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Freeman, R. Austin (Richard Austin), 1862-1943

"The Vanishing Man"

"
"Now, Berkeley, you don't think that, and I hope you don't think that I
do. We should be bad biologists and worse physicians if we should
under-estimate the importance of that which is Nature's chiefest care.
The one salient biological truth is the paramount importance of sex; and
we are deaf and blind if we do not hear and see it in everything that
lives when we look abroad upon the world; when we listen to the spring
song of the birds, or when we consider the lilies of the field. And as
is man to the lower organisms, so is human love to their merely reflex
manifestations of sex. I will maintain, and you will agree with me, I
know, that the love of a serious and honourable man for a woman who is
worthy of him is the most momentous of all human affairs. It is the
foundation of social life, and its failure is a serious calamity, not
only to those whose lives may be thereby spoilt, but to society at
large."
"It's a serious enough matter for the parties concerned," I agreed; "but
that is no reason why they should bore their friends.


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