§ 212
Women are unable to control or direct their own development in the erotic sphere up to the point of greatest exaltation. They are perforce required to be developed by men. But, in from fifty to seventy per cent of marriages, men are too uninterested or too ignorant to develop their wives’ erotism to this point, and, of course, to develop their own erotism to the necessary degree of self-control whereby they can secure the total erotic relaxation of their wives.
So that when we say that men are more virginal than women we imply a responsibility on the husband’s part, and none whatever on the wife’s part, for the proper erotic development which alone constitutes the basis of a permanent monogamy.
That is the reason for saying that in the love episode control is the husband’s organically, fundamentally, biologically. The husband reader of this book should ask himself whether he has exercised the adequate amount of control in the erotic sphere. Has he left his wife, the mother of his children, in the condition of being psychically a virgin? If he has, he must realize that he, too, is in a sense, himself a virgin. This signifies primarily that because his wife’s erotism is left undeveloped, his own is too. Undeveloped erotism is no secure bond, no perfect assurance, of a true monogamy.
He will need to take the matter into his own hands and truly marry his wife by means of fully developing his own and her erotism. This need of marrying one’s own wife is the greatest need of the present day. It can be fulfilled only by more knowledge and more (truly erotic) passion on the part of the husband.
The husband, therefore, who has not in this sense married his own wife, is illogical in thinking that there is any justice or beauty or poetry or romance in any attempted affiliation, liaison or other intimate relation with any other woman. On the other hand, the husband who has married his wife in this sense, will neither seek nor need the intimacy of any other woman than his wife.
The phantasied happiness with any other woman rests solely on the thought that the erotic development of the other would be easier for him, or that it would be unnecessary. If it is unnecessary, it has been accomplished by some other man; for true mutual erotic relations are not attained by a woman alone or by two women, man being the only developer of woman’s erotism.
He may think indeed that some extra-marital woman actually loves him, and that his wife does not. This may be true, if he is fully developed himself, has made sincere attempts for years to develop his wife and, in spite of his own best thought and advice of erotologists, has found that she is definitely ineducable. This is an exceedingly rare case.
It may appear that the extra-marital woman loves him, and that he loves her; but the experience of many centuries has shown that, except in the rarest of instances, the woman is ignorant of her own true feelings and that the attempt on the man’s part to develop her erotically would be a failure.
If his own desire for the extra-marital woman is conditioned, as it so often is, on the mentally autoerotic nature of his own satisfactions, which his lack of success with his wife has, in most cases, amply proved, his success in the adulterous union is not likely to be any greater. He will be most likely to expect an easier conquest in the extra-marital liaison than in the marital relation. His going from the marital one to one fancied easier is an evidence of his mental autoerotism.