But as we know
there are no instincts in any of these directions, these analogies are not
only false but false on the cardinal fact. I do not speak of the
comparative comfort or merit of these different things: I say they are
different. It may be that love turned to hate is terribly common in
sexual matters: it may be that hate turned to love is not uncommon in the
rivalries of race or class. But any philosophy about the sexes that
begins with anything but the mutual attraction of the sexes, begins with a
fallacy; and all its historical comparisons are as irrelevant and
impertinent as puns.
But to expose such cold negation of the instincts is easy: to express or
even half express the instincts is very hard. The instincts are very much
concerned with what literary people call "style" in letters or more vulgar
people call "style" in dress. They are much concerned with how a thing is
done, as well as whether one may do it: and the deepest elements in their
attraction or aversion can often only be conveyed by stray examples or
sudden images. When Danton was defending himself before the Jacobin
tribunal he spoke so loud that his voice was heard across the Seine, in
quite remote streets on the other side of the river.
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