Beyond the pleasure principle

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lEYOND THE
PLEASUR E
PRINCIPLE

I

SIGM. FREUD

THE INTEHNATIONAL
PSYCHO -ANALYTICAL
PiiESS

'^-"-•- ■^-^-^•^■^-"

SAMUEL COURTAULD

i

THii INTERNATIONAL

PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL

LIBRARY

EDITED BY ERNEST JONES
No. 4

1^

THE INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL LIBRARY

No. 4

BEYOND THE
PLEASURE
PRINCIPLE

BY

SIGM. FRBUD, M.D, LL.D.

t

AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION

FROM THE SECOND GERMAN EDITION

BY C J. M. HUBBACK

11

THE INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL PRESS
LONDON ., MCMXXII VIENNA

A

COPYRICHT 151;

INTERNATIONAL

PSYCHOANALYTIC

UNIVERSITY

DIE PSYCHOANALYTISCHE HOCHSCHULE IN BERLIN

EDITORIAL PREFACE

I have revised this translation, so carefully made
by Miss Hubback, several times, but I feel that it calls
for special indulgence on the part of the reader. On
account, doubtless, of the extreme complexity and re-
markable novelty of the ideas which Professor Freud
here expounds, comprising as they do his thoughts
on the ultimate problems of life, the style is one of
exceptional difficulty. As it is more important to render
his ideas precisely than to clothe them in another
garb, we decided to adhere faithfully to the original
even at the expense of some uncouthness as regards
the English.

The word (Juirtst, as in the phrase pleasure-pain
principle, has been translated as 'pain'; pain without
inverted commas signifies Schmerz in the original. The
word Besetzimg (literally: state of being occupied), as
in the expressions Beselzungscncrgie and Energiebe-
setzit7ig has been rendered by the words 'investment'
or 'charge', the latter being taken from the analogy
of electricity. These and other technical terms will be
discussed in a Glossary which it is intended to publish
as a supplement to the International Journal of
Psycho- Analysis.

i

3
,1

4

BEYOND THE
PLEASURE
PRINCIPLE

BEYOND THE PLEASURE PRINCIPLE

In the psycho-analytical theory of the mind we take
it for granted that the course of mental processes is
automatically regulated by 'the pleasure-principle': that
is to say, we believe that any given process originates
in an unpleasant state of tension and thereupon
determines for itself such a path that its ultimate issue
coincides with a relaxation of this tension, i.e. with
avoidance of *pain' or with production of pleasure.
When we consider the psychic processes under observ-
ation in reference to such a sequence we are introducing
into our work the economic point of view. In our opin-
ion a presentation which seeks to estimate, not only
tlie topographical and dynamic, but also the economic
element is the most complete that we can at present
imagine, and deserves to be ^distinguished by the term
meta -psychological.

We are not interested in examining how far in
our assertion of the pleasure-principle we have
approached to or adopted any given philosophical
system historically established. Our approach to such
speculative hypotheses is by way of our 'endeavour

2 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

to describe and account for the facts falling within our
daily sphere of observation. Priority and originality are
not among the aims which psycho-analysis sets itself,
and the impressions on which the statement of this
principle is founded are of so unmistakable a kind that
I, it is scarcely possible to overlook them. On the other

hand, we should willingly acknowledge our indebted-
ness to any philosophical or psychological theory that
could tell us the meaning of these feelings of pleasure
and 'pain' which affect us so powerfully. Unfortun-
ately no theory of any value is forthcoming. It is the
obscurest and least penetrable region of psychic life
and, while it is impossible for us to avoid touching on
it, the most elastic hypothesis will be, to my mind,
the best. We have decided to consider pleasure and
' pain ' in relation to the quantity of excitation present
in the psychic life— and not confined in any way — along
such lines that 'pain' corresponds with an increase and
pleasure with a decrease in this quantity. We do not
thereby commit ourselves to a simple relationship
, between the strength of the feelings and the changes

corresponding with them, least of all, judging from
f , psycho-physiological experiences, to any view of a

L- ^^ct proportion existing between them; probably the

I amount of diminution or increase in a given time is

[. the decisive factor for feeling. Possibly there is room

here for experimental work, but it is inadvisable for
t us analysts to go further into these problems until we

can be guided by quite definite observations.
&; We cannot however profess the like indifference

i ^^^" ^e fincl that an investigator of such penetration

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 3

as G. Th. Fechner has advocated a conception of pleas-
ure and 'pain' which in essentials coincides with that
forced upon us by psycho-analytic work. Fechner's
pronouncement is to be found in his short work ' Einige
Ideen zur Schopfungs- und Entwicklungsgeschichte der
Organismen', 1873 (Section XI, Note p. 94) and reads
as follows: 'In so far as conscious impulses always bear
a relation to pleasure or "pain", pleasure or "pain"
may be thought of in psycho-physical relationship to
conditions of stability and instability, and upon this
may be based the hypothesis I intend to develop else-
where, viz.: that every psycho-physical movement rising
above the threshold of consciousness is charged with
pleasure in proportion as it approximates — beyond a
certain limit — to complete equilibrium, 'and iwith'" pain"
in proportion as it departs from it beyond a certain
limit; while between the two limits which may
be described as the qualitative thresholds of "pain"
or pleasure, there is a certain area of aesthetic
indifference. '

The facts that have led us to believe in the
supremacy of the pleasure-principle in psychic life also
find expression in the hj'pothesis that there is an
attempt on the part of the psychic apparatus to keep
the quantity of excitation present as low as possible,
or at least constant. This is the same supposition only
put into another form, for, if the psychic apparatus
operates in the direction of keeping down the quantity
of excitation, all that tends to increase it must be felt
to be contrary to function, that is to say painful, The

pleasure-principle is deduced from the principle of

1*

4 . Beyond the Pleasure Principle

constancy; in reality the principle of constancy was
inferred from the facts that necessitated our assump-
tion of the pleasure-principle. On more detailed dis-
cussion we shall find further that this tendency on the
part of the psychic apparatus postulated by us may
be classified as a special case of Fechner's principle
of the tendency towards stability to which he has related
the pleasure-pain feelings.

In that event, however, it must be affirmed that it
is not strictly correct to speak of a supremacy of the
pleasure-principle over the course of psychic processes.
If such existed, then the vast majority of our psychic
processes would necessarily be accompanied by pleasure
or would conduce to it, while the most ordinary
experience emphatically contradicts any such conclusion.
One can only say that a strong tendency towards the
pleasure-principle exists in the psyche, to which,
however, certain other forces or conditions are opposed
so that the ultimate issue cannot always be in accord-
ance with the pleasure-tendency. Compare the comment
of Fechner in a similar connection. ^ ' Therewithal it
is to be noted that the tendency towards the goal
does not imply the attainment of it and that in general
the goal is only approximately attainable . . . ' If we
now address ourselves to the question of what
circumstances have the power to frustrate the success-
ful carrying out of the pleasure-principle we shal
be treading on safer and better-known ground, and we
can draw in abundant measure on our analytical
experiences for the answer.

' op. cit., p. 90.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 5

The first case of such a check on the pleasure-
principle is perfectly familiar to us in the regularity
of its occurrence. We know that the pleasure-principle
is adjusted to a primary mode of operation on the
part of the psychic apparatus, and that for the pre-
servarion of the organism amid the difficulties of the
external world it is ab initio useless and indeed extre-
mely dangerous. Under the influence of the instinct
of the ego for self-preservation it is replaced by the
* reality-principle', which without giving up the intention
of ultimately attaining pleasure yet demands and
enforces the postponement of satisfaction, the renun-
ciation of manifold possibilities of it, and the temporary
endurance of 'pain' on the long and circuitous road
to pleasure. The pleasure-principle however remains
for a long time the method of operation of the sex
impulses, which are not so easily educable, and it
happens over and over again that whether acting
through these impulses or operating in the ego itself
it prevails over the reality-principle to the detriment

of the whole organism.

It is at the same time indubitable that the replace-
ment of the pleasure-principle by the reality-principle
can account only for a small part, and that not
the most intense, of painful experiences. Another
and no less regular source of 'pain' proceeds from
the conflicts and dissociations in the psychic apparatus
during the development of the ego towards a
more highly co-ordinated organisation. Neariy all the
energy with which the apparatus is charged comes
from the inborn instincts, but not all of these are

£

6 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

aUowed to develop to the same stage. On the way
it over and again happens that particular instincts, or
portions of them, prove irreconcUable in their aims or
demands with others which can be welded into the
comprehensive unity of the ego. They are thereupon
spht off from this unity by the process of repression,
retained on lower stages of psychic development,
and for the time being cut off from aU possibility of
gratification. If they then succeed, as so easUy happens
witii the repressed sex-impulses, in fighting their way
through— along circuitous routes— to a direct or a substi-
tutive gratification, this success, which might otherwise
have brought pleasure, is experienced by the ego as
I pain'. In consequence of the old conflict which ended
in repression the pleasure-principle has been violated
anew, just at the moment when certain impulses were
at work on the achievement of fresh pleasure in pur-
suance of die principle. The details of tiie process
by which repression changes a possibility of pleasure
into a source of 'pain' are not yet fuUy understood
or are not yet capable of clear presentation, but it is
certain that aU neurotic 'pain' is of this kind, is
pleasure which cannot be experienced as such.

The two sources of 'pain' here indicated still do
not nearly cover the majority of our painful experiences,
but as to the rest one may say with a fair show of
reason that their presence does not impugn the
supremacy of the pleasure-principle. Most of the 'pain'
we experience is of a perceptual order, perception
eitiier of the urge of unsatisfied instincts or of some-
thmg in the external worid which may be painful in itself

V

^

-.- - —■ ■ .!«r_ ' .r- - ■ - .- .!■ ;, '- :_- '

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 7

or may arouse painful anticipations in the psychic appara-
tus and is recognised by it as ' danger'. The reaction to
these claims of impulse and these threats of danger, a
reaction in which the real activity of the psychic
apparatus is manifested, may be guided correctly by the
pleasure-principle or by the reality-principle which modi-
ties this. It seems thus unnecessary to recognise a still
more far-reaching limitation of the pleasure-principle,
and nevertheless it is precisely the investigation of the
psychic reaction to external danger that may supply
new material and new questions in regard to the
problem here treated.

n

After severe shock of a mechanical nature, railway
collision or other accident in which danger to life is
involved, a condition may arise which has long been
recognised and to which the name 'traumatic neurosis'
is attached. The terrible war that is just over has been
responsible for an immense number of such maladies
and at least has put an end to the inclination to
explain them on the basis of organic injury to the
nervous system due to the operation of mechanical
force. ^ The clinical picture of traumatic neurosis
approaches that of hysteria in its wealth of similar
motor symptoms, but usually surpasses it in its strongly
marked signs of subjective suffering— in this resem-
bling rather hypochondria or melancholia— and in
the evidences of a far more comprehensive general
weakemng and shattering of the mental functions.
Neither the war neuroses nor the traumatic neuroses of
peace are as yet fully understood. With the war neuroses

' Cp. Psycho-Analysis and the War Neuroses, by
l-erenczi, Abraham, Simmel and Ernest Jones ; No. 2 of the
International Psycho-Analytical Library, 1921.

8

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 9

some light was contributed, but also on the other
hand a certain confusion introduced, by the fact that
the same 'type of malady could occasionally occur
without the interposition of gross mechanical force. In
the traumatic neuroses there are two outstanding
features which might serve as clues for further reflec-
tion- first that the chief causal factor seemed to he
in the element of surprise, in the frightj and secondly
that an injury or wound sustained at the same time
generally tended to prevent the occurrence of the neu-
rosis Fright, fear, apprehension are incorrectly used
as synonymous expressions: in their relation to danger
they admit of quite clear distinction- Apprehension
Unzst) denotes a certain condition as of expectation
of danger and preparation for it. even though it be an
unknown one; fear iFurcht) requires a definite object
of which one is afraid; fright {SchrecH) is the name
of the condition to which one is reduced if one
encounters a danger without being prepared for it; it
lavs stress on the element of surprise. In my opinion
apprehension cannot produce a traumatic neurosis; m
apprehension there is something which protects against
fright and therefore against the fright-neurosis. We
shall return later to this dictum.

The study of dreams may be regarded as the
most trustworthy approach to the exploration of the
deeper psychic processes. Now in the traumatic neur-
oses the dream life has this peculiarity: it continually
takes the patient back to the situation of his disaster,
from which he awakens in renewed terror. This fact
has caused less surprise than it merits. The

ro

Beyond the Pleasure Principle

obtrusion on the patient over and again, even in
sleep, of the impression made by the traumatic ex-
perience is taken as being merely a proof of its
strength. The patient has so to speak undergone a
psychical fixation as to the trauma. Fixations of this
kind on the experience which has brought about
the malady have long been known to us in
connection with hysteria. Breuer and Freud stated
in 1893 that hysterics suffer for the most part from
reminiscences. In the war neuroses, observers, such as
Ferenczi and Simmel, have been able to explain a
number of motor symptoms as fixation on the factor
of the trauma.

But I am not aware that the patients suffering
from traumatic neuroses are much occupied in wakina
life with the recollection of what happened to them.
They perhaps strive rather not to think of it. To
regard it as self-evident that the dream at night takes
them back to the situation which has caused the
trouble is to misunderstand the nature of dreams. It
would be more in correspondence with that nature
if the patient were presented (in sleep) with images
from the time of his normal health or of his hoped-
for recovery. If we are not to go thoroughly astray
as to the wish-fulfilment tendency of the dream in
consequence of these dreams of the shock neuroses,
perhaps the expedient is left us of supposing that
in this condition the dream function suffers dislocation
along with the others and is diverted from its usual
ends, or else we should have to think of the enig-
matic masochistic tendencies of the ego.

\ ■

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 1 1

1 propose now to leave the obscure and gloomy
theme of the traumatic neuroses and to study the
way in which the psychic apparatus works in one of
its earliest normal activities. I refer to the play ot

children.

The different theories of child-play have recently
been collated by S. Pfeifer in Imago- and their
analytical value estimated; I may here refer the reader
to this work. These theories endeavour to conjecture
the motives of children's play, though without placing
any special stress on the 'economic' point of view,
i. e. consideration of the attainment of pleasure. Without
the intention of making a comprehensive study of these
phenomena 1 availed myself of an opportunity which
offered of elucidating the first game invented by
himself of a boy eighteen months old. It was more
than a casual observation, for I lived for some weeks
under the same loof as the child and his parents, and
it was a considerable time before the meaning of his
puzzling and continually repeated performance became

clear to me.

