STUDIES IN THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SEX, VOLUME I The Evolution of Modesty
The Phenomena of Sexual Periodicity
Auto-Erotism
by
HAVELOCK ELLIS
1927
GENERAL PREFACE.
The origin of these _Studies_ dates from many years back. As a youth I was
faced, as others are, by the problem of sex. Living partly in an
Australian city where the ways of life were plainly seen, partly in the
solitude of the bush, I was free both to contemplate and to meditate many
things. A resolve slowly grew up within me: one main part of my life-work
should be to make clear the problems of sex.
That was more than twenty years ago. Since then I can honestly say that in
all that I have done that resolve has never been very far from my
thoughts. I have always been slowly working up to this central problem;
and in a book published some three years ago--_Man and Woman: a Study of
Human Secondary Sexual Characters_--I put forward what was, in my own
eyes, an introduction to the study of the primary questions of sexual
psychology.
Now that I have at length reached the time for beginning to publish my
results, these results scarcely seem to me large. As a youth, I had hoped
to settle problems for those who came after; now I am quietly content if I
do little more than state them. For even that, I now think, is much; it is
at least the half of knowledge. In this particular field the evil of
ignorance is magnified by our efforts to suppress that which never can be
suppressed, though in the effort of suppression it may become perverted. I
have at least tried to find out what are the facts, among normal people as
well as among abnormal people; for, while it seems to me that the
physician's training is necessary in order to ascertain the facts, the
physician for the most part only obtains the abnormal facts, which alone
bring little light. I have tried to get at the facts, and, having got at
the facts, to look them simply and squarely in the face.
If I cannot
perhaps turn the lock myself, I bring the key which can alone in the end
rightly open the door: the key of sincerity. That is my one panacea:
sincerity.
I know that many of my friends, people on whose side I, too, am to be
found, retort with another word: reticence. It is a mistake, they say, to
try to uncover these things; leave the sexual instincts alone, to grow up
and develop in the shy solitude they love, and they will be sure to grow
up and develop wholesomely. But, as a matter of fact, that is precisely
what we can not and will not ever allow them to do.
There are very few
middle-aged men and women who can clearly recall the facts of their lives
and tell you in all honesty that their sexual instincts have developed
easily and wholesomely throughout. And it should not be difficult to see
why this is so. Let my friends try to transfer their feelings and theories
from the reproductive region to, let us say, the nutritive region, the
only other which can be compared to it for importance.
Suppose that eating
and drinking was never spoken of openly, save in veiled or poetic
language, and that no one ever ate food publicly, because it was
considered immoral and immodest to reveal the mysteries of this natural
function. We know what would occur. A considerable proportion of the
community, more especially the more youthful members, possessed by an
instinctive and legitimate curiosity, would concentrate their thoughts on
the subject. They would have so many problems to puzzle over: How often
ought I to eat? What ought I to eat? Is it wrong to eat fruit, which I
like? Ought I to eat grass, which I don't like? Instinct notwithstanding,
we may be quite sure that only a small minority would succeed in eating
reasonably and wholesomely. The sexual secrecy of life is even more
disastrous than such a nutritive secrecy would be; partly because we
expend such a wealth of moral energy in directing or misdirecting it,
partly because the sexual impulse normally develops at the same time as
the intellectual impulse, not in the early years of life, when wholesome
instinctive habits might be formed. And there is always some ignorant and
foolish friend who is prepared still further to muddle things: Eat a meal
every other day! Eat twelve meals a day! Never eat fruit! Always eat
grass! The advice emphatically given in sexual matters is usually not less
absurd than this. When, however, the matter is fully open, the problems of
food are not indeed wholly solved, but everyone is enabled by the
experience of his fellows to reach some sort of situation suited to his
own case. And when the rigid secrecy is once swept away a sane and natural
reticence becomes for the first time possible.
