Two intense desires rule and govern mankind and control all man’s thoughts, his joys and sorrows. They are man’s two appetites, hunger for food and craving for love. Curiously enough, while man takes great pains in the education of the young to prepare them for the gratification of hunger, the much tabooed question of sex has been excluded, in our present civilization, from every discussion.

Yet love lies at the foundation of society, it permeates unconsciously the thoughts, aspirations and hopes of mankind. Love is glorified as the source of the most admirable productions of art, of the sublime creations of poetry and music; it is accepted as the mightiest factor in human civilization, as the basis of the family and state. The egoism of passion and the power of love are absorbing all other considerations. Virgil calls love the greatest conqueror:

“Omnia vincit amor, nos et cedamus amori.”

Solomon sings, “Love is strong as death.”

In its right appreciation, love has been exalted by the ancients in song and story and extolled by priest and philosopher. “To the Spirit, to Heaven, to the Sun, to the Moon, to Earth, to Night, to the Day, and to the Father of all that is and will be, to Eros.” Such an invocation was possible only among the ancient civilized nations. They recognized the importance of sexuality in life. They could not see any moral turpitude in actions, regarded by them as the design of nature and as the acme of felicity. They discovered in Love the focus of life. For this reason sexuality among the ancients was an object of pure reverence as the fundamental force of life. The divine adoration of sex was the practice of every tribe and nation of prehistoric antiquity. Even the organs of sex were considered beautiful and pleasurable objects, and were admired accordingly. The phallus, or the male sex-organ, and the yoni, the external female genitals, were symbols of the worship of the ancients and were objects of special religious rites.

In the remotest antiquity the worship of the generative principle was the only religion known to men. Sex-worship was not confined to any one race. It was the form of worship common to all primeval nations of the globe. The Hindus, Chaldeans, Hebrews, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Gauls, Celts, Teutons, Britons and Scandinavians, all shared in phallicism and yonism.

The study of sexual activities and of generation was the basis of ancient Hindu theology. Siva had on his left arm a ring on which was portrayed the sex organs in the act of procreation. The Greek bacchanalia, and the Roman saturnalian mysteries, the free love that prevailed during the festivities in honor of Mylitta, Anaitis, and Aphrodita were still relics of sex-worship. Herodotos’ statement that in Babylon women offered themselves, once at least in their lives, in the Temple of Venus, and that only after so doing were they considered free to marry, and his further report that the women on the vessels sailing for Bubastis to the festivals of Iris uncovered themselves in the presence of the men, show that sex-worship was not unknown among Assyrians and Egyptians.

In the historic time sex worship was almost replaced by other forms of religion. Yet there are traces of the cult of the phallus to be found everywhere in ancient profane and sacred history. The temple in which the emperor Elgabal was brought up was represented on a bronze coin of his reign; an ionic peristyle with a peek into the Cella, but instead of the statue of a god was a gigantic phallus. Even the Hebrews worshipped in the phallus the principle of the production of life before the adoption of the cult of Jehovah. Records of phallicism can still be found in the Old Testament. Instead of invoking the Deity in taking a solemn oath, Abraham orders his servant to place his hand upon his phallus, because the phallus was still kept in its former high veneration. The slain enemy was, for this reason, deprived of his phallus. David bought Saul’s daughter with a trophy of two hundred phalli, taken from the slain Philistines. Circumcision also shows the incorporation of phallic ritual with religion.

In the same light and with the same veneration as the phallus was the yoni worshipped. In the yoni was worshipped the receptacle of life, the divine ark, within the hidden enclosure of which was contained the mystery of life. Its interior was considered the holy of holies. The yoni was for that reason often represented by an ark, which was the holiest of all symbols in the worship of the Ancients. The worship of Osiris took place before an ark; the sanctum sanctorum of Jehovah’s temple harbored an ark.

Yonism was the adoration of the vulva, as the organ through which the sexual powers are manifested. It is through the woman that the divine sexual emotions are aroused; it is the sight or thought of her that calls into activity the man’s generative nature and powers.

