# Psychopathia Sexualis/Chapter 1

I. A FRAGMENT
OF A
PSYCHOLOGY OF THE SEXUAL LIFE.
The propagation of the human species is not committed to accident or to the caprice of the individual, but made secure in a natural instinct, which, with all-conquering force and might, demands fulfillment. In the gratification of this natural impulse are found not only sensual pleasure and sources of physical well-being, but also higher feelings of satisfaction in perpetuating the single, perishable existence, by the transmission of mental and physical attributes to a new being. In coarse, sensual love, in the lustful impulse to satisfy this natural instinct, man stands on a level with the animal; but it is given to him to raise himself to a height where this natural instinct no longer makes him a slave: higher, nobler feelings are awakened, which, notwithstanding their sensual origin, expand into a world of beauty, sublimity, and morality.
On this height man overcomes his natural instinct, and from an inexhaustible spring draws material and inspiration for higher enjoyment, for more earnest work, and the attainment of the ideal. Maudsley (Deutsche Klinik, 1873, 2, 3) rightly calls the sexual feeling the foundation for the development of the social feeling. “Were man to be robbed of the instinct of procreation and all that arises from it mentally, nearly all poetry and, perhaps, the entire moral sense as well, would be torn from his life.”
Sexuality is the most powerful factor in individual and social existence; the strongest incentive to the exertion of strength and acquisition of property, to the foundation of a home, and to the awakening of altruistic feelings, first for a person of the opposite sex, then for the offspring, and, in a wider sense, for all humanity.
​Thus all ethics and, perhaps, a good part of æsthetics and religion depend upon the existence of sexual feeling.
Though the sexual life leads to the highest virtues, even to the sacrifice of the ego, yet in its sensual force lies also the danger that it may degenerate into powerful passions and develop the grossest vices.
Love as an unbridled passion is like a fire that burns and consumes everything; like an abyss that swallows all,—honor, fortune, well-being.
It seems of high psychological interest to trace the developmental phases through which, in the course of the evolution of human culture to the morality and civilization of to-day, the sexual life has passed. On primitive ground the satisfaction of the sexual appetite of man seems like that of the animal. Openness in the sexual act is not shunned; man and woman are not ashamed to go naked. To-day we see savages in this condition (comp. Ploss, “Das Weib,” p. 196, 1884); as, for example, the Australians, the Polynesians, and the Malays of the Phillipines. The female is the common property of the males, the temporary booty of the strongest, who strive for the possession of the most beautiful of the opposite sex, thus carrying out instinctively a kind of sexual selection.
Woman is a movable thing, a ware, an object of bargain and sale and gift; a thing to satisfy lust and to work.
The appearance of a feeling of shame before others in the manifestation and satisfaction of the natural instinct, and modesty in the intercourse of the sexes, form the beginning of morality in the sexual life. From this arose the effort to conceal the genitals (“And they knew that they were naked”) and the secret performance of the sexual act.
The development of this degree of culture is favored by the rigors of climate and the necessity for complete protection of the body thus entailed. Thus in part the fact is explained that among northern races modesty may be proved anthropologically earlier than among southern races.
A further stage in the development of culture in sexual ​life is marked when the female ceases to be a movable thing. She becomes a person; and if still for a long time placed far below the male socially, yet the idea that the right of disposal of herself and her favors belongs to her is developed.
Thus she becomes the object of the male’s wooing. To the barbarous sensual feeling of sexual desire the beginnings of ethical feeling are added. The instinct is intellectualized. Property in women ceases to exist. Individuals of the opposite sexes feel themselves drawn toward each other by mental and physical qualities, and show love for each other only. At this stage woman has a feeling that her charms belong only to the man of her choice, and wishes to conceal them from others. Thus, by the side of modesty, the foundations of chastity and faithfulness—as long as the bond of love lasts—are laid.
Woman attains this degree of social elevation earlier when, at the transition from nomadic life to a state of fixed habitation, man obtains a house and home, and the necessity arises for him to possess in woman a companion for the household,—a housewife.
Among the nations of the East, the Egyptians, the Israelites, and the Greeks, and among those of the West, the Germans, early attained this stage of culture. Among all these races, at this stage of advancement, the esteem in which virginity, chastity, modesty, and sexual faithfulness are held is in marked contrast with other nations which offer the female of the house to the guest for his sexual enjoyment.
That this stage in the culture of sexual morality is quite high and makes its appearance much later than other developmental forms of culture—as, for example, æsthetics—is seen from the condition of the Japanese, with whom it is the custom to marry a woman only after she has lived for a year in the tea-houses (which correspond with European houses of prostitution), and to whom the nakedness of women is nothing shocking. At all events, among the Japanese every unmarried woman can prostitute herself without lessening her value as a future wife,—a proof that with this remarkable people woman possesses ​no ethical worth, but is valued in marriage only as a means of enjoyment, procreation, and work.
Christianity gave the most powerful impulse to the moral elevation of the sexual relations by raising woman to social equality with man and elevating the bond of love between man and woman to a religio-moral institution.
