. THE
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL
OF
PSYCHO-ANALYSIS
VOLUME III
1922
^
I
■ 1
THE
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL
OF
PSYCHO-ANALYSIS
DIRECTED BY
SIGM. FREUD
OFFICIAL ORGAN }
OF THE
INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL ASSOCIATION
EDITED BY .
ERNEST JONES
■
PRESIDENT OF THE ASSOCIAPION
WITH THK ASSISTANCE OF
K. ABRAHAM
BERLIN
G. BOSE A. A. BRILL
CALCUTTA NEW YORK
D. BRYAN
LONDON
J. VAN EMDEN S. FERENCZI
THE HAGUE BUDAPEST
J. C FLtJGEL
LONDON
H. W. FRINK E. OBERHOLZER
NEW YORK ZURICH
C, p. OBERNDORF 0. RANK
NEW YORK VIENNA
VOLUME m
1922
THE INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL PRESS
LONDON VIENNA
INTERNATIONAL
PSYCHOANALYTIC
UNIVERSITY
DIE PSYCHO AN ALYTISCHE HOCHSCHULE IN BERLIN
COPYRIGHT
I 9I1
CONTENTS OF VOLUME III
ORIGINAL ARTICLES
PAG£
ABRAHAM, KARL: Manifestations of the Female
Castration Complex i
ABRAHAM, KARL: Rescue and Murder of the Father
in Neurotic Phantasies 467
BRILL, A. A.: Tobacco and the Individual .... 430
EISLER, MICHAEL JOSEF: Pleasure in Sleep and
Disturbed Capacity for Sleep 30
FERENCZI, S.: The Symbolism of the Bridge ... 163
FREUD, SIGM.: Dreams and 'Telepathy 283
PFISTER,0.: Plato: A Fore-Runner of Psycho-Analysis 169
R6HEIM, G.: The Significance of Stepping Over . . 320
SCHROEDER, THEODORE: Prenatal Psychisms and
Mystical Pantheism . 445
SOKOLNICKA, E: Analysis of an Obsessional Neurosis
in a Child 306
STRACHEY, A. S.: Analysis of a Dream of Doubt
and Conflict 154
VARENDONCK, J.: A Contribution to the Study of
Artistic Preference 409
WESTERMAN-HOLSTIJN, J.: From the Analysis of a
Patient with Cramp of the Spinal Accessory . . 139
COMMUNICATIONS I
BRYAN, DOUGLAS: A Grammatical Error .... 332
BRYAN, DOUGLAS: A Note on the Tongue ... 481
COLE, ESTELLE MAUDE: A Few 'Don'ts' for Beginners
in the Technique of Psycho-Analysis 43
DALY, C. D.: A Simple Lapsus Linguae 46
HERBERT, S.: The Unconscious Root of Aesthetic Taste 47
HERBERT, S.: A Child's Birth-Myth Story .... 187
Tl
CONTENTS OF VOLUME III
HERBERT, S.: Three Dreams 329
HILLER, ERIC: Some Remarks on Tobacco . . . -475
JONES, ERNEST: Notes on Dr. Abraham's Article on
the Female Castration Complex 327
MULLER, F. P.: A Spermatozoa Phantasy of an
Epileptic 50
PFEIFER, S.: Disappointment in Love during Analysis 175
r6hEIM, G.: Psycho-Analysis and the Folk-Tale . . 180
STODDART, W.H.B.: A Symbolism of Appendicitis 45
COLLECTIVE REVIEW
ETHNOLOGY AND FOLK-PSyCHOLOGY, by G. R6-
heim 189
ABSTRACTS FROM CURRENT LITER-
ATURE
APPLIED PSYCHO-ANALYSIS 359, 4S9
CHILDHOOD 357
CLINICAL 344, 4S 5
DREAMS 351, 4^7
GENERAL 333. 483
SEXUALITY 353, 488
BOOK REVIEWS
BAUDOUIN, CHARLES: Suggestion and Auto-Suggestion . . 87
BERGUER, GEORGES: Quelques traits de la vie de Jl^su au
point de vue psychologiqoe et psychanalytique ... 89
erANCHI, LEONARDO: The Mechanism of the Brain and the
Function of the Frontal Lobes 399
BLANCHARD, PHYLLIS: The Adolescent Girl 240
BRETT, G. S. : History of Psychology 243
BRIERLEY, SUSAN S.: An Introduction to Psychology ... 82
CHAMBERLOT, FREDERICK: The Private Character of Queen
Elizabeth 256
■ CHOWK, ALICE A.: The Stairway 4^7
GLUTTON-BROCK, A.: Shakespeare's 'Hamlet' 495
CORIAT, ISADOR H.: What is Psycho-Analysis f .... 76
CORIAT, ISADOR H.: Repressed Emotions 234
CORIAT, ISADOR H.: The Meaning of Dreams .... 394
^ DUNLAP, KNIGHT: Mysticism, Freudianism and Scientific
f,;. Psychology ■ i^7
*
CONTENTS OF VOLUME III vii
ELLIS, HAVELOCK: Little Essays of Love and Virtue . . 405
FAY, DUDLEY WARD: A Psycho- Analytic Study of Psychoses
with Endocrinoses ^00
FLOGEL, J. G.: The Psycho -Analytic Study of the F»mily 370
FORSYTH, DAVID: The Technique of Psycho- Analysis ... 224
FRAZER, Sir JAMES GEORGE: Les Origines magiques de la
roy^"t^ 4QQ
FREUD, SIGM.: Dream Psychology j I^
FREUD, SIGM.: Delusion and Dream ........ -^zt
FREUD, SIGM,: Leonardo da Vinci 223
FREUD, SIGM.: Beyond the Pleasure Principle ..... 367
GALLICHAN, WALTER M.: Our Invisible Selves .... 387
GREEN, GEORGE H-: Psychoanalysis in the Qass Room . . 217
HALE. WILLIAM BAYARD; The Story of a Style ■ ■ - ■ 385
HALL, G. STANLEY: Jesus, the Christ, in the Light of Psychology 247
HARTLAND, EDWIN SIDNEY: Primitive Society, the Beginnings
of the Family and the Reckoning of Descent . . . . 113
HINGLEY, R. H.: Psycho- Analysis .227
HUG-HELLMUTH, H. von: A Study of the Mental Life of the
Child 236
JACKSOK, JOSEPHINE A.: Outwitting our Ne.ves .... 232
JUNG, EMIL: Die Herkunft Jesn gy
KEMPF, EDWARD J.: Psychopathology 55
KNIGHT, M.M: Taboo and Genetics 252
LOISY, ALFRED: Essai historique sur le sacrifice . . . , 497
McDOUGALL, WILLIAM: The Group Mind ' 99
McDOUGALL, WILLIAM: National Welfare and National Decay 403
MAGIAN, A. C: Sex Problems in Women 401
MEDICAL RESEARCH COUNCIL: First Report of the Miners'
Nystagmus Committee 4Q2
MITCHELL, T. W. : The Psychology of Medicine 65
MORDELL, ALBERT: The Literature of Ecstasy ■ - . . 396 ■
MURRAY, MARGARET ALICE: The Witch-Cult in Western
Europe 2154
PATTERSON, L.: Mithraism and Christianity 97
PENN, LORD DAWSON OF: Love -Marriage -Birth Control . 398
PFISTER, O.: An vieil evangile par un chemin nouveau . . 88
PLEBS TEXT BOOKS NUMBER ONE: An Outline of Psychology 246
PUTNAM, J. J.: Addresses on Psycho-Analysis 68
PYM, T. W.: Psychology and the Christian Life 248
RALPH, JOSEPH: How to Psycho -Analyze Yourself .... 232
READ, CARVETH: The Origin of Man and of his Superstitions 109
RINALDO, JOEL: Psycho-Analysis of the 'Reformer' ... 233
RIVERS, W. H. R.: Instinct and the Unconscious . -^^^
ROFFENSTEm, GASTON: Zur Psychologic und Psychopathologie
der Gegenwartsgeschichte ... 246
RORSCHACH, HERMANN; Psychodiagnostik, Methodik und Er-
gebnisse eines wahmeHtaungsdiagnostLschen Experimentes 85
RUSSELL, BERTRAND: The Analysis of Mind 24I
^ CONTENTS OF VOLUME III
SAINTYVES, P.: Les Origines de la m^decine. Empirisme on
magje?' 499
SAXBY, I. B.; The Education of Behaviour 239
SOMERVILLE, H.: Practical Psycho-Analysis 49S
STODDART, W. H. B.: Mind and its Disorders 84
STRANSKY, ERWIN: Psychopathologie der Ausnahmezustande
und Psychopathologie des Alltags 07
VALENTINE, C. W.: Dreams and the Unconscious .... 77
VARENDONCK, j.: L'£volution des facult^s conscientes . . 493
VARIOUS: Psycho-Analysis and the War Neuroses .... 73
VODOZ, J.: 'Roland' 395
' WARREN, HOWARD C: AHistoryoftheAssociationPsychology 244
WESTERMARCK, EDWARD: The History of Human Marriage 249
WOODWORTH, ROBERT S.: Psychology 245
REPORTS OF THE INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-
ANALYTICAL ASSOCIATION
AMERICAN PSVCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY 260, 500
BERLIN PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY 116, 261, 506
BRITISH PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY 117, 263, 5o7
DUTCH PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY .... 267
HUNGARIAN PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY . 121,
268, 509
NEW YORK PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY . . 509
SWISS PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY . . 130, 277
VIENNA PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY 133,280,512
PSYCHO-ANALYSIS IN RUSSIA 5I3
PRIZE ESSAY 521
OBITUARY
W. H. R. Rivers, MD., D.Sc, F.R.S., F.R.C.P 408
THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL
OF
PSYCHO-ANALYSIS
VOLUME m MARCH 1922 PART i
ORIGINAL ARTICLES
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION
COMPLEXi
BY
KARL ABRAHAM
BERLIN
The psychological phenomena which we ascribe to the so-
called castration complex of the female sex are so numerous and
multiform that even a detailed description cannot do full justice
to them. These questions are made still more complicated by their
relations to biological and physiological processes. The following
investigation, therefore, does not pretend to present the problem
of the female castration complex in all its aspects, but is limited
to the purely psychological consideration of material gathered
from a wide field of clinical observation.
