§ 2. Sexual Love, Appetite, and Copulation

2. Sexual love can be employed in a fuller or a narrower signification. In the narrower signification, it is the same as sexual desire or venereal appetite; this usage is the more frequent one. Yet it pertains to human dignity that we here recall and affirm its adequate notion, by which it is distinguished from venereal appetite and, at least in part, transcends the senses.

Taken in its full force, therefore, sexual love designates the innate inclination which follows upon the division of the human race into the two sexes, and it embraces all the tendencies by which the one sex inclines toward the other. Among these tendencies, however, there are also found affections which are superior to the sensible order.

These propensities are confirmed and perfected by acts and habits. Yet because, being founded in man's organic and psychological constitution, they are present in us from birth and are not first acquired by acts, they can be ascribed to instinct, the term being employed in a metaphorical sense.

For by metaphorical usage, inclinations which proceed from no deliberation and are common to our species are called instinctive.

3. Properly speaking, instinct designates that mysterious principle of actions, often wonderful, which animals of the same species perform in a constant and uniform manner without previous experience or training. These acts, as St. Thomas says ¹, "are ordered to an end by natural inclination rather than by apprehension." With its utility in view, instinct is defined by R. P. Monaco ² as "a certain inclination implanted in souls by the very Author of nature, by which animals are more readily able to guard against evil and harmful things and to pursue those things which are good and useful."

¹ De anima, book 3, lecture 5.

² Praelectiones metaphysicae speciales, part II, no. 224.

What instinct truly is, however, is much disputed, and no adequate explanation has yet been found, as His Eminence Cardinal Mercier testifies ³. Already, commonly and deservedly, the biologists themselves reject a merely mechanical explanation, according to which Spencer offered this simple description of instinct: it is a complex reflex action ⁴.

³ La Psychologie, p. 251.

⁴ Principles of Psychology, I, § 194.

The Scholastic philosophers place instinct in the cognitive faculty, or in the sensible judging power which they call the estimative power. Moreover, Cardinal Mercier says that these sensible judgments are, as it were, synthetic a priori; and that they cohere with a natural faculty of associating certain images, different ones for different animal species ⁵.

⁵ Op. cit., p. 254.

St. Thomas himself admits that instinct exists in infants, for example, for sucking milk ⁶; whether it is also present in the adult human being is disputed ⁷.

⁶ In I Sent., 2, d. 20, q. 2, art. 2, ad 5.

⁷ Urraburu, Institutiones philosophicae, Psychologia, book 1, disputation 4, chapter 2, article 6, p. 887. On instinct, compare the works cited of His Eminence Mercier and Urraburu. Physiologists dispute whether it is expedient to retain the name itself. Compare Havelock Ellis in Moll, Handbuch der sexualen Wissenschaften, p. 173. He names as a defender of the term H. Piéron, Les problèmes actuels de l'instinct (Revue philosophique, October 1908); but as an opponent, G. Bohn, La naissance de l'intelligence (Paris, 1909), and, earlier, Causes actuelles et causes passées, in Revue scientifique, 1 February 1901, p. 354.

4. However this matter may stand, sexual love or appetite thus taken fully is not referred by us, as it is by not a few, to sexual congress alone, nor is it said to possess an order to that alone.

For provident God bestowed upon each sex various qualities proper to it which would produce mutual sympathy. Hence man and woman seek one another not only for propagating human life, but also for leading it better and more pleasantly, indeed for preparing for the future life by present perfection.

We therefore posit a threefold intrinsic end of the union of man and woman: individual, generic, and formally social.

The individual end consists in the mutual completion of man and woman by their combined gifts.

The generic end is in the propagation of the human race.

The formally social end appears in the domestic society which husband and wife establish by their union, especially for educating offspring, while at the same time giving an example to other social friendships and preparing the way for them. For conjugal society gives origin to a manifold community and covenant among human beings.

