Psychopathia sexualis: With especial reference to contrary sexual instinct: A medico-legal studyKrafft-Ebing, R. von (Richard)
Science
Psychopathia sexualis: With especial reference to contrary sexual instinct: A medico-legal study
Krafft-Ebing, R. von (Richard)
Paraphilias
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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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