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In analyzing the sexual impulse we have seen that the process whereby the conjunction of the sexes is achieved falls naturally into two phases: the first phase, of tumescence, during which force is generated in the organism, and the second phase, of detumescence, in which that force is discharged during conjugation.
In some monkeys it would seem that the muscular movement which in man has become the smile is the characteristic facial expression of sexual tumescence or courtship.
Hitherto we have been occupied mainly with the first phase, that of tumescence, and with its associated psychic phenomena. It was inevitable that this should be so, for it is during the slow process of tumescence that sexual selection is decided, the crystallizations of love elaborated, and, to a large extent, the individual erotic symbols determined.
In men there normally supervenes, together with the relief from the prolonged tension of tumescence, with the muscular repose and falling blood-pressure, a sense of profound satisfaction, a glow of diffused well-being, perhaps an agreeable lassitude, occasionally also a sense of mental liberation from an overmastering obsession.
But there is diffused vascular and nervous tumescence and a state of exaltation comparable, though not equal, to that experienced in adolescent and adult age.
The occurrence of the mucous flow in tumescence always indicates that that process is actively affecting the central sexual organs, and that voluptuous emotions are present. The secretions of the genital canal and outlet in women are somewhat numerous.
In men, corresponding to the more copious secretion in women, there is, during the latter stages of tumescence, a slight secretion of mucus Fürbringer's urethrorrhoea ex libidine which appears in drops at the urethral orifice. It comes from the small glands of Littré and Cowper which open into the urethra.
All these parts are composed of most keenly responsive nerves, and they are covered with a thin, delicate and exceedingly sensitive skin, almost exactly such as lines the cheeks and the mouth. Both the clitoris and the lips are filled with expandable blood vessels, and in a state of tumescence they are greatly enlarged by a flow of blood into the parts.
This initial stage has been described as the stage of tumescence, and is succeeded by the introduction of the male organ into the vagina. A motor nerve discharge follows which produces ejaculation of the seminal fluid and is for the male the climax of the orgasm.
Stendhal described the mental side of the process of tumescence as a crystallization, a process whereby certain features of the beloved person present points around which the emotions held in solution in the lover's mind may concentrate and deposit themselves in dazzling brilliance.
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