WOMEN UNDER POLYGAMY
cerning the Oriental incapacity for psychic, or spiritual, love between the sexes. In Turkey, in India, in Burma, and in Persia love is not merely "the grossest animal desire." It is quite impossible to accept such an estimate after reading the love poetry of these nations and the records of unbiassed travellers.
Who can assert truly that the beautiful poems of conjugal love by Tagore are simple poems of sensuality? In regard to Indian love, are we to dismiss the tributes of Dr. Ananda Coomaraswamy, Miss Margaret Noble, Mrs. Steele, Laurence Hope, and a number of English men and women who have lived among the Hindu people? There is no question that ages ago, in the great civilisations of the East, the love of man for woman was associated with the deepest religious emotions.
Long before Western culture, in remote eras, married love was an idyl in Egypt, Arabia and India. Reverence was shown towards women. In the lines of an ancient Hindu poet, we find such sentiments as this:—
"Woman is man's better half,
Woman is man's bosom friend,
Woman is redemption's source,
From woman springs the liberator."
What higher praise has been bestowed upon woman? The poet sings: "Women are the friends of the solitary
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