“I have so far told you,” continued Mr. Midith, “of our sex relations
as they now actually exist on Mars. I have so far offered no comments
on either our practice of individual freedom sexually, or on your
marriage system. But to leave it without further investigation and
comparison would be a very incomplete account. Let us closely and
impartially investigate whether it is your or our system of sex
relation which is most nearly in accord with the known laws of life,
health and happiness. Let us see what defects and demerits we can find
in either of them.
“It is a well-known fact that the exercise of the sexual function is
an expenditure of vital energy; and, therefore, the person who has the
sexual function so adjusted that he exercises it only for the special
purpose of reproduction, is the most complete person sexually; while he
who exercises it most excessively, or who is most passionately prompted
to exercise it most excessively, either in a married state, as you
have it here, or under individual freedom, is the most incomplete or
licentious person sexually.
“You, no doubt, all agree that the higher inferior animals live
a comparatively chaste life; while man, here on earth, lives a
comparatively unchaste life. Why is this? There must be a cause for it,
if you believe in universal causation, and as long as the cause exists
the effect will naturally follow. To find and remove the cause, then,
must be your whole aim in this field of purification and advancement.
The Marsites have long ago removed the causes of unchastity and are
therefore living a comparatively pure life. Let us see now whether we
can find the causes producing the purity in the inferior animals and
the impurity in _your_ human beings, as they now live on earth.”
“Show us first, then, why it is that the inferior animal lives a pure
life sexually,” said Viola. “I mean, give us your reason for it, Mr.
Midith.”
“Very well,” continued Mr. Midith. “I have already said that the
exercise of the sexual function is an expenditure of vital energy; that
proposition you, no doubt, all admit. We have seen elsewhere, too, that
as we descend in the scale of animal life, from man downward, they
become more and more prolific.
“In the lower orders of life, millions must die in order to give room
and opportunity for a few to live. The struggle for existence in the
orders below man is so fierce that, with their present prolificness,
only a few of the fittest can survive. Those individuals, who are most
perfect at birth, and who direct their vital energy most economically
in harmony with the so-called laws of life, survive; while the weakly
born and the licentious ones must perish in the fierce struggle for
existence. Hence, the phenomena of evolution forces the inferior
animal to live a chaste life, or perish from the effect of expending
unnecessary energy.”
“But why do not the phenomena of evolution, as you call them, also
force man to live a virtuous life?” asked Rev. Dudley.
“That seems very plain to me,” replied Mr. Midith. “But, in the first
place, let us keep in mind that in a state of perfect sexual freedom
the human being, like the inferior animal, does live a comparatively
chaste life, as I know the Marsites do. As evolution gradually
develops the higher intellectual faculties of man, a keener sense
of appreciating a faultless body and a highly cultivated mind is
continually produced, so that he feels more and more reluctant to waste
his animal forces in licentious acts which impair the physical and
mental capacities after which he is seeking, and without which no one
can be really happy.
“Now let us see why the human being, as he now exists on earth,
does not live a pure, chaste life. Why he is so intemperate in many
directions. Let us see if we can discover some of the causes that
produce this evil and misery. I am well aware that your people, as a
rule, do not like to be reminded of their faults. But, nevertheless,
I believe we should always tell the _whole_ truth, regardless of
immediate likes and dislikes.
“The inferior animal lives by virtue of comparatively _few_ and
_simple_ functions, while man lives by _many_ and _complex_ ones. The
animal, then, is harder pressed for room and opportunity, and lives by
virtue of fewer functions than man. If the brute animal violates one of
its few functions, it must perish in the hard struggle for existence;
while man, on the other hand, is enabled to live by his _many complex_
functions in a milder struggle, even if he does violate to a certain
degree the sexual function.
“Your present earthly human being, then, is on the one hand so complex
that the partial violation of one of his many complex functions does
not cause him to perish directly like the inferior animal, while on
the other hand, his higher faculties of keenly appreciating the highest
physical perfection and mental eminence are, as yet, not sufficiently
developed to turn his steps _only_ on the path of virtue and purity.
