THE OUTLOOK 763
INDEX OF NAMES 767
INDEX OF SUBJECTS 778
ERRATA
Page 189, note, line 2, _for_ “Classes in Antiquity,” _read_ “Age
Classes.”
Page 361, line 1, _for_ “=inflammation of the retina=,” _read_
“=syphilitic iritis=.”
Page 361, line 2, _for_ “retina,” _read_ “iris.”
Page 446, lines 6 and 7 from foot, _for_ “=reflection=,” _read_
“=reflective=.”
Page 481, note 493, line 5, _for_ “Classes of Antiquity,” _read_ “Age
Classes.”
Page 485, line 17, _for_ “Classes of Antiquity,” _read_ “Age Classes.”
Page 548, note 577, line 1, _for_ “Classes in Antiquity,” _read_ “Age
Classes.”
Page 747, lines 21 and 24, _for_ “divorce,” _read_ “adultery.”
INTRODUCTION
“_It seems at first sight as if Nature had endowed man with the
procreative impulse solely with a view to the preservation of the
species, and regardless of the individual; and yet it is undeniable that
in the high estimation of this impulse the individual was not
forgotten._” (“On the Art of Attaining an Advanced Age,” vol. i., p. 2;
Berlin, 1813).
CONTENTS OF INTRODUCTION
The two constituents of modern love -- The purposes of the species and
the purposes of the individual -- Insufficiency of the former for the
understanding of love -- The individualization of love through the
process of civilization -- The organic interconnexion between the
bodily and the mental manifestations of love -- Possibilities of
future development -- Victory of the love of civilized man over the
elemental force of the sexual impulse -- Our own time a turning-point
in the history of love.
INTRODUCTION
The sexuality of the modern civilized man--the sum, that is to say, of
the phenomena of sexual love dependent upon and associated with the
sexual impulse--is the result of a process of development lasting many
thousands of years. Therein, as in a mirror, we may see an accurate
reflection of all the phases of the bodily and mental history of the
human race. Anyone who wishes to understand modern love in all its
complexity must, in the first place, succeed in informing himself, not
merely regarding the first foundations of the feeling of love in the
grey primeval age, but, in addition, as to the manner in which that
feeling has been transformed and enriched in the course of the history
of civilization. For modern love is a complex of two constituents.
The word “love” is applicable to the sexual impulse of human beings
only. Its use implies that in the case of man the purely animal feelings
have acquired an =importance= far greater than that of subserving the
purposes of mere reproduction, and aim at a =goal= transcending that of
the preservation of the species. The nature of human love can be
understood and explained only with reference to this intimate and
inseparable union of its purposes in respect of the preservation of the
species and its independent significance in the life of the loving
individual himself. Herein is to be found the starting-point of the
whole so-called “sexual problem,” and it is necessary that the matter
should be clearly understood at the outset of this book. In earlier days
human love was mainly concerned with the purposes of the species. Modern
civilized man, conceiving history as progress in the consciousness of
freedom, has also come to recognize the profound =individual=
significance of love for his own inward growth, for the proper
development of his free manhood. To quote a phrase from Georg Hirth, a
cultured modern writer, the genuine experienced love of a civilized man
of the present day is one of the “ways to freedom.” By love is made
manifest, and through love is developed, his inmost individual nature.
For this reason Schopenhauer’s “Metaphysik der Geschlechtsliebe”
(“Metaphysic of Sexual Love”), which wholly ignores this individual
factor, must be regarded, brilliant as it unquestionably is, as a quite
inadequate explanation of the nature of love. Again, a recent writer,
Arnold Lindwurm, greatly influenced by Schopenhauer’s teaching, in the
introduction to his work entitled “Ueber die Geschlechtsliebe in
sozial-ethische Beziehung” (“Sexual Love in its Socio-Ethical
Relations”), writes: “The =fruit of love=, =children=, and =marriage= as
a domestic institution indispensable for the upbringing of
children--these constitute the author’s ethical criterion in the field
of sexual research; these also form the socio-ethical goal of all sexual
love, inasmuch as the =sole= standard by which sexual love can be judged
is the procreation and upbringing of children.” We, however, at the very
outset, contest the validity of such a standpoint, for we consider that
it fails entirely to do justice to the nature of modern love. For the
history of the human sexual impulse teaches us beyond dispute that, in
the course of the development of the human species, that impulse,
through its progressive association with intellectual and emotional
elements to form the complex whole designated by the term “love,” has
undergone a progressive individualization, and has attained a more
defined significance for the unitary human being. At the present day
sexual love constitutes a part of the very being of the civilized man;
his sexual life clearly reflects his individual nature, and love
influences his development in an enduring manner.
Love conjoins in a quite unique way the =two= principal classes of vital
manifestations--the lower vegetative and the higher animal life; and it
thus constitutes the highest and the most intense expression of the
=unity= of life (Schopenhauer’s “focus of the will;” Weismann’s
“continuity of the germ-plasma”).
Whoever wishes to understand the developmental tendencies of love as
they manifest themselves at the present day in the course of human
history, whoever desires to grasp how remarkably love has been
developed, enriched, and ennobled in the course of civilization, must at
the outset gain a clear understanding of this apparently dualistic, but
in reality thoroughly monistic, nature of the passion.
The matter may be expressed also in this way--that he who has
scientifically investigated love, who has based his conception of it
philosophically, and has personally experienced it, will become a
convinced monist in relation to life, at least, and to the organic
world, and will be compelled to regard every dualistic division into a
physical and a spiritual sphere as something quite artificial. In love
above all is manifested this mystery of the life force, as for centuries
the poets, the artists, and the metaphysicians have declared, and more
especially as the great natural philosophers of the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries have proved--above all Charles Darwin and Ernst
Haeckel. There is, indeed, no more happily chosen metaphor, none that
better describes the fundamentally monistic nature of love, than the
saying of the old æsthetic J. G. Sulzer--that love is a =tree=, that it
has its =roots= in the physical sphere, but that its =branches= extend
high above the physical world, expanding more and more, branching more
and more abundantly into the sphere of the spiritual.[1] It is certainly
impossible to find a more appropriate comparison. Thereby we show
clearly the intimate =organic= connexion between the physical and
spiritual phenomena of love; it is rooted for ever in Mother Earth, but
it grows always upwards into the subtle ether. Just as the arborescence
of the tree has a richer, more manifold, more extensive development than
the root, so also it is in the =spiritual= form that love is first
capable of extending upwards and in all directions, compared with which
its physical capacity for development is minimal and strictly limited.
=But just as the arborescence of the tree grows from, and is supplied
with nutriment by, the root, so also the higher love is inevitably
founded upon a sensory basis. Even while= love becomes spiritually
richer, it remains as irrevocably as ever dependent upon the
physical.[2]
To put the matter briefly, the future =developmental possibilities= of
human love rest purely in the spiritual sphere, but they are inseparably
connected with the far less variable physical phenomena of sexuality.
Upon the development, the configuration, and the differentiation, of the
spiritual elements of sexual love are alone based the intimate relations
of love with the process of civilization. This fact is again reflected
in the manifold phases of the evolution of the sentiment of love.
For the human spirit in the course of its development has become not
merely lord of the earth and of the elementary forces of Nature: it has
become also lord and master, interpreter and guide, of the sexual
impulse; for this impulse owes to the human spirit its new and peculiar
life, its life =capable of further development= as manifested in the
history of human love. The history of love is the history of mankind, of
civilization. For love manifests a continual =progress=, which can be
denied by those only who have failed to understand the deep significance
of human love in the entire civilized life of all times, and who,
observing the persistence of the primeval and ever-active sexual
impulse, elemental in its nature, are led only to a hopeless doubt as to
the possibility of all love, and thus justify the pessimism with which
Schopenhauer has condemned the significance of human sexual love.
Undoubtedly this elemental impulse persists for ever, and to follow it
=alone= leads to death, to utter desolation, to nothingness, as Tolstoi,
Strindberg, and Weininger, the bitter opponents of modern “love,” have
so vehemently declared. But did these men know true love? Had they
become conscious of the inevitable =necessity= with which civilization
in the course of ages and generations had transformed the human sexual
impulse into love as it now exists, transformed it in so manifold and so
wonderful a way? Had they any idea of the =development= of love, and of
its place and its significance in history?
Let them believe this, these doubting and despairing souls--=nothing=
has been destroyed of all the spiritual relations, of all the wonderful
possibilities of development, which have manifested themselves in the
course of the long and varied history of the evolution of love. To
describe this evolution, it is necessary to draw attention to all those
elements of civilization which =remain at present= influential in love,
but it is further indispensable to forecast their future development.
Once again we stand at an important turning-point in the history of
love. The old separates itself from the new, the better will once more
be the enemy of the good. But love regarded, as it must now be regarded,
in its inner =nature=, as a sexual impulse most perfectly and completely
infused with a spiritual content, will remain the inalienable gain of
civilization; it will stand forth ever purer and more promotive of
happiness, like a mirror of marvellous clearness, wherein is reflected a
peculiar and accurate picture of the successive epochs of civilization.
[1] The natural philosopher Kielmeyer, the teacher of Cuvier, also
compared the genital organs with the root, the brain with the
arborescence, of a tree. _Cf._ Arthur Schopenhauer, “New Paralipomena”
(Grisebach’s edition, p. 217).
[2] Eduard von Hartmann points out very effectively that “an assumed
love without sensuality is merely a fleshless and bloodless phantom of
the creative imagination” (“Philosophy of the Unconscious,” sixth
edition, p. 196; Berlin, 1874).
CHAPTER I
THE ELEMENTARY PHENOMENA OF HUMAN LOVE
“_The critical natural philosopher conceives this process, this ‘crown
of love,’ in a very matter-of-fact manner, as the process of conjugation
of two cells and the coalescence of their nuclei._”--ERNST HAECKEL.
CONTENTS OF CHAPTER I
The well-spring of love -- The conjugation of the germinal cells as
the simplest expression of the nature of the sexes -- The active
masculine and the passive feminine principles of sexuality -- Their
representation in ancient mythology -- The significance of sexual
procreation -- The most important principle of progressive development
-- The significance of sexual differentiation -- The development of
heterosexuality -- Vestiges of an original hermaphroditic state in men
and women -- New acquisitions -- The hymen -- Metchnikoff’s hypothesis
of the original significance of the hymen -- The “third sex” --
The attainment of perfection by means of progressive sexual
differentiation -- The increase in the intensity of the sexual
attractive force in the course of human evolution -- Its cause --
Explanation of Paul Rée -- Theory of Havelock Ellis -- Elementary
psychical phenomena of love -- A sensation analogous to one of smell
-- Theories of Steffens, Haeckel, and Kröner -- The specific sexual
odours of the capryl group -- Odoriferous glands in animals and human
beings -- An example from Southern Slavonic folk-lore -- The position
of the nose in relation to the genital system -- The sexual rôle of
artificial perfumes -- Origin of the latter -- Reduction in size of
the organ of smell in the human species -- Primary and secondary
elements in human sexuality -- Bölsche’s “fusion-love” and
“distance-love” -- Their different significance.
CHAPTER I
The mystery of sexual love, of this “wonder of life,” from which both
religious belief and artistic inspiration have drawn and continue to
draw the major part of their force, may ultimately be referred to a
single phenomenon in the sexuality of the great group of metazoa to
which the major part of the animal world and the human species belong.
This process is a conjugation of the female germ cell with the male
sperm cell--the “well-spring of love,” to use Haeckel’s expression; in
comparison with this conjugation, all other spiritual and physical
phenomena, however complicated, are of a subordinate and secondary
nature. From this primitive organic process of reciprocal attraction and
conjugation of the two reproductive cells has arisen the entire complex
of the remaining physical and spiritual phenomena of love. We have, in
this process of cell conjugation, a picture in little of love, a greatly
simplified representation of the nature of the relations between man and
woman; moreover, the highest and the finest psychical experiences and
impressions occurring under the influence of love are ultimately no more
than the results of this “erotic chemotropism” of the sperm and germ
cells.
Sexual =differentiation= existed already as a =natural= product in the
early stages of organic evolution, and =civilization= has done no more
than develop, increase, and refine that differentiation, which is
typified in a manner at once simple and convincing--because =directly
visible=--in the male sperm cell and the female germ cell. Herein the
=specific sexual differences= are made visibly manifest.
Procreation results from the approach of the male sperm cell towards the
female germ cell, and from the entrance of the former into the latter.
Thus, the sperm cell represents the =active=, the germ cell the
=passive=, principle in sexuality. Already in this =most important= act
in the process of procreation the natural relations between man and
woman are very clearly manifested. This fact is clearly grasped already
in the mythology and the sepulchral symbolism of antiquity. In these the
man is always represented as the active principle; woman, on the
contrary, as the passive principle.
“Peace reigns in the ovum, but when driven by the desire of creation
the masculine god breaks through the shell and begins his work of
fertilization, everything at once becomes movement, restless haste,
impulsive force, unending circulation. Thus the male generative
principle appears as the representative and embodiment of movement in
the visible act of creation.... The active principle in Nature appears
to be identical with the principle of motion.... Winged is the
phallus, quiescent the female; the man is the principle of movement,
and the woman the principle of repose; force is the cause of eternal
change, woman the picture of eternal repose; for which reason the
‘earth-mother’ is almost always depicted in a sitting posture”
(Bachofen).
