Havelock Ellis, philosopher of love

Front matter

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Philosopher of Love : By Houston Peterson me ae ate i yee

_ In an age bewildered about religion, " overawed by science, and obsessed with sex, Havelock Ellis stands alone, a great scientist, psychologist, _and writer whose serene philosophy has brought consolation to thousands. In ‘Havelock Ellis, Philosopher of

Preface

WirH only the slightest knowledge of Havelock Ellis, I read, some years ago, his volume of essays Affirmations, which drew me steadily from one volume to another, through the whole range of his writings. I found that he was peculiarly aware of the motives and problems of his age and yet strangely free from its characteristic poisons and panaceas. He was modern, indeed ultra-modern, but at the same time ancient in spirit, a critic who did not confuse classicism with ‘immaculate perception’ nor sophistication with fatigue. He expressed audacities in no raucous voice and wrote no lamentations of man’s miserable lot in a hostile world. If one word more than any other gave color to his reflections, it was serenity, and serenity seemed to be his possession rather than his need.

In the field of sex psychology, where Ellis had done his special work and become a supreme authority, I found that he avoided the methods of both the prude and the procurer — who have so much in common. He insisted on the enormous importance of erotic activities, but saw clearly that they formed only one figure in the elaborate dance of life. It was, for me, refreshing and surprising to discover a scholar who could devote himself so intensely to this precarious subject, without losing the fine perspective.

At first sight Ellis’s writings fall into two distinct groups: the more literary books, such as The New Spirit, Affirmations, The Soul of Spain, and The Dance of Life; the more scientific works, such as The Criminal, Man and Woman, A Study of British Genius, and Studies in the Psychology of Sex. This division is artificially emphasized by the fact that the first group is

Viii PREFACE brought out by general publishers, whereas the studies in sex are handled exclusively by a medical publishing house, the F. A. Davis Company of Philadelphia. Consequently, many readers of Ellis’s essays have — never even seen his books on sex, and students of the latter often do not know that he is a literary figure of great importance. This is unfortunate because the two aspects of his work are so beautifully complementary.

In the fall of 1923 I outlined a comprehensive essay on Ellis. In the summer of 1925 I met Mr. Ellis for the first time and spent several hours with him. The following November I started work on a small critical volume which was to have some such title as The Themes of Havelock Ellis, or, In the Mind of Havelock Ellis. After some months I informed him of my project and asked certain questions, to which he gave very illuminating answers. Then, in the summer of 1926, I went again to London where I enjoyed many conversations with Mr. Ellis at his home in Brixton and in the neighborhood of the British Museum. Early in our association he casually turned over to me a packet of juvenile notes on books he had read, which showed clearly his mental outlook at sixteen. Day after day he extracted from an old trunk more documents which he had not seen for fifty years, and as the material accumulated I found that my small - monograph was expanding into a story of the development of a genius.

This book is based mainly on: (1) the published writings of Havelock Ellis, (2) quantities of unpublished notes written in his youth, (3) numerous conversations, (4) more than sixty personal letters to me, (5) a long list of written answers to specific questions, (6) a forty-six-page commentary on the next to the last

PREFACE ix revision of my manuscript. It is obvious, therefore, that my debt to Mr. Ellis is immeasurable, and without his constant sympathy and codperation I could have made little progress.

I am also deeply obligated to his sister, Miss Louie Ellis, who gaye me much information regarding his childhood; to the late Dr. J. Barker Smith who went to medical school with Mr. Ellis and saw him frequently during nearly half a century; to Mr. Percival Chubb who also met Mr. Ellis often in the 80’s; to Mr. Edward Carpenter with whom I had one memorable conversation; and to Mrs. Margaret Sanger and Madame Francoise Cyon, both close friends of Mr. Ellis for many years. The account of the Bedborough trial, which Mr. Ellis considers definitive, is based on information received from Mr. George Bedborough and particularly from Mr. Henry Seymour, the organizer of the Defense Committee. To Dr. Isaac Goldberg I am indebted for his pioneer work, Havelock Ellis: A Biographical and Critical Survey, published in the spring of 1926.