This secrecy has not always been maintained. When the Catholic Church was
at the summit of its power and influence it fully realized the magnitude
of sexual problems and took an active and inquiring interest in all the
details of normal and abnormal sexuality. Even to the present time there
are certain phenomena of the sexual life which have scarcely been
accurately described except in ancient theological treatises. As the type
of such treatises I will mention the great tome of Sanchez, _De
Matrimonio_. Here you will find the whole sexual life of men and women
analyzed in its relationships to sin. Everything is set forth, as clearly
and as concisely as it can be--without morbid prudery on the one hand, or
morbid sentimentality on the other--in the coldest scientific language;
the right course of action is pointed out for all the cases that may
occur, and we are told what is lawful, what a venial sin, what a mortal
sin. Now I do not consider that sexual matters concern the theologian
alone, and I deny altogether that he is competent to deal with them. In
his hands, also, undoubtedly, they sometimes become prurient, as they can
scarcely fail to become on the non-natural and unwholesome basis of
asceticism, and as they with difficulty become in the open-air light of
science. But we are bound to recognize the thoroughness with which the
Catholic theologians dealt with these matters, and, from their own point
of view, indeed, the entire reasonableness; we are bound to recognize the
admirable spirit in which, successfully or not, they sought to approach
them. We need to-day the same spirit and temper applied from a different
standpoint. These things concern everyone; the study of these things
concerns the physiologist, the psychologist, the moralist. We want to get
into possession of the actual facts, and from the investigation of the
facts we want to ascertain what is normal and what is abnormal, from the
point of view of physiology and of psychology. We want to know what is
naturally lawful under the various sexual chances that may befall man, not
as the born child of sin, but as a naturally social animal. What is a
venial sin against nature, what a mortal sin against nature? The answers
are less easy to reach than the theologians' answers generally were, but
we can at least put ourselves in the right attitude; we may succeed in
asking that question which is sometimes even more than the half of
knowledge.
It is perhaps a mistake to show so plainly at the outset that I approach
what may seem only a psychological question not without moral fervour. But
I do not wish any mistake to be made. I regard sex as the central problem
of life. And now that the problem of religion has practically been
settled, and that the problem of labor has at least been placed on a
practical foundation, the question of sex--with the racial questions that
rest on it--stands before the coming generations as the chief problem for
solution. Sex lies at the root of life, and we can never learn to
reverence life until we know how to understand sex.--So, at least, it
seems to me.
Having said so much, I will try to present such results as I have to
record in that cold and dry light through which alone the goal of
knowledge may truly be seen.
HAVELOCK ELLIS.
July, 1897.
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.
The first edition of this volume was published in 1899, following "Sexual
Inversion," which now forms Volume II. The second edition, issued by the
present publishers and substantially identical with the first edition,
appeared in the following year. Ten years have elapsed since then and this
new edition will be found to reflect the course of that long interval. Not
only is the volume greatly enlarged, but nearly every page has been partly
rewritten. This is mainly due to three causes: Much new literature
required to be taken into account; my own knowledge of the historical and
ethnographic aspects of the sexual impulse has increased; many fresh
illustrative cases of a valuable and instructive character have
accumulated in my hands. It is to these three sources of improvement that
the book owes its greatly revised and enlarged condition, and not to the
need for modifying any of its essential conclusions.
These, far from
undergoing any change, have by the new material been greatly strengthened.
It may be added that the General Preface to the whole work, which was
originally published in 1898 at the beginning of "Sexual Inversion," now
finds its proper place at the outset of the present volume.
HAVELOCK ELLIS.
Carbis Bay,
Cornwall, Eng.
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.
The present volume contains three studies which seem to me to be necessary
_prolegomena_ to that analysis of the sexual instinct which must form the
chief part of an investigation into the psychology of sex. The first
sketches the main outlines of a complex emotional state which is of
fundamental importance in sexual psychology; the second, by bringing
together evidence from widely different regions, suggests a tentative
explanation of facts that are still imperfectly known; the third attempts
to show that even in fields where we assume our knowledge to be adequate a
broader view of the phenomena teaches us to suspend judgment and to adopt
a more cautious attitude. So far as they go, these studies are complete in
themselves; their special use, as an introduction to a more comprehensive
analysis of sexual phenomena, is that they bring before us, under varying
aspects, a characteristic which, though often ignored, is of the first
importance in obtaining a clear understanding of the facts: the tendency
of the sexual impulse to appear in a spontaneous and to some extent
periodic manner, affecting women differently from men.
This is a tendency
which, later, I hope to make still more apparent, for it has practical and
social, as well as psychological, implications. Here--
and more especially
in the study of those spontaneous solitary manifestations which I call
auto-erotic--I have attempted to clear the ground, and to indicate the
main lines along which the progress of our knowledge in these fields may
best be attained.
It may surprise many medical readers that in the third and longest study I
have said little, save incidentally, either of treatment or prevention.
The omission of such considerations at this stage is intentional. It may
safely be said that in no other field of human activity is so vast an
amount of strenuous didactic morality founded on so slender a basis of
facts. In most other departments of life we at least make a pretence of
learning before we presume to teach; in the field of sex we content
ourselves with the smallest and vaguest minimum of information, often
ostentatiously second-hand, usually unreliable. I wish to emphasize the
fact that before we can safely talk either of curing or preventing these
manifestations we must know a great deal more than we know at present
regarding their distribution, etiology, and symptomatology; and we must
exercise the same coolness and caution as--if our work is to be
fruitful--we require in any other field of serious study. We must approach
these facts as physicians, it is true, but also as psychologists,
primarily concerned to find out the workings of such manifestations in
fairly healthy and normal people. If we found a divorce-court judge
writing a treatise on marriage we should smile. But it is equally absurd
for the physician, so long as his knowledge is confined to disease, to
write regarding sex at large; valuable as the facts he brings forward may
be, he can never be in a position to generalize concerning them. And to
me, at all events, it seems that we have had more than enough pictures of
gross sexual perversity, whether furnished by the asylum or the brothel.