The appearance of =sexual= reproduction in the history of the evolution
of the organic world is an especially instructive example of the great
importance of differentiation and variation as the most effective
principle of evolution in general. The lowliest forms of life reproduce
their kind in an extremely simple manner by a process of asexual cell
division, which has not improperly been regarded as nothing more than a
peculiar form of =growth=; and this simple process of cell division is
retained as a mode of growth also in the higher organisms which
reproduce their kind by sexual union. In some cases of simple cell
division the secondary cell, the “daughter cell,” separates itself from
the old cell, the “mother cell,” and forms a new complete individual; in
other cases the cell division occurs as gemmiparous reproduction
(budding or pululation), the daughter cell remaining united with the
mother cell, so that a new organ is built up. Reproduction by cell
division is found in many plants and lower animals side by side with
sexual reproduction. This latter becomes the exclusive method of
production in higher animals and in the human species, whose capacity
for the procreation of new individuals by cell division, and for the
replacement of lost organs by growth, has been lost. Thus, the progress
and the gain which on the one hand are derived from the process of
sexual reproduction, whose character we are about to investigate more
closely, are balanced on the other hand by a loss. We shall often
encounter this fact again in the history of the evolution of the sexual
impulse, more especially in mankind and in relation to human love.
With the evolution of sexual reproduction is introduced the opportunity
for a great step forward, since an incomparably greater sphere of action
is opened to the differentiation and variability of specific forms than
was possible in the case of species reproduced asexually (Kerner von
Marilaun, R. Martin). By means of the sexual union of two =differing=
independent individuals, each of which, again, has been brought into the
world by the sexual union of two differing individuals, the way is
freely opened for a progressive differentiation of the individuals of
this species. No one of them is exactly similar to any other. Each one
exhibits new peculiarities, new capabilities, and all of these play
their part in the struggle for existence. This gradually results in a
progress towards higher, better, more perfect forms. The persistence of
specific type, due to inheritance, is largely counteracted by sexual
reproduction, inasmuch as the conjugation of reproductive cells derived
from two different individuals induces a tendency to progressive
variation and improvement. Moreover, by this sexual mode of reproduction
the preservation of the species is rendered much more secure than by
asexual reproduction, whilst at the same time the possibility of
differentiation or variation is indubitably increased. We have already
insisted on the fact that in the striking difference between the sperm
cell of the male and the germ cell of the female we must seek for the
ultimate cause of the profound difference between the sexes. Those who
maintain the theory of the absolute identity of man and woman must
continually be reminded of this fact. Unquestionably the greater
motility of the male reproductive cell as compared with the more passive
quality of the female cell implies the existence of deeply founded
psychical differences; and the existence of these may be assumed with
more confidence since we know from experience to what a high degree the
finest psychical peculiarities of father and mother can be transmitted
by inheritance to the child.
=For this reason, all attempts, whether initiated by some natural
process or by some intentional guidance of the process of civilization,
towards the obliteration of the distinction between the specific
masculine and the specific feminine, must be regarded as futile, and as
antagonistic to the process of development.= The production of the
so-called “third sex” is unquestionably a step backwards. For bisexual
differentiation is an =advance= upon the more primitive form of sexual
differentiation in which both the male and the female sexual elements
were produced by a single individual (=hermaphroditism=). In the
phylogeny of the human species unilateral sexual reproduction gave place
to the bilateral type, the reproductive elements being formed within the
bodies of two =distinct= individuals--the sperm cells within the body of
the male, the germ cells within the body of the female. In this manner
originated the contrast between the individuals of the two sexes, or
bisexual differentiation, which, in the course of phylogenetic
development, has become continually more definite, more extensive, and
more characteristic, through the operation of the principle of =sexual
selection=; and thus by inheritance and adaptation the mental and
physical characteristics of sexuality, primitive and superadded, have
gradually become defined and fixed. In the higher ranks of the animal
kingdom and in the human species, this =heterosexuality= has, through
inheritance, become continually more sharply defined; but the traces of
the primitive hermaphroditic state have never been wholly obliterated.
Love in the human species is manifested by pairing. Such is the normal
condition, and the =only= condition in harmony with the progressive
tendency towards perfection. But remnants of hermaphroditism, of
bisexuality in a single individual, of the “third sex,” are to be found
in every human being, and are disclosed by embryology and comparative
anatomy in the form of vestiges of female reproductive organs in the
male and of male reproductive organs in the female. Herein exists an
indisputable proof of the originally hermaphrodite nature of the human
ancestry. But these female organs in the male body, and their converse,
the male organs in the female body, are =stunted=, are rudiments merely;
whereas in the course of evolution the masculine reproductive organs of
the male and the feminine reproductive organs of the female have been
more and more powerfully developed, and more and more sharply
differentiated in type, until they have come to constitute the
expression of the specific differences between man and woman. They alone
represent the more advanced stage. Moreover, these vestiges of an early
hermaphroditic condition are in the human species far less extensive
than in other mammals; and the sexual discrepancy in the human species,
as compared with the lower animals, becomes still more noticeable when
we take into account the fact that certain parts of the reproductive
system are peculiar to mankind, are =new acquisitions=, and, above all,
the hymen, which is non-existent even in the anthropoid apes.
The original purpose of the hymen, which unquestionably must at the time
of its appearance have represented an evolutionary advance, is still
undetermined. Metchnikoff has propounded an interesting hypothesis on
this subject. According to him, it is very probable that human beings,
during the earliest period of human history, began sexual relations at
an extremely youthful age, at a time when the external genital organs of
the boy were not yet fully developed. In such a case the hymen would not
only have been no hindrance to the act of copulation, but rather, by
narrowing the vaginal outlet, and thus accommodating its size to the
relatively too small penis of the male, would have rendered pleasure in
sexual intercourse possible. In such cases, moreover, the hymen would
not have been brutally lacerated, but gradually dilated. Laceration of
the hymen represents a later and secondary phenomenon.
It is a fact that, even at the present day, among many primitive races,
marriages commonly take place in childhood, and it is further true that
even in civilized races in a considerable number of cases (15 per cent.,
according to Budin) the hymen is not always lacerated during sexual
intercourse, but is retained; thus some support is given to
Metchnikoff’s hypothesis.
It is unquestionable that evolution and the progress of civilization
have resulted in an extremely marked differentiation between the two
sexes, and for this reason the formation of a so-called “third sex,” in
which these sexual differences are obscured, can only be regarded as a
markedly retrogressive step. Ernst von Wolzogen, in a well-known
romance, to which he gave the name of “The Third Sex,” described a kind
of barren, stunted woman, capable, however, of holding her own at work
in competition with men; but in our opinion such women represent merely
a =stage of transition= in the great battle of women for the
independent, free development of their =peculiar= personality. Such
types as these are certainly not the final goal of the woman’s movement;
they are caricatures, products of a false and extreme conception of
woman’s development. This “third sex,” which Schurtz very justly
compares to the stunted, barren workers among ants and bees, is
incapable of prolonged existence, and will give place to a new
generation of women, who, while fully retaining their specific feminine
peculiarities, will share with men the rights and duties of the great
work of civilization; and thus this work will unquestionably be enriched
by a number of new and fruitful elements.
It is indeed possible that this “third sex,” that hermaphrodites,
homosexual individuals, sexual “intermediate stages,” also play a
certain part in the great process of civilization. But their
significance is slight and limited, if for this reason alone because
from these individuals the possibility of transmission by inheritance of
valuable peculiarities is cut off, and hence the possibility of a future
perfectibility, of true “progress,” is excluded. There are =two= sexes
only on which every true advance in civilization depends--the genuine
man and the genuine woman. All other varieties are ultimately no more
than phantoms, monstrosities, vestiges of primitive sexual conditions.
Very ably has Mantegazza described the intimate relationship between
these dreams of the “third sex” and the fantastic aberration of the
sexual impulse. He writes:
“While the pathology of love recognizes in many sexual aberrations the
obscure traces of a general hermaphroditism, imagination, which works
faster than science, shows us the possibility that in more
complicated creations sexual differentiation might be more than
twofold, so that in such worlds sexual reproduction might be effected
by a more elaborate division of labour. Thus, in the cynical or
sceptical distinction between platonic, sexual, and licentious love,
we see the first traces of new and monstrous possibilities of sexual
union, on the one hand reflecting the sublimity of the supersensual,
and on the other more brutal than the most horrible sexual
aberration.”
In reality, it is only for normal heterosexual love between a normal man
and a normal woman that it is possible to find an unimpeachable
sanction. Only this love, continually more differentiated and more
individualized, will play a part in the future course of civilization.
Heterosexuality arises from the reciprocal attraction and the
coalescence of the reproductive cells of two individuals of distinct
sexes; it forms the foundation and constitutes the most important
element of the sexual relations of the higher animal world and of the
human species; and it obtains through inheritance continually a more
sharply defined expression. Since this fundamental phenomenon of the
sexual impulse has been transmitted from the most ancient and simplest
forms of the organic world and has been modified only in the direction
of heterosexuality, it has come to pass, as Ewald Hering says at the end
of his celebrated lecture on “Memory as a General Function of Organic
Matter,” that organic matter has the strongest memory of the impulse of
conjugation in its most ancient and most primitive form; thus this
impulse at the present day continues to dominate mankind as an intensely
powerful physical imperative, endowed with the strength of an elemental
force, which, notwithstanding the gradually higher development of the
brain, has remained during thousands of years undiminished in its
potency, and indeed by the accumulative influence extending through
thousands of generations has acquired a notable increase in intensity.
We must assume that for untold generations always those animals and men
have had the most numerous descendants in whom the sexual impulse was
the most powerful; this powerful impulse being inherited, was
transmitted once more to the next generation, and tended by natural
selection continually to increase.
This explanation of the indisputable gradual increase in the intensity
of the sexual impulse, first given by the moral philosopher Paul Rée, is
more illuminating than the theory propounded by Havelock Ellis of the
increase of the sexual impulse by civilization, which was long ago
maintained by Lucretius (“De Rerum Naturâ,” V. 1016). In support of this
latter theory, it is asserted that among savage people the genital
organs are less powerfully developed than among civilized races, but
this can by no means be regarded as an established fact. Civilization
has done no more than cause a fuller development of all sides of sexual
love by a multiplication of physical and psychical =stimuli=; but it
appears extremely doubtful if civilization itself is to be regarded as
the immediate causal influence in the increase of the intensity of the
sexual impulse.
* * * * *
Having studied the elementary phenomena of human love dependent upon the
phylogenetic history of the human race, namely the union of the male and
female reproductive cells, the question now arises as to the nature of
the =psychical= processes, the character of the =sensations= that
accompany this union of the sperm cells and the germ cells. What is the
most primitive =psychical elementary phenomenon= of love?
It is apparently that sensation in which the actual contact of the
psyche with the material occurs--an immediate sensation of the nature of
matter--namely, the =sense of smell=. The metaphysical significance of
the sense of smell has been aptly indicated by describing that sense as
the “sublimated thing-in-itself,” as a sense which, like no other sense,
allows us to enter immediately into the nature of matter; it is, in
fact, the sense of personality.
“Smell,” says Heinrich Steffens, “is the principal sense of the higher
animals; it represents for them their own inner world; it envelops
their existence. Upon smell, wherein sympathy and antipathy are
represented, is based the whole security of the higher animal
instinct; =for carnal desire is comprehended in this sense=....
Indeed, in sexual union the subjective sensation which is developed by
means of smell blends completely with the objective, and from the
monistic union of the two arises the intenser libido, wherein the
unfathomableness of the procreative force and the whole power of sex
are absorbed.”
Ernst Haeckel ascribes to the two sexual cells a kind of inferior
psychical activity; he believes that they experience a sensation of one
another’s proximity; and indeed it is probably a form of sensory
activity analogous to the sense of smell that draws them together. The
sensation of the two sexual cells, which Haeckel believes to be situated
especially in the cell nuclei, he denotes by the term “erotic
chemotropism.” He attributes it to an attraction of the nature of smell,
and considers that it represents the psychical quintessence, the
original being of love.
A later investigator, Eugen Kröner, holds the same view. In the
conjugation of two vorticellæ he recognizes the influence of the
chemically operative sensation of smell; to him smell is the most
important element in the sexual impulse of animals.
This theory is strongly supported, and indeed elevated to the rank of a
natural law, by the circumstance that in the higher animals the sense of
smell, in the course of phylogenetic development, has attained a
continually greater significance in relation to sexuality; and by the
fact that, according to the discovery of Zwaardemaker, there exists
widely diffused throughout Nature a =distinct group= of sexual odours,
the so-called =capryl odours=, which have a natural biological connexion
with the _vita sexualis._ These capryl odours, which already in plants
play a sexual part, are in animals and in the human species localized in
or near the genital organs (odoriferous glands of the beaver, the
musk-ox, etc., the secretions of the male foreskin and the female
vagina), or in other cases are found in the general secretions, such as
the sweat. Recently Gustav Klein has succeeded in proving that a
definite group of glands in the female genital organs (glandulæ
vestibulares majores, or glands of Bartholin) must be regarded as a
vestige from the time of periodic sexual excitement (rutting). At that
time in the human species, as now in the lower animals, the sexual
impulse was periodic in its activity, and the secretion of these
odoriferous glands of the human female then served as a means of
alluring members of the male sex. At the present time these glands have
for the most part lost their significance as specific stimuli. Now it is
rather the exhalation from the entire surface of the female body which
exercises the erotic influence. Cases in which such stimuli proceed
exclusively from the female genital organs are regarded by Klein as a
phylogenetic vestige of the primitive relations between the rutting
odours of the female and sexual excitement in the male. Friedrich S.
