CHAPTER XLII. Free Love--Adultery

FREE LOVE--ADULTERY

HARDLY less variable than the moral ideas relating to marriage are those concerning sexual relations of a non-matrimonial character.

Among many uncivilised peoples both sexes enjoy perfect freedom previous to marriage, and in some cases it is considered almost dishonourable for a girl to have no lover.

The East African Barea and Kunáma do not regard it as in the least disreputable for a girl to become pregnant, nor do they punish nor censure the seducer. Among the Wanyoro "it constantly happens that young girls spend the night with their lovers, only returning to their father's house in the morning, and this is not considered scandalous.**" The Wadigo regard it as disgraceful, or at least as ridiculous, for a girl to enter into marriage as a virgin. Among the Bakongo, "womanly chastity is unknown, and a woman's honour is measured by the price she costs." Over nearly the whole of British Central Africa, says Sir H. Johnston, "before a girl is become a woman (that is to say before she is able to conceive) it is a matter of absolute indifference what she does, and scarcely any girl remains a virgin after about five years of age." Among the Baronga "l'opinion publique se moque des gens continents plus qu'elle ne les admire." According to Mr. Warner, "seduction of virgins, and cohabiting with unmarried women and {423} widows, are not punishable by Kafir law, neither does any disgrace attach to either sex by committing such acts." In Madagascar "continence is not supposed to exist in either sex before marriage, . . . and its absence is not regarded as a vice." Among the Maoris of New Zealand "girls were at perfect liberty to act as they pleased until married," and chastity in single women was held of little account. In the Tonga Islands unmarried women might bestow their favours upon whomsoever they pleased without any opprobrium, although it was thought shameful for a woman frequently to change her lover. In the Solomon Islands "female chastity is a virtue that would sound strangely in the ear of the native"; and in St. Christoval and the adjacent islands, "for two or three years after a girl has become eligible for marriage she distributes her favours amongst all the young men of the village." In the Malay Archipelago intercourse between unmarried people is very commonly considered neither a crime nor a disgrace; and the same is perhaps even more generally the case among the uncivilised races of India and Indo-China. Among the Angami Nagas, for instance, "girls consider short hair, the symbol of virginity, a disgrace, and are anxious to become entitled to wear it long; men are desirous before marriage to have proof that their wives will not be barren. . . . Chastity begins with marriage." The Jakuts see nothing immoral in free love, provided only that nobody suffers material loss by it. Among the Votyaks it is disgraceful for a girl to be little sought after by the young men, and it is honourable for her to have children; she then gets a wealthier husband, and a higher price is paid for her to her father. The Kamchadales set no great value on the virginity of their brides. Of the Point Barrow Eskimo Mr. Murdoch writes:--"As to the relations between the sexes there seems to be the most complete absence of what we consider moral feelings. Promiscuous sexual {424} intercourse between married or unmarried people, or even among children, appears to be looked upon simply as a matter for amusement. As far as we could learn, unchastity in a girl was considered nothing against her. The immorality of these people among themselves, as we witnessed it, seems too purely animal and natural to be of recent growth or the result of foreign influence. Moreover, a similar state of affairs has been observed among Eskimo elsewhere."

Yet however commonly chastity is disregarded in the savage world, we must not suppose that such disregard is anything like a universal characteristic of the lower races. In a previous work I have given a list of numerous savage and barbarous peoples among whom unchastity before marriage is looked upon as a disgrace or a crime for a woman, sometimes punishable with banishment from the community or even with death; and it is noteworthy that to this group of peoples belong savages of so low a type as the Veddahs of Ceylon, the Igorrotes of Luzon, and certain Australian tribes. I have also called attention to facts which seem to prove that in several cases the wantonness of savages is largely due to foreign influence. The pioneers of a "higher civilisation" are very frequently unmarried men who go out to make their living in uncivilised lands, and, though unwilling to contract regular marriages with native women, they have no objection to corrupting their morals. Moreover, in many tribes the {425} free intercourse which prevails between unmarried people is not of a promiscuous nature, and leads necessarily to marriage should the girl prove with child. Nay, among various uncivilised races not only the girl, but the man who seduces her is subject to punishment or censure.

Among the East African Takue a seducer may have to pay the same sum as if he had killed the girl, although the fine is generally reduced to fifty cows. Among the Beni Amer and Marea he is killed, together with the girl and the child. In Tessaua a fine of 100,000 kurdi is imposed on the father of a bastard child. Among the Beni Mzab a man who seduces a girl has to pay two hundred francs and is banished for four years. Among the Tedâ he is exposed to the revenge of her father. The Baziba look upon illegitimate intercourse between the sexes as the most serious offence, though no action is taken until the birth of a child; "then the man and woman are bound hand and foot and thrown into Lake Victoria." Among the Bakoki, whilst the girl was driven from home and remained for ever after an outcast, the man was fined three cows to her father and one to the chief. Certain West African savages described by Mr. Winwood Reade, who banish from the clan a girl guilty of wantonness, inflict severe flogging on the seducer. In Dahomey a man who seduces a girl is compelled by law to marry her and to pay eighty cowries to the parent or master. Among some Kafir tribes the father or guardian of a woman who becomes pregnant can demand a fine of one head of cattle from the father of the child; whilst in the Gaika tribe the mere seduction of a virgin incurs the fine of three or four head of cattle. Casalis mentions an interesting custom prevalent among the Basutos, which on the one hand illustrates the belief that sexual intercourse in certain circumstances exposes a person to supernatural danger, and on the other hand indicates that unchastity in unmarried men is not looked upon with perfect indifference:--Immediately after the birth of a child the fire of the dwelling was kindled afresh. "For this purpose it was necessary that a young man of chaste habits should rub two {426} pieces of wood quickly one against another, until a flame sprung up, pure as himself. It was firmly believed that a premature death awaited him who should dare to take upon himself this office, after having lost his innocence. As soon, therefore, as a birth was proclaimed in the village, the fathers took their sons to undergo the ordeal. Those who felt themselves guilty confessed their crime, and submitted to be scourged rather than expose themselves to the consequences of a fatal temerity." Livingstone, speaking of the good name which was given to him by the Bakwains, observes:--"No one ever gains much influence in this country without purity and uprightness. The acts of a stranger are keenly scrutinised by both young and old, and seldom is the judgment pronounced, even by the heathen, unfair or uncharitable. I have heard women speaking in admiration of a white man, because he was pure, and never was guilty of any secret immorality. Had he been, they would have known it, and, untutored heathen though they be, would have despised him in consequence."

