Part 15

No doubt this instinctive modern prejudice in favour of Romantic Love will ultimately throw a halo of sacredness around it, which will raise Cupid’s will to the dignity of an Eleventh Commandment—a consummation devoutedly to be wished; for although the conjugal affection which grows out of Romantic Love is not always deeper than that which results from unions not based on Love, the physical and mental qualities of the children commonly show at a glance whether or not the parents were brought together by Sexual Selection.

LEADING MOTIVES

The psychic elements of Love which thus far have been compared to overtones, might also be regarded from a Wagnerian point of view as _Leitmotive_ or leading motives in the Drama of Historic Love. In the first scenes, where the actors are animals and savages, followed by Egyptians, Hebrews, Hindoos, Greeks, and Romans, and mediæval clowns and fanatics, these leading motives are heard only as short melodic phrases, and at long intervals, pregnant, indeed, with future possibilities, but isolated and never combined into a symphony of Love. In the last act, however, which we have now reached, all these motives appear in various combinations, in the gorgeous and glowing instrumentation of modern poets, with all possible figurative, harmonic, and dynamic nuances; and at the same time so intertwined and interwoven that no one apparently has ever succeeded in unravelling the poetic woof and distinguishing the separate threads. For us, however, who have followed these motives from the moment when they first appeared in a primitive form, it will be easy to distinguish them and subject each one to a separate analysis. We shall first consider those which, like Coyness and Jealousy, are already familiar and need only be considered in their modern forms, and then pass on to those which are more and more exclusively modern.

MODERN COYNESS

At least five sources or causes of modern female Coyness may be suggested:—

(1) _An Echo of Capture._—Why are modern city-folks so fond of picnics? It was Mr. Spencer, I believe, who suggested somewhere that it is because picnics awaken in civilised men and women a vague and agreeable reminiscence of the time when their ancestors habitually took their meals on meadows in the shade of a tree. If it is possible for such experiences to re-echo, as it were, in our nervous system through so many generations, thanks to the conservatism of oft-repeated cerebral impressions, then it does not seem so very fantastic to suggest that one cause of female Coyness may be a similar echo, or reminiscence, of the time when the primitive ancestresses of modern women were “courted” by Capture or Purchase, and so badly treated as wives that in course of time an instinctive impulse was formed in their minds to shrink back and say No to man’s proposals.

(2) _Maiden_ versus _Wife_.—It is hardly necessary, however, to rely upon such a remote sociological echo, so to speak, for an explanation of a girl’s hesitation to become a wife even if her suitor pleases her. The thought of exchanging her maiden freedom for conjugal restrictions and duties; of giving up the homage and admiration of all men for the possible neglect of one; of probably soon losing her youthful beauty, etc.—such thoughts would make many girls even more coy than they now are, did not the fear of becoming an old maid act as a counterbalancing motive in favour of marriage.

(3) _Modesty._—Esquimaux girls, as we have seen, “affect the utmost bashfulness and aversion to any proposal of marriage, lest they should lose their reputation for modesty.” And the greatest analyst of the human heart puts the same philosophy into the mouth of Juliet in a passage which, although everybody knows it by heart, must yet be quoted here—

“O gentle Romeo, If thou dost love, pronounce it faithfully: Or if thou think’st I am too quickly won, I’ll frown and be perverse and say thee nay, So thou wilt woo; but else, not for the world. In truth, fair Montague, I am too fond, And therefore thou may’st think my ’haviour light: But trust me, gentleman, I’ll prove more true Than those that have more _cunning to be strange_. I should have been more strange, I must confess, But that thou overheard’st, ere I was ware, My true love’s passion: therefore pardon me, And _not impute this yielding to light love_, Which the dark night hath so discovered.”

(4) _Cunning to be Strange._—No huntsman (except a monarch) would care to go to an enclosure and shoot the deer confined therein, nor a fisherman to catch trout conveniently placed in a pond. But to wade up a mountain brook all day long, climbing over slippery rocks, and enduring the discomforts of a hot sun and wet clothes, with nothing to eat, and only a few speckled trifles to reward him—that is what he considers “glorious sport.”

