his children, a woman is primarily conscious of a man as the father of her children and then as husband. In the choice of a life-companion a woman is influenced much more by the mental than the physical qualities of a man. When she has become a mother she divides her love between child and husband. Sensuality disappears in the mother’s love. Thereafter, in marital intercourse, the wife finds less sensual satisfaction than proof of the love of her husband.
A woman loves with her whole soul. To her love is life; to a man it is the joy of life. To him misfortune in love is a wound; but it costs a woman her life, or at least her happiness. A psychological question worthy of consideration is whether a woman can truly love twice in her life. Certainly the mental inclination of woman is monogamous, while in man it is polygamous.
The weakness of men in comparison with women lies in the great intensity of their sexual desires. Man becomes dependent upon woman, and the more, the weaker and more sensual he becomes; and this just in proportion as he becomes neuropathic. Thus may be understood the fact that, in times of effeminateness and luxury, sensuality flourishes luxuriantly. Then arises the danger to society that mistresses and their dependents may rule the state and compass its ruin (the mistresses of the courts of Louis XIV and XV; the prostitutes of ancient Greece).
The biographies of many statesmen of ancient and modern times show that they were the instruments of women, owing to their great sensuality, which had its foundation in their neuropathic constitutions. The fact that the Catholic Church enjoins celibacy upon its priests, in order to emancipate them from sensuality and preserve them entirely for the purpose of their calling, is an example of discerning psychological knowledge of mankind; but it is unfortunate that the priests, living in celibacy, lose the elevating effect which love and matrimony exert upon the development of character.
From the fact that man by nature plays the aggressive rôle in sexual life, he is in danger of overstepping the limits which morality and law have set. The unfaithfulness of a wife,
