of the presence of a young woman, sitting alone on a seat at a little
distance, whom I could observe unnoticed. She was leaning back with legs
crossed, swinging the crossed foot vigorously and continuously; this
continued without interruption for some ten minutes after I first observed
her; then the swinging movement reached a climax; she leant still further
back, thus bringing the sexual region still more closely in contact with
the edge of the bench and straightened and stiffened her body and legs in
what appeared to be a momentary spasm; there could be little doubt as to
what had taken place. A few moments later she slowly walked from her
solitary seat into the waiting-room and sat down among the other waiting
passengers, quite still now and with uncrossed legs, a pale quiet young
woman, possibly a farmer's daughter, serenely unconscious that her
manoeuvre had been detected, and very possibly herself ignorant of its
true nature.
There are many other forms in which the impulse of auto-erotism presents
itself. Dancing is often a powerful method of sexual excitement, not only
among civilized but among savage peoples, and Zache describes the erotic
dances of Swaheli women as having a masturbatory object.[217] Stimulation
of the nates is a potent adjuvant to the production of self-excitement,
and self-flagellation with rods, etc., is practiced by some individuals,
especially young women.[218] Urtication is another form of this
stimulation; Reverdin knew a young woman who obtained sexual gratification
by flogging herself with chestnut burrs, and it is stated that in some
parts of France (departments of the Ain and Côte d'Or) it is not uncommon
for young girls to masturbate by rubbing the leaves of the _Linaria
cymbalaria_ (here called "pinton" or "timbarde") on to the sexual parts,
thus producing a burning sensation.[219] Stimulation of the mamma,
normally an erogenous centre in women, may occasionally serve as a method
for obtaining auto-erotic satisfaction, including the orgasm, in both
sexes. I have been told of a case in a man, and a medical correspondent in
India informs me that he knows a Eurasian woman, addicted to masturbation,
who can only obtain the orgasm by rubbing the genitals with one hand while
with the other she rubs and finally squeezes her breasts. The tactile
stimulation even of regions of the body which are not normally erogenous
zones in either sex may sometimes lead on to sexual excitement;
Hirschsprung, as well as Freud, believes that this is often the case as
regards finger-sucking and toe-sucking in infancy. Even stroking the chin,
remarks Debreyne, may produce a pollution.[220] Taylor refers to the case
of a young woman of 22, who was liable to attacks of choreic movements of
the hands which would terminate in alternately pressing the middle finger
on the tip of the nose and the tragus of the ear, when a
"far-away,
pleased expression" would appear on her face; she thus produced sexual
excitement and satisfaction. She had no idea of wrong-doing and was
surprised and ashamed when she realized the nature of her act.[221]
Most of the foregoing examples of auto-erotism, are commonly included, by
no means correctly, under the heading of "masturbation."
There are,
however, a vast number of people, possessing strong sexual emotions and
living a solitary life, who experience, sometimes by instinct and
sometimes on moral grounds, a strong repugnance for these manifestations
of auto-erotism. As one highly intelligent lady writes:
"I have sometimes
wondered whether I could produce it (complete sexual excitement)
mechanically, but I have a curious unreasonable repugnance to trying the
experiment. It would materialize it too much." The same repugnance may be
traced in the tendency to avoid, so far as possible, the use of the hands.
It is quite common to find this instinctive unreasoning repugnance among
women, a healthy repugnance, not founded on any moral ground. In men the
same repugnance exists, more often combined with, or replaced by, a very
strong moral and æsthetic objection to such practices.
But the presence of
such a repugnance, however invincible, is very far from carrying us
outside the auto-erotic field. The production of the sexual orgasm is not
necessarily dependent on any external contact or voluntary mechanical
cause.