You do not esteem life and health as highly as we do. But as
intellectual development continues, you will gradually feel that every
act that conduces to the fullness of life, individually and socially,
produces happiness as a whole, and is therefore right; while every act
that detracts from the fullness of life, individually and socially,
produces unhappiness as a whole, and is therefore wrong.”
“You have shown to my satisfaction, Mr. Midith, why an inferior animal,
according to the nature of things, is compelled to live a pure, chaste
life; and that man can, if he so desires, live a comparatively unchaste
one,” said Mr. Uwins. “I can plainly see the causes that produce the
chastity in the inferior animals, but I cannot see the causes that
produce the excessive sexual function in our human being. Why does our
human being not derive more pleasure from leading a pure, chaste life,
which is in accord with life and health, than he does from leading a
licentious life?”
“Let us see, then, if we can point out the causes which make the
earthly human being unchaste. We have seen that the inferior animal
leads a chaste life, and I have also told you that the Marsites do the
same. According to these facts, then, unchastity, the same as chattel
slavery, is possible only during a particular stage of intellectual
progress. Below this particular stage, the fierce struggle for room and
opportunity permits only the most virtuous to survive; while above that
particular stage, the pleasure derived from enjoying the most complete
life possible becomes so agreeable that a violation of a physiological
law is too painful.
“Now, in order to find the causes of unchastity, let us enumerate some
of the differences existing between our and your system of sex relation.
“1. You marry for life; we do not. 2. Your church and state interfere
with your sexual affairs; we leave it in the hands of the individual
the same as in the case of the inferior animal. 3. Our women are not
financially dependent on the man; yours, as a rule, are. 4. Our women
have the privilege of soliciting the love of any man whose sexual
co-operation they desire; yours have not. 5. In a state of sexual
freedom, the woman regulates her own sexual affairs to suit herself;
in a state of marriage, or, in other words, interference of church
and state, the man or husband largely runs the sexual affairs to suit
himself the same as he runs the financial and political affairs. 6. We
invariably room alone, both men and women; under your marriage system
your husband and wife invariably room and lodge together. 7. You make
your women dependent creatures by not financially compensating maternal
labor the same as mining, farming, etc.; we make her independent
because we pay her the same compensation for maternal work as we do
for any other labor. 8. You shift the burden of parental cares almost
exclusively off unto the mother; while we act on the supposition that
we have all received parental care during our infancy, and that we in
turn should do the same for some one else, whether we are parents or
not; to neglect this would make us shirks, for we would not be paying
for what we received during our infancy. 9. We teach the laws of
sexuality to our children of all ages; you try to hide all knowledge of
it. Hence, we make intelligence the safeguard of sexual purity, while
you make ignorance the safeguard of it.”
“As I have said before, Mr. Midith,” said Rev. Dudley, “your system of
sex relations may do very well on Mars, but I think we ought to keep
what we have as long as we have a good one, and that we undoubtedly
have. I firmly believe that our sexual relations are _better_ now than
they have ever been before, or than they are in any other country in
the world--here, or on any other planet or moon.”
“It may be true, Rev. Dudley, that your sexual, and even your social
and industrial relations, are better now than they ever were before,
but that may not be a sign that they need no further improvement.
_Best_, as I have told you once before, has nearly always been a
deceptive, unreliable criterion. Nothing is good enough unless it is
_faultless_. You must remember that every age always had the best of
everything, perhaps better than any preceding age. There was a certain
people two thousand years ago that had the best system of sex relation,
and the contemporaries of that age doubtless used the same argument
against those who desired to improve it then as you are now using
against me. You are undoubtedly proud of the progressive achievements
of your ancestors, but you seem to fear the improvements of your
contemporaries and of your posterity. But you need not fear progress
of any kind. As I have told you some time ago, all wrong arises from
ignorance. Hence, there can be but one line of advancement, and that
line is by the way of acquiring more and more intelligence, which,
on the one hand, tends to adjust and perfect voluntary co-operation
on the highest possible scale, while, on the other hand, it tends to
give more and more freedom to the individual. Any proposed improvement
which does not bear these marks is not in the line of progress. If
our sex relation is more nearly in harmony with these principles,
it is better than yours; if yours is more so, yours is the better.
