The Intermediate Sex

“The licentious or garrulous or morbid types of inverts have been so honoured with publicity that the other types are even yet little known. The latter, in the maturity of their intellectual and moral nature, cease to look upon sex as the pivot of the universe. They cease to repine about their lot. They have their mission to fulfil here below, and they try to fulfil it as best they can. In the same way we find there are heterosexual (or normal) folk who at a certain stage of their growth free themselves from the sexual life.—M. A. Raffalovich, “Uranisme et Unisexualité,” p. 74.

“The well-bred, highly-cultured Urning is a complete Idealist; matter is for him only a symbol of thought, and the actual only the living expression of the Invisible.”—De Joux, “Die Enterbten des Liebesglückes,” p. 46.

“As nature and social law are so cruel as to impose a severe celibacy on him his whole being is consequently of astonishing freshness and superb purity, and his manners of life modest as those of a saint—a thing which, in the case of a man in blooming health and moving about in the world, is certainly very unusual.”—Ibid, p. 41.

“If the soul of woman in its usual form represents a secret closed with seven seals, it is—when prisoned in the sturdy body of a man and fused with some of the motives of manhood, a far more enigmatic scripture of whose sibylline meaning one can never be really sure. Only the Urning can understand the Urning.”—Ibid, p. 63.

“Because they (Urnings) themselves are of a very complex nature and put together of opposing elements, they seek out and love the simple, plain, and straightforward natures. Because they continually suffer from the rebellion of their desires against good taste and morals, they often long for a barbaric freedom. And because their every emotion is cut short, distracted, and worn out by the thousand doubts and suspicions of their Urning-minds, they gather to themselves men who are wont to live straight from feeling to action, and who work from untamed masterly instincts, as sure as the animals.”—Ibid, p. 97.

“It is true that we are often inferior to normal men in force of will, worldly wisdom, and sense of duty; but on the other hand, in depth and delicacy of feeling and every virtue of the heart, we are far superior. We cannot love women, but we lament with them, and help them on the hearth and by the cradle, in need and loneliness, as their most unselfish friends.… We do not despise women because they are weak, for we are much clearer-sighted, much less prejudiced than the so-called lords of creation, much nobler, more helpful, and just-minded than they.… Anyhow, if either of the sexes has cause to withhold its respect in any degree from the other—which has the most cause? Say what you will of them, the second and third sexes—women and Urnings—are ever so much better than the brutal egotistical Men, who to-day are plunged in grossest materialism; for, with whatever corruption, both the former are still of purer heart, easier kindled towards whatever is good, and more capable of genuine enthusiasm and love of their fellows, than the latter.”—Ibid, p. 204.

“Embodying as he does Love, Patience, Renunciation, Humility and Mildness, the Urning should seek to soothe with his gentle hand all hurts, and to heal all wounds, which are the results of weak Man’s original sinfulness. The tender emotions in his breast, his all too soft and easily troubled heart, his delicate sensitiveness and receptiveness of all that is lofty and pure, his mildness, goodness and inexhaustible patience—all these divine gifts of his soul point clearly to the conclusion that the great framer of the world meant to create in Urnings a noble priesthood, a race of Samaritans, a severely pure order of men, in order to offer a strong counterpoise to the immoral tendencies of the human race, which increase with its increasing culture.”—Ibid, p. 253.

“When I review the cases I have brought forward and the mental history of the inverted I have known, I am inclined to say that if we can enable an invert to be healthy, self-restrained and self-respecting, we have often done better than to convert him to the mere feeble simulacrum of a normal man. An appeal to the paiderastia of the best Greek days, and the dignity, temperance, even chastity, which it involved, will sometimes find a ready response in the emotional enthusiastic nature of the congenital invert. The ‘manly’ love celebrated by Walt Whitman in ‘Leaves of Grass,’ although it may be of more doubtful value for general use, furnishes a wholesome and robust ideal to the invert who is insensitive to normal ideals. It is by some such method of self-treatment as this that most of the more highly intelligent men and women whose histories I have already briefly recorded have at last slowly and instinctively reached a condition of relative health and peace, physical and moral.”—Havelock Ellis, “Sexual Inversion,” p. 202.

“From America a lady writes:—‘Inverts should have the courage and independence to be themselves, and to demand an investigation. If one strives to live honourably, and considers the greatest good to the greatest number, it is not a crime nor a disgrace to be an invert. I do not need the law to defend me, neither do I desire to have any concessions made for me, nor do I ask my friends to sacrifice their ideals for me. I too have ideals which I shall always hold. All that I desire—and I claim it as my right—is the freedom to exercise this divine gift of loving, which is not a menace to society nor a disgrace to me. Let it once be understood that the average invert is not a moral degenerate nor a mental degenerate, but simply a man or a woman who is less highly specialised, less completely differentiated, than other men and women, and I believe the prejudice against them will disappear, and if they live uprightly they will surely win the esteem and consideration of all thoughtful people. I know what it is to be an invert—who feels himself set apart from the rest of mankind—to find one human heart who trusts him and understands him, and I know how almost impossible this is, and will be, until the world is made aware of these facts.”—Ibid, p. 213.

THE END

notes

1

For the derivation of these terms see ch. ii., p. 20 (#x2_x_2_i58), infra.

2

See Appendix, pp. 139 and 140 (#x5_x_5_i17).

3

From Uranos, heaven; his idea being that the Uranian love was of a higher order than the ordinary attachment. For further about Ulrichs and his theories see Appendix, pp. 157-159 (#x5_x_5_i60).

4

Charles G. Leland (“Hans Breitmann”) in his book “The Alternate Sex” (Wellby, 1904), insists much on the frequent combination of the characteristics of both sexes in remarkable men and women, and has a chapter on “The Female Mind in Man,” and another on “The Male Intellect in Woman.”

5

Some late statistical inquiries (see “Statistische Untersuchungen,” von Dr. M. Hirschfeld, Leipzig, 1904) yield 1.5 to 2.0 per cent. as a probable ratio. See also Appendix, pp. 134-136 (#x5_x_5_i1).

6

For instances, see Appendix, pp. 149-153 (#x5_x_5_i39).

7

See De Joux, “Die Enterbten des Liebesglückes” (Leipzig, 1893), p. 21.

8

“Psychopathia Sexualis,” 7th ed., p. 276.

9

See Appendix, pp. 153-156 (#x5_x_5_i49).

10

A good deal in this description may remind readers of history of the habits and character of Henry III. of France.

11

Perhaps, like Queen Christine of Sweden, who rode across Europe, on her visit to Italy, in jack-boots and sitting astride of her horse. It is said that she shook the Pope’s hand, on seeing him, so heartily that the doctor had to attend to it afterwards!

12

“Homosexual,” generally used in scientific works, is of course a bastard word. “Homogenic” has been suggested, as being from two roots, both Greek, i.e., “homos,” same, and “genos,” sex.

13

“Athenæus” xiii., ch. 78.

14

See Plutarch’s “Eroticus,” §xvii.

15

See “Natural History of Man,” by J. G. Wood. Vol: “Africa,” p. 419.

16

See also Livingstone’s “Expedition to the Zambesi” (Murray, 1865) p. 148.

17

Though these two plays, except for some quotations, are lost.

18

Mantegazza and Lombroso. See Albert Moll, “Conträre Sexualempfindung,” 2nd ed., p. 36.

19

Though in translation this fact is often by pious fraudulence disguised.

20