The child was in no respect forward in his mtel-
lectual development; at eighteen months he spoke
only a few intelligible words, making besides sundry
significant sounds which were understood by those about
him. But he made himself understood by his parents
and the maid-servant, and had a good reputation for
behaving 'properly'. He did not disturb his parents
at night; he scrupulously obeyed orders about not
touching various objects and not going into certain

1 igig, Bd. V, S. 243-

12

Beyond the Pleasure Principle

rooms; and above all he never cried when his
mother went out and left him for hours together,
although the tie to his mother was a very close
one: she had not only nourished him herself, but
had cared for him and brought him up without
any outside help. Occasionally, however, this well-
behaved child evinced the troublesome habit of
flinging into the corner of the room or under the
bed all the little things he could lay his hands
on, so that to gather up his toys was often no
light task. He accompanied this by an expression
of interest and gratification, emitting a loud lona-
drawn-out 'o-o-o-oh' which in the judgement of
the mother (one that coincided with my own) was
not an interjection but meant 'go away' {fort).
I saw at last that this was a game, and that the child
used all his toys only to play 'being gone' (fortsein)
with them. One day I made an observation that
confirmed my view. The child had a wooden reel
with a piece of string^ wound . round it. ^t never
occurred to him, for example, to drag this after him
on the floor and so play horse and cart with it, but
he kept throwing it with considerable skill, held by
the string, over ;the [side of his little draped cot
so that ;the reel disappeared into it, then said his
significant ' o-o-o-oh " and drew the reel by the string
out of the cot again, greeting its reappearance with
a joyful 'Da' (there). This was therefore the com-
plete game, disappearance and return, the first act
being the only one generally observed by the onlookers,
and the one untiringly repeated by the child as a

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 13

game for its own sake, although the greater pleasTire
unquestionably attached to the second act.^

The meaning of the game was then not far
seek It was connected with the child's remarkable
cutoal achievement-the foregoing of the satisfaction
of an instinct-as the result of which he could let Ins
mother go away without making any fuss. He made
it right with himself, so to speak, by dramatismg the
same disappearance and return with the objects he
had at hand. It is of course of no importance for the
affective value of this game whether the child invented
it himself or adopted it from a suggestion from out-
side Our interest wiU attach itself to another point.
The* departure of the mother cannot possibly have
been pleasant for the child, nor merely a matter of
indifference. How then does it accord with the pleasure-
principle that he repeats this painful experience' as a
Lme? The answer wUl perhaps be forthcoming that
the departure must be played as the necessary prelude
to the joyful return, and that in this latter lay the
true purpose of the game. As against this, however,
there is the observation that the first act, the going
away, was played by itself as a game and far more
1 This interpretation was fully established by a further
observation. One day when the mother had been out for
some hours she was greeted on her return by the information
'Baby 0-0-0-0' which at first remained unintelligible. It soon
proved that during his long lonely hours he had found a
method of bringing about his own disappearance. He had
discovered his reflection in the long mirror which nearly
reached to the ground and had then crouched down in front
of it, so that the reflection was 'fort'.

H

Beyond the Pleasure Principle

frequently than the whole drama with its joyful
conclusion.

The analysis of a single case of this kind yields
no sure conclusion: on impartial consideration one ^ains
the impression that it is from another motive that the
child has turned the experience into a game. He was
"1 the first place passive, was overtaken by the
experience, but now brings himself in as playing an
active part, by repeating the experience as a game
m spite of its unpleasing nature. This effort might be
ascribed to the impulse to obtain the mastery of a
situation (the 'power' instinct), which remains inde
pendent of any question of whether the recollection
was a pleasant one or not. But another interpretation
may be attempted. The fiinging away of the object
so that It is gone might be the gratification of an
impulse of revenge suppressed in real life but directed
agamst the mother for going away, and would then
have the defiant meaning: 'Yes, you can go, I don't
want you, I am sending you away myself.' The same
child a year later than my observations used to thr'w
on the floor a toy which displeased him, and to say
Go to the war.-' He had been told th;t his absent
^ther was at the war, and he did not miss him a
an, giving the clearest indications that he did not wish
to be disturbed in the sole possession ofhismoth^'

' When the child was five and three-quarter years old
h.s mother died Now, when she was reaUy 'g ne' To-o)

true 'bin r^' -"^ ^^ '^^ '"■ ^ "^^"^^ ^^^ ^^^^ - ^

n:

Beyond the Pleasure Principle I5

It is known of other chUdren also that they can
give vent to sin^ilar hostile feeUngs by throwing objects
fway in place of people.^ Thus one .s left m doubt
whether the compulsion to ^vork over m psychic life
wha has made a deep impression, to make oneself
XI master of it, can express itself primarily and
tlv^:Zy, of ;he pleasure-principle In the case
„ed here, however, the child might have repeated
a disagreeable impression in play only because with
the repetition was bound up a pleasure gam of a
different kind but more direct. •

Nor does the further pursuit of the question of
play resolve our hesitations between two concepuons
We see that children repeat in their play everything
Tt has made a great impression on them in actua
Ufe that they thereby abreact the strength of the
Sression and so to speak make themselves mas r
of the situation. But on the other hand it is clear
ough tH all their play is influenced by the dominant
:;.h'of their time of life: viz. to be grown-up and
to be able to do what grown-up people do. It i also
observable that the unpleasing character of the
experience does not always prevent its being utilised
as a game. If a doctor examines a child's throat, or
- performs a small operation on him, the alarmmg
experience will quite certainly be made the subject
of the next game, but in this the pleasure gam from
another source is not to be overlooked. In passmg
from the passivity of experience to the activity of
I Cp. 'Eine Kindheitserinnerung aus "Dichtung und
Wahrheit".' Imago, 1917, "d. V, S. 49-

-I

/

1 6 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

play the chUd applies to his playfellow the unpleasant
occurrence that befell himself and so avenges himself
on the person of this proxy.

From this discussion it 'p at all events evident
that it is unnecessary to assume a particular imitation
impulse as the motive of play. We [may add the
reminder that the dramatic and imitative art of adults,
which differs from the behaviour of children in being
directed towards the spectator, does not however
spare the latter the most painful impressions, e. g. in
tragedy, and yet can be felt by him "as highly enjoy-
able. This convinces us that even under the domination
of the pleasure-principle there are ways and means ^

enough of making what is in itself disagreeable the ^

object of memory and of psychic pre-occupation. A ;

theory of aesthetics with an economic point of view ^.

should deal with these cases and situations ending in '"

final pleasure gain: for our purposes they are of no
help, since they presuppose the existence and suprem-
acy of the pleasure-principle and bear no witness
to the operation of tendencies beyond the pleasure-
principle, that is to say, tendencies which might be of
earher origin and independent of this.

in

Five-and-twenty years of intensive work have
brought about a complete change in the more immed-
iate aims of psycho-analytic technique. At first tlie
endeavours of the analytic physician were confined to
divining the imconscious of which his patient was
unaware, effecting a synthesis of its various components
and communicating it at the right time. Psycho-
analysis was above all an art of interpretation. Since
the therapeutic task was not thereby accomplished,
the next aim was to compel the patient to confirm
the reconstruction through his own memory. In this
endeavour the chief emphasis was on the resistances of
the patient; the art now lay in unveiling these as soon
as possible, in calling the patient's attention to them,
and by human influence— here came in suggestion
acting as ' transference '—teaching him to abandon
the resistances.

It then became increasingly clear, however, that
the aim in view, the bringing into consciousness of
the unconscious, was not fully attainable by this method
either. The patient cannot recall all of what lies

17 2

1 8 Beyo7id the Pleasure Principle

repressed, perhaps not even the essential part of it,
and so gains no conviction that the conclusion
presented to him is correct. He is obliged rather
to repeat as a current experience what is repressed,
instead of, as the physician would prefer to see him
do, recollecting it as a fragment of the past.^ This
reproduction appearing with unwelcome fidelity always
contains a fragment of the infantile sex-life, there-
fore of the Oedipus complex and its off-shoots, and
is played regularly in the sphere of transference,
i. e. the relationship to the physician. When this point
in the treatment is reached, it may be said that
the earlier neurosis is now replaced by a fresh one
viz. the transference-neurosis. The physician makes it
his concern to limit the scope of this transference-
nem-osis as much as he can, to force into memory as
much as possible, and to leave as little as possible to
repetition. The relation established between memory
and reproduction is different for every case. As a
rule the physician cannot spare the patient this
phase of the cure; he must let him live through
a certain fragment of his forgotten life, and has
to see to it that some measure of ascendency
remains, in the light of which the apparent reality
is always recognised as a reflection of a forgot-
ten past. If this is successfully accomplished then
conviction on the part of the patient is attained, and
with it the therapeutic result that depends on it.

^ See *Zur Technik der Psychoanalyse. II. Erirmern.
Wiederholen und Durcharbeiten.' Sammlung kleiner Schriften
zur Neurosenlehre. IV. Folge, 1918, S. 441.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 19

In order to render more comprehensible this
'repetition-compulsion' which appears in the psycho-
analytic treatment of neurotics, we must above all get
entirely rid of the erroneous idea that in this struggle
with resistances we are concerned with any resistance
on the part of the unconscious. The unconscious, i. e. the
'repressed' material, offers no resistance whatever to
the curative efforts; indeed it has no other aim than
to force its way through the pressure weighing on it,
either to consciousness or to discharge by means of some
real action. The resistance in the treatment proceeds from
the same higher levels and systems in the psychic life
that in their time brought about the repression. But
since the motives of the resistances, and indeed the
resistances themselves, are found in the process of the
treatment to be unconscious, we are well advised to
amend an inadequacy in our mode of expression. We
escape ambiguity if we contrast not the conscious and
the unconscious, but the coherent ego and the repressed.
Much in the ego is certainly unconscious itself, just
\vhat may be called the kernel of the ego; only a
part of it comes under the category of preconscious.
After thus replacing a purely descriptive method of
expression by a systematic or dynamic one, we may
say that the resistance on the part of the analysed
person proceeds from his ego, and then we at once
see that the 'repetition-compulsion' must be ascribed
to the repressed element in the unconscious. It prob-
ably could not find expression till the work of the
treatment coming to meet it had loosened the re-
pression.

20 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

There is no doubt that the resistance of the con-
scious and preconscious ego subser^'cs the pleasure-
principle; it is trying to avoid the *pain' that would
be aroused by the release of the repressed material,
and our efforts are directed to effecting an entry
for such painful feeling by an appeal to the reality-
principle. In what relation to the pleasure-principle
then does the repetition-compulsion stand, that which
expresses the force of what is repressed ? It is plain
that most of what is revived by the repetitior--
compuision cannot but bring discomfort to the ego, for
it promotes the bringing to light of the activities of
repressed impulses; but that is a discomfort we have
already taken into account and without subversion of
the pleasure-principle, since it is 'pain' in respect of
one system and at the same time satisfaction for the
other. The new and remarkable fact, however, that
we have now to describe is that the repetition-
compulsion also revives experiences of the past that
contain no potentiality of pleasure, and which could at
no time have been satisfactions, even of impulses since
repressed.

The efflorescence of infantile sex-life was, by
reason of the irreconcilability of its wishes with reality
and the inadequacy of the childhood stage of develop-
ment reached, destined to pass away. It perished
in most painful circumstances and with feelings of a
deeply distressing nature. Loss and failure in the
sphere of the affections left behind on the ego-feeling
marks of injury comparable to a narcissistic scar,
which, according to my experience and the expositioa

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 2i

given by Marcinowski,i yields the most important
contribution to the 'inferiority complex' common
among neurotics. The sex-quest to which the physical
development; of the child set limits could be brought
to no satisfying conclusion; hence the plaint in later
life: '"I can't do anything, I am never successful.'
The bonds of tenderness linking the child more
especially to the parent of the opposite sex succum-
bed to disappointment, to the vain expectation
of satisfaction, and to the jealousy aroused by the
birth of a new child, unmistakable proof as it is of
the faithlessness of the loved parent; the child's
attempt, undertaken with tragic seriousness, to produce
another such child himself met with humiliating
failure; while the partial withdrawal of the tenderness
lavished on the little one, the more exacting demands
of discipline and education, severe words and an occa-
sional punishment finally revealed to him the whole
extent of the disdain which is his portion. Some few
regularly recurring types are to be found, according
to the way in which the typical love ot this period
was brought to an end.

All these undesired happenings and painful affect-
ive situations are repeated by neurotics in the ' trans-
ference' stage and re-animated with much ingenuity.
They struggle to break off the unfinished treatment,
they know how to re-create the feeHng of being dis-
dained, how to force the physician to adopt brusque
speech and a chilling manner towards them, they find

1 Marcinowski: 'Die erotischen Quellen der Minderwertig-
keitsgefiihle ', Zeitschrift fur Sexuahvissensckaft, 1918, IV.

22 Beyond the Pleasure Principle *■

suitable objects for their jealousy, they substitute for

the ardently desired child of early days the promise

of some great gift which becomes as little real as

that was. Nothing of all this could ever have afforded

any pleasure; one would suppose it ought to bring *

somewhat less 'pain' if revealed as memory rather

than if lived through as a new experience. It is a

question naturally of the action of impulses that should

lead to satisfaction, but the experience that instead

of this they even then brought ' pain ' has borne no

result. The act is repeated in spite of everything; a

powerful compulsion insists on it.

That which psycho-analysis reveals in the trans-
ference phenomena with neurotics can also be ob-
served in the life of normal persons. It here gives
the impression of a pursuing fate, a daemonic trait in
their destiny, and psycho-analysis has from the outset
regarded such a life history as in a large measure
self-imposed and determined by infantile influences. The
compulsion which thereby finds expression is in no
way different from the repetition-compulsion of neu-
rotics, even though such persons have never shown
signs of a neurotic conflict resulting in symptoms.
Thus one knows people with whom every human
relationship ends in the same way : benefactors whose
proteges, however different they may otherwise have
been, invariably after a time desert them in ill-will,
so that they are apparently condemned to drain to
the dregs all the bitterness of ingratitude; men with
whom every friendship ends in the friend's treachery;
others who indefinitely often in their lives invest some

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 23

other person with authority either in their own eyes
or generally, and then:iselves overthrow such authority
after a given time, only to replace it by a new one;
lovers whose tender relationships with women each
and all run through the same phases and come to the
same end, and so on. We are less astonished at this
' endless repetition of the same ' if there is involved
a question of active behaviour on the part of the person
concerned, and if we detect in his character an
unalterable trait which must always manifest itself in
the repetition of identical experiences. Far more striking
are those cases where the person seems to be ex-
periencing something passively, without exerting any
influence of his own, and yet always meets with the
same fate over and over again. One may recall, for
example, the story of the woman who married three
men in succession, each of whom fell ill after a short

. time and whom she had to nurse till their death.*
Tasso gives a singularly affecting poetical portrayal
of such a trend of fate in the romantic epic : ' Geru-
salemme liberata. ' The hero, Tancred, has unwittingly

' slain Clorinda, the maiden he loved, who fought with
him disguised in the armour of an enemy knight.
After her burial he penetrates into the mysterious
enchanted wood, the bane of the army of the crus-
aders. Here he hews down a tall tree with his sword,
but from the gash in the trunk blood streams forth

1 Cp. the pertinent observations of C. G. Jung in his article
'Die Bedeutung des Vaters fur das Schicksal des Einzelnen".
Jahrhuch fur psychoanalytische und psychopatJiologische For-
schungen, 1901, Bd. I.

I

24 - Beyond the Pleasure Principle

and the voice of Clorinda whose soul is imprisoned
in the tree cries out to him in reproach that he has
once more wrought a baleful deed 'on his beloved.