The fact that in higher civilization human love must be monogamous and rest on a lasting contract was thus recognized. If nature does no more than provide for procreation, a commonwealth (family or state) cannot exist without a guaranty that the offspring shall flourish physically, morally, and intellectually. Christendom gained both mental and material superiority over ​the polygamous races, especially Islam, through the equalization of woman and man, and by establishing monogamous marriage and securing it by legal, religious, and moral ties.
If Mohammed was actuated by a desire to raise woman from her place as a slave and means of sensual gratification to a higher social and matrimonial plane, nevertheless, in the Mohammedan world woman remained far below man, to whom alone divorce was allowed and also made very easy.
Islam kept woman from any participation in public life under all circumstances, and thus hindered her intellectual and moral development. In consequence of this the Mohammedan woman has ever remained essentially a means of sensual gratification and procreation; while, on the other hand, the virtues and capabilities of the Christian woman, as housewife, educator of children, and equal companion of man, have been allowed to unfold in all their beauty. Islam, with its polygamy and harem-life, is glaringly contrasted with the monogamy and family life of the Christian world.
The same contrast is apparent in a comparison of the two religions with reference to the conception of the hereafter. The picture of eternity seen by the faith of the Christian is that of a paradise freed from all earthly sensuality, promising the purest of intellectual happiness; the fancy of the Mussulman fills the future life with the delights of a harem full of houris.
In spite of all the aids which religion, law, education, and morality give civilized man in the bridling of his passions, he is always in danger of sinking from the clear height of pure, chaste love into the mire of common sensuality.
In order to maintain one’s self on such a height, a constant struggle between natural impulses and morals, between sensuality and morality, is required. Only characters endowed with strong wills are able to completely emancipate themselves from sensuality and share in that pure love from which spring the noblest joys of human life.
It is yet questionable whether, in the course of the later centuries, mankind has advanced in morality. It is certain, however, that the race has become more modest; and this ​phenomenon of civilization—this hiding of the animal propensities—is, at least, a concession that vice makes to virtue.
From a reading of Scherr’s works (“History of German Civilization”) one would certainly gain the impression that, in comparison with those of the Middle Ages, our own ideas of morals have become refined, even when it must also be allowed that in many instances finer manners, without greater morality, have taken the place of earlier obscenity and coarseness of expression.
When widely separated periods of history are compared, no doubt is left that public morality, in spite of occasional temporary retrogression, makes continuous progress, and that Christianity is one of the most powerful of the forces favoring moral progress.
To-day we are far beyond the sexual conditions which, as shown in the sodomitic worship of the gods, in the life of the people, and in the laws and religious practices, existed among the ancient Greeks,—to say nothing of the worship of Phallus and Priapus among the Athenians and Babylonians, of the bacchanals of ancient Rome, and the prominent place prostitutes took among these peoples. In the slow and often imperceptible progress which human morality makes there are variations or fluctuations, just as in the individual sexuality manifests an ebb and flow.
Periods of moral decadence in the life of a people are always contemporaneous with times of effeminacy, sensuality, and luxury. These conditions can only be conceived as occurring with increased demands upon the nervous system, which must meet these requirements. As a result of increase of nervousness, there is increase of sensuality, and, since this leads to excesses among the masses, it undermines the foundation of society,—the morality and purity of family life. When this is destroyed by excesses, unfaithfulness, and luxury, then the destruction of the state is inevitably compassed in material, moral, and political ruin. Warning examples of this character are presented by Rome, Greece, and France under Louis XIV and XV. In such times of political and moral destruction ​monstrous perversions of the sexual life were frequent, which, however, may in part be referred to psycho-pathological or, at least, neuro-pathological conditions existing in the people.
It is shown by the history of Babylon, Nineveh, Rome, and also by the “mysteries” of life in modern Capitals, that large cities are the breeding-places of nervousness and degenerate sensuality. The fact which may be learned from reading Ploss’s work is remarkable, viz., that perversion of the sexual instinct (save among the Aleutians, and in the form of masturbation among the females of the East and the Nama Hottentots) does not occur in uncivilized or half-civilized races.
The study of the sexual life in the individual must begin at its development at puberty, and follow it through its different phases to the extinction of sexual feelings. In his “Physiology of Love,” Mantegazza describes the longings and impulses of awakening sexual life, of which presentiments, indefinite feelings, and impulses have existed long before the epoch of puberty. This epoch is, physiologically, the most important. In the abundant increase of feelings and ideas which it engenders is manifested the significance of the sexual factor in mental life.
These impulses, at first vague and incomprehensible, arising from the sensations which are awakened by organs which were previously undeveloped, are accompanied by a powerful excitation of the emotions. The psychological reaction of the sexual impulse at puberty expresses itself in a multitude of manifestations which have in common only the mental condition of emotion and the impulse to express in some way, or render objective, the strange emotionality. Religion and poetry lie close to it, which, after the time of sexual development is past and these originally incomprehensible feelings and impulses have cleared up, receive powerful incentives from the sexual sphere. He who doubts this has only to think how often religious enthusiasm occurs at the time of puberty; how frequent sexual episodes are ​in the lives of the saints; how powerfully sensuality expresses itself in the histories of religious fanatics; and in what revolting scenes, true orgies, the religious festivals of antiquity, no less than the “meetings” of certain sects in modern times, express themselves,—to say nothing of the lustful mysteries which characterized the cults of the ancients. On the other hand, we see that unsatisfied sensuality very frequently finds an equivalent in religious enthusiasm.
