IS "LOVE" SIMPLY THIS?

Mataura Ensign, 6 July 1910, Page 7

IS "LOVE" SIMPLY THIS?

ANTHROPOLOGIST'S VIEW

MERELY A NERVOUS DISORDER,

Professor W. J. McGee, the famous anthropologist, former Chief of the United States Bureau of Ethnology and author of many books, declares' that lovo is merely a nervous disorder. It is not mother love or paternal devotion of which he speaks, but that of physical attraction, which, arising between the sexes, is the most powerful and absorbing of all human emotions. I -'Why is it," asks Professor McGee, "that a young man, becoming enamored of a girl, will suddenly alter his habits of living, change his point of view entirely, and concentrate an ardent affection upon a person who is almost a stranger to him, exhibiting in the meanwhile symptoms which suggest something not altogether unlike mental derangement?

"Why ie it that a young woman, overtaken by a similar frenzy, loses interest in everything else (always barring dress and whatever may accentuate her own physical attractions), and thinks and talks about only one individual—namely, the youth who has inspired hor tender and passionate regard ?

"These are only surface symptoms of the malady that is called 'falling in love,'" says Professor McGee. "To speak of it as a derangement of the faculties is by no means to describe it in terms too strong. Often it gives rise to actual tragedy. In St. Petersburg the other day, at a fashionable entertainment given for the young folks of the highest nobility, a boy of 15, the heir to a great title, shot himself, and a girl one year his junior immediately 'swallowed poison, in the midst of the brilliant company. The two were in love with each other, and youth was a temporary bar to their marriage. "What is it that engenders this strange passion? How docs it develop, and what facts do an analysis of its symptoms disclose? Truth of the Matter. *Tn order to answer these questions it is necessary to consider certain truths of a fundamental kind. "Love is an expression of duality—of human twoness, so to speak. It is absolutely necessary, in order to carry out the princilpes on which creation is founded that there shall be two genders, or sexes, to start with. So it was in the Garden of Eden.

"Now, the early explorers, who in ancient times searched the far corners of the world, were always looking eagerly for curiosities. Usually they came back with stories of giants, pigmies and other human freaks. They were for ever on the lookout for people with tails and one-eyed Cyclops. But most of all they were anxious to'find 'androgyns'—that is to say, men-women, combining the two sexes in one individual. One of tfrem, according to his own account, did actually discover androgyns in Florida as late as three centuries ago, but since that day they would seem to have disappeared. j'For this purpose, however, they might heftier have stayed at home and looked about them. For the true androgyns are everyday boys and girls, v/ho, under a certain age, are substantially neuters, being neither of one sex nor the other.

"Up ,to the age of 11 or 12 the boy and the girl are much alike in cast of countenance—that is to say, in Features and expression. Their eyes are alike, tne cheeks of both are round, and their facial contours are alike in softness.

"But swiftly, when a certain age is reached, there arrives a change. The girl's features become still softer and her eyes gain a new expressiveness. She undergoes a rapid feminisation in her modes of thought, and develops, as one item in the metamorphosis, a new interest in dress.

"On the other hand, the boy, passing through a corresponding phrase of his being, become musculinised. His shoulders widen, his stature is more upright; his features become more regular ; his chin squares; his cheeks grow thinner and his cheek-bones are more prominent.

''The likeness of the young boy to a girl k emphasised by the fact that, at nine or 10 years of age, he cannot throw a ball well. He does not strike out with his fists, but pounds. In a fight he pulls hair. It is true that a woman's inability to throw a ball is due partly to peculiarities of her anatomical structure. Her collar-bone is shorter 'and smaller than that of a man, and there is a difference in the shoulder ' joints. But her fundamental difficulty in this matter lies in her brain. She does not think the correct action for throwing, and she cannot perform it. It is the same way with the young boy up to the time when he begins to develop out the neuter or androgyn stage. 'Falling in Love!' "Under ordinary circumstances, when two young persons are seized by the malady it comes upon them gradually. The girl experiences the strong attraction of the 'potential mate' subconsciously at first; and it is not until some time has elapsed, and after many meetings, that her attention is seriously called to the condition of her emotions. Then, at last, she is obligated to confess to herself that she has 'fallen in love.' The man, on his side, undergoes a similar experience. But love at first sight—such, for instance, as that which Romeo experienced when he met Juliet t —is like a thunderclap from the clear sky. It represents the most acute and dangerous form of the malady.

"Nor, indeed, is this form of aberration restricted to the young. Middleaged and even elderly persons appear to be eqiially subject to it. How, except on grounds of temporary dementia, is one to account for the extraordinary and even idiotic letters which are constantly read in courts of law, to furnish evidence in breach of promise cases? What man is there who has not written, ttt some time in his life, just such fool letters to a woman?

"One hears a great deal nowadays aßont 'affinities.' They are not in the least new, but have acquired a fresh name, men who have Jed entirely respectable lives are sometimes carried away by a passion for women other than those who are properly entitled to their

affections. The same thing happens every now and then to persons of the gentler sex. "Affections? Love has little to do with the affections, in the ordinary sense of the term. It is a passion, pure and simple. It may be, and often is, replaced later on, between man and wife, with the dearest regard. "It frequently happens that a man, well-born, well-bred, will fall violently in love with a woman who is not of his own station of life. She may be unrefined, and devoid of any physical attractions that are perceptible to anybody else. But. being blinded by the mischievous god, he does not see her as she is. From his point of view she is enveloped in a radiance all her own. Her very defects are to him marks of beauty. To attempt to open his eyes on the subject is perilous. Unfortunately, by the time he gets over his infatuation, ho is usually married to the 6'ifject thereof. i

"What is it that precipitates 'falling in love? 1 The question connot be exae£ ly answered'. But it may be said that, where two persons of opposite sex j-.re thrown together, it is always possible, under suitable conditions, that there may occur in one or both that disturbance of nervous equilibrium which bogins the trouble.

"Love is a greit disorder of the m rid. Nobody is proof against an attack of it! 1 he hopeless i la maid is inspired v.iLli a passion for her clergyman, .-aid exhibits the silliest frivolities with a view 1o attracting him. The steady-goiug business man yields to an overwhelming fescination exercised by a young woman on the stage, who under ordinary circumstances, he would not introduce t<, his sister—neglecting his work for her, lavishing his money upon her, and very likely marrying her. Friends declare that he is crazy. So he is, for the time being."

"And the cure? Only one remedy, thoroughly effective, has ever been discovered for the malady. It is matrimony. That will cure the worst case of it."