REPRODUCTION AND SEX 543 



the demonstration by geneticists of the fairly wide existence of sex- 

 gradations, such as we are broadly familiar with in our own species — 

 in which we characterise some men as manly, others as effeminate, 

 and see all gradations between — and also unmistakably among 

 women, as from the most womanly to the most mannish. So now, 

 given the like among many other species — indeed, why not more or 

 less among all? — have we not here a wide possibiUty, especially 

 through analogous and congruent pairings, of the evolution of the 

 masculoid and feminoid varieties, and thence to species, genera, 

 etc. ? In humanity, both similar and contrasted pairings seem each 

 not unfrequently to occur, though we know not with what results; 

 so this matter may be worth more attention from eugenists than it 

 has yet received. 



Pass now to what is by far the most prominent line of sex study 

 of recent times, that initiated by Freud. His has been a line of 

 approach altogether beyond our range, since essentially concerned 

 with the excessive sexualism and morbid sex-pathology of our times, 

 and these as hypertrophied in great cities especially. Yet the broad 

 correspondences of these two polarly distinct lines of inquiry are 

 more striking than is their contrast. As naturalistic students of sex, 

 and so of this as the very maturation and culmination of animal and 

 plant individuality and beauty, as from peacock to rose, and thus 

 also towards the like in human life, we have been in company not 

 with the physicians and pathologists, but rather with the artists and 

 poets: so that indeed we may now confess that this theory of sex 

 and its development was for us as nature-students what our friends' 

 paintings and lyrics were for them — and for the like fundamental 

 personal life-history reasons. So in all ways, naturalistic, human, and 

 personal alike, we could not but substantially realise and agree that 



All thoughts, all passions, all delights, 



Whatever stirs this mortal frame. 

 All are but messengers of Love, 



And bear his sacred flame ! 



Here, then, is an example of how, long before either naturalistic 

 studies or pathologic discoveries and interpretations, the poets have 

 been voicing Life and Sex in their compenetrance ; and all this since 

 who knows how early times— for poets, naturalists, and physicians 

 alike are but Life's children, beginning to understand her. The 

 superiority first of the poets, and now of the physicians, over us 

 mere naturalists is obvious ; for the song of the poet springs from 

 his own subconscious depths, and it is the physician's merit to 

 have recognised these ; while naturalists have been too simply fas- 

 cinated by the objective and organic aspect and interest of living 

 beings. But if Freud, with his strong intuition as well as searching 