This relation between religious and sexual feeling is also shown on the basis of unequivocal psycho-pathological states. It suffices to recall how intense sensuality makes itself manifest in the clinical histories of many religious maniacs; the motley mixture of religious and sexual delusions that is so frequently observed in psychoses (e.g., in maniacal women, who think they are or will be the Mother of God), but particularly in masturbatic insanity; and, finally, the sensual, cruel self-punishments, injuries, self-castrations, and even self-crucifixions resulting from abnormal sexual-religious feeling.
Any attempt to explain the relations between religion and love has difficulties to encounter. Many analogies present themselves. The feeling of sexual attraction and religious feeling (considered as a psychological fact) consist of two elements.
In religion the primary element is a feeling of dependence,—a fact which Schleiermacher recognized long before the later studies in anthropology and ethnography, founded on the observation of primitive conditions, had led to the same conclusion. It is only at a higher stage of culture that the second and essentially ethical element—love of God—enters ​into religious feeling. In the place of the evil spirits of the primitive peoples came the two-faced—now kind, now angry—creations of the more complicated mythologies, until, finally, the God of love, as the giver of eternal happiness, is reverenced, whether this be hoped for from Jehovah, as a blessing on earth; from Allah, as a physical blessing in Paradise; from Christ, as eternal bliss in heaven; or as the Nirvana of the Buddhists.
In sexual desire, love, the expectation of unbounded happiness is the primary element. The feeling of dependence is of secondary development. The nucleus of this feeling exists in both parties, but it may remain undeveloped in one. As a rule, owing to her passive part in procreation and social conditions, it is more pronounced in woman; but exceptionally this is true of men having minds that approach the feminine type.
In both the religious and sexual spheres love is mystical, transcendental. In sexual love the real purpose of the instinct, the propagation of the species, does not enter into consciousness; and the strength of the desire is greater than any that consciousness of purpose could create. In religion, however, the good sought and the object of devotion are of such nature that they cannot become a part of empirical knowledge. Therefore, both mental processes give unlimited range to the imagination.
But both have an immortal object, in as far as the bliss which the sexual sentiment creates in fancy seems incomparable and infinite in contrast with all other pleasurable feelings; and the same is true of the promised blessings of faith, which are conceived to be eternal and supreme.
From the correspondence between the two states of consciousness, with reference to the commanding importance of their objects, it follows that they both often attain an intensity that is irresistible, and which overcomes all opposing motives. Owing to their similarity in that their objects cannot be attained, it follows that both easily degenerate into silly enthusiasm, in which the intensity of feeling far surpasses the clearness and constancy of the ideas. In both cases, in this enthusiasm, with the expectation of a happiness that cannot be attained, the necessity of unconditional submission plays a part.
Owing to the correspondence in many points between these two emotional states, it is clear that when they are very intense the one may take the place of the other; or one may appear by the side of the other, since every intensification of one element of mental life also intensifies its associations. The constant emotion thus calls into consciousness now one and now the other of the two series of ideas with which it is connected. Either of these mental states may become transformed into the impulse to cruelty (actively exercised or passively suffered).
In the religious life this is expressed by sacrifice. Primarily this is done with the idea that the victim is materially enjoyed by the deity; then, in reverence, as a sign of submission, as a tribute; and, finally, with the belief that sins and transgressions against the deity are thus atoned ​for and blessing obtained. If, however, the offering consist of self-punishment, which occurs in all religions, in individuals of very excitable religious nature, it serves not only as a symbol of submission and as an equivalent in the exchange of present pain for future bliss, but everything that is thought to come from the deity, all that happens in obedience to divine mandate or to the honor of the godhead, is felt directly as pleasure. Thus religious enthusiasm leads to ecstasy, to a condition in which consciousness is so preoccupied with feelings of mental pleasure that the concept of suffering endured can only be apperceived without its painful quality.
The exaltation of religious enthusiasm may lead actively to pleasure in the sacrifice of another, if pity be overcompensated by feelings of religious pleasure.
Sadism, and particularly masochism (v. infra), show that in the sphere of the sexual life there may be similar phenomena. Thus the well-established relations between religion, lust, and cruelty may be comprehended in the following formula: States of religious and sexual excitement, at the acme of their development, may correspond in the amount and quality of excitement, and, therefore, under favoring circumstances, one may take the place of the other. Both, in pathological conditions, may become transformed into cruelty.
The sexual factor proves to be no less influential in awakening æsthetic feelings. What would poetry and art be without a sexual foundation? In (sensual) love is gained that warmth of fancy without which a true creation of art is impossible; and in the fire of sensual feelings its glow and warmth are preserved. It may thus be understood why great poets and artists have sensual natures.
This world of ideals reveals itself with the inception of the processes of sexual development. He who, at this period of life, cannot become enthusiastic for all that is great, noble, and beautiful, remains a Philistine all his life. At this epoch does not the least of natural poets forge verses?