Of the Australian Maroura tribe, Lower Darling, we are told that before the advent of the whites "their laws were strict, especially those regarding young men and young women. It was almost death to a young lad or man who had sexual intercourse till married." Among various tribes in Western Victoria "illegitimacy is rare, and is looked upon with such abhorrence that the mother is always severely beaten by her relatives, and sometimes put to death and burned. Her child is occasionally killed and burned with her. The father of the child is also punished with the greatest severity, and occasionally killed."

In Nias the pregnancy of an unmarried girl is punished with death, inflicted not only upon her but upon the seducer as well. Among the Bódo and Dhimáls of India chastity is prized in man and woman, married and unmarried. Among the Tunguses "in irregular amours only the men are punished," the seducer being obliged either to purchase the girl at a certain price or, if he refuses, to submit to corporal punishment. Among the Thlinkets, "if unmarried women prove frail the partner of their guilt, if discovered, is bound to make reparation to the parents, soothing their wounded honour with handsome {427} presents." In certain North American tribes the seducer is said to be viewed with even more contempt than the girl whom he has dishonoured.

Passing to more advanced races, we find that chastity is regarded as a duty for unmarried women, whilst a different standard of morality is generally applied to men. "Confucianism," says Mr. Griffis, "virtually admits two standards of morality, one for man, another for woman. . . . Chastity is a female virtue, it is a part of womanly duty, it has little or no relation to man personally." Yet it is held up as an ideal even to men. It is said that in youth, when the physical powers are not yet settled, the superior man guards against lust. Though licentious in their habits, the Chinese exalt and dignify chastity as a means of bringing the soul and body nearer to the highest excellence; one of their proverbs even maintains that "of the myriad vices, lust is the worst." Chastity for its own sake, when defended by a woman at the expense of her life, meets with a reward at the hands of the Government. "If a woman"--so the Ordinances run--"be compelled by her husband to prostitute herself for money, and takes her own life in order to preserve her chastity, or if an unmarried virgin loses her life in defending herself against violation, an honorary gate shall be erected in each case near the door of the paternal dwelling." According to the Chinese Penal Code, "criminal intercourse by mutual consent with an unmarried woman shall be punished with seventy blows," whilst the punishment for such intercourse with a married woman is eighty blows.

Among the ancient Hebrews fornication was forbidden to women but not to men. The action of Judah towards the supposed harlot on the way to Timnath is mentioned {428} as the most natural thing in the world, even though the perpetrator was a man of wealth and position, a man whom his brethren "shall praise" and before whom his "father's children shall bow down." Throughout the Muhammedan world chastity is regarded as an essential duty for a woman. In Persia an unmarried girl who gave birth to a child would surely be killed. Among the Fellaheen of Egypt a father or brother in most instances punishes an unmarried daughter or sister who has been guilty of incontinence by throwing her into the Nile with a stone tied to her neck, or cutting her to pieces, and then throwing her remains into the river. Among the Jbâla and Rif Berbers of Morocco she is also frequently killed. For unmarried men, on the other hand, chastity is by Muhammedans at most looked upon as an ideal, almost out of reach. The Caliph Ali said that "with a man who is modest and chaste nobody should find fault." We are told that the Muhammedans of India consider it inconceivable that a Moslem should have illicit intercourse with a free Muhammedan woman; but connections with slave girls are regarded in a different light.

Among the Hindus sexual impurity is scarcely considered a sin in the men, but "in females nothing is held more execrable or abominable. The unhappy inhabitants of houses of ill fame are looked upon as the most degraded of the human species." In one of the Pahlavi texts continence is recommended from the point of view of prudence:--"Commit no lustfulness, so that harm and regret may not reach thee from thine own actions." But in Zoroastrianism, also, chastity is chiefly a female duty. It is written in the Avesta, "Any woman that has given up her body to two men in one day is sooner to be killed than a wolf, a lion, or a snake."

{429} Among the ancient Teutons an unmarried woman who belonged to an honourable family was severely punished for going wrong, and the seducer was exposed to the revenge of her family, or had to pay compensation for his deed. The yet un-Romanised Saxons, down to the days of St. Boniface, compelled a maiden who had dishonoured her father's house, as well as an adulteress, to hang herself, after which her body was burned and her paramour hung over the blazing pile; or she was scourged or cut with knives by all the women of the village till she was dead.