Krauss, in his “Anthropophyteia” (1904, vol. i., p. 224), reproduces a
Southern Slavonic story in which a man is described who obtained sexual
gratification only by enjoying the =natural= smell of the female genital
organs. The remarkable classification of Indian women according to the
various odours proceeding from their genital organs must not be
forgotten in this connexion.
That this primitive phenomenon of love has even to-day a certain
significance, although, in consequence of the enormous development of
the brain and the predominance of purely psychical elements in man, its
influence has been very notably diminished, is shown by the existing
physiological connexion proved by Fliess to exist between the nose and
the genital organs. On the inferior turbinate bones there exist certain
“genital areas,” which, under the influence of sexual stimulus and
excitement, as in coitus, during menstruation, etc., swell up. From
these areas it is also possible to influence directly certain conditions
of the genital organs.
It is noteworthy that civilization has to a large extent replaced the
natural sexual odours by artificial scents, so-called =perfumes=, whose
origin is partly due to the =imitation= or =accentuation= of the natural
odours, in part, however, and especially in recent times, to an
endeavour to =conceal= these natural odours, especially when the latter
are of a disagreeable character. For this reason, in addition to
penetrating perfumes, such as civet, ambergris, musk, etc., we have also
mild perfumes, for the most part vegetable in origin. The markedly
exciting influence of these artificial scents is employed especially by
women, above all by professional prostitutes, in order to excite men.[3]
Frequently also the simple perfume of flowers suffices for this purpose.
Krauss tells us that in the kolo-dance of the Southern Slavs the girls
fasten strong-scented flowers and sprigs in the front of their dress,
and thereby excite intense sexual desire in the young men. In the East
sexual stimulation by means of the sense of smell plays a far more
extensive rôle than in Europe.
In the human species, however, as a specific elementary phenomenon of
sexual reproduction, smell has long been thrust into the background by
the strong development of other senses, especially that of sight. This
fact is very clearly exhibited by the notable reduction which has
occurred in the size of the organ of smell. In man the frontal lobes of
the brain, the seat of the highest intellectual processes and of speech,
have taken the place of the olfactory lobes in the lower animals.
Besides, by means of clothing, the natural odours of men and women,
which previously had such marked sexual significance, have been rendered
almost imperceptible, and nowadays sexual stimulation may result merely
from the senses of touch and of sight, so that the hands and the lips
and the female breasts have been transformed into erotic organs.
Notwithstanding, however, the notable weakening of the sexual
significance of smell, this most primitive sense (actually associated,
as we have shown, with the activity of the germinal cells) will never
completely cease to influence the sexual life.
“Still, there always surrounds us a now gently moving and now stormy
sea of odours, whose waves without cessation arouse in us feelings of
sympathy or antipathy, and to the minutest movements of which we are
not wholly indifferent” (Havelock Ellis).
Inasmuch as we have pointed out as the single primæval basis, as the
most important elementary phenomenon, of human love, the conjugation of
the male sperm cell with the female ovum (dependent probably upon a
sensation analogous to that of smell), we denote this particular
phenomenon of sexuality as =primary=, and we separate all the other
phenomena as =secondary=, as more remote. Wilhelm Bölsche has also
expressed this difference by denoting the union of the two reproductive
cells as “=fusion-love=,” whilst all that has occurred later, in the
course of many thousands of years of evolution, and that has transformed
this primary process, by innumerable new influences, stimuli, and
perceptions, into the love of modern civilized man, he denotes by the
apt name of “=distance-love=.”
According to him,
“the ultimate act of love in a member of the most highly civilized
community assumes the form of a sudden withdrawal from the entire
world of surrounding artifacts, of alphabets, posts, telephones,
submarine cables, etc.... At this instant the principle of union is
once again victorious, as it were, in an ultimate posthumous vision in
a vital experience of a portion of primæval Nature, of the primæval
world, of an instant’s profoundest self-absorption into the great
mystery of the obscure original basis of Nature, to which neither time
nor old and new is known, but which is ever renewed in us in its
elemental force--the procreative principle. At this instant the loving
individual must return home to the heart of the all-mother--it is
useless to resist. It must draw from the fountain of youth--must
descend like Odin to the Norns, like Faust to the Mothers--=and there
all civilization is swallowed up; there cell body must join cell
body=, in order in the ardent embrace to reduce to a minimum the
distance which usually sunders such large bodies. Indeed, in reality
the sexual act goes further and deeper than this reduction of
separation to a minimum. Within the body of one of the partners of the
sexual act the ovum and the spermatozoon undergo an ultimate =perfect
fusion= of soul and body, in comparison with which even the closest
approximation of the great halves of the love partnership is no more
than a mere mechanical apposition. The ultimate aim of the loving
union is attained only in the coalescence of ovum and spermatozoon.”
To express the matter briefly, fusion-love fulfils the purpose of the
species, while distance-love subserves rather the purpose of the
individual. Thus the natural course of the development of love, which in
the next chapter we propose to follow further, affords already the proof
of the thesis propounded in the introduction regarding the duplicate
nature of human love.
[3] According to Laurent (“Morbid Love,” pp. 133, 134, Leipzig, 1895),
common prostitutes generally use musk; young working women, violet or
rose-water; ladies of the bourgeoisie, penetrating perfumes, such as
white heliotrope, jasmine, and ylang-ylang; women of the half-world,
finer perfumes, or such “as are complex, like their own mode of
life”--for example, lily-of-the-valley, or mignonette.
CHAPTER II
THE SECONDARY PHENOMENA OF LOVE (BRAIN AND SENSES)
“_From these considerations it follows that man, in the course of his
phylogenetic development extending through lengthy geological periods,
has lost numerous advantages; and the question arises whether, in
exchange for these, he may not also have gained certain other
advantages. Such must, indeed, have been the case if the human species
was to remain capable of survival. There has been a_ process of
exchange, _by means of which man has gained an equivalent for all the
qualities he has lost. And the gain consists in the_ unlimited
plasticity of his brain. _By this he is fully compensated for the loss
of the large and long series of advantages which his remote predecessors
possessed._”--R. WIEDERSHEIM.
CONTENTS OF CHAPTER II
The secondary phenomena of sexuality -- Their connexion with the
nervous system and the sense organs -- The brain as criterion of human
sexuality -- Its development proportional to the retrogression of
other parts -- Example of the organ of smell and of the mammary glands
-- Relative retrogression of the female clitoris -- Variation of the
female genital organs -- Reduction of the hairy covering of the skin
-- Theory regarding the origin of the comparative baldness of the
human species -- Assumed connexion with climate -- With dentition --
Influence of artificial clothing -- The hygienic and æsthetic
significance of the loss of hair -- The reason why the axillary and
pubic hair have been retained -- Sexual influence of the hair of these
regions and of the hair of woman’s head -- Gradual retrogression of
the male beard -- The change of bodily type under the influence of the
brain -- The way of the spirit in love -- The pure instinctive in the
sexuality of primitive man -- His lack of the idea, “love” -- Analogy
of this state among the lower classes of the present day --
Periodicity of the sexual impulse in the time of primitive man --
Periodicity amongst savage races of to-day -- The researches of Fliess
and Swoboda -- The twenty-three day “masculine” and the twenty-eight
day “feminine” periods -- Menstruation -- A peculiarity of the human
female -- The origin of enduring love in mankind -- Love rendered more
enduring by the spirit -- Kant’s views on the subject -- Hypothesis of
W. Rheinhard and Virey -- The complication of the sexual impulse
through sensory stimuli -- Buddha’s speech to the monks -- The
prepotency of the higher senses -- The sense of touch -- The skin as
an organ of voluptuous sensation -- Erogenic areas of skin -- The kiss
-- Its erotic significance -- An Arabian poet (Sheik Nefzawi) on this
subject -- Burdach’s definition of the kiss -- The kiss on the
boundary-line between erotism and actual sexual enjoyment -- The
origin of the kiss -- The primitive elements of contact, licking and
biting -- Its connexion with the nutritive impulse -- European origin
of the kiss of contact -- The smelling kiss of the Mongols -- The kiss
and sexuality -- Voltaire’s genito-labial nerve -- The sense of taste
and sexuality -- The preponderant importance of the higher senses in
the love of civilized man -- The beautiful explanation of Herder --
Liberation from the material in the higher senses -- The sense of
sight as the true æsthetic sense -- Beauty as the product of love --
Its perception by the sense of sight -- Rôle of the sense of hearing
in love -- The investigations of Darwin -- The voice as a sexual lure
-- The rhythmical repetition of alluring sounds -- Origin of song and
music -- Greater susceptibility of women to impressions received
through the sense of hearing -- The charm of woman’s voice -- An
experience of the natural philosopher Moreau.
CHAPTER II
As we have learnt in the first chapter, the primitive phenomenon of
sexual attraction and reproduction, the conjugation of the male and the
female germinal cells, persists unaltered in man as the most important
part of the act of procreation; but this process of “fusion-love”
derived by inheritance from unicellular organisms, is associated in man
with a number of new secondary physical and psychical phenomena of
sexuality. This inevitably results from the nature of the human organism
as a cell society, from the development of man as one of the order of
mammalia, and finally from man’s elevation above the other mammalia as a
being of enormously enhanced brain powers. The complex of these
secondary physical and psychical phenomena of love, dependent upon the
process of evolution, has, as we have already said, been denoted by W.
Bölsche by the apt name of “distance-love,” which he thus distinguishes
from the primary elemental phenomenon of “fusion-love.” These superadded
elements play an extremely important part in human civilization, and,
indeed, actually characterize that civilization which is in no way
dependent on the primitive qualities shared by man with plants and lower
animals.
This secondary sexuality of mankind is, in correspondence with the
differentiation of the various organs of his body, extremely
complicated, and it is by no means solely dependent upon the structure
of the special =reproductive= or =copulatory= organs; it is also
intimately connected with other parts of the body, and more especially
with the sense organs and the nervous system. Thus it has accommodated
itself to all the external influences to which the species has been
subjected in the long course of its development history. We may say that
the =criterion, the characteristic mark of distinction between the human
body and that of the lower animals, is also the distinctive differential
characteristic between human sexuality and that of the lower animals=.
And this criterion is the =brain=.
The present physical and mental constitution of man is the result of an
evolutionary process, of which the most marked characteristic has been a
continually more rapid increase in the size and complexity of the brain.
Phylogeny and ontogeny clearly demonstrate the evolution of the human
body from lower states to higher, the slow but sure improvement in the
direction of a continual enlargement and increasing convolution of the
brain, which has by no means yet attained finality, but which may be
expected to continue into the far-distant future; and associated with
this physical development will undoubtedly proceed an equally extensive
improvement in the quality of human consciousness.
This progressive development of the brain has resulted in a
retrogression and arrest of development of other parts and organs, and
among these some more or less closely associated with the sexual
functions, and originally of considerable importance. Gegenbaur, in his
“Anatomy,” and Wiedersheim, in his interesting work on “The Structure of
Man as Bearing Witness to his Past,” recognize in the unlimited
plasticity of the human brain the sole cause of the arrest of
development and retrogressive metamorphosis of many organs and functions
which persist in other members of the animal kingdom.
In the sexual life, also, in correspondence with this preponderating
development of the brain, purely psychical elements continually play a
larger part, whilst parts and functions at one time intimately related
to sexuality have undergone atrophy. Thus, as we have already pointed
out, the human organ of smell had unquestionably in earlier times much
greater significance in relation to the _vita sexualis_ than it has at
the present day. Wiedersheim shows that in the ancestors of the human
race this organ was much more extensively developed, and that it must
now be regarded as in a state of atrophy. The mammary glands, the
original function of which was perhaps the production of odoriferous
substances, but which later became devoted solely to the secretion of
milk, existed in our ancestors in a larger number than in the present
human race. This is clearly shown by the fact that the human embryo
normally exhibits a “hyperthelia,” an excess of breasts, of which,
however, two only normally undergo development; moreover, the breasts of
the male, which are now in a state of arrested development, were
formerly better developed, and served, like those of the female, the
purpose of nourishing the offspring. These facts are clearly explicable
on the assumption that at one time the number of offspring at a single
birth was considerable, and that in this way the preservation of the
species was favoured (Wiedersheim).
It is a very interesting fact that the principal “organ of
voluptuousness” in women, the clitoris, is notably diminished in size
absolutely and relatively as compared with the clitoris of apes. It
certainly no longer represents an organ so susceptible to voluptuous
stimulation and excitement as it was assumed to be by the older
physicians and physiologists; so that, for example, Van Swieten, the
celebrated body physician of the Empress Maria Theresa, recommended
_titillatio clitoridis_ as the most certain means of curing the sexual
insensibility of his royal patient.