At the limits of physiological reaction there are events which take place at the time of puberty in which these obscure feelings of longing express themselves in paroxysms of despair ​of self and the world, which may go on to tædium vitæ, and are often accompanied by a desire to do harm to others (weak analogies of a psychological connection between lust and cruelty).
Youthful love has a romantic, idealistic character. It elevates the beloved object to apotheosis. In its inception it is platonic, and turns to forms of poetry and romance. With the awakening of sensuality there is danger that this idealizing power may be brought to bear upon persons of the opposite sex who are mentally, physically, and socially of inferior station. Thus there may occur méssalliances, seductions, and errors, with the whole tragedy of a passionate love that comes in conflict with the dictates of social position and prospects, and sometimes terminates in suicide or double suicide.
Over-sensual love can never be lasting and true. For this reason the first love is, as a rule, very fleeting; because it is nothing else than the flare of a passion, the flame of a fire of straw.
Only the love that rests upon a recognition of the social qualities of the beloved person, only a love which is willing not only to enjoy present pleasures, but to bear suffering for the beloved object and sacrifice all, is true love. The love of a strongly constituted man shrinks before no difficulties or dangers in order to gain and keep possession of its object.
Love expresses itself in acts of heroism and daring. Such love is in danger, under certain circumstances, of becoming criminal, if moral principles be weak. Jealousy is an ugly spot in this love. The love of a weekly constituted man is sentimental. It sometimes leads to suicide when it is not returned or meets with obstacles, while, under like conditions, the strongly constituted man may become a criminal.
Sentimental love is in danger of becoming a caricature, i.e., when the sensual element is weak (the Knight of Toggenburg, Don Quixote, many minnesingers and troubadours of the Middle Ages).
Such love is flat and soft, and may be even silly; but the true expression of this powerful feeling awakens appropriate pity, respect, or sorrow in the hearts of others.
​Frequently this weak love expresses itself in equivalents—in poetry, which, however, under such circumstances, is effeminate; in æsthetics which are overdrawn; in religion, in which it gives itself up to mysteries and religious enthusiasm; or, where there is a more powerful sensual foundation, founds sects or expresses itself in religious insanity. The immature love of the age of puberty has something of all this in it. Of all the poems and rhymes written at this time of life, they only are readable that are the product of poets divinely endowed.
Notwithstanding all the ethics which love requires in order to develop into its true and pure form, its strongest root is still sensuality. Platonic love is an impossibility, a self-deception, a false designation for related feelings.
In as far as love rests upon sensual desire, it is only conceivable in a normal way as existing between individuals of opposite sex and capable of sexual intercourse. If these conditions are wanting or destroyed, then, in the place of love, comes friendship.
The rôle which the retention of sexual functions plays in the case of a man, both in originating and retaining the feeling of self-respect, is remarkable. In the deterioration of manliness and self-confidence which the onanist, in his weakened nervous state, and the man that has become impotent, present, may be estimated the significance of this factor.
Gyurkovechky (männl. Impotenz. Vienna, 1889) says, very justly, that old and young men essentially differ mentally, on account of the condition of their virility, and that impotence has a detrimental effect upon the feeling of well-being, mental freshness, activity, self-confidence, and the play of fancy. This loss becomes the more important the younger a man is when he loses his virility and the more sensually he was constituted.
Under such circumstances a sudden loss of virility may induce severe melancholia, and even lead to suicide. For such natures life without love is unbearable.
But, also, in cases where the reaction is not so deep, the man bereft of his virility is morose and spiteful, egotistic, jealous, contrary, listless, has but little self-respect or sense of honor, and is cowardly. Analogies are seen in the Skopzens, who, after their castration, change for the worse.
In a woman who has become a matron the condition is of much less importance psychologically, though it is noticeable. If the past period of sexual life has been satisfactory, if children delight the heart of the aging mother, then she is scarcely conscious of the change of her personality.
The situation is different, however, where sterility or circumstances have kept a woman from the performance of her natural functions and denied her that happiness.
These facts place in a clear light the differences which exist between man and woman in the psychology of the sexual life, and in all the sexual functions and desires.
Undoubtedly man has a much more intense sexual appetite than woman. As a result of a powerful natural instinct, at a certain age, a man is drawn toward a woman. He loves sensually, and is influenced in his choice by physical beauty. In accordance with the nature of this powerful impulse, he is aggressive and violent in his wooing. At the same time, this demand of nature does not constitute all of his mental existence. When his longing is satisfied, love temporarily retreats behind other vital and social interests.
With a woman it is quite otherwise. If she is normally developed mentally, and well bred, her sexual desire is small. If this were not so the whole world would become a brothel and marriage and a family impossible. It is certain that the man that avoids women and the woman that seeks men are abnormal.
Woman is wooed for her favor. She remains passive. This lies in her sexual organization, and is not founded merely on the dictates of good breeding.
Nevertheless, the sexual sphere occupies a much larger place in the consciousness of woman than in that of man. The need of love in her is greater than in man, and is continual, not intermittent; but this love is rather more spiritual than sensual. While a man loves a woman first as wife and then as mother of ​his children, a woman is primarily conscious of a man as the father of her children and then as husband. In the choice of a life-companion a woman is influenced much more by the mental than the physical qualities of a man. When she has become a mother she divides her love between child and husband. Sensuality disappears in the mother’s love. Thereafter, in marital intercourse, the wife finds less sensual satisfaction than proof of the love of her husband.