I
Many women suffer temporarily or permanently, in childhood
or in adult age, from the fact that they have been bom female.
Psycho-analysis further shows that a great number of women have
repressed the wish to be male ; we come across this wish in all
products of the unconscious, especially in dreams and neurotic
symptoms. The extraordinary frequency of these observations
suggests that this wish is one common to and occurring in all
' Amplified from a paper read before the Sixth Internationa! Psycho-
Analytical Congress in The Hague, 1920.
KARL ABRAHAM
■women. If we incline to this view then we place ourselves under
the obligation of examining both thoroughly and without prejudice
the facts to which we attribute such a general significance.
Many women are often quite conscious of the fact that certain
phenomena of their mental life arise from an intense dislike ot
being a woman ; but, on the other hand, many of them are quite
in the dark as regards the motives of such an aversion. Certain
arguments are again and again brought forward to explain this
attitude : for instance, it is said that girls even in childhood are
at a disadvantage to boys because boys are allowed greater
freedom; or, in later life, men are permitted to choose their
profession and can extend their sphere of activity in many
directions, and especially that they are Subjected to far fewer
restrictions in their sexual life. Psycho-analysis, however, shows
that conscious arguments of this sort are of limited value, and are
the result of rationalisation— a process which veils the motives
lying deeper. Direct observation of young girls shows unequivocally
that at a certain stage of their development they feel at a dis-
advantage as regards the male sex by their poverty in external
genitals. The results of the psycho-analysis of adults fully agree
with this observation. We find that a large proportion of women
have not overcome this disadvantage; or, expressed psycho-
analytically, they have not successfully repressed and sublimated
it. Ideas belonging to it often impinge with great force, arising in
their strong charge of libido, against the barriers which oppose
their entry into consciousness. This struggle of repressed material
widi the censorship can be demonstrated in a great variety of
neurotic symptoms, dreams, etc.
The observation that the non-possession of a male organ
produces such a serious and lasting effect in the woman's mental
life would justify us in denoting all the mental derivatives relating
to it by the coUective name 'genital complex'. We prefer, however,
to make use of an expression taken from the psychology of male
neurotics, and to speak of the 'castration complex' also in the
female sex ; we have good reasons for this.
The child's high estimation of its own body is closely connected
with its narcissism. A girl has primarily no feeling of inferiority
in regard to her own body, and does not recognise that it ex-
hibits a defect in comparison with a boy's. A girl, inc^able of
recognising a primary defect in her body, forms then the following
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 3
idea, as we have often observed: 'I had a penis once as boys
have, but it has been taken away from me'. She therefore en-
deavours to represent the painfully perceived defect as a secondary
loss, one resulting from castration.
This idea is closely associated with another which we shall
later treat of in detaU. The female genital is looked upon as a
wound, and as such it represents an effect of castration.
We also come across phantasies and neurotic symptoms, and
occasionally impulses and actions, which indicate a hostile tendency
towards the male sex. In many women the idea that they have
been damaged gives rise to the wish to revenge tliemselves on the
privileged man. The aim of such an impulse is to castrate the man.
We find therefore in the female sex not only the tendency to
represent a painfully perceived and primary defect as a secondary
idea of 'having been robbed', but also active and passive phantasies
of mutilation alongside each other, just as in the male castration
complex. These facts then justify us in using the same designation
in both sexes.
As was mentioned above, a girl's discovery of the male genitals
acts as an injury to her narcissism. In the narcissistic period of
development a child carefully watches over its possessions, and
regards those of others with jealousy. It wants to keep what it
has and to get what it sees. If anyone has an advantage over it
then two reactions occur which are closely associated with each
other; a hostile feeling against the other person is associated
with the impulse to rob that other of what he possesses. The
union of these two reactions constitutes envy, which represents a
typical expression of the sadistic-anal developmental phase of the
libido.' . ,., : , . . .,
A child's avaricious-hostile reaction to any additional possession
it has noticed in another person may often be lessened in a simple
manner : one tells the child that it will eventually receive what it
longs for. There are many ways in whi ch such pacifying promises
' The character trait of envy is treated more in detail in an article
by the author to appear shortly, 'Erganzungen zur Lehre vom analen
Qiarakter '.
KARL ABRAHAM
may be made to a little girl with respect to her own body. Her
doubts may be relieved by telling her that she will grow as big
as her mother, that she will have long hair like her sister, etc.,
and she will be satisfied with these assurances ; but the subsequent
growth of a male organ one cannot promise her. However in this
latter case the little girl herself makes use of the method that
has often been successful ; for a long time she seems to cling
to the hope of this expectation being fulfilled as to something
that is obvious, as though the idea of a life-long defect were quite
incomprehensible to her.
The following observation of a little girl, two years old, is
particularly instructive in this respect. The little one saw her
parents taking coifee at table. A box of cigars stood on a low
cabinet near by. The child opened the box, took out a cigar and
brought it to her father. She went back and brought one for her
mother. Then she took a third cigar and held it out against the
lower part of her body. Her mother put the three cigars back in
the box. The chUd waited a little while and then played the same
game over again.
The repetition of this game excluded its being due to chance.
Its meaning is clear ; the little one grants her mother a male organ
like her father's. She represents the possession of the organ not as
a privilege of men but of adults in general, and then she can
expect to get one herself in the future. A cigar is not only a
suitable symbol for the child's wish on account of its form. The
child of course has long noticed that only her father smokes
cigars and not her mother. The tendency to put man and woman
on an equaUty is palpably expressed in presenting a cigar to her
mother as well.
We are well acquainted with the attempts of little girls to
adopt the male position in urination. Their narcissism cannot
endure their not being able to do what another can, and therefore
they endeavour to arouse the impression that their physical form
does not prevent them from doing the same as boys do.
When a child sees its brother or sister receive sometliing to
eat or play with which it does not possess Itself it looks to those
persons who are the givers, and these in the first instance are the
parents. It does not like to be less well off than its rivals. A girl,
who compares her body with her brother's, often in phantasy
expects that her father will 'make her a present' of that part of
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 5
the body she painfully misses ; for the child's narcissistic confidence
still leads her to believe that she could not possibly be permanently
defective, and creative 'omnipotence' is readily ascribed to the
father who can bestow on the child everything it desires.
But all these dreams crumble after a time. The pleasure principle
ceases to dominate psychical processes unconditionally, adaptation
to reality commences and with it the criticism of one's own
wishes. The girl has now in the course of her psychosexual
development to carry out an adaptation which is not demanded
of boys in a similar manner ; she has to reconcile herself to the
fact of her physical 'defect', and to her female sexual r61e.
The undisturbed enjoyment of early genital sensations will be a
considerable aid in facilitating tlie renunciation of masculinity, for by
this means the female genitals will regain their narcissistic value.
In reality, however, the process is considerably more complicated.
Freud has drawn our attention to the close association of certain
ideas in the child, namely, that the idea of a proof of love is
insq>arable from that of a gift The first proof of love, which
creates a lasting impression on the child and is repeated many
times, is feeding from the mother. This act brings food to the
child and therefore increases its material property, and at tlie
same time acts as an agreeable stimulus to its erotogenic zones.
It is interesting that in certain districts of Germany (according to
my colleague Herr Koerber) the suckling of a child is denoted
'Schenken' (to give, to pour). The child within certain limits repays
the mother's 'gift' by a 'gift' in return — it regulates its bodily
evacuations according to her wishes. The motions at an early age
are the child's material gift par excellence in return for all the
proofs of love it receives.
Psycho-analysis, however, has shown that the child in this
early psychosexual period of development considers its faeces as
a part of its own body. The process of identification further
establishes a close relation between the ideas 'motion' and 'penis'.
The boy's anxiety regarding the loss of the penis is based on this
equating of the two ideas ; the penis may be detached from the
body in the same way as the motion is. In girls, however, the
phantasy occurs of obtaining a penis by way of defaecation— to
make one herself — or to receive it as a gift : the father as beatus
possidens is usually the giver. The psychical process is thus
dominated by the equation : motion — gift - penis.
KARL ABRAHAM
The little girl's narcissism undergoes a severe test of endurance
in the subsequent period. The hope that a penis will grow is just
as little fulfilled as the phantasies of obtaining one by herself or
as a gift Thus disappointed tlie child is likely to direct an intense
and lasting hostility towards those from whom she has in vain
expected the gift. Nevertheless, the phantasy of the child normally
finds a way out of this situation. Freud has shown that besides
'motion* and 'penis' signifying 'gift' there is still a third idea
which is identified with both of them, namely, the idea of 'child'.
The infantile theories of procreation and birth adequately explain
this connection.
The little girl now cherishes the hope of getting a child from
her father — as a substitute for the penis not granted her, again as
a 'gift'. The wish for a child can be fulfilled, although in the
future and with the help of a later love object. The wish therefore
signifies an approxknation to reality. The child by raising the
father to the love object now enters into that stage of libido
development which is characterised by the domination of the
female Oedipus complex. At the same time maternal impulses
develop through identification with the mother. The hoped-for
possession of a child is therefore destined to compensate the
woman for her physical defect.