We must continually strive to improve what we have. The microscope,
the spectroscope, the engine, and human intelligence are more nearly
perfect now than they ever were before, as far as you know; but we
should all strive to improve them as much now as any of our ancestors
did, to whom we owe the previous improvements. Only a _faultless_ thing
is good enough. Improvement should cease only when _perfection_ makes
further improvement impossible.
“It is like this, then, Rev. Dudley: As long as we can point out
wrongs in any system, no matter whether the system is the _best_ or
the _worst_, it is not what it ought to be; and no honest, progressive
person who has the welfare and happiness of his fellow-man at heart can
remain silent or indifferent as long as this wrong or evil remains in
sight.
“The way to test a system is to analyze it; to look at all its parts
and relations; to endeavor to find all the faults we can; to compare
it impartially with any system that may be offered in place of it. We
should never try to cover up the defects by a few merits which it may
contain. A truthful system contains not a single demerit. If it does it
is faulty, and the faults should be eliminated.”
“Those words which you have spoken are all very true,” observed Rev.
Dudley. “I fully agree with you that all wrongs should be righted,
but I can see no wrongs in our marriage system; but, on the contrary,
I believe that it is _divinely_ instituted, that it is the most sacred
boon that has ever brought joy and gladness to the human heart.
I believe that conjugal affection has conduced more toward human
happiness and contentment than any other one thing. I believe that the
greatest earthly bliss is found in the union of man and wife, and that
for life, too.”
“I think, Rev. Dudley, that you are perfectly honest and sincere in
what you say. But you must not forget that honesty and sincerity are
not necessarily signs of truth and justice, for which alone we should
be seeking. I believe that Thomas de Torquemada, Inquisitor-General
of Spain, was perfectly honest and sincere in killing the cream of
European thought. The masters of chattel slaves, the soldier who fights
for the preservation of a monarchy, the mother that drowns her babe
in the Ganges, the widow that practices suttee, the social parasite
that lives on profit, interest, rent and taxes, the savage that steals
his wife, and the minister that frightens his congregation with an
imaginary hell fire, are very likely all honest and sincere in doing
those things that we, with a little more knowledge, would condemn. The
question is not whether we are honest and sincere, but whether we are
_right_ and _just_. Is our view correct or is it erroneous? Have we
thoroughly and impartially examined every side of our position, or have
we, too, been educated and raised in an atmosphere of superstition,
prejudice and jealousy, like the soldier, mother, widow, etc.?
“You say, Rev. Dudley, that you can find no faults and defects in your
marriage system. That is nothing strange. You, no doubt, have been
educated that way, and very likely you have blindly accepted the dogmas
of your ancestors and masses of your contemporaries. Let us, then,
fairly and impartially examine and compare your marriage system with
our sex relation. I am fully aware that it is a tender topic for you
to handle in your present age and thought; but in doing so we should
endeavor to lay aside as much as we can of our superstition, prejudice
and jealousy. We should boldly and untimidly seek to find the truth
wherever it may lead. Truth is always worth following, and without
we find the truth on the sex relations we can not hope to live clean
lives.”
“I should be very much pleased, Mr. Midith,” said Rev. Dudley, “to have
you examine and compare our system of marriage with your individual
sex relation. You are, no doubt, better capable of fairly judging our
institutions than we are, because, as you said, you have not been
biased by education and training.”
“Very well,” said Mr. Midith.
“In the first place, have you ever thought from what source you
received that great ‘_boon_’--your institution of marriage--which you
say is ‘divinely instituted?’ Let us examine from whence you received
it. According to the doctrine of evolution, the only theory of the
genesis of man, which is supported by science, man slowly, through the
lapse of countless ages, evolved from lower organisms by the agency
of the survival of the fittest, etc. This implies, then, that all our
ancestors were at one time savages.
“We all know that the savage in the lowest stages of barbarism, even as
he now exists, steals and forcibly takes his wife or wives from other
tribes, etc. He also often _forces_ captives to become his wives.