Moreover, the common variations in the external configuration of the
female genital organs, which Rudolf Bergh has very fully and minutely
described in his “Symbolæ ad Cognitionem Genitalium Externorum
Femineorum,” are largely dependent on such arrests of development,
which, indeed, occur also in the male.
A very remarkable phenomenon in the course of human evolution has been
the =diminution in the hairy covering of the body=. As compared with the
other mammalia, especially those most nearly allied to man--the
anthropoid apes--man is relatively bald. This baldness has been
=gradually acquired=, and seems likely to progress further in the
future. Numerous hypotheses have been propounded regarding the purpose
and true cause of this progressive atrophy of the hairy covering which
originally extended over the entire surface of the body. The effect of
tropical climate will not suffice to account for the change, for in the
tropics the hairy covering is useful for a covering against the rays of
the sun--witness the thick hairy coat of the tropical apes. More apt is
the idea of sexual selection, advanced by Darwin in explanation of the
loss of hair. According to this theory, the comparatively balder women
were preferred by the men to those with a thicker covering of hair.
Helbig raises the objection that primitive man in sexual intercourse
would observe only the genital organs and the parts in their immediate
neighbourhood. Yet in this region the sexually mature woman has retained
a portion of the hairy covering of the body. We must therefore, in order
to rescue the idea of sexual selection as an explanation of the
increasing baldness of the human race, assume that primitive man had
cultivated æsthetic tastes, and was not an extremely sensual person, and
that in his choice of a partner he would be guided by the appearance of
the woman’s entire body. This, however, is a very questionable
assumption. Very doubtful also is the suggested connexion between
largely developed dentition and the baldness of the skin (Helbig). More
apposite is W. Bölsche’s view that the atrophy of the human hairy
covering is related to the adoption of an =artificial covering=. Since
that time the thick hairy covering of the skin was felt to be
burdensome, since it hindered perspiration beneath the clothing, and
also favoured the harbouring of parasites, fleas, lice, etc., which play
so large a part in the annoyance of all hair-covered mammals. In these
circumstances bareness of skin became an ideal to primitive man. By
rubbing away the hair beneath the clothes, by cutting it short, and by
pulling it out by the roots, an artificial baldness was produced; this
then became an ideal of beauty. Thus it happened in the choice of a
partner that those individuals less hairy than others were preferred,
and thus gradually by this process of sexual selection the race became
continually less hairy, until ultimately the relative baldness of the
present day was attained.
In certain parts of the body, especially in the armpits and in the
neighbourhood of the external genital organs, the thick hairy covering
has been retained. This may, perhaps, be dependent upon the fact that
from the axillary and pubic hair certain erotic stimuli proceed, more
especially certain odours. In fact, it is possible that the hair of
those regions in which strong-smelling secretions were produced have
played the part of scent-sprinklers, analogous to the “perfume brushes”
of butterflies.
In a similar way, the preservation of an exceptionally rich development
of the hair of a woman’s head may be explained by the fact that
therefrom erotically stimulating odours unquestionably proceed. This
circumstance has influenced sexual selection in the direction of the
preservation and continual increase in the length of the hair of a
woman’s head; while, in the opposite direction, and equally by the
process of sexual selection, the female body has been much more fully
deprived of hair than that of the male.
It seems, however, that this process of loss of hair is not yet
completed. The male beard has already ceased to play the part of a
sexual lure, which it formerly undoubtedly possessed. Schopenhauer’s
opinion, that with the advance of civilization the beard will disappear,
probably represents the truth; he regarded shaving as a sign of the
higher civilization. It is certainly a logical postulate of the natural
course of development.[4]
Havelock Ellis, in “Man and Woman,” comes to the conclusion that the
bodily development of our race is a progress in the direction of a
youthful type. This is merely another way of expressing the fact that
in the case of many organs and systems, and more especially in the case
of the hairy covering of the skin, an arrest of development has
occurred, and it is a recognition of the fact that the retrogressive
metamorphosis of these organs is a compensation for the dominating and
enormous development of the brain.
Parallel with this development of the brain there has occurred a
progressive development of sexuality from the lowest animal instinct to
the highest human “love.” The way of the spirit in love becomes
predominant _pari passu_ with the development of mankind in
civilization. There is a profound meaning in the saying of Schopenhauer
that the transformation of the sexual impulse into passionate love
represents the victory of the intelligence over the will. And when
another writer of genius has described the history of civilization as
the history of the progress of mankind from nearer to =more remote=,
more spiritual stimuli of pleasure, this is above all true of human
love.
In lower states of human love these spiritual elements are undoubtedly
wanting. Amongst primitive men the manifestations of sexuality can have
differed in no wise from those of the animals most nearly related to
them. Their love was still a pure animal instinct. The Asiatic myth
which divided the earliest periods of human history in this way,
asserting that the inhabitants of paradise loved for thousands of years
merely by means of glances, later by a kiss, by simple physical contact,
until ultimately they underwent a “fall” through adopting the debased
methods of common animal sexual indulgence--this infantile mythology
would be accurate enough if one inverted the series of stages in the
evolution of love.
This view is confirmed by the fact that, according to the most recent
investigation into the history of primitive man, it is extremely
probable that to palæolithic man of the earlier diluvial period the idea
of the spiritual was still completely unknown--that palæolithic man was,
in fact, purely a creature of impulse--an opinion already maintained by
Darwin in his work on the “Descent of Man.” In the sexual instinct,
above all, every dualistic division into physical and spiritual was
entirely foreign to primitive man. The more primitive the state of
civilization, the less is the idea “love” known, a fact first
established by Lubbock. Even at the present day, in regard to this
matter, there is a notable difference between the upper and the lower
classes in a European civilized community. For example, Elard Hugo
Meyer, in his excellent “Deutsche Volkskunde” (“German Folk-lore,” p.
152; Strasburg, 1898), states that from Eastern Friesland to the Alps
amongst the common people the word “love,” to us so indispensable and so
exalted, is entirely unknown; in its place words expressing rather the
sensual side of the impulse are employed.
Rousseau suggested that primitive man embraced primitive woman only in
the fugitive moments of domination by his instinctive impulse. It is no
doubt very probable that primæval man shared with other animals the
periodicity of the sexual impulse; this periodicity disappeared only in
the subsequent course of human development, and traces of it yet remain.
It is probable that this periodicity of the sexual impulse was
associated with variations in the supply of nutriment, and was thus, as
Darwin assumes, a kind of natural obstacle to too rapid an increase in
the population. Later, in consequence of an increase in individual
security, and of a more enduring supply of abundant nutriment, such
periodic rutting ceased to occur, or was preserved only in the form of
menstruation (ovulation) in women, in whom at this period there is a
perceptible increase in sexual excitability. =Among savage races this
periodicity of the sexual impulse, its increase at definite seasons of
the year, is still clearly manifested even in the male.= Heape and
Havelock Ellis have carefully studied this primitive phenomenon, and
have adduced numerous proofs of its truth.[5]
Only the human female experiences true “menstruation”; that is to say,
only in women is the maturation of the ovum accompanied by a monthly
discharge of blood from the genital passage. The so-called menstruation
of female apes is limited to a periodic swelling of the external
genital organs, with a mucous discharge therefrom. According to
Metchnikoff, the menstruation of apes constitutes the intermediate stage
between the rutting of the lower animals and the menstruation of the
human female. This latter is a new acquisition, the purpose of which is
perhaps the limitation of fertility and the prevention of the
excessively early marriage of girls.
With the advanced development of the brain, the old periodic rutting, of
which rudiments still persist, became more and more subordinate to the
conscious will, was transformed more and more into enduring love.
Charles Letourneau writes:
“If we go to the root of the matter, we find that human love is in its
essence merely the rutting season in a reasoning being; it increases
all the vital forces of the human being, just as rutting increases
those of the lower animals. If love apparently differs enormously from
rutting, this is merely due to the fact that the reproductive impulse,
the most primitive of all impulses, becomes in developed nerve centres
more diffuse in its sphere of operations, and thus in man awakens and
excites a whole province of psychical life which is entirely unknown
to the lower animals.”
Philosophers and scientific observers have defined the distinction
between human and animal love as consisting in the fact that man can
love at all times, the animal periodically only; but this distinction
certainly does not apply to the beginnings of human development; it
originates beyond question with the =first appearance of the spiritual
element in love=. This alone makes man capable of enduring love, this
alone frees him from dependence upon periodic rutting seasons. The
=prolongation= of love by the introduction of the spiritual element was
already pointed out by Kant, whose writings (especially the lesser ones)
are rich in valuable observations of a similar kind. In his treatise
published in 1786, “The Probable Beginning of Human History,” he says
regarding the sexual instinct:
“Reason, as soon as it had become active, did not delay to exert its
influence also in the sexual sphere. Man soon discovered that the
stimulus of sex, which in animals depended merely on a transient and
for the most part periodic impulse, was in his own case =capable of
prolongation, and indeed of increase, by the force of imagination=.
This influence works more moderately, it is true, but with more
persistence and more evenness the more the affair is withdrawn from
the dominion of the senses, so that the satiety produced by the
gratification of a purely animal passion is avoided.”
This important question regarding the origin of the love of human beings
as contrasted with the periodic instinct of the lower animals and
primitive man has hitherto, strangely enough, hardly received any
attention, notwithstanding the fact that it is one of the most important
evolutionary problems in the history of human civilization, and
represents to a certain extent the only problem in the primitive history
of love.
The =principal= cause of the perennial nature of human love, as
contrasted with the periodic character of the sexual impulse of the
lower animals, must, as Kant says, be sought in the appearance of these
psychical relations between the sexes. Hypotheses such as that put
forward by Dr. W. Rheinhard in his book, “Man considered as an Animal
Species, and his Impulses,” according to which the prolonged
=separation= of the sexes, consequent on the increased difficulty in the
provision of sufficient nutriment (more especially in the Ice Age), led
to an incomplete satisfaction of the sexual impulse during the rutting
season, and thus gave rise to an =enduring= sexual excitement, cannot be
treated seriously. The same author suggests that the excessive
=consumption of meat= of the Ice Age, owing to the absence of vegetable
food, was responsible for the stronger stimulation of the sexual
impulse, and for its prolongation beyond the rutting season.
Unquestionably Kant’s explanation is the only true one; it is the one
which Schiller had in his mind when in his essay on the connexion
between the animal and the spiritual nature of man, he spoke of the
happiness of the animals as of such a kind that
“it is dependent merely upon the periods of the organism, and these
are subject to chance, to blind hazard, because this happiness rests
solely on sensation.”
The sexual love of primitive man was, like this, purely instinctive and
impulsive.
For him, beginning, course, and end, of every love-process was “directly
=linear=, with no to-and-fro oscillations into the indefinite province
of the transcendental.” The need for love and the satisfaction of that
need were in primitive man entirely limited to the physical process of
sexual activity (L. Jacobowski, “The Beginnings of Poetry,” p. 84).
It was the interpenetration of the whole of sexuality with spiritual
elements which first interrupted this single line of sensation, making
in a sense two lines: hence arose the frequently unhappy dualism between
body and mind in our experience of love; and yet at the same time it was
the cause of the elevation of human love to purely =individual=
feelings, which, extending far beyond the purposes of reproduction,
subserved the spiritual demands of the loving individual himself.[6]
Natural science, and especially the doctrine of descent, have shown that
in the higher animal world, to which we have proved primitive man
belongs, a =complication= of the sexual impulse exists as compared to
this condition in lower forms; this complication consists mainly in the
intimate association of =sensory stimuli= with the sexual impulse. In a
speech to monks, reported in the Pali Canon, Buddha has well described
the sexual part played by the various senses:
“I do not know, young men, any other =form= which fetters the heart of
man like a woman’s form.
“A woman’s form, young men, fetters the heart of man.
“I do not know, young men, any other =voice= which fetters the heart
of man like the voice of woman.
“The voice of woman, young men, fetters the heart of man.
“I do not know, young men, any other =odour= which fetters the heart
of man like the odour of woman.
“The odour of woman, young men, fetters the heart of man.
“I do not know, young men, any other =taste= which fetters the heart
of man like the taste of woman.
“The taste of woman, young men, fetters the heart of man.
“I do not know, young men, any =touch= which fetters the heart of man
like the touch of woman.
“The touch of woman, young men, fetters the heart of man.”
Then there follows, in the same rhythmical form, an enumeration of the
sexual stimuli emanating from woman through eye, ear, smell, taste, and
touch.
Associated with the progress towards “love” of this sexual impulse
enriched by sensory stimuli was a =preponderance=, a prevalence, of
certain particular sensory stimuli. Herein are certainly to be found the
beginnings of a spiritualization of purely animal instincts and
impulses.
The most important part in the amatory life of man is played, even at
the present day, by the sense of touch, and by the two higher senses,
sight and hearing, these two latter containing so many spiritual
elements.