We regard it as normal for the libido of a woman to be
narcissistically bound to a greater extent than in a man, but it
is not to be inferred from this that it does not experience far-
reaching alterations right up to adult age.
The girl's original so-called 'penis envy' is at first replaced
by envy of the mother's possession of children in virtue of the
identification of her own ego with the mother. These hostile
impulses need sublimation just as the libidinal tendencies directed
towards the father. A latency period now sets in, as with boys,
and when the age of puberty is reached the wishes which were
directed to the first love object are re-awakened. The wish for
the gift (child) has now to be detached from the idea of the
father, and the libido thus freed has to find a new object. If this
process of development is gone through in a favourable manner,
the female libido is from now on attached to the idea of ex-
pectancy in connection with the man. Its expression is regulated
by certain inhibitions (feelings of shame). The normal adult woman
becomes reconciled to her own sexual r6le and to that of the
-■
:
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 7
man, and in particular to the facts of male and female genitality ;
she desires passive gratification and longs for a child. The castration
complex then gives rise to no disturbing effects.
Daily observation, however, shows us how frequently this normal
end-aim of development is not attained. This fact should not
astonish us, for a woman's life gives cause enough to render the
overcoming, of the castration complex difficult. We refer to those
factors which keep bringing back to memory the 'castration' of
the woman. The primary idea of the 'wound' is re-animated by
the impression created by the first and each succeeding jnenstruation,
and then once again by defloration; for both processes are connected
with loss of blood and thus resemble an injury. A girl need never
have experienced either of these events ; the very idea of being
subjected to them in the future has tlie same effect on the
growing-up girl. We can readily understand from the standpoint
of the infantile sexual theories that delivery (or child-birth) is
conceived of in a similar manner in the phantasies of young girls ;
we need only call to mind, for example, the 'Caesarian section
theory' which conceives of delivery as a bloody operation.
In these circumstances we must be prepared to find in every
female person some traces of the castration complex. The individual
differences are only a matter of degree. In normal women we
perhaps occasionally come across dreams with male tendencies in
them. From these very slight expressions of the castration complex
transitions lead to severe and complicated phenomena of a pro-
nounced pathological kind, and it is with these latter that this
investigation is principally concerned. In this respect also, therefore,
we find a similar state of affairs to that obtaining in the male sex.
m
In his essay on ' Das Tabu der Virginitat ' Freud contrasts the
normal outcome of the castration complex, which is in accord with
the prevailing demand of civilisation, with the 'archaic' type.
With many primitive peoples custom forbids a man to deflorate
his wife; the defloration has to be carried out by a priest as a
sacramental act, or must occur in some other way outside
wedlock. Freud shows in his convincing analysis that this peculiar
precept has arisen from the psychological risk of an ambivalent
S KARL ABRAHAM
reaction on the part of the woman towards the man who has
deflorated her. Living with the woman whom he has deflorated
might therefore be dangerous for a man.
Psycho-analytical experience shows that an inhibition of the
psychosexual development is manifested in phenomena which are
closely related to the conduct of primitive peoples. It is by no
means rare for us to come across women in our civilisation of
to-day who react to defloration in a way which is at all events
closely related to that 'archaic' form. I know several cases in
which women after defloration produced an outburst of affect and
hit or throttled their husband. One of my patients went to sleep
with her husband after the first intercourse, then woke up, seized
him violently and only gradually came to her senses. There is no
mistaking the significance of such conduct : the woman revenges
herself for the injury to her physical integrity. Psycho-analysis,
however, enables us to recognise a historical layer in the motivation
of such an impulse of revenge. The retaliation is connected with
the recent defloration ; this experience undoubtedly serves as a con-
vincing proof of male activity, and puts an end to all attempts
to obliterate the functional difference between male and female
sexuality. Nevertheless every profound analysis reveals the close ,
connection of the phantasies of revenge with all the earlier events -^
— phantasised or real — which have been equivalent to castration. &:
The retaliation is found to refer ultimately to the injustice suffered >
at the hands of the father. The unconscious of the adult daughter
takes a late revenge for the father's omission to bestow upon her
a penis, either to begin with or subsequently; she takes it, however,
not on the father in person, but on the man who in consequence
of her transference of libido has assumed the father's part The
only adequate revenge for the suffered injustice — the castration —
is castration. This can, it is true, be replaced symbolically by
aggressive measures; among these strangling is a typical sub-
stitutive action.
The contrast of such cases with the normal issue is evident
The normal attitude of love towards the other sex is both in
man and woman indissolubly bound up with the conscious or
unconscious desire for genital gratification in conjunction with the
love object On the other hand, in the cases just described we
And a sadistic-hostile attitude with the aim of possession arising
from anal motives, in place of an attitude of love with a genital
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 9
aim. The tendency to take away by force is evident from numerous
accompanying psychical conditions. This phantasy of robbery exists
in close connection with the idea of transferring the robbed penis
to oneself. We shall return to this later.
The woman's wishes for masculinity, as already mentioned, only
occasionally succeed in breaking through in this 'archaic' sense.
On the other hand, there is a considerable number of women
who are unable to carry out full psychical adaptation to the female
sexual r61e. A third possibility remains to these women, namely,
the way to homosexuality in virtue of the bisexual disposition
common to humanity ; they tend to adopt the male r61e in erotic
relations with other women. They love to exhibit their masculinity
in dress, in the way of doing their hair, and in their general
behaviour. Other cases approximate to these in which the homo-
sexuality does not break through to consciousness ; the repressed
wish to be male is here found in a sublimated form, i. e. masculine
interests of an intellectual and professional character and other
kinds are preferred and accentuated. Femininity, however, is not
consciously denied ; they usually proclaim that these interests are
just as much feminine as masculine ones. They consider it irrelevant
to say that the performances of a human being, especially in the
intellectual sphere, belong to the one or the other sex. This type
of woman is well represented in the woman's movement of to-day.
I have not thus briefly described these groups because I lightly
value their practical significance. The phenomena of both types
are well known, however, and have been sufficiently treated in
psycho-analytical literature, so that I can rapidly pass on to the
consideration of the neurotic transformations of the castration
complex. There are many of them and they must be described
exactly, some of them for the first time, and rendered intelligible
from psycho-analytical points of view.
IV
The neurotic transformations originating in the female castration
complex may be divided into two groups. The phenomena of one
group rest on a strong, emotionally-toned, but not conscious
desire to adopt the male r61e, i. e. on the phantasy of possessing
a male organ. In the phenomena of the other group is expressed
lo KARL ABRAHAM
the unconscious refusal of the female rfile, and also tlie repressed
desire for revenge on the privileged man. There is no sharp hne
of demarcation between these two groups. The phenomena of one ;
group do not exclude those of tlie otlier in the same individual ;
they supplement each other. The preponderance of this or that
attitude can nevertheless often be clearly recognised. One may then
speak of the preponderating reaction of a wish-fulfilment type or
a revenge type.
We have already learned that besides the normal outcome of
the female castration complex there are two abnormal forms of
conscious reaction, namely, the homosexual type and the archaic
(revenge) type. We have only to recall the general relation betvk^een
perversion and neurosis with which we are familiar from Freud s
investigations in order to be able to estimate the two neurotic
types above described in respect to their psychogenesis. They are
the 'negative' of the homosexual and sadistic types; they contain ;
the same motives and tendencies, but in repressed form. \
The psychical phenomena which arise from the unconscious
wishes for physical masculinity or for revenge on the man are
difficult to classify on account of their multiplicity. It has also to ^
be borne in mind that neurotic symptoms are not the sole ex- •
pressions of unconscious origin which have to concern us here ;
we need only refer to the different forms in which tlie same I
repressed tendencies appear in dreams. As mentioned at the
beginning, therefore, this investigation cannot pretend to give an
exhaustive account of the forms of expression of the repressed
castration complex, but rather to lay stress on certain frequent
and instructive forms and especially those which have not hitherto
been considered.
The wisk-fuifibnent which goes farthest in the sense of the
female castration complex comprises those symptoms or dreams
of neurotics which convert the fact of femininity into the opposite.
The unconscious phantasies of the woman proclaim in such a
case : I am the fortunate possessor of a penis and exercise the
male function. Van Ophuijsen gives an example of this kind in his
article on the 'masculine complex' of women. This case of the
conscious phantasy from the youtli of one of his patients gives
us at first only an insight into the patient's still unrepressed
active-homosexual wishes, but at the same time clearly demonstrates
the foundation of neurotic symptoms which give expression to the
/
t
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX II
same tendencies after they have become repressed. The patient
in the evening would place herself between the lamp and the wall,
and then would hold her finger against the lower part of her body
in such a manner that her shadow portrayed the form of a penis
on her. She thus did something veiy similar to what the two years
old child did with the cigar.
In conjunction with this instructive example I mention the
dream of a neurotic newly-married woman. She w^as an only
child. Her parents had ardently desired a son and had in
consequence cultivated the narcissism and particularly the mascul-
inity wishes of their daughter. According to an expression of
theirs she was to become quite 'a celebrated man'. In her youthful
day-dreams she saw herself as a ' female Napoleon ' ; she began
a glorious career as a female officer, advEince^ to the highest
positions, and saw all the countries of Europe lying at her feet.