In Greece the chastity of an unmarried girl was anxiously guarded. According to Athenian law, the relatives of a maiden who had lost her virtue could with impunity kill the seducer on the spot. Virginity was an object of worship. Chastity was the pre-eminent attribute of sanctity ascribed to Athene and Artemis, and the Parthenon, or virgin's temple, was the noblest religious edifice of Athens. It is true that a certain class of courtesans occupied a remarkably high position in the social life of Greece, being admired and sought after even by the principal men. But they did so on account of their extraordinary beauty or their intellectual superiority; to the Greek mind the moral standard was by no means the only standard of excellence. The Romans, on the other hand, regarded the courtesan class with much contempt. In A.D. 19 the profligacy of women was checked by stringent enactments, and it was provided that no woman whose grandfather, father, or husband had been a Roman knight should get money by prostitution. The names of prostitutes had to be published on the aedile's list, as Tacitus says, "according to a recognised custom {430} of our ancestors, who considered it a sufficient punishment on unchaste women to have to profess their shame." But both in Rome and Greece pre-nuptial unchastity in men, when it was not excessive or did not take some especially offensive form, was hardly censured by public opinion. The elder Cato expressly justified it. Cicero says:--"If there be any one who thinks that youth is to be wholly interdicted from amours with courtesans, he certainly is very strict indeed. I cannot deny what he says; but still he is at variance not only with the licence of the present age, but even with the habits of our ancestors, and with what they used to consider allowable. For when was the time that men were not used to act in this manner? When was such conduct found fault with? When was it not permitted? When, in short, was the time when that which is lawful was not lawful?" Epictetus only went a little step further. He said to his disciples:--"Concerning sexual pleasures, it is right to be pure before marriage, as much as in you lies. But if you indulge in them, let it be according to what is lawful. But do not in any case make yourself disagreeable to those who use such pleasures, nor be fond of reproving them, nor of putting yourself forward as not using them." Here chastity in men is at all events recognised as an ideal. But even in pagan antiquity there were a few who enjoined it as a duty. Musonius Rufus emphatically asserted that no union of the sexes other than marriage was permissible, and Dio Chrysostom desired prostitution to be suppressed by law. Similar opinions grew up in connection with the Neo-Platonic and Neo-Pythagorean philosophies, and may be traced back to the ancient masters themselves. We are told that Pythagoras inculcated the virtue of {431} chastity so successfully that when ten of his disciples, being attacked, might have escaped by crossing a bean-field, they died to a man rather than tread down the beans, which were supposed to have a mystic affinity with the seat of impure desires. Plato, again, is in favour of a law to the effect that "no one shall venture to touch any person of the freeborn or noble class except his wedded wife, or sow the unconsecrated and bastard seed among harlots, or in barren and unnatural lusts." Our citizens, he says, ought not to be worse than birds and beasts, which live without intercourse, pure and chaste, until the age for procreation, and afterwards, when they have arrived at that period and the male has paired with the female and the female with the male, "live the rest of their lives in holiness and innocence, abiding firmly in their original compact."

Much stronger was the censure which Christianity passed on pre-nuptial connections. While looking with suspicion even on the life-long union of one man with one woman, the Church pronounced all other forms of sexual intercourse to be mortal sins. In its Penitentials sins of unchastity were the favourite topic; and its horror of them finds an echo in the secular legislation of the first Christian emperors. Panders were condemned to have molten lead poured down their throats. In the case of forcible seduction both the man and woman, if she consented to the act, were put to death. Even the innocent offspring of illicit intercourse were punished for their parents' sins with ignominy and loss of certain rights which belonged to other, more respectable, members of the Church and the State. Persons of different sex {432} who were not united in wedlock were forbidden by the Church to kiss each other; nay, the sexual desire itself, though unaccompanied by any external act, was regarded as sinful in the unmarried. In this standard of purity no difference of sex was recognised, the same obligations being imposed upon man and woman.

In this, as in so many other points of morals, however, there is a considerable discrepancy between Christian doctrine and public opinion in Christian countries. The gross and open immorality of the Middle Ages indicates how little the idea of sexual purity entered into the manners and opinions of the people. The influence of the ascetic doctrine of the Church was in fact quite contrary to its aspirations. The institution of clerical celibacy lowered the estimation of virtue by promoting vice. During the Middle Ages unchastity was regarded as an object of ridicule rather than censure, and in the comic literature of that period the clergy are universally represented as the great corrupters of domestic virtue. Whether the tenet of chastity laid down by the code of Chivalry was taken more seriously may be fairly doubted. A knight, it was said, should be abstinent and chaste; he should love only the virtues, talents, and graces of his lady; and love was defined as the "chaste union of two hearts by virtue wrought." But whilst the knight had certain claims as regards the virtue of his lady, whilst he probably was inclined to draw his sword only for a woman of fair reputation, and whilst he himself professed to aspire only to her lip or hand, we have reason to believe that the amours in which he indulged with her were of a far less delicate kind. Sainte-Palaye observes, "Jamais {433} on ne vit les murs plus corrompues que du temps de nos Chevaliers, et jamais le règne de la débauche ne fut plus universel." For a mediæval knight the chief object of life was love. He who did not understand how to win a lady was but half a man; and the difference between a lover and a seducer was apparently slight. The character of the seducer, as Mr. Lecky remarks, and especially of the passionless seducer who pursues his career simply as a kind of sport, and under the influence of no stronger motive than vanity or a spirit of adventure, has for many centuries been glorified and idealised in the popular literature of Christendom in a manner to which there is no parallel in antiquity.

The Reformation brought about some change for the better, if in no other respect at least by making marriage lawful for a large class of people to whom illicit love had previously been the only means of gratifying a natural desire, and by abolishing the monasteries. In fits of religious enthusiasm even the secular legislators busied themselves with acts of incontinence in which two unmarried adults of different sex were consenting parties. In the days of the Commonwealth, according to an act of 1650, in cases of less serious breach of chastity than adultery and incest, each man or woman was for each offence to be committed to the common gaol for three months, and to find sureties for good behaviour during a whole year afterwards. In Scotland, after the Reformation, fornication was punished with a severity nearly equal to that which attended the infraction of the marriage vow. But the fate of these and similar laws has been either to be repealed or to become inactive. For ordinary acts of incontinence public opinion is, practically at least, the only judge. In the case of female unchastity its sentence is {434} severe enough among the upper ranks of society, whilst, so far as the lower classes are concerned, it varies considerably even in different parts of the same country, and is in many cases regarded as venial. As to similar acts committed by unmarried men, the words which Cicero uttered on behalf of Clius might be repeated by any modern advocate who, in defending his client, ventured frankly to express the popular opinion on the subject. It seems to me that with regard to sexual relations between unmarried men and women Christianity has done little more than establish a standard which, though accepted perhaps in theory, is hardly recognised by the feelings of the large majority of people--or at least of men--in Christian communities, and has introduced the vice of hypocrisy, which apparently was little known in sexual matters by pagan antiquity.

