“ Sweet it is to me, dearest cousin, that thy marriage with Caviceo is finally concluded: for, the night which will make thee a wife in his embraces will, I assure thee, afford thee by far the greatest of all pleasures; provided Venus befriend thee, as this thy heavenly shape deserveth. ”

“ It is exceedingly nice of thee to have conserved until now that pure reputation of an honest woman, with that beauty which inflameth even the coldest, with that learning which doth captivate those insensible of beauty. ”

“ Strangers are within my house, passing the night therein. Come thou the next night.”
“I go, beloved,” answered the lover. “But lean thou from the window that we may embrace.”
The labourer turned his posterior to the window and thrust out his backside. The lover embraced it with rapture.
“I go ... adieu, my beloved. Fare thee well. I will return to-morrow night.”
“Go, loved one. I will await thee, but, as a parting gift, give me thy yard, which I will hold for several moments in my hand. ‘Twill console me somewhat.” ”

“ Yet, in truth, I esteem the fruition of a virgin to be, with respect both to the mind and body of the enjoyer, the highest aggravation of sensual delight. In the first place, his fancy is heated with the prospect of enjoying a woman, after whom he has perhaps long sighed and has been in pursuit, who he thinks has never before been in bed with a man, (in whose arms never before has man laid) , and in triumphing in the first sight of her virgin charms. ”

“ Why are they said to corrupt our minds, they who are as the ardour of our souls, stimulating us all, men and women alike, to grand and praiseworthy actions? Undoubtedly because men, from a certain haughty and silly malignity, envy us these resources of which they themselves are proud, by making us the victims of their jealousy. Men shun every poison and venom just as we do, whom they call the weaker sex, because the same pest which may take our lives away, may take theirs away too. ”

“ While life lasts, the virgin maid will lure the normal lover, common sense and cold facts notwithstanding. What the poet sang and the amorous swain coveted in those by-gone times of pomp and paganism, in the days of chivalry, and even in that dreary early Victorian era, will be sung and coveted centuries hence. Science, new discoveries, new theories, new ideals, new conditions, cannot oust human nature, our undeniable birthright. The sanctity and value of virginity are traditions ”

“ As in the ancient torch-race, which seemed to Lucretius to be the symbol of all life, we press forward torch in hand along the course. Soon from behind comes the runner who will outpace us. All our skill lies in giving into his hand the living torch, bright and unflickering, as we ourselves disappear in the darkness. ”

“ I have a daughter of the like not seen elsewhere on earth. She pisseth over the most lofty houses. All the physicians I have summoned cannot cure her, and it is a sad pity, for she is of surpassing beauty. If thou canst prevent her from pissing over the haycocks which thou shalt erect, thy fortune is made. I will give her to thee in marriage. If thou failest, thou shalt go join in their prison those imbeciles of physicians and charlatans who have already sought to succeed in this my proposal. Thou dost understand? ”

“ The palaces and marble stairs of old Venice are no longer desolate, but thronged with scarlet-robed senators, prisoners with the doom of the Ten upon their heads cross the Bridge of Sighs, at dead of night the nun slips out of the convent gate to the dark canal where a gondola is waiting, we assist at the parties fines of cardinals, and we see the bank made at faro. ”

“ But I am now Queen of all the Ebony Islands and they are under my rule, nor shall I ever again meet my Kamar al-Zaman save in this place; for there is no way for him to his native land but through the Ebony Islands. Verily, I know not what to do in my present case, but I commit my care to Allah who directeth all for the best, for I am no man that I should arise and open this virgin girl.”
Then quoth Queen Budur to Hayat al-Nufus:
“O my beloved, that I have neglected thee and abstained from thee is in my own despite.” ”

“ Anthologica Rarissima is a modest attempt to remedy this state of affairs. In a series of volumes the editors will put before their readers the cream of what is tantamount to a small library, and a library not often seen on the book-lover’s shelves. Herein will be found, set out in plain English, curious and diverting extracts from some of the world’s most remarkable works. The text will be literal and unexpurgated. Nothing of interest to the student of folk-lore, psychology and literature will be omitted or glossed over, for the editors believe that a classic castrated is a classic spoilt. ”

“ If learning is, of its very essence, a certain source of every evil and crime for us, how shall they drink out of the same source the nectarean waters of immortal glory: whilst we unhappy and wretched women shall drink a sort of sulphureous Stygian water which will excite us to those debaucheries, to which they drive us by their sway or lead us by their example? For, I remember that thou spokest thus on this subject a few days ago in thy conversation with Caviceo. ”

“ The curtain draws up, and suddenly a hundred and fifty years are rolled away, and in bright light stands out before us the whole life of the past; the gay dresses, the polished wit, the careless morals, and all the revel and dancing of those merry years before the mighty deluge of the Revolution. ”

“ Virginity in woman, it seems, has been set on a pedestal unsupported by history, science, or investigation. It is obviously the outcome of man’s desire, when he buys or acquires, to obtain unsoiled goods. ”

“ I know not whether Nature may have failed to bestow upon you French gentlemen that which she always gives to the lower animals. I mean to say that I know of no male beast, whether wild or tame, which, when under the sway of love, will not recognise the female by her odour. ”

“ One day, nevertheless, Pierre, the maiden’s lover, who was a good lad and a quiet, came seeking to conduct her to an assembly, and both lad and maid besought the mother to let them go. In the end she consented, thinking in herself that Pierre was too honest to do her daughter ill, and she enjoined him guard her well.
Behold, then, these two on their way; and as they went, the maiden said:
“My mother hath strictly enjoined me to guard my maidenhead. It seemeth that at assemblies one is in case to lose it. How best preserve it?” ”