A woman loves with her whole soul. To her love is life; to a man it is the joy of life. To him misfortune in love is a wound; but it costs a woman her life, or at least her happiness. A psychological question worthy of consideration is whether a woman can truly love twice in her life. Certainly the mental inclination of woman is monogamous, while in man it is polygamous.
The weakness of men in comparison with women lies in the great intensity of their sexual desires. Man becomes dependent upon woman, and the more, the weaker and more sensual he becomes; and this just in proportion as he becomes neuropathic. Thus may be understood the fact that, in times of effeminateness and luxury, sensuality flourishes luxuriantly. Then arises the danger to society that mistresses and their dependents may rule the state and compass its ruin (the mistresses of the courts of Louis XIV and XV; the prostitutes of ancient Greece).
The biographies of many statesmen of ancient and modern times show that they were the instruments of women, owing to their great sensuality, which had its foundation in their neuropathic constitutions. The fact that the Catholic Church enjoins celibacy upon its priests, in order to emancipate them from sensuality and preserve them entirely for the purpose of their calling, is an example of discerning psychological knowledge of mankind; but it is unfortunate that the priests, living in celibacy, lose the elevating effect which love and matrimony exert upon the development of character.
From the fact that man by nature plays the aggressive rôle in sexual life, he is in danger of overstepping the limits which morality and law have set. The unfaithfulness of a wife, ​in comparison with that of a husband, is morally much more weighty, and should be more severely punished legally. The unfaithful wife dishonors not only herself, but also her husband and her family, not to speak of the possibility of pater incertus. Natural instinct and social position favor unfaithfulness on the part of a husband, while the wife is afforded much protection. In the case of an unmarried woman, sexual intercourse is something quite different from what it is in an unmarried man. Of a single man society demands decency; of a woman, also chastity. In the cultivated social life of to-day, woman, occupying a sexual position and concerning herself in the interests of society, can only be thought of as a wife.
The aim and ideal of woman, even when she is sunken in the mire of vice, is, and remains, marriage. Woman, as Mantegazza justly remarks, desires not only satisfaction of her sexual feeling, but also protection and support for herself and her children. A man of right feeling, no matter how sensual he may be, demands a wife that has been, and is, chaste. The emblem and ornament of a woman seeking this, her only worthy purpose in life, is modesty. Mantegazza finely characterizes modesty as “one of the forms of psychical self-respect” in woman. This is not the place for anthropological and historical consideration of this, the most beautiful attribute of woman. Probably, feminine modesty is an hereditarily evolved product of the development of civilization.
In remarkable contrast with it, there is occasional exposition of physical charms, conventionally sanctioned by the law of fashion, in which even the most discreet maiden allows herself to indulge in the ball-room. The reasons which lead to this display are evident. Fortunately the modest girl is as little conscious of them as of the reason for the occasionally recurring mode of making certain portions of the body more prominent (panniers); to say nothing of corsets, etc.
​In all times, and among all races, women show a desire to adorn themselves and be charming. In the animal kingdom nature has distinguished the male with the greater beauty. Men designate women as the beautiful sex. This gallantry clearly arises from the sensual desire of men. As long as this personal adornment has a purpose only in itself, or the true psychological reason of the desire to please remains unknown to the woman, nothing can be said against it. When it is done with knowledge, the effort is called flirting.
Under all circumstances a dandified man is ridiculous. We are accustomed to this slight weakness in a woman, and find no fault with it, so long as it is but a subordinate manifestation. When it has become the all-absorbing aim, the French apply to it the word coquetry.
Woman far surpasses man in the natural psychology of love, partly because, through heredity and education, her native element is love; and partly because she has finer feelings (Mantegazza). Even in a man of the very highest breeding, it cannot be found objectionable that he recognizes woman as a means of satisfying his natural instinct. But it becomes his duty to belong only to the woman of his choice. In a civilized state this becomes a binding social obligation,—marriage; and, inasmuch as the wife requires for herself and children protection and support, it becomes a marriage right.
It is of great importance psychologically, and, for certain pathological manifestations to be later described, indispensable, to examine the psychological events which draw a man and a woman together and unite them; so that, of all other persons of the same sex, only the beloved one seems desirable.
If one could demonstrate design in the processes of nature,—adaptation cannot be denied them,—the fact of fascination by a single person of the opposite sex, with indifference toward all others, as it occurs between true and happy lovers, would appear as a wonderful creative provision to insure monogamous unions for the promotion of their object.
​To the scientific observer, however, this love, or “harmony of souls,” this “heart-bond,” does not, by any means, appear as a “soul-mystery;” but, in the majority of cases, it may be referred to certain physical or mental peculiarities, as the case may be, by which the attractiveness of the beloved person is exerted.
Thus we speak of what is called fetich and fetichism. In the term fetich we are wont to comprehend objects, or parts, or simply peculiarities of objects, which, by virtue of associative relations to an intense feeling, or to a personality or idea that awakens deep interest, exert a kind of charm (“fetisso,” Portuguese), or, at least, owing to peculiar individual coloring, produce a very deep impression which does not belong to the external sign (symbol, fetich) in itself.