Why has sexual intercourse between unmarried people, if both parties consent, come to be regarded as wrong? Why are the moral opinions relating to it subject to so great variations? Why is the standard commonly so different for man and woman? We shall now try to find an answer to these questions.

If marriage, as I am inclined to suppose, is based on an instinct derived from some ape-like progenitor, it would from the beginning be regarded as the natural form of sexual intercourse in the human race, whilst other more transitory connections would appear abnormal and consequently be disapproved of. I am not certain whether some feeling of this sort, however vague, is not still very general in the race. But it has been more or less or almost totally suppressed by social conditions which make it in most cases impossible for men to marry at the first outbreak of the sexual passion. We have thus to seek for some other explanation of the severe censure passed on pre-nuptial connections.

It seems to me obvious that this censure is chiefly due to the preference which a man gives to a virgin bride. As I have shown in another place, such a preference is a {435} fact of very common occurrence. It partly springs from a feeling akin to jealousy towards women who have had previous connections with other men, partly from the warm response a man expects from a woman whose appetites he is the first to gratify, and largely from an instinctive appreciation of female coyness. Each sex is attracted by the distinctive characteristics of the opposite sex, and coyness is a female quality. In mankind, as among other mammals, the female requires to be courted, often endeavouring for a long time to escape from the male. Not only in civilised countries may courtship mean a prolonged making of love to the woman. Mariner's words with reference to the women of Tonga hold true of a great many, if not all, savage and barbarous races of men. "It must not be supposed," he says, "that these women are always easily won; the greatest attentions and most fervent solicitations are sometimes requisite, even though there be no other lover in the way." The marriage ceremonies of many peoples bear testimony to the same fact. One origin of the form of capture is the resistance of the pursued woman, due to coyness, partly real and partly assumed. On the East Coast of Greenland, for instance, the only method of contracting a marriage is for a man to go to the girl's tent, catch her by her hair or anything else which offers a hold, and drag her off to his dwelling without further ado; violent scenes are often the result, as single women always affect the utmost bashfulness and aversion to any proposal of marriage, lest they should lose their reputation for modesty. It is certainly not the woman who most readily yields to the desires of a man that is most attractive to him; as an ancient writer puts it, all men love seasoned dishes, not plain meats, or plainly dressed {436} fish, and it is modesty that gives the bloom to beauty. Conspicuous eagerness in a woman appears to a man unwomanly, repulsive, contemptible. His ideal is the virgin; the libertine he despises.

Where marriage is the customary form of sexual intercourse pre-nuptial incontinence in a woman, as suggesting lack of coyness and modesty, is therefore apt to disgrace her. At the same time it is a disgrace to, and consequently an offence against, her family, especially where the ties of kinship are strong. Moreover, where wives are purchased the unchaste girl, by lowering her market value, deprives her father or parents of part of their property. Among the Tshi-speaking peoples of the Gold Coast, says Major Ellis, "chastity per se is not understood. An unmarried girl is expected to be chaste because virginity possesses a marketable value, and were she to be unchaste her parents would receive little and perhaps no head-money for her." Among the Rendile of Eastern Africa, we are told, the unchastity of unmarried girls meets with severe retribution, the girl invariably being driven out from her home, for the sole and simple reason that her market value to her parents has been decreased. The same commercial point of view is expressed in the Mosaic rule:--"If a man entice a maid that is not betrothed, and lie with her, he shall surely endow her to be his wife. If her father utterly refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins." But the girl is not the only offender. Whilst the disgrace of incontinence falls on her alone, the offence against her relatives is divided between her and the seducer. Speaking of the presents which, among the Thlinkets, a man is bound to give to the parents of the girl whom he has seduced, Sir James Douglas observes, "The offender is simply regarded as a robber, who has committed depredation on their merchandise, their only anxiety being to make the {437} damages exacted as heavy as possible." Marriage by purchase has thus raised the standard of female chastity, and also, to some extent, checked the incontinence of the men. But it can certainly not be regarded as the sole cause of the duty of chastity where such a duty is recognised by savages. Among the Veddahs, who do not make their daughters objects of traffic, the unmarried girls are nevertheless protected by their natural guardians "with the keenest sense of honour." In many of the instances quoted above where a seduction is followed by more or less serious consequences for the seducer, the penalty he has to pay is evidently something else than the mere market value of the girl.

Thus the men, by demanding that the women whom they marry shall be virgins, indirectly give rise to the demand that they themselves shall abstain from certain forms of incontinence. From my collection of facts relating to savages I find that in the majority of cases where chastity is required of unmarried girls the seducer also is considered guilty of a crime. But, as was just pointed out, his act is judged from a more limited point of view. It is chiefly, if not exclusively, regarded as an offence against the parents or family of the girl; chastity per se is hardly required of savage men. Where prostitution exists they may without censure gratify their passions among its victims. Now, to anybody who duly reflects upon the matter it is clear that the seducer does a wrong to the woman also; but I find no indication that this idea occurs at all to the savage mind. Where the seducer is censured the girl also is censured, being regarded not as the injured party but as an injurer. Even in the case of rape the harm done to the girl herself is little thought of. Among the Tonga Islanders "rape, providing it be not upon a married woman or one to whom respect is due on the score of {438} superior rank from the perpetrator, is considered not as a crime but as a matter of indifference." The same is the case in the Pelew Islands. In the laws of the Rejangs of Sumatra referring to this offence, "there is hardly anything considered but the value of the girl's person to her relations, as a mere vendible commodity." Among the Asiniboin, a Siouan tribe, the punishment for rape is based on the principle that the price of the woman has been depreciated, that the chances of marriage have been lessened, and that the act is an insult to her kindred, as implying contempt of their feelings and their power of protection. Even the Teutons in early days hardly severed rape from abduction, the kinsmen of the woman feeling themselves equally wronged in either case. If the girl's feelings are thus disregarded when she is an unwilling victim of violence, it can hardly be expected that she should be an object of pity when she is a consenting partner. Does not public opinion in the midst of civilisation turn against the dishonoured rather than the dishonourer?