Somewhat later in the stage of social development, the man generally
buys his wives without their consultation. At a still later period the
old folks, instead of the young folks who are to be married, make the
bargain. And still later on, the period in which you are now living,
young boys and girls give each other away for life; at an age, too,
you must remember, when they are young, inexperienced and blinded by
first love, as you term it. No amount of after-knowledge on the sexual
relations is of any value to the contracting parties as far as the
contract is concerned, for, according to your doctrine, the parties are
indissolubly bound together for life as man and wife. According to your
marriage system, they are supposed to live together for life, whether
they love each other or not. Whether they afterward quarrel or love
some one else better cannot be taken into account. Nothing less than
the cruelest abuse enables them to secure a divorce, and even then the
divorced parties are looked upon with scorn and contempt.
“You would, no doubt, think it cruel, Rev. Dudley, if some one should
steal you, like a savage steals his wife, and compel you to live with a
woman with whom you did not want to live or whom you did not love. But
there is very little difference, when we examine the matter closely,
whether a woman is stolen and compelled, from the start, to live with
a man, or whether she voluntarily marries him, thinking that she loves
him, but afterward finds that she does not love him, that she was
mistaken like all mankind are at times likely to be.
“You compel a husband and wife by law, superstition and public
opinion, to live together, whether they really love each other,
or whether they simply stay together to gratify their passions.
Your church and state interfere with the marriage as well as with
the dissolution of it. You can clearly see, then, that your system
of marriage is based upon force, which, it is true, has gradually
diminished from the lowest stages of barbarism, when the husband stole
his wife, to the present time, when the contracting parties give each
other away for life under a contract which they are not at liberty to
make or dissolve without the interference of church and state.
“With us no men and women are together who do not really love each
other. Those who do not love each other sexually are no sexual
companions; and those who once did love each other, but have ceased
loving, forsake each other’s company to the extent that it becomes
agreeable to them. They are much freer, at any time, to seek other
company than you are to make your _first_ choice, which must continue
for life. Why should two persons be compelled to live together when
they do not desire to? When they fight, quarrel, and dislike each
other? Why should not parting be as free and honorable as coming
together? Why should a man and wife eke out a miserable existence,
simply because they for once selected the wrong person to live with?”
“But every one, in making this choice for life, should be very
cautious. They should know each other well before they entered into
this life-contract. Too many marriages are entered into carelessly. The
parties do not understand each other well enough,” said Rev. Dudley.
“We fully agree to what you have said,” observed Mr. Midith. “You say
that great caution should be exercised by the contracting parties.
But can we always be so cautious as never to make a mistake? I think
that in all our undertakings we are liable to make mistakes; and would
you recommend that one mistake should condemn us to a life of misery
forever after? You say that the contracting parties should know each
other well before they entered into a marriage contract. We agree
perfectly with you there. We believe that it requires more than a whole
lifetime for a man and a woman to know each other well enough to enter
into a contract which is to be binding for life; therefore, you see, we
exercise the greatest caution, because we study each other during our
whole lifetime, and then claim that our knowledge of one another is too
limited to give ourselves away even for a single day. The evil of the
earthites lies in the fact that your ill-adjusted social and economic
institutions require _binding promises_; and a promise, according to
your common acceptation of the term, is a _binding_ declaration made
by one person to another to do, or not to do, a certain act at some
_future_ time. According to this definition, there can be no place for
a binding promise in a _harmonious, progressive_ world. Promises and
harmonious progress are incompatible, unless all the parties are, at
all times, as free to break them as they were to make them; and this
admission eliminates the _binding_ element, and, therefore, destroys
the popular meaning of a promise.
“The evil consequences of binding promises can be easily seen when
we bear in mind that, in a progressive world, we know more to-morrow
than we know to-day. Also, that harmony implies absence of external
coercion; for, all external coercion being social discord, a promise
that appears _just_ and feels agreeable when measured with to-day’s
knowledge, may appear _unjust_ and become disagreeable when measured
with the standard of to-morrow’s knowledge; and in so far as the
fulfillment of a promise becomes disagreeable or impossible, no matter
what the promise may be, it is an element of discord, and discord
is the opposite of harmony. Hence, before you can hope to enjoy
uninterrupted harmony, your institutions must be so molded that there
is no place in them for a binding promise. In regard to the sexual
relations, nothing but mutual inclination should be made the bonds
of union. If you have closely followed my narrative, you will have
discovered long before this time, that, on Mars, we have no _binding_
promises. In our just systems, we can not apply them any place, and we
know of them only as relics of past crudity.”