The instinctive perception that a thing is valued in proportion to the difficulty of its attainment is what taught women the “cunning to be strange.” Seeing that they could not compete with man in brute force, they acquired the arts of Beauty and of Coyness, as their best weapons against his superior strength—the Beauty to fascinate him, the Coyness to teach him that in Love, as in fishing, the _pleasure of pursuit_ is the main thing.

At first this Coyness was manifested in a very crude manner, as among the primitive maidens who hid in the forest; or among the Roman women celebrated by Ovid, who locked their door and compelled the lover to beg and whine for admission by the hour; or among the mediæval women who, to gratify their caprices and enjoy the sense of a newly-acquired power, sent their admirers to participate in bloody wars before recognising their addresses. And so coarse-grained were the men that as soon as the women ceased to tease they ceased to woo; as, for instance, in mediæval France, about the time of the _Chansons de Geste_, “the man who desires a woman yet does not appear as a wooer; for he knows he is certain of her favour,” as we read in Ploss. Hence Cleopatra’s brief and pointed rejoinder to Charmian when he advises her, in order to win Antony’s love, to give him way in everything, cross him in nothing: “Thou teachest like a fool; the way to lose him.”

(5) _Procrastination._—Love at first sight is frequent at the present day, but in ancient Greece and Rome marriage at first sight appears to have been more common. The classical suitor’s wooing was generally comprised in three words: _Veni, Vidi, Vici_; _i.e._ I Came, Saw the girl’s father, Conquered his scruples by proving my wealth or social position. Sufficient brevity in this, no doubt: but _brevity is not the soul of Love_.

“Tant plus le chemin est long dans l’amour, tant plus un esprit délicat sent de plaisir,” says Pascal, announcing a truth of which ancient and mediæval nations had no conception until female Coyness taught it them. Goethe evidently had the same truth in mind when he mentioned as a phase of ancient love (Roman _Elegies_)—

“In der heroischen zeit, da Götter und Göttinen liebten Folgte Begierde dem Blick folgte Genuss der Begier.”

That is, in prose, there were no preliminaries in the love-drama, which had only one act, the fifth, in which the marriage is celebrated.

_Goldsmith on Love._—In Goldsmith’s _Citizen of the World_ there is a chapter on “Whether Love be a Natural or Fictitious Passion,” in which reference is likewise made to the value of procrastination. As this passage shows Goldsmith to have been the first author who had an approximate conception of the development and psychology of Love, I will quote it almost entire. It is in the form of a dialogue, and one of the speakers remarks: "Whether love be natural or no ... it contributes to the happiness of every society in which it is introduced. All our pleasures are short and can only charm at intervals; love is a method of protracting our greatest pleasure; and surely that gamester who plays the greatest stake to the best advantage will, at the end of life, rise victorious. This was the opinion of Vanini, who affirmed that ‘every hour was lost which was not spent in love.’ His accusers were unable to comprehend his meaning; and the poor advocate for love was burned in flames; alas! no way metaphorical. But whatever advantages the individual may reap from this passion, society will certainly be refined and improved by its introduction; all laws calculated to discourage it tend to embrute the species, and weaken the state. Though it cannot plant morals in the human breast, it cultivates them when there: pity, generosity, and honour receive a brighter polish from its assistance; and a single _amour_ is sufficient entirely to brush off the clown.

“But it is an exotic of the most delicate constitution: it requires the greatest art to introduce it into a state, and the smallest discouragement is sufficient to repress it again. Let us only consider with what ease it was formerly _extinguished in Rome_, and with what difficulty it was _lately revived in Europe_: it seemed to sleep for ages, and at last fought its way among us through tilts, tournaments, dragons, and all the dreams of chivalry. The rest of the world, _China only excepted_, are, and have ever been, utter strangers to its delights and advantages. In other countries, as men find themselves stronger than women, they lay a claim to rigorous superiority: this is natural, and love, which gives up this natural advantage, must certainly be the effect of art—an art calculated to lengthen out our happier moments, and add new graces to society.”