There is yet another party to be considered, namely, the offspring. One would imagine that to every thinking mind, not altogether destitute of sympathetic feelings, the question what is likely to happen to the child if the woman becomes pregnant should present itself as one of the greatest gravity. But in judging of matters relating to sexual morality men have generally made little use of their reason and been guilty of much thoughtless cruelty. Although marriage has come into existence solely for the sake of the offspring, it rarely happens that in sexual relations much unselfish thought is bestowed upon unborn {439} individuals. Legal provisions in favour of illegitimate children have made men somewhat more careful, for their own sake, but they have also nourished the idea that the responsibility of fatherhood may be bought off by the small sum the man has to pay for the support of his natural child. Custom or law may exempt him even from this duty. We are told that in Tahiti the father might kill a bastard child, but that, if he suffered it to live, he was eo ipso considered to be married to its mother. This custom, it would seem, is hardly more inhuman than the famous law according to which "la recherche de la paternité est interdite."

The great authority on the ethics of Roman Catholicism tries to prove that simple fornication is a mortal sin chiefly because it "tends to the hurt of the life of the child who is to be born of such intercourse," or more generally, because "it is contrary to the good of the offspring." But this tender care for the welfare of illegitimate children seems strange when we consider the manner in which such children have been treated by the Roman Catholic Church herself. It is obvious that the extreme horror of fornication which is expressed in the Christian doctrine is in the main a result of the same ascetic principle which declared celibacy superior to marriage and tolerated marriage only because it could not be suppressed.

Moral ideas concerning unchastity have also been influenced by the close association which exists in a refined mind between the sexual impulse and a sentiment of affection which lasts long after the gratification of the bodily desire. We find the germ of this feeling in the abhorrence with which prostitution is regarded by savage tribes who have no objection to ordinary sexual intercourse previous to marriage, and in the distinction which among ourselves is drawn between the prostitute and the woman {440} who yields to temptation because she loves. To indulge in mere sexual pleasure, unaccompanied by higher feelings, appears brutal and disgusting in the case of a man, and still more so in the case of a woman. After all, love is generally only an episode in a man's life, whereas for a woman it is the whole of her life. The Greek orator said that in the moment when a woman loses her chastity her mind is changed. On the other hand, when a man and a woman, tied to each other by deep and genuine affection, decide to live together as husband and wife, though not joined in legal wedlock, the censure which public opinion passes upon their conduct seems to an unprejudiced mind justifiable at most only in so far as it may be considered to have been their duty to comply with the laws of their country and to submit to a rule of some social importance.

Sexual intercourse between unmarried persons of opposite sex is thus regarded as wrong from different points of view under different conditions, social or psychical, and all of these conditions are not in any considerable degree combined at any special stage of civilisation. Sometimes the opinions on the subject are greatly influenced by the institution of marriage by purchase, sometimes they are influenced by the refinement of love; and between such causes there can be no co-operation. This is one reason for the singular complexity which characterises the evolution of the duty of chastity; but there is another reason perhaps even more important. The causes to which this duty may be traced are frequently checked by circumstances operating in an opposite direction. Thus the preference which a man is naturally disposed to give to a virgin bride may be overcome by his desire for offspring, inducing him to marry a woman who has proved capable of gratifying this desire. It may also be ineffective for the simple reason that no virgin bride is to be found. Nothing has more generally prevented chastity {441} from being recognised as a duty than social conditions promoting licentious habits. Even in savage society, where almost every man and every woman marry and most of them marry early in life, there are always a great number of unmarried people of both sexes above the age of puberty; and, generally speaking, the number of the unmarried increases along with the progress of civilisation. This state of things easily leads to incontinence in men and women, and where such incontinence becomes habitual it can hardly incur much censure. Again, where the general standard of female chastity is high, the standard of male chastity may nevertheless be the lowest possible. This is the case where there is a class of women who can no longer be dishonoured, because they have already been dishonoured, whose virtue is of no value either to themselves or their families because they have lost their virtue, and who make incontinence their livelihood. Prostitution, being a safeguard of female chastity, has facilitated the enforcement of the rule which enjoins it as a duty, but at the same time it has increased the inequality of obligations imposed on men and women. It has begun to exercise this influence already at the lower stages of culture. Prostitution is by no means unknown in the savage world. It is a recognised institution in many of the Melanesian islands; "at Santa Cruz," says Dr. Codrington, "where the separation of the sexes is so carefully maintained, there are certainly public courtesans." Prostitution prevails in many or most Negro countries; and so favourably, we are told, is this institution sometimes regarded, that rich Negro ladies on their death-beds buy female slaves and present them to the public, "in the same manner as in England they would have left a legacy to some public charity." The Wanyoro even have a {442} definite system of prostitution, governed by stringent laws which seem to be very old. In Greenland, where it was "reckoned the greatest of infamies" for an unmarried woman to become pregnant, there were professional harlots already in early times; and the same was the case among many of the North American Indians. Thus among the Omahas extra-matrimonial intercourse is, as a rule, practised only with public women, called minckeda; and "so strict are the Omahas about these matters, that a young girl or even a married woman walking or riding alone, would be ruined in character, being liable to be taken for a minckeda, and addressed as such." Public prostitution was tolerated, if not encouraged, among all the Maya nations, whilst intercourse with other unmarried women was punished with a fine or, if the affronted relatives insisted, with death. "In order to avoid greater evils," the Incas of Peru permitted public prostitutes, who were treated with extreme contempt; but, with this exception, "to be lewd with single women was capital." Among all the civilised nations of the Old World prostitution has existed, and still exists, as a tolerated institution, even where legislators have endeavoured to suppress it. Its prevalence in our modern society greatly increases the perplexity of public opinion in regard to sexual morality. Its victims are degraded and despised beyond description. At the same time their male customers {443} are tacitly allowed to support the trade. That the demand for a merchandise increases the production of it is in this case seldom thought of. But secrecy must be observed. In sexual matters openness is indecent, and the chief crime is to be found out.