They are only really instructive when they are seen in their proper
perspective as the rare and ultimate extremes of a chain of phenomena
which we may more profitably study nearer home.
Yet, although we are, on every hand, surrounded by the normal
manifestations of sex, conscious or unconscious, these manifestations are
extremely difficult to observe, and, in those cases in which we are best
able to observe them, it frequently happens that we are unable to make any
use of our knowledge. Moreover, even when we have obtained our data, the
difficulties--at all events, for an English investigator--are by no means
overcome. He may take for granted that any serious and precise study of
the sexual instinct will not meet with general approval; his work will be
misunderstood; his motives will be called in question; among those for
whom he is chiefly working he will find indifference.
Indeed, the pioneer
in this field may well count himself happy if he meets with nothing worse
than indifference. Hence it is that the present volume will not be
published in England, but that, availing myself of the generous sympathy
with which my work has been received in America, I have sought the wider
medical and scientific audience of the United States. In matters of faith,
"liberty of prophesying" was centuries since eloquently vindicated for
Englishmen; the liberty of investigating facts is still called in
question, under one pretence or another, and to seek out the most vital
facts of life is still in England a perilous task.
I desire most heartily to thank the numerous friends and correspondents,
some living in remote parts of the world, who have freely assisted me in
my work with valuable information and personal histories. To Mr. F.H.
Perry-Coste I owe an appendix which is by far the most elaborate attempt
yet made to find evidence of periodicity in the spontaneous sexual
manifestations of sleep; my debts to various medical and other
correspondents are duly stated in the text. To many women friends and
correspondents I may here express my gratitude for the manner in which
they have furnished me with intimate personal records, and for the
cross-examination to which they have allowed me to subject them. I may
already say here, what I shall have occasion to say more emphatically in
subsequent volumes, that without the assistance I have received from women
of fine intelligence and high character my work would be impossible. I
regret that I cannot make my thanks more specific.
HAVELOCK ELLIS.
CONTENTS.
THE EVOLUTION OF MODESTY.
I.
The Definition of Modesty--The Significance of Modesty--
Difficulties in
the Way of Its Analysis--The Varying Phenomena of Modesty Among Different
Peoples and in Different Ages.
II.
Modesty an Agglomeration of Fears--Children in Relation to
Modesty--Modesty in Animals--The Attitude of the Medicean Venus--The
Sexual Factor of Modesty Based on Sexual periodicity and on the Primitive
Phenomena of Courtship--The Necessity of Seclusion in Primitive Sexual
Intercourse--The Meaning of Coquetry--The Sexual Charm of Modesty--Modesty
as an Expression of Feminine Erotic Impulse--The Fear of Causing Disgust
as a Factor of Modesty--The Modesty of Savages in Regard to Eating in the
Presence of Others--The Sacro-Pubic Region as a Focus of Disgust--The Idea
of Ceremonial Uncleanliness--The Custom of Veiling the Face--Ornaments and
Clothing--Modesty Becomes Concentrated in the Garment--
The Economic Factor
in Modesty--The Contribution of Civilization to Modesty-
-The Elaboration
of Social Ritual.
III.
The Blush the Sanction of Modesty--The Phenomena of Blushing--Influences
Which Modify the Aptitude to Blush--Darkness, Concealment of the Face,
Etc.
IV.
Summary of the Factors of Modesty--The Future of Modesty--Modesty an
Essential Element of Love.
THE PHENOMENA OF SEXUAL PERIODICITY.
I.
The Various Physiological and Psychological Rhythms--
Menstruation--The
Alleged Influence of the Moon--Frequent Suppression of Menstruation among
Primitive Races--Mittelschmerz--Possible Tendency to a Future
Intermenstrual Cycle--Menstruation among Animals--
Menstruating Monkeys and
Apes--What is Menstruation--Its Primary Cause Still Obscure--The Relation
of Menstruation to Ovulation--The Occasional Absence of Menstruation in
Health--The Relation of Menstruation to "Heat"--The Prohibition of
Intercourse during Menstruation--The Predominance of Sexual Excitement at
and around the Menstrual Period--Its Absence during the Period Frequently
Apparent only.
II.
