320 Hitman Physiology. 



we fear that we are not, or shall cease to be. In our pain and 

 fear, distrust and suspicion, we make ourselves unlovely, and 

 bring upon us the very calamity we dread. Distrust destroys 

 friendship, and jealousy may kill out in time the tenderest 

 affection. 



No doubt jealousy, or the tendency or disposition to jealousy, 

 has its uses. In the lower stages of development, it is the 

 watch-dog, sentinel, safeguard of marriage and the family. 

 The husband or the wife, ever so faultless, may suffer deeply 

 from the fault of another ; and a prudent watchfulness and wise 

 care may prevent many evils. When both husband and wife 

 are honest and pure, no such protection is needed. Jealousy 

 is like physical pain ; the healthy do not suffer from it. We 

 do, however, suffer deeply from the real or imaginary wrong- 

 doing of those we love. 



Bearing the infirmities of the weak, we must aspire to the 

 health that has no pain, and the pure unselfish love that has no 

 torment of jealousy; for jealousy dishonours its subject and its 

 object. People feel it to be a humiliation, and do not like to 

 confess it ; and they are also unwilling to admit, that those 

 they love enough to be jealous of can ever give them cause for 

 such an emotion. We must therefore consider jealousy a mor- 

 bid passion, the result of morbid conditions, and strive to attain 

 to a higher and purer phase of life and love. 



There are many other questions connected with the genera- 

 tive function and sexual relations, some of which will be more 

 properly treated in Part Fifth, in the chapters on the Condi- 

 tions of Health, and Causes of Disease ; while others will 

 naturally be discussed in Part Sixth among the elements of 

 morals and society. 