Among various patient friends who have been constantly helpful with criticism of my growing chapters, I must mention Mr. Angel Flores, Mr. Thomas Munro, Mrs. Charlotte Peterson, and Mr. John Storck. Dr. Robert L. Dickinson, of the Committee on Maternal Health, kindly went over the entire manuscript, and Mr. Bartlet Brebner read the larger part of it. Mr. Flores also did much work on the detailed bibliography and corrected all the proofs.

Finally, I must acknowledge the courtesy of the F. A. Davis Company and of Houghton Mifflin Company in allowing me to quote generously from the works of Havelock Ellis.

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Contents

I. SUSANNAH MARY WHEATLEY’sS SON I

I]. Lire Is VERY EARNEST 15 Ill. THe SEx THEME 50 IV. Lost IN THE Cosmic FAcTORY 74 V. CONVERSION AT SPARKES CREEK 94.

VI. JAMEs HINTON’s MANUSCRIPTS 120 VII. PHysIcIAN AND SURGEON 145 VIII. OLIVE SCHREINER 160 IX. THE NEw SPIRIT 171 X. SODOM AND GOMORRAH 202 XI. THE Ways oF PuRITY 217 XII. HAVELocK ELLIs ON TRIAL 237 XIII. Freup AnpD ELLIs 263 XIV. DIGRESSIONS 282 XV. THE FINISHED TASK 299 XVI. AUTUMN LEAVES 317 “XVII. Vira Nuova 340 APPENDIX A: COMMONPLACE Books 367 APPENDIX B: BIBLIOGRAPHY 394

Chapter II Life Is Very Earnest

In early adolescence, between twelve and the end of his fifteenth year, Henry’s general point of view did not change, but his encyclopedic curiosity and passion for classification developed while he read as widely as his poor library facilities permitted. He also began frequent visits to art galleries which established the habit of precise observation and inspired his pioneer reflections on the problems of nudity. At best he wasa serious youth, apparently destined for an honorable career in a conservative church. At worst he was a sententious, unworldly little prig too much concerned with God and duty.

In the summer of 1871 a charming girl of sixteen, distantly related to his mother, visited at the home in Merton. She was much in the company of the reticent, worshipful boy. On parting they exchanged books, but met no more because their mothers ceased to be friendly. For a long time she glowed in his memory and at last became the theme of a wistful, juvenile lyric.

‘I think of all these things: The cornfields and the August air,

The music that was in your speech, The purple that was on your hair.’

In his twelfth year also he left the French and German College and entered as a weekly boarder a somewhat exclusive school at Mitcham. The principal, Grover by name, was a tall man with a genial Socratic countenance, a blind eye, a very bald head, and a long gray beard. He was a competent teacher along oldfashioned lines, but his chief claim to immortality was a versified attack on Darwinism which had to be removed from the railroad stands because of coarseness. Of much more benefit to Henry was the French tutor, Joseph Stevens, who carried on with Henry the good work started by de Chastelain. Stevens evidently loved teaching and was not only interesting in the classroom, but was generous in loaning to the boys books from his own library. They were frequently surprised to find how many translations from other languages he had hidden away besides his French volumes. Privately he gave Henry his first grounding in German, while Henry started Italian by himself.

Yet more significant than any record of his formal schooling is a worn and faded little book with ‘H. H. Ellis 1871,’ written on the fly-leaf. The title-page reads: ‘On Self-Education and the Formation of Character, Addressed to the Young, by Mrs. Hope, 1843.’ At the back are the words ‘very good. H. H. Ellis, 1871’ and below, ‘Reread 2/9/72.’ It isasolemn little Encheiridion quite free from the heavy Philistinism of Smiles’s Duty and Self-Help. The main divisions deal with the acquisition of knowledge, the formation of opinions, and the government of the moral feelings. In order that the mind may be developed and the precepts properly observed, constant self-examination is required. Such advice for the young may now appear somewhat questionable, but Henry read the book twice with pleasure and tried to follow its injunctions, thus beginning his great work of self-education. A few years hence he was to be fascinated by that epic of self-education, Wilhelm Meister, which throughout life has remained his favorite novel. .