The =sense of touch= is more widely extended in space than the other
senses, and for this reason touch is quantitatively the most excitable
of the senses. The stimulation of the sensory nerves of the skin, the
enormous number of which suffices to explain the richness of sensation
through the skin, experienced as touch, tickling, or slight pain,
transmits very similar sensations to the voluptuous sensorium. The
relationship between these various modes of sensation is confirmed by
the fact that the terminals of the sensory nerves of the skin, the
so-called corpuscles of Vater or Pacini, closely resemble in structure
the corpuscles of Krause found on the glans penis and glans clitoridis,
on the prepuce of the clitoris, the labia majora, and on the papillæ of
the red margin of the lip. From this point of view, the entire skin may
be regarded as a huge organ of voluptuous sensation, of which the skin
of the external organs of conjugation is most strongly susceptible to
stimulation.
Mantegazza therefore describes sexual love as a higher form of tactile
sensation. In human beings of a baser disposition love is no more than a
touch. Between the chaste stroking of the hair and the violent storm of
the sexual orgasm there is a quantitative, but not a qualitative
difference. The sense of touch is a profoundly sexual sense, which at
the present day plays much the same part as was in primitive times
played by the sense of smell.
“The skin,” says Wilhelm Bölsche, “became the great procurer, the
dominant intermediary of love, for the multicellular animals, in which
complete conjugation of the cell bodies had become impossible, so that
their sexual gratification had to be obtained by distance-love, by
contact-love. Thus the skin was the primitive area of voluptuous
sensation, the arena of the supreme bodily triumph of this
distance-love.”
It has been well said that the first intentional touching of a part of
the skin of the loved one is already a half-sexual union; and this view
is confirmed by the fact that such intimate bodily contacts, even when
they occur between parts far distant from sexual organs, very speedily
lead to states of marked excitement of these organs. Quite rightly,
therefore, the pleasurable sensations aroused by means of cutaneous
sensibility are regarded by Magnus Hirschfeld as the stages of
transition along which the power of self-command and the capacity for
resisting the impulses arising out of the transformation of sensory
perceptions into movements and actions most commonly break down. He who
avoids these first contacts, best protects himself against the danger
of being overpowered by his sexual impulse, and of blindly following
where that impulse leads--if, for example, he wishes to avoid
intercourse with a person whom he suspects to be suffering from some
venereal disease.
Areas of skin more especially susceptible to sexual stimulation, the
so-called erogenic areas, are those parts of the body where skin and
mucous membrane meet--above all therefore the lips, but also the region
of the anus, the female genital organs, and the nipples of the female
breast. That in certain circumstances even the eye may be an erogenic
zone is shown by the remarkable observation of Dr. Emil Bock, that in
many female patients a gentle inunction of Pagenstecher’s ointment into
the eye gives rise to changes of countenance showing that a sexual
orgasm is occurring.
The contact of the lips in the =kiss= is one of the most powerful
stimuli of love.[7] An Arabian author of the sixteenth century (Sheikh
Nefzawi) in his work, “The Perfumed Garden,” an Arabian _ars amandi_,
alludes to this fact. He quotes the verses of an Arabian poet:
“When the heart burns with love,
It finds, alas, nowhere a cure;
No witch’s magic art
Will give the heart that for which it thirsts;
The working of no charm
Will perform the desired miracle;
And the most intimate embrace
Leaves the heart cold and unsatisfied--
If the rapture of the kiss is wanting.”
The physiologist Burdach, influenced by the then dominant natural
philosophy of Schelling, defined the kiss as “the symbol of the union of
souls,” analogous to “the galvanic contact between a positively and a
negatively electrified body; it increases sexual polarity, permeates the
entire body, and if impure transfers sin from one individual to the
other.” Goethe has very perspicuously described sexual union in a kiss:
“Eagerly she sucks the flames of his mouth:
Each is conscious only of the other.”
And Byron writes:
“A long, long kiss, a kiss of youth and love,
And beauty, all concentrating like rays
Into one focus kindled from above;
Such kisses as belong to early days,
Where heart and soul and sense in concert move,
And the blood’s lava, and the pulse a blaze,
Each kiss a heart-quake--for a kiss’s strength,
I think it must be reckoned by its length.”
It is therefore a true saying, that a woman who permits a man to kiss
her will ultimately grant him complete possession.[8] Moreover, by the
majority of finely sensitive women the kiss is valued just as highly as
the last favour.[9]
The problem of the =origin= of the kiss, which Scheffel, in his book
(“Trompeter von Säckingen”), has treated in humorous verse, has recently
been investigated by the methods of natural science. The lip kiss is
peculiar to man and in him the impulse to kiss is not innate, but has
been gradually developed, and the kiss has only acquired by degrees a
relation to the sexual sphere.
Havelock Ellis has recently made an interesting investigation regarding
the origin of the kiss, and has proved that the love kiss has developed
from the primitive maternal kiss and from the sucking of the infant at
the maternal breast,[10] which are customary in regions where the sexual
kiss is unknown. Both the sense of touch and the sense of smell play a
part in this primitive kiss, and to simple contact primitive man
superadded both licking and biting. This primitive physiological sadism
of the biting kiss was probably inherited from the lower animals, which
when copulating often bite one another (Kleist in “Penthesilea” writes
“Küsse”--kissing--rhymes with “Bisse”--biting). Earlier authors--as, for
example, Mohnike, in his admirable essay on the sexual instinct--have
inferred from the existence of these passionate accompaniments of the
kiss that the latter has an intimate connexion with the nutritive
impulse. We have indeed the familiar expression, “I could eat you for
love.” Indeed, according to Mohnike, the frenzy of the wild kisses of
passionate love may actually lead to anthropophagy, as in a case
reported by Metzger, in which a young man on his wedding night actually
bit and began to devour his wife. Although in this case we doubtless
have to do with an insane individual, such sadistic feelings in a lesser
degree are so often observed in association with kissing that they may
be regarded as physiological.[11]
In the novel “Hunger,” by Knut Hamsun, the author describes a peculiar
relationship between hunger and the _libido sexualis_. Georg Lomer also,
in the beginning of his thoughtful work, “Love and Psychosis”
(Wiesbaden, 1907), expresses the opinion that hunger and love are not
opposites, but that one is rather the completion, the larval state, or
the sublimation, of the other. In certain species of spiders the male
runs the danger, when performing his share in sexual congress, of being
actually devoured by the stronger female.
The kiss by contact between the lips or neighbouring parts of the skin
is of European origin, and even here is a comparatively recent practice,
for the ancients very rarely allude to it. Its erotic significance was
early pointed out by Indian, Oriental, and Roman poets. Amongst the
Mongol races the so-called olfactory kiss (“smell-kiss”) is in much more
common use. In this the nose is apposed to the cheek of the beloved
person, and the expired air and the odour arising from the cheek are
inhaled.
With the diffusion of European civilization, the European kiss of
contact has also been diffused. It is no longer possible to determine
whether the peculiar connexion between the lips and the genital organs,
as manifested for example by the growth of hair on the upper lip at
puberty in the male sex, and also by the well-known thick “sensual” lips
often seen in individuals with exceptionally powerful sexual impulses,
is originally primary, or merely a secondary result of the employment of
the lips in a sexual caress.[12]
To our consideration of the kiss we may naturally append a few remarks
on the rôle of the =sense of taste= in human love. Inasmuch as taste is
almost invariably closely connected with smell, we are rarely able to
prove in an individual case whether an impression of taste or an
impression of smell more powerfully affects the _vita sexualis_. In
kissing, an unconscious tasting of the beloved person seems often to
play a part; and as regards the kissing of other parts of the body,
especially the genital organs, at the acme of sexual excitement this
undoubtedly often occurs. In Norwegian folk-tales, and in a South
Hungarian song published by Friedrich S. Krauss, this tasting of the
woman is very realistically described. The taste for sweets has also
been largely associated with sexuality. Children who are fond of sweets,
who have, as it is called, a sweet tooth, are also sensually disposed,
sexually more excitable, and more inclined to the practice of onanism,
than other children. The sensory impulses have therefore been classified
as the hunger impulse and the sexual impulse respectively. A certain
amount of truth appears to lie in these observations.
Much greater influence than these lower senses possess is exerted in the
sexual sphere on modern civilized man by the higher, truly
=intellectual= senses, =sight= and =hearing=. With the adoption of the
upright posture they gained an advantage over the sense of smell and
taste.
In his work “Ideas Concerning the Philosophy of Human History” Herder
writes:
“In the beginning all the senses of man had but a small area of
action, and =the lower senses were more active than the higher=. We
see this among savages of the present day: smell and taste are their
guides, as they are in the case of the lower animals. But when man is
raised above the earth and the undergrowth, smell is no longer in
command, but the eye: it has a wider kingdom, and accustoms itself
from early childhood to the finest geometry of lines and colours. The
ear, deeply placed beneath the projecting skull, has closer access to
the inner chamber for the collection of ideas, whilst in the lower
animals the ear stands upright, and in many is so formed as to point
in the direction of the sound.”
Smell, taste, and even touch, have but little æsthetic value as compared
with the two higher senses, because in the former the material
preponderates too greatly, and because they are more closely related
with the pure animal impulses than are sight and hearing. Johannes
Volkelt, in his valuable work “Æsthetics,” has carried on an interesting
investigation of this question, and comes to the conclusion that in
sight and hearing perception proceeds without any trace of the material;
in touch and taste, on the other hand, the material enormously
predominates, whilst smell stands between. Schiller wrote:
“In the case of the eye and the ear the surrounding matter is rejected
by the senses; for this reason, these two senses give the freest
æsthetic enjoyment unalloyed with animal lust.”
The sense of sight is a true æsthetic sense in relation to the _vita
sexualis_; it is the first messenger of love. By means of this sense,
colour and form become sexual stimuli: by the sense of sight the entire
impression of the beloved personality is first conveyed; sympathy and
sexual attraction are almost always at first dependent upon sight. In
regard to love’s choice, sight is unquestionably the sense of the
greatest importance.
According to researches guided by the light of the modern doctrine of
evolution, we can no longer doubt that the beauty of the living world is
intimately connected with the sexual life, and is indeed by this first
called into being. All beauty is, to use the words of Darwin and P. J.
Möbius, “love become capable of perception,” and, let us ourselves add,
love become capable of perception by means of the sense of sight. The
figure, the carriage, the gait, the clothing, the adornment, the
observation of the beauties of the various parts of the body of the
beloved person--all these impressions, received by means of the sense of
sight, have the most powerful erotic influence.
Havelock Ellis also comes to the conclusion that for mankind the ideal
of a suitable love-partner is based far more upon the =data of the sense
of sight= than upon those of touch, smell, and hearing.
However, in addition to the sense of sight, the sense of hearing plays a
part of considerable importance in the amatory life of mankind. A
sufficient indication of this fact is given by the change occurring in a
man’s voice at the time of puberty. Darwin’s classical investigations
prove beyond a possibility of doubt the intimate relationship between
the voice and sexual life. The masculine voice, especially, has a
sexually stimulating effect upon woman; but the converse influence of a
woman’s voice upon man may also be observed. In the other mammalia, it
is especially in the rutting season that the voice is used as a means of
sexual allurement. The repetition of this vocal lure at measured
intervals gives rise to rhythm and song. The rhythmical repetition of
the same tone possesses something highly suggestive, fascinating, and so
gives rise to sexual attraction and charm in the most powerful manner.
Here lies the origin of the profound erotic influence of singing and
music. Darwin assumes that the early progenitors of mankind, before they
had acquired the faculty of expressing their mutual love in articulate
speech, used to charm one another by musical tones and rhythms. Woman
is far more susceptible than man to the sexual influence of singing or
music, but man himself is by no means indifferent to the charms of the
beautiful feminine voice. The soft tones of a woman’s voice are, for
many men, the first enthralling disclosure of woman’s nature. The French
physician and natural philosopher Moreau relates that he was once
compelled to renounce the pleasure of seeing the performance of a
beautiful actress, for only thus could he overcome a violent outburst of
sexual passion which was evoked in him by the mere stimulus of her
voice.
[4] If at the present day an inquiry were instituted among the
cultured women of European and Anglo-American descent, whether bearded
or beardless men more nearly corresponded to their ideal of beauty,
there can be little doubt that the majority--perhaps a very large
majority--would declare against a full beard.
[5] Recently, apart from sexual periodicity, a general periodicity of
vital manifestations, more especially of the psychical phenomena
associated with sexuality, has been proved to exist in both sexes. In
a work that attracted much attention--“The Course of Life: Elements of
Exact Biology” (Vienna, 1905)--Wilhelm Fliess proved the occurrence in
the human species of a twenty-three day “masculine,” and a
twenty-eight day “feminine” period. Not merely do physical phenomena
recur quite spontaneously at intervals of twenty-three and
twenty-eight days respectively, but the same is true of perceptions,
feelings, and voluntary impulses. Hermann Swoboda, a thoughtful
supporter of Fliess’s theory, has treated this question in two
works--“The Periods of the Human Organism in their Psychological and
Biological Significance” (Leipzig and Vienna, 1904), and “Studies in
the Elements of Psychology” (Leipzig and Vienna, 1905). In these he
has described also twenty-three-hour and eighteen-hour vital
undulations in human beings, and has discussed the significance of
this periodicity to psychology. These researches of Fliess and Swoboda
need to be confirmed by other investigators before they can be
regarded as definite additions to our scientific knowledge. In this
connexion also the older work of Carl Reinl--“Undulatory Movements of
the Vital Processes in Woman” (Leipzig, 1884)--may be consulted. See
also Van de Velde’s “Ovarian Functions, Undulatory Movement, and
Menstrual Hæmorrhage” (Jena, 1905).