To this conclusion the lady interlocutor in the dialogue objects on the ground that “the effects of love are too violent to be the result of an artificial passion”; and suggests, by way of accounting for the absence of love, that “the same efforts that are used in some places to suppress pity, and other natural passions, may have been employed to extinguish love”; and that “those nations where it is cultivated only make nearer advances to nature.”

Goldsmith thus leaves it in doubt whether he considers Love a natural or an artificial passion. In the three passages which I have italicised, he errs: first, in saying that Love was “extinguished” in Rome, when in fact it never existed there, except incompletely in the poetic intuition of Ovid and possibly one or two other poets; secondly, he errs in remarking that it was lately “revived” in Europe, when in fact it was newly-born; and his excepting China, in speaking of the absence of Love, can only be looked on in the light of a joke in view of the absolute subjection of women to parental dictation, and the fact that, as one writer remarks, “a union prompted solely by love would be a monstrous infraction of the duty of filial obedience, and a predilection on the part of the female as heinous a crime as infidelity.” But his definition of Love as “the effect of art—an art calculated to lengthen out our happier moments and add new graces to society” is exceedingly good. The art in question is known as Courtship: and it is the latest of the fine arts, which even now exists in its perfection in two countries only—England and America. The Italian language has no equivalent for Courtship, as Professor Mantegazza tells us in his _Fisiologia dell’ Amore_; and a German commentator on this passage in Mantegazza comments dubiously: “Das Eutsprechende deutsche Wort _dürfte wohl_ Werbung sein;” “the corresponding German word is presumably _Werbung_.” “Presumably” is very suggestive. Yet the Germans have another expression of mediæval origin apparently, namely, “Einem Mädchen den Hof machen”—"to pay court to a girl," which, though somewhat conversational, has evidently the same historic origin as our word Court-ship; implying that formerly it was the custom at court alone to prolong the agony of Love by gallant attentions to women, which enabled them to exercise the “cunning to be strange.”

_Disadvantages of Coyness._—Beneficial as are no doubt the effects which have been brought about by female Coyness in developing the art of Courtship, there are corresponding evils inherent in that mental attitude which make it probable that Coyness will gradually disappear and be succeeded by something more modern, more natural, more refined.

There are four serious objections to Coyness, one from a masculine, three from a feminine point of view.

Men, in the first place, can hardly approve of Coyness; for it certainly indicates a coarse mediæval fibre in a man if he is obliged to confess that he can love a girl not for her beauty and amiability, but only because she tantalises and maltreats him:

“Spaniel-like, the more she spurns my love, The more it grows and fawneth on her still.”

Or, in Heine’s delightful persiflage of this attitude—

“Ueberall wo du auch wandelst, Schaust du mich zu allen Stunden, Und jemehr du mich misshandelst, Treuer bleib ich dir verbunden.

“Denn mich fesselt holde Bosheit Wie mich Güte stets vertrieben; Willst du sicher meiner los sein Musst du dich in mich verlieben.”

In one English sentence: Your amiability repels, your malice attracts me; if you wish to get rid of my attentions, you must fall in love with me.

If a refined man can feel ardent affection for an animal, a friend, a relative, without being “spurned” and consequently “fawning,” why should not the same be true of his love for a beautiful girl? It is true; and hence the cleverest women of the period, feeling this change in the masculine heart, have adopted a different method of fascinating men and bringing them to their feet, as we shall presently see.

Women, in turn, are injured by Coyness; first, because it makes them act foolishly. French and German girls are systematically taught to take immediate alarm at sight of a horrid man (whom they secretly consider a darling creature, with _such_ a moustache) and conceal themselves behind their mamma or chaperon, like spring chickens creeping under the old hen at sight of a hawk. This sort of _spring-chicken coyness_ does infinitely more harm than good; it makes the girls weak and frivolous, and as for the men, if they are systematically treated as birds of prey, how can they avoid falling in with their _rôle_? If men are to behave like gentlemen they must be treated as gentlemen, as they are in England and America.