As an example, though not of specifically auto-erotic manifestations, I
may mention the case of a man of 57, a somewhat eccentric preacher, etc.,
who writes: "My whole nature goes out so to some persons, and they thrill
and stir me so that I have an emission while sitting by them with no
thought of sex, only the gladness of soul found its way out thus, and a
glow of health suffused the whole body. There was no spasmodic conclusion,
but a pleasing gentle sensation as the few drops of semen passed." (In
reality, no doubt, not semen, but urethral fluid.) This man's condition
may certainly be considered somewhat morbid; he is attracted to both men
and women, and the sexual impulse seems to be irritable and weak; but a
similar state of things exists so often in women, no doubt due to sexual
repression, and in individuals who are in a general state of normal and
good health, that in these it can scarcely be called morbid. Brooding on
sexual images, which the theologians termed _delectatio morosa_, may lead
to spontaneous orgasm in either sex, even in perfectly normal persons.
Hammond described as a not uncommon form of "psychic coitus," a condition
in which the simple act of imagination alone, in the presence of the
desired object, suffices to produce orgasm. In some public conveyance,
theatre, or elsewhere, the man sees a desirable woman and by concentrating
his attention on her person and imagining all the stages of intimacy he
quickly succeeds in producing orgasm.[222] Niceforo refers to an Italian
work-girl of 14 who could obtain ejaculation of mucus four times a day, in
the workroom in the presence of the other girls, without touching herself
or moving her body, by simply thinking of sexual things.[223]
If the orgasm occurs spontaneously, without the aid of mental impressions,
or any manipulations _ad hoc_, though under such conditions it ceases to
be sinful from the theological standpoint, it certainly ceases also to be
normal. Sérieux records the case of a somewhat neurotic woman of 50, who
had been separated from her husband for ten years, and since lived a
chaste life; at this age, however, she became subject to violent crises of
sexual orgasm, which would come on without any accompaniment of voluptuous
thoughts. MacGillicuddy records three cases of spontaneous orgasm in women
coming under his notice.[224] Such crises are frequently found in both men
and women, who, from moral reasons, ignorance, or on other grounds are
restrained from attaining the complete sexual orgasm, but whose sexual
emotions are, literally, continually dribbling from them. Schrenck-Notzing
knows a lady who is spontaneously sexually excited on hearing music or
seeing pictures without anything lascivious in them; she knows nothing of
sexual relationships. Another lady is sexually excited on seeing beautiful
and natural scenes, like the sea; sexual ideas are mixed up in her mind
with these things, and the contemplation of a specially strong and
sympathetic man brings the orgasm on in about a minute.
Both these ladies
"masturbate" in the streets, restaurants, railways, theatres, without
anyone perceiving it.[225] A Brahmin woman informed a medical
correspondent in India that she had distinct though feeble orgasm, with
copious outflow of mucus, if she stayed long near a man whose face she
liked, and this is not uncommon among European women.
Evidently under such
conditions there is a state of hyperæsthetic weakness.
Here, however, we
are passing the frontiers of strictly auto-erotic phenomena.
_Delectatio morosa_, as understood by the theologians, is
distinct from desire, and also distinct from the definite
intention of effecting the sexual act, although it may lead to
those things. It is the voluntary and complacent dallying in
imagination with voluptuous thoughts, when no effort is made to
repel them. It is, as Aquinas and others point out, constituted
by this act of complacent dallying, and has no reference to the
duration of the imaginative process. Debreyne, in his
_Moechialogie_ (pp. 149-163), deals fully with this question, and
quotes the opinions of theologians. I may add that in the early
Penitentials, before the elaboration of Catholic theology, the
voluntary emission of semen through the influence of evil
thoughts, was recognized as a sin, though usually only if it
occurred in church. In Egbert's Penitential of the eighth or
ninth century (cap. IX, 12), the penance assigned for this
offence in the case of a deacon, is 25 days; in the case of a
monk, 30 days; a priest, 40 days; a bishop, 50.
(Haddon and
Stubbs, _Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents_, vol. iii, p.
426.)
The frequency of spontaneous orgasm in women seems to have been
recognized in the seventeenth century. Thus, Schurig (_Syllepsilogia_, p. 4), apparently quoting Riolan, states that
some women are so wanton that the sight of a handsome man, or of
their lover, or speech with such a one, will cause them to
ejaculate their semen.