Accordingly, in Sacred Scripture itself, Eve is said to have been created for this general reason, that Adam might find a helper like himself ⁸; St. Thomas approves this statement made by the Philosopher: "Male and female are joined among human beings not only because of the necessity of generation, as in other animals, but also for domestic life, in which there are certain works of the man and of the woman, and in which the man is the head of the woman" ⁹; and in Roman law itself marriage is defined as "the union of a man and a woman, comprising an undivided manner of life" ¹⁰. Concerning this definition, commentators observe that the end of generation is not alleged even in express words.

⁸ Genesis 2:18.

⁹ Summa theol., I, q. 92, art. 2, ad 3.

¹⁰ Institutiones, I, 9, De patria potestate, § 1.

What of the fact that physiologists themselves, besides individual instincts, which procure the good of individuals, recognize both generic instincts, by which provision is made for the good of the human species, and social instincts, which induce the formation of communities? Nor do they themselves deny the mutual kinship by which some instincts assist and almost penetrate others ¹¹.

¹¹ Compare Féré, L'instinct sexuel, p. 5. Concerning sexual appetite itself he has the following: "The first effect of the sexual instinct is the act of conjunction; little by little it becomes more complex: (1) with instincts relating to sexual pursuit and attraction; then (2) with instincts relating to permanent union and the protection of the young."

5. Those who deny a spiritual soul to man labor to explain the love of benevolence which they are compelled to observe mingled with sexual appetite. Having recourse to the tenets of transformism, they think that this love was gradually brought forth from the sexual appetite of those animals from which we ourselves would derive our origin: that this more universal affection was generated from certain instincts which accompany that appetite in animals, by which, for example, the mother patiently nourishes and tends the offspring, while the father protects and guards it. The specific nobility of the human soul, that is, its spiritual nature, frees us from investigations of this kind.

6. There are also those who think that in almost every spontaneous movement and pursuit of human beings, not only of adults but even of adolescents, indeed even of infants, beginnings or signs of venereal appetite can be detected. Thus, in the games and fights in which adolescents delight, they perceive the beginning and, as it were, the preparation of the generative function.

The celebrated author of "Psycho-analysis" ¹², Professor Freud, assuredly also goes too far, although he excels in ingenuity and sagacity, when he maintains that all so-called "hysteria," and related nervous disturbances, are to be traced back to sexual impulses, even unconscious ones, and attributes to all infants an intense sexual life of which no trace remains in the memory ¹³.

¹² That is, of the method of investigation which explores the things hidden in the subconscious.

¹³ Compare Gemelli, pp. 9-17 of Non moechaberis, where several sources concerning this matter are indicated.

These men also seem to us insufficiently mindful of the proper dignity of human nature, which we wished to acknowledge by a broader notion of sexual love. For unlike beings deprived of reason, man does not exist wholly for the sake of the species; that is, he did not receive life merely in order that as an infant he might grow, as an adult generate, and, once the preservation of the race had been secured, himself perish. Rather, he is a person, existing for a personal end or his own good. Accordingly, even if that were true of other living creatures, which nevertheless we very much doubt, the pursuits and propensities of man cannot find their adequate explanation in the physiological process of generation. Their adequate explanation, I say; for there is no reason for us to be concerned here about a partial one.

Thus far concerning the broader signification of sexual appetite. Before we speak of the narrower one, it seems proper to recall these few things concerning the sexual parts of man.

7. The male organs which serve generation are:

1. The two testes or testicles, in which nemaspermata or zoospermata (spermatozoa) are produced. Zoospermata appear to consist, as it were, of a head and a tail and to move themselves after the manner of animals. They are thought, however, not to be animals but merely cells.

These testes are contained in the infant's scrotum from birth. Before birth, they are hidden in the abdomen. It sometimes happens that one or both have not descended into the scrotum; they then remain very small in the abdomen or inguinal canal, and there is what is called ectopia of the testes.

The fluid proceeding from the testes consists by far for the greatest part, or almost wholly, of these nemaspermata, to which a very small quantity of liquid is added. But that which physicians call sperma, or male semen, contains, besides these nemaspermata, fluids distilled or secreted through other glands, so that a mixed liquid is obtained which can flow and be ejaculated ¹⁴. Hence sperma strictly so called can be defined as the liquid in which nemaspermata swim. When the nemaspermata are absent, what remains is sperma, or male semen, in the broader sense.

