In the foregoing three cases, for the most part, passive flagellation serves the individual subject to this perversion of masochism as an expression of the desired situation of subjection to the woman. The same means is needed by a large number of masochists. But passive flagellation is a process which, as is known, has a tendency to induce erection reflexly by irritation of the nerves of the nates.[1] This effect of flagellation is used by weakened debauchees to help their diminished power; and this perversity—not perversion—is very common. It is, therefore, necessary to ascertain in what relation the passive flagellation of the masochists stands to these dissipated individuals who are not psychically perverse, but physically weakened.
It is not difficult to show that masochism is something essentially different from flagellation, and more comprehensive; that flagellation is rather a by-play,—one of the many means used for the purpose of masochistic gratification in the sense of subjection to the woman. For the masochist the principal thing is subjection to the woman; the punishment is only the expression of this relation,—the most intense effect of it he can bring upon himself. For him the act has only a symbolic value, and is a means to the end of mental satisfaction of his peculiar desires. The essential thing is the desire for ill-treatment, as a sign of this subjection. Besides flagellation, and often without it, there are many other things which serve to express this subjection; as is shown by the following series of cases. This fact establishes a presumption of the existence of an original anomaly of sexual feeling,—a paræsthesia sexualis. On the other hand, the individual that is weakened and not a subject of masochism, and who has himself flagellated, desires only a mechanical irritation of his spinal centre.
Whether, in a given case, it is simple (reflex) flagellation
- ↑ Comp., supra, Introduction, p. 28.
