WOMEN UNDER POLYGAMY
The restraints upon the sex-passion among the Greeks and Romans had their reaction in the orgies associated with sacred festivals. These carnivals became licentious, and fell into disrepute in the period of decadence in both nations. Out of the orgy arose that other form of reaction known in all advanced nations as prostitution. When we speak in England of "secret" polygamy we misuse a term signifying sanctioned plural conjugality. There is no legal polygamy in Great Britain, but there is, biologically speaking, a constant practice of polygyny. The polygynous man may be described as one who is not content with one mate at a time. He is not constant in his desires.
"The social evil" flourishes chiefly where there is the strictest insistence on permanent monogamic marriage. We, as monogamists, are bound to accept this too-evident fact. Before English religious reformers attempted to dispel the creeds and the customs of India, there was practically no bartering of the sexes in the form which we know only too well. Quite involuntarily, the missionaries have, by the condemnation of Eastern practice in marriage and extra-matrimonial association, fostered an evil that was previously unknown. This is especially the case in Burma.
The European literature treating upon prostitution is very comprehensive, and it is not necessary for me
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