¹⁴ Compare Antonelli, Medicina pastoralis, I, p. 187.

Moreover, not only the nemaspermata destined for external ejaculation are produced in these testes; these glands are at the same time sources of an internal distillation or secretion, which is mingled with the blood and to which are attributed the signs of virility (beard, pubic hair, masculine voice) and the power of nourishing sexual appetite.

The external secretion of the testes is then carried through several (10-15) small canals, which are called efferent canals or cones, to the epididymis, where they terminate.

The epididymis is a canal folded back upon itself many times, so that beneath the exterior skin it appears to be, as it were, an inner coat of the testes. Along this path the same external secretion is conducted to each vas deferens, or deferent canal.

2. The two deferent canals, or vasa deferentia, which take their beginning from the testes and run through the abdomen and the prostate into the urethra, with which they unite as ejaculatory canals.

3. The two seminal vesicles, which, being situated between the rectum and the urinary bladder, were formerly thought to be receptacles for the nemaspermata, so that the semen emitted from them was said to flow immediately forth ¹⁵. From this their very name was taken. And it was thought that, by the nemaspermata preserved there, one could explain how, after the testicles had been removed, the faculty of generating could remain for some time. Today, however, they are considered rather as the organ of a certain secretion ¹⁶. This secretion, together with the secretion from the end of the vas deferens, from the prostate, and perhaps from the glands of Littré and Cowper, accompanies the flow from the testes.

¹⁵ They are still so described by Dr. Antonelli, Medicina pastoralis, I, p. 142, no. 190, and by Dr. R. P. Gemelli in the work Non moechaberis.

¹⁶ "The seminal vesicles do not, as was formerly assumed, constitute a reservoir for preserving the semen." Compare Zuntz and Loewy, Lehrbuch der Physiologie des Menschen, 1906 (p. 721).

This does not prevent nemaspermata from often being found in the said vesicles. Whether they are dead or living is uncertain. Many living ones, however, are found in the epididymis, so that they can be extracted from the epididymis for artificial fertilization.

4. The prostate, which is a gland hidden in the abdomen beneath the urinary bladder and the seminal vesicles, through which the ejaculatory ducts and the urethra pass.

5. The two glands of Cowper, which, situated beneath the prostate, also discharge into the urethra.

6. The urethra, or urethral canal, which is the lower part of the male member and emits both semen and urine.

7. The male member (penis, rod, virile organ, male organ), which is constituted of two joined cavernous bodies, beneath which is the urethra. When it is filled with blood, it becomes erect.

The extremity of the member is occupied by the highly excitable glans, which is covered by the prepuce (which adheres to the glans very little). Under the prepuce, at the root or corona of the glans, there is collected from the sebaceous glands and from cells continually shed from the epithelium of the glans what is called preputial smegma, which among many persons must sometimes be removed, lest it become foul-smelling or even impel toward masturbation.

8. The female organs of generation are:

1. The vulva, by which name are understood the exterior parts of the female genitals: the large labia (large lips), which are two folds of exterior skin; the small labia or nymphs, that is, two smaller folds situated between the large labia, where smegma of the same nature as preputial smegma is produced and must frequently be removed; the clitoris, or very small penis without a urethra, which is the instrument of pleasure and becomes pleasurably erect; and the urinary meatus, or opening through which urine is emitted.

2. The vagina, which is the organ of copulation in the female and is destined to receive the male member. It has a cylindrical form and consists of three coverings, by which it is always closed. In virgins its opening is regularly covered by a membrane which is usually fashioned like a half-moon, so that it does not cover the whole opening.

In the vagina are glands named after Bartholin, which, during very intense arousal, emit a fluid almost as men do in seminal emission. When the vagina is suffused with this fluid, it is better suited for copulation, and by it the pleasure of contact is also increased.

Through the vagina are emitted uterine secretions and the menses, and the fetus passes out. And since it is situated between the urinary bladder and the rectum, so that it opens between the urinary meatus and the anus, the saying of Augustine is understood: "I was born between excrement and urine."

