393. VI. THAT THIS SPHERE AFFECTS THE FEMALE SEX, THUS MOTHERS, PRINCIPALLY, AND THE MALE SEX, OR FATHERS, FROM THEM. This is a consequence due to the same origin that was previously spoken of [no. 222], namely, that the sphere of conjugial love is received by women, and through women is transferred to men, and this because women are born loves of the understanding of men and the understanding is a recipient. It is the same with the love of infants, the origin of this love being from conjugial love. That mothers have a more tender love of infants, and fathers a less tender, is well known. That the love of infants is inscribed on the conjugial love into which women are born, is manifest from the loving and friendly affection which girls have for infants and for their dolls which they carry about, dress, kiss, and press to their bosoms. Boys have no such affection. [2] It appears as if mothers have the love of infants from having nourished them in the womb with their own blood, and so from their appropriation of their own life; thus from a sympathetic union. Yet this is not the origin of that love, for if, after the birth and unknown to the mother, another infant were substituted for the true one, it would be loved with equal tenderness as if it were her own. Moreover, sometimes infants are loved by their nurses more than by their mothers.
It follows from the above, that this love is from no other source than the conjugial love implanted in every woman. To this is adjoined the love of conceiving, by reason of the delight of which, the wife is prepared for reception. This is the first stage of that love. After the birth, it passes completely over into the babe, and with it its delight.