The individual valuation of the fetich, which may go to the extent of an unreasoning enthusiasm in the individual affected, is called fetichism. This interesting psychological phenomenon is explicable by an empirical law of association,—the relation of a particular to a general concept,—in which, however, the essential thing is the pleasurable emotional coloring of the particular concept peculiar to the individual: It is most common in two related mental spheres,—those of religious and erotic feelings and ideas. Religious fetichism differs in relation and significance from sexual fetichism, for it found, and still finds, its original motive in the delusion that the object of the fetichism, or the idol, possesses divine attributes, and that it is not simply a symbol; or peculiar wonder-working (relics) or protective (amulet) virtues are superstitiously ascribed to the fetich.
With respect of the development of physiological love, it is probable that its nucleus is always to be found in an individual fetich (charm) which a person of one sex exercises over a person of the opposite sex.
The case is the simplest where the sight of a person of the opposite sex occurs simultaneously with sensual excitement, and the latter is thus increased.
​Emotional and visual impressions are brought into associative connection, and this association is strengthened in proportion as the recurring emotion awakens the visual memory-picture, or the latter (another meeting) renews sexual excitement, which may possibly reach the intensity of orgasm and pollution (dream-picture). In this case the whole physical personality has the effect of a fetich.
As Binet and others show, merely parts of the whole, simply peculiarities, either physical or mental, may affect the person of the opposite sex as a fetich, when the perception of them is associated with (accidental) sexual excitement (or induces it).
It is well known from experience that accident determines this mental association, that the objects of the fetich may be individually very diverse, and that thus the most peculiar sympathies (and antipathies) arise.
These physiological facts of fetichism explain the individual sympathies between husband and wife; the preference of a certain person to all others of the same sex. Since the fetich represents a symbol that is purely individual, it is clear that its effect must be individual. Since it is colored by the most intense pleasurable feeling, it follows that possible faults in the beloved object are overlooked (“Love is blind”), and an exaltation of it is induced that to others is incomprehensible, and even silly under some circumstances. Thus it is clear why lovers are not understood by their unaffected fellow-men; and why they deify their idols, develop a true cult of devotion, and invests them with attributes which objectively they do not possess. Thus we may understand why love appears sometimes more like a passion, sometimes as a formal, exceptional mental state, in which the unattainable seems attainable, the ugly beautiful, the profane sacred, and every other interest, every duty, disappears.
Tarde (Archives de l’anthropologie criminelle, v year, No. 30) rightfully emphasizes the fact that the fetich may vary with nations as well as with individuals, but that the general ideal of beauty remains the same among civilized people of the same era.
​Binet deserves great credit for having studied and analyzed in detail the fetichism of love. The particular sympathies all spring from it. Thus one is attracted to slender, another to plump beauties, to blondes or brunettes. For one a peculiar expression of the eyes; for another a peculiar tone of the voice, or a particular (even an artificial) odor (perfume); or the hand, the foot, the ear, etc., may be the individual fetich (charm),—the beginning of a complicated chain of mental processes which, as a whole, represent love, i.e., the longing to possess, physically and mentally, the beloved object.
This fact is important, as showing a condition for the origin of a fetichism that falls within physiological limits. The fetich may constantly retain its significance without being pathological; but this is possible only when the particular concept is developed to a general concept; when the resulting love comes to take as its object the whole mental and physical personality.
Normal love can be nothing but a synthesis, a generalization. Ludwig Brunn, under the heading, “The Fetichism of Love,” cleverly says:—
“Thus normal love appears to us as a symphony of tones of all kinds. It results from the most various stimuli. It is likewise polytheistic. Fetichism recognizes only the tone of a single instrument; it results from a certain stimulus; it is monotheistic.”
On slight reflection any one will see that real love (this word is only too often abused) can be spoken of only when the whole person is both physically and mentally the object of adoration. Love must always have a sensual element, i.e., the desire to possess the beloved object, to be united with it and fulfill the laws of nature. But when merely the body of the person of the opposite sex is the object of love, when satisfaction of sensual pleasure is the sole object, without desire to possess the soul and enjoy mutual communion, love is not genuine, no more than that of platonic lovers, who love only the soul and avoid sensual pleasure (many cases of contrary sexuality). For the former merely the body, for the latter simply the soul, is a ​fetich, and the love fetichism. Such cases certainly represent transitions to pathological fetichism. This assumption is even more justified when, as a further criterion of real love, mental satisfaction must be given by the sexual act.
There remains to be mentioned, within the physiological phenomena of fetichism, the fact that among the many things that may become fetiches there are certain ones that gain such significance for a majority of persons.
As such for a man may be mentioned the hair, the hand, the foot of a woman, the expression of her eyes. Certain ones of these gain a remarkable significance in the pathology of fetichism. These facts clearly play a rôle in the feminine mind, either consciously or unconsciously.
One of the greatest cares of women is the cultivation of the hair, to which often an unreasonable amount of time and money is devoted. How a mother cares for her little daughter’s hair! What a part the hair-dresser plays! Falling of the hair would cause despair in a young lady. I recall a proud lady who became insane over it, and died by suicide. Young ladies like to talk of coiffures, and are envious of beautiful hair.