[6] Virey likewise explains the enduring nature of human love as
dependent upon an excess of potent nutritive material, whereas the
poor savages of Northern Europe and America, who must often go hungry,
really experience no more than an instant of sexual pleasure, just
like the wild animals, who rut only at certain distinct seasons. For
the same reason, our domestic animals, which have a superfluous supply
of nutriment, copulate far more frequently. And in our own case, the
incessant intimate association of the sexes in our domestic life is a
continued source of ever-renewed sexual needs, even contrary to our
own will. The assumption of the =upright posture= by man, which is so
intimately connected with the preponderance of the human brain, is
also regarded by Virey as “an enduring cause of sexual excitement.”
_Cf._ J. J. Virey, “Das Weib” (“Woman”), p. 301; Leipzig, 1827.
[7] Recently Gualino [“Il Riflesso Sessuale nell’ Eccitamento alle
Labbra” (“The Sexual Reflex resulting from the Stimulation of the
Lips”), published in the Italian “Archives of Psychiatry,” 1904, p.
341 _et seq._] by mechanical stimulation of the red parts of the lips,
has produced erotic ideas and congestion of the genital organs, and
this proves that the lips are an erogenic zone. Compare also the
interesting remarks of Professor Petermann and Dr. Näcke on the origin
of the kiss, in the German “Archives of Criminal Anthropology,” 1904,
vol. xvi., pp. 356, 357.
[8] A kiss is on the boundary-line between erotism and sexual
enjoyment. Bölsche calls it the true transitional form between
fusion-love and distance-love. At the instant of the kiss the distance
between the two lovers is certainly reduced to a minimum; the
distance-love, therefore, is on the point of becoming fusion-love. On
the other hand, however, the kiss is still simply tactile contact, and
contact of the heads only, the actual seat in mankind of the sentiment
of distance-love. The kiss represents a yearning for complete
fusion-love, and yet is at the same time a symbol of purely spiritual
distance-love.
[9] Especially in France is this the case. Madame Adam describes very
tastefully this feeling of loss of virtue after granting a kiss.
[10] _Cf._ also J. Librowicz, “The Kiss and Kissing,” p. 22 (Hamburg,
1877).
[11] It is interesting to observe that the Chinese regard the European
kiss as a sign of cannibalism [d’Enjoy, “Le Baiser en Europe et en
Chine” (“The Kiss in Europe and in China”), _Bulletin de la Société
d’Anthropologie_, Paris, 1897, No. 2.]
[12] We can allude only in passing to the celebrated genito-labial
nerve of Voltaire.
CHAPTER III
THE SECONDARY PHENOMENA OF HUMAN LOVE (REPRODUCTIVE ORGANS, SEXUAL
IMPULSE, SEXUAL ACT)
“_Sexual passion is a matter of universal experience; and speaking
broadly and generally, we may say it is a matter on which it is quite
desirable that every adult at some time or other should have actual
experience._”--EDWARD CARPENTER.
CONTENTS OF CHAPTER III
Origin and purpose of the reproductive organs -- Progressive
differentiation of these organs -- Original identity of their
rudiments in the two sexes -- Weininger’s theory of the intermixture
of the sexual elements -- This theory anticipated by Heinse --
Bisexuality -- The actual significance of bisexuality trifling --
Phylogenetic explanation of the organs of sexual congress -- Bölsche’s
three problems -- The “aperture-problem” -- Connexion between the
genital aperture and the urinary passage -- Between the genital
aperture and the anus -- Significance in relation to certain sexual
aberrations -- The “member-problem” -- Earlier modes of fixation
during coitus -- Sucking and biting -- The action of the limbs (the
embrace) -- The penis -- Its various forms -- The penis-bone -- The
free character of the human penis -- The descent of the testicles --
The feminine rudiment of the penis -- Its original function rendered
superfluous by the further evolution of the sexual orifice --
Transformation into the clitoris and the labia minora -- The
“libido-problem” -- Voluptuousness a phenomenon of distance-love --
Questionable specificity of voluptuousness -- Theory of the “sexual
sense” and of the “sexual cells” -- Relations of voluptuousness to
tickling and to painful sensations -- A special variety of contact
stimuli -- Localization to the genital organs -- The sexual impulse --
Relative independence of the impulse from the reproductive glands --
Genesis of sexual excitement -- Stage of prelibido (sexual tension) --
Terminal libido (sexual gratification) -- Symptoms and early
appearance of prelibido -- Causes of sexual tension -- Freud’s
chemical theory of sexual tension -- The act of sexual intercourse --
Roubaud’s description of coitus -- Demeanour of woman in coitus --
Magendie on this subject -- Dr. Theopold’s observations --
Physiological phenomena associated with coitus -- Sadistic and
masochistic elements -- The normal position during sexual intercourse
-- Figuræ Veneris -- Significance of the normal position in relation
to civilization.
CHAPTER III
As the progressive evolution of the multicellular organism continued,
and there occurred an increasing differentiation of the individual
portions of the body, it became necessary that the very simple process
of reproduction of the unicellular organism (by simple cell-division or
by conjugation) should, in the multicellular organisms of the metazoa,
be ensured and facilitated by the development of new apparatus. This was
all the more necessary because, owing to the differentiation of the
other organs, the originally independent reproductive elements became
more and more dependent upon the parent organism, and lost their former
capacity for obtaining nourishment by means of their own activity. Hence
it became necessary that the period of time elapsing between the moment
when the reproductive cells were freed from the parent organism and the
moment in which they coalesced to form a new individual should be
shortened to a minimum. This purpose is subserved by apparatus which
renders possible the =secure= and =rapid= coalescence of the two
reproductive elements, having the form of special =excretory canals=
with contractile walls, through which the two sexual elements pass.
These are the “=copulatory organs=,” by means of which the distance
between the two loving individuals is abridged. According to the
exhaustive investigations of Ferdinand Simon, the perfection and
differentiation of these conducting canals proceeds _pari passu_ with
the higher development of the organism.
Simultaneously therewith proceeds the differentiation of the proper
internal reproductive organs, the rudiments of which are =identical= in
the two sexes. A portion of these primitively identical structures
undergoes further development in the male, another portion undergoes
further development in the female, whilst in both sexes rudiments of the
earlier condition are retained, and these bear witness to the primitive
state in which =both= reproductive glands were present in a single
individual (hermaphroditism). In this sense Weininger’s theory
applies--viz., that there is no absolutely male and no absolutely female
individual, that in every man there is something of woman, and in every
woman something of man, and that between the two various transitional
forms, sexual “intermediate stages,” exist. Therefore, according to this
view, every individual has in his composition so many fractions “man”
and so many fractions “woman,” and according to the preponderance of
one set of elements or the other, he must be assigned to one or the
other sex. This theory, which Weininger regards as his own discovery,
=is by no means new=, and already finds a place in Heinse’s
“Ardinghello,” where we read:
“I find it therefore necessary to assume the existence in Nature of
masculine and feminine elements. =That man is nearest perfection who
is composed entirely of masculine elements, and that woman perhaps is
nearest perfection who contains only so many feminine elements as to
be able to remain woman; whilst that man is the worst who contains
only so many masculine elements as to qualify for the title of man.=”
Magnus Hirschfeld, to whom this noteworthy passage in Heinse’s book
appears to be unknown, has recently, in his valuable monographs, “Sexual
Stages of Transition” (Leipzig, 1905) and “The Nature of Love” (Leipzig,
1906), thoroughly investigated these relations, and quotes, among
others, sayings of Darwin and Weismann, according to which the latent
presence of opposite sexual characters in every sexually differentiated
bion must be regarded as a normal arrangement. Unquestionably the widely
diffused phenomenon of “psychical hermaphroditism,” or “spiritual
bisexuality,” is connected with the physical facts just enumerated, and
provides us with the key for the understanding of the nature of
homosexuality. Both these states--the physical and the mental--may be
referred to primitive conditions of sexuality. They cannot play any
serious part in the future course of human evolution, of which the
progressive differentiation of the sexes is so marked a characteristic.
In contrast with this differentiation, these rudimentary sexual
conditions are practically devoid of significance. Suggestion, indeed,
the influence of momentary tendencies of the time and of transient
mental states, may temporarily deceive us. And when, for example,
Hirschfeld maintains that in the central nervous system of women the
more masculine, rational qualities, and in the central nervous system of
men the more feminine, emotional qualities, are respectively on the
increase, we must answer, in the first place, that this is not generally
true, and, in the second place, that, in so far as it is true, it is a
passing phenomenon, which has already provoked a powerful reaction in
the =opposite= direction.[13] The exuviæ of a dead condition cannot
again be vitalized.
The original purpose of the organs of sexual congress is, then, to
safeguard and to facilitate, in the more complicated conditions peculiar
to multicellular organisms, the conjugation of the two reproductive
cells. They do not exist, as Eduard von Hartmann assumes, as a mere lure
to voluptuousness, to induce man to continue the practice of sexual
congress, purely instinctive in his animal ancestors, but now endangered
by the development of the higher type of consciousness. For animals
without organs of sexual congress also experience a voluptuous sensation
at the instant of the sexual orgasm and of procreation.
The history of evolution alone solves the riddle of the origin of the
organs of sexual congress, and renders their purpose clear to us. In a
most ingenious manner, W. Bölsche distinguishes three problems in this
history of the genital organs: the “=aperture-problem=,” the
“=member-problem=,” and the “=libido-problem=.”
The first problem relates to the character and the position of the two
apertures from which the sexual products, the reproductive cells, issue;
the second relates to the exact mutual adaptation of the male and the
female reproductive apertures; the third relates to the impulse to the
intimate apposition of the genital apertures in consequence of a
powerful nervous stimulus.
The most remarkable fact that we encounter in our consideration of the
first problem--the “aperture-problem”--is the intimate association
between the sexual aperture and the excretory canal of the urinary
apparatus both in woman and in man--in the latter, indeed, the
association is more pronounced. There seems to be a sort of parsimony on
the part of Nature to combine so closely these two excretory tubes of
the urine and of the products of sexual activity. Phylogenetically,
indeed, the reproductive products originally passed with the urine
freely into the open, and it was there that their conjugation took
place. Among certain worms still existing at the present day we find
this “urine-love.” Later, the genital canal became separated from the
urinary canal, but the two tubes remained partly united at their
outlets, opening side by side at the same part of the body. In man,
indeed, the urethra still subserves the double purpose of the excretion
of urine and the emission of semen. In woman the two excretory apertures
are distinct, but they open in close proximity into the genital fissure
between the thighs.
The intimate connexion which thus obtains between the urinary and the
reproductive organs is not without significance for the understanding of
certain aberrations of the _libido sexualis_. The same is true of the
relations between the orifice of the genital passage and the similarly
adjacent aperture of the large intestine, the anus. “Anus,” or, better,
“cloaca love,” plays a part, indeed, in many fishes, amphibia, and
reptiles; in these the act of procreation and the excretion of urine and
fæces all take place by way of the cloaca. Among the mammals, at an
early stage of phylogenetic development the intestine became completely
separated from the sexual rudiment and the sexual excretory passages;
and it is only in the proximity of the respective orifices that we find
an indication of the primitive association. The act of pæderasty reminds
us of the same fact.
The “aperture-problem” itself leads us, in the course of progressive
development, to the “member-problem”--that is to say, to the problem of
the more accurate apposition of the two reproductive apertures. The
penis, by its introduction into the body of a member of the opposite
sex, acts as a means for the shortening of distance-love; it serves for
the fixation, for the clamping together, of the copulating pair, which
in earlier stages of animal life was effected by sucking and biting; for
example, in birds, who for the most part lack an actual penis, the cock
holds the hen firmly with his beak during intercourse, and the sucking
and biting which often occur in human beings in the sexual act persist
as a reminiscence of these relations. In various vertebrates other means
of fixation are employed: by the shape of fins, of arms, or of legs, a
close “embrace” is rendered possible; finally, the evolution of a
special member for sexual purposes closed the long series of means of
ensuring union. Originally no more than a peg or a spine, in man the
penis is first developed into the form of an absolutely free limb. Dogs,
beasts of prey, rodents, bats, and apes, have a strong bone in the
organ, the so-called “penis-bone.” In man this bone is lacking; the
penis has become entirely free. W. Bölsche writes:
“In relation to the large, heavy, massive trunk and thighs, the
sharply individualized, independent, mobile penis appears as a kind of
spiritualized central point; as it were, a finger or a small third
hand to the trunk, appearing to the eye to stand in rhythmical
relation with the hands, right and left.”
In phylogenetic parallelism with the development of the penis, proceeds
(from the marsupials upwards) the _descensus testiculorum_, the descent
of the male reproductive glands, the testicles, until they attain their
final position in the scrotum, beneath the penis. Here also we can
recognize the principle of “limb-mobility,” mentally refined mobility.
