9 From the antiquarian side, Bachofen, more than half a century ago, put forth his conception of the exalted position of the primitive mother which, although it has been considerably battered by subsequent research, has been by no means without its value, and is of special significance from the present standpoint, because it sprang from precisely the same view of life as that animating the German women who are to-day inaugurating the movement we are here concerned with.
From the medical side the late Professor Krafft-Ebing of Vienna and Dr. Albert Moll of Berlin are recognized throughout the world as leading authorities on sexual pathology, and in recent times many other German physicians of the first authority can be named in this field; while in Austria Dr. F.S. Krauss and his coadjutors in the annual volumes of Anthropophyteia are diligently exploring the rich and fruitful field of sexual folk-lore.
The large volumes of the Jahrbuch für Sexuelle Zwischenstufen, edited by Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld of Berlin, have presented discussions of the commonest of sexual aberrations with a scientific and scholarly thoroughness, a practical competence, as well as admirable tone, which we may seek in vain in other countries.
In Vienna, moreover, Professor Freud, with his bold and original views on the sexual causation of many abnormal mental and nervous conditions, and his psycho-analytic method of investigating and treating them, although his doctrines are by no means universally accepted, is yet exerting a revolutionary influence all over the world.
During the last ten years, indeed, the amount of German scientific and semi-scientific literature, dealing with every aspect of the sexual question, and from every point of view, is altogether unparalleled.
It need scarcely be said that much of this literature is superficial or worthless. But much of it is sound, and it would seem that on the whole it is this portion of it which is most popular.