After having thus shown herself superior to all the men in the
world a man appeared at last who surpassed not only all men but
also herself; she subjected herself to him. Marital relations in real
life were accompanied by the most extreme resistance against
assuming the feminine r61e ; I shall mention symptoms relating to
this later. I quote here one of my patient's dreams.
'My husband seizes a woman, lifts up her clothes, finds a
peculiar pocket and pulls out from it a hypodermic morphia
syringe. She gives him an injection with this syringe and he is
then carried away quite weak and miserable.'
The woman in this dream is the patient herself who takes
over the active rflle from the man. The possibility for this is
afforded her by a concealed penis (syringe) with which she practices
coitus on him. The weakened condition of the man signifies that
he is killed by her assault.
Pulling out the syringe from the pocket suggests the male
method of urinating, which seemed enviable to the patient in her
childhood. It has, however, a further significance. At a meeting
of the Berlin Psycho-Analytical Society Boehm drew attention to
a common infantile sexual theory: the penis originally ascribed
to both sexes is thought to be concealed in a cleft from which
it can temporarily emerge.
, Another patient, whose neurosis brought to expression the
permanent divorce between masculinity and femininity in most
manifold forms, stated that during sexual excitation she often had
V
I
12 KARL ABRAHAM ■
the feeling that something on her body swelled to an enormous ■,
size. The tendency of this sensation was obviously to delude j
herself that she possessed a penis. '
In other patients the symptoms do not represent the complete
wish-fulfilment in the sense of masculinity, but a corresponding j
expectation for the near or distant future. While the unconscious ,
in the cases just described expresses the idea, 'I am a male', it i
here conceives the wish in the formula, ' I shall receive the " gift "
one day, I absolutely insist upon that!'.
The following conscious phantasy from the youth of a neurotic
girl is perfectly typical of the unconscious content of many neurotic [
symptoms. When the girl's elder sister menstruated for the first ;
time she noticed that her mother and sister conversed together
secretly. The thought flashed across her, 'Now my sister is certainly
getting a penis' ; therefore she herself will get one in due course. ;
The reversal of the rea! state of affairs is here highly characteristic:
the acquisition of the longed-for part of the body is put in place
of the renewed 'castration* which the first menstruation signifies.
A neurotic patient in whom psycho-analysis revealed extraordinary
narcissism one day showed the greatest resistance to treatment, and
manifested many signs of defiance towards me which really referred
to her deceased father. She left my consulting room in a state of
violent negative transference. When she stepped into the street
she caught herself saying impulsively : ' I will not be well until
I have got a penis'. She thus expected this gift from me, as a
substitute for her father, and made the effect of the treatment
dependent upon it. Certain dreams of the patient had the same
content as this idea which suddenly appeared from her unconscious.
In these dreams being presented with something occurred in a
double sense (to receive a child or a penis).
Compromises between impulse and repression occur in the
sphere of the castration complex as elsewhere in the realm of
psychopathology. In many cases the unconscious is content with
a substitute-gratification, in place of the male organ and the fall
wish fulfilment by present or future possession.
A condition in neurotic women which owes one of its most
important determinants to the castration complex is enuresis
noctuma. The analogy to the determination of this symptom in
male neurotics is striking. I mention, for example, a dream of a
patient fourteen years old who suffered from this complaint. He
i
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 13
was in a closet and urinating with manifest feelings of pleasure when
he suddenly noticed that his sister was looking at him through
the window. When a little boy he had actually demonstrated
with pride before his sister his masculine way of urinating. This
dream ending in enuresis shows the boy's pride in his penis, and
enuresis in the female frequently rests on the wish to urinate in
the male way. The dream represents this process in a disguised
form and ended with a pleasurable emptying of the bladder.
Women who are prone to enuresis nocturna are regularly
burdened with strong resistances agamst the female sexual functions.
The infantile desire to urinate in the male position is associated
with the well-known interchange of urine and sperma, and of
micturition and ejaculation. The unconscious tendency to wet the
man with urine in sexual intercourse has its origin here.
Other substitute formations show a still greater displacement
of .the libido in that they are removed some distance from the
genital region. When the libido for some reason or other has to
turn away from the genital zone it is attracted to certain other
erotogenic zones, the particular ones being chosen as the result
of individual determinations. In some neurotic women the nose
achieves the significance of a surrogate of male genital. The not
infrequent neurotic attacks of redness and swelling of the nose in
women is conceived in the unconscious phantasy as an erection
in the sense of masculinity wishes.
In other cases the eyes take over a similar r61e. Some neurotic
women get an abnormally marked congestion of the eyes with
every sexual excitation. In a certain measure this congestion is a
normal and common phenomenon accompanying sexual excitation.
However, in those women of whom we are speaking the condition
is not simply a quantitative increase of the phenomenon for a
short period, but a redness of the sclerotics accompanied by a
burning sensation, while swelling persists for several days after each
sexual excitation. In such cases we are justified in speaking of a
conjunctivitis neurotica.
I have seen several women patients, troubled by many neurotic
consequences of the castration complex, in whom this condition
of the eyes was associated with a feeling of a fixed stare which ,
they conceived to be an expression of their masculinity. In the
unconscious the 'fixed stare* is often equivalent to an erection.
I have already alluded to this symptom in an earlier article dealing
14
KARL ABRAHAM
with neurotic disturbances of the eyes,' In some cases the idea
exists that the fixed stare will terrorise people. If we pursue the
unconscious train of thought of these patients who identify the
fixed stare with erection we can then understand the meaning of
their anxiety. Just as male exhibitionists among other things seek
to terrify women by the sight of the phallus, so these women
unconsciously endeavour to attain the same effect by means of
their fixed stare.
Some years ago a very neurotic young girl consulted me. The
very first thing she did on entering my consulting room was to
ask me straight out whether she had beautiful eyes. I was startled
for a moment by this very unusual way of introducing oneself to
a physician. She noticed my hesitation and then gave vent to a
violent outburst of affect on my suggestion that she should first
of all answer my questions. The whole conduct of the patient,
whom I only saw a few times, made a methodical psycho-analysis
impossible. I did not succeed even in coming to a clear diagno-
sis of the case, for certain characteristics of the clinical picture
suggested a paranoid condition. Still I was able to obtain a few
facts concerning the origin of a most striking symptom, which in
spite of their incompleteness offered a certain insight into the
structure of the condition.
The patient told me that she had experienced a great fright
when a child. In a small town where she then lived a boa constrictor
had broken out from a menagerie and could not be found. On
passing through a park with her governess she thought the snake
suddenly appeared before her. She became quite rigid with terror
and ever since had been afraid that she might have a fixed stare.
It could not be decided whether this experience was a real
one or whether it was wholly or partially a phantasy. The associ-
ation, snake = rigidity, is familiar and comprehensible to us. We
also recognise the snake as a male genital symbol. Fixity of the
eye is then expUcable from the identification, fixed eye ^ snake
= phallus. The patient, however, protected herself against this
masculinity wish of hers, and its place was taken by the compuls-
ion to get every man to assure her that her eyes were beautiful,
' See ' Uber Einschrankungen und Umwandlungen der Schaulust usw. '
Jahrhuch der Psyckaanalyse, 1914, Bd. IV, or the same article in
'Klinische Beitrage zur Psychoanalyse', 1921, S. 168 f.
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 15
i.e. had feminine charms. If anyone hesitated to answer her
question in the affirmative we have to assume that she was ex-
posed to the danger of becoming overwhelmed by a male-sadistic
impulse which was repressed with difficulty, and so fell into a
state of anxiety at the rising tide of her masculinity.
1 should like to point out here that these various observations
by no means do justice to the great multiplicity of the symptoms
belonging to this group. 1 supplement these examples, which
illustrate the vicarious assumption by various parts ofthebodyof
the male genital r6Ie, by adding that objects which do not belong
to the body can also be made use of for the same purpose, pro-
vided their form and use permits in any way a genital-symbolical
utilisation. We may call to mind the tendency of neurotic women
to use a syringe and to give themselves or relatives enemas.
There are numerous points of contact here with the normal
expressions of the female castration complex, especially with
typical female symptomatic acts. For example, thrusting the end
of an umbrella into the ground may be mentioned; the great
enjoyment many women obtain from using a hose for watering the
garden is also characteristic, for here the unconscious experiences
the ideal fulfilment of a childish wish.
Other women are less able or less inclined to find a sub-
stitute-gratification of the masculinity wishes in neurotic surrogates.
Their symptoms give expression to a completely different attitude.
They represent the male organ as something of secondary impor-
tance and unnecessary. Here belong all the symptoms and phan-
tasies of immaculate conception. It is as though these women want
to proclaim through their neurosis: 'I can also do it alone\ One
of my patients experienced such a conception while in a dream-
like, hazy state of consciousness. She had had a dream once
before in which she held a box with a crucifix in her hands; the
identification with Mary is here quite clear. I constantly found
the anal character traits particularly pronounced in neurotic women
who showed these phenomena. In the idea, 'to be able to do it
alone', is expressed a high degree of obstinacy which is also pro-
minent in these patients. They wish, for example, to find every-
thing in the psycho-analysis alone, without the help of the physi-
cian. They are as a rule women who through obstinacy, envy
and self-overestimation destroy all relationships in their environ-
ment, even their whole life.
l5 KARL ABRAHAM
The symptoms we have described up to the present bear the
character of positive wish-fulfilment in the sense of the infantile j
desire to be physically equal to the man. The last-mentioned j
forms of reaction, however, already begin to approximate to the J
revenge type. For in the refusal to acknowledge the significance \
of the male organ there is expressed, although in a very mitigated ,j
form, an emasculation of the man. We therefore arrive quite ^
easily at the phenomena of the second group. ;
We regularly meet two tendencies in repressed form in these j
patients: the longing for revenge on the man, and the desire to «
take by force the longed-for organ, i.e. to rob the man of it ;
One of my patients dreamed that she in common with other *
women carried round a gigantic penis which they had robbed J
from an animal. This reminds us of the neurotic impulse to steal.