There is, however, a closely allied, and, indeed, overlapping form of
auto-erotism which may be considered here: I mean that associated with
revery, or day-dreaming. Although this is a very common and important
form of auto-erotism, besides being in a large proportion of cases the
early stage of masturbation, it appears to have attracted little
attention.[226] The day-dream has, indeed, been studied in its chief form,
in the "continued story," by Mabel Learoyd, of Wellesley College. The
continued story is an imagined narrative, more or less peculiar to the
individual, by whom it is cherished with fondness, and regarded as an
especially sacred mental possession, to be shared only, if at all, with
very sympathizing friends. It is commoner among girls and young women than
among boys and young men; among 352 persons of both sexes, 47 per cent.
among the women and only 14 per cent. among the men, have any continued
story. The starting-point is an incident from a book, or, more usually,
some actual experience, which the subject develops; the subject is nearly
always the hero or the heroine of the story. The growth of the story is
favored by solitude, and lying in bed before going to sleep is the time
specially sacred to its cultivation.[227] No distinct reference, perhaps
naturally enough, is made by Miss Learoyd to the element of sexual emotion
with which these stories are often strongly tinged, and which is
frequently their real motive. Though by no means easy to detect, these
elaborate and more or less erotic day-dreams are not uncommon in young
men and especially in young women. Each individual has his own particular
dream, which is always varying or developing, but, except in very
imaginative persons, to no great extent. Such a day-dream is often founded
on a basis of pleasurable personal experience, and develops on that basis.
It may involve an element of perversity, even though that element finds no
expression in real life. It is, of course, fostered by sexual abstinence;
hence its frequency in young women. Most usually there is little attempt
to realize it. It does not necessarily lead to masturbation, though it
often causes some sexual congestion or even spontaneous sexual orgasm. The
day-dream is a strictly private and intimate experience, not only from its
very nature, but also because it occurs in images which the subject finds
great difficulty in translating into language, even when willing to do so.
In other cases it is elaborately dramatic or romantic in character, the
hero or heroine passing through many experiences before attaining the
erotic climax of the story. This climax tends to develop in harmony with
the subject's growing knowledge or experience; at first, merely a kiss, it
may develop into any refinement of voluptuous gratification. The day-dream
may occur either in normal or abnormal persons.
Rousseau, in his
_Confessions_, describes such dreams, in his case combined with masochism
and masturbation. A distinguished American novelist, Hamlin Garland, has
admirably described in _Rose of Dutcher's Coolly_ the part played in the
erotic day-dreams of a healthy normal girl at adolescence by a
circus-rider, seen on the first visit to a circus, and becoming a majestic
ideal to dominate the girl's thoughts for many years.[228]
Raffalovich[229] describes the process by which in sexual inverts the
vision of a person of the same sex, perhaps seen in the streets or the
theatre, is evoked in solitary reveries, producing a kind of "psychic
onanism," whether or not it leads on to physical manifestations.
Although day-dreaming of this kind has at present been very little
studied, since it loves solitude and secrecy, and has never been counted
of sufficient interest for scientific inquisition, it is really a process
of considerable importance, and occupies a large part of the auto-erotic
field. It is frequently cultivated by refined and imaginative young men
and women who lead a chaste life and would often be repelled by
masturbation. In such persons, under such circumstances, it must be
considered as strictly normal, the inevitable outcome of the play of the
sexual impulse. No doubt it may often become morbid, and is never a
healthy process when indulged in to excess, as it is liable to be by
refined young people with artistic impulses, to whom it is in the highest
degree seductive and insidious.[230] As we have seen, however,
day-dreaming is far from always colored by sexual emotion; yet it is a
significant indication of its really sexual origin that, as I have been
informed by persons of both sexes, even in these apparently non-sexual
cases it frequently ceases altogether on marriage.
