Primitive Love and Love-Stories Part 5

In a second cla.s.s of cases, where lower races have ideas similar to ours, I believe that the origin of domestic chast.i.ty must be sought in utilitarian practices. In the earlier stages of marriage, girls are usually bought of their parents, who profit by the sale or barter. Now when a man marries a girl to be his wife and maid of all work, he does not want to take her to his home hampered by a bevy of young children.

Fathers guilty of incestuous practices would therefore be unable to dispose of their daughters to advantage, and thus a prejudice in favor of domestic purity would gradually arise which a shrewd medicine man would some day raise to the rank of a religious or social taboo.

As regards modern society, Darwin, Brinton, h.e.l.lwald, Bentham, and others have advocated or endorsed the view that the reason why such a horror of incestuous unions prevails, is that novelty is the chief stimulus to the s.e.xual feelings, and that the familiarity of the same household breeds indifference. I do not understand how any thinker can have held such a view for one moment. When Bentham wrote (_Theory of Legislation_, pt. iii., chap. V.) that "individuals accustomed to see each other from an age which is capable neither of conceiving desire nor of inspiring it, will see each other with the same eyes to the end of life," he showed infinitely less knowledge of human nature than the author of _Paul and Virginia_, who makes a boy and a girl grow up almost like brother and sister, and at the proper time fall violently in love with one another. Who cannot recall in his own experience love marriages of schoolmates or of cousins living in intimate a.s.sociation from their childhood? To say that such bringing up together creates "indifference" is obviously incorrect; to say that it leads to "aversion" is altogether unwarranted; and to trace to it such a feeling as our horror at the thought of marrying a sister, or mother, is simply preposterous.

The real source of the horror of incest in civilized communities was indicated more than two thousand years ago by Plato. He believed that the reason why incestuous unions were avoided and abhorred, was to be found in the constant inculcation, at home and in literature, that

"They are unholy, hated of G.o.d, and most infamous....

Everyone from his earliest childhood has heard men speaking in the same manner about them always and everywhere, whether in comedy or in the graver language of tragedy. When the poet introduces on the stage a Thyestes or an Oedipus, or a Macareus having secret intercourse with his sister, he represents him, when found out, ready to kill himself as the penalty of his sin." (_Laws,_ VIII., 838.)

Long before Plato another great "medicine man," Moses, saw the necessity of enforcing a "taboo" against incest by the enactment of special severe laws relating to intercourse between relatives; and that there was no "instinct" against incest in his time is shown by the fact that he deemed it necessary to make such circ.u.mstantial laws for his own people, and by his specific testimony that "in all these things the nations are defiled which I cast out from before you, and the land is defiled." Regarding his motives in making such laws, Milman has justly remarked (_H.J_., I., 220),

"The leading principle of these enactments was to prohibit near marriage between those parties among whom, by the usage of their society, early and frequent intimacy was unavoidable and might lead to abuse."

If Moses lived now, he would still be called upon to enact his laws; for to this day the horror of incest is a sentiment which it is necessary to keep up and enforce by education, moral precept, religion, and law. It is no more innate or instinctive than the sentiment of modesty, the regard for chast.i.ty, or the disapproval of bigamy. Children are not born with it any more than with the feeling that it is improper to be seen naked. Medical writers bear witness to the wide prevalence of unnatural practices among children, even in good families, while in the slums of the large cities, where the families are herded like swine, there is a horrible indulgence in every kind of incest by adults as well as children.

Absolute proof that the horror of incest is not innate lies furthermore in the unquestionable fact that a man can escape the calamity of falling in love with his sister or daughter only if he _knows_ the relationship. There are many instances on record--to which the daily press adds others--of incestuous unions brought about by ignorance of the consanguinity. Oedipus was not saved by an instinct from marrying his mother. It was only after the discovery of the relationship that his mind was filled with unutterable horror, while his wife and mother committed suicide. This case, though legendary, is typical--a mirror of actuality--showing how potent _ideas_ are to alter _emotions_. Yet I am a.s.sailed for a.s.serting that the Greeks and the lower races, whose ideas regarding women, love, polygamy, chast.i.ty, and marriage were so different from ours, also differed from us in their feelings--the quality of their love. There were numerous obstacles to overcome before romantic love was able to emerge--obstacles so serious and diverse that it is a wonder they were ever conquered. But before considering those obstacles it will be advisable to explain definitely just what romantic love is and how it differs from the sensual "love" or l.u.s.t which, of course, has always existed among men as among other animals.