​Beautiful hair is a powerful fetich with many men. In the legend of the Loreley, who lured men to destruction, the golden hair, which she combs with a golden comb, appears as a fetich. Frequently the hand and foot possess an attractiveness no less powerful, when, indeed, often (though by no means invariably) masochistic and sadistic feelings aid in determining the peculiar kind of fetich.
By a transference through association of ideas, the gloves or shoes may obtain the significance of a fetich.
Brunn (op. cit.) justly points out that among the customs of the Middle Ages drinking from the shoe of a beautiful woman (still to be found in Poland) played a remarkable part in gallantry and homage. The shoe also plays an important rôle in the legend of Aschenbrödel.
The expression of the eyes is particularly important as a means of kindling the sparks of love. A neuropathic eye frequently affects persons of both sexes as a fetich. “Madame, vos beaux yeux me font mourir d’amour” (Molière).
There is superfluity of examples showing that odors of the body may become fetiches.
This fact is also taken advantage of in the ars amandi of woman, either consciously or unconsciously. Ruth sought to attract Boaz by perfuming herself. The demi-monde of ancient and modern times is noted for its use of perfume. Jäger, in his “Discovery of the Soul,” calls attention to many olfactory sympathies.
Cases are known where men have married ugly women simply because their personal odors were exceedingly pleasing.
Binet makes it probable that the voice may also become a fetich. He relates a case in point of Dumas, who used it in his ​novel, “La Maison du Vent.” It was the case of a wife who fell in love with a tenor’s voice, and thus became untrue to her husband. Belot’s romance, “Les Baigneuses de Trouville,” speaks in favor of this assumption. Binet thinks that many marriages with singers are due to the fetich of their voices. He also calls attention to the interesting fact that among singing-birds the voice has the same sexual significance as odors among quadrupeds. The birds allure by their song, and the male that sings most beautifully flies at night to his charmed mate.
The pathological facts of masochism and sadism show that mental peculiarities may also act as fetiches in a wider sense.
Thus the fact of idiosyncrasies is explained, and the old saying, “De gustibus non est disputandum,” retains its force.
* ↑ Comp. Lombroso, “The Criminal.”
* ↑ Comp. Westermarck, “History of Human Marriage.” McMillan & Co., 1891.
* ↑ This generally entertained idea, also held by many historians, requires some limitation, in that the symbolic and sacramental character of marriage was first made clear and unequivocal by the Council of Trent, even though there was ever in the spirit of Christianity that which would free woman and raise her from the inferior position occupied by her in the ancient world and the Old Testament. That this took place so late may well be due in part to the traditions of Genesis of the secondary creation of woman from the rib of man, and of her part in the Fall, and the consequent curse: “Thy will shall be to thy husband.” Since the Fall, for which the Old Testament made woman responsible, became the corner-stone of the fabric of church-teachings, the wife’s social position could but remain inferior until the spirit of Christianity had gained a victory over tradition and scholasticism. It is remarkable that, with the exception of the interdiction of putting away a wife (Matt. xix, 9), the gospels contain nothing favoring woman. Gentleness toward the adulteress and the repentant Magdalene does not affect the position of the wife in itself. The Epistles of Paul specifically declare that the position of woman shall not be altered. (II Corinth. xi, 3–12; Ephes. v, 22: “Wives, submit yourselves unto your husbands;” and 33, “And the wife see that she reverence her husband”). Passages in Tertullian show how the Fathers of the Church were prejudiced against woman by Eve’s guilt: “Woman, thou shouldst forever go in sorrow and rags, thy eyes filled with tears! Thou hast brought man to the ground!” St. Hieronymus has nothing good to say of woman. He says, “Woman is a door for the devil, a way to evil, the sting of the scorpion.” (“De cultu feminarum,” i, 1.) Canonical Law declares: “Only man was created in the image of God, not woman; therefore, woman should serve him and be his maid!” The Provincial Council of Macon, in the sixth century, earnestly debated the question whether woman had a soul. The effect of these ideas in the Church on the peoples embracing Christianity was direct. Among the Germans, after the acceptance of the new faith, for the foregoing reason, the weregild for a wife—the simple expression of her value—decreased (J. Falke, “Die ritterliche Gesellschaft,” p. 49. Berlin, 1862). Concerning the value of each sex among the Jews, vide Leviticus, xxvii, 3 and 4. Moreover, polygamy, which is expressly recognized in the Old Testament (Deut. xxi, 15), is nowhere explicitly interdicted in the New Testament. Christian princes (e.g., the Marovingian kings, Clotar I, Childebert I, Pepin I, and many of the royal Franks) lived in polygamy; and at that time the Church made no opposition to it (Weinhold, “Die deutschen Frauen im Mittelalter,” ii, p. 15). Comp. also Unger, “Die Ehe,” etc., and the excellent work by Louis Bridel, “La femme et le droit,” Paris, 1884.
* ↑ Comp. Friedländer “Sittengeschicte Roms.” Wiedemeister, “Der Cäsarenwahnsinn.” Suetonius. Moreau, “Des aberrations du sens génésique.”