As there were few books in the home his chief source of information was some old files of The Penny Magazine of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, dating back thirty or forty years, which had been taken by his grandfather Ellis. He himself was able to buy, very cheaply, antiquated copies of The Visitor, or Monthly Instructor, through the ‘Exchange and Mart,’ a valuable newspaper medium for buying and selling almost anything. In a day of pretentious and expensive outlines of existence one may feel inclined to smile at these faded old volumes with their poor printing, double columns, and quaint woodcuts, but on examination they prove to be mines of diverse information, carefully selected. Besides popular articles on scientific subjects, notable art works, natural history, eminent men, foreign countries, and the like, the pages are enriched by lengthy quotations from the classic writers. Along with The Visitor and The Penny Magazine, other domestic periodicals such as Sunday at Home, The Mirror and The Christian Witness, an inspiring compilation called The Ari of Doing Our Best and Macaulay’s

essays made up the bulk of Henry’s general reading for -ayearor two. He classified it, for future reference, in an ‘Index Rerum’ of more than two hundred items, extending from air-beds and Chinese amusements to weeds and wild-flowers. The Visitor was cited one hundred and seventeen times, The Penny Magazine twenty times. Dated May 23, 1872, this dilapidated little ‘Reference Book’ was prophetic of Ellis’s wide-ranging explorations in the field of knowledge.

From the same year there is a mass of loose notes which might have been intended for a first psychological treatise. ‘Longevity’ is one of the principal topics, with several lists of old men, some suggestions as to how to live to a ripe age, and a score of illustrative clippings from the newspapers. On a separate slip is the statement that ‘Early rising conduces to longevity as does music.’ There is also a collection of notes on the virtues and methods of early rising. Anticipating more definitely his later interests are a number of comments, taken from periodicals and conventional poetry, on eyes, smiles, blushing and lips. During the Christmas holidays of 1872 he carefully copied, into a notebook of two hundred and fifty pages, quotations under five headings — Memory, Flowers, Dreams, Sleep, and The Ocean. Half a century later, in Impressions and Comments, he returns again and again to precisely the same themes.

On the 16th of April, 1873, Henry began a long series of notes on ‘ Books I Have Read’ which were continued until October, 1876. Most of them merely state the substance of his reading and need not be reproduced, but they also contain many personal reflections, concrete indications of his mental growth which are especially revealing because they were only intended for his own eyes. Such passages may be presented almost without commentary, as one of the most interesting youthful records that has ever fallen into the hands of a biographer.

The series starts off with a few words on the bestseller of Charlotte Mary Yonge, who helped along the Oxford Movement and contributed a hundred volumes to the moral enlightenment of England: ‘While at Hastings I read the “‘ Heir of Redclyffe’’ which is interesting and shows intimate acquaintance with human nature. I could have wished it to come to an end at the marriage of Guy and Annabel. The last half is very affective and mournful, containing some of the most affective passages | ever remembered to have read al- ‘though illness may have made me more susceptible of being affected. The conclusion, however, of Marryat’s “King’s Men” which I read about the same time is very touching, and almost unexpected, but the book itself in my idea is one of the pleasantest of Marryat’s although there is far too little about the hero and the style is rambling, which I rather like in Marryat at least.’ As Henry was little drawn to the activities of his schoolmates and had a much more intense inner life of his own, he found his realities largely among books, literally living with their characters and making them his models. He hoped that he might be influenced by the ‘noble rectitude and disregard of self’ of Isa Grattan, a figure in Rescued from Egypt and Triumph Over Midian, two popular stories by ‘a Lady of England.’

‘Just finished Mrs. Jameson’s ‘‘Essays on the Lives of Remarkable Painters’’ (18/4/73), which I have read at intervals for about 6 weeks. It is very interesting and to me entirely new. It has greatly increased my taste for pictures and desire to travel. She appears very enthusiastic. I do not know whether her estimates are correct or not.’ Partly under the inspiration of Mrs. Jameson, Henry paid his first visit to the National Gallery some two or three months later.

‘Just read (21/4/73) Shakespere’s (I have decided to spell it thus, as there is as much authority for this mode as any other, and IJ do not see the need of adding an a, Shakespeare seems out of fashion) “‘Cymbeline.”’ I like it very much, it is very interesting, but I do not yet feel the enthusiasm for Shakespere, the lavish praise bestowed upon him made me expect. Perhaps Coriolanus and Cymbeline, the only two plays of his I have read, are not favourable for producing such an effect. I think however when I know more of him I shall be more able to appreciate him.’

