Page:The rights of women and the sexual relations.djvu/105

Rh man. The inadequacy of friendship among persons of the same sex the Greeks have shown most strikingly in their attempt to complete, as it were, the friendships into which the abnormal taste of the times had led the men by the unnatural introduction of the feminine element of "love." Accustomed to look upon women as inferior beings, but not able to withdraw themselves entirely from the acknowledgment of the feminine element, they transferred it, as it seems, partly to youths in order to sanction its acknowledgment through the male sex. And while thereby unconsciously degrading woman, they avenged her at the same time in themselves, by their endeavor to complete, to idealize themselves by the feminine element. The two sexes are designed to complement each other, to perfect the human being in each. This completion is the bond of true friendship; and if, on the one hand, the writer is not entirely wrong who says, "One man and one woman are together equal to two angels, two women are together equal to two devils;" Rousseau, on the other hand, hits the truth exactly when he says, "A man's best friend is his wife." I admit that the psychological interest and common ideal aims ‘can bring about a relationship between men which deserves the name of friendship; but, according to our views, perfect friendship demands complete devotion, complete confidence, and mutual indispensableness, which exists as little among men as among