Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3: Analysis of the Sexual Impulse; Love and Pain; The Sexual Impulse in WomenEllis, Havelock
Science
Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3: Analysis of the Sexual Impulse; Love and Pain; The Sexual Impulse in Women
Ellis, Havelock
Sex; Sex (Psychology)
Féré (_L'Instinct sexuel_, p. 241) has sought to explain away
some of these phenomena, in so far as they may be brought against
the theory that the secretions and excretions of the sexual
glands are the sole source of the sexual impulse. The persistence
of sexual feelings after castration may be due, he argues, to the
presence of the nerves in the cicatrices, just as the amputated
have the illusion that the missing limb is still there. Exactly
the same explanation has since been put forward by Moll,
_Medizinische Klinik_, 1905, Nrs. 12 and 13. In the same way the
presence of sexual feelings after the menopause may be due to
similar irritation determined by degeneration during involution
of the glands. The precocious appearance of the sexual impulse in
childhood he would explain as due to an anomaly of development in
the sexual organs. Féré makes no attempt to explain the presence
of the sexual impulse in the congenital absence of the sexual
glands; here, however, Mundé intervenes with the suggestion that
it is possible that in most cases "an infinitesimal trace of
ovary" may exist, and preserve femininity, though insufficient to
produce ovulation or menstruation.
It is proper to mention these ingenious arguments. They are,
however, purely hypothetical, obviously invented to support a
theory. It can scarcely be said that they carry conviction. We
may rather agree with Guinard that so great is the importance of
reproduction that nature has multiplied the means by which
preparation is made for the conjunction of the sexes and the
roads by which sexual excitation may arrive. As Hirschfeld puts
it, in a discussion of this subject (_Sexual-Probleme_, Feb.,
1912), "Nature has several irons in the fire."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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