What Henry could appreciate thoroughly at this time was anything that had to do with the Bible or the

Christian religion. ‘I have just commenced,’ he wrote in May, ‘taking in monthly numbers Cassell’s “ Bible Educator” edited by Professor Plumptre, a way of spending money far more to my state and infinitely more interesting (not to speak of its instructiveness) than the way in which boys usually spend their money. I am very much pleased with it. It is contributed to by such writers as Dr. Payne Smith, Canon Rawlinson, Rev. Dr. Ginsberg, Dr. Stainer and many others equally capable of writing on the various subjects treated of such as history of the Sacred Scriptures, history of the English version, allusions to Bible history in coins. Zodlogy of the Bible, Botany of the Bible, Music of the Bible, Poetry of the Bible, etc. Although not written for the student it is certainly not exclusively for the lower classes as Greek, Hebrew and Latin quotations are continually coming up.’

Among various books read in June, Henry was much impressed by The Transformation of Hawthorne (the title for the edition of The Marble Faun, published in

England), ‘which may be said to be the first of his I have read, although I have a very dim idea of having read the Scarlet Letter — very dim idea indeed.’ He enjoyed not the tale so much as the beautiful descriptions which made him long to be in Italy, but as usual the religious question comes in for major consideration. ‘His views of the Roman Catholic Church are those of a great many and slightly modified they are my own. With the Romish Church is connected almost all that is beautiful in painting, music, sculpture, architecture and much in literature. It was besides the original Christian Church. There are many beautiful ideas embodied in it (perhaps Hawthorne rather exaggerates them) but it is a great mixture of error, truth and absurdity, the first greatly preponderating, and the errors i a «dat are deadly — so pernicious that to write in favour of the Romish Church involves a great responsibility.’

‘Read two (29/6/73) small books of poems by Mr. MacKay which are made doubly interesting to me by the author being for the time English master at Mr. Grover’s school. I like them very much, they are an imitation of Tennyson, have real poetry in them.’ This Angus MacKay soon became Henry’s first congenial friend and the most important feature of his school life, although some six or eight years older. His mother was English, his father a Scotch Highlander, who was at one time ‘Royal Piper.’ He published his two books of moderately good verse before he was twenty. His reading was broad, his critical judgment well developed, and he did not disdain, in academic fashion, the contemporary tendencies in literature. ‘I cannot say,’ Ellis has recently written, ‘that MacKay had any influence in moulding me, and I had begun to write before I met him, but his value for me was immense. He was exactly the guide and liberator I needed. He opened for me a new world of life and thought, which I should in any case have found, but not under such auspicious circumstances or so easily and rapidly.’ ? The essential point is that MacKay opened for Ellis a new world at just that critical period, before his mind could crystallize in an orthodox pattern.

Earlier in the century young Charles Cowden Clark, the well-read son of a school principal, placed himself at the disposal of one John Keats, eight years younger, and in consequence an inexperienced groping genius quickly achieved an orientation which hostile circumstances might have permanently prevented. When Ellis went to Australia in 1875 for his long stay, Mac- Kay was the only person outside of his family with

t I, Goldberg: Havelock Ellis, A Biographical and Critical Survey, 42-43.

whom he corresponded regularly, and it was MacKay who criticized meticulously many of his literary experiments before he began to publish. In the beginning of their relationship MacKay was of course much in advance of Ellis, but he developed little and by 1880 was being rapidly outgrown. He died in 1906 after a worthy career as clergyman in the Church of England. He and Ellis remained very good friends to the end, their most serious difference of opinion having to do with the merits of Jan Steen, whom Ellis ranked more highly.

MacKay was Ellis’s first real friend. After that early period all his most intimate friends have been women.

To come back to ‘Books I Have Read’ and the summer of 1873, Henry is re-reading some of the poems by ‘my favourite poet,’ Longfellow. ‘I never before knew how beautiful they,— especially many of the shortest are.— I suppose it is because I am getting older but now I like them very much and often read one of those short ones over and over again, liking it better each time. The chords which he strikes meet a response in my own heart which is not the case with most poetry I have read. Milton I have read but he is far above me standing dim and majestic. Shakespeare I can wonder at, admire, but he also stands far away from me and I can see him from afar, a monument of human genius but Longfellow I feel within me.’