There is, moreover, a form of religious prostitution, just as there is religious celibacy. In fact, the two customs are sometimes very closely connected with one another. Among the E[(w]e-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast the chief business of the female kosi, or wife of the god to whom she is dedicated, is prostitution. "In every town there is at least one institution in which the best-looking girls, between ten and twelve years of age, are received. Here they remain for three years, learning the chants and dances peculiar to the worship of the gods, and prostituting themselves to the priests and the inmates of the male seminaries; and at the termination of their novitiate they become public prostitutes. This condition, however, is not regarded as one for reproach; they are considered to be married to the god, and their excesses are supposed to be caused and directed by him. Properly speaking, their libertinage should be confined to the male worshippers at the temple of the god, but practically it is indiscriminate. Children who are born from such unions belong to the god." So also the priestesses on the Gold Coast, though not allowed to marry, are by no means debarred from sexual intercourse. They "are ordinarily most licentious, and custom allows them to gratify their passions with any man who may chance to take their fancy. A priestess who is favourably impressed by a man sends for him to her house, and this command he is sure to obey, through fear of the consequences of exciting her anger. She then tells him that the god she serves has directed her to love him, and the man thereupon lives with her until she grows tired of him, or a new object takes her fancy. Some priestesses have as many as half a dozen men in their train at one time, and may on great occasions be seen walking {444} in state, followed by them. Their life is one continual record of debauchery and sensuality, and when excited by the dance they frequently abandon themselves to the wildest excesses." It seems that the "wife" of the Egyptian god at Thebes also in time became a libertine; Strabo tells us that the beautiful woman who was dedicated to him had sexual intercourse with any man she chose "till the natural purification of her body took place," after which she was given to a man. In India every Hindu temple of any importance has its dancing girls, whose position is inferior only to that of the sacrificers. Thus at J[)u]g[)u]nnat'h[)u]-ksh[)u]tr[)u] in Orissa a number of women of infamous character are employed to dance and sing before the god. They live in separate houses, not at the temple. The Brahmins who officiate there continually have adulterous connections with them, and these women also prostitute themselves to visitors. In the Canaanitish cults there were women, called [k.]ed[=e]sh[=o]th, who were consecrated to the deity with whose temple they were associated, and who at the same time acted as prostitutes. At the local shrines of North Israel the worship of Yahveh itself was deeply affected by these practices; but they were forbidden in the Deuteronomic code. Perhaps this temple prostitution may be accounted for by a belief that it bestowed blessings upon the worshippers. According to notions which prevail to this day in countries with Semitic culture, sexual intercourse with a holy person is regarded as beneficial to him or her who indulges in it.

Of a somewhat different character was the religious prostitution which prevailed in ancient Babylonia, in connection with the worship of Ishtar. Herodotus says that every woman born in that country was obliged once in her {445} life to go and sit down in the precinct of Aphrodite, and there consort with a stranger. A woman who had once taken her seat was not allowed to return home till one of the strangers threw a silver coin into her lap, and took her with him beyond the holy ground. The silver coin could not be refused because, since once thrown, it was sacred. The woman went with the first man who threw her money, rejecting no one. When she had gone with him, and so satisfied the goddess, she returned home, and from that time forth no gift, however great, would prevail with her. Several allusions in cuneiform literature to the sacred prostitution carried on at Babylonian temples confirm Herodotus' statement in general. A cult very similar to this was also found in certain parts of the island of Cyprus, at Heliopolis in Syria, and at Byblus. In the worship of Anaitis the Armenians even of the highest families prostituted their own daughters at least once in their lives, nor was this regarded as any bar to an honourable marriage afterwards. Although such practices were generally excluded from the ordinary Greek worships of Aphrodite, unchastity in the temple cult of that goddess is reported to have occurred at Corinth and in the city of the Locri Epizephyrii, who, according to the story, vowed to consecrate their daughters to this service in order to gain the goddess's aid in a war.

Various theories have been set forth to explain the religious prostitution of the Babylonian type. It has been interpreted as an expiation for individual marriage, as a temporary recognition of pre-existing communal rights at a time when "communal marriage" in the full sense of the term had already ceased to exist. It {446} has been supposed to be nothing but ordinary immorality practised under the cloak of religion. It has been represented as a form of sacrifice, either as a first-fruit offering or as an act by which a worshipper sacrifices her most precious possession to the deity. To Dr. Farnell it seems to be "a special modification of a wide-spread custom, the custom of destroying virginity before marriage so that the bridegroom's intercourse should be safe from a peril that is much dreaded by men in a certain stage of culture; and here, as in other ritual," he adds, "it is the stranger that takes the peril upon himself." But why should the stranger have been more willing than the bridegroom to expose himself to this danger? Considering that the act was performed at the temple of the goddess of fecundity, I think its object most probably was to ensure fertility in the woman; this, in fact, is directly indicated by the words which the stranger, according to Herodotus, uttered when he threw the silver coin into her lap:--"The goddess Mylitta prosper thee!" And from what has been said in a previous chapter about the semi-supernatural character ascribed to strangers, about the efficacy of their blessings and the benefits expected from their love, we can see why a stranger was appointed to confer the blessing upon the girl.

Among ourselves an act of incontinence assumes a {447} different aspect if one of the parties, either the man or the woman, is married. Involving a breach of faith, adultery is an offence against him or her to whom faith is due, and at the same time the seducer commits an offence against the husband of the adulteress. But here again our own views are not universally shared.

