PHILOSOPHY OF LOVE 



intelligence. As it is not the least necessary to answer 

 this question here, we will say nothing save this, proviso- 

 rily: one need not scorn chastity nor disdain asceticism. 



Is modesty an aberration? Indulgent observers have 

 believed that they noticed it in elephants as well as 

 in rabbits. The modesty of the elephant is a popular 

 maxim which makes right-minded women cast sheep's 

 eyes, in circuses, at the great beast who hides for her 

 amours. During copulation, says a celebrated rabbit- 

 raiser x "the male and female should be alone, in demi- 

 obscurity. This solitude and obscurity are more neces- 

 sary in view of the fact that certain females show signs 

 of modesty." The modesty of animals is a fancy. Like 

 modesty among humans, it is merely the mask of fear, 

 the crystallization of timorous habits, necessitated by the 

 animals being unarmed during coupling. This is very 

 well known and needs no explanation. But the need of 

 reproduction is so tyrannic that, even among the most 

 timid animals, it does not always leave them presence of 

 mind enough to hide themselves during the amour. The 

 most domesticated of animals, one knows it only too 

 well, shows at this moment neither fear nor shame. 



In man, among the civilized and among the uncivilized, 

 sexual fear, shame, has taken a thousand forms which, 

 for the most part, seem to have no longer any relation to 

 the original feeling whence they are derived. One notices 

 however that if the milieu where the couple finds itself 

 is such that no attack, no ridicule is to be feared, shame 



1 Mariot-Didieux, Guide pratique de 1'educateur de lapins. 

 Bibliotheque des professions industrielles et agricoles, serie H. 

 No. 17. 



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