Long Before Harry Hay...

Employing an argument which is basically the same as the one made by gay people today, Cannon writes: "unnatural desire is a contradiction in terms; downright nonsense. Desire is an amatory impulse of the inmost human parts."

In another passage, he relates a tale that might move Eddie Murphy to exclaim "I hear you, brotha!":

"The enraptur'd Amorio, snatching her up, speeds to the Bed, where Incumbrances quickly off, he finds in his Clasp a Body past Imagination delicate; but of Gender masculine."

To read more: run to your nearest university library and get your hands on the latest edition of the journal "Eighteenth Century Life".