Even from the religious point of view, prurient prudery is not justifiable.
Northcote has very temperately and sensibly discussed the question of the nude in art from the standpoint of Christian morality.

He points out that not only is the nude in art not to be condemned without qualification, and that the nude is by no means necessarily the erotic, but he also adds that even erotic art, in its best and purest manifestations, only arouses emotions that are the legitimate object of man's aspirations.

It would be impossible even to represent Biblical stories adequately on canvas or in marble if erotic art were to be tabooed (Rev.H.
Northcote, _Christianity and Sex Problems_, Ch.

XIV).
Early familiarity with the nude in classic and early Italian art should be combined at puberty with an equal familiarity with photographs of beautiful and naturally developed nude models.

In former years books containing such pictures in a suitable and attractive manner to place before the young were difficult to procure.