have a value not only moral but scientific. In love everything is just,
everything is noble, as soon as, among the maddest animals, it is a
play moved by the desire of creating. It is more difficult doubtless to
justify fantasies which are merely for the purpose of avoiding trouble,
especially if one allow oneself to be blinded by the idea of specific
finality; one may however affirm, and one will say nothing more about
the matter, that animals are not ignorant either of sodomy or of
onanism and that they cede to them by necessity, in the absence of
females. Sénancour has written wise and bold pages upon these practices
among humans.
Sexual ethnography hardly exists. The scattered data on this subject,
though extremely important, have not been co-ordinated. That would be
a small matter. They have not even been verified. One knows nothing of
coital practices save what life teaches one, questions of this sort
being difficult to ask, and answers being always equivocal. There is
here an entire science which has been corrupted by Christian prudery.
An order was issued long ago and is still obeyed; one has concealed
all that unites, sexually, man and animal, everything that proves
the unity of origin for all that lives and feels. Physicians who
have studied this question have known only the abnormal, the malady:
it would be imprudent to base conclusions on general practices from
their observations. The best source, at least for Europeans, is still
the casuist writings. From the enumeration of sins against chastity
gathered by professional confessors, one could, after some study,
deduce the secret sexual habits of civilized humanity. But one must
take care not to retain either the old idea of sin, or the idea of the
same under modern cloak, of fault, crime or error. Practices common to
an entire ethnic group can not be judged to be other than normal, it
matters little whether they have been stigmatized by the apologists of
right living. What is good is what is and what will continue to be. It
is known that bimanes and quadrumanes are very libertine, and that this
is in accord with their physical suppleness and their intelligence.
It is a fact undeniable and insurmountable, even if annoying. The
human couple has drawn from this tendency a thousand erotic fantasies,
which, in being disciplined have ended in the creation of a veritable
sexual method, be it disinterested pleasure, be it preservation
against fecundity; is this of no importance? How can one lecture about
depopulation if one lose sight of this primordial fact? What can
normal or patriotic reasoning do against an instinct which has become
or rebecome an intelligent and conscious practice, bound to what is
deepest in human sensibility? It is very difficult, especially when
dealing with man, to distinguish between normal and abnormal. What is
the normal; what the natural? Nature ignores this adjective, and one
has dragged out of her bosom many illusions, perhaps in irony, perhaps
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account