The so-called kleptomania is often traceable to the fact that a j
child feels injured or neglected in respect of proofs of love— |-
which we have equated with gifts— or in some way feels disturb- T
ed in the gratificadon of its libido. It procures a substitute |.
pleasure for the lost pleasure, and at the same time takes revenge |
on those who have caused it the supposed injury. Psycho-analysis
shows that in the unconscious of our patients there exist the
same unpulses to take forcible possession of the 'gift' which has
not been received.
Vaginismus is from a practical point of view the most impor-
tant of the neurotic symptom serving the repressed phantasies of per-
forming castration on the man. The tendency of vaginismus is not
only to prevent intromission of the penis, but also in case of its
intromission not to let it escape again, i. e. to retain it and thereby
carry out castration on the man. The phantasy therefore culminates
in robbing the man of his penis and appropriating it to oneself.
The patient who had produced the previously-mentioned dream of
the morphia syringe showed a rare and complicated form of refusal of
her husband at the commencement of their marriage. She suffered
from an hysterical adduction of her thighs whenever her husband
approached her. After this had been overcome in the course of
a few weeks a high degree of vaginimus developed as a fresh
symptom of refusal; the vaginismus only completely disappeared
under psycho-analytic treatment
/
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX l^.
The same patient, whose libido was very strongly fixed on her
father, once had a short dream previous to her marriage, whicfi
she related to me in very remarkable words. She said that in the
dream her father had been run over and had thereby 'lost some
leg or other and his power'. The castration idea is here not only
expressed by means of the Meg' but also by the 'power'. Being,
run over is one of the most frequent castration symbols. One of
my patients whose 'totem' was a dog dreamed how a dog was
run over and lost a leg. The same symbol is found in a phobia
that a definite male person may be run over and thereby lose,
an arm or a leg. One of my patients was the victim of this
anxiety with reference to various male members of her family.
For many years and especially during the late war I have
come across women who take particular erotic interest in men
who have lost an arm or a leg by amputation or accident. These
are women with particularly strong feelings of inferiority; their
libido prefers a mutilated man rather than one who is physically,
intact; the mutilated man has also lost a limb. It is obvious
that these women feet themselves physically closer to the mutil-
ated man, they consider him a companion in distress and do not
need to reject him with hate like the sound man. The interest
of some women in Jewish men is explicable on the same grounds;,
the circumcision is looked upon as at any rate a partial castration,,
Eind so makes possible a transference of libido to the man. I know
cases in which mixed marriages were contracted by women chiefly
as a result of an unconscious motive of this nature. The same
interest is also shown in men who are crippled in other ways and
have thereby lost the masculine 'superiority'.
It was the psycho-analysis of a girl seventeen years old that
gave me the strongest impression of the power of the castration
complex. In this case there was an abundance of neurotic con-
version phenomena, phobias, and obsessive impulses, all of which
were connected with her disappointment at her femininity and
with revenge phantasies against the male sex. The patient had
been operated on for appendicitis some years previously, i The
surgeon had given her the removed appendix preserved in a
bottle of spirit, and this she now treasured as something sacred.
Her ideas of being castrated centred round this specimen, and
' The removal of the vermiform appendix in men also often stimulates
their castration complex.
I
l8 KARL ABRAHAM
it also appeared in her dreams with the significance of the once
possessed but now lost penis.* As the surgeon happened to be a
relative of the patient it was easy for her to connect the 'castra-
tion' performed by him associatively with her father.
Among the patient's symptoms which rested on the repression
of active castration wishes was a phobia which can be called
dread of marriage. This anxiety was expressed in the strongest
opposition to the idea of a future marriage, because the patient
was afraid 'that she would have to do something terrible to her
future husband'. The most difficult part of the analysis was to
uncover an extreme refusal of genital erotism, and an extraordi-
nary accentuation of mouth erotism in the form of phantasies
which appeared compulsively. The idea of oral intercourse was
firmly united with that of biting off the penis. This phantasy,
which is frequently expressed in anxiety and phenomena of the
most varied kinds, was in the present case accompanied by a
number of other ideas of a terrifying nature. Psycho-analysis suc-
ceeded in removing this abundant production of morbid phantasy.
These kinds of anxiety prevent the person from having inti-
mate union with the other sex, and thereby also from carrying
out the unconsciously intended 'crime*. The patient is then the
only person who has to suffer under those impulses, in the form
of permanent abstinence and neurotic anxiety. This assumes a
different form as soon as the active castration phantasy has be-
come somewhat distorted and thereby unrecognisable to conscious-
ness. The modified appearance of the phantasies makes possible
stronger effects of these tendencies externally. Such a modification
of the active castration tendency can take such a form as that the idea
of robbing the man of his genital is abolished and the hostile
purpose is displaced from the organ to its function; the aim is
now to destroy the potency of the man. The wife's neurotic
sexual aversion often has a repelling effect on the man's libido
so that a disturbance of potency occurs.
A further modification of the aggressive tendency is expressed
in an attitude of the woman to the man that is seen fairly fre-
quently and which can be exceedingly painful to him; it is the
tendency to disappoint the man. Disappointing signifies to excite
i.
* Another patient imag^ed she had a brother and had to remove
his appendix.
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 19
expectations in a person and not fulfil them. In relations with the
man this can occur through response up to a certain point follow-
ed by refusal. This behaviour is most frequently and signific-
antly expressed in frigidily on the part of the woman. Dis-
appointing other persons is a piece of unconscious tactics which
we frequently find in the psychology of the neuroses and is
especially pronounced in obsessional neurotics. These neurotics
are unconsciously impelled towards violence and revenge,
but on account of the contrary play of ambivalent forces these
impulses are incapable of efifectuaUy breaking through. Because
the hostility cannot express itself in actions these patients excite
expectations of a pleasant nature in their environment which they
do not subsequently fulfil. In the sphere of the female castration
complex the tendency to disappoint can be represented in respect
to its origin as follows:
First stage: I rob you of what you have because I lack it
Second stage: I rob you of nothing; I even promise you what
I have to give.
Third stage: I do not give you what I have promised.
In very many cases the frigidity is associated with the con-
scious readiness to assume the female rdle and acknowledge that
of the man. The unconscious striving has in part the object of
disappointing the man who is inclined to infer from the conscious
readiness of his wife the possibility of mutual enjoyment ; while
there also exists in the frigid woman the tendency to demonstrate
to herself and her partner that his ability signifies nothing.
If we penetrate to the deeper psychic layers we recc^ise how
strongly the desire of the frigid woman to be male dominates in
the unconscious. In a previous article I have attempted to demon-
strate in conjunction with Freud's well-known observations on frig-
idity t that this condition in the female sex is the exact analogue
of a disturbance of potency in the man, namely, 'ejaculatio praecox'.^
In both conditions the libido is attached to that erotogenic zone
which has normally a similar signiiicance in the opposite sex. In
cases of frigidity the pleasurable sensation is as a rule situated in
the clitoris and the vaginal zone has none. The clitoris, however,
corresponds developmentally with the penis.
' Drei Abhandlungen zur Sexualtheorie, 4. Aufl., sTs^f
» 'Cber Ejacolatio praecox'. Internationale Zeitsckrift fur Psycho-
analyse, 1916-17, Bd. IV, S. 171.
20 ' KARL AURAHAM
V
Frigidity is such an exceedingly wide-spread disturbance that
it hardly needs description with examples. On the other hand,
it is less well-known that the condition appears in varying degrees.
The highest degree, that of actual anassthesia, is rare; in these
cases the vaginal mucous membrane has lost all sensitiveness to
touch, so that the male organ is not perceived in sexual inter-
course, and its existence is therefore actually denied. The common
condition is a relative disturbance of sensitivity; contact is perceiv-
ed but is not pleasurable. In other cases a sensation of pleasure is
felt but does not go on to orgasm, or, what is the same thing,
the contractions of the female organ corresponding with the acme
of pleasure are absent It is these contractions that signify the
complete and positive reaction of the woman to the male activity,
the absolute affirmation of the normal relation of the sexes.
Some women desire gratification along normal paths but endea- 1
vour to make the act as brief and formal as possible. They refuse
all enjoyment of any preliminary pleasure ; especially do they be-
have after gratification as if nothing had happened that could
make any impression on them, and turn quickly to some other
subject of conversation, a book or occupation. These women thus
give themselves up to the full physical function of the woman for
a few fleeting moments only to disown it immediately afterwards.
It is an old and well-known medical fact that many women
only obtain normal sexual sensation after a child has been born.
They become, so to speak, only female in the full sense by way
of maternal feelings. The deeper connection of this is only to be *
comprehended by the castration complex. The child was even |
at an early period the 'gift' which was to compensate for the V
missed penis. It is now received in reality, and thus the 'wound' is '
at last healed. It is to be noted that in some women there exists ^-
a wish to get a child from a man against his will; we cannot ^\-,
fail to see in this the unconscious tendency to take the penis from the
man and appropriate it— in the form of a child. The otlier extreme
belonging to this group is represented by those women who wish
to remain childless under all circumstances. They decline any
kind of 'substitute', and would be constantly reminded of their
femininity in the most disturbing manner if they had children.
A relative frigidity exists not only in the sense of the degree
of capability of sensation, but also in the fact that some women
are frigid with certain men and sensitive with others.
