Page:Sexology.djvu/115

 women and their first husbands — a resemblance which often extends to minute physical and mental peculiarities. It would also seem that this theory is corroborated by the facts known to stock raisers as the "breeding back" of animals. We can barely indicate here, however, what can be scientifically discussed only on other fields. We are pre- pared for such encounter should our position be assailed.

In conclusion we have to consider marriage in another point of view, that is to say, aesthetically. It has been said that "man does not live by bread alone." He has not only physical, but intellectual and moral wants which no less imperiously require satisfaction. He has not only the right, but the duty of seeking this satisfaction under the penalty of sinking to the level of the brute, and of failing in the accomplishment of his destiny. The sentiment of art causes him to seek the beautiful and the good. In all that he fashions he aims at perfection ; all his efforts tend to personify himself in his works, and he allows to matter the least possible share in the value of his productions. He does not otherwise in love. Carnal, gross pleasure, disen- gaged from all participation of the heart, very soon becomes for him a source of disgust, and an object of repulsion. He is only really happy in the spiritual possession of the loved being, and this happiness, comparable to none other, is the only one of which time cannot deprive him. Marriage has, consequently, a double end, applicable to the dual nature of man — the procreation of the species, and the gratifica- tion of his love of perfectibility. Says Proudhon : "Love, then, as soon as it is determined and fixed by marriage, tends to free itself from the tyranny of the organs. It is this imperious tendency (of which man is warned from the first day by the fatigue of his senses, and upon which so many persons build such wretched illusions) that the pro-