WHAT IS ROMANTIC LOVE?

How does it feel to be in love?

When a man loves a girl, he feels such an overwhelming _individual preference_ for her that though she were a beggar-maid he would scorn the offer to exchange her for an heiress, a princess, or the G.o.ddess of beauty herself. To him she seems to have a monopoly of all the feminine charms, and she therefore monopolizes his thoughts and feelings to the exclusion of all other interests, and he longs not only for her reciprocal affection but for a monopoly of it. "Does she love me?" he asks himself a hundred times a day. "Sometimes she seems to treat me with cold indifference--is that merely the instinctive a.s.sertion of feminine _coyness_, or does she prefer another man?" The pangs, the agony of _jealousy_ overcome him at this thought. He hopes one moment, despairs the next, till his _moods_ become so _mixed_ that he hardly knows whether he is happy or miserable. He, who is usually so bold and self-confident, is humbled; feels utterly unworthy of her.

In his fancy she soars so far above all other women that calling her an angel seems not a _hyperbole_, but a compliment to the angel.

Toward such a superior being the only proper att.i.tude is _adoration_.

She is spotless as an angel, and his feelings toward her are as _pure_, as free from coa.r.s.e cravings, as if she were a G.o.ddess. How royally _proud_ a man must feel at the thought of being preferred above all mortals by this divine being! In _personal beauty_ had she ever a peer? Since Venus left this planet, has such grace been seen?

In face of her, the strongest of all impulses--selfishness--is annihilated. The lover is no longer "number one" to himself; his own pleasures and comforts are ignored in the eager desire to please her, to show her _gallant_ attentions. To save her from disaster or grief he is ready to _sacrifice_ his life. His cordial _sympathy_ makes him share all her joys and sorrows, and his _affection_ for her, though he may have known her only a few days--nay, a few minutes--is as strong and devoted as that of a mother for the child that is her own flesh and blood.

INGREDIENTS OF LOVE

No one who has ever been truly in love will deny that this description, however romantic it may seem in its apparent exaggeration, is a realistic reflection of his feelings and impulses.

As this brief review shows, Individual Preference, Monopolism, Coyness, Jealousy, Mixed Moods of Hope and Despair, Hyperbole, Adoration, Purity, Pride, Admiration of Personal Beauty, Gallantry, Self-sacrifice, Sympathy, and Affection, are the essential ingredients in that very composite mental state, which we call romantic love.

Coyness, of course, occurs only in feminine love, and there are other s.e.xual differences which will be noted later on. Here I wish to point out that the fourteen ingredients named may be divided into two groups of seven each--the egoistic and the altruistic. The prevailing notion that love is a species of selfishness--a "double selfishness," some wiseacre has called it--is deplorably untrue and shows how little the psychology of love has heretofore been understood.

It has indeed an egoistic side, including the ingredients I have called Individual Preference, Monopolism, Jealousy, Coyness, Hyperbole, Mixed Moods, and Pride; and it is not a mere accident that these are also the seven features which may be found in sensual love too; for sensuality and selfishness are twins. But the later and more essential characteristics of romantic love are the altruistic and supersensual traits--Sympathy, Affection, Gallantry, Self-sacrifice, Adoration, Purity, and Admiration of Personal Beauty. The two divisions overlap in some places, but in the main they are accurate.

It is certain that the first group precedes the second, but the order in which the ingredients in each group first made their appearance cannot be indicated, as we know too little of the early history of man. The arrangement here adopted is therefore more or less arbitrary.

I shall try in this long chapter to answer the question "What is Romantic Love?" by discussing each of its fourteen ingredients and tracing its evolution separately.

