That Nature disdains arbitrary rules, and that she pays little heed to the proprieties established by man, are facts everywhere to be observed among the lower orders of life. She nevertheless jealously guards the germ and the young of the species. The mother is the natural guardian of prenatal and infant life, and as such, under natural conditions, is usually able to control the sexual relation.
Failing to note the fact that among the orders of life below mankind the female chooses her mate, and failing also to observe that through the natural adjustment of the sexual relations his instincts are checked by her will, nearly if not all the writers upon this subject have declared that women and men at the outset of the human career lived in a state of “lawlessness” or “promiscuity,” similar no doubt to that which at the present time would prevail in a community in which women were utterly devoid of influence, and in which there were no laws regulating the intercourse of the sexes.
By the most trustworthy writers on the subject of the primitive conditions of the human race, it is believed that the most archaic organization of society was that founded on the basis of sex, but, as in the infancy of the race, prior to the inauguration of the system based on sex, and during the long ages which were spent merely in gaining a subsistence, no organized form of society existed, it is held that the order which is observed among creatures lower in the scale of life was suspended, and that the universal law which had hitherto regulated the relations of the sexes, and which throughout the ages of life on the earth had held in check the lower instincts of the male, became immediately inoperative.
Here the common ground of belief ceases, and each writer branches off upon his own peculiar line of argument, appropriating and arranging the facts observed by explorers and investigators in the various lines of inquiry according to his own preconceived notions, or as best suits the particular scheme of development which he essays to establish.
In the following pages the attempt will be made to show that the facts which in these later years have been brought to light concerning the development of the human race are in strict accord with the facts as enunciated by scientists relative to the development of the orders of life below man, and that together they form a connected chain of evidence going to prove not only that the higher faculties had their origin in the female but that the progressive principle has also been confided to her.
[CHAPTER II]
THE RELATIONS OF THE SEXES AMONG EARLY MANKIND
We have seen that an investigation of the instincts and habits of creatures lower in the scale is necessary to an understanding of the relations which must have existed between the sexes among primitive races.
Among birds and mammals, the greater differentiation of the nervous system and the higher pitch of the whole life is associated with the development of what pedantry alone can refuse to call love. Not only is there often partnership, co-operation, and evident affection beyond the limits of the breeding period, but there are abundant illustrations of a high standard of morality, of all the familiar sexual crimes of mankind, and every shade of flirtation, courtship, jealousy, and the like. There is no doubt that in the two highest classes of animals at least, the physical sympathies of sexuality have been enhanced by the emotional, if not also intellectual, sympathies of love.[52]
It has been observed that among the orders of life below mankind, except among polygamous species, the female chooses the individual which is best endowed—the one whose beauty appeals to her æsthetic taste, or which through his stronger development is best fitted to assist her in the office of reproduction.