Let us return now to this wonderful nerve center, or brain of the
physical life. When does it begin to send out _these finely attenuated
beauty impulses, which must move at very high rates of vibration_?
These impulses which give grace, form, and all other touches of
indescribable charm to the body of the child.
From the very beginning of its life to some small degree, and from
twelve years of age they begin to show themselves the dominant impulses
of the life. They rise in the body just like waves of heat on a summer
day. _They are flooding every fiber of the being, giving roundness
to the limbs, grace to the form, drawing beauty lines upon the face,
painting roses in the cheeks, putting sparkles in the depths of liquid
eyes._ All of this and more are these little builders, which we call
sex impulses, doing in the years from twelve to eighteen. Is it any
wonder with all this marvelous work to do, that like the sculptor who
is to make a statue out of a block of marble, they must take possession
of the body and become the dominant element in it? The heart, liver,
digestive organs, and even the brain itself are subject to these
outflooding impulses as they work out the beauty of the physical life.
Turn back to your chart now and note what a small part the intellect
plays in the life of the girl or boy between the ages of twelve and
eighteen. Just enough to be a willing servant of the sex impulses, as
they work out the plan of beauty, as given them by the hand of the
Master of all life. In fact the brain is largely an automaton in this
work, for the ego has not had time _to fully lay through the brain
that fine system of telephone connections and wires by which the brain
becomes a perfect instrument through which the ego or inner man may
reason out the problems of life_, so that up to eighteen there is
comparatively little reasoning ability in the life of children.