The-Conquest-of-Happiness-by-Bertrand-Russell

enjoined both in the name of morality and in the
name of worldly wisdom, with the result that
generosity and adventurousness are discouraged
where the affections are concerned. All this tends
to produce timidity and anger against mankind,
since many people miss throughout life what is
really a fundamental need, and to nine out of ten an
indispensable condition of a happy and expansive
attitude towards the world. It is not to be supposed
that those who are what is called immoral are in
this respect superior to those who are not. In sex
relations there is very often almost nothing that can
be called real affection; not infrequently there is
even a fundamental hostility. Each is trying not to
give himself or herself away, each is preserving
fundamental loneliness, each remains intact and
therefore unfructified. In such experiences there is
no fundamental value. I do not say that they should
be carefully avoided, since the steps necessary to
this end would be likely to interfere also with the
occasions where a more valuable and profound
affection could grow up. But I do say that the only
sex relations that have real value are those in