I. INDIVIDUAL PREFERENCE

If a man pretended to be in love with a girl while confessing that he liked other girls equally well and would as soon marry one as another, everybody would laugh at him; for however ignorant many persons may be as to the subtler traits of sentimental love, it is known universally that a decided and obstinate preference for one particular individual is an absolute condition of true love.

ALL GIRLS EQUALLY ATTRACTIVE

As I have just intimated, a modern romantic lover would not exchange a beloved beggar-maid for an heiress or princess; nor would he give her for a dozen other girls, however charming, and with permission to marry them all. Now if romantic love had always existed, the lower races would have the same violent and exclusive preference for individuals. But what are the facts? I a.s.sert, without fear of contradiction from any one familiar with anthropological literature, that a savage or barbarian, be he Australian, African, American, or Asiatic, would laugh at the idea of refusing to exchange one woman for a dozen others equally young and attractive. It is not necessary to descend to the lowest savages to find corroboration of this view. Dr.

Zoller, an unusually intelligent and trustworthy observer, says, in one of his volumes on German Africa (III., 70-71), that

"on the whole no distinction whatever is made between woman and woman, between the good-looking and the ugly, the intelligent and the stupid ones. In all my African experiences I have never heard of a single young man or woman who conceived a violent pa.s.sion for a particular individual of the opposite s.e.x."

So in other parts of Africa. The natives of Borgou, we are told by R.

and J. Lander, marry with perfect indifference. "A man takes no more thought about choosing a wife than he does in picking a head of wheat." Among the Kaffirs, says Fritsch (112) it may occur that a man has an inclination toward a particular girl; but he adds that "in such cases the suitor is obliged to pay several oxen more than is customary, and as he usually takes cattle more to heart than women, such cases are rare;" and though, when he has several wives, he may have a favorite, the attachment to her is shallow and transient, for she is at any moment liable to displacement by a new-comer. Among the Hottentots at Angra Pequena, when a man covets a girl he goes to her hut, prepares a cup of coffee and hands it to her without saying a word. If she drinks half of it, he knows the answer is Yes. "If she refuses to touch the coffee, the suitor is not specially grieved, but proceeds to another hut to try his luck again in the same way."

(Ploss, I., 454.)

Of the Fijians Williams (148) says: "Too commonly there is no express feeling of connubial bliss, men speak of 'our women' and women of 'our men' without any distinctive preference being apparent." Catlin, speaking (70-71) of the matrimonial arrangements of the p.a.w.nee Indians, says that daughters are held as legitimate merchandise, and, as a rule, accept the situation "with the apathy of the race." A man who advertised for a wife would hardly be accused of individual preference or anything else indicating love. From a remark made by George Gibbs (197) we may infer that the Indians of Oregon and Washington used to advertise for wives, in their own fashion:

"It is not unusual to find on the small prairies human figures rudely carved upon trees. These I have understood to have been cut by young men who were in want of wives, as a sort of practical intimation that they were in the market as purchasers."

It might be suggested that such a crude love-letter _to the s.e.x in general_, as compared with one of our own love-letters to a particular girl, gives a fair idea of what Indian love is, compared with the love of civilized men and women.

SHALLOW PREDILECTION

Even where there is an appearance of predilection it is apt to be shallow and fragile. In the _Jesuit Relations_ (XVIII., 129) we read how a Huron youth came to one of the missionaries and said he needed a wife to make his snow-shoes and clothes. "I am in love with a young girl," said he. "I beg you to call my relatives together and to consider whether she is suitable for me. If you decide that it is for my good, I will marry her; if not, I will follow your advice." Other young Indians used to come to the missionaries to ask them to find wives for them. I have been struck, in reading Indian love-stories, by the fact that their gist usually lies not in an exhibition of decided preference for one man but of violent _aversion_ to another--some old and disagreeable suitor. It is well known, too, that among Indians, as among Australians, marriage was sometimes considered an affair of the tribe rather than of the individual; and we have some curious ill.u.s.trations of the way in which various tribes of Indians would try to crush the germs of individual preference.