“ The chief business of my life has always been to indulge my senses; I never knew anything of greater importance. I felt myself born for the fair sex, I have ever loved it dearly, and I have been loved by it as often and as much as I could....
“ ... Should anyone bring against me an accusation of sensuality he would be wrong, for all the fierceness of my senses never caused me to neglect any of my duties.... I have always been fond of highly-seasoned, rich dishes.... As for women, I have always found the odour of my beloved ones exceeding pleasant.... ”

“ Here, in all probability, are the most powerful reasons for the value placed on virginity; each reason, too, is highly practical. Who among us truly wants to share his most treasured possession? And the shy charm of virginity ‘neath the attack of the amorous lover is as undeniable as it is indescribable. ”

“ EXCURSUS to ADVENTURES WITH HEDVIGE AND HELÈNE AT GENEVA.
Jacques Casanova, Chevalier de Seingalt, Knight of the Golden Spur, and one of the most remarkable figures in history and letters, was born on April 2nd, 1725. To-day, nearly two hundred years afterwards, his Memoirs are more vivid and readable than anything penned by our contemporary writers.
“He who opens these wonderful pages,” says the English translator in his preface, “is as one who sits in a theatre and looks across the gloom, not on a stage-play, but on another and a vanished world. ”

“ Havelock Ellis, op. cit., vol.6: ‘Equally unsound is the notion that the virgin bride brings her husband at marriage an important capital which is consumed in the first act of intercourse and can never be recovered. That is a notion which has survived into civilisation, but it belongs to barbarism and not to civilisation. So far as it has any validity it lies within a sphere of erotic perversity which cannot be taken into consideration in an estimation of moral values. ”

“ Must we believe that all these writers fashioned women out of their own lascivious fancy, or that the sexual impulse in the women of those races has totally changed?
Without a doubt, time and custom are responsible for much that seems obscure and irreconcilable. Many of our authorities are writing of an age in which men and women spoke and acted in a manner which to-day seems coarse and inexcusably free. ”

“ There is never a moment when the new dawn is not breaking over the earth, and never a moment when the sunset ceases to die. It is well to greet serenely even the first glimmer of the dawn when we see it, not hastening toward it with undue speed, nor leaving the sunset without gratitude for the dying light that once was dawn. ”

“ In the good town of Rouen, not long ago, a young man was married to a fair and tender virgin, aged fifteen, or thereabouts. On the day of the great feast—that is to say, the wedding—the mother of the young girl, as is customary in such places, instructed the bride in all the mysteries of wedlock, and taught her how to behave to her husband on the first night. ”

“ All is over. I love thee still; probably I shall love thee always; but I long for thee to go, and by so doing, thou wilt give me proof of thy love.”
“This is dreadful; thou amazest me. Thou dost seem in perfect health; thou art grown even more beautiful; art made for the worship of the sweetest of gods; ‘tis beyond my powers of comprehension how, with a temperament like thine, thou canst live in continual abstinence.”
“Alas! lacking the reality we console ourselves with make-belief.99 I will not conceal from thee that I love my young boarder. ”

“ On a certain day the mother of the bride came to her daughter, and questioned her as to her husband’s state and condition and the countless other things which women like to know. To all of which questions the bride replied that her husband was a good man, and that she did not doubt but that she would be happy with him. ”

“ The lord drew two hundred roubles from his pocket, the peasant took the money, and withdrew the ring from the lord’s finger, whereat the yard vanished as if by magic, and there was left to the lord but his former little instrument. ”

“ On the other hand, integrity of the hymen is no proof of virginity, apart from the obvious fact that there may be intercourse without penetration.... The hymen may be of a yielding or folding type, so that complete penetration may take place and yet the hymen be afterwards found unruptured. It occasionally happens that the hymen is found intact at the end of pregnancy.”1
And while the foregoing is the exception rather than the rule, it goes far to prove the fallibility of the physical, tangible test.
To most of us, virginity is a quality supposedly prized at all times and by all races. ”

“ Why lose two souls? For as soon as the yard is cut, the woman will fall and kill herself. ‘Tis better to pray to God that perchance by some miracle the old woman will disentangle herself from it.
During this time the son-in-law awoke, and perceived that his ring had descended to the base of his finger, that his yard raised itself towards the sky to a height of seven versts, and that it nailed him solidly to the earth, in such wise that he could not turn upon his other side.
He withdrew very softly the ring from his finger; his yard descended to the height of a cubit’s span ”

“ Nay, it was nowise hot.”
“Mother mine,” answered Caterina, “you should say ‘to my seeming’ and belike you would say sooth; but you should consider how much hotter are young girls than ladies in years.”
“Daughter mine,” rejoined the lady, “that is true; but I cannot make it cold and hot at my pleasure, as belike thou wouldst have me do. We must put up with the weather, such as the seasons make it; maybe this next night will be cooler and thou wilt sleep better.” ”

“ When the girl has to do later with a negro husband, an astringent lotion will render the bride a pseudo-virgin. The deceived husband, not having the anatomical knowledge necessary to assure himself of the real existence of the signs of virginity, feels a difficulty in copulating, and is far from suspecting any trick.5
“Does not much the same kind of thing prevail also in Europe? How many girls who have been deflowered get married without their husband ever suspecting anything, although he has not the same physical disadvantages that the black has to prevent his seeing through the trick? ”

“ My Memoirs are not written for young persons who, in order to avoid false steps and slippery roads, ought to spend their youth in blissful ignorance, but for those who, having thorough experience of life, are no longer exposed to temptation, and who, having but too often gone through the fire, are like salamanders, and can be scorched by it no more.... ”