Strange Science of sexual attraction

 

Without sexual attraction, in greater or lesser degree, there can be no love. Where the former is entirely lacking the latter can have no existence. This you may take as an axiom. Some may call it love, but on analyzing it you will find that it is no such thing. It may be friendship, it may be gratitude, it may be respect, it may be pity, it may be habit, it may even be a desire or a readiness to love or to be loved, but it is not love. Experience has proved it in thousands and thousands of sad cases. And the girl who marries a man who is physically repulsive to her, who possesses no physical sexual attraction for her, though she may experience for him all of the feelings mentioned above, namely, friendship, gratitude, respect and pity, is preparing for herself a joyless couch to sleep on. Unless, indeed, she happens to belong to the class of women whom we call frigid, that is, if she is herself devoid of any sexual desire and feels no need of any sexual relations. Such a woman may be fairly or even quite happy with a husband who repels her physically, but whom she likes or respects. And what I said about the wife applies with still greater force to the husband. A man who marries a woman who is physically antipathetic to him is a criminal fool.

I repeat, sexual, physical attraction is the basis, the foundation of love. It is true we see certain cases of love which puzzle us. We cannot understand what “he” has seen in “her” or what “she” has seen in “him.” But let us remember this paradox, which paradoxical though it be, is true nevertheless: Love is blind, but Love also sees acutely and penetratingly; it sees things which we who are indifferent cannot see. The blindness of Love helps her not to see certain defects which are clearly seen to everybody else; but, on the other hand, her penetrating vision helps her to see good qualities which are invisible to others. And a homely person may possess certain compensating physical qualities—such as passionate ardor or strong sexual power—which, render him or her irresistible to a member of the opposite sex.

But homeliness, ugliness or deformity have their limits, and I challenge anybody to bring forth an authenticated case in which a man fell in love with a woman—or vice versa—who had an enormous tumor on one side of the face, which made her look like a monstrosity, or whose nose was sunk in as a result of lupus or syphilis, or whose cheek was eaten away by cancer. Love under such circumstances is an absolute impossibility, because there is physical aversion here, and physical aversion is fatal to the genesis of love. A man who loved a woman may continue to love her after she has become disfigured by disease, but he cannot fall in love with such a woman.

I will repeat, then, and I trust you will agree with me on this point: sexual attraction is the foundation of all love between the opposite sexes. Where sexual attraction is lacking you can give the feeling any other name you choose: it will not be love.