To the scientific observer, however, this love, or “harmony of souls,” this “heart-bond,” does not, by any means, appear as a “soul-mystery;” but, in the majority of cases, it may be referred to certain physical or mental peculiarities, as the case may be, by which the attractiveness of the beloved person is exerted.
Thus we speak of what is called fetich and fetichism. In the term fetich we are wont to comprehend objects, or parts, or simply peculiarities of objects, which, by virtue of associative relations to an intense feeling, or to a personality or idea that awakens deep interest, exert a kind of charm (“fetisso,” Portuguese), or, at least, owing to peculiar individual coloring, produce a very deep impression which does not belong to the external sign (symbol, fetich) in itself.[1]
The individual valuation of the fetich, which may go to the extent of an unreasoning enthusiasm in the individual affected, is called fetichism. This interesting psychological phenomenon is explicable by an empirical law of association,—the relation of a particular to a general concept,—in which, however, the essential thing is the pleasurable emotional coloring of the particular concept peculiar to the individual: It is most common in two related mental spheres,—those of religious and erotic feelings and ideas. Religious fetichism differs in relation and significance from sexual fetichism, for it found, and still finds, its original motive in the delusion that the object of the fetichism, or the idol, possesses divine attributes, and that it is not simply a symbol; or peculiar wonder-working (relics) or protective (amulet) virtues are superstitiously ascribed to the fetich.
It is otherwise with erotic fetichism, which finds its psychological motive in fetiches which consist of physical or mental qualities of a person, or even merely of objects which a person has used. These always awaken intense associative ideas of the personality as a whole, and, moreover, are always colored with a lively feeling of sexual pleasure. Analogies with religious fetichism are always discernible; for, under certain circumstances, in the latter, the most insignificant objects (bones, nails, hair, etc.) become fetiches, and are associated with pleasurable feelings which may reach the intensity of ecstasy.With respect of the development of physiological love, it is probable that its nucleus is always to be found in an individual fetich (charm) which a person of one sex exercises over a person of the opposite sex.
The case is the simplest where the sight of a person of the opposite sex occurs simultaneously with sensual excitement, and the latter is thus increased.
- ↑ Comp. Max Müller, who derives the word fetich etymologically from factitious (artificial, an insignificant thing).