In the clitoris woman also possesses a rudiment of a primitive penis.
By the apposition of the two limbs, a more complete and rapid
conjunction of the reciprocal sexual products must have been effected.
But the further development of the large sexual aperture of the female
checked the progressive development of this primitive penis, made it to
some extent superfluous, since now, by the adaptation of the male penis
to the female sexual aperture, a sufficient internal fixation in the act
of copulation was rendered possible. Thus the female penis came to
subserve other purposes: a portion of it formed the labia minora;
another portion, the upper, the clitoris, the name of which sufficiently
indicates the fact that, like the penis of the male, its function is
connected with the voluptuous sense.
This leads us to the third and last problem, the “libido-problem.” In
the human species voluptuous pleasure is almost completely divorced from
the process of “fusion-love,” the coalescence of spermatozoon and ovum,
and has for the most part become a phenomenon of “distance-love.” It
appears extremely doubtful if there is anything specific about the
voluptuous sensation--whether there is, in fact, a special “sexual
sense.” Magnus Hirschfeld assumes the existence of peculiar “sexual
cells,” of receptive areas for sexual stimuli, furnished with a sensory
substance endowed with a peculiar specific sensibility. He regards love
and the sexual impulse as “a molecular movement or force of a quite
specific quality, streaming through the nervous system,” and accompanied
by a quite peculiar sensation, or pleasure-tone, arising from a
condition of excitement of the sexual cells. But, as we have already
pointed out, the voluptuous sensation is merely a special case of
general cutaneous sensibility; it is very closely allied with the
cutaneous sensation of tickling; properly speaking, it is no more than
an =excessively powerful tickling=.[14] It has also intimate relations
with the sensation of pain.[15] The structure and position of the
nerve-terminal apparatus of the genital organs, by means of which
voluptuous pleasure is rendered possible, exhibit great similarity with
the touch corpuscles and sensory end-organs of other parts of the skin.
In the sexual orgasm the general cutaneous sensation increases to so
high a degree of intensity, becomes so powerful, that for an instant
=consciousness= is actually lost. The association of a momentary loss of
consciousness with the acme of sensation indicates the summit of sexual
pleasure--it is an abandonment, a dissolution, of individual
personality.
Voluptuous pleasure plays its part in the human species entirely in the
sphere of distance-love. Bölsche has very beautifully described its
significance in this relation:
“All-embracing in its path towards the attainment of its final aim is
the love-life also of the great cell societies, such as you yourself
are, such as I myself am, such as your beloved is. These higher, more
advanced individuals saw one another, approached one another, heard
one another, perceived one another through a hundred external media;
they became spiritually fused, and attained a condition of wonderful
harmony--their principal body walls came at length into immediate
contact--they pressed one another’s hands, they embraced one another,
kissed one another--they drew ever closer and closer together; to a
certain extent the body of one penetrated the body of the other. In
all this, =their= love undertook the =whole= affair, undertook it a
thousand times more effectually than the individual cells seeking
conjunction could ever have done; undertook it for the sake of the
reproductive cells hidden deep within their bodies. All the
pleasurable and painful feelings of love undulated and surged for so
long a time throughout the entire organism with intense force; these
feelings agitated the entire superior, comprehensive, individual
personality, searched its every depth with stormy emotions of desire,
complaint, and exultation.
“But at a precise instant this all came to a halt. The seminal cells
were ejaculated; one of them conjugated with the ovum; the hidden
inward life of a tiny separate organism began within the body of one
of the over-individuals. The last separation was bridged, and the true
cell-fusion took place. But when this happened, the immediate
relationship with the love-life of the great individual man and woman
was already completely severed. The bodily act of love was already
long at an end; its increase to a climax and its fulfilment had long
passed by.
“The instant of supreme voluptuous pleasure, which in the case of
unicellular beings naturally occurs at the moment of complete
coalescence, must in the case of the multicellular organisms just as
naturally be =transferred= to another stage, as it were, in the great
path of love.
“To an earlier stage.
“To that stage of distance-love which is =nearest= to the true act of
fusion of the reproductive elements. To the farthest point, that is to
say, attained by the great containers of the genuine unicellular
sexual elements (themselves capable of the act of ultimate
coalescence)--the farthest point =attained= by the multicellular
over-individuals.”
This farthest point is an =act of contact=.[16] We have already learnt
to regard the skin as a projection of the nervous system, and we have
come to understand the significance of the skin in the sphere of
sexuality. The other senses which have arisen from the skin must also be
taken into account in this matter. In the genital organs, this touch
stimulus assumes a quite peculiar character; it gives rise here to the
proper voluptuous sensation which is associated with the discharge of
the reproductive products. In man this association is most distinctly
manifest. The instant of most intense sexual pleasure coincides with
ejaculation, with the expulsion of the semen. The character of this
voluptuous sensation can hardly be defined; in part, it is like an
intense tickling sensation, but, on the other hand, it has an
unmistakable relationship to pain. Later, in another connexion, we shall
consider this interesting point at greater length. Not inaptly the
sexual act has also been compared with sneezing; the preliminary
tickling sensation, with the subsequent discharge of nervous tension, in
the form of a sneeze, have, in fact, a notable similarity with the
processes occurring in the sexual act.
The sexual act depends upon the occurrence of certain stimuli which are
connected with the complete development of the internal and external
genital organs and of the reproductive glands. The time when this
development occurs in man and woman is known as =puberty=. The sum of
these stimuli is known as the “=sexual impulse=.” Whereas in the lower
animals the sexual impulse is for the most part connected with the
activity of the reproductive glands, in the human species, in
association with the preponderating significance of the brain, it has
attained a relative independence of the reproductive glands; whilst the
mind has come to influence the sexual impulse very powerfully. Generally
speaking, sexual excitement is produced in three ways: first, by the
activity of the reproductive glands; secondly, by peripheral excitement
derived from the so-called “erogenic” areas; and thirdly, by central
psychical influences. S. Freud has recently studied the relations
between these three causes of sexual excitement, of the sexual impulse,
and has very properly distinguished two stages--the stage of
“=prelibido=” (sexual desire), and the stage of the proper sexual
“=libido=” (sexual gratification).
The stage of prelibido has distinctly the character of tension; the
stage of libido, the character of relief. The feeling of tension during
the prelibido finds expression mentally as well as physically by a
series of changes in the genital organs. The tension is further
increased by the stimulation of the various erogenic zones. If this
prelibido increases beyond a certain degree, the characteristic
potential energy of sexual tension is transformed into the relief-giving
kinetic energy of the terminal libido, during which the evacuation of
the reproductive products occurs.
Prelibido, which is especially characterized by engorgement, swelling,
and erection of the corpora cavernosa of the male and female
reproductive organs, occurring as a reflex from the spinal cord, may be
experienced long before puberty; it is much more independent of
processes occurring in the reproductive glands than is the terminal
libido, or sexual gratification, which in the male accompanies
ejaculation of the semen, and is associated with conditions attained
only at puberty.
The actual origin of the sexual tension which ultimately leads to
ejaculation is still obscure; it seems, at first sight, probable that in
the male this sensation is connected with the accumulation of semen in
the seminal vesicles. Pressure on the walls of these structures may be
supposed to stimulate the sexual centres in the spinal cord, and also
those in the brain; but this theory fails to take into account the
condition in the child, in woman, and in castrated males, in all of
whom, notwithstanding the absence of the accumulation of any
reproductive products, nevertheless a distinct state of sexual tension
may be observed. It is, indeed, an old experience that eunuchs may have
a very powerful sexual impulse. It is obvious, then, that the sexual
impulse must be, to a very great extent, independent of the reproductive
glands.
The nature of sexual tension is still entirely unknown. Freud assumes,
in view of the recently recognized significance of the thyroid glands in
relation to sexuality, that possibly some substance generally diffused
throughout the organism is produced by stimulation of the erogenic
zones, that the products of decomposition of this substance exercise a
specific stimulus on the reproductive organs, or on the associated
sexual centre in the spinal cord. For example, such a transformation of
a toxic, chemical stimulus into a special organ-stimulus is known to
occur in the case of certain foreign poisonous materials introduced into
the body. Freud considers that the probability of this chemical theory
of sexual excitement is increased by the fact that the neuroses
referable to disturbances of the sexual life possess a great clinical
similarity to the phenomena of intoxication induced by the habitual
employment of aphrodisiac poisons (certain alkaloids).
The relief of sexual tension occurs in the natural way in the =sexual
act=, in the completion of normal intercourse between man and woman.
Notwithstanding the numerous observations of leading natural
philosophers and physicians concerning the act of sexual congress, among
which I need only refer to those of Magendie, Johannes Müller, Marshall
Hall, Kobelt, Busch, Deslandes, Roubaud, Landois, Theopold, Burdach, and
many others, we possess, for reasons it is easy to understand, no really
exact investigations regarding the different phenomena occurring during
the sexual act. More particularly, the demeanour of the woman during
this act is a matter which remains extremely obscure.
The French physician Roubaud has given us the most vivid description of
sexual intercourse:
“As soon as the penis enters the vaginal vestibule, it first of all
pushes against the glans clitoridis, which is situated at the entrance
of the genital canal, and owing to its length and to the way in which
it is bent, can give way and bend further before the penis. After this
preliminary stimulation of the two chief centres of sexual
sensibility, the glans penis glides over the inner surfaces of the two
vaginal bulbs; the collum and the body of the penis are then grasped
between the projecting surfaces of the vaginal bulbs, but the glans
penis itself, which has passed further onward, is in contact with the
fine and delicate surface of the vaginal mucous membrane, which
membrane itself, owing to the presence of erectile tissue between the
layers, is now in an elastic, resilient condition. This elasticity,
which enables the vagina to adapt itself to the size of the penis,
increases at once the turgescence and the sensibility of the clitoris,
inasmuch as the blood that is driven out of the vessels of the vaginal
wall passes thence to those of the vaginal bulbs and the clitoris. On
the other hand, the turgescence and the sensitiveness of the glans
penis itself are heightened by compression of that organ, in
consequence of the ever-increasing fulness of the vessels of the
vaginal mucous membrane and the two vaginal bulbs.
“At the same time, the clitoris is pressed downwards by the anterior
portion of the compressor muscle, so that it is brought into contact
with the dorsal surface of the glans and of the body of the penis. In
this way a reciprocal friction between these two organs takes place,
repeated at each copulatory movement made by the two parties to the
act, until at length the voluptuous sensation rises to its highest
intensity, and culminates in the sexual orgasm, marked in the male by
the ejaculation of the seminal fluid, and in the female by the
aspiration of that fluid into the gaping external orifice of the
cervical canal.
“When we take into consideration the influence which temperament,
constitution, and a number of other special and general circumstances
are capable of exercising on the intensity of sexual sensation, it may
well be doubted if the problem regarding the differences in voluptuous
sensation between the male and the female is anywhere near solution;
indeed, we may go further, and feel convinced that this problem, in
view of all the difficulties that surround it, is really insoluble. So
true is this, that it is a difficult matter to give a picture at once
accurate and complete of the phenomena attending the normal act of
copulation. Whilst in one individual the sense of sexual pleasure
amounts to no more than a barely perceptible titillation, in another
that sense reaches the acme of both mental and physical exaltation.
“Between these two extremes we meet with innumerable states of
transition. In cases of intense exaltation various pathological
symptoms make themselves manifest, such as quickening of the general
circulation and violent pulsation of the arteries; the venous blood,
being retained in the larger vessels by general muscular contractions,
leads to an increased warmth of the body; and, further, this venous
stagnation, which is still more marked in the brain in consequence of
the contraction of the cervical muscles and the backward flexion of
the neck, may cause cerebral congestion, during which consciousness
and all mental manifestations are momentarily in abeyance. The eyes,
reddened by injection of the conjunctiva, become fixed, and the
expression becomes vacant; the lids close convulsively, to exclude the
light. In some the breathing becomes panting and labouring; but in
others it is temporarily suspended, in consequence of laryngeal spasm,
and the air, after being pent up for a time in the lungs, is finally
forcibly expelled, accompanied by the utterance of incoherent and
incomprehensible words.
“The impulses proceeding from the congested nerve centres are
confused. There is an indescribable disorder both of motion and of
sensation; the extremities are affected with convulsive twitchings,
and may be either moved in various directions or extended straight and
stiff; the jaws are pressed together so that the teeth grind against
each other; and certain individuals are affected by erotic delirium to
such an extent that they will seize the unguarded shoulder, for
instance, of their partner in the sexual act, and bite it till the
blood flows.
“This delirious frenzy is usually of short duration, but sufficiently
long to exhaust the forces of the organism, especially in the male, in
whom the condition of hyperexcitability is terminated by a more or
less abundant loss of semen.
“A period of exhaustion follows, which is the more intense in
proportion to the intensity of the preceding excitement. The sudden
fatigue, the general sense of weakness, and the inclination to sleep,
which habitually affect the male after the act of intercourse, are in
part to be ascribed to the loss of semen; for in the female, however
energetic the part she may have played in the sexual act, a mere
transient fatigue is observed, much less in degree than that which
affects the male, and permitting far sooner of a repetition of the
act. ‘_Triste est omne animal post coitum, præter mulierem
gallumque_,’ wrote Galen, and the axiom is essentially true--at any
rate, so far as the human species is concerned.”