‘IT am now (Aug. 1873) reading the Student’s Hume, an English History founded on Hume but without his partiality, and I believe a very correct one. I am reading very slowly though, for as I am reading I put down questions which embrace a whole chapter (about twenty in a chapter). When I have finished the chapter I answer all the questions on paper and then write the whole chapter down in epitome and sometimes almost word for word. I get through about one chapter a week in this way. The history I very much like.’

In September Henry read for the first time one of Carlyle’s works, Sartor Resarius, ‘kindly lent by Mr. Mackay, with whom Carlyle is a great favourite.’ Enjoying both ‘the grand flow of laughter and the originality of thought’ he copied down in another little booklet a number of the most striking passages. Later on he was to read Past and Present and the Life of Stirling, evidently finding in Carlyle the same rich tonic dear to Tyndall, Huxley, and other great Victorians. For more obvious reasons he revelled at this time in Macaulay’s eloquent essays, overflowing with specific information about Addison, Johnson, the Restoration dramatists, and a thousand other subjects. ‘Macaulay is one of my favourites, perhaps almost my chief favourite although I am so entirely opposed to him in politics, still I find very little if anything in those essays not historical or political with which to disagree, and even in those essays which are historical and political I can hardly help agreeing with his remarks, so apparently true are they.’ Incidentally it was on the last day of 1873 that he read for the second time Macaulay’s essay on the comic dramatists of the Restoration.

‘Received (Feb 1874) as a birthday present (at my own wish) Prof. H. Morley’s First Sketch of English Literature with which I am thoroughly satisfied. It is a sort of work I have long wished to possess and this particular book is I believe the best of the kind and is throughout most trustworthy, most instructive, most interesting. I could wish him however to have said something more on Shakespeare’s works. He gives us about 3 or four pages on Merchant of Venice and barely mentions others, only giving their supposed dates, with the exception of The Tempest. But I am thoroughly satisfied with the work (of nearly 1,000 pages) and it is deeply interesting.’

‘Read (Feb 21st) the ‘‘Gerusalemme Liberata” through the medium of a French translation kindly lent me by Monsieur Joseph Stevens. I have not read many French books — very few — but I can sincerely say I never before came across one I more thoroughly enjoyed or which on the whole presents fewer difficulties to surmount in reading.’ He goes on to argue that the French language is ideally adapted not to poetry, but to poetic prose, and differs with Byron’s dictum that Tasso’s epic is equal to those of Homer, Dante and Milton. Itis clear that by fifteen Henry had his French very well in hand and was almost ready to take up the most difficult writers.

‘Read (March 2, 1874) the Aurora Leigh of England’s greatest poetess Elizabeth Barrett Browning, (kindly lent me by Mr. MacKay) and seldom have I read a book by which I felt more raised, more elevated, ennobled, I know not what to call it — but call it what you will — it is a true and living book — written out of the poet’s own life and heart and mind — it is her own mature convictions upon life and art and well worthy of being her masterpiece.’ In this vein he expatiates for a thousand words, utterly carried away by Mrs. Browning’s union of the ideal and practical life. Even his beloved Longfellow suffers by comparison. He prays that God will give him some slight part of that gift passing gold or silver, the noble power of translating the soul into words.

As a relief from so much spirituality Henry turned to ‘The Song of Songs’ which he did not consider a symbolic picture of Christ and the Church, but a great poem of passionate and pure love. ‘It is full of charming touches of Nature. The similes are exceedingly precise, almost too much so, though at times remarkably striking and appropriate. It achieves great charm from some little touches which it would not now be deemed proper to introduce. For instance it would hardly be deemed right now for anyone to compare his love’s navel to “‘a round goblet which inviteth not liquor,’ or for her to say thus, “‘his belly is as bright ivory overlaid with sapphires.”” Again it has a somewhat sensuous sound to say, ‘‘His left hand should be under my head and his right hand should embrace me,’’ but it is one of the prettiest touches in the poem and the naiveté with which it is said is charming.’