The female principle in nature was hence not considered simply as a passive medium, but was exalted and worshipped as a potent factor in the mystery of creation and reproduction. The earth itself was considered feminine, and all natural orifices have been regarded as typical of that part which characterizes woman. The vulva, therefore, was the sacred symbol of the female principle in nature.

The Ashereh, so often mentioned in the Bible, was nothing but the image of the yoni. It was a symbol of Ashtoreth, or of the union of Baal and Ashtoreth. The Ashereh was made of wood and had in its centre an opening or fissure as the door of life. Above the fissure was a small elevation as an emblematical representation of the clitoris.

The most common forms of the feminine symbol were those made in representation of the mons Veneris. The mountain of Venus was represented by mounds, columns and pyramids. Mounds and hills were considered holy. The graves of Egyptian kings were erected in form of huge pyramids in honor of the feminine creative deity. The yoni worshippers of the Old Testament had the temples of their feminine deity on high hills. The obelisk, pillar, column, altar, mount and cave, all have their origin in the pristine symbolism of yonic worship.

Even the present belief in the lucky horseshoe is connected with the ancient emblems of the female genitals, the yoni. In Ireland the yoni seem to have been the symbol of sex-worship most in use. Even in the arches over the doorways of Christian churches a female figure, with the person fully exposed, was so placed that the external organs of generation at once caught the eye. In olden times, the people were in the habit of making charcoal drawings of the female genitals over the doors of their houses to ward off ill luck. Now, the horseshoe has a great resemblance with the form of the vulva. Hence the drawings over the doors resembled a horseshoe. From this symbol originates the horseshoe’s alleged power to ward off evil and to bring luck. Father Dubois found that the lingam which the devout Hindus attach either to their hair or arms or is suspended from the neck is a small amulet representing the organs of both sexes in activity. Even the symbol of the cross has been identified with the earliest records of sex-worship. The cruciform symbol on the Assyrian relics and in the temples of Vishnu typifies the sacredness of Love’s physical expression.

Thus with the ancients the passion of sex and the fervor of religion were closely interwoven. Accordingly every ancient temple had within its confines a number of consecrated women whose office it was to submit to the embraces of any man upon the payment of a specified sum. The money was used for religious purposes. To the mind of the Ancients no more appropriate nor holy means could be devised for raising money for the maintenance of the temple than a sanctified indulgence in the divine act. It was the most sacred and sublime of all human functions. Hence the temple-courtesan was held in high honor and was considered as sacred as the priest. The Old Testament calls the temple-courtesan “Hakdeshoh,” the consecrated, the holy; and it was not in the least degrading to associate with her, in the early history of the Hebrews, as the story of Juda and Tamar shows. Later on, Amos (ii, 7) complains that the Hebrew maidens received the embraces of men at every altar. Hosea (iv, 14) distinguishes between the common prostitute and the temple-courtesan.

The lapse of Israel into the former sex-worship, at the time of these prophets, caused a reaction against any sex-manifestations. This reaction is especially noticeable among the faithful adherents of the religion of Jehovah in the latter days of the second temple. The pious men sought the greatest virtue in chastity and celibacy and looked with contempt upon sexuality. In the beginning only individual persons took to celibacy, as did Elijah and Elisha. Later on these celibates became more numerous and formed different orders, of which the order of the Essaeans was the most important, because Christianity took its origin within the folds of this order.

In accordance with its origin, Christianity never looked with favor upon sexuality of any kind. The immaculate virgin is the ideal. Even holy matrimony was only tolerated. “It is good for a man not to touch a woman,” writes Paul to the Corinthians (Cap. vii). Christianity, therefore, always surrounded with a halo those who vowed chastity. To overcome the passion of sex was always praised as the highest virtue, and asceticism was held in high veneration. Justinus says that total sexual abstinence is a high virtue, and that sexual activity is unnecessary to life. Hieronymus claims that God and the Church requested singleness and only permitted marriage. Christianity entirely overlooked the tremendous strain upon the physical, mental and moral forces such an unnatural life must carry with it. For though complete abstinence is possible and feasible during the period of adolescence, men and women, when mature in years, suffer under such enforced abstinence, and although the final act, or the culmination of the sex-attraction, may be suppressed by the will, yet its emotions are irresistible. The neurotic nun who imagines herself being embraced by a saint thinks that she has subjugated the instinct of sex, but in reality her emotions have a sexual origin.