* ↑ These statements, however, are opposed to Friedreich (“Hdb. d. gerichtsärztl Praxis,” i, p. 271, 1843), and also Lombroso (op. cit., p. 42), according to whom pederasty is very frequent among the uncivilized Americans.
* ↑ Comp. Friedreich, “gerichtl. Psychologie,” p. 389, who has collected numerous examples. Thus the nun Blanbekin was always troubled with the thought about what had become of the part lost at the circumcision of Christ. Veronica Juliani, canonized by Pope Pius II, in memory of the divine lion, took an actual lion in her bed and kissed it, and let it suck from her breast; and even secreted a few drops of milk for it. St. Catherine, of Genoa, often burned with such inward fire that, in order to cool herself, she would lie down on the ground and cry “Love, love, I can endure it no longer!” At the same time she felt a peculiar inclination for her confessor. One day she lifted his hand to her nose and smelled an odor which penetrated to her heart, “a heavenly perfume, so delightful that it would wake the dead.” St. Armelle and St. Elizabeth were troubled with a similar longing for the child Jesus. The temptations of St. Anthony, of Padua, are well known. An old prayer is significant: “O, that I had found thee, Holy Emanuel; O, that I had thee in my bed to bring delight to body and soul. Come and be mine, and my heart shall be thy resting-place.”
* ↑ Comp. Friedreich, “Diagnostik der psych. Krankheiten,” p. 247 u. ff.; Neumann, “Lehrb. d. Psychiatrie,” p. 80.
* ↑ The relation of this trio finds its expression not only in the events of real life, as above indicated, but also in romance, and even in the sculpture of degenerate eras. As an example we may point to the group of St. Theresa, by Bernini, who “sinks in an hysterical faint on a marble cloud, with an amorous angel plunging the arrow (of divine love) into her heart” (Lübke).
* ↑ A Russian religious sect.
* ↑ Westermarck (op. cit., p. 211), after a careful review of the evidence, says: “These facts appear to prove that the feeling of shame, far from being the original cause of man’s covering his body, is, on the contrary, a result of this custom; and that the covering, if not used as a protection from climate, owes its origin, at least in a great many cases, to the desire of men and women to make themselves attractive.”—Trans.
* ↑ This is not literally the case. “It is expressly stated, of the women of several savage peoples, that they are less desirous of self-decoration than the men.”—Westermarck, op. cit., p. 184. And the same writer (p. 182) says that “it is a common notion that women are by nature vainer and more addicted to dressing and decorating themselves than men. This certainly does not hold good for savage and barbarous peoples in general.”—Trans.
* ↑ Comp. Max Müller, who derives the word fetich etymologically from factitious (artificial, an insignificant thing).
* ↑ Deutsches Montagsblatt, Berlin, August 20, 1888.
* ↑ Magnan’s “spinal cérébral postérieur,” who finds pleasure in every woman, and on whom every woman looks with favor, has only desire to satisfy his lust. Purchased or forced love is not real love (Mantegazza). The one who originated the saying, “Sublata lucerna nullum discrimen inter feminas,” must have been a cynic indeed. Power in a man to perform love’s act is no proof that this makes possible the greatest pleasure of love. There are, indeed, urnings who are potent for women,—men who do not love their wives, but who are still able to perform the marital “duty.” In most cases of this kind, indeed, there is no lustful pleasure; it is essentially a kind of onanistic act, for the most part made possible by means of help of imagination that calls up another beloved person. By this deception sensual pleasure can be induced, but this rudimentary psychical satisfaction is the result of a mental trick, just as in solitary onanism, where fancy has to assist in order to induce sensual pleasure. As a rule, the degree of orgasm necessary as a means to the attainment of lustful pleasure seems attainable only when the imagination intervenes. Where mental impediments exist (indifference, repugnance, disgust, fear of infection or pregnancy, etc.), sensual pleasure seems usually wanting.
* ↑ “The important part played by the hair of the head as a stimulant of sexual passion appears in a curious way from Mr. Sibree’s account of King Radàma’s attempt to introduce European customs among the Hovas of Madagascar. As soon as he had adopted the military tactics of the English, he ordered that all his officers and soldiers should have their hair cut, but this command produced so great a disturbance among the women of the capital that they assembled in great numbers to protest against the king’s order, and could not be quieted until they were surrounded by troops, and their leaders cruelly speared.”—Westermarck, op. cit. Here male hair was a physiological fetich of females. It represents a relation of the sexes that civilization has gradually reversed. While in civilized society woman exercises her ingenuity to increase her attractiveness, among savages it is the men who are anxious to increase their physical charms. This reversal of the primitive relation is a very interesting fact, and is probably to be explained by the transference of the “liberty of choice” from woman to man which civilization has gradually induced. Westermarck (op. cit., p. 185) says: “It should be noted that it is, as a rule, the man only that runs the risk of being obliged to lead a single life. Hence it is obvious that, to the best of his ability, he must endeavor to be taken into favor by making himself as attractive as possible. In civilized Europe, on the other hand, the opposite occurs. Here it is the woman that has the greatest difficulty in getting married, and she is also the vainer of the two.”—Trans.