In the light of such observations as these, drawn
from the behaviour during transference and from the |

fate of human beings, we may venture to make the ^

assumption that there really exists in psychic] life a
repetition-compulsion, which goes beyond the pleasure-
principle. We shall now also feel disposed to relate
to this compelling force the dreams of shock-patients
and the play-impulse in children. We must of course
remind ourselves that only in rare cases can we
recognise the workings of this repetition-compulsion
in a pure form, without the co-operation of other
motives. As regards children's play we have akeady
pointed out what other interpretations its origin
permits. The repetition-compulsion and direct pleasurable
satisfaction of impulse seem there to be inextricably
intertwined. The transference phenomena obviously sub-
serve the purpose of the resistance made by the ego
persisting in its repression: the repetition-compulsion
is, as it were, called to the aid of the ego, which is
resolved to hold fast to the pleasure-principle. In what
one might call the destiny compulsion much appears
capable of rational explanation, so that no need is felt
to establish a new and mysterious impulse. The least
suspicious case is perhaps that of the shock-dream,
but on closer examination it must be admitted that in
the other examples too the state of affairs is not completely
explained by the operation of the motives known to us.
There remains enough over to justify the assumption

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 2$

of a repetition-compulsion, and this seems to us more
primitive, more elementary, more instinctive than the
pleasure-principle which is displaced by it. But if there
is such a repetition-compulsion in psychic life, we should
naturally like to know with what function it corresponds,
under what conditions it may appear, and in what
relation it stands to the pleasure-principle, to which
we have heretofore ascribed the domination over the
course of the processes of excitation in the psychic life.

IV

What follows now is speculation, speculation often
far-fetched, which each will according to his particular
attitude acknowledge or neglect. Or one may caU it
the exploitation of an idea out of curiosity to see
whither it will lead.

Psycho-analytic speculation starts from the impres-
sion gained on investigating unconscious processes that
consciousness cannot be the most general character-
istic of psychic processes, but merely a special func-
tion of them. Metapsychologically expressed, it asserts
that consciousness is the functioning of a particular
system which may be called Bw. Since consciousness
essentiaUy yields perceptions of excitations coming from
without and feelings {Empfindzmgen) of pleasure and
'pain' which can only be derived from within the
psychic apparatus, ;^ we may aUot the system W-Bw.i
(= perceptual consciousness) a position in space. It
must lie on the boundary between outer and inner,
must face towards the outer world, and must envelop

1 Thus named after the German words Wahmehmung
(= perception) and Bewupsein (= consciousness).

26

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 27

the other psychic systems. We then note that in this
assumption we have ventured nothing new, but are in
agreement with the localising tendencies of cerebral
anatomy, which places the 'seat' of consciousness in
the coi-tical layer, the outermost enveloping layer of
the central organ. Cerebral anatomy does not need to
wonder why — anatomically speaking — consciousness
should be accomodated on the surface of the brain,
instead of being safely lodged somewhere in the deepest
recesses of it. Perhaps we may carry matters a little
further than this in our deduction of such a position
for our system W-Bw.

Consciousness is not the only peculiar feature that
we ascribe to the processes in this system. Our im-
pressions gained by psycho-analytic experience lead
us to the supposition that all excitation processes in
the other systems leave in them permanent traces
forming the foundations of memory-records which
have nothing to do with the question of becoming
conscious. They are often strongest and most enduring
when the process that left them behind never reached
consciousness at all. But we find it difficult to believe
that such lasting traces of excitation are formed also
in the system W-Bw. itself. If they remained per-
manently in consciousness they would very soon limit
the fitness of the system for registration of new exci-
tations; ^ on the other hand, if they became uncon-
scious we should be confronted with the task of ex-
plaining the existence of unconscious processes b a

» Here I follow throughout J. Breuer's exposition in the
theoretical section of the 'Studien liber Hysteric', 1895.

28 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

system whose functioning is otherwise accompanied
by the phenomenon of consciousness. We should, so
to speak, have gained nothing and altered nothing
by our supposition which relegates to a special system
the process of becoming conscious. Though this mav
not be an absolutely binding consideration, it may
at any rate lead us to conjecture that becoming con-
scious and leaving behind a memory-trace are processes
incompatible with each other in the same system.
We should thus be able to say: in the system Bw. the
process of excitation becomes conscious but it leaves
behind no lasting tracer all the traces of it on which
memory relies would come about in the next systems
inwards from the propagation of the excitation on to
them. It is on these lines that the scheme is sketched
which I inserted into the speculative section of my
'Traumdeutung' in 1900, If one reflects how little we
know from other sources about the origin of con-
sciousness the pronouncement that consciousness arises
in the place of the memory-trace must be conceded
at least the importance of a statement which is to
some extent definite.

The system Bw. would thus be characterised by
the peculiarity that the excitation process does not
leave in it, as it does in all other psychic systems,
a permanent alteration of its elements, but is as it
were discharged in the phenomenon of becoming con-
scious and vanishes. Such a departure from the general
rule requires an explanation on the ground of a fact-
or which comes into account in this one system only:
this factor which is absent from all other systems might

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 29

well be the exposed situation of the Bw. system-
its immediate contact with the outer world.

Let us imagine the living organism in the simplest pos-
sible form as an undifferentiated vesicle of sensitive sub-
stance : then its surface, exposed as it is to the outer world,
is by its very position differentiated and serves as an
organ for receiving stimuli. Embryology, repeating as
it does the history of evolution, does in fact show
that the central nen^ous system arises from the ecto-
derm; the grey cortex of the brain remains a deriva-
tive of the primitive supei-ficial layer and may have
inherited essential properties from this. It would then
be easily conceivable that, owing to the constant
impact of external stimuli on the superficies of the
vesicle, its substance would undergo lasting alteration
to a certain depth, so that its excitation process takes
a different course from that taken in the deeper layers.
Thus a rind would be formed which would finally
have been so burned through by the effects of stimu-
lation that it presents the most favourable conditions
for the reception of stimuli and is incapable of any
further modification. Applying this idea to the system
Bw., this would mean that its elements are not
susceptible of any further lasting alteration from the
passage of the excitation, because they are already
modified to the uttermost in that respect. But they are
then capable of giving rise to consciousness. In what
exactly these modifications of the substance and of
the excitation process in it consist many views may
be held which as yet cannot be tested. It may be
assumed that the excitation has, in its transmission

IC5:.

30 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

from one element to another, to overcome a resist-
ance, and that this diminution of the resistance
itself lays down the permanent trace of the excitation
(a path): in system Bw. there would no longer exist
any such resistance to transmission from one element
to another. We may associate with this conception
Breuer's distinction between quiescent (bound) and free-
moving 'investment-energy' in the elements of the
psychic systems;! the elements of the system Bw.
would then convey no ' bound ' energy, only free energy
capable of discharge. In my opinion, however, it is
better for the present to express oneself as to these
conditions in the least committal way. At any rate by
these speculations we should have brought the origin
of consciousness into a certain connection with the
position of the system Bw. and with the peculiarities
of the excitation process to be ascribed to this.

We have more to say about the living vesicle
with its receptive outer layer. This morsel of living
substance floats about in an outer world which is
charged with the most potent energies, and it would
be destroyed by the operation of the stimuli proceeding
from this world if it were not furnished with a pro-
tection against stimulation {Reizsclmtz). It acquires
this through its outermost layer — which gives the struct-
ure that belongs to living matter— becoming in a meas-
ure morganic, and this now operates as a special
integument or membrane that keeps off the stimuli,
1. e. makes it impossible for the energies of the outer
world to act with more than a fragment of their
^ J. Breuer and S. Freud: Studien uber Hysteric.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 31

intensity on the layers immediately below which have
preserved their vitality. These are now able under
cover of the protecting layer to devote themselves to
the reception of those stimulus masses that have been
let through. But the outer layer has by its o\vn death
secured all the deeper layers from a like fate^at
least so long as no stimuli present themselves of such
a strength as to break through the protective barrier.
For the living organism protection against stimuli is
almost a more important task than reception of stim-
uli j the protective barrier is equipped with its own
store of energy and must above all endeavour to pro-
tect the special forms of energy-transformations going
on within itself from the equalising and therefore de-
structive influence of the enormous energies at work
in the outer world. The reception of stimuli serves
above all the purpose of collecting information about
the direction and nature of the external stimuli, and
for that it must suffice to take little samples of the
outer world, to taste it, so to speak, in small quanti-
ties. In highly developed organisms the receptive ex-
ternal layer of what was once a vesicle has long been
withdrawn into the depths of the body, but portions
of it have been left on the surface immediately beneath
the common protective barrier. These portions form
the sense organs, which essentiall}'^ comprise arrange-
ments for the reception of specific stimuli, but also
possess special arrangements adapted for a fresh pro-
tection against an overwhelming amount of stimulus,
and for warding off unsuitable kinds of stimuli. It is
characteristic of them that they assimilate only very

32

Beyond the Pleasure Principle

small quantities of the outer stimulus, and take in only
samples of the outer world; one might compare them
to antennae which touch at the outer world and then
constantly withdraw from it again.

At this point I shall permit myself to touch curs-
orily upon a theme which would deserve the most
thorough treatment. The Kantian proposition that time
and space are necessary modes of thought [may be
submitted to discussion to-day in the light of certain
knowledge reached through psycho-analysis. We have
found by experience that unconscious mental processes
are in themselves 'timeless'. That is to say to begin
with : they are not arranged chronologically, time alters
nothing in them, nor can the idea of time be applied
to them. These are negative characteristics, which can
be made plain only by instituting a comparison witli
conscious psychic processes. Our abstract conception
of time seems rather to be derived wholly from the
mode of functioning of the system W-Bw., and to
correspond with a self-perception of it. In this mode
of functioning of the system another form of protect-
ion against stimulation probably comes into play.
I know that these statements sound very obscure, but
I must confine myself to these few hints.

So far we have got to the point that the living
vesicle is equipped with a protection against stimuli
from the outer world. Before that, we had decided
that the cortical layer next to it must be differentiated
as the organ for reception of external stimuli. But this
sensitive layer (what is later the system Bw.) also
receives excitations from within: the position of the

^

-^s

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 33

system between outer and inner and the difference
in the conditions under which this receptivity operates
on the two sides become deciding factors for the
functioning of the system and of the whole psychic
apparatus. Towards the outer world there is a barrier
against stimuli, and the mass of excitations coming
up against it will take effect only on a reduced scale;
towards what is within no protection against stimuli
is possible, the excitations of the deeper layers pursue
their way direct and in undiminished mass into the
system, while certain characteristics of their course
produce the series of pleasure-pain feelings. Naturally
the excitations coming from within will, in conformity
with their intensity and other qualitative characteristics
(or possibly their amplitude), be more proportionate
to the mode of operation of the system than the
stimuli streaming in from the outer world. Two things
are, however, decisively determined by these conditions:
first the preponderance over all outer stimuli of tlie
pleasure and 'pain' feelings, which are an index for
processes within the mechanism; and secondly a shap-
ing of behaviour towards such inner excitations as
bring with them an overplus of 'pain'. There will be
a tendency to treat them as though they were acting
not from within but from without, in order for it to
be possible to apply against them the defensive meas-
ures of the barrier against stimuli {Reissckutz). This
is the origin of projection, for which so important a
part is reserved in the production of pathological states.
I have the impression that by these last
I" considerations we have approached nearer to a

( - a

34 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

comprehension of the supremacy of the pleasure-
principle, but we have not attained to an explanation
of those cases which are opposed to it. Let us therefore
go a step further. Such external excitations as are
strong enough to break through the barrier against
stimuli we call traumatic. In my opinion the concept of .
trauma involves such a relationship to an otherwise
efficacious barrier. An occurrence such as an external i

trauma will undoubtedly provoke a very extensive |

disturbance in the workings of the energy of the |

organism, and will set in motion every kind of pro- j

tective measure. But the pleasure-principle is to begin |

with put out of action here. The flooding of the j

psychic apparatus with large masses of stimuli can no .

longer be prevented: on the contrary, another task j

presents itself — to bring the stimulus under control, ,

to 'bind' in the psyche the stimulus mass that has j^

broken its way in, so as to bring about a discharge of it. |

Probably the specific discomfort of bodily pain is
the result of some local breaking through of the barrier
against stimuli. From this point in the periphery there
stream to the central psychic apparatus contkiual ex-
citations such as would otherwise come only from with-
in.^ What are we to expect as the reaction of the
psychic life to this invasion? From all sides the 'charg-
ing energy' is called on in order to create all round
the breach correspondingly high 'charges' of energy.
An immense 'counter-charge' is set up, in favour of
which all the other psychic systems are impoverished,

1 Cp. 'Triebe und Triebschicksale ', Sammlung kleiner
Schriften 2ur Neurosenlehre. IV. Folge, 19 18.

A

s

m

~^

Beyond the Pleasiire Principle 35

so that a wide-spread paralysis or diminution of other
psychic activity follows. We endeavour to learn from
examples such as these to base our metapsychological
conjectures on such prototypes. Thus from this be-
haviour we draw the conclusion that even a highly
charged system is able to receive new energy stream-
ing in, to convert it into a 'quiescent charge', thus
to 'bind' it psychically. The more intense is the in-
trinsic quiescent charge the greater is its binding force :
and conversely the lower the charge of the system
the less capable is it of receiving the energy that
streams in, and so the more violent are the conse-
quences when the barrier against stimuli is broken
through. It is not a valid objection to this view that
the intensifying of the charges round the place of
irruption could be much more simply explained as
the dii'ect action of the oncoming mass of excitation.
If that were so, the psychic apparatus would merely
undergo an increase of its energy charges, and the
paralysing character of pain, with the impoverish-
ment of all the other systems, would remain without
explanation. Nor do the very violent discharge effects
of pain invalidate our explanation, for they happen in
a reflex manner, that is to say, they follow without
the interposition of the psychic apparatus. The indef-
inite nature of all the discussions that we term meta-
psychological naturally comes from the fact that we
know nothing about the nature of the excitation pro-
cess in the elements of the psychic systems and do
not feel justified in making any assumption about it.
Thus we are all the time operating with a large X,

3*

tai.

36

Beyond the Pleasure Prificiple

U-

which we carry over into every new formula. That
this process is accomplished wdth energies which differ
quantitatively is an easily admissible postulate, that it
also has more than one quality (e.g. in the direction
of amplitude) may be regarded as probable : the new
consideration we have brought in is Breuer's propos-
ition that we have to do with two ways in which a
system may be filled with energy, so that a distinc-
tion has to be made between a 'charging' of the
psychic systems (or its elements) that is free-flowing
and striving to be discharged and one that is quies-
cent. Perhaps we may admit the conjecture that the
binding of the energy streaming into the psychic
apparatus consists in a translating of it from the free-
flowing to the quiescent state.