Although it is hard to understand that the seducer could ever be regarded as guiltless, we are told that among a few peoples adultery is not held to be wrong; and Mr. Morgan states that among the Iroquois "punishment was inflicted upon the woman alone, who was supposed to be the only offender." But these cases are certainly quite exceptional. In a savage tribe a seducer may be thankful if he escapes by paying to the injured husband the value of the bride or some other fine, or if the penalty is reduced to a flogging, to his head being shaved, his ears cut off, one of his eyes destroyed, or his legs speared. Very commonly he has to pay with his life. We have seen that even among many peoples who generally prohibit self-redress an adulterer may be put to death by the aggrieved husband, especially if he be caught flagrante delicto; and in other cases he may be subject to capital punishment, in the proper sense of the word. In Albania, even in our days, custom not only allows, but compels, the injured husband to kill the adulterer. Hebrew law enjoined the man who committed adultery with another man's wife to be put to death; and Christian legislators followed the example. Constantine celebrated his new zeal for the sacramental idea of marriage by establishing the punishment of death for the seducer; adultery was in point of {448} heinousness assimilated to murder, idolatry, and sorcery. Various mediæval law-books punished the seducer with death; whilst in Scotland notorious and manifest adultery was made capital as late as 1563. This extreme severity, however, has been followed by extreme leniency. In Scotland, though adultery kept its place in the statute-book as a heinous and in some cases a capital crime, prosecution for it had ceased for many years before the time of Baron Hume; and in England it is no crime at all in the eyes of the law, only an ecclesiastical offence.

The punishment of the seducer often varies according to his rank, or according to that of the husband, or according to the relative rank of both, or according to the rank of the adulteress. Among the Monbuttu, if the guilty woman belongs to the royal household, the adulterer is put to death, whereas otherwise he is only compelled to pay an indemnity to the offended husband. Among the E[(w]e-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast the fine imposed for adultery depends on the rank of the injured husband; and the same principle is found in Anglo-Saxon law. Among the Bakongo, again, the penalties for adultery "vary from capital punishment to a trifling fine, according to the station of the offender or the district he lives in." Drury tells us that in the country of Anterndroea in Madagascar, "if a man lies with another man's wife who is superior to him, he forfeits thirty head of cattle besides beads and shovels a great number," whereas "if the men are of an equal rank, then twenty beasts are the fine." According to the Chinese Penal Code, a slave who is guilty of criminal intercourse with the wife or daughter of a freeman, shall be punished at the least one degree more {449} severely than a freeman would have been under the same circumstances. In India a man of one of the first three castes who committed adultery with a Sûdra woman was banished, but a Sûdra who committed adultery with a woman of one of the first three castes suffered capital punishment; and an opinion is also quoted that for a Brâhmana who once was guilty of adultery with a married woman of equal class, the penance was one-fourth of that prescribed for an outcast. In ancient Peru "an adulterer was punish'd with death, if the woman was of note, or else with the rack."

We find no difficulty in explaining all these facts. In early civilisation a husband has often extreme rights over his wife. The seducer encroaches upon a right of which he is most jealous, and with regard to which his passions are most easily inflamed. Adultery is regarded as an illegitimate appropriation of the exclusive claims which the husband has acquired by the purchase of his wife, as an offence against property. It is said in the 'Laws of Manu' that "seed must not be sown by any man on that which belongs to another." How closely the seducer is associated with a thief is illustrated by the fact that among some peoples he is punished as such, having his hands, or one of them, cut off. Yet even among savages the offence is something more than a mere infringement of the right of ownership. The Kurile Islanders, says Krasheninnikoff, have an extraordinary way of punishing adultery: the husband of the adulteress challenges the adulterer to a combat. The result is generally the death of both the combatants; but it is held to be "as great dishonour to refuse this combat as to refuse an invitation to a duel among the people of Europe." The passion of jealousy, the feeling of ownership, and the sense of honour, {450} thus combine to make the seducer's act an offence, and often a heinous offence, in the eyes of custom or law; and for the same reasons as in other offences the magnitude of guilt is here also influenced by the rank of the parties concerned. Modern legislation, on the other hand, does not to the same extent as early law and custom allow a man to give free vent to his angry passion; it regards the dishonour of the aggrieved husband as a matter of too private a character to be publicly avenged; and the faithfulness which a wife owes her husband is no longer connected with any idea of ownership. Moreover, the severity of earlier European laws against adultery was closely connected with Christianity's abhorrence of all kinds of irregular sexual intercourse; and secular legislation has more and more freed itself from the bondage of religious doctrine.

Among some savage peoples it is the seducer only who suffers, whilst the unfaithful wife escapes without punishment. Jealousy, in the first place, turns against the rival, and the seducer is the dishonourer and the thief. But, as a general rule, the unfaithful wife is also looked upon as an offender, and the punishment falls on both. She is discarded, beaten, or ill-treated in some way or other, and not infrequently she is killed. Often, too, she is disfigured by her enraged husband, so that no man may fall in love with her ever after. Indeed, so strong is the idea that a wife belongs exclusively to her husband, that among several peoples she has to die with him; and frequently a widow is prohibited from remarrying either for ever or for a certain period after the husband's death. In ancient Peru widows generally continued to live single, as "this virtue was much commended in their laws and ordinances." Nor is it in China considered proper {451} for a woman to contract a second marriage after her husband's death, and a lady of rank, by doing so, exposes herself to a penalty of eighty blows. "As a faithful minister does not serve two lords, neither may a faithful woman marry a second husband"--this is to the Chinese a principle of life, a maxim generally received as gospel. Among so-called Aryan peoples the ancient custom which ordained sacrifice of widows survived in the prohibitions issued against their marrying a second time. Even now the bare mention of a second marriage for a Hindu woman would be considered the greatest of insults, and, if she married again, "she would be hunted out of society, and no decent person would venture at any time to have the slightest intercourse with her." In Greece and Rome a widow's remarriage was regarded as an insult to her former husband; and so it is still regarded among the Southern Slavs. The early Christians, especially the Montanists and Novatians, strongly disapproved of second marriages by persons of either sex; a second marriage was described by them as a "kind of fornication," or as a "specious adultery." It was looked upon as a manifest sign of incontinence, and also as inconsistent with the doctrine that marriage is an emblem of the union of Christ with the Church.

