g the contrasts
which consanguinity diminishes.

SENTIMENT AND CALCULATION IN SEXUAL SELECTION

Youth, beauty, health, finery and flirtation excite the sexual
appetite. Many other sentiments are accessory, such as admiration, the
pleasure of possession, respect, pity, etc. Inclination is an
important element, but in no way necessary to sexual union.

In the lower stages of human development, tenderness toward children
is much stronger than sexual love. Among many savage races the love of
a man for his wife is completely wanting, as well as that of the wife
for her husband. In this case marriage depends on reciprocal
convenience, on the desire to have children, and profits by personal
comfort and the satisfaction of a purely animal sexual appetite.
However, among these people the parents have a tender regard for their
children. The husband has the right to beat his wife, but the wife is
considered as unnatural or even criminal if she beats her children.
Among the North American Indians, for example, conjugal love is, so to
speak, unknown. On the other hand, in other savage races, such as the
Touaregs, the Niam-Niams, the New Caledonians, the Tonganese and
Australians, the conjoints have a deep affection for each other, and
the husband often commits suicide on the death of his wife. On the
whole, the sentiments of affection of the conjoints are the result of
a long sexual life in common, and they are especially strengthened by
the love of the parents for their children.

As a rule, the mutual attachment of conjoints for each other among
cultivated races is developed along with altruism. The tenderness and
refinement of love as they exist at the present day among highly
civilized races were unknown to most savages and to the older
civilizations. In China it is considered good manners to beat the
wife, and when a poor Chinaman treats his wife with consideration, it
is to avoid having to buy another. What the Arab understands by love
is only sexual appetite, and among the ancient Greeks it was nearly
the same.

In civilized Europe mental culture progresses in the direction of
equality of rights between the two sexes, so that a man regards his
wife more as a companion who is his equal and no longer a slave.
Community of interests, opinions, sentiments and culture constitute a
primary condition for sentiments of mutual sympathy and favors
affection. No doubt, excitation of the sexual appetite by contrasts
acts here as