The Sign of Four: Since Men are in a Transitional Condition..., G

[tweedisgood.livejournal.com]

The Sign of Four

Author: tweedisgood
Title: Since Men are in a Transitional Condition...
Rated G
Notes: Victorian attitudes to sexuality

“since Nature ordains that the existence of the race can only be preserved by gross appetites inherited from our ancestors, the animals, it is obvious that men should refine them as far as they are able....passions are sanctified by marriage; blended with the pure affections, their coarseness disappears; their violence is appeased; they become the ministers of conjugal and parental love” William Winwood Reade: The Martyrdom of Man.



And for those of us who will never marry? Who can never marry, else we deny the deepest truths of body and soul? However pure our affections, nothing can sanctify what we desire. Nature's violence done on us, not by us, is not appeased. Perhaps in some far, fair, unshackled future. Until then, for me there remains the cocaine bottle.

Comments

[tweedisgood.livejournal.com]

Mainly if you take a certain view of his sexuality, but to an extent I suppose it counts even if you don't.His desires are not ones that have obvious, socially sanctioned outlets, hence the drugs and the unsociability and the depressions.