I think one may venture (tentatively) to regard
the ordinary traumatic neurosis as the result of an ex-
tensive rupture of the barrier agabst stimuli. In this
way the old naive doctrine of 'shock' would come
into its own again, apparently in opposition to a later
and psychologically more pretentious view which as-
cribes aetiological significance not to the effect of the
mechanical force, but to the fright and the menace
to life. But these opposing views are not irreconcil-
able, and the psycho-anal3^ic conception of the traum-
atic neurosis is far from being identical with the
crudest form of the ' shock ' theory. WhUe the latter
takes the essential nature of the shock as residing in
the direct injury to the molecular structure, or even
to the histological structure, of the nervous elements,
we seek to understand the effect of the shock by

Beyo7id the Pleasure Principle 37

considering the breaking through of the barrier with
which the psychic organ is provided against stimuli,
and from the tasks with which this is thereby faced.
Fright retains its meaning for us too. What conditions
it is the failure of the mechanism of apprehension to
make the proper preparation, including the over-charg-
ing of the systems first receiving the stimulus. In
consequence of this lower degree of charging these
systems are hardly in a position to bind the oncoming
masses of excitation, and the consequences of the
breaking through of the protective barrier appear all
the more easily. We thus find that the apprehensive
preparation, together with the over-charging of the
receptive systems, represents the last line of defence
against stimuli. For a great number of traumata the
difference between the unprepared systems and those
prepared by over-charging may turn the scale as to
the outcome : with a trauma beyond a certain strength
such a difference may no longer be of any importance.
When the dreams of patients suffering from traumatic
neuroses so regularly take them back to the situation
of the disaster they do not thereby, it is true,
serve the pm-pose of wish-fulfilment, the hallucinatory
conjuring up of which has, under the domination of
the pleasure-principle, become the function of dreams.
But we may assume that they thereby subserve
another purpose, which must be fulfilled before the
pleasure-principle can begin its sway. These dreams
are attempts at restoring control ot the stimuli by
developing apprehension, the pretermission of which
caused the traumatic neurosis. They thus afford us

38 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

an insight into a function of the psychic apparatus,
which without contradicting the pleasure-principle is
nevertheless independent of it, and appears to be of
earlier origin than the aim of attaining pleasure and
avoiding 'pain'.

This is therefore the moment to concede for the
first time an exception to the principle that the dream
is a wish-fulfilment. Anxiety dreams are no such
exception, as I have repeatedly and in detail shown;
nor are the ' punishment dreams ' , for they merely
put in the place of the interdicted wish-fulfilment
the punishment appropriate to it, and are thus the
wish-fulfilment of the sense of guilt reacting on the
contemned impulse. But the dreams mentioned above
of patients suffering from traumatic neuroses do not
permit of classification under the category of wish-
fulfilment, nor do the dreams occurring during
psycho-analysis that bring back the recollection of the
psychic traumata of childhood. They obey rather the
repetition-compulsion, which in analysis, it is true, is
supported by the (not unconscious) wish to conjure
up again what has been forgotten and repressed. Thus
the function of the dream, viz. to do away with the
motives leading to interruption of sleep by presenting
wish-fulfilments of the disturbing excitations, would
not be its original one ; the dream could secure control
of this function only after the whole psychic life had
accepted the domination of the pleasure-principle. If
there is a 'beyond the pleasure-principle' it is logical
to admit a prehistoric past also for the wish-fulfilling
tendency of the dream, though to do so is no

>

■r

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 39

contradiction of its later function. Now, when this
tendency is once broken through, there arises the further
question : are such dreams, which in the interests of the
psychical binding of traumatic impressions follow the
repetition-compulsion, not possible apart from analysis?
The answer is certainly in the affirmative.

With regard to the war neuroses, so far as the
term has any significance apart from a reference to
the occasion of the appearance of the illness, I have
explained elsewhere that they might very well be
traumatic neuroses which have arisen the more easily
on account of an ego-conflict. » The fact mentioned
on page 9, viz. that a severe injury inflicted at the
same time by the trauma lessens the chance of a
neurosis arising, is no longer difficult to understand
if two circumstances emphasised by psycho-analytic
research are borne in mind. First that mechanical
concussion must be recognised as one of the sources
of sexual excitation (cp. the remarks: 'The effects of
swinging and railway travelling' in Drei Abhandlungen
zur Sexualtheorie, 4. Auflage 1920); and, secondly,
that a painful and feverish illness exerts for the time
it lasts a powerful influence on the distribution of the
hbido. Thus the mechanical force of the trauma would
set free the quota of sexual excitation which, in
consequence of the lacking preparation by apprehension,
has a traumatic effect: but, on the other hand, the
contemporaneous bodily injury would bind the surplus
excitation by the putting in of a claim to a narcissistic

1 Psycho- Analysis and the War Neuroses. Introduction.
International Psycho-Analytical Library. No. 2, 1921.

40

Beyond the Pleasiire Principle

over-charging of the injured part (see ' Zur Einfahrung
des Narzissmus', Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neu-
rqsenlehre, IV. Folge, 191 8). It is also known, though the
idea has not been sufficiently made use of in the Libido
theory, that disturbances in the distribution of the libido
so severe as those of melancholia may be removed for
a time by an intercurrent organic disease ; in fact even
the condition of a fully developed dementia praecox is
capable of a transitory improvement in these circum-
stances.

f-

V

The fact that the sensitive cortical layer has no
protective barrier against excitations emanating from
within will have one inevitable consequence t viz. that
these transmissions of stimuli acquire increased economic
significance and frequently give rise to economic
disturbances comparable to the traumatic neuroses.
The most prolific sources of such inner excitations
are the so-called instincts of the organism, the re-
presentatives of all forces arising within the body
and transmitted to the psychic apparatus— the most
important and most obscure element in psychological

research.

Perhaps we shall not find it too rash an assumption
that the excitations proceeding from the instincts do
not conform to the type of the 'bound' but of the
free-moving nerve processes that are striving for dis-
charge. The most trustworthy knowledge we have of
these processes comes from the study of dreams.
There we found that the processes in the unconscious
systems are fundamentally different from those in the
(pre)consciousj that in the unconscious 'charges' may

41

42 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

easily be completely transferred, displaced or condensed^
while if this happened with preconscious material only
defective results would be obtained. This is the reason
for the well-lmown peculiarities of the manifest dream,
after the preconscious residues of the day before have
undergone elaboration according to the laws of the
unconscious. I termed this kind of process in the
unconscious the psychic 'primary process' in contra-
distinction to the secondary process valid in our normal
waking life. Since the excitations of instincts all affect
the unconscious systems, it is scarcely an innovation
to say that they follow the lines of the primary process^
and little more so to identify the psychic primary
process with the freely mobile charge, the secondary
process with changes in Breuer's bound or tonic
charge. 1 It would then be the task of the higher
layers of the psychic apparatus to bind the instinct-
excitation that reaches the primary process. The
failure to effect this binding would evoke a disturbance
analogous to the traumatic neuroses; it is only after
the binding had been successfully accomplished that
the pleasure-principle (and its modificadon the reality-
principle) would have an opportunity to assert its sway
without hindrance. Till then, the other task of the
psychic apparatus would take precedence, viz. to
obtain control of or to bind the excitation, not in
opposition to the pleasure-principle but independently
of it and in part without regard to it.

The expressions of a repetition-compulsion which

1 Cp. Section VII, 'Psychology of the Dream-Processes'
in my ' Traumdeutung '.

"T—

r

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 43

we have described, both in the early activities of
infantile psychic life and in the experiences of psycho-
analytic treatment, show m a high degree an instinctive
character, and, where they come into contrast with
the pleasure-principle, a daemonic character. In the
play of children we seem to arrive at the conclusion
that the child repeats even the unpleasant experiences
because through his own activity he gains a far more
thorough mastery of the strong impression than was
possible by mere passive experience. Every fresh
repetition seems to strengthen this mastery for which
the child strives; even with pleasurable experiences
the child cannot do enough in the way of repetition
and will inexorably insist on the identity of the im-
pression. This characteristic is destined later to dis-
appear. A witticism heard for the second time will
almost fail of effect; a theatrical performance will never
make the same impression the second time that it did
on the first occasion; indeed it is hard to persuade
the adult to read again at all soon a book he has
enjoyed. Novelty is always the necessary condition of
enjoyment. The child, however, never gets tired of
demanding from a grown-up the repetition of a game
he has played with him before or has shown him,
till at last the grown-up refuses, utterly worn out;
similarly if he has been told a pretty story, he wants
always to hear the same story instead of a new one,
insists inexorably on exact repetition and corrects each
deviation which the narrator lets slip by mistake,
which perhaps he even thought to gain new merit by
inserting. Here there is no contradiction of the pleasure-

44 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

•■i
t

F

principle: it is evident that the repetition, the re-
discovery of the identity, is itself a source of pleasure.
In the case of a patient in analysis, on the other hand,
it is plain that the compulsion to repeat in the trans-
ference the occurrences of his infantile life disregards
■ . in every way the pleasure-principle. The patient behaves

in this respect completely like a child, and thus makes
it clear to us that the repressed meniory-traces of his
primitive experience are not present in a 'bound'
form, are indeed, in a sense, not capable of the secondary
process. To this fact of their not being bound they
owe then- power to weave a wish-phantasy that will
be represented in a dream, by adhering to the residues
from waking experiences. We frequently encounter
the same repetition-compulsion as a therapeutic ob-
stacle, when at the end of the treatment we wish to
bring about complete detachment from the physician;
and it may be supposed that the vague dread with
which those who are unfamiliar with it view anah'sis
^ as though they feared to wake what they think is

better left to sleep, is at root a fear of the appearance
^ of this daemonic compulsion.

In what way is the instinctive connected with the
compulsion to repetition? At this point the idea is
■' . forced upon us that we have stumbled on the trace

I' of a general and hitherto not clearly recognised — or

J at least not expressly emphasised — characteristic ot

}: instinct, perhaps of all organic life. According to this,

\'' an instinct wotild be a tendency innate in living

\ organic ^natter i7npelling it towards the reinstate?nent

f of an earlier condition, one which it had to abandon

• Beyond the Pleasure Principle 45

under the influence of external disturbing forces— a
kind of organic elasticity, or, to put it another way,
the manifestation of inertia in organic life.^

This conception of instinct strikes us as strange,
since we are accustomed to see in instinct the factor
urging towards change and development, and now we
find ourselves required to recognise in it the very
opposite, viz. the expression of the conservative nature
of living beings. On the other hand, we soon think
of those examples in animal life which appear to
confirm the idea of instinct having been historically
conditioned. When certain fish undertake arduous
journeys at spawning-time, in order to deposit the
spawn in certain definite waters far removed from
their usual habitats, according to the interpretation of
many biologists they are only seeking the earlier
homes of their kind, which in course of time they
have exchanged for others. The same is said to be
true of the migratory flights of birds of passage, but
the search for further examples becomes superfluous
when we remember that in the phenomena of heredity
and in the facts of embryology we have the most
imposing proofs of the organic compulsion to repetition.
We see that the germ cell of a living animal is
obliged to repeat in its development— although in a
fleeting and curtailed fashion— the structures of all
the forms from which the animal is descended, instead
of hastening along the shortest path to its own final
shape. A mechanical explanation of this except in
1 I have little doubt tliat similar conjectures about the
nature of instinct have been already repeatedly put forward.

46

Beyond the Pleasure Principle

some trifling particulars is impossible, and the historical
explanation cannot be disregarded. In the same way
we find extending far upwards in the animal kingdom
a power of reproduction whereby a lost organ is re-
placed by the growth of a new one exactly like it.

The obvious objection, that it may well be that
besides the conservative instincts compelling repetiUon
there are others which press towards new formation
and progress, should certainly not be left unnoticed;
it will be considered at a later stage of our discussion!
But we may first be tempted to follow to its final
consequences the hypothesis that aU instincts have as
their aim the reinstatement of an earlier condition
If what results gives an appearance of 'profundity'
or bears a resemblance to mysticism, still we know
ourselves to be clear of the reproach of having striven
after anything of the sort. We are in search of sober
results of investigation or of reflections based upon
It, and the only character we wish for in these results
IS that of certainty.

■If then all organic instincts are conservative,
historically acquired, and are directed towards regression,
towards reinstatement of something earlier, we are
obliged to place all the results of organic development
to the credit of external, disturbing and distracting
mfluences. The rudimentary creature would from its
very beginning not have wanted to change, would, if
circumstances had remained the same, have always
merely repeated the same course of existence. But in
the last resort it must have been the evolution of our
earth, and its relation to the sun, that has left its

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 47

imprint on the development of organisms. The conserv-
ative organic instincts have absorbed everyone of these
enforced alterations in the course of life and have stored
them for repetition; they thus present the delusive
appearance of forces striving after change and progress,
while they are merely endeavouring to reach an old goal
by ways both old and new. This final goal of all organic
striving can be stated too. It would be counter to the
conservative nature of instinct if the goal of life were
a state never hitherto reached. It must rather be an
ancient starting point, which the living being left long
ago, and to which it harks back again by all the
circuitous paths of development. If we may assume as
an experience admitting of no exception that everything
living dies from causes within itself, and returns to the
inorganic, we can only say ' The goal of all life is
death'-, and, casting back, 'The inmiimate was there
before the animated

At one time or another, by some operation of force
which still completely baffles conjecture, the properties
of life were awakened in lifeless matter. Perhaps the
process was a prototype resembling that otlier one
which later in a certain stratum of living matter gave
rise to consciousness. The tension then aroused in the
" previously inanimate matter strove to attain an equi-
librium; the first instinct was present, that to return
to lifelessness. The living substance at that time had
death within easy reach; there was probably only a
short course of life to run, the direction of which was
determined by the chemical structure of the young
organism. So through a long period of time the living

48 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

i- substance may have been constantly created anew, and

easily extinguished, until decisive external influences
i altered in such a way as to compel the still suiviving

r- substance to ever greater deviations from the original

I path of life, and to ever more complicated and circuitous

; routes to the attainment of the goal of death. These

I circuitous ways to death, faithfully retained by the

p -• conservative instincts, would be neither more nor less

[■ than the phenomena of life as we now know it. If

the exclusively conservative nature of the instincts is
1: accepted as true, it is impossible to arrive at any

■ other suppositions with regard to the origm and goal

of life.

If tliese conclusions sound stiangely in our ears,
equally so will those we are led to make concerning
the gi-eat groups of instincts which we regard as lying
[ behind the vital phenomena of organisms. The postulate

j of the self-preservative instincts we ascribe to evei7

I living being stands in remarkable contrast to the

^ supposition that the whole life of instinct serves the

one end of bringing about death. The theoretic signif-
( , icance of the instincts of self-presei-vation, power and

self-assertion, shrinks to nothing, seen in this light;
I ' they are part-instincts designed to secure the path to

death peculiar to the organism and to ward off possi-
bilities of return to the inorganic other than the
immanent ones, but the enigmatic struggle of the or-
ganism to maintain itself in spite of all the world, a
struggle that cannot be brought into connection with
anything else, disappears. It remains to be added that
the organism is resolved to die only in its own way;

^

m

Beyond the Pleas2ire Principle 49

even these watchmen of life were originally the myrmi-
dons of death. Hence the paradox comes about that
the living organism resists with all its energy influences
(dangers) which could help it to reach its life-goal by
a short way (a short circuit, so to speak); but this
is just the behaviour that characterises a pure instinct
as contrasted with an intelligent striving.^

But we must bethink ourselves: this cannot be the
whole truth. The sexual instincts, for which the theory
of the neuroses claims a position apart, lead us to
quite another point of view. Not all organisms have
yielded to the external compulsion driving them to an
ever further development. Many have succeeded in
maintaining themselves on their low level up to the
present time: there are in existence to-day, if not
all, at all events many forms of life that must re-
semble the primitive stages of the higher animals and
plants. And, similarly, not all the elementary organisms
that make up the complicated body of a higher form
of life take part in the whole path of evolution to the
natural end, i.e. death. Some among them, the re-
productive cells, probably retain the original structure
of the living substance and, after a given time, detach
themselves from the parent organism, charged as they
are with all the inherited and newly acquired instinct-
ive dispositions. Possibly it is just those two features
that make their independent existence possible. If
brought under favourable conditions they begin to
develop, that is, to repeat the same cycle to which

1 Compare the subsequent criticism of this extreme view
of the self-preservative instincts.

50 Beyo7id the Pleasure Principle

they owe their origin, the end being that again one
portion of the substance carries through its develop- '

ment tea finish, while another part, as a new germinal
core, again harks back to the beginning of the develop-
ment. Thus these reproductive cells operate against
the death of the Hving substance and are able to win
for it what must seem to us to be potential immort- [

ality, although perhaps it only means a lengthening
of the path to death. Of the highest significance is
the fact that the reproductive cell is fortified for this
function, or only becomes capable of it, by the mingling
with another like it and yet different from it. !