Actions caused by great sexual excitement may be found in the life of many a saint. Augustinus, in his confessions, says: “My heart was burning, boiling and foaming with unchastity; it was poured out, it overflowed, it went up in licentiousness.”

Origines found sexual abstinence too difficult and castrated himself. For that reason he never was canonized. For the spirit should kill the flesh. Parkman’s report about Marie de l’Incarnation is highly interesting in this respect. She heard, while in a trance, a miraculous voice, Christ promising to become her spouse. Months and years passed, when again the voice sounded in her ear, this time with the assurance that the promise was fulfilled, that she was indeed his bride. Now ensued phenomena which are not infrequent among female devotees, when unmarried or married unhappily. In her excited imagination, the divine spouse became a living presence, and her language to him, as recorded by herself, is of intense passion. Her prayer is, “O! my Love! when shall I embrace you? Have you no pity on the torments which I suffer? Alas, alas, my Love, my Beauty, my Life! Instead of healing my pain you take pleasure in it. Come, let me embrace you and die in your sacred arms.”

A curious instance of perversion in religio-sexual feeling, bordering on zoÖerastia, is the case of St. Veronica. According to Friedrich she was so enamored of the divine lion, symbolizing St. Mark, that she took a lion whelp to her bed, fondled it, kissed it “et prÆbebat ei mammas.”

Thus the preaching of the Church on the subjugation of the flesh was no great success even among the saints. If the ascetics are not frigid they remain subject to the emotions of sex. Mankind at large is surely ruled by the dictates of the sex-urge, in our day no less than at the time of sex-worship. Especially do all feminine thoughts, aspirations and pursuits aim, though sometimes unconsciously, at love, in spite of our false modesty, prudery and conspiracy of silence about the fundamental facts of reproduction.

One glance at the fashions in dress will bear out this contention. The question of dress surely rules the thoughts and actions of a majority of our modern women. Now what is the meaning of dress? Grosse in his “AnfÄnge der Kunst” shows that the desire for clothes was originally an irradiation of the sex instinct. The man adopted dress for the purpose of decoration, the woman for the purpose of attraction through covering. The first coverings of the private parts served as an ornament of the same and to render the parts covered more conspicuous. For where nudity generally prevails, the practice of covering certain parts of the body excites curiosity and solicits the observation of the other sex. Mortimer reports that in Australia girls cast off their aprons after marriage, being no longer anxious to engage the notice of men.

This fact serves to prove that clothes, which originated from the first coverings, were originally worn to allure. It was not the feeling of shame that caused resort to coverings and created clothes, but the very coverings provoked in time the feeling of shame.A

Clothes owing their introduction to the irradiation of sex-attraction, fashion never disowned their origin. Fashion, says Bloch, bears witness of its intimate relationship to the vita sexualis, in that it always started from the ranks of courtesans and at the instance of opulent demi-mondaines. Gunther says: The demi-monde has always, since fashions are in existence, dictated them, in Rome, in Venice and now in Paris.

Fashion has in two ways introduced a sensual element in dress. Either it renders conspicuous certain parts of the body and exaggerates their size, by the shape of the garment, its drapery and trimmings, or it leaves uncovered these parts to catch the eye. Both manoeuvers aim at the production of a sensual effect. The stretching of the skirt over the abdomen and legs in such a way that the outlines of the hips and thighs obtrude themselves upon the eye was surely invented by a Parisian demi-mondaine to serve sensuality. The corset, says Bloch, aims to render conspicuous and prominent the specific female organ, the bosom. It tries to effect an exciting contrast between the form of the bosom and the slimness of the waist, increased by tight lacing. At the same time, fashion dictates for a great number of occasions an ample nudity of this most alluring female organ.