REPRESSION OF PREFERENCE

Thus Hunter relates (243) of the Missouri and Arkansas tribes that "It is considered disgraceful for a young Indian publicly to prefer one woman to another until he has distinguished himself either in war or in the chase." Should an Indian pay any girl, though he may have known her from childhood, special attention before he has won reputation as a warrior, "he would be sure to suffer the painful mortification of a rejection; he would become the derision of the warriors and the contempt of the squaws." In the _Jesuit Relations_ (III., 73) we read of some of the Canadian Indians that

"they have a very rude way of making love; for the suitor, as soon as he shows a preference for a girl, does not dare look at her, nor speak to her, nor stay near her unless accidentally; and then he must force himself not to look her in the face, nor to give any sign of his pa.s.sion, otherwise he would be the laughing-stock of all, and his sweetheart would blush for him."

Not only must he show no preference, but the choice, too, is not left to him; for the relatives take up the matter and decide whether his age, skill as a hunter, reputation, and family make him a desirable match.

In the face of such facts, can we agree with Rousseau that to a savage one woman is as good as another? The question is very difficult to answer, because if a man is to marry at all, he must choose a particular girl, and this choice can be interpreted as preference, though it may be quite accidental. It is probable, as I have suggested, that with a people as low as the Australians it would be difficult to find a man having sufficient predilection for one young woman to refuse to exchange her for two others. Probably the same is true of the higher savages and even of the barbarians, as a rule.

UTILITY VERSUS SENTIMENT

We do, indeed, find, at a comparatively early stage, evidences of one girl or man being chosen in preference to others; but when we examine these cases closely we see that the choice is not based on _personal_ qualities but on utilitarian considerations of the most selfish or sensual description. Thus Zoller, in the pa.s.sage just referred to, says of the negro:

"It is true that when he buys a woman he prefers a young one, but his motive for so doing is far from being mental admiration of beauty. He buys the younger ones because they are youthful, strong, and able to work for him."

Similarly Belden, who lived twelve years among the Plains Indians, states (302) that "the squaws are valued by the middle-aged men only for their strength and ability to work, and no account whatever is taken of their personal beauty." The girls are no better than the men.

Young Comanche girls, says Parker (Schoolcraft, V., 683) "are not averse to marry very old men, particularly if they are chiefs, as they are always sure of something to eat." In describing Amazon Valley Indians, Wallace says (497-498) that there is

"a trial of skill at shooting with the bow and arrow, and if the young man does not show himself a good marksman, the girl refuses him, on the ground that he will not be able to shoot fish and game enough for the family."

These cases are typical, and might be multiplied indefinitely; they show how utterly individual preference on personal grounds is out of the question here. It is true that many of our own girls marry for such utilitarian reasons; but no one would be so foolish as to speak of these marriages as love-matches, whereas in the cases of savages we are often invited by sentimentalists to witness the "manifestation of love" whenever a man shows a utilitarian or sensual interest in a particular girl. A modern civilized lover marries a girl for her own sake, because he is enamoured of her individuality, whereas the uncivilized suitor cares not a fig for the other's individuality; he takes her as an instrument of l.u.s.t, a drudge, or as a means of raising a family, in order that the superst.i.tious rites of ancestor-worship may be kept up and his selfish soul rest in peace in the next world.

He cares not for her personally, for if she proves barren he repudiates her and marries another. Trial marriages are therefore widely prevalent. The Dyaks of Borneo, as St. John tells us, often make as many as seven or eight such marriages; with them marriage is "a business of partnership for the purpose of having children, dividing labor, and by means of their offspring providing for their old age."

A STORY OF AFRICAN LOVE

An amusing incident related by Ernst von Weber (II., 215-6) indicates how easily utilitarian considerations override such skin-deep preference as may exist among Africans. He knew a girl named Yanniki who refused to marry a young Kaffir suitor though she confessed that she liked him. "I cannot take him," she said, "as he can offer only ten cows for me and my father wants fifteen." Weber observed, that it was not kind of her father to let a few cows stand in the way of her happiness; but the African damsel did not fall in with his sentimental view of the case. Business and vanity were to her much more important matters than individual preference for a particular lover, and she exclaimed, excitedly: