1266 LIFE : OUTLINES OF GENERAL BIOLOGY 



tory. In regard to this important matter it seems clear from the out- 

 look of psychology, biology and common sense, that there are in ideal 

 risings in love three distinct notes : the first is the note of physical 

 fondness (which should be indispensable), the second is the note of 

 esthetic attraction, and the third is the note of psychical sympathy 

 of personality for personality. All these three notes we can recognise 

 in the higher reaches of the animal kingdom— at their highest among 

 the birds. The root of the matter, so to speak, is physical fondness; 

 then there is esthetic attraction, often very subtle; this is sub- 

 limated in the psychological attraction of personality for personality. 

 All this we find expressed in birds, and a great school lesson is to 

 indicate that one of the big facts of organic evolution has been the 

 rise from physical fondness to esthetic attraction, and thence to 

 what we can only call love in the mating birds. 



Maturity. — ^Then comes the period of married life, and here we 

 cannot but be absolutely simple. There are three sails on the 

 voyage of married life, if it is to be a happy one: the first sail is 

 organic fondness, without which the voyage is apt to end in ship- 

 wreck; the second sail is esthetic attraction, which may take many 

 forms, even down to dress, which may be an expression of the self ; 

 and the third is a certain amount of intellectual and emotional sym- 

 pathy, which will find its climax in working together for some big 

 endeavour. Of course we do not mean that man and wife must belong 

 to the same political party, but there should be some measure of 

 intellectual sympathy which will reach its height when man and 

 wife work together with some large ambition. No doubt there are 

 some matrimonial voyages on crafts which have only two sails, and 

 others which have only one, and others which have none, and are 

 only at the most legal marriages ; but the happy married life is the 

 one with three sails — organic fondness, esthetic attraction, and 

 intellectual S5anpathy. After married life has lasted some long time 

 there comes a dangerous period — although all the periods are dan- 

 gerous, since each has risks as well as promises. But in later married 

 life there comes a particularly dangerous period of life, when the sex 

 urge has waned, say, after fifty or sixty. What is one to say about 

 that dangerous period of life for man and woman, disquieting to so 

 many? Well, two things, frankly and sincerely. The first is the 

 grave danger, even for some of the best of us, of artificially fanning 

 fires which should be smouldering — an undoubted danger for men 

 especially. Secondly, common sense suggests that this period after 

 fifty, when the sex life has largely waned, should be anticipated, and 

 provided for by the cultivation of hobbies and enthusiasms, some- 

 thing to occupy life, especially as the strain of activities has usually 

 begun to lessen at the same time. It seems that we educate too 

 little for leisure time and too much in reference to the workaday world. 



Ageing. — Yet why should people necessarily age? The Protozoa 