Even when we have eliminated all these forms of auto-erotic activity,
however refined, in which the subject takes a voluntary part, we have
still left unexplored an important portion of the auto-erotic field, a
portion which many people are alone inclined to consider normal: sexual
orgasm during sleep. That under conditions of sexual abstinence in healthy
individuals there must inevitably be some auto-erotic manifestations
during waking life, a careful study of the facts compels us to believe.
There can be no doubt, also, that, under the same conditions, the
occurrence of the complete orgasm during sleep with, in men, seminal
emissions, is altogether normal. Even Zeus himself, as Pausanias has
recorded, was liable to such accidents: a statement which, at all events,
shows that to the Greek mind there was nothing derogatory in such an
occurrence.[231] The Jews, however, regarded it as an impurity,[232] and
the same idea was transmitted to the Christian church and embodied in the
word _pollutio_, by which the phenomenon was designated in ecclesiastical
phraseology.[233] According to Billuart and other theologians, pollution
in sleep is not sin, unless voluntarily caused; if, however, it begins in
sleep, and is completed in the half-waking state, with a sense of
pleasure, it is a venial sin. But it seems allowable to permit a nocturnal
pollution to complete itself on awaking, if it occurs without intention;
and St. Thomas even says "_Si pollutio placeat ut naturæ exoneratio vel
alleviatio peccatum non creditur_."
Notwithstanding the fair and logical position of the more
distinguished Latin theologians, there has certainly been a
widely prevalent belief in Catholic countries that pollution
during sleep is a sin. In the "Parson's Tale,"
Chaucer makes the
parson say: "Another sin appertaineth to lechery that cometh in
sleeping; and the sin cometh oft to them that be maidens, and eke
to them that be corrupt; and this sin men clepe pollution, that
cometh in four manners;" these four manners being (1) languishing
of body from rank and abundant humors, (2) infirmity, (3) surfeit
of meat and drink, and (4) villainous thoughts. Four hundred
years later, Madame Roland, in her _Mémoires Particulières_,
presented a vivid picture of the anguish produced in an innocent
girl's mind by the notion of the sinfulness of erotic dreams. She
menstruated first at the age of 14. "Before this,"
she writes, "I
had sometimes been awakened from the deepest sleep in a
surprising manner. Imagination played no part; I exercised it on
too many serious subjects, and my timorous conscience preserved
it from amusement with other subjects, so that it could not
represent what I would not allow it to seek to understand. But an
extraordinary effervescence aroused my senses in the heat of
repose, and, by virtue of my excellent constitution, operated by
itself a purification which was as strange to me as its cause.
The first feeling which resulted was, I know not why, a sort of
fear. I had observed in my _Philotée_, that we are not allowed to
obtain any pleasure from our bodies except in lawful marriage.
What I had experienced could be called a pleasure. I was then
guilty, and in a class of offences which caused me the most shame
and sorrow, since it was that which was most displeasing to the
Spotless Lamb. There was great agitation in my poor heart,
prayers and mortifications. How could I avoid it?
For, indeed, I
had not foreseen it, but at the instant when I experienced it, I
had not taken the trouble to prevent it. My watchfulness became
extreme. I scrupulously avoided positions which I found specially
exposed me to the accident. My restlessness became so great that,
at last I was able to awake before the catastrophe.
When I was
not in time to prevent it, I would jump out of bed, with naked
feet on to the polished floor, and with crossed arms pray to the
Saviour to preserve me from the wiles of the devil.
I would then
impose some penance on myself, and I have carried out to the
letter what the prophet King probably only transmitted to us as a
figure of Oriental speech, mixing ashes with my bread and
watering it with my tears."
To the early Protestant mind, as illustrated by Luther, there was
something diseased, though not impure, in sexual excitement during sleep;
thus, in his _Table Talk_ Luther remarks that girls who have such dreams
should be married at once, "taking the medicine which God has given." It
is only of comparatively recent years that medical science has obtained
currency for the belief that this auto-erotic process is entirely normal.