The bosom of the woman, says Berg, is the organ by which she is able to express herself most ingeniously. Its undulations were always her most expressive and skilful rhetoric. The bosom represents the woman’s language and her poetry, her history and her music, her purity and her longing, her policy and her religion, her worship and her art, her secret and her convention, her character and her pride, her consciousness, her magic mirror and her mystery. The bosom is the central organ of all female ideas, desires and humors. No wonder, therefore, that fashion concentrates its greatest endeavors and painstaking effort upon this particular part of the female body. Being Cupid’s most faithful servant, fashion selects this part which it expects to serve best as the target of the winged god’s arrows. To be sure, the individual refined and chaste woman is unaware of the underlying principle of the creators of fashions. She is convinced that clothes were adopted for esthetic reasons, although the sculptor who knows most of beauty seldom covers up the naked body. By heredity and social custom, clothing for refined women has become a mere side current of irradiation of the sensual. Clothes are used, by a majority of women, mainly as a means of beautifying. Ornamental clothing is not any longer a simple lure. It is a sign or symbol of a greater refinement of perception and delicacy of feeling. By the use of clothes the attention is directed rather to the personality than to the person. It is an attempt to display psychical rather than physical features. The impulse of the normal woman to attribute an exaggerated value to clothes is more an imaginative radiation and far remote from the desire of physical exhibition. But as far as fashion is concerned, the original close connection between clothes and the attraction of the sexes is still the commanding principle. Fashion is still standing in the service of sensuality. This explains its modern fickleness. In previous epochs the same mode of dress was worn for centuries, as the European peasant’s dress shows. The present feverishly frequent change of fashion is a pathological phenomenon, betraying the diseased eagerness for ever stronger and more original sensual stimulations.

Love and sex attraction being the chief objects in the lives of a considerable part of mankind, it is surprising that until recently sexuality was not looked upon with great favor, and that a sane knowledge of sex and reproduction was assiduously withheld from the people. While our ancestors considered the sex functions sacred, by a strange mental process it is now considered shameful. So deeply is the sense of shame morbidly associated with the sensual desire that most people, and especially women, frequently disavow their propensity and attempt to hide their ardor from the world. They do not recognize that normal, well-ordered amativeness is a physiological and moral virtue, while manifestations of spurious spirituality are often induced by certain perversions. Indifference to amatory pleasures is frequently professed by those who resort to artificial stimulants. Only those most occupied with amatory delights feign to look with contempt upon sex and to despise its wonderful functions.B To the really innocent and pure all things are pure. The result of this morbid sense of shame is that there is scarcely any other subject so completely ignored as the sex function, although so much of the health and happiness of the race depends upon it. This false sense of shame is the cause of our modern fig-leaf modesty and prudery, which attributes a particular obscene meaning to everything sexual. It has created that diseased imagination, depraved beyond all hope, which can find any prurient gratification in the cold, chaste nakedness of ancient marble. The mere nude arms or legs of a small school girl, the furnishings of a public bath-house, the naked limbs of a Tirolian peasant, or the grandest works of art awaken in them lascivious thoughts. Individuals with such traits are accustomed to interject their own diseased imagination, guilty conscience and obscene sentiments into the purest artistic creations, be they sculptured, painted, written or spoken.

The prudery and obscenity of these victims of a diseased imagination and perverted moral sense have succeeded in distorting our judgment on questions of sex in such a way that any desire for scientific instruction in these subjects has become inextricably confused with ideas of prurience and impropriety. Matters pertaining to the generative functions are, as a rule, excluded even from treatises on physiology. But for the anatomists and alienists, nothing would be known about the physiology of normal Love. The zealots wish to persuade us that the population of the earth increases by the stork-method.