3. The uterus or womb, which, rather like a small flask in shape, is as it were inserted into the vagina by its lower part, which is called the neck, while the upper part, or body of the uterus, has a triangular form. In the middle of the neck, the interior part of which is called the tench's snout, is a small opening through which the uterus communicates with the vagina.

4. The Fallopian tubes, or oviducts, which are two canals about 10-12 centimeters long, and which communicate with the uterus through what is called the uterine opening.

5. The ovaries, which are, as it were, female testicles. For they are two glands, at the right and left of the uterus, in which ova are produced.

Although the oviducts do not adhere to the ovaries, at the time when mature ovules fall from the ovaries out of the so-called Graafian vesicles, the oviducts are applied to the ovaries by a part which, like the end of a tube, is not unlike a shell, so that they may receive the ovules and conduct them toward the uterus. This time recurs almost every month.

It happens, however, for various reasons, that a fertilized ovule adheres in the oviduct or in the ovary itself, or, not having been received by the tube, falls into the abdomen and is there developed as though in the uterus. There is then an extrauterine gestation, which, being dangerous to the mother, gives only a slight hope that the fetus will be brought forth alive.

6. The breasts, or udders, which are destined for producing and giving milk.

9. The organs which belong to generation are not at the same time, throughout their whole extent, seats of venereal pleasure. Nor must a seat of this kind be confused with a place from which excitation, even manual excitation, can originate (compare no. 17). In a woman, the parts by which venereal appetite is satisfied are the clitoris, the vagina as far as the uterus, and to some extent the nipples of the breasts; whereas in a man it is the male member, especially the glans, at which it terminates. Hence they judge the woman's venereal satisfaction to be greater than the man's ¹⁷.

¹⁷ On these notions compare Antonelli, Medicina pastoralis, vol. 1, chapter 12, nos. 183-200.

10. Moreover, the essential elements of fertilization are the semen in which nemaspermata are contained and the female ovule. For fertilization requires that some zoosperm penetrate the ovule either in the ovary itself or before the ovule, having fallen from the ovary, has reached the uterus through either oviduct. Since it proceeds slowly, the ovule seems to require about seven days (indeed, 10-15 days, as others maintain) to complete that short journey. The zoosperm, however, enters the oviduct within the space of a few hours, where it can live for several days and await the ovule: for several days, that is, for seven or eight, whence there appears a wonderful concord of the organs of each sex.

In view of that period of days, there are some, for example the physician Capellmann, who affirm that fertilization is improbable unless it results from intercourse which occurred a few days (three or four) before the menstrual flow, or within fourteen days from the beginning of that flow ¹⁸. But because ovulation, or the release of the ovule, does not always occur simultaneously with the menstrual flow, and because, in addition to the principal or ordinary ovulation, another, secondary or accidental one can arise, for example from carnal arousal in copulation itself, this rule is shown to be subject to exceptions ¹⁹.

¹⁸ Capellmann, Medicina pastoralis (11th edition, or 4th Latin edition, p. 139).

¹⁹ Compare Albertoni, Fisiologia, p. 946.

Dr. Foekiston, who constructed a table in which, relying upon statistical calculations, he assigns to each day its own probability of fertilization, declares that the least probability is present on the twenty-third day after the menstrual flow has ceased, and estimates it to be no more than a sixty-second (1/62) part at most.

11. Now, by sexual appetite in the narrower signification is understood the propensity by which a man loves and seeks in a person of the other sex a companion and helper in the carnal operation which nature instituted principally for generation. For the union itself of the two sexes exists primarily for the sake of generation.

But whence does the propensity toward carnal commerce proximately pass into act; or, what is the same, what proximately impels a man toward copulation, to accomplish generation through itself?

Formerly, not a few thought that man was immediately excited by the desire or necessity of pouring out the semen which had accumulated, almost as a full bladder and full bowels arouse the desire to evacuate them. Thus Montaigne used to say, and Féré says even today ²⁰. But this explanation cannot account for the vehemence of libido; moreover, it seems always to fail in a woman and frequently in a man, since a woman regularly does not pour forth semen during carnal arousal, while a man, as experience testifies, is frequently agitated by libido without any sense of fullness. Rather, it happens that aroused libido accumulates the semen and produces the sensation of a full little vessel.

