ovaries, a woman would look more or less like a man; she would not develop her beautiful rounded form, her pretty long hair, her breasts, her broad pelvis, her feminine voice, etc. Second, the secretion is necessary to the proper development of her other sexual organs; if the ovaries are cut [51] out, then the uterus and the vagina and even the vulva shrivel up. Third, it is that internal secretion that excites in woman sexual desire and makes her enjoy relations with the male sex. ”

“ Owing to the fact that both male and female organs develop from more primitive structures which were sexually undifferentiated, a fundamental analogy in the sexual organs of the sexes always remains; the developed organs of one sex exist as rudiments in the other sex; the testicles correspond to the ovaries; the female clitoris is the homologue of the male penis; the scrotum of one sex is the labia majora in the other sex, and so throughout, although it is not always possible at present to be quite certain in regard to these homologics. ”

“ Or that an individual with Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser Syndrome (that is, born with XX chromosomes, ovaries, and labia but without a vagina and uterus) can be female. Putting together these two concepts—that “biological sex” includes gender identity and that the markers of a person’s biological sex may diverge—despite the majority’s protestations otherwise, a person can be male if some biological components of sex, including gender identity, align with maleness, even if other biological components (for example, chromosomal structure) align with femaleness. ”

“ It is no longer a question of the formation of semen in the male, of the function of menstruation in the female. It has become largely a question of physiological chemistry. The chief parts in the drama of sex, alike on its psychic as on its physical sides, are thus supposed to be played by two mysterious protagonists, the hormones, or internal secretions, of the testes and of the ovary. Even the part played by the brain is now often regarded as chemical, the brain being considered to be a great chemical laboratory. ”

“ And the fact that it is possible for a woman to realize this wish by the same sensation as a man does, will not mislead anyone acquainted with anatomy. There is a small organ in the genitals of a woman similar to that of the male, and this small organ, the clitoris, even in childhood, and in the years before sexual intercourse, plays the same role as does the large organ of the male.
To the less comprehensible male sex-symbols belong certain reptiles and fish, notably the famous symbol of the snake. ”

“ Even when puberty is reached, with its enormous development of sexual and reproductive activity modifying those parts of the organism with which it is concerned, and producing certain secondary sexual characteristics, there yet remains the major extent of the human body and of physical function little, or not at all, affected by sex modification. The eye, the ear, the sense of touch, the general organs of nutrition and respiration and volition are in the main identical, and often differ far more in persons of the same sex than in those of opposite sexes ”

“ Aside from these there are no newly-developed mental attributes which may be traced to sex. Any thing new in mental vigor which may present itself at this period of life is more clearly explained by the general maturity of mind and body than by the action of a special function, and the state of remote organs.
It has been believed until recently that the removal of the ovaries, by operation or disease, would unsex the woman; that the features would become thin and masculine, the voice harsh, and even a beard develop. ”

“ As already stated, androgynism is a mere matter of arrested development, due to imperfect internal testicular secretion, in the natural sex differentiation that begins in the early fœtus and ends at puberty. ”

“ We now know that the problem of sex does not rest merely in the complete development of the primary sexual organs; we know that fertile unions do not depend merely on the act of pairing, but on the functional activity of those ancillary glands already referred to. And it may well be that some change in the character of the secretions has not only altered the numerical values of the sexes, but reversed the normal rôle of coloration and behaviour. ”

“ Other women, with normal or exaggerated sex instinct who welcome and stimulate the sex life, may have no wish for children, no functioning maternal instinct at all, and if sterile, will accept their fate with indifference or even exultation. These variations occur because of a difference in chemical source and determination of the two instincts. While the ovary, stimulated by the thyroid and the adrenal medulla, is the chief determinant of the sex instinct, to the posterior pituitary must be credited the chief hormone of the maternal instinct. ”

“ The mixed ensemble of the directly contrasting type, such as the concomitance of testes with feminine secondary sex traits, or of ovaries with masculine sex traits, have been described from time immemorial as freaks. Occurring even more frequently is the mixed sex ensemble, in which the type of reproductive organs and of secondary sex traits run roughly parallel, emulsified with certain traits of the opposite sex. ”

“ SEX Over no domain of the body have the endocrines a more absolute mandatory than over that of the whole complex of sex. Both as regards the primary reproductive organs, their size and shape, and the character of their implantation, malformations and anomalies, as well as the physical and mental traits lumped as the secondary sexual, puberty, maturity, and senility, voice changes and erotic trends, virility and femininity, the internal secretions are dictators at every step. ”

“ Such women possess a vigor and energy above the normal, and command responsible positions in society, not only among their own sex, but also among men. They are the ones who, in the present overturn of the traditional sex relationships, will become the professional politicians, bankers, captains of industry, and directors of affairs in general.
THE GONADS (Sexual, Puberty or Interstitial Glands)
The gonads is the name applied to the generative or reproductive glands considered collectively. In the male, they are the testes; in the female, the ovaries. ”

“ Normal sex-distinction manifests itself in all species in what are called primary and secondary sex-characteristics. The primary are those organs and functions essential to reproduction; the secondary, those modifications of structure and function which subserve the uses of reproduction ultimately, but are not directly essential,—such as the horns of the stag, of use in sex-combat ”