In some women the excitability of the genital nerves reaches such a degree that the mere touch of the gynaecologist’s finger during an examination will immediately induce orgasm. Since erection ceases in both sexes after the orgasm, this anomaly is of great importance in men, because the conjugal embrace cannot be consummated. In women, on the other hand, with their passive rôle during concarnatio, and with whom erection of the clitoris is not requisite for sexual congress, the act may be continued as in the normal woman. The anomaly is hence of less importance in women. Still it has some bearing upon the woman’s fecundity. In the ideal commixtione the female orgasm ought to take place immediately after that of the male, so that aspiration of some amounts of sperma could be effected. In the anomaly of orgasmus praecox the spermatozoa have to rely upon their own power of motion to reach the interior of the uterus. The anomaly may, therefore, sometimes lead to sterility. Otherwise medical aid is never sought for. The pathological condition is extremely rare, anyway.
In the same way the anomaly of a diminished frequency is of no importance to the physician when occurring in women. He may be asked for advice when it is met in men, for it may lead to some incongruities in the matrimonial life of the couple, especially when the wife is of a sensual nature. But a woman who is able even very rarely to experience orgasm will never seek the advice of her physician.
[CHAPTER XVII]
HYPERAESTHESIA
Sexual hyperaesthesia signifies an abnormal intensity of the sexual instinct. The intensity of the impulse of voluptas varies in different individuals, and the line of demarkation between the physiological and the pathological increase of the impulse is not always distinctly pronounced. With some individuals the intensity may reach a high degree and still be within the physiological bounds. This is especially the case where the intensity of experiencing libido is correspondingly increased. But when there is a conflict between the two potencies, the potency of voluptas and that of libido, the least exaggeration in the intensity of voluptas becomes pathological. Such an anomaly where there is a decrease of the intensity of libido and at the same time an increase of a higher or lesser degree in the intensity of voluptas, is the phenomenon of mixoscopy. Mixoscopy thus stands upon the border-land of anaesthesia and hyperaesthesia.
Mixoscopy.—Literally, mixoscopy means assisting or rather looking at animals or at persons while they are in concarnatione. In this degree the anomaly is a very rare occurrence. In a broader sense, however, mixoscopy means every active interest in the erotic relations of others in so far as this interest bears an erotic character. In this broader sense, mixoscopy is a widely spread anomaly.
The mixoscopic complex or the system of connected ideas, having a strong emotional tone and displaying a tendency to produce or influence thought or action in a definite direction, is more or less present in every person, especially in its youth. All the world loves the lover, when the world is allowed to assist at the scene of the love-making and partake of the erotic delights of the lover. When the lover is alone, nobody notices him. This love to assist at erotic scenes is based upon the desire of procuring for oneself sensual gratification in an indirect way, by the aid of a third party, with whom one identifies himself and in whom one submerges his ego so as to experience this person’s emotions.
The erotic scenes may not be of the gross and the vulgar variety. Every desire to assist physically or mentally at scenes with an erotic coloring, even of the most refined, airy and ethereal nature has a mixoscopic foundation. Mixoscopy is responsible for the avidity of youth to devour novels and to assist at plays which generally revolve upon erotic plots. Especially the desire of those readers who are so impatient as to read the last chapter first to see if it ends in marriage, is only the refined way of satisfying the craving for mixoscopy. The gratification is secured by the reader’s identification of himself or herself with the hero or heroine. It is often self-deception of many a youth or maiden when they are petting themselves and boasting of their love of belles-lettres, as though all their reading is done in the interest of education and culture. The reader deceives himself and unconsciously changes the egotistic desire into the refined longing for mental improvement, rationalization.
Thus in a slight degree mixoscopy is a normal phenomenon. It is especially found in women, in their eagerness and talent for match-making. In the interest of others, woman is allowed to display the activity for sensual gratification which modesty denies her to develop in her own interest.
Mixoscopy becomes pathological when it degenerates into panderism or bawdry for the sole purpose of sensual gratification. The main motives of catering for the lust of others, by aiding and patronizing an existent love-affair or by calling such an affair into being, says Meller (O. Sexual Probleme, 1912, p. 480), are of three different kinds. There is 1) the pecuniary motive or the motive of avarice, found in the professional matchmaker and in the procurer; 2) there is the motive of toadyism, the sycophant will descend so low in his degradation even to the point of becoming the pander or bawd of his or her superior; 3) the erotic motive, when the pander or bawd acts out of love of the subject. The first two motives are more or less to be counted among the vices, the third motive has a pathological basis. When an erotic interest is at play only, the activity of the pander or bawd becomes pathological in nature. It is found in persons who through old age, disease, ugliness, poverty, shyness, etc., cannot themselves share in the enjoyments of love and who, by assisting at the gratification of lust by others, try to procure themselves an opportunity of experiencing a certain part of the pleasure by identifying themselves with or entering into the spirit of those whom they aided to the lust.