■•
:.
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 21
It will probably be expected that a marked activity on the
part of the man is the most favourable condition to call forth
sexual sensation in such relatively frigid women. This, however,
is not always the case; on the contrary, there are many women
in whom a humiliation of the man is just as essential a condition
of love as is the humiliation of the woman to many neurotic
men.» A single example may be given in illustration of this by
no means rare attitude. I analysed a woman whose love-life was
markedly polyandrous, and who was constantly anesthetic if she
had to acknowledge that the man was superior to her in some
way or other. If, however, she had a quarrel with the man and
succeeded in forcing him to give in to her, then her frigidity dis-
appeared completely. Such cases show very clearly how necessaiy
acknowledgement of the male genital function is as a condition of
a normal love-life on the part of the woman. We here arrive at a
source of the conscious and unconscious prostitution of women.
Frigidity is a necessary condition of the behaviour of the
prostitute. Full sexual sensation binds the woman to the man,
and only where this is lacking does the woman go from man to
man, just like the continually ungratified Don Juan type of man
who has constantly to change his love-object. The Don Juan
avenges himself on all women for the disappointment which
happened to bim once on the part of the first woman in his life,
and the prostitute avenges herself on every man for the gift she
had expected from her father and did not receive. Her frigidity
signifies a humiliation of all men and therefore a mass castration
in the sense of her unconscious; her whole life is given up to
this tendency.*
While the frigid woman unconsciously strives to diminish the
importance of that part of the body denied her, there is another
form of refusal of the man which strives for the same aim with
the opposite means. In this form of refusal the man is nothing
else than a sex organ and therefore consists only of coarse sen-
suality. Every other mental or physical quality is denied him. The
effect is that the neurotic woman imagines that the man is an
inferior being on account of his possession of a penis. Her selF-
' See Freud, Beitrage zur Psychologie des Liebeslebens, sections 1
and n, ' Kleine Schriften zur Neurosenlehre ', Bd. IV.
= The remarks of Dr. Theodor Reik in a discussion at the Berlin
Psycho-Analytical Society have suggested this idea to me.
22
KARL ABRAHAM
respect is thereby enhanced, and she may even be pleased at
being free from such inferiority. One of my patients who showed
a very marked aversion to men had the obsessing hallucination
of a very big penis at the sight of any man and in any situation.
This vision brought to her mind again and again that there is nothing
else in men than their genital organ, from which she turned away
in disgust, but which at the same time represented something that
greatly interested her unconscious. Certain phantasies connected
with this vision were of a supplementary nature. In these the patient
represented herself as though every opening of her body, even
the body as a whole, was nothing else than a receptive female
organ. The vision therefore contained a mbtture of overestimation
and depreciation of the male organ.
VI
We have already shown that the tendency to depreciate the
importance of the male genital underlies a progressive sexual
repression, and often appears outwardly as humiliation of men
as a whole. In neurotic women this tendency is often shown by
an instinctive avoidance of men who have pronounced masculine
characteristics. They direct their love choice towards passive and
effeminate men, and by living with them can daily renew the
proof that their own activity is superior to the man's. Just like
manifest homosexual women they love to represent the mental and
physical differences between man and woman as insignificant
One of my patients when six years old had begged her mother
to send her to a boy's school in boy's clothes; * then no one will
know that she is a girl'.
Besides the inclination to depreciate men there is also found
a marked sensitiveness of the castration complex towards any
situation which can awaken a feeling of inferiority, even if only
remotely. Women with this attitude refuse to accept any kind of
help from a man, and show the greatest disinclination to follow
a man's example. A young woman betrayed her claims of mas-
culinity, repressed with difficulty, by declining to walk along a
street covered in deep snow behind her husband and make use
of his footsteps. A further very significant characteristic of this
lady may be mentioned here. When she was almost a child she
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 23
had had a strong desire for mdependence, and in adolescence she
was very jealous of the occupations of two women in particular :
the cashier in her father's office, and the woman who swept
the street in her native town. The cause of this attitude is ob-
vious to the psycho-analyst. The cashier sweeps together money,
the crossing-sweeper dirt, and both things have the same signifi-
cance in the unconscious. There is here a marked turning
away from genital sexuaUty in favour of the formation of anal
character traits, a process which will be mentioned in another
connection.
A characteristic behaviour of some children shows the strength
of the disinclination, to be reminded of one's own femininity by
any impression. In little girls it not infrequently happens that they
give up in favour of the stork fable knowledge they have already
obtained of procreation and birth. The rflle bestowed upon them
by nature is distinctly unwished-for. The stork tale has the ad-
vantage that in it children originate without the man's part being
a more privileged one in respect of activity.
The most extreme degree of sensitiveness in the sense of the
castration complex is foimd in certain cases of psychical depression
in the female sex. Here the feeling of misfortune on account of
their femininity exists wholly unrepressed ; these women do not
even succeed in working it off in a modified form. One of my
patients complained about the complete uselessness of her life
because she had been bom a girl. She considered the superiority
of men in all respects as obvious, and just for this reason felt it
so tormentingly. She refused to compete with men in any sphere,
and also rejected every feminine performance. In particular she
declined the female erotic r61e, and equally so the male one. In
consequence of this attitude all conscious eroticism was entirely
strange to her ; she even said that she was unable to imagine
any erotic pleasure at all. Her resistance against female sexual
functions assumed grotesque forms. She transferred her refusal
to everything in the world that reminded her, if only remotely,
of bearing fruit, propagation, birth, etc. She hated flowers and
green trees, and found fruit disgusting, A mistake which she made
many times was easily explicable from this attitude; she would
read 'furchtbar' {'frightful') instead of 'fruchtbar' ('fruitful'). In
the whole of nature only the winter in the mountains could give
her pleasure ; there was here nothing to remind her of living
H-
KARL ABRAHAM
beings and their propagation, but only stones, ice and snow. She
had the idea that in marriage the woman was quite of secondary
importance, and an expression of hers clearly showed that this
idea was based on the castration complex. She said that the ring
— which was to her a hated female symbol — was not fit to be a
symbol of marriage, and she suggested a nail as a substitute.
The over-emphasis of masculinity here evidently developed from
the penis envy of the little girl which appeared strikingly undis-
guised in the patient's adult age.
In many women the incapability of reconciling themselves to
the lack of the male organ is expressed in neurotic horror at the
sight of wounds. Every wound re-awakens in their unconscious
the idea of the 'wound' received in childhood. Sometimes a de-
finite feeling of anxiety occurs at tlie sight of wounds, and some-
times this sight or the mere idea of it causes a 'painful feeUng
in the lower part of the body'. The patient whom I mentioned
above as having a complicated form of vaginismus spoke of her
horror of wounds at the commencement of the psycho-analysis and
before there had been any mention of the castration complex.
She said that she could look at large and irregular wounds without
being particularly affected. On the other hand, she could not bear
to see a very small and somewhat open cut in her skin or on
another person if the red colour of the flesh was visible in the
depth of the cut; this gave her an intense pain in the genital
region coupled with marked anxiety, 'as though something had
been cut away there'. Similar sensations accompanied by anxiety
are found in men with marked fear of castration. In many women
it does not need the sight of a wound to cause phenomena of the
kind described, but they also have an aversion, associated with
marked affects, to the idea of surgical operations, even to knives.
Some time ago a lady who was a stranger to me and who would
not give her name rang me up on the telephone and asked me
if I could prevent an operation that had been arranged for the
next day. On my request for more information she told me she
was to be operated on for a severe uterine haemorrhage due to
myomata. When I told her it was not part of my work to prevent
a necessary and perhaps life-saving operation she did not reply,
but explained with affective volubility that she had always been
'hostile to all operations', adding, 'whoever is once operated on
is for ever afterwards a cripple for life'. The senselessness of this
>
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 25
exaggeration is comprehensible if we remember that that operation
carried out in phantasy in early chUdhood makes the girl a 'cripple'.
VII
A tendency with which we are well acquainted and which has
already been mentioned leads in the sphere of the female castration
complex to modifications of the aversion, to conditional admission
of that which is tabooed, and to compromise formations between
impulse and repression.
In some of our patients we come across phantasies which refer
to the possibility of a recognition of the man and to the formula-
tion of conditions under which the patient, after their fulfilment,
WQiJd be prepared to reconcile herself to her femininity. I mention
first of all a condition I have met with many times; it runs: 'I
could be content with my femininity if I were absolutely the most
beautiful of all women'. All men would lie at the feet of the
most beautiful woman, and the female narcissism would consider
this power not a bad compensation for the defect so painfully
perceived. It is in fact easier for a beautiful woman to assuage
her castration complex than for an ugly one. However, the idea
of being the most beautiful of all women does not have this
effect in all cases. We are well-acquainted with the expression
of a woman, 'I should Uke to be the most beautiful of all women
so that all men would adore me; then I would show them the
cold shoulder'. In this case the craving for revenge is quite clear;
this remark was made by a woman of an extremely tyrannical
nature which was based on a wholly unsublimated castration
complex.
However, the majority of women are less blunt, they are
inclined to compromise and to satisfy themselves with relatively
harmless expressions of their repressed hostility. In this connection
we can understand a characteristic trait in the conduct of many
women. Let us keep in view the fact that sexual activity is essen-
tially associated with the male organ, that the woman is only in
the position to excite the man's libido or respond to it, and that
otherwise she is compelled to adopt a waiting attitude. In a great
number of women we find resistance against being a woman dis-
placed to this necessity of waiting. In marriage these women take
i^
1
X
r.
26 KARL ABRAHAM
a logical revenge upon the man in that they keep him ivatting on
all occasions in daily life.
