for and blessing obtained. If, however, the offering consist of self-punishment, which occurs in all religions, in individuals of very excitable religious nature, it serves not only as a symbol of submission and as an equivalent in the exchange of present pain for future bliss, but everything that is thought to come from the deity, all that happens in obedience to divine mandate or to the honor of the godhead, is felt directly as pleasure. Thus religious enthusiasm leads to ecstasy, to a condition in which consciousness is so preoccupied with feelings of mental pleasure that the concept of suffering endured can only be apperceived without its painful quality.
The exaltation of religious enthusiasm may lead actively to pleasure in the sacrifice of another, if pity be overcompensated by feelings of religious pleasure.
Sadism, and particularly masochism (v. infra), show that in the sphere of the sexual life there may be similar phenomena. Thus the well-established relations between religion, lust, and cruelty[1] may be comprehended in the following formula: States of religious and sexual excitement, at the acme of their development, may correspond in the amount and quality of excitement, and, therefore, under favoring circumstances, one may take the place of the other. Both, in pathological conditions, may become transformed into cruelty.
The sexual factor proves to be no less influential in awakening æsthetic feelings. What would poetry and art be without a sexual foundation? In (sensual) love is gained that warmth of fancy without which a true creation of art is impossible; and in the fire of sensual feelings its glow and warmth are preserved. It may thus be understood why great poets and artists have sensual natures.
This world of ideals reveals itself with the inception of the processes of sexual development. He who, at this period of life, cannot become enthusiastic for all that is great, noble, and beautiful, remains a Philistine all his life. At this epoch does not the least of natural poets forge verses?
At the limits of physiological reaction there are events which take place at the time of puberty in which these obscure feelings of longing express themselves in paroxysms of despair
- ↑ The relation of this trio finds its expression not only in the events of real life, as above indicated, but also in romance, and even in the sculpture of degenerate eras. As an example we may point to the group of St. Theresa, by Bernini, who “sinks in an hysterical faint on a marble cloud, with an amorous angel plunging the arrow (of divine love) into her heart” (Lübke).
