Page:The rights of women and the sexual relations.djvu/90

74 intimidated nature has become entirely shamefaced, and all the world is ashamed. But with regard to the very things on account of which it ought to be most ashamed it has become totally shameless.

There is therefore no absolute sense of shame, and the present sense of shame in sexual matters is not a spontaneous emotion rooted in nature and continuous with it, but, as above stated, dependent on the judgment of. others and a product of circumstances.

If we measure the sense of shame by the standard of reason, it is justifiable only when it conforms to true morality, and is therefore the expression of the moral consciousness, and in this way we come to understand that the preachers of shame are sometimes the true preachers of immorality, of that immorality which would further morality by the suppression of nature and truth. It is surely not at all necessary to go about naked in order to show that one is free from false shame, nor is it necessary to love each other on the public thoroughfare in order to prove that one recognizes the claims of nature; but only a fool ora hypocrite will want to sacrifice the inner law to external considerations, and incorruptible nature to ridiculous prejudices.