Even the physician who is often called upon for advice about things pertaining to the psychological phase of sex, prudishly ignores the mightiest of human instincts which is so intimately related to human weal and woe. He is conversant with the sexual question by virtue of its anatomical and physiological knowledge, and he is well aware of its hygienic, sociological and ethical importance. But when he is to furnish enlightenment on psychic or pedagogic questions of sex, he is embarrassed because of a lack of knowledge of sex psychology. The great teachers in our medical schools, who ought to impart to their pupils all their knowledge about the nature of things concerning Love that they have gathered in their long and extensive experience, seem either to consider Love a subject too sacred for physiological and psychological analysis, or are really afraid to arouse the anger of the zealots who made of the sanctuary of sex-attraction a “noli me tangere.”

Only the writers of fiction and poetry are allowed to approach the sanctuary of Love, because with their abnormal imagination they sang dithyrambs on this natural sentiment and morbidly transformed it into a supernatural, obscure phenomenon. The hyperaesthetic writers of this morbid fiction are encouraged to continue their practice of elevating the natural sentiment of love to the height of a fetich, which only the lover is capable of understanding. The scientist who dared to analyze this sentiment, so important to the human race, and tried to enlighten us about the nature of the attraction of the sexes, was met with the cry, “To the Tarpeian rock.” The unbiased observer was declared incapable of feeling and comprehending this natural sentiment. Even philosophers, such as Schopenhauer, Hartman and Spencer, though they touched upon the subject only from a philosophical point of view, without probing it with the anatomist’s scalpel, have been decried as heartless and soulless cynics whom nature denied the possession of this sublimest of sentiments, because they dared to attack the majesty of Love.

No wonder, therefore, that no other physical function has been treated with so stepmotherly a regard and scant attention as the important instinct of the preservation of the species, no wonder that no other physiological phenomenon has been approached with such hesitancy as the study of love in man. The works on physiology and gynaecology are significantly silent on the subject of this important sentiment, and the practitioner who so often has to deal with the pathological side of love looks in vain for light in his text-books.

In the last decennium, a certain change has taken place in this respect. A wave of sex discussion is sweeping over the civilized countries of the world. The former taboo on the discussion of sexual matters has been more or less removed and the veil lifted. Things which not very long ago could not have been mentioned in polite society except in whispers and with low breath, are now publicly discussed in season and out of season. As it is often the case, we have turned from the one extreme of complete darkness to the other extreme of too glaring light. Sex enlightenment runs rampant at present. It haunts the stage, lurks in innumerable societies and crops out in newspapers and magazines.

But, although the world is full of sex discussion, the emphasis is generally laid upon sex-hygiene and upon the knowledge of the relations of the sex function to mental and physical development. Sex-hygiene is nowadays held to be a proper subject of pedagogy and is taught in many schools and colleges. But the emotion of Love is still very little studied, and it is still wrapped in complete darkness. A great deal of ignorance still prevails in regard to this important emotion. Few people understand under this much-abused word one and the same emotion. The same word is used to designate entirely different feelings. The ancient Greeks had three different words to express the different emotions that go under the name of love. One of the highest emotions is expressed by the word ??ap??. It is the love man feels for God, parents or country. It is the love founded upon worship, adoration, gratitude and habit. The other kind of love was expressed by the word f????. It designates the love founded on sympathy and liking, as the love of friends, of humanity, of wisdom. The last, amatory emotion, was expressed by the word ????. It is the love founded upon sex-attraction. It is a purely instinctive emotion, found throughout the animal kingdom and even among some plants. Hence it is just the feeling which should not be treated with such besotted reverence. True enough sexual passion is the passion of creation, the most important function in the universe. Sympathy, affection, fidelity, sacrifice, indeed, all those noble traits, included under the term altruism, spring from the reproductive instinct. Still the two emotions, love, sung by poetry and exalted by art, and sex-attraction, found in animals and plants as well as in man, can not be identical. Still they are both generally confounded even by the best writers.

To spread more light upon this important subject is the aim of this treatise. It has been written for the elucidation of the normal amatory emotions, considering the pathological changes only by way of contrast, for the perusal of the profession of medicine and of students of medical jurisprudence.