²⁰ "Sexual appetite has at its base a sensation of fullness, a kind of need for evacuation." L'instinct sexuel, p. 6.

In truth, however, the existence of this appetite is principally connected with the sexual glands; but its vehemence and excitation are to be attributed to various causes and occasions. Some are involuntary and material, others voluntary and moral; some are present in man from birth, others from a subsequent event, whether culpable or not. The causes which, besides the physical constitution of the body, stir carnal appetite will be discussed shortly below.

12. Carnal arousal is accustomed to comprise two intimately connected parts: the excitation of the organs and their collapse.

A man who indulges in venery is first impelled by his venereal appetite, which we here suppose to be normal, to seek in physical and psychic union with a person of the other sex the organic excitation which he carries through to orgasm. Orgasm is then immediately followed by the collapse of the organs which serve generation. The physical union, or carnal copulation, is this: that the man introduce his turgid penis into his wife's vagina and, in the very release of the arousal, emit semen there. That semen is thus emitted and received so that it may tend toward penetration of the female ovule, if a mature one has fallen from the ovaries. Sexual union is useful in this manner for the end of human generation.

13. Because it helps to elucidate the moral argument, it is worthwhile here to set forth according to the account of physicians or physiologists the distinct parts of each sex in carnal copulation, and at the same time to show how equal man and woman have been made by the Creator in the generative function.

1. As regards the organic constitution, or the remote preparation for copulation: in the sexual parts of both the man and the woman there is observed a system capable of erection (erectile apparatus) which, in carnal arousal, is filled with blood and dilated. For the female and male organs are furnished with nerves in a similar manner; the vagina and uterus, no less than the penis, are spread throughout with many veins, in which blood can be contained and remain.

2. As regards the process of carnal arousal:

In each sex, it begins with the swelling of the genital parts.

Next, in the man, there usually appears what is called distillation, that is, before the expulsion of the semen itself, the production of a thinner fluid from the glands which discharge into the penis and have their names from Littré and Cowper. This distillation is called by another name urethrorrhea from libido.

In the woman, however, the glands which are called Bartholin's are then accustomed to render the vagina moist, as it were, with an abundant distillation. This distillation was regarded by the ancients as female seminal emission. It is not necessary for generation itself; it is beneficial to the woman, however, insofar as her nerves, thus moistened, are less affected by venereal excitation.

This discharge is sometimes designated by the name female pollution. It rarely flows outward, but rather into the cavity of the uterus. The flow itself is then often not noticed, although it brings pleasure. Hence most women can be judged to have been polluted only from libidinous satiety. And already for some time before puberty they are capable of this pollution. Compare Noldin, De Sexto, no. 30.

There then follows a rhythmic movement of the male member, to which rhythmic contractions of the sides of the vagina seem to respond.

Nemaspermata then swim in the emitted male semen, seeking for several days (seven or eight) the female ovule, which itself, having previously fallen from the ovary, descends at a slow pace to meet the nemaspermata.

Moreover, when the female vagina is relaxed from orgasm, it draws the spermatic fluid into itself as if by suction, in this way complying with and, as it were, going to meet the motion of the nemaspermata, which, as has been said, seem to seek the interior parts of the vagina and uterus.

By this suction and, as it were, attraction of the vagina, it is also explained how semen deposited at the opening of the vagina could provide occasion for fertilization.

3. As regards the secondary phenomena which accompany the complete use of the genital organs:

In each sex, during arousal, there are observed more frequent and interrupted breathing, stronger and more frequent palpitation of the heart, perspiration, secretion of the glands, and other things of this kind.

4. As regards the subjective feeling of the outcome:

Both sexes experience pleasurable satiety and a certain peace and repose: in a general manner, each party feels well (a sensation of general well-being).

Accordingly, in truth, by carnal union man and woman have been made one out of two; they have produced one action with two similar parts, just as though one organ had been composed from each body.