The sexual question

by Auguste Forel

In his novels and romances, Guy de Maupassant has given perhaps the finest and most true descriptions which exist of the psychology of love and the sexual appetite. Although he has depicted the most ticklish sexual situations, often most recherché, we can say that with few exceptions he has not written in a pornographic spirit. His descriptions are profound and true, and he does not attempt to make attractive what is ugly and immoral, although he cannot be blamed for moralizing.

We have seen that the old hypocritical eroticism consisted essentially in the art of describing sexual forbidden fruit and making it as desirable as possible, at the same time covering it with pious phrases which were only a transparent mask. Vice was condemned, but described in such a way as to make the reader's mouth water. There is nothing of this in Guy de Maupassant, nor in Zola. By their tragic descriptions, they provoke disgust and sadness in the reader, rather than sensuality. It is otherwise with the illustrations which de Maupassant's publisher has added to his works and which are frankly pornographic. These are not fair to the author.

Another comparison shows, perhaps, still better the uncertainty of the line of demarcation between pornography and art. If we compare Heine with de Maupassant, I think we must admit that, in spite of the refinement of his art, the pornographic trait is incomparably stronger in the former, because Heine continually loses the thread of moral sense which impregnates most of the works of de Maupassant. The latter author emphasizes evil and injustice in the sexual question.

The refined art of the Greeks contains much eroticism and much nudity, but there is nothing whatever immoral in either. Innocence and beauty are so apparent that no one can think of evil. When we look at the antique statues of the Greek sculptors; when we read Homer, especially the story of Ares and Aphrodite; when we read the bucolic idyll of Daphnis and Chloe, we can no longer have any doubt on the point. It is not nudity, it is not the natural description of sexual life, but the obscene intention of the artist, his improper and often venal object, which has a demoralizing effect.

Finally, I repeat that the purest artistic creation may serve as a pornographic theme for every individual who is accustomed to introduce into his parodies his own depravity, immorality and obscene sentiments. I do not deny that in antiquity, especially at the time of the decadence of Rome, pornography and cynical coarseness often ruled in the sexual domain. History and the ruins of Pompeii give abundant evidence of it. But such phenomena occurred at the periods of decadence. Who then can decide where art ends and pornography begins, or how far eroticism may without danger be expressed in art? This question is so difficult and delicate that I am unable to answer it with sufficient competence. I think that when the reign of capitalism and alcohol has come to an end, the danger of pornography will be reduced enormously. I believe we ought to avoid extremes in both directions. Wherever pornography manifests itself in a purely cynical way, denuded of all art, society can and should suppress it. When it appears under an artistic mantle, it should be possible in each particular case to weigh the artistic merit of the work against its immoral tendencies, taking all other accessory circumstances into account, in order to decide the real weight of each of these elements. The corrupting action should also be carefully considered, which experience proves to have been exerted on the public by certain so-called works of art, or artistic exhibitions, as for example certain cafés chantants, etc.

Pathological Art.—The progressively pathological nature of certain productions of modern art constitute without any doubt a vicious feature; a fact of special importance in the sexual question. Witness what I have said concerning the poet Baudelaire. Erotic art ought not to become a hospital for perverts and sexual patients, and should not lead these individuals to regard themselves as interesting specimens of the human race. It should not make heroes of them, for in acting thus, it only confirms their morbid state, and often contaminates healthy-minded people.

A great number of novels, and even modern pictures, deserve the reproach of being pornographic works. In these are described, or painted, beings that we meet in hospitals for nervous diseases, or even in lunatic asylums, but more often phantoms which only exist in the pathological mind of the author. No doubt, art should not allow itself to be instructed in morality by pedagogues and ascetics; but, on the other hand, artists ought not to forget the high social mission of their art, a mission which consists in elevating man to the ideal, not in letting him sink into a bog.

The Moral Effect of Healthy Art.—Art has great power, for man is directed by sentiment much more than by reason. Art should be healthy; it should rise toward the heavens and show the public the road to Olympus—not the Olympus of superstition, but that of a better humanity. It is not necessary for this that it should diminish the energy of its eternal theme—love. No truly moral man would wish to eliminate the seasoning of eroticism whenever artistic necessity requires it, but art should never prostitute itself in the service of venal obscenity and degeneration.

As to the manner in which it attains its object, while holding to its fundamental principles, that is its own affair, the business of the true artist. I cannot, however, in my capacity as a naturalist, refrain from giving a little modest advice to certain modern artists; that when they wish to take for the subject of their works the themes of social morality, medicine or science, they should avoid previous study of their subject in scientific books; that they should follow the example of de Maupassant and begin by living themselves the situations which they wish to depict, before beginning to model their work. Without this they will completely fail in artistic effect, and will become bad theorists, bad scientists, bad moralists and bad social politicians, at the same time ceasing to be good artists. If Maeterlinck's "Life of Bees" is a fine work of art, it is not only because the author is a distinguished writer, but because he was himself acquainted with bees, being an apicultor, and did not make his book a mere compilation of other scientific works.

Along with the struggle against the debasing influence of money and alcohol, the elevation of the artistic sentiment among the public will contribute strongly to condemn pornographic "æsthetics." The false and unnatural sentimentalism, spiced with erotic lewdness, which is displayed in the trash offered to the public under the title of "art," fills every man who possesses the least artistic sense with disgust. Disgust evidently constitutes a beneficial mental medicine in the domain of art, and we cannot agree with the severe and ascetic minds who think that true morality has nothing to do with art, or even that everything moral should be destitute of art. These people are completely deceived and unwittingly promote pornography, by repelling humanity with their austerity and driving it to the opposite extreme. The æsthetic and moral sentiments should be harmoniously combined with intelligence and will, each of these departments of the mind participating by its special energies in the elevation of man.