The Question of a Monthly Sexual Cycle in Men--The Earliest Suggestions of
a General Physiological Cycle in Men--Periodicity in Disease--Insanity,
Heart Disease, etc.--The Alleged Twenty-three Days'
Cycle--The
Physiological Periodicity of Seminal Emissions during Sleep--Original
Observations--Fortnightly and Weekly Rhythms.
III.
The Annual Sexual Rhythm--In Animals--In Man--Tendency of the Sexual
Impulse to become Heightened in Spring and Autumn--The Prevalence of
Seasonal Erotic Festivals--The Feast of Fools--The Easter and Midsummer
Bonfires--The Seasonal Variations in Birthrate--The Causes of those
Variations--The Typical Conception-rate Curve for Europe--The Seasonal
Periodicity of Seminal Emissions During Sleep--Original Observations--Spring and Autumn the Chief Periods of Involuntary Sexual
Excitement--The Seasonal Periodicity of Rapes--Of Outbreaks among
Prisoners--The Seasonal Curves of Insanity and Suicide--
The Growth of
Children According to Season--The Annual Curve of Bread-consumption in
Prisons--Seasonal Periodicity of Scarlet Fever--The Underlying Causes of
these Seasonal Phenomena.
AUTO-EROTISM: A STUDY OF THE SPONTANEOUS MANIFESTATIONS
OF THE SEXUAL
IMPULSE.
I.
Definition of Auto-erotism--Masturbation only Covers a Small Portion of
the Auto-erotic Field--The Importance of this Study, especially
To-day--Auto-erotic Phenomena in Animals--Among Savage and Barbaric
Races--The Japanese _rin-no-tama_ and other Special Instruments for
Obtaining Auto-erotic Gratification--Abuse of the Ordinary Implements and
Objects of Daily Life--The Frequency of Hair-pin in the Bladder--The
Influence of Horse-exercise and Railway Traveling--The Sewing-machine and
the Bicycle--Spontaneous Passive Sexual Excitement--
_Delectatio
Morosa_--Day-dreaming--_Pollutio_--Sexual Excitement During Sleep--Erotic
Dreams--The Analogy of Nocturnal Enuresis--Differences in the Erotic
Dreams of Men and Women--The Auto-erotic Phenomena of Sleep in the
Hysterical--Their Frequently Painful Character.
II.
Hysteria and the Question of Its Relation to the Sexual Emotions--The
Early Greek Theories of its Nature and Causation--The Gradual Rise of
Modern Views--Charcot--The Revolt Against Charcot's Too Absolute
Conclusions--Fallacies Involved--Charcot's Attitude the Outcome of his
Personal Temperament--Breuer and Freud--Their Views Supplement and
Complete Charcot's--At the Same Time they Furnish a Justification for the
Earlier Doctrine of Hysteria--But They Must Not be Regarded as Final--The
Diffused Hysteroid Condition in Normal Persons--The Physiological Basis of
Hysteria--True Pathological Hysteria is Linked on to almost Normal States,
especially to Sex-hunger.
III.
The Prevalence of Masturbation--Its Occurrence in Infancy and
Childhood--Is it More Frequent in Males or Females?--
After Adolescence
Apparently more Frequent in Women--Reasons for the Sexual Distribution of
Masturbation--The Alleged Evils of Masturbation--
Historical Sketch of the
Views Held on This Point--The Symptoms and Results of Masturbation--Its
Alleged Influence in Causing Eye Disorders--Its Relation to Insanity and
Nervous Disorders--The Evil Effects of Masturbation Usually Occur on the
Basis of a Congenitally Morbid Nervous System--
Neurasthenia Probably the
Commonest Accompaniment of Excessive Masturbation--
Precocious Masturbation
Tends to Produce Aversion to Coitus--Psychic Results of Habitual
Masturbation--Masturbation in Men of Genius--
Masturbation as a Nervous
Sedative--Typical Cases--The Greek Attitude toward Masturbation--Attitude
of the Catholic Theologians--The Mohammedan Attitude--
The Modern
Scientific Attitude--In What Sense is Masturbation Normal?--The Immense
Part in Life Played by Transmuted Auto-erotic Phenomena.
APPENDIX A.
The Influence of Menstruation on the Position of Women.
APPENDIX B.
Sexual Periodicity in Men.
APPENDIX C.
The Auto-erotic Factor in Religion.
INDEX.
DIAGRAMS.
THE EVOLUTION OF MODESTY.
I.
The Definition of Modesty--The Significance of Modesty--
Difficulties in
the Way of Its Analysis--The Varying Phenomena of Modesty Among Different
Peoples and in Different Ages.
Modesty, which may be provisionally defined as an almost instinctive fear
prompting to concealment and usually centering around the sexual
processes, while common to both sex