ii8 Life and Love. 



become exaggerated. And as the difference be- 

 tween them increases, the attraction they feel for 

 each other also increases. 



\Vh}' they experience this powerful attraction for 

 each other they do not know, they only know that 

 in the society of each other alone is contentment, 

 is peace and joy, — in short, is life. 



What life is, we do not know. What this power 

 is that attracts one sex to the other, we do not 

 know. 



What it is that mutually attracts iron and mag- 

 net, or planets and sun, or bodies and earth, we do 

 not know. We only know that everywhere is 

 manifest this strange power which in some way is 

 associated with all matter and all life. We may 

 call it love, or magnetism, or gravitation, but that 

 does not explain it. 



We know that in some primal way sex attraction 

 is a part of the general law of attraction every- 

 where manifest in the universe, and that like all 

 other activities it waxes and wanes, rises to culmi- 

 nation, subsides to rest. 



The season of love over, the high office of love 

 discharged, the phenomena of the reproductive 

 period disappear. Colors fade, horns are shed, 

 plumes fall. Life passes from crest to hollow. 

 Sometimes the creature passes on to extinction; 

 where this is not the case, a longer or shorter 

 period of quiescence intervenes between the repro- 

 ductive renewals. The length of time of this 