There is a group of instincts that care for the
destinies of these elementary organisms which survive j

the individual being, that concern themselves with the
safe sheltering of these organisms as long as they
are defenceless against the stimuli of the outer world, ,

and finally bring about their conjunction with other
reproductive cells. These are collectively the sexual
instincts. They are conservative in the same sense as
the others are, in that they reproduce earlier con- '

ditions of the living substance, but they are so in a '

higher degree in that they show themselves specially I

resistant to external influences; and they are more
conservative in a wider sense still, since they preserve
life itself for a longer time. They are the actual life-
instincts; the fact that they run counter to the trend
of the other instincts which lead towards death indi-
cates a contradiction between them and the rest, one
which the theory of neuroses has recognised as full
of significance. There is as it were an oscillating rhythm

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 5 i

in the life of organisms: the one group of instincts
presses forward to reach the fmal goal of life as quickly
as possible, the other flies back at a certain point on
the way only to traverse the same stretch once more
from a given spot and thus to prolong the duration
of the journey. Although sexuality and the distinction
of the sexes certainly did not exist at the dawn of
life, nevertheless it remains possible that the instincts
which are later described as sexual were active from
the very beginning and took up the part of opposition
to the r61e of the 'ego-instincts' then, and not only at

some later time.

Let us now retrace our steps for the first time,
to ask whether all these speculations are not after all
without foundation. Are there really, apart from the
sexual instincts, no other instincts than those which
have as their object the reinstatement of an earlier
condition, none that strive towards a condition never
yet attained? I am not aware of any satisfactory example
in the organic world running counter to the characteristic
I have suggested. The existence of a general impulse
towards higher development in the plant and animal
world can certainly not be established, though some
such line of development is as a fact unquestionable.
But, on the one hand, it is often merely a question
of our own valuation when we pronounce one stage
of development to be higher than another, and, on
the other hand, biology makes clear to us that a
higher development in one particular is often purchased
with, or balanced by, retrogression in another. Then
there are plenty of animal forms the youthful stages

4*

52 Bcyo7id the Pleasure Principle

of which teach us that their development has taken
a retrograde character rather than otherwise. Higher
development and retrogression alike might well be the
results of external forces impelling towards adaptation,
and the part played by the instincts might be confined
in both cases to retaining the enforced changes as
sources of pleasure.^

Many of us will also find it hard to abandon our
belief that in man himself there dwells an impulse
towards perfection, which has brought him to his
present heights of intellectual prowess and ethical subli-
mation, and from which it might be expected that his
development into superman will be ensured. But I
do not believe in the existence of such an inner im-
pulse, and I see no way of preserving this pleasing
illusion. The development of man up to now does not
seem to me to need any explanation differing from
that of animal development, and the restless striving
towards further perfection which may be observed in
a minority of human beings is easily explicable as the
result of that repression of instinct upon which what is
most valuable in human culture is built. The repress-
ed instinct never ceases to strive after its complete
satisfaction which would consist in the repetition of a

1 By a different route Ferenczi has arrived at the possi-
bility of this conception. (' Stages of Development in the Sense of
Reality'. Ch. VIII of his Contributions to Psycho-Analysis, 1916.)
He writes: 'By following through this process of thought
logically one is obliged to gain familiarity with the idea of
a tendency to persistence or regression governing organic life
also, while the tendency to progress in development, adap-
tation, etc. is manifested only as against external stimuli.'

r

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 53

primary experience of satisfaction: all substitution- or
reaction-formations and sublimations avail nothing
towards relaxing the continual tension; and out of
the excess of the satisfaction demanded over that
found is born the driving momentum which allows of .
no abiding in any situation presented to it, but in the
poet's words 'urges ever forward, ever unsubdued'
(Mephisto in 'Faust', Act i. Faust's study.). The path
in the other direction, back to complete satisfaction,
is as a rule barred by the resistances that maintain
the repressions, and thus there remains nothing for it
but to proceed in the other, still unobstructed direction,
that of development, without, however, any prospect
of being able to bring the process to a conclusion or
to attain the goal. What occurs in the development
of a neurotic phobia, which is really nothing but an
attempt at flight from the satisfaction of an instinct,
gives us the prototype for the origin of this ostensible
'impulse towards perfection' which, however, we cannot
possibly ascribe to all human beings. The dynamic
conditions are, it is true, quite generally present, but
the economic relations seem only in rare cases to
favour the phenomenon.

VI

I

Our discussion so far results in the establishing ol
a sharp antithesis between the ' ego-instincts ' and the
sexual instincts, the former impelling towards death
and the latter towards the preservation of life, a result
which we ourselves must surely find in many respects
far from adequate. Further, only for the former can
we properly claim the consen'^ative — or, better,
regressive — character corresponding to a repetition-
compulsion. For according to our hypothesis the ego-
instincts spring from the vitalising of inanimate matter,
and have as their aim the reinstatement of lifelessness.
As to the sexual instincts on the other hand : it is obvious
that they reproduce primitive states of the living being,
but the aim they strive for by every means is the
union of two germ cells which are specifically
differentiated. If tliis union does not take place, then
the germ cell dies like all other elements of the multi-
cellular organism. Only on this condition can the sexual
function prolong life and lend it the semblance of
immortality. Of what important happening then in the
process of development of the living substance is sexual

5+

n

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 55

reproduction, or its forerunner, the copulation of two
individual protozoa, the repetition? That question we
do not Imow how to answer, and therefore we should
feel relieved if the whole structure of our arguments
were to prove erroneous. The opposition of ego- (or
death-) instincts and sexual (life-) instincts would then
disappear, and the repetition-compulsion would there-
upon also lose the significance we have attributed to it.
Let us turn back therefore to one of the assumptions
we interpolated, in the expectation that it will permit
of exact refutation. We built up further conclusions
on the basis of the assumption that aU life must die
from internal causes. We made this assumption so
Ught-heartedly because it does not seem to us to be
one. We are accustomed so to thinly, and every
poet encourages us in the idea. Perhaps we have re-
solved so to think because there lies a certain con-
solation in this belief. If man must himself die, after
first losing his most beloved ones by death, he would
prefer that his life be forfeit to an inexorable law of
nature, the sublime Avdyxri, than to a mere accident
which perhaps could have been in some way avoided.
But perhaps this belief in the incidence of death as
the necessary consequence of an inner law of being
is also only one of those illusions that we have fashioned
for ourselves * so as to endure the burden of existence '.
It is certainly not a primordial belief: the idea of a
'natural death' is alien to primitive races; they ascribe
every death occurring among themselves to the in-
fluence of an enemy or an evil spirit. So let us not
neglect to turn to biological science to test the belief.

56 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

If we do so, we may be astonished to find how
little agreement exists among biologists on the question
of natural death, that indeed the very conception of
death altogether eludes them. The fact of a certain
average length of life, at least among the higher
animals, is of course an argument for death from inner
causes, but the circumstance that certain large animals
and giant trees reach a very great age, one not to
be computed up to now, once more removes this im-
pression. According to the grandiose conception of
W. Fliess all the vital phenomena — and certainly also
death — are linked with the accomplishment of certain
periods of time, among which there finds expression
the dependence of two living substances, one male and
one female, upon the solar year. But observations
of how easily and extensively the influences of external
forces can alter vital manifestations, especially in the
plant world, as to their occurrence in time, can hasten
or retard them, militate against the rigidity of the
formulae laid down by Fliess and leaves at least doubt-
ful the universality of the laws he sought to establish.

The treatment of these themes, death and the
duration of life among organisms, in the works of
A. Weismann * possesses the greatest interest for us.
This investigator originated the distinction of living
substance into a mortal and an immortal half; the
mortal is the body in the narrower sense, the soma,
which alone is subject to natural death; while the
germ cells are potentially immortal, in so far as they

' Ober die Dauer des Lebens, 1S82; Ober Leben und
Tod, 2. Aufl., 1892; Das Keimplasma, 1892, etc.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 57

are capable under certain favourable conditions of
developing into a new individual, or expressed other-
wise, of surrounding themselves with a new soma. ^

What here arrests our attention is the unexpected
analogy with our conception developed along so
different a line of thought. Weismann, who is con-
sidering living substance morphologically, recognises in
it a constituent which is the prey of death, the soma,
the body viewed apart from sex or heredity elements,
and, on the other hand, an immortal part, the germ-
plasm, which serves the purpose of preservation of
the species, of propagation. We have fixed our attention
not on the living matter, but on the forces active in
it, and have been led to distinguish two kinds of in-
stincts: those the purpose of which is to guide life
towards death, and the others, the sexual instincts,
which perpetually strive for, and bring about, the
renewal of life. This sounds like a dynamic corollary
to Weismann's morphological theory.

This appearance of an important correspondence
vanishes as soon as we examine Weismann's pro-
nouncement on the problem of death. For Weismann
admits the differentiation between the mortal soma
and the immortal germ-plasm only in relation to multi-
cellular organisms; with the unicellular beings the in-
dividual and the reproductive cell are still one and
the same. 2 The unicellular he thus affirms to be
potentially immortal; death appears only among the
metazoa, the multicellular. This death of the higher

1 Ober Leben und Tod, 2. Aufi., S. 20.

2 Ober die Dauer des Lebens, S. 38.

58 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

organisms is, it is true, a natural one, a death from
inner causes, but it does not depend on an inherent
quality of the living substance, ^ is not to be conceived
as an absolute necessity based on the nature of life. ^
Death is rather a purposive contrivance, a phenomenon
of adaptation to the external conditions of life, because
after the differentiation of the corporeal cells into soma
and germ-plasm the indefinite prolongation of the life
of the individual would have become a quite inex-
pedient luxury. With the appearance of this differentiation
among multicellular organisms death became possible
and expedient. Since then the soma of the higher
organisms dies after a certain time from internal causes;
the protozoa, however, remain immortal. Propagation,
on the other hand, was not first introduced with death;
it is on the contrary a primordial property of living
matter like growth, in which it originated, and life

has gone on uninterruptedly from its inception on the
earth.3

It is easy to see that to concede natural death to
the higher organisms does not greatly help our case.
If death is a late acquisition of life, then death-instincts
traceable to the beginning of life on this planet no
longer come into question. i\Iulticellular organisms may
continue to die from internal causes, whether defect
of differentiation or imperfections of their metabolism;
it possesses no interest for the inquiry on which we
are engaged. Such a conception and derivation of

1 Ober Leben und Tod, 2. Aufl., S. 67.
^ Ober die Dauer des Lebens, S. 33.
* Ober Leben und Tod. Conclusion.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 59

death certainly more nearly approaches the ordinary
human view of it than the unwonted assumption of
'death-instincts'.

The discussion which has centred round Weismann's
assertations has in my opinion had no decisive result
in any direction. ^ Many writers have reverted to the
standpoint of Goette (1883) who saw in death the
direct consequence of propagation. Hartmann does not
regard as the characteristic of death the appearance
of a 'corpse', a piece of living substance which has
'died off', but defines it as the 'definitive end of
individual development'. In this sense protozoa are
also subject to deathj with them death invariably coin-
cides with propagation, but it is, so to speak, dis-
guised by the latter, for the whole substance of the
parent organism may be absorbed directly into the
new individuals.^

The interest of the inquiry was soon directed towards
testing experimentally the asserted immortality of living
substance in unicellular beings. An American, named
Woodruff, instituted a culture of a ciliated infusorium,
a 'slipper-animalcule', which reproduces itself by division
into two individuals; each time he isolated one of the
products and put it into fresh water. He traced the
propagation to the 3029th generation, when he dis-
continued the experiment. The last descendant of the

1 Cp. Max Hartmann: Tod und Fortpflanzung, 1906;
Alex. Lipschiltz: 'Warum wir sterben', Kosmosbiicher, 1914;
Franz Doflein: Das Problem des Todes und der Unsterblich-
keit bei den Pflanzen und Tieren, 1919-

2 Hartmann: loc. cit, S. 29.

6o Beyond the Pleasure Principle

first slipper-animalcule was just as lively as its original
ancestor, without any sign of age or degeneration : if
such numbers are convincing, the immortality of protozoa
seemed thus experimentally demonstrable. ^

Other investigators have arrived at other results.
Maupas, Calkins, etc., found, in contradiction to Woodruff,
that even these infusoria after a certain number of
divisions become weaker, decrease in size, lose a portion
of their organisation, and finally die if they do not
encounter certain invigorating influences. According to
this, protozoa die after a phase of senile decay just
like higher animals, in direct contravention of what
is maintained by Weismann, who recognises in death
a late acquisition of living organisms.

Taking the net result of these researches together,
we note two facts which seem to afford us a firm
foothold. First: if the animaiculae, at a time when
they as yet show no signs of age, have the oppor-
tunity of mingling with each other, of 'conjugat-
ing '—afterwards again separating— then they remain
exempt from age, they have been 'rejuvenated'. This
conjugation is doubtless the prototype of sexual pro-
pagation of higher organisms: as yet it has nothing
to do with multiplication, it is confined to the mingl-
ing of the substances of both individuals (Weismann's
Amphimixis). The invigorating influence of conjugation
can also be replaced, however, by certain modes of
stimulation, changes in the composition of the nutrient
fluid, raising of temperature, or shaking. The famous

* For this and what follows see Lipschutz ; Loc. cit., S. 26
and 52i=f.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 6i

experiment of J. Loeb will be recalled, who by the
application of certain chemical stimuli to the ova of
sea-urchins brought about processes of division which
usually take place only after fertilisation.

Secondly: it is after all probable that the infusoria
are brought to a natural death through their own vital
process, for the contradiction between Woodruifs
findings and those of others arises from Woodruff having
placed each generation in fresh nutrient fluid. When
he refrained from doing so he observed, as did the
other investigators, that the generations showed signs
of age. He concluded that the animalculae were injured
by the products of metabolism which they gave off
into the surrounding fluid, and was then able to prove
convincingly that only the products of zVi" own metabolism
had this effect in bringing about the death of the
generarion. For in a solution over-saturated with waste
products of a distantly related species the very same
animalculae throve excellently which when allowed to
accumulate in their own nutrient fluid inevitably perished.
Thus, left to itself, the infusorium dies a natural death
from the imperfect disposal of its own metabolic products :
perhaps all higher animals die ultimately from the same-
inability.

