511. THE LUST OF VIOLATION By the lust of violation is not meant the lust of defloration. The latter lust is the violation of virginities, but not the violation of virgins when done without their consent;* but the lust of violation here treated of recedes in consequence of consent, and is sharpened by refusal. It is a burning desire to violate any woman, whether virgin, widow, or wife, who absolutely refuses and resists with violence. These violators are like robbers and pirates who delight in rapine and spoils, and not in gifts and things justly acquired; and like malefactors who are eager for things unlawful and forbidden, and spurn things lawful and conceded. They are utterly averse to consent, and are inflamed by resistance; and if they observe that it is not an inner resistance, the ardor of their lust is instantly extinguished, like fire by water thrown upon it. As regards the ultimate effects of love, it is known that wives do not submit themselves spontaneously to the will of their husbands, and that from prudence they offer resistance as though to violation, and this to the end that they may remove from their husbands the cold arising from commonness, by reason of its being continually allowed, and arising also from an idea of lasciviousness with respect to such things. Yet these resistances, although they enkindle, are not the causes of this lust but only its initiaments. Its cause is, that when conjugial love and also scortatory love become worn out by exercise, then, in order that they may be restored, they wish to be set on fire by absolute resistance. The lust thus begun afterwards increases, and as it increases it spurns and breaks down all the limits of love of the sex and exterminates itself. Then, from being a lascivious, corporeal, and carnal love, it becomes cartilaginous and bony, and becomes acute from the periostea which enjoy acute sensibility. This lust, however, is rare, existing only with those who have entered into marriage and then indulged in whoredoms until these became worn out. In addition to this natural cause of the lust, there is also a spiritual cause, of which something shall be said in what follows. * The Latin is dum fit ex consensu at libido violationis, etc. (when done from consent, but the lust of violation, etc.). The context clearly shows that this ought to be dum fit, absque consensu, as in the translation.