Blumenbach stated that nocturnal emissions are normal.[234] Sir James
Paget declared that he had never known celibate men who had not such
emissions from once or twice a week to twice every three months, both
extremes being within the limits of good health, while Sir Lauder Brunton
considers once a fortnight or once a month about the usual frequency, at
these periods the emissions often following two nights in succession.
Rohleder believes that they may normally follow for several nights in
succession. Hammond considers that they occur about once a fortnight.[235]
Ribbing regards ten to fourteen days as the normal interval.[236]
Löwenfeld puts the normal frequency at about once a week;[237] this seems
to be nearer the truth as regards most fairly healthy young men. In proof
of this it is only necessary to refer to the exact records of healthy
young adults summarized in the study of periodicity in the present volume.
It occasionally happens, however, that nocturnal emissions are entirely
absent. I am acquainted with some cases. In other fairly healthy young men
they seldom occur except at times of intellectual activity or of anxiety
and worry.
Lately there has been some tendency for medical opinion to revert
to the view of Luther, and to regard sexual excitement during
sleep as a somewhat unhealthy phenomenon. Moll is a distinguished
advocate of this view. Sexual excitement during sleep is the
normal result of celibacy, but it is another thing to say that it
is, on that account, satisfactory. We might, then, Moll remarks,
maintain that nocturnal incontinence of urine is satisfactory,
since the bladder is thus emptied. Yet, we take every precaution
against this by insisting that the bladder shall be emptied
before going to sleep. (_Libido Sexualis_, Bd. I, p.
552.) This
remark is supported by the fact, to which I find that both men
and women can bear witness, that sexual excitement during sleep
is more fatiguing than in the waking state, though this is not an
invariable rule, and it is sometimes found to be refreshing. In
a similar way, Eulenburg (_Sexuale Neuropathie_, p.
55) states
that nocturnal emissions are no more normal than coughing or
vomiting.
Nocturnal emissions are usually, though not invariably, accompanied by
dreams of a voluptuous character in which the dreamer becomes conscious in
a more or less fantastic manner of the more or less intimate presence or
contact of a person of the opposite sex. It would seem, as a general rule,
that the more vivid and voluptuous the dream, the greater is the physical
excitement and the greater also the relief experienced on awakening.
Sometimes the erotic dream occurs without any emission, and not
infrequently the emission takes place after the dreamer has awakened.
The widest and most comprehensive investigation of erotic dreams
is that carried out by Gualino, in northern Italy, and based on
inquiries among 100 normal men--doctors, teachers, lawyers,
etc.--who had all had experience of the phenomenon.
(L. Gualino,
"Il Sogno Erotico nell' Uomo Normale," _Rivista di Psicologia_,
Jan.-Feb., 1907.) Gualino shows that erotic dreams, with
emissions (whether or not seminal), began somewhat earlier than
the period of physical development as ascertained by Marro for
youths of the same part of northern Italy. Gualino found that all
his cases had had erotic dreams at the age of seventeen; Marro
found 8 per cent, of youths still sexually undeveloped at that
age, and while sexual development began at thirteen years, erotic
dreams began at twelve. Their appearance was preceded, in most
cases for some months, by erections. In 37 per cent, of the cases
there had been no actual sexual experiences (either masturbation
or intercourse); in 23 per cent, there had been masturbation; in
the rest, some form of sexual contact. The dreams are mainly
visual, tactual elements coming second, and the _dramatis
persona_ is either an unknown woman (27 per cent, cases), or only
known by sight (56 per cent.), and in the majority is, at all
events in the beginning, an ugly or fantastic figure, becoming
more attractive later in life, but never identical with the woman
loved during waking life. This, as Gualino points out, accords
with the general tendency for the emotions of the day to be
latent in sleep. Masturbation only formed the subject of the
dream in four cases. The emotional state in the pubertal stage,
apart from pleasure, was anxiety (37 per cent.), desire (17 per
cent.), fear (14 per cent.). In the adult stage, anxiety and fear
receded to 7 per cent, and 6 per cent., respectively.
Thirty-three of the subjects, as a result of sexual or general