Kobelt, in his celebrated work on the human organs of sexual pleasure
(Freiburg, 1884, p. 55 _et seq._), gave a similar description of
copulation. In the majority of descriptions of coitus but little
attention is usually paid to the demeanour of the woman. Magendie long
ago drew attention to the fact that there was much obscurity about this
matter, and insisted that, in comparison with the male, the female
exhibited extremely marked differences, in respect to her active
participation in copulation and to the intensity of her voluptuous
sensations.
“Very many women,” says this distinguished physiologist, “experience a
sexual orgasm accompanied by very intense voluptuous sensations;
others, on the contrary, appear entirely devoid of sensation; and
some, again, have only a disagreeable and painful sensation. Many
women excrete, at this moment of most intense sexual pleasure, a large
quantity of mucus, but the majority do not exhibit this phenomenon. In
reference to all these phenomena, =there are perhaps no two women who
are precisely similar=.”
The demeanour of the woman _in coitu_ has been especially studied by
gynæcologists, such as Busch, Theopold, and recently Otto Adler. Little
known are the observations of Dr. Theopold, based upon his own
experience, and published in 1873. He energetically denies the view that
the woman is always passive in coitus, and also that the female
reproductive organs are inactive during intercourse. During erotic
excitement in woman the heart beats more frequently, the arteries of the
labia pulsate powerfully, the genital organs are turgid and are hotter
to the touch. As the most intense libido approaches, the uterus
undergoes erection; its base touches the anterior abdominal wall; the
Fallopian tubes can be distinctly felt through the abdominal wall, when
these are thin, as hard, curved strings. The vagina, especially the
upper part of the passage, undergoes rhythmical contraction and
dilation, and complete gratification terminates the act.
As long as the muscle guarding the vaginal outlet (constrictor
cunni--bulbo-cavernosus muscle) is intact, the woman is able, by tightly
grasping the root of the penis, to expedite the ejaculation of semen, or
to increase the stimulation of the male until ejaculation occurs.
These powerful contractions of the vagina, alternating rhythmically with
the dilatations occurring during the orgasm, grip the glans penis
tightly, and induce a coaptation of the male urethral orifice with the
os uteri externum, and the enlargement of the latter orifice facilitates
the entrance of the semen. According to O. Adler, sexual excitement of
the woman during sexual intercourse begins with very powerful congestion
of the entire reproductive apparatus, including even the fimbriæ
surrounding the abdominal orifice of the Fallopian tubes; this
congestion gives rise to an erection of these parts, and especially of
the clitoris, the labia minora, and the vaginal wall. At the same time,
the glands of the vaginal mucous membrane and of the vaginal inlet begin
to secrete, as is manifest by the moistness of the external genital
organs. There now begin gentle rhythmical contractions of the vagina and
of the pelvic muscles, and during the orgasm these increase, to become
spasmodic contractions, whereby an increased secretion is extruded, and
more especially is there an evacuation of uterine mucus.
It is very important to note the various physiological accompaniments of
coitus, since they assist us to understand the mode of origin and the
biological root of many sexual perversions. Already in normal sexual
intercourse sadistic and masochistic phenomena may be observed. The
biting and crying out mentioned by Roubaud as occurring in the
voluptuous ecstasy are, indeed, of very frequent occurrence. Rudolf
Bergh, the celebrated Danish dermatologist and physician, of the
Copenhagen Hospital for Women suffering from Venereal Diseases, alludes
regularly in his annual reports to the consequences of “erotic bites.”
Amongst the Southern Slavs, the custom of “biting one another” is very
general (Krauss). The intense dark red coloration of the face and of the
reproductive organs and their environment is also a physiological
accompaniment of sexual excitement, and this coloration is more marked
in consequence of the associated turgescence of the male and female
genital organs; it leads, moreover, to associations of feeling in which
the =blood= plays a dominant part. Hence we deduce the biological and
ethnological significance of the colour red in the sphere of sexuality.
The nature of the sadist “to see red” during sexual intercourse is,
therefore, firmly founded upon a physiological basis, and merely
exhibits an increase of a normal phenomenon.[17] The crying and cursing
in which many individuals find sexual gratification has also a
physiological representative in the inarticulate noises and cries
frequently expressed in normal intercourse. It is remarkable that an
Indian writer on erotics--Vātsyāyana--deduces this verbal sadism from
the various noises which are commonly made in normal intercourse.
Similarly, in both parties to the sexual act the presence of masochistic
elements can be detected: witness the patience with which pain is borne
when it has a voluptuous tinge.[18]
Passing to the consideration of the =posture= adopted during
intercourse, we find in civilized man, who in this respect is far
removed from animals, the normal position during coitus is front to
front, the woman lying on her back with her lower extremities widely
separated, and the knee and hip joints semiflexed; the man lies on her,
with his thighs between hers, supporting himself on hands or elbows--or
often the two unite their lips in a kiss.
Of all other numerous positions during coitus, or _figuræ Veneris_, some
of which, according to Sheikh Nefzawi, are possible only “in words and
thoughts,” the postures that demand consideration on hygienic grounds
are, lateral decubitus of the woman, dorsal decubitus of the man, and
coitus _a posteriori_ (for example, when man and woman are extremely
obese); but this subject belongs rather to the chapter on sexual
hygiene.
Ploss-Bartels has proved that the position described above as normal was
usual already in ancient times and amongst the most diverse peoples. The
adoption of this position in coitus undoubtedly ensued in the human race
upon the evolution of the upright posture. It is the natural,
instinctive position of civilized man, who in this respect also
manifests an advance on the lower animals.
[13] Apart from Strindberg and Weininger, who advocate, for the
salvation of the future and as ideals of development, the most
pronounced and one-sided development of the masculine type, I need
refer only to “The Physiological Weakmindedness of Woman” by Möbius,
and to such writings as B. Friedländer’s “Renaissance des Eros
Uranios” (Berlin, 1904), and to Eduard von Mayer’s “The Vital Laws of
Civilization” (Halle, 1904), as characteristic symptoms of such a
reaction.
[14] ITCHING, TICKLING, AND SEXUAL SENSIBILITY.--On September 2, 1890,
Dr. Bronson, Professor of Dermatology in the New York Polyclinic, read
before the American Dermatological Association a paper on “The
Sensation of Itching” (printed in the _New York Medical Record_ of
October 18, 1890, and republished by the New Sydenham Society in 1893
in a volume entitled “Selected Monographs on Dermatology”). In this
paper the author deals at some length with the relations between
itching and the voluptuous, or, as he calls it, the “aphrodisiac,”
sense. He also denies the specific character of sexual sensations, and
states that the aphrodisiac sense “is but a higher development of the
primitive sense of contact. It has a special organ or instrument--the
penis in the male, the clitoris in the female. Moreover, it is
distributed over the entire cutaneous surface” (New Sydenham Society,
_op. cit._, p. 314). In this connexion, and more particularly apropos
of Dr. Bloch’s statement on the previous page that “the function of
the clitoris is expressed by its name” (German, _Kitzler_), it is
interesting to note that in German the word _Kitzel_ variously
denotes--(1) _tickling_, (2) _itching_, (3) _sexual desire_, (4)
_sexual gratification_. The more commonly employed German term for
itching, _Jucken_, does not possess any secondary sexual
signification; but, as Dr. Bronson points out (_op. cit._, p. 312),
“both the English words _itch_ and _itching_, and the Latin _prurio_
and _pruritus_, in their secondary significations, convey the idea of
a longing, teasing desire, while _pruritus_ was commonly used by the
Latins as a synonym for lasciviousness.” The same idea is, of course,
conveyed by the English derivations, _pruriency_ and _prurient_. Thus,
we see that the familiar terminology of these three tongues (and
doubtless of many others) refuses to countenance Hirschfeld’s view
regarding the specific character of sexual sensibility.--TRANSLATOR.
[15] In his profound essay, containing a number of new points of view,
“Concerning the Emotions” (_Monatsschrift für Psychiatrie und
Neurologie_, 1906, vol. xix., Heft 3 and 4), Dr. Edmund Forster has
ably discussed these primitive relations between voluptuous sensation
and pain. According to him, the sexual tension, which commences at the
time of puberty, is an increased stimulus of the sensory nerves of the
genital organs. The positive sensation-tone of libido accompanying
ejaculation represents the relief of the painful, disturbing sensation
of sexual tension, and for this reason it has a pleasurable tone.
[16] Carpenter perceives in this “sense of contact” the essence of all
sexual love.
[17] For this reason many ingenious prostitutes wear a red
chemise.--_Cf._ P. Näcke, “Un Cas de Fetichisme de Souliers,” etc. (“A
Case of Shoe Fetichism”), in _Bulletin de la Société de Médecine
Mentale de Belgique_, 1894.
[18] Thus it appears that sadism and masochism are not manifestations
of “genital atavism” in the sense of Mantegazza and Lombroso, but are
rather due to the gradual and pathological increase of physiological
phenomena still manifest at the present day.
CHAPTER IV
PHYSICAL DIFFERENTIAL SEXUAL CHARACTERS
“_We have here a_ primitive _inequality, whose primitiveness goes back
to the opposition between content and form. From this primeval
difference arise all the other secondary differences._”--ALFONS
BILHARZ.
CONTENTS OF CHAPTER IV
Sexual differentiation as the primeval fact of human sexual life --
Waldeyer on the significance of sexual differentiation -- The
biological law of Herbert Spencer -- Antagonism between reproductive
and developmental tendencies -- Example of menstruation in
illustration of this contrast -- The primitiveness of woman, and her
greater proximity to nature -- Untenability of the notion of the
“inferiority” of woman -- Views upon the nature of her physical
development -- Increased differentiation of the sexes in consequence
of civilization -- Comparison between medieval and modern pictures of
women -- Obscuration of the sexual contrast in primitive times --
Examples -- Change of the voice in consequence of civilization --
Return to primitive conditions in certain phenomena of the
emancipation of woman (the adoption of a masculine style of clothing,
tobacco-smoking) -- Sexual indifference in the primitive history of
mankind -- Connexion therewith of a primordial gynecocracy (according
to Ratzel) -- Secondary sexual characters -- Principal difference
between the masculine and the feminine body -- New researches on
sexual differences -- Skeletal differences -- The specific sexual
differences of the human pelvis -- Their dependence upon civilization
and upon development of the brain -- Differences in body-size and
body-weight -- In muscular and fatty development -- In the
constitution of the blood -- Sexual differences in the larynx and the
voice -- The skulls of men and women -- The weight of the brain -- No
ground for the assumption of the inferiority of women -- Differences
in brain-structure -- Researches of Rüdinger, Waldeyer, Broca, G.
Retzius, etc. -- Recognition of the fact that the feminine type is
somewhat infantile -- This type due to adaptation to the purposes of
reproduction -- Masculine and feminine beauty -- Men and women
different, but neither superior to the other.
CHAPTER IV
The difference between the sexes is the =original cause= of the human
sexual life, the primeval preliminary of all human civilization. The
existence of this difference can be proved, alike in physical and
psychical relations, already in the fundamental phenomenon of human
love, in which, because here the relations are simple and uncomplicated,
it is most easily visible.
Waldeyer, in his notable address on the somatic differences between the
sexes, delivered in 1895 at the Anthropological Congress in Kassel, drew
attention to the fact that the higher development of any particular
species is notably characterized by the increasing differentiation of
the sexes. The further we advance in the animal and vegetable world from
the lower to the higher forms, the more markedly are the male and the
female individuals distinguished one from another. In the human species
also, in the course of phylogenetic development, this sexual
differentiation increases in extent.
In the development of these sexual differences, the antagonism first
shown by Herbert Spencer to exist between reproduction and the higher
evolutionary tendency plays an important part. Among the higher species
of animals the males exhibit a stronger evolutionary tendency than the
females, owing to the fact that their share in the work of reproduction
has become less important. The more extensive organic expenditure
demanded by the reproductive functions limits the feminine development
to a notably greater extent than the masculine. In the human species
this retardation of growth in the female is especially increased in
consequence of menstruation, and this affords a striking example of the
truth of Spencer’s law. I quote also in this connexion the remarks of
the Würzburg anatomist Oskar Schultze, in his recently published
valuable monograph on “Woman from an Anthropological Point of View,” pp.
55, 56 (Würzburg, 1906);
“The undulatory periodicity of the principal functions of the feminine
organism, which depends on the processes of ovulation and
menstruation, and is invariable in the females of the human species,
does not occur in the other mammalia (with the exception of apes). In
these latter, as far as we have been able to observe, the secondary
sexual characters, in the matter of differences in muscular
development and in strength, are not so developed, or sometimes are
not so developed, as in the human species. We must in this connexion
exclude the differences which appear in domestic animals as a result
of domestication (for example, the difference between the cow and the
bull). In the human female, the periodicity, which begins to act even
on the youthful, still undeveloped body, has during thousands of years
increased the secondary sexual differences. Periodicity is, in my
opinion, an important cause of the fact that woman is inferior to man,
more especially in the development of the muscular system and in
strength, and that her organs, for the most part, are more closely
approximated to the infantile type.