There is another condition related to the above mentioned *If
I were the most beautiful woman'. In some women we find
readiness to admit the male activity and their own passivity
connected with the idea that the most manly (greatest, most l
important) man should come and desire them. We have no diffi-
culty in recognising here the infantile desire for the father. I have
previously mentioned an example of a phantastic form of this *
idea from one of my psycho-analyses. I was able to follow the -
development of a similar phantasy through different stages in the £
psycho-analysis of another patient. The original desire ran: 'I ?
should like to be a man'. When this was given up, the patient
wished to be 'the only woman' (at first 'the only woman of the 1^
father' was meant). When also this wish had to give way to reality ; *
the idea appeared: 'As a woman I should like to be unique'.
Certain compromise formations are of far greater practical
importance, and though well-known to psycho-analysts nevertheless
merit special consideration in this connection. They concern the
acknowledgement of the man, or to be more correct, his activity
and the organ serving it, combined with definite limitations. Sexual
relations with the man are endured, even wished-for, so long as
the woman's own genital organ is avoided, or is, so to speak,
considered to be non-existent. A displacement of libido to other
erotogenic zones (mouth, anus) takes place, and a mitigation of
feelings of discomfort originating in the castration complex is
associated with this turning away of sexual interest from the
genital organ. The body openings which are now at the disposal
of the libido are not specifically female organs! Further determinants
are found in the analysis of each of this kind of cases; one only
need be mentioned, namely, the possibility of active castration
through biting by means of the mouth. Oral and anal perversions
in women are therefore to a considerable extent explicable in the ^i
light of the castration complex.
Among our patients we certainly have to deal more frequently
with the negative counterpart of the perversions, i.e. with con-
version symptoms which occur in relation to the specific erotogenic
zones, than with the perversions themselves. Examples of this kind
have already been mentioned above. I referred among other
cases to that of a young girl who had the phobia of having to
■i,
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX ^^
do something horrible to her husband in the event of her mar-
riage. The 'horrible thing' turned out to be the idea of castration
through biting. The case showed most clearly how displacement
of the libido from the genital to the mouth zone gratifies very-
different tendencies simultaneously. In these phantasies the mouth
serves equally for the desired reception of the male organ and
for its destruction. Such experiences warn us not to be too ready
to overestimate a single determinant. Although in Ijie preceding
presentation we have estimated the castration complex to be an
important impelling force in the development of neurotic pheno-
mena, we are not justified in over-valuing it in the way Adler
has done when he one-sidedly represents the 'masculine protest'
as an essential causa movens of the neuroses. Experience that is
definite and is verified every day shows us that neurotics of both
sexes who loudly proclaim and lay emphasis on the masculine
tendency frequently conceal — though only superficially — intense
female-passive desires. Psycho-analysis should constantly remind
us of the over-determination of all psychical ideas; it has to
reject as one-sided and fragmentar^f every psychological method
of working which does not take into full account the influence
of various factors on one another. In the present work I have
collected material belonging to the castration complex from a
great number of psycho-analyses. I expressly mention here that
it is solely for reasons of clearness that I have only occasionally
mentioned the expressions of the female-passive impulses which
were lacking in none of my patients.
vm
Women whose ideas and feelings are influenced and governed
by the castration complex to an important degree — no matter
whether consciously or unconsciously — transplant ike effect oj this
complex on to their children. These women may influence the
psychosexual development of their daughters either by speaking
disparagingly of female sexueility to them, or by unconsciously
giving them indications of their aversion to the man. The latter
method is the more permanently effective one, because it tends to
undermine the heterosexuality of the growing-up girl. On the other
hand, the direct method of depreciation can evoke real effects of
28 KARL ABRAHAM
a diock, for instance, if a mother says to her daughter who is
about to marry *What is coming now is disgusting'.
There are in particular those neurotic women whose libido
has been displaced from tlie genital to the anal zone and who
give expression to their disgust of the male body in this or similar
manner. These women produce serious effects on their sans without
foreseeing the result of their attitude. A mother with this kind of
aversion to the male sex injures the narcissism of the boy. A boy
in his early years is proud of his genital organs, he likes to ex-
hibit them to his mother and expects her to admire them. He
soon sees that his mother ostentatiously looks the other way, even
if she does not give expression to her disinclination in words.
These women are especially given to prohibiting masturbation on
the grounds that it is disgusting for him to touch his genital
organ. Whereas touching and even mentioning the penis is most
carefully avoided by these women they tend to caress the child's
buttocks, and cannot speak enough of the 'bottom', often getting
the child to repeat this word; they also take an excessive interest
in the child's defaecatory acts. The boy is thus forced to an
altered orientation of his libido. Either it is transferred from the
genital to the anal zone, or the boy is impelled towards his own
sex, his father in the first instance, and feels himself bound to
his father by a bond which is quite comprehensible to us; at the
same time he becomes a woman-hater, and later will be con-
stantly ready to make very severe criticisms of the weaknesses
of the female sex. This chronic influence of the mother's castration
complex seems to me to be a cause of the castration-fear in
boys of greater importance than occasionally uttered threats of
castration. I can produce abundant proofs of this view from my
psycho-analyses of male neurotics. The mother's anal-erotism is
the earliest and most dangerous enemy ol the psychosexual devel-
opment of children, the more so because the mother has more
influence on them in the earliest years of life than the father. *
To everyone of us who are practising psycho-analysts the
question occurs at times whether the trifling number of individuals
to whom we can give assistance justifies the great expenditure of
time, labour and patience. The answer to this question is con-
tained in the above exposition: If we succeed in freeing such a
person from the defects of her psychosexuality, i.e. from the
burdens of her castration complex, then we obviate the neuroses
MANIFESTATIONS OF THE FEMALE CASTRATION COMPLEX 29
of children to a great extent, and thus help the coining generation.
Our psycho-analytic activity is a quiet and little recognised work,
and for this reason all the more attacked, but its effect on and
beyond the individual seems to us an aim worthy of much
labour.
PLEASURE IN SLEEP AND DISTURBED CAPACITY FOR
SLEEP
A CONTRIBUTION TO THE STUDY OF THE ORAL PHASE OF THE
DEVELOPMENT OF THF, LIBIDO
BY
MICHAEL JOSEF EISLER
BUDAPEST
Science has so far treated the biological plienomenon of sleep
descriptively, but it is unable to explain it satisfactorily as a ».
dynamic process. Our assured knowledge regarding sleep is very
deficient. We recognise it as a fundamental phenomenon in the
orgaaic world, which, like breathing and taking nourishment, aids
in the periodic recuperation of the individual. We do not know
the exact nature of this recuperation, at any rate not with the
same accuracy as with the processes of respiration and digestion.
The peculiar association of the state of sleep witli certain mental
phenomena has rendered its understanding more difficult, and
has made problematical that experimental investigation to which
we primarily owe most of our real knowledge. Biologists have
formed the c^inion, which appears to us quite reasonable, that
a general significance is to be attached to sleep almost in the
same way as to the concept 'life', and therefore its problem does
not directly concern physiology, Nevertheless, when it has to be
discussed there are evident signs of discomfort. There is no doubt
that a hidden and unconfessed perplexity is felt regarding the
problem of sleep.
Psycho-analytic investigation has not avoided this question ;
but what it has to say about it does not fall into line with its
other results without some explanation. Ferenczi, ' in a work which
lays more stress on theoretical than clinical aspects, considers that the
sleep of a new-bom child Is a hallucinatory attempt to return to the
' ' Entwicklungsstufen des Wirklichkeitssinnes. ' IntemaHonale Zeii-
schrifi fur arstliche Psyckoanalyse, 1913, Bd. 1, S. 12S.
30
t
PLEASURE IN SLEEP AND DISTURBED CAPACITY FOR SLEEP 31
protection of its mother's womb. This is not a direct observation
but an abstraction which is arrived at logically and easily from
the sum of psycho-analytical experience. Freud' following the
same train of thought has made this abstraction clearer. 'We
are not accustomed to give much thought to the fact that every
night a human being removes the garments with which he has
clothed himself, and also those complements of the organs of his
body which as far as possible replace whatever is lacking in them,
for instance, spectacles, false hair and teeth, etc. It can also be
said that he carries out a similar unclothing of his psyche on
going to sleep — he renounces most of his psychical acquisitions.
Thus in two directions he brings about a remarkable resemblance
to the situation in which his life began. Sleep is somatically a
re-activation of the sojourn in the womb, fulfilling the same con-
ditions of restful posture, warmth and absence of stimuli ; indeed,
many people assume in sleep the foetal attitude. The psychic con-
dition of a person asleep is characterised by an almost complete
withdrawal from his environment and all interest in it.' In another
place Freud says:' 'We can say in the light of the libido theory
that sleep is a state in which all investments of objects, both
libidinal and egoistic, are given up and withdrawn into the ego.
Does not this throw a new light on recuperation IJy sleep and on
the nature of fatigue? The picture of blissful isolation in intra-uterine
life, which the sleeping person conjures up again every night is
thus confirmed and amplified on the mental side. In the sleeper
the primal state of the libido-distribution is again reproduced, that
of absolute narcissism, in which libido and ego-interests dwell
together still, united and indistinguishable in the self-sufficient Self.'
These are the most important contributions that psycho-ana-
lysis has made to the problem of sleep. These two statements
of Freud, which are more in the nature of brilliant apergtis, never-
theless contain the essence of all his clear-sighted observations
which have been so carefully put together. His view of the nature
of sleep is peculiar to the psycho-analytic line of thought, and it
has nowhere been foreshadowed in academic biology and psycho-
logy. We anticipate all subsequent discussion when we remark
that in the first instance we have nothing to add to these
' 'Metapsychologische Erganzung zur Traumlehre '. Iniemationale Zeit-
sekrift filr Sntlicke Psychoanalyse. 19I&-17, Bd. IV, S. 277.
