Philosophy in the Bedroom

TO LIBERTINESVoluptuaries of all ages, of every s*x, it is to you only that Ioffer this work; nourish yourselves upon its principles: they favoryour passions, and these passions, whereof coldly insipid moralistsput you in fear, are naught but the means Nature employs to bringman to the ends she prescribes to him; hearken only to thesedelicious Promptings, for no voice save that of the passions canconduct you to happiness. Lewd women, let the voluptuous Saint-Angebe your model; after her example, be heedless of all thatcontradicts pleasure's divine laws, by which all her life she wasenchained. You young maidens, too long constrained by a fancifulVirtue's absurd and dangerous bonds and by those of a disgustingreligion, imitate the fiery Eugénie; be as quick as she todestroy, to spurn all those ridiculous precepts inculcated in youby imbecile parents. And you, amiable debauchees, you who sinceyouth have known no limits but those of your desires and who havebeen governed by your caprices alone, study the cynicalDolmancé, proceed like him and go as far as he if you toowould travel the length of those flowered ways your lecheryprepares for you; in Dolmancé's academy be at last convincedit is only by exploring and enlarging the sphere of his tastes andwhims, it is only by sacrificing everything to the senses' pleasurethat this individual, who never asked to be cast into this universeof woe, that this poor creature who goes under the name of Man, maybe able to sow a smattering of roses atop the thorny path oflife.