At this point the doubt may then occur to us
whether any good purpose has been served in looking
for the answer to the question as to natural death in
the study of the protozoa. The primitive organisation
of these forms of life may conceal from us important
conditions which are present m them too, but can be
recognised only among the higher animals where they

I

62 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

have achieved for themselves a morphological ex-
pression. If we abandon the morphological point of
view for the dynamic, it may be a matter of entire
indifference to us whether the natural death of the
protozoa can be proved or not. With them the
substance later recognised as immortal has not yet
separated itself in any way from the part subject to
death. The instinctive forces which endeavour to
conduct life to death might be active in them too
from the beginning and yet their effect might be so
obscured by that of the forces tending to preserve
life that any direct evidence of their existence becomes
hard to estabHsh. We have heard, it is true, that the
observations of biologists allow us to assume such
death-ward tending inner processes also among the
protozoa. But even if the protozoa prove to be im-
mortal in Weismann's sense, his assertion that death
is a late acquisition holds good only of the outward
manifestations of death, and does not invalidate any
hypothesis as to such processes as impel towards
death. Our expectation that biology would entirely
put out of court any recognition of the death-instincts
has not been fulfilled. It is open to us to occupy
ourselves further with this possibility, if we have other
reasons for doing so. The striking resemblance between
Weismann's separation of soma and germ-plasm and
our distinction between the death and the Hfe-instincts
remains unshaken, moreover, and retains its value.

Let us dwell for a moment on this exquisitely
dualistic conception of the instinctive life. According
to E. Hering's theory of the processes in living matter 1

E

^

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 63

there course through it uninterruptedly two kinds of
processes of opposite direction, one anabolic, assimilatory,
the other katabolic, disintegrating. Shall we venture
to recognise in these two directions of the vital
processes the activity of our two instinctive tendencies,
the life-instincts and the death-instincts? And we cannot
disguise another fact from ourselves, that we have
steered unawares into the haven of Schopenhauer's
philosophy for whom death is the 'real result' of life ^
and therefore in so far its aim, while the sexual instinct
is the incarnation of the will to live.

Let us boldly try to go a step further. According
to general opinion the union of numerous cells into
one vital connection, the multiceUularity of organisms,
has become a means to the prolongation of their span
of life. One cell helps to preserve the life of the
others, and the cell-community can go on Hving even
if single cells have to perish. We have already heard
that also conjugation, the temporary mingling of two
unicellular entities, has a preservative and rejuvenating
effect on both. The attempt might consequently be
made to transfer the Libido theory yielded by psycho-
analysis to the relationship of the cells to one another
and to imagine that it is the vital or sexual instincts
active in every cell that take the other cells for their
'object', partially neutralise their death-instincts, i. e. the
processes stimulated by these, and so preserve those
cells in life, while other cells do the same for them,

1 'Ober die anscheinende Absichtlichkeit im Schicksale
des Einzelnen'. GroGherzog Wilhelm Ernst Auflage, Bd. IV,
S. 268.

64 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

and still others sacrifice themselves in the exercise of

this libidinous function. The germ cells themselves

would behave in a completely 'narcissistic^ fashion, .^^—

as we are accustomed to describe it in the theory "^B

of the neuroses when an individual concentrates his

libido on the ego, and gives out none of it for the

charging of objects. The germ cells need their libido

— the activity of their vital instincts — for themselves ■

as a provision for their later enormous constructive

activity. Perhaps the cells of the malignant growths

that destroy the organism can also be considered to

be narcissistic in the same sense. Pathology is indeed

prepared to regard the kernels of them as congenital

in origin and to ascribe embryonal attributes to them.

Thus the Libido of our sexual instincts would coincide

with the Eros of poets and philosophers, which holds

together all things living.

At this point opportunity offers of reviewing the
gradual development of our Libido theory. The analysis
of the transference-neuroses forced on our notice in
the first place the opposition between ' sexual instincts '
which are directed towards an object and other
instincts which we only imperfectly discerned and
provisionally described as 'ego-instincts'. Among the
latter those which subserve the self-preservation of
the individual had the first claim for recognition. What
other distinctions were to be made, it was impossible
to say. No knowledge would have been so important
for the establishment of a sound psychology as some
approximate understanding of the common nature and
possible differences of the instincts. But in no department

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 65

of psychology did one grope more in the dark.
Everyone posited as many instincts or 'fundamental
instincts' as he pleased, and contrived with them just
as the ancient Greek philosophers did with their four
elements: earth, air, fire and water. Psycho-Analysis,
which could not dispense with some kind of hypothesis
as to the instincts, adhered to begin with to the
popular distinction, typically represented by the phrase
* hunger and love'. It was at least no new arbitrary
creation. With this one adequately covered a consider-
able distance in the analysis of the psychoneuroses.
The conception of 'sexuality' — and therewith that of
a sexual instinct — certainly had to be extended, till
it included much that did not come into the category
of the function of propagation, and this led to outcry
enough in a severe and superior or merely hypocritical
world.

The next step followed when Psycho-Analysis was
:able to feel its way a little nearer to the psychological
ego, which was at first known to us only as a re-
pressing, censoring agency, capable of constituting
defences and reaction-formations. Critical and other
far-seeing minds had indeed for a long time raised
objections to the narrowing of the libido concept
-down to the energy of the sexual instinct as directed
to the object. But they omitted to say whence they
•obtained this fuller comprehension, and failed to deduce
anything from it of value for Psycho-Analysis. In the
course of more deliberate advance it came under
psycho-analytic observation how regularly libido is
withdrawn from the object and directed towards the

^

'^

66 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

ego (introversion) J and through the study of the libido-
development of the child in its earliest phases it
became clear that the ego is the true and original
reservoir of the libido, which 'is extended to the object
only from this. The ego took its place as one of the
sexual objects and was immediately recognised as the
choicest among them. Where the libido thus remained
attached to.the ego it was termed * narcissistic '.^ This
narcissistic libido was naturally also the expression of
the energy of sexual instincts in the analytical sense
which now had to be identified with the ' instincts of
self-preservation', the existence of which was admitted
from the first. Whereupon the original antithesis
between the ego-instincts and the sexual instincts
became inadequate. A part of the ego-instincts was
recognised as libidinous: in the ego sexual instincts
were found to be active — probably in addition to
others^ nevertheless one is justified in saying that the
old formula, viz. that a psych oneurosis arises out of
a conflict between the ego-instincts and the sexual
instincts, contained nothing that we should have to
reject to-day. Only, the difference of the two kinds
of instincts which was supposed originally to be in
some kind of way qualitative has now to be defined
otherwise, namely on a topographical basis. In particular
the transference neurosis, the real object of psycho-
analytic study, is still seen to be the result of a conflict
between the ego and libidinous investment of an object.

■ 'Zur Einfuhrung des Narzissmus', Jahrbuch der Psycho-
analyse, Bd. Vf, 1914, and Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur
Neurosenlehre, IV. Folge, igiS.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 67

We are the more compelled now to accentuate
the libidinous character of the self-preservative instincts, .
since we are venturing on the further step of recognising
the sexual instinct as the Eros, the all-sustaining, and
of deriving the narcissistic libido of the ego from the
sum of the libido quantities that bring about the
mutual adherence of the somatic cells. But we now
find ourselves suddenly confronted with this question :
If the self-presei-vative instincts are also of a libidinous
kind, then perhaps we have no other instincts at all
than libidinous ones. There are at least no others
apparent. In that event we must admit the critics to
be in the right who from the first have suspected
that psycho-analysis makes sexuality the explanation
of everything, or the innovators like Jung who, quickly
making up their mind, have used 'libido' as a synonym
for 'instinctive force' in general. Is that not so?

This result was at all events one not intended by
us. On the contrary, we took as our starting point
a sharp distinction between the ego-instincts ( = death-
instincts) and the sexual instincts (= life-instincts). We
were prepared indeed to reckon even the alleged self-
preservative instincts of the ego among death-instincts, k
a position which we have since corrected and with- '
drawn from. Our standpoint was a dualistic one from
the beginning, and is so to-day more sharply than
before, since we no longer call the contrasting tendencies
egoistic and sexual instincts, but life-instincts and
death-instincts. Jung's libido theory, on the other hand,
is a monistic one; that he has applied the term libido
to his only instinctive energy was bound to create

68 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

confusion, but should not have any further effect on
us. We suspect that there are in the ego other
instincts than those of self-preservation; only we ought
to be in a position to demonstrate them. Unfortunately
so little progress has been made in the analysis of
the ego that this proof becomes extraordinarily difficult
of attainment. The libidinous instincts of the ego may
indeed be conjoined in a special way with other ego-
instincts of which we as yet know nothing. Before
ever we had clearly recognised narcissism, the con-
jecture was already present in the minds of psycho-
analysts that the 'ego-instincts' had drawn libidinous
components to themselves. But these are merely vague
possibilities which our opponents will hardly take into
account. It remains an awkward fact that analysis up
to now has only put us in the position of demonstrating
libidinous impulses. The conclusion that therefore
there are no others is one to which we do not
assent.

In the obscurity that at present shrouds the theory
of instinct, we shall certainly not do well to reject
any idea that promises to throw light. We have made
the antithesis between the life and death instincts our
point of departure. Object-love itself displays a second
such polarity, that of love (tenderness) and hate
(aggression). What if we could succeed in bringing
these two polarities into relation with each other, in
tracing the one to the other! We have long re-
cognised a sadistic component of the sexual instinct :i

» Drei Abhandlurgen zur Sexualtheorie, from the First
EditioQ, 1905, onwards.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 6g

it can, as we know, attain independence, and as a
perversion, dominate the whole sexual trend of a
person. In one of the organisations which I have
termed 'pregenital' it appears as a dominating part-
instinct. But how is one to derive the sadistic impulse,
which aims at the injui-y of the object, from the life-
sustaining Eros ! Does not the assumption suggest
itself that this sadism is properly a death-instinct which
is driven apart from the ego by the influence of the
narcissistic libido, so that it becomes manifest only
in reference to the object? It then enters the service
of the sexual function; at the oral stage of organisation
of the libido, amorous possession is still one and the
same as annihilation of the object; later the sadistic
impulse" separates itself, and at last at the stage of
the genital primacy it takes over with the aim of
propagation the function of so far overpowering the
sex-object as the carrying out of the sexual act
demands. One might even say that the sadism expelled
from the ego has acted as guide to the libidinous
components of the sexual instinct; these later press
on towards the object. Where the original sadism
experiences no abatement or fusion, the well-known
hate-love ambivalence of the love-life is set up.

If the above assumption is justifiable then we have
met the challenge of demonstrating an example of a
death-instinct—though a displaced one. This conception,
however, is far from being evident, and creates a
frankly mystical impression. We incur the suspicion
of having attempted at all costs to find a way out
of an impasse. We may appeal against this verdict

^

70 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

by saying that the assumption is no new one, that
we have once before made it when there was no
question of an impasse. Clinical observations forced
upon us the view that the part-instinct of masochism,
the one complementary to sadism, is to be understood
as a recoil of the sadism on to the ego itself. 1 A
turning of the instinct from the object to the ego is,
however, essentially the same as a turning from the
ego to the object, which is just now the new idea in
question. Masochism, the turning of the instinct against
the self, would then be in reality a return to an
earlier phase of this, a regression. The exposition
I then gave of masochism needs correction in one
respect as being too exclusive: masochism may also
be what I was there concerned io deny, primary. ^

Let us return, however, to the life-sustaining

sexual instincts. We have already learned from the

investigation of the protoi:oa that the mingling of

■ See SexuaJtheorie, 4. Aufl., 1920, and 'Triebe und

Inebsdncksale' in Sammlung kleiner Schriften, IV. Fo]<^c

= A considerable part of this speculation has been "anti-
cipated m a work which is full of valuable matter and ideas
but IS unfortunately not entirely clear to me; (Sabina Spielrein:
Die Destruktioii als Ursache des Werdens', Jakrbuch fur
Psychoanalyse, IV, 191 2). She designates the sadistic component
as 'destructive'. In still another way A. Starcke (Jnleiding
by de vcrtaling von S. Freud, De sexuele beschavingsmoral
etc., 1914) has attempted to identify the libido concept itself
with tlie biological concept of an impulsion towards death
which is to be assumed on theoretical grounds (Cp. also
Rank: 'Der Kiinstlcr"). All these attempts, as the one in the
text, indicate how much the need is felt for a clarification
in the theory of instinct which we do not yet possess.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 7 1

two individuals without consequent partition, just as
copulation between two individuals which soon after
separate, has a strengthening and rejuvenating effect
(v. s. Lipschutz), There is no sign of degeneration in
their descendents, and they also seem to have gained
the capacity for withstanding^ for a longer time the
injurious results of their own metabolism. I think that
this one observation may be taken as a prototype of
the effect of sexual intercourse also. But in what way
does the blending of two slightly different cells bring
about such a renewal of life? The experiment which
substitutes for conjugation among protozoa the effect
of chemical or even of mechanical stimuli ' admits of
our giving a reply v^'ith certainty : it comes about by
the introduction of new stimulus-masses. This is in
close agreement with the hypothesis that the life-
process of an individual leads, from internal causes,
to the equalising of chemical tensions: i.e. to death,
while union with an individually different living substance
increases these tensions— so to speak, introduces new
vital differentia, which then have to be again lived
out. For this difference between the two there must
naturally be one or more optima. Our recognition that
the ruling tendency of psychic life, perhaps of nerve
life altogether, is the struggle for reduction, keeping
at a constant level, or removal of the inner stimulus-
tension (the Nirvana-principle, as Barbara Low terms it)
—a struggle which comes to expression in the pleasure-
principle— is indeed one of our strongest motives for
beheving in the existence of death-instincts.

1 loc. cit.

72 Beyo7id the Pleasure Principle

But the course of our argument is still disturbed
by an uneasy feeling that just in the case of. the
sexual instinct we are unable to demonstrate th at
character of a repetition-compulsion which first put
us on the track of the death-instincts. It is true that
the realm of embryonic developmental processes offers
an abundance of such repetition phenomena^ — the two
germ cells of sexual propagation and their life-history
are themselves only repetitions of the beginning of
organic Hfe : but the essential feature in the processes
designed by the sexual instinct is nevertheless the
mingling of two cells. Only by this is the immortality
of the living substance among the higher forms of
life assured.

To put it in other words: we have to make
enquiry into the origin of sexual propagation and the
source of the sexual instincts in general, a task before
which the lay mind quails and which even specialists
have not yet been able to solve. Let us, therefore,
make a condensed selection from all the conflicting
accounts and opinions of whatever can be brought
into relation with our train of thought.

One view deprives the problem of propagation of
its mysterious attraction by representing it as part of
the phenomenon of growth (multiplication by division,
germination, budding). The arising of propagation by
means of germ-cells sexually differentiated might be
conceived, in accordance with the sober Darwinian mode
of thought, as a way of maintaining and utilising for
further development the advantage of the amphimixis
which resulted in the first instance from the fortuitous

. Beyond the Pleasure Principle 73

conjugation of two protozoa. ^ 'Sex' would not thus
be of very ancient origin and the extraordinarily
powerful instincts which aim at bringing about sexual
union would thereby repeat something which once
chanced to happen and since became established as
being advantageous.

The same question now recurs as arose in respect
of death— namely, whether the protozoa can be credited
with anything beyond what they exhibit, and whether
we may assume that forces and processes which become
perceptible only in the case of the higher animals did
first arise in the more primitive. For our puipose the
view of sexuality mentioned above helps very little.
The objection may be raised against it that it pre-
supposes the existence of life-instincts as already
operative in the simplest forms of life, for otherwise
conjugation, which works against the expiration of life
and makes the task of dying harder, would not have
been retained and elaborated, but would have been
avoided. If, then, we are not to abandon the hypothesis
of death-instincts maintained, we must associate them
with life-instincts from the beginning. But we must
admit that we are working here at an equation with
two unknown quantities. Anything else that science
can tell us of the origin of sexuality amounts to so
1 Although Weismann (Das Keimplasma, 1892) denies
even this advantage: 'Fertilisation in no way signifies a
rejuvenation or renewing of life.— it is in no way necessary
for the prolongation of life ; it is nothing but a device for
making possible the blending of two different inheritance
tendencies.' Still, lie considers an increase of variability in
living organisms to be the result of such blending.