Coyness, again, makes women deceitful and insincere. “Amongst her other feminine qualities,” says Thackeray of one of his characters, “she had that of being a perfect dissembler.” And in another place, “I think women have an instinct of dissimulation; they know by nature how to disguise their emotions far better than the most consummate courtiers can do.” It cannot be said that dissimulation is a virtue, though it may be a useful weapon against coarse and selfish men. If not the same thing as hypocrisy, it is next door to it; and it cannot have a beneficial effect on a woman’s general moral instincts if she is compelled constantly to act a part contrary to her convictions and feelings. Though as deeply in love as her suitor, she is commanded to treat him with indifference, coldness, even cruelty,—in a word, to do constant violence to her and his feelings, and to lacerate her own heart perhaps even more than the unhappy lover’s. Thus instead of mutually enjoying the period of Courtship, and indulging in harmless banter, “they gaze at each other fiercely, though ready to die for love”; or, as Heine puts it—

“Sie sahen sich an so feindlich, Und wollten vor Liebe vergehen.”

And why all this perverseness, this unnaturalness, this emotional torture? Simply because—once more be it said—the men of former days, the men who lived on pork and port, who delighted in bear-baiting, cock-fights, and similar æsthetic amusements, had nerves so coarse and callous that to make any impression on them the women had to play with them as a cat does with a mouse to make it tender and sweet.

_Coyness lessens Woman’s Love._—One more charge, the gravest of all, remains to be piled on top, as a last crushing argument against crude Coyness. An emotion, like a plant, requires for its growth sunshine, light, and open air; if kept in a dark cellar and stifled, it soon becomes weak and pale and languishes. Man’s superior strength and selfish exercise of it have compelled women to cultivate Coyness as an art of dissembling, hiding, and repressing their real feelings. But to repress the manifestations of anger, of pity, of Love, is to suppress them; hence Coyness has necessarily had the effect of weakening woman’s Love. It weakens it in the same proportion as it strengthens man’s. And hence, as I have said before, the current notion that women love more ardently, more deeply, than men is an absurd myth. The poets have always shown a predilection for this, as for all other myths; and as it is still served up as a self-evident truth in a thousand books every year, it is worth while to clear away the underbrush and let in some daylight on the subject.

_Masculine_ versus _Feminine Love_.—One thing may be conceded at the outset: that woman’s Love, when once kindled, is apt to endure longer than man’s. Shakspere’s “’Tis brief, my Lord, as woman’s love” is therefore a libel on the sex. The difficulty is to get it under way. It takes so much of the small kindling wood of courtship (“sparking” it is called) to set a female heart aflame, that many men give it up in despair and remain bachelors; or else, like the young man in _Fidelio_, they finally tell their girl, “If you will not love me, at least marry me.”

It may also be conceded that Rousseau exaggerates when he says that “Women are a hundred times sooner reasonable than passionate: they are as unable to describe love as to feel it.” This may have been true in his day; but that there have since been some female authors who have correctly described Love, and thousands of women who have been deeply in Love, it would be absurd to deny. All that is here maintained is that Love is of less frequent occurrence in women than in men; and when it does occur in women it is not usually so deep, so passionate, so maddening. The average woman knows little of Romantic Love. She has read about it in novels, in poems, and thinks how delightful it must be. The faintest symptom is taken for an attack, just as in perusing a medical book people commonly fancy they have symptoms of the disease they chance to be reading about. Thus it happens that young girls so easily “fall in love,” as they imagine, and are ready to elope with the first music teacher or circus rider that comes along—

“A blockhead with melodious voice In boarding-school may have his choice, And oft the dancing-master’s art Climbs from the toe to touch the heart.”—SWIFT.