“But do you not think, Mr. Midith, that licentiousness would run riot
here on earth, with _your_ system of sex relation, even if it proves to
be ever so good and pure on Mars?” asked Rev. Dudley.
“I do not claim that our system of sex relation would operate
_perfectly_ here on earth, or perhaps on any other world,” observed Mr.
Midith. “What I claim is not that it would produce _perfect_ results,
but that it would produce, with highly intelligent people, much better
results than your system of matrimony. That the human family can and
would live a cleaner and happier life under our system of sex relation,
guarded by intelligence and on individual freedom, than under your
system of marriage, largely guarded by ignorance, force, superstition
and jealousy.
“The masses of the contemporaries of an institution rarely ever see the
wrongs, cruelties and evils which that institution contains; they are
blinded by their so-called _loyalty_ and _patriotism_. We might give a
few illustrations:
“The master once believed that no wrong could be done to a slave;
that the slave had no rights which the master was bound to respect.
The inquisitor believed that no wrong could be done to a heretic. The
warrior thought the same of his captive. The witch-finder thought that
no amount of torture he inflicted on the supposed witch was wrong or
cruel. Just so do the vast majority--yes, nearly all of your men and
women--believe that there can be no sexual abuse _within your bonds of
matrimony_. But _you_ are as wrong in that as your ancestors were to
the chattel slave, heretic, captive, and supposed witch. Is it not a
fact that nearly every family home under your marriage system is a more
or less legalized house of sexual impurity (house of prostitution as
you term it) upheld by church and state? Is it not true that the sexual
function, under your system of matrimony, is, as a whole, exercised
vastly in excess--perhaps from ten to a hundred times? Very likely
this truth seems painful to you at this age of your earth, but it is a
truth, nevertheless, which you are bound to face some time, if you do
not desire to keep forever the pallor of disease on the sunken cheeks,
pale lips, and feeble frame of nearly all your mothers, especially you
American mothers. We must bear in mind that a _chaste_ life, whether
_in_ marriage or _out_ of it, is one in which the sexual functions of
the male and of the female are mutually exercised only in accordance
with the most vigorous health and highest well-being of the parties as
they are then constituted. Sexual activity, then, whether married or
not, is licentious and dissolute, just in proportion as it is excessive.
“Those acts which detract from the fullness of life are wrong, because
they cannot, as a whole, be productive of the greatest happiness,
and therefore an excessive exercise of any function implies a waste,
which, as a whole, is productive of _pain_ and is therefore wrong. The
church or state can no more change or suspend the laws of life, waste,
and reproduction, by a marriage ceremony, than the acquired abnormal
passions of an individual can change or suspend them.
“An organism, whether man or beast, is sexually perfect only whenever
its sexual instinct is so organized and developed that the agreeable
exercise of this function does not detract from the fullness of life
and happiness, on the one hand, and is sufficiently active for the
normal propagation of the species on the other. The sexual organization
of the Marsites is, of course, not entirely perfect, but yours is about
as vicious and faulty as it can well be.
“When the sexual function, like that of your human family, has once
become greatly in excess from the evil effects of a vicious, social
and sexual relation, no system, however perfect, can at once remove
this excess. It was gradually acquired by a vicious arrangement, and
must also be gradually eliminated by the institution of a more perfect
arrangement.
“As we placed motherhood more and more under the exclusive control of
the woman, our sexual association became continually purer and more
normal. All who are familiar with the anatomy, physiology, and hygiene
of the organs of procreation know that the female organs of procreation
have periods of alternate activity and rest (menses, gestation,
lactation, age, desirability of motherhood, etc.), and the woman is the
only party who is conscious of these periods; and for these and other
reasons which I have already stated, sexual abuse, if it once exists,
can be diminished and finally disappear, only by making the female
completely free and independent from the male as we find them among the
inferior animals and among the Marsites.
“To be sexually perfect, then, does not only mean that the sexual
function should be normally exercised, but that even the sexual
_desire_ should not prompt an excessive use; for a person who must
labor to _curb_ a _desire_ is not so complete as one who has the desire
so adjusted that it operates only in conformity with the fullest life,
and therefore, as a whole, to the greatest happiness.”