74 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

little that this problem may be likened to an obscurity

into which not even the ray of an hypothesis has

penetrated. In quite another quarter, however, we

encounter such an hypothesis, but it is of so fantastic

a kind— assuredly a myth rather than a scientific

explanation — that I should not venture to brina it

forward if it did not exactly fulfil the one condition

for the fulfilment of which we are labouring. That is

to say, it derives an instinct from the necessity, for the

rei7istatement of an earlier sitnatioti.

1 refer, of course, to the theory that Plato in his

Symposium puts into the mouth of Aristophanes and

which deals not only with the origin of the sexual

instinct but also with its most important variations in

relation to the object. 'Human nature was once quite

other than now. Originally there were three sexes,

three and not as to-day two : besides the male and

the female there existed a third sex which had an

equal share in the two first. ... In these beings

everything was double : thus, they had four hands

and four feet, two faces, two genital parts, and so

on. Then Zeus allowed himself to be persuaded to

cut these beings in two, as one divides pears to stew

them. . . . When all nature was divided in this way,

to each human being came the longing for his own

other half, and the two halves embraced and entwined

their bodies and desired to ^rozv tocetker ao-aiii. ' ^

■3 i5 o>

' I am indebted to Prof, Heinrich Gomperz of Vienna
for the following indications as to the origin of the Platonic
myth, which I repeat partly in his own words : I should like
to call attention to the fact that essentially the same theory

r

Beyond the Pleasure Prhiciple

/ D

Are we to follow the clue of the poet-philosopher
and make the daring assumption that living substance
was at the time of its animation rent into small
particles, which since that time strive for reunion by
means of the sexual instincts? That these instincts —
in which the chemical affinity of inanimate matter is

is also to be found in the Upantshads. The ]iri]iad-Aranyaka
Upanishad 1,4, 3 (Deussen, 60 Upanishads des Veda, S. 393),
where the creation of the world from the Atmaii (the selt
or ego) is described, has the following passage 'Nor did he
(tlie Atman, the self or ego) experience any joy, and for
that reason no one has joy when he is alone. So he longed
for a partner. He was as big as a woman and a man together
when they embrace. He divided himself into two parts, wliich
made a husband and a wife. This body is therefore one half
of the self, according to Yajnavalkya. And for the same
reason this empty space here becomes filled by the woman.'

The Brihad-Aranyaka Upanishad is the oldest of all the
Upanishads, and no expert authority would date it later tlian
800 B. C. In opposition to the prevailing opinion I sliould
not like definitely to deny the possibility of Plato having
been dependent, even though very indirectly, on these hidian
thoughts, for this possibility cannot be absolutely put aside
even for the doctrine of rc-in carnation. A dependence of this
sort, first conveyed through Pythagoras, would scarcely
detract from the signilicance of the coincidence in thought,
for Plato would not liave adopted any such story conveyed
in some way from Oriental traditions, let alone have given
it such an important place, had he not himself felt the truth
contained in It to be illuminating.

In an article by K. Ziegler ('Menschen- und Wcltwerden',
Neue yahrbiichcr fur das klassiscJie Altertmn. 191 3, Band XXXI),
which contains a systematic investigation of the thought in
question, it is traced back to Babylonian ideas.

76 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

continued — passing through the realm of the protozoa
gradually overcome all hindrances set to their striving
by an environment charged with stimuli dangerous to
life, and are impelled by it to form a protecting
covering layer? And that these dispersed fragments of
living substance thus achieve a multicellular organisation,
and finally transfer to the germ-celJs in a highly
concentrated form the instinct for reunion? I think
this is the point at which to break off.

But not without a few words of critical reflection
in conclusion. I might be asked whether I am myself
convinced of the views here set forward, and if so
how far. My answer would be that I am neither con-
vinced myself, nor am I seeking to arouse conviction
in others. More accurately: I do not Icnow how far
I believe in them. It seems to me that the affective
feature 'conviction' need not come into consideration
at all here. One may surely give oneself up to a line
of thought, and foUow it up as far as it leads, simply
out of scientific curiosity, or— if you prefer— as ad-
vocatus diaboli, without, however, making a pact with
the devil about it. I am perfectly aware that the third
step in the theory of instinct which I am taking here
cannot claim the same certainty as the two former ones,
viz. the extending of the conception of sexuality and
the establishing of narcissism. These innovations were
direct translations of observation into theoiy, subject to
no greater sources of error than is inevitable in anything
of the kind. The assertion of the regressive character
of instinct rests also, it is true, on observed material,
namely on the facts of the repetition-compulsion.

Beyond the Pleasure Principle yy

But perhaps I have over-estimated their significance.
At all events there is no way of working out this
idea except by combining facts with pure imagination
many times in succession, and thereby departing far
from observation. We know that the final result
becomes the more untrustworthy the oftener one does
tliis in the course of building up a theory, but the
precise degree of uncertainty is not ascertainable. One
may thereby have made a brilliant discovery or one
may have gone ignominiously astray. In such work
I trust little to so-called intuition: what I have seen
of it seems to me to be the result of a certain im-
partiahty of the intellect — only that people unfortunately
are seldom impartial where they are concerned with
the ultimate things, the great problems of science and
of life. My belief is that there everyone is under the
sway of preferences deeply rooted within, into the
hands of which he unwittingly plays as he pursues his
speculation. Where there are such good grounds for
•distrust, only a tepid feeling of indulgence is possible
towards the results of one's own mental labours. But
I hasten to add that such self-criticism does not render
obligatory any special tolerance of divergent opinions.
One may inexorably reject theories that are contra-
<licted by the very first steps in the analysis of ob-
servation and yet at the same time be aware that
those one holds oneself have only a tentative validity.
Were we to appraise our speculations upon the life
and death-instincts it would disturb us but little that
so many processes go on which are surprising and hard
to picture, such as one instinct being expelled by

1

7S Beyond ihe Pleasure Prindple

others, or turning from the ego to an object, and so
on. This comes only from our being obliged to operate
with scientitic terms, i. e. with the metaphorical ex-
pressions peculiar to psychology (or more correctly:
psychology of the deeper layers). Otherwise we should
not be able to describe the corresponding processes
at all, nor in fact even to have remarked them. The
shortcomings of our description would probably disappear
if for the psychological terms we could substitute
physiological or chemical ones. These too only con-
stitute a metaphorical language, but one familiar to
us for a much longer time and perhaps also simpler.

On the other hand we wish to make it quite clear
that the uncertainty of our speculation is enhanced in
a high degree by the necessity of borrowing from
biological science. Biology is truly a realm of limitless
possibUities; we have the most surprising revelations
to expect from it, and cannot conjecture what answers
it will offer in some decades to the questions we have
put to it. Perhaps they may be such as to overthrow
the whole artificial structure of hypotheses. If that is
so, someone may ask why does one undertake such
work as the one set out in this article, and why should
it be communicated to the world? Well, I cannot
deny that some of the analogies, relations and
connections thereia traced appeared to me worthy of
consideration.'

1 I would here subjoin a few words to clarify our nomen-
clature, one which has undergone a certain development in
the course of our discussion. What 'sexual instincts' are, we
knew through their relation to the sexes and to the function

1

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 79

of propagation. We then retained this term when the findings
of psycho-analysis compelled us to regard its relation to
propagation as less close. With the discovery of narcissistic
libido, and the extension of the libido-concept to the individual
cells, the sexual instinct became for us transformed into the
Eros that endeavours to impel the separate parts of living
matter to one another and to hold them together; what is
commonly called the sexual instinct appears as that part of
the Eros that is turned towards the object. Our speculation
then supposes that this Eros is at work from the beginnings of
life, manifesting itself as the 'life-instinct' in contradistincfion
to the 'death-instinct' wliich developed through the animation
of the inorganic. It endeavours to solve the riddle of life by
the hypothesis of these two instincts striving with each other
from the very beginning. The transformation which the concept
of the ' eg o- instincts ' has undergone is perhaps harder to
review. Originally we applied this term to all those instjnct-
directions — not better known tons — which can be distinguished
from the sexual instincts that have the object as their aim,
thus contrasting the ego-instincts with the sexual ones, the
expression of which is the libido. Later on we approached
the analysis of the ego and saw tliat a part also of the
'eo-o-instincts' is of a libidinous nature, having taken its own
self as an object. These narcissistic instincts of self-preserv-
ation therefore had now to be reckoned to the libidinous
sexual instincts. The contrast between egoistic and sexual
instincts was now converted into one between egoistic and
object-instincts, both libidinous in nature. In its place, however,
arose a new contrast between libidinous (ego and object)
instincts and others whose existence can be determined in
the ego and can perhaps be detected in the destruction-
instincts. Speculation transforms this contrast into that of
life-instincts (Eros) and death-instincts.

I '

VII

if this attempt to reinstate an earlier condition
really is so universal a characteristic of the instincts,
we should not find it surprising that so many processes
in the psychic life are performed independently of the
pleasure-principle. This characteristic would communi-

} ' cate itself to every part-instinct and would in that

case concern a harking back to a definite point on

' ' the path of development. But all that the pleasure-

principle has not yet acquired power over is not
therefore necessarily in opposition to it, and we have
not yet solved the problem of determining the relation
of the instinctive repetition processes to the domination
of the pleasure-principle.

We have recognised that one of the earliest and
most important functions of the psychic apparatus is
I to 'bind' the instreaming instinctive excitations, to

substitute the 'secondary process' for the 'primary
process 'dominating them, and to transform their freely
mobile energy-charge into a predominantly quiescent
(tonic) charge. During this transformation no attention
•can be paid to the development of 'pain', but the

" 80

'

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 8 1

pleasure-principle is not thereby annulled. On the con-
trary, the transformation takes place in the service of
the pleasure-principle; the binding is an act of prepar-
ation, which introduces and secures its sovereignty.

Let us distinguish function and tendency more
sharply than we have hitherto done. The pleasure-
principle is then a tendency which subserves a certain
function— namely, that of rendering tlie psychic apparatus
as a whole free from any excitation, or to keep the
amount of excitation constant or as low as possible.
We cannot yet decide with certainty for either of these
conceptions, but we note that the function so defined
would partake of the most universal tendency of all
living matter — to return to the peace of the inorganic
world. We all know by experience that the greatest
pleasure it is possible for us to attain, that of the
sexual act, is bound up with the temporary quenching
of a greatly heightened state of excitation. The 'binding'
of instinct-excitation, however, would be a preparatory
function, which would direct the excitation towards
its ultimate adjustment in the pleasure of discharge.

In the same connection, the question arises whether
the sensations of pleasure and 'pain' can emanate
as well from the bound as from the ' unbound' excitation-
processes. It appears quite beyond doubt that the
'unbound', the primary, processes give rise to much
more intense sensations in both directions than the
bound ones, those of the 'secondary processes'. The
primary processes are also the earlier in point of time;
at the beginning of mental life there are no others,
and we may conclude that it the pleasure-principle

82 Beyond the Pleasure Principle

were not already in action in respect to them, it would
not establish itself in regard to the later processes.
We thus arrive at the result which at bottom is not
a simple one, that the search for pleasure manifests
itself with far greater intensity at the beginning of
psychic life than later on, but less unrestrictedly: it
has to put up with repeated breaches. At a maturer
age the dominance of the pleasure-principle is very
much more assured, though this principle as little
escapes limitations as all the other instincts. In any
case, whatever it is in the process of excitation that
engenders the sensations of pleasure and ' pain ' must
be equally in existence when the secondary process
is at work as with the primary process.

This would seem to be the place to institute further
studies. Our consciousness conveys to us from within
not only the sensations of pleasure and 'pain', but
also those of a peculiar tension, which again may be
either pleasurable or painful in itself. Now is it the
'bound' and 'unbound' energy processes that we
have to distinguish from each other by the help of
these sensations, or is the sensation of tension to be
related to the absolute quantity, perhaps to the level
of the charge, while the pleasure-pain series refers to
the changes in the quantity of charge in the unit of
time? We must also be struck with the fact that the
life-instincts have much more to do with our inner
perception, since they make their appearance as dis-
turbers of the peace, and continually bring along with
them states of tension the resolution of which is ex-
perienced as pleasure; while the death-instincts, on the

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 83

other hand, seem to fulfil their function unostentatiously.
The pleasure-principle seems directly to subserve the
death-instincts j it keeps guard, of com-se, also over
the external stimuli, which are regarded as dangers
by both kinds ot instincts, but in particular over the
inner increases in stimulation which have for their aim
the complication of the task of living. At this point
innumerable other questions arise to which no answer
can yet be given. We must be patient and wait for
other means and opportunities for investigation. We
must hold ourselves too in readiness to abandon the
path we have followed for a time, if it should seem
to lead to no good result. Only such * true believers '
as expect from science a substitute for the creed they
have relinquished will take it amiss if the investigator
develops his views further or even transforms them.

For the rest we may find consolation in the words
of a poet for the slow rate of progress in scientific
knowledge :

Whither we cannot fly, we must go limping.
The Scripture saith that limping is no sin. '

' Ruckert in the 'Makamen des Hariri.'

jaioq KJdi -/. , *: "• ■ :{-■,: .'.j; .■.-■ , ^,

^yv/ani; Oi^ rf:>jf!// :. ; ..•'.;i: c;r;ob-'.e.f;p ■.■;:;;■■

■1-;-. :;,0 LJOil JSLItlfi

f i . : . .

;.,.-:CD ■

-)lij iyj J:jOt.J a iO

•»'^

INDEX --^ '."■ -'^^ *^* '-^ .oi.iiiJritl

. ..j^..y

■ '.,-■ V.-;.'.'. ,•<!■. I

Acquired instincti^re dispositions, 49'

Adaptation, 52-

Death a phenomenon of, 58.
Ambivalence, hate-love, 69- ..,-7
Amphimixis, 60, 72. -^ ,..^.,
Anabolic processes, 63.
Angst, 9. -, _. .

Animalculae, 60, 61.
Anxiety-dreams, 38.
Apprehension, 9, 37. 39-
Aristophanes, 74-

Barrier against stimuli, 33, 34, 36-7-
Binding, psychical, 30. 34-7. 39, 42, 44,

80-2.
Breufr, J-. >o, 27. 3°, 36, 4=.

Calkins, 60.
Cliarge, 34-7. 80, S2.

Breuer's bound or tonic, 43-

Counter-, 34-

Free-flowing, 36. 42, 80.
» of object, 64.

Over-, 57, 39-40-

Quiescent, 35-6, 80.
Children, play of, n. 16. 43-
Compulsion, 22, 49-

Daemonic, 44-

Destiny-, 24-

Repetition-. See Repetition-corn

pulsion.

to repeat, 44-
Conjugation, 60, 63, 71-3- •'»'■*
Conscious:

Becoming, 27. 28. '■

ego, 19-30,

impulses, 3. >!

psychic processes, 32.- ^'inltr ''

The, 19.