Conjugal fidelity, whilst considered a stringent duty in the wife, is not generally considered so in the husband. This is obviously the rule among savage and barbarous tribes; but there are interesting exceptions to the rule. The Igorrotes of Luzon are so strictly monogamous that {452} in case of adultery the guilty party can be compelled to leave the hut and the family for ever, and among various other monogamous savages adultery is said to be unknown. The Dyak husband "preserves his vow of fidelity with a rectitude which makes jealousy a farce." The Toungtha, who marry only one wife, do not consider it right for a master to take advantage of his position even with regard to the female slaves in his house. Nay, the duty of fidelity in the husband has been recognised even by some savage peoples who allow polygamy. The Abipones, we are told, thought it both wicked and disgraceful to have any illicit intercourse with other women than their wives; hence adultery was almost unheard of among them. Among the Omaha Indians, "if a woman's husband be guilty of adultery with another woman she may strike him or the guilty female in her anger," though she cannot claim damages. In several tribes of Western Victoria a wife whose husband has been unfaithful to her "may make a complaint to the chief, who can punish the man by sending him away from his tribe for two or three moons"; and among some aborigines in New South Wales similar complaints may be made to the elders of the tribe, with the result that the adulterous husband may have to suffer for his conduct. The Kandhs of India deny the married man certain prerogatives which are granted to his wife: whilst constancy to her husband is so far from being required in a wife, "that her pretensions do not, at least, suffer diminution in the eyes of either sex when fines are levied on her convicted lovers," infidelity in a married man is held to be highly dishonourable, and {453} is often punished with deprivation of many social privileges.

The duty which savages thus in certain instances have imposed on the husband is hardly at all recognised in the archaic State. The Mexicans "did not consider, nor did they punish, as adultery the trespass of a husband with any woman who was free, or not joined in matrimony; wherefore the husband was not bound to so much fidelity as was exacted from the wife," adultery in her being inevitably punished with death. In China, where adultery in a woman is branded as one of the vilest crimes and the guilty wife is oftentimes "cut into small pieces," concubinage is a recognised institution of the country. In Corea "conjugal fidelity--obligatory on the woman--is not required of the husband. . . . Among the nobles, the young bridegroom spends three or four days with his bride, and then absents himself from her for a considerable time, to prove that he does not esteem her too highly. Etiquette dooms her to a species of widowhood, while he spends his hours of relaxation in the society of his concubines. To act otherwise would be considered in very bad taste, and highly unfashionable." In Japan, "while the man is allowed a loose foot, the woman is expected not only to be absolutely spotless, but also never to show any jealousy, however wide the husband may roam, or however numerous may be the concubines in his family." According to Hebrew law adultery was a capital offence, but it presupposed that the guilty woman was another man's wife. The "Aryan" nations in early times generally saw nothing objectionable in the unfaithfulness of a married man, whereas an adulterous wife was subject to the severest penalties. Until some time after the introduction of Christianity among the Teutons their {454} law-books made no mention of the infidelity of husbands, because it was permitted by custom. The Romans defined adultery as sexual intercourse with another man's wife; on the other hand, the intercourse of a married man with an unmarried woman was not regarded as adultery. The ordinary Greek feeling on the subject is expressed in the oration against Neæra, ascribed to Demosthenes, where the licence accorded to husbands is spoken of as a matter of course:--"We keep mistresses for our pleasures, concubines for constant attendance, and wives to bear us legitimate children and to be our faithful house-keepers."

At the same time the idea that fidelity in marriage ought to be reciprocal was not altogether unknown in classical antiquity. In a lost chapter of his 'Economics,' which has come to us only through a Latin translation, Aristotle points out that it for various reasons is prudent for a man to be faithful to his wife, but that nothing is so peculiarly the property of a wife as a chaste and hallowed intercourse. Plutarch condemns the man who, lustful and dissolute, goes astray with a courtesan or maid-servant; though at the same time he admonishes the wife not to be vexed or impatient, considering that "it is out of respect to her that he bestows upon another all his wanton depravity." Plautus argues that it is unjust of a husband to exact a fidelity which he does not keep himself.

In its condemnation of adultery Christianity made no distinction between husband and wife. If continence is a stringent duty for unmarried persons independently of {455} their sex, the observance of the sacred marriage vow must be so in a still higher degree. But here again there is a considerable discrepancy between the actual feelings of Christian peoples and the standard of their religion. Even in the laws of various European countries relating to divorce or judicial separation we find an echo of the popular notion that adultery is a smaller offence in a husband than in a wife.

The judgment pronounced upon an unfaithful husband is of course influenced by the opinion about extra-matrimonial connections in general. Where it is considered wrong for a man to have intercourse with either an unmarried woman or another man's wife, adultery in a husband is eo ipso condemned. But whether, or how far, infidelity on his part is stigmatised as an offence against his wife, chiefly depends upon the degree of regard which is paid to the feelings of women. That a married man generally enjoys more liberty than a married woman is largely due to the same causes as make him the more privileged partner in other respects; but there are also special reasons for this inequality between the sexes. It was a doctrine of the Roman jurists that adultery is a crime in the wife, and in the wife only, on account of the danger of introducing strange children to the husband. Moreover, the temptation to infidelity and the facility in indulging in it are commonly greater in the case of the husband than in that of the wife; and, as we have often noticed before, actual practice is always apt to influence moral opinion. And a still more important reason for the inequality in question is undoubtedly the general notion that unchastity of any kind is more discreditable for a woman than for a man.