nd which arise from those of
which we have spoken or from direct sexual differences. They can be
observed, on the one hand, in purely male reunions in saloons, smoking
rooms and other similar places; on the other hand, in feminine circles
of all classes, among the common people, among the fashionable, or
even in philanthropic associations. On the average, woman is more
artful and more modest; man coarser and more cynical, etc. After much
personal experience, gained in societies in which the two sexes
possess the same rights and are admitted to the same titles, I am
obliged to declare that I have never found any confirmation (at least
in the German-Swiss country) of the popular saying that gossip and
intrigue are the special appanage of woman. I have found these two
vices quite as often in man.

CHAPTER IV

THE SEXUAL APPETITE

If we sum up the three preceding chapters we arrive at the
philosophical conclusion that reproduction depends on the general
natural tendency of all living beings to multiply indefinitely.
Fission and sexual reproduction arise from the simple fact that the
growth of each individual is necessarily limited in space as well as
time. Reproduction is thus destined to assure the continuation of
life; the individual dies but is perpetuated in his progeny. We do not
know why the crossing of individuals is rendered necessary by the
phenomenon of conjugation. On this subject we can only build
hypotheses, but the study of nature shows us that where conjugation
ceases reproduction is etiolated and finally disappears, even when it
is still possible for a certain time.

From the commencement of life there is thus a powerful law of
attraction with the object of reproduction. At first there are
unicellular organisms, in which one cell penetrates the other in the
act of conjugation. Their substances combine intimately, while the
molecules of each nucleus become so arranged as to give the new
individual a more fresh and powerful energy of growth.

In the lower multicellular plants and animals which bud, fresh buds
live at the expense of the old trunk to give life to new branches, and
the male cells or pollen fecundate the female cells so as to disperse
the germs capable of growth and of thus reproducing the species. It is
also the same in the madrepores and other agglomerated animals (such
as the solitary worms), composed of parameres or metameres, so long as
a single central nervous system does not