Consciousness {continue^: ^•■■^^•<'--^ ^^

Perceptual, 26. ' ■ '" '

Seat of, 27.

Threshold of, 3. .ira^-.itv'
Conservative:

instincts. See under Instincts.

nature of living beings, 45.
Constancy, principle of, 4. ■

Daemonic: •" ■-^■'.■i'." hp
character, 43-
compulsion, 44-
Danger, 7, 9. 49. 83,
Death, 47-50, 54-63, 71, 73-

consequence of propagation, 59
from inner causes, 56, 58,
Goal of. See under Goal.
Impulsion towards, 70.
instincts. See under Instincts.
Natural, 55, 56, 58, 61-2.
of higher animals, 61.
phenomenon of adaptation, 58.
Destiny, 22,

-compulsion, 24. ■'-'■'■V-"'-
Deussen, 75. .:i-,iJi.mui'!^

Development, 45, 47, 49-54, 59. 72, So.
Impulse towards higher, 51,
Libido-, 66. *

Organic, 46,
Dobleiv, franz, 59.
Dreams, 9-10, 37-9, 41, 44.
Anxiety-, 3S. ,;i"i-"
during psycho-analysis, 38.
Function of, 37-8.
in traumatic neuroses, 37-8.
-life, 9-

of shock patients, 24,
Punishment, 38.

Wish-fultilmcnt tendency of, 10.
Consciousness, 3, i7, «9, 26-9, 47,82. I Dualistic standpoint of psycho-analysis,
Origin of, 28, 30. ' I ^7- • ' '^'' -

85

ii^..

86

Beyond the Pleasure Principle

Dynamic, i, 19, 53, 57, 62.

Economic, i, 11, 16, 4', 53.

Ego, 5, 6, 19, 20, 24, 64, 66-70, 75, 78-9.

Analysis of, 68, 69.

Coherent, 19.

-conflict, 39.

Conscious, 19, 20.

-feeling, 20.

instinct. See under Instinct.

Kernel of, 19.

Libidinous components of, 68.

Libido directed towards, 65-6.

Masochistic tendencies of, 10.

Picconscious, 19, 20.

Psychological, 65.
Embryology, 29, 45.
Energy, 5, 31, 36.

liindiiig of, 36.

Bound 30, 82,
, charges, 34, as-
Charging, 34.

Free, 30,

Free-flowing, 36, 80.

Instinctive, 67.

Propagation of, 28.

-transformations, 31..

Unbound, Ss.

Quiescent, 36, So.
Eros, 64, 67, 69, 79.
Excitation, 29, 33, 34, 39, 41, 42, 81, 82.

Barrier against, 41.

Bound, 81.
. Disturbing, 38.

External, 34.

from within, 32, 33.

Heightened state of, 81.

Inner, 4.

Instinct, 42, 81.

Instinctive, So.

Mass of, 33, 35, 37.

Quantity of, a, 3, 81.

Perceptions of, 26,

Excitation {continued):

processes, 25, 27-30, 35.

Propagation of, 28.

Sexual, 39.

Traces of, 27, 30.

Traumatic, 34.

Unbound, 81,
Experiences:

Painful, 6, 13; repeated as a game,
1:3, IS, 43-

Pleasurable, 43.

Primary e. of satisfaction, 53.

Repetition of identical, 22, 23.

Revival of past, 20.

Traumatic, 10.

Fate, 22, 23, 24.
Fear, 9,

Feclimr, G. Tk., 3, 4.
Feeling, 2.

Ego-, 20.

Hostile, 15.

of 'pain', 26, 33.

of pleasure, 26, 33.

Painful, 20.

Pleasure-pain, 4, 33-
Ferenczi, 10, 52.
Fixation, 20.

Fliess, IrV., 56.
Fright, 9, 36, 37.
-neurosis, 9.
Furcht, 9.

Game:

Child's, 12.

Meaning of, 13.

Painful experience repeated as, 13,

15, 43-

Repetition of, 43.
Genital primacy, 69.
Germ cell, 45. 54, 56, 64, 72, 76.

Narcissistic behaviour of, 63.
Germ-plasm, 57, 58, 62.

Index

87

Goal, 47, 53.

Life-, 49.

Tendency towards, 4.

of life, 47-9, 51-

of organic striving, 47-
Goette, 59.
Gamperz, Prof. Hem., 74.

Harhnann, Max, 59.
Hate, 6S, 69.
Heredity, 4S. 57.
Hering, E., 62.
' Hunger and Love', 65.

Imitation impulse, 16.
Immortaltty, 50, 54, J^-^^, 72.

of protozoa, 60.

of unicellular beings, 59.
Impulse, 7. 14, 22, 51.

Conscious, 3.

Contemned, 38.

Imitation, 16.

Libidinous, 68,

of revenge, 14.

Play, 24-

Repressed, 20.

Sadistic, 69,

Stages of, 51.

towai'ds higher development, 51.

towards perfection, 52-3,
Inertia, in organic life, 45'

Infantile :

influences, 22.

life, 44-

psychic life, 43. ■

sex-life, iS, 20.
Inferiority complex, 21.
Inheritance tendencies, 73.
Inherited instinctive dispositions, 49
Instability, conditions of, 3.
Instinct, 5, 6, 41, 46, 48-53, 64-8, 70,
73-4, 77, 79-So, 82-3.

Aim of, 46.

compelling repetition, 46.

Instinct {continued):

Conception of, 44-5-

Conservative, 46, 48; c ego-, 54;
c. organic, 47'> c. sexual, 50.
. Death-, S4-S, 5^-9, 62-3, 67-9, 71-3,
77, 79. S2-3-

Destniction-, 79'

Ego-, 51. 54-5, 64, 66-S, 79;

Libidinous nature of, 79.

Egoistic-, 79-

excitations, 42, 8r.

First, 47-

Foregoing the satisfaction of, 13.

for reunion, 76.

Inborn, 5.

Libidinous, 67-S, 79.

Life-, 50-1, 54-5, 57, 62-3, 67-8, 73,
77, 79, 82.

Narcissistic, 79.

Nature of, 44.

Object-, 79.

of self-assertion, 48.

Part-, 48, 69, 70, So. -

Power-, 14, 48.

Regressive character of, 76.

Repression of, 52.

Self-preservative, 5, 48, 49. ^4, 66,
67, 68, 79-

Sexual, 49-5', 54, 55, 57,63-8,70,
72, 78, 79; libidinous, 79, libi-
dinous components of, 69, ori-
gin of, 74.

Theory of, 68, 70, 76-

Two kinds of, 57.
Unsatisfied, 6.
Vital, 63, 64.
Introversion, 66,

Investment-energy, quiescent (bound)
and free-moving, 30. Set Charge,

Jealousy, 14, 21, 22.
Jung, C. G.. 23, 67.

Katabolic processes, 63.

n

88

Deyond the Pleasure Principle

-\ ■

Libido, 64-7, 79. r.atYtvt'.i-iji'. ."»(;;;-««;

concept, 65, 70, 79. -f^to-J-'
■ development, 66.

directed towards the ego, 65-6.
-•- d'stribution, 39-40.

Narcissistic, 66-7, 69, 77.

Oral stages of, 69. ■ -''-'''

quantities, 67. '^ .'-^.'i'A

Reservoir of, 66. ^ '

theory, 40, 63, 64, 67. -v"?
Life, 47-8, so, 55, 5S, 63, 63-. .--■

Beginnings of, 79.

Dawn of, 51. i

Forces tending to preserve, 62,

Goal of. See under Goal.

-instincts. See under Instincts.

Instinctive, 62.

Length of, 56.

Love-, 69. .•-■». ;ii::--.;.

Menace to, 36, ■'

process, 71,

Prolongation of, 54, 58, 63, 73.

Properties of, 47. /r rX^ttl.

Renewal of, 57, 71, 73.

Rhythm in, 50-1.

Stimuli dangerous to, 76.
Lifschuts, Alex., 59, 60, 71.
Loeb, y., 61.

Love, 21, 68, 69.
^ow, Barhara, 71.

Marcinowski, 21.

Masochistic tendencies of the ego, 10
Masochism, 70.

primary, 70.
Maufas, 60,
Mechanical:

concussion, 39.

force, 39.

shock, 8.

stimuli, 7,
Memory, 23, 28.

-records, 27.

-traces, 27-8; repressed, 44.:iy;;/:

.■;'i3fit

Metabolism, 58, 61, 71. r-'-f;.
Metapsychology, i, 26, 35.
Metazoa, 57.
Multicellular organisms, 57-8, 63, 76.

Narcissism, 68, 76.
Narcissistic:

behaviour of gerra-cells, 63,

instincts, 79.

libido, 66, 67, 69, 79.

over-charging of the injured pai-t,
39-40. .,:,..„..,..

scar, 20.
Neuroses, 8-9, i3, 39,

Fright-, 9.

Shock, 10,

Theory of the, 49, 50, 64.
Nirvana-principle, 71.

Object, 63-6, 69, 70, 74, 7S-9..

Annihilation of, 69.

Charging of, 64.

Injury of, 69.

-instinct, 79.

Libidinous investment of, 66.

-love, 68.

Sex-, 6g.
Oedipus complex, iS.
Oral stage of libido, 69.
Organic:

compulsion to repetition, 45.

development, 47.

Pain, 35- - t

Bodily, 34.
'Pain ', 1-3, s-6, 20, 32, 26, 33, 38, 80-2.

Avoidance of, i, 38.

feelings, 33.

Feelings {^Emffinditngett) of, a6.

Neurotic, 6.

Sensations of, 81.
Part-instinct, 48, 69, 70, 80.

Index ..,c^ H.uvi.fyA

?9

Perfection, impulse towards, 52.
Pfeifer, S., 11.
Philosophy, i, 2, 63, 65.

Plato, 74-5- .:_.,.L.,J:: ..yAi

t*'ay: . . :■ . .:i-v/-

-impulse, 24.

of children, I1-16, 43.

Motive of, 16.
Pleasure, 1-6, 11, 15. 16. 23' ^^^ 33, 38,

52, SI.
Pleasure-pain, 4. 33i 82,
Pleasure-principle, 1-7, '3, 1S-161 2^
24-S> 34, 37-9, 42-4, 71, 8o-3.

Beyond the, 16, 24, 38. ...

Dominance of, 82. . ::, , .

Frustration of, 4-6. -.iv.ivi:

Replaced by reality-principle, 5.

Supremacy of, 3-

Tendencies beyond, 16.
Pleasure-tendency, 4-
power-instinct, 14- ■■■■■ '■■'

Prcconscious, 19, 4i-

ego, 19, 20. ,r;T .71 .nwj'-.^.h';-

material, 42. .-.cX-x

residues, i,2. ov.f; ■

Pregenital organisation, 69. .fj-r^

Primary: mlUm. ■

experience of satisfaction, S3-

Masochism, 70.

process, 80, 81.
Projection, 33-
Propagation, S7-9. ^5, 69, 73. :,.:.,-

and death, 59.

Death the consequence of, 59.

Function of, 79.

of energy, 2b. r.. . .

Sexual, 60, 72,
Protective barrier, 31, 37, 41, 76-
Protozoa, 55, 58-62, 70-1, 73, 76.

Immortality of, 60.
Psychic:

apparatus, 3, 4, 5, 7, n, 26, 33,
34, 35, 36, 37, 41, 42, 80, Si.

'(ri

Psychic {conthmed): . ... ._..t..i..,,.:,.,:'_i,
life, 3, 3, 15, 19, 24, 25, 34, 38,

71, 80, 82.
processes, i, 4t 9, 26; conscious,
32, primary, 42, secondary, 43,
systems, 27, 28, 30, 34, 35t 36-
Punishment-dreams, 38.
Pyi/tagaras, 75.

l^a/ii, 70.

Reaction-formation, 53, 65.
Reality-principle, 5, 7, 20, 42.

Pleasure-principle replaced by, j.
Regression, 46, 52, 70.
Regressive character of;

ego-instincts, 54.

instincts, 76.
Re-incamation, 75-
Reinstatement of:

earlier condition, 44, 46, 51, 74, So.

lifelcssness, 54.
Rejuvenation, 60, 63, 71, 73.
Repetition, iS, 43, 44, 46, 47t 49, 52.

55. 73-
Endless r. of the same, 23.

Instincts compelling, 46.

of identical experiences, 22-3,

processes. So.
Repetition-compulsion, 19, so, 22, 24,
25, 3S, 39, 42, 44. 55. 73> 76.

Organic, 45.
Repressed:

impulses, 20.

instinct, 52.

material, 19, 20.

memory-traces, 44-

sex-impulses, 6.

The, 19, 38-

Repressing agency, 65.
Repression, 6, iS, 19, 24, 53-

of instinct, 52.
Reproductive cells, 49, 50, 57.
Resistance, I7> 19. 20, 24, 30, 53.

.0" ,.-.« ,*'

90

■ Beyond the Pleasure Principle

Retrogression, 51-2. ■ '" - ■-

Return to;

lifelcssness, 47.

the inorganic, 4S, 81.

Riickert, 83.

Sadism, 69, 70.

Schopenhautr, 63.

Secondary process, 44, So, Sr, 82.

Self-preservation:

Instinct of, 5, 48, 49, 64, G6, 6S,
Libidinous character of, 67.
Sex, S7, 73, 7S.

distinction, 51.
impulses, 5; repressed, 6,
-life, infantile, 18, 20.
-object, 69.
-quest, 21.
Sexuality, 51, 65, 57.
Conception of, 76.
Origin of, 73.
Shock, 36.

-dream, 24.

Dreams of s. patients, 24.
Mechanical, 8.
neuroses, 10,
theory, 36.
Simmel, 10.
Spielrcin, Sabina, 70.
Stability:

Conditions of, 3.
Tendency towards, 4.
Starcke, A., 70.
Stimulation, 83.

Protection against, 30, 32.
Stimuli, 29-34, 37, 4i, 5°, 52, 76, 83.
Barrier against, 33, 34, 36, 37.
Chemical, 71,
Control of, 37,
dangerous to life, 76.
Defence against, 37.
Mechanical, 71.
Protection against, 31, 33.
Reception of, 29, 31, 32.

79.

Stimulus masses, 31, 34, 71.
Sublimation, 52, 53.
System:

Bw., 26, 28, 29.

W-B\v., 26, 27, 32,

Tasso, 23.
Tension, 82.

Unpleasant state of, i.

Chemical, 71.

Relaxation of, i, 53.
Trauma, 34, 37, 39-

External, 34,

Fixation on, 10.
Traumatic:

excitation, 34.

experiences, 10,

impressions, 39.

neurosis, 36, 37,39, 4i, 42; dreams
in, 37, 3S.

neurosis of peace, S. -

Unconscious, 17, 19, 27.

charges. 41.

mental process ' timeless ', 32.

processes, 26, 27,

resistances. 19.

Systems, 41-2.

The, 19, 42.
Unicellular beings, 57, 59, ^3-

Immortality of, 5';.
Upanishads, 75.

Vcsicic, 29, 30, 31, 32.

War neuroses, S, 9, 10, 39
W-Bw., the system, 26-7, 33.
Weismami, A., 56, S7, 59, 60, 6z, 73-
Wish fulfilment, 37, 3S.

tendency of dreams, 10; prehi-
storic past of, 38.
WoodriiJ^, 59j 60, 61.

Ziegler, K., 75.

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