The more intensely passionate the love of the child, the more
fantastical is its conduct. The child sometimes endeavours to imitate
the beloved person in every detail, often with the most ridiculous
results. A boy's mode of dress, even, may be influenced by his love for
a girl, and still more by his love for another boy. The child tries also
to imitate the movements of the beloved person, and in walking to tread
in the same footsteps. The youthful knight seeks in every possible way
to become pleasing to the girl of his choice, and to exhibit to her
every attention in his power. He does all this, not merely in imitation
of the conduct of grown-up persons, but for the gratification of his own
impulses. Sometimes we are able to observe the changes of mood that
occur in the child when the loved one is present or absent. The boy
bubbles over with joy when the girl he loves draws near; sorrow and
depression overwhelm him when the hour of parting is at hand. All kinds
of fetichistic sentiments are also met with even in childhood. Every
object belonging to the loved one is covered with passionate kisses; and
everything which has been touched by the beloved, has been endowed for
the child-lover with a quite exceptional value. "Those lovely girls whom
kindly or cruel Nature has predestined to awaken desire and to call
forth sighs at every footstep they take, are often unaware that among
the crowd of their admirers are numbered boys also, who have hardly
outgrown the age of childhood, who kiss in secret every flower which
their beloved has let fall, who are happy if they have been able to
steal like thieves into the room in which the fair one has slept, who
kiss the carpet where her foot has pressed, to whom she is the most
wonderful creature in the universe. And when a young woman allows a boy
to sit on the ground beside her, resting his head on her knee, when her
fingers play lightly among his curls, how rarely does she know that his
heart is beating furiously under her caressing touch; when he throws
back his curly head, and she sees that his face is reddened, she does
not know that this is not simply on account of the heat of the fire, but
that he is glowing from the effect of an internal fire whose nature is a
mystery even to himself--the fire of Love."[36]
Children have also ample experience of jealousy. A boy is tortured by
its pangs when he sees his much-loved friend conversing with another. A
girl of ten may suffer from sleepless nights when the governess she
loves has spoken affectionately to another girl. A child may wait for
hours before the door or in the neighbourhood of the beloved person,
simply to snatch a glance in passing. Speaking generally, it appears to
me that children are jealous of adults to a less extent than they are
jealous of children of their own age.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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