It is quite probable that Coleridge was right when he wrote—

“For maids as well as youths have perished From fruitless love too fondly cherished;”

although this does not seem to agree with the opinion of Shakspere and Thackeray regarding the rarity of broken lovers’ hearts. Morselli’s work on Suicide does not contain any definite statistics _à propos_; but I have seen the statement in a newspaper that in Italy, during 1883, thirty-six men and nine women committed suicide—four to one; and the proportion will appear larger still if it is remembered that girls often commit suicide from an anguish deeper than a refusal.

The myth that woman’s passion is deeper than man’s is commonly expressed in the form given to it by Byron: that in man’s life love is only an episode, whereas to a woman it is all in all. Allowing for poetic exaggeration, it does not at all follow that because a man does not brood all his life over Love, he therefore loves less. The fact that Goethe, the poet, also wrote treatises on botany and physics, and made landscape sketches, did not decrease the depth of his poetic feeling but added to it. For it is a fundamental law of psychology—except in pathologic cases—that continuous brooding over an emotion weakens and exhausts it; but after intervals of rest it emerges more fresh than ever. The various objects and ambitions that occupy man only serve to strengthen his feelings, his capacity for Love. That women are more easily swamped and carried away by emotions does not prove their feelings to be deeper, but themselves to be weaker. One lake may be entirely full, and yet not contain half as much water as a larger lake which is only half-full.

It was evidently with a vague desire to justify or excuse woman’s comparative weakness in Love that Ninon de L’Enclos wrote “Women and flowers are made to be loved for their beauty and sweetness, rather than themselves to love.” And that intelligent observer Mrs. Childs adds the weight of her feminine testimony by confessing her belief “That men more frequently marry for love than women.”

To remove all lingering doubt, consider the “overtones” of Love separately. Is woman ordinarily as absurdly or ferociously Jealous as man, or quite so Proud of her conquest? Is she so deeply absorbed in Admiration of his Personal Beauty? Is she as Gallant, and as ready for Sacrifices? or does she not rather take his devoted services for granted, and consider them rewarded by a smile or some other trifle? Indeed, the only element of Love which in woman is stronger than in man is Coyness; and Coyness, as has been shown, weakens woman’s Love in the same degree as it increases man’s.

Of course it would be unjust to attribute to the effects of Coyness all the difference between man’s and woman’s Love. Much is due to the physiologic law that emotional capacity—amorous included—depends on brain capacity (_not_ on the “heart”); and man’s brain is more powerful than woman’s. But crude mediæval Coyness must bear a large share of the blame; and it is probable that now, having played its _rôle_ of bringing men to terms and making them gallant and polite towards women, it will disappear gradually.

“Der Mohr hat seine Schuldigkeit gethan, Der Mohr kann gehen.”

Already, however, there is, especially in America and England, a superior class of women who, despising Coyness as crude, artificial, and silly, have adopted in its place a much more refined method of making men fall in love with them. In one word, they have substituted Flirtation for Coyness. As this statement will to many appear paradoxical, if not absurd, it is necessary first to distinguish between Flirtation and Coquetry before trying to justify it.

_Flirtation and Coquetry._—These two words are so constantly confused by careless or ignorant writers that some girls are almost as much offended if accused of Flirtation as of Coquetry. It was bad enough for Winthrop to say that “A woman without coquetry is as insipid as a rose without scent, champagne without sparkle, or corned beef without mustard” (!), but there is no excuse whatever for “Ik Marvel’s” saying that “Coquetry whets the appetite; flirtation depraves it. Coquetry is the thorn that guards the rose (!), easily trimmed off when once plucked. Flirtation is like the slime on water-plants, making them hard to handle, and when caught only to be cherished in slimy waters.” No excuse, I say, because the dictionaries on our table tell us the very reverse. Flirtation, in Webster, is simply “playing at courtship,” without any cruel intentions; while Coquetry is an attempt “to attract admiration, and gain matrimonial offers, from a desire to gratify vanity, and with the intention to reject the suitor.”