In those same weeks Henry was inspired to further moral reflection by his growing interest in art. Since paying his first visit to the National Gallery in the summer of 1873 he has gone constantly to exhibitions of painting and sculpture, frequently making detailed notes at the moment of observation or writing up his impressions a few hours afterward. Perhaps the first record of this kind was that composed on the 8th of April, 1874, the day of his third visit to the National Gallery. By that time he had come to the conclusion that nothing was so valuable for the culture of the imagination, after Nature and poetry, as ‘the study of a few varied paintings of the first class.” He had a most decided preference for the Renaissance Italians, especially ‘the divine Raphael,’ whose Saint Catherine of Alexandria he could almost worship. What a devout expression, what wonderful colors, what graceful drapery! ‘I have it all before me now, even to the plaits of the hair and the elegant fingernails.’

‘...As usual I admire Turner; also Etty’s The Female Bathing, Youth at the Helm and Pleasure at the Prow, and Two Females Surprising a Swain. In this last the little strips of transparent drapery floating around the loins of the two girls appear fastidious, unnatural and rather ridiculous. But this, if it is a fault, is a very slight. and unnoticeable one; a greater fault appears to me to be the warmth he gives to all his nude females. This is especially conspicuous in the Female Bathing. It is very pretty and slightly sensuous, but, I venture to say, hardly natural. In this respect Correggio appears to me to have come much nearer nature in the nude figure of Venus in Mercury Teaching Cupid the Alphabet. There are some of the old masters whose paintings, on the whole, I do not admire but I refrain from saying anything with regard to them as I know they are by masters who deservedly enjoy a great reputation and that if I cannot enjoy them I know that others can. This I think to be a perfectly safe and good and useful rule, and one which I always strive to adopt with regard to other things besides pictures.’

Remembering pleasantly the French pictures in the International Exhibition of the previous year, Henry went again this spring, 1874, but the French section was not yet open, and only a few historical and allegorical paintings interested him at all. Some statues justified the long fatiguing day and caused him to express himself elaborately for the first time on the dark mystery of sex. At this time Henry was barely fifteen, with no training in anatomy or physiology, reared in true Victorian fashion to abhor the low, sensuous roots of human nature, and there was nothing in his environment to make him have a broader view.

After commenting on a few pictures in the International Exhibition, he went on: ‘There are very many beautiful sculptures — especially heads of females — scattered in the galleries. Ellen (of the Lady of the Lake) is a lovely female statue, life-size, very well executed, thoroughly simple and natural. Michael

Angelo — a handsome youth of sixteen meditating as to the faun he is sculpturing — is another true work of art and genius. Poetry is marked in every line of the beautiful statue. It is by an Italian. His hand holding the mallet is behind his back; his handsome features wrapt up in meditation are suffused with a vision of the glorious ideas floating in his brain and his eyes almost sparkle with youthful genius. It is in every respect admirably executed.

‘Lesbia, the Mistress of Catullus, at her toilet is another lovely statue from Milan. It is perfectly nude and although the catalogue says “‘at her toilet’’ she is merely standing in a small marble bath or basin. I examined this statue rather attentively and am quite satisfied with my examination. Without being at all tragic or sensational — not however that grace is its predominating characteristic — it is a simple, natural, truthful and beautiful image. It was the figure — quite nude — more than the face which attracted chiefly my attention. It is an almost perfect female form; its perfect symmetry is most pleasing to the eye. It is of white marble slightly veined with black, rather under life-size, not too fat, as some good statues are, and without sensual voluptuousness; although not cold and unpleasing in contour: it is warm without sensuousness. It is a most carefully executed piece of work; it is as excellent as is any statue I remember to have seen for a long time. The muscles and the various inward parts of the body are so plainly and truthfully portrayed but all subdued with the grace of nature and it is yet as I said without sensuality or immodesty. There is one fault — not exactly a great fault — buta serious one. The artist in his almost servile attention to his model has apparently so far forgotten the subject he was sculpturing as to give Lesbia her doubled up fourth toe. For I cannot think that Lesbia had such a toe. And though through a foolish and ridiculous modern custom we cramp up the foot most unnaturally one might in painting and in sculpture preserve the natural foot, for it is both more natural and more elegant, especially in such a statue as Lesbia.