» Vorlesungen zur Einfiihrung in die Psychoanalyse, 151 7, S. 486.
32 MICHAEL JOSEF EISLER
Statements. Our investigation of the problem does not go back so
far; the clinical pictures of the condition which underlie the in-
vestigation admit of a further and, perhaps for practical purposes,
a more important conception. We shall keep as far as possible to
experiential evidence, but at the same time we shall find that we
can support Freud's ingenious conclusions from clinical ob-
servation.
One of the most familiar psycho-analytical observations is that
in every infant gratification of the oral libido promotes sleep. It is
immaterial whether this gratification occurs through taking nourish-
ment or through continued sucking of a finger. This intimate
association of oral gratification and need for sleep at a time when
the individual has no other desire to appease must produce an ex-
ceedingly firm connection, to which nothing of equal significance
in later phases of development can be compared. Therefore we
shall not be surprised if both oral gratification and sleep henceforth
show a tendency to become more and more strengthened in their
union, which primarily was perhaps a loose one, and in patho-
logical cases to act in sympathy with each other. In investigating
this notion by suitable examples, and apart from theoretical con-
siderations, we shall hope to obtain a better understanding of a
number of phenomena. I shall give a somewhat detailed description
of the first case for the sake of clearness.
I. A bright and vivacious girl, eighteen years ot age, who
was very appreciative of the pleasures of life, became ill with the
following nervous disturbance which first appeared after an episode
on an excursion. At the prospect of going into company she was
seized with a kind of spasm of the throat, i. e. a choking reflex
which belongs to the well-known group of globus hystericus. This
symptom so alarmed her that she gave up her intention and shut
herself up at home. She gradually had to recognise that this
trouble was not of a temporary nature, but tended to occur more
and more frequently, with the result that she had an increasing
aversion to meet acquaintances. At the same time she developed
an extraordinary and ingenious capacity for hiding from the world her
true condition, of which she was very much ashamed ; and she almost
completely succeeded in doing so. The next result of the neurosis
was that she considered herself incapable of playing the part of
a woman, and she had therefore refused several quite suitable
offers of marriage. As a pretext for this state of affairs she said
PLEASURE IN SLEEP AND DISTURBED CAPACITY FOR SLEEP 33
that she did not wish to owe her future husband to the influential
position of her father, since no one would marry her for herself.
Before she came for analysis she had discovered a kind of anti-
dote to the sudden spasm in her throat. Wlien it was impossible for
her to avoid going into company the feared attack did not occur
if she could manage to place unobserved a piece of dry food, for
example, bread, in her mouth, and to swallow it down. If she got
over the worst she felt a little relieved and was able to remain.
But this means of relief was not reliable and often failed. After
three years of an endless and fluctuating struggle against the demon
of the neurosis the patient had for a long time become incapable
of venturing even one step outside the house without her bread
talisman.
The nature of her suffering, a common and well-known one,
should not prevent us from apprehending the real state of affairs.
The same facts are always confronting us in life; it only
depends on our attitude and reflection what deductions we draw
from them.
The present case shows the choking reflex as a psychic symptom
which bore a number of different meanings, and which, as we
might gather from the complaint of the patient, was conditioned
by many factors. Its previous history alone proves that it is not
a question of a simple globus, but a conversion symptom in which
an unusual wealth of affect is condensed. This is the rule in every
mono-symptomatic hysteria which after long duration enters into
association with the most important experiences of life. We might
mention as further characteristics of the symptom, that it settled
in the throat like an erectile formation, and that it never produced
a disturbance of eating.* The incorporation of a firm object as a
'The patient suffered from an oral libido fixation of unusual dispo-
sitional strength which had never abandoned its infantile r61e, and had
evoked no reactions. It was for the most part directly attached to the
nutritional function ; for she showed a marked pleasure in eating. She
liked to suck soup or water slowly; drinking quickly gave her less
pleasure. She sometimes licked her plate for a joke; she said she did
this like animals. At night a frequent flow of saliva occurred; this phe-
nomenon existed in other members of her family. Her father and sister
occasionally suffered from nervous vomiting, and a near relative on her
father's side was bom with a malformation of the palate. In this case
therefore archaism of the mouth was marked anatomically as well.
34
MICHAEL JOSEF EISLER
m^c charm has another meaning. The patient betrayed what
significance the oral region possessed for her by her tendency to
keep her mouth covered as far as possible.
The analysis first showed that the initiation of her malady was
determined by a remarkable circumstance ; the neurosis followed
on a prophecy. When the patient was a little girl her aunt, who
later on played a part in her life, caught her doing a forbidden
act— onanism— and censured her for it. Her aunt told her, 'If
you do it again you will become ill when you are a big girl.'
This date (a big girl) coincided with the age at which her
elder sister married. Her aunt had therefore been right, she could
not become a bride and wife like her sister. When in the further
course of the analytic treatment a strongly repressed 'masculine-
complex' — the'renounced longing to be formed like a boy— came
to light, that ominous prophecy appeared in a new light as
a correlate of a threat of castration, the threat which gives
us so much trouble in many neuroses. These two factors, the
repressed masculine complex * and the threat, led to a serious
interruption of her genital sexuality. It is true that onanism
was continued after puberty, and even developed into homo-
erotic acts with the co-operation of a governess. However, it
remained rather a kind of mechanical gratification, and appeared
in connection with the repressed psychic material only so far
as it became a poor substitute for the heterosexual object
choice which was inhibited, though firmly adhered to in the
unconscious. The tenacity of her neurosis aided this substitution,
and added to its temporary significance as a possible form
of relief of definite libidinal tension. At the same time it
offered a guarantee that after such strongly repressed quant-
ities of energy became free the original attraction to the male
would finally be strengthened.
Besides this infantile cause of her illness a recent one was the
marriage of a cousin. Circumstances had enabled her to share in
the intimacies of a long betrothal, and she had experienced unsatisfied
excitations which she would never seriously acknowledge to herself.
Her former tendency to repress sexual feelings, and a mental
innocence that was artificially guarded in the family circle, now
came into action ; but this time the measure was full and the
' One event among those of childhood was very painful to her; in a
sexual game her person was spumed with derision.
' A
PLEASURE IN SLEEP AND DISTURBED CAPACITY FOR SLEEP 35
neurosis broke out. Its course was determined by the dispositional
strength of the oral libido. It took possession of this component
instinct with unusual force, and produced almost the entire range
of those pathological phantasies which draw nourishment from this
impulse. I should like, incidentally, to call attention to two re-
sults, because they seem to me characteristic products of the
oral phase, and in their genera! nature to leave traces on every
human character. The regression of the libido to the oral or
cannibalistic stage changes not only its form, but also its content,
until it is unrecognisable. It is then difficult to recognise in the
symptom the original libidinal excitation as such. In the present
case I had to regard an excessive envy and certain murderous
phantasies as the strongest psychical emanations by means of which
the libido had betaken itselfto lower levels and had formed its relation
with the world ; these phantasies and envy were quite foreign to
her conscious personality and contrasted remarkably with the rest
of her character. Envy in particular seems to me to be always a
narcissistic side-stream arising cut of the oral instinct, and is an
important clue towards establishing a character based on this com-
ponent instinct. Wherever it is possible to observe envy at an early
stage, m children, for instance, we find that it is directed only
against people to whom there is simultaneously a hbidinal
attachment.
Owing to the progress of the Uhiess the effective oral libido,
which up to this time had been latent, obtained control and took
possession of her whole personality which had to subject itself
to it entirely. At the same time the patient adopted a remarkable
behaviour during sleep, and this supplemented the neurosis in an
unexpected direction. Her need for sleep had always been great,
and her vivid description of it gave rise from the first to the
supposition that it concerned an act from which she derived a
considerable amount of pleasure. That a sleeper should experience
pleasure of this kind is plausible to anyone. Only analysis finds
sufficient grounds in this very fact for seeing a problem here. The
patient's pleasure in sleep had now in neurosis adopted a sympto-
matic form. Some details are easily understandable, such as a tendency
to he on her stomach completely covered up, in order to procure comfort
and warmth as a preliminary condition for sleep. When sleep came
the tendency to increase this condition did not cease. She men-
tioned three so-called 'sleep actions' which she carried out from
i'
36 MICHAEL JOSEF EISLER
time to time without any subsequent memory of them. ' She slipped
oflF her night-dress during the night in her sleep and found her-
self lying naked in the morning ; she got out of bed and urinated
without waking, and never used the chamber clumsily ; finally
while asleep ehe emptied the glass of water put ready for her
without letting it fall or knocking it as she put it back. It even
happened that she drank two glasses which had been left on her
table. I should say that in this case the actions signified automatic
sleep activities, not dream activities, the latter being more com-
plicated processes which convert psychical material into action. ^
In this case there was no question of the elaboration of a phan- "
tasy, because the patient never produced further associations to - ^
the subject
Nevertheless, the case, by reason of its relative simplicity, seems
suited to furnish the starting point for the explanation of more
complicated cases. vThe meaning of the first sleep action, which
like the others must be regarded as an expression of her auto- :
erotic strivings, is quite clear if we take Freud's hypothesis of =
the sleep state. It may then be said, she sleeps 'naked as in her
mother's womb'. The two other activities are reminiscent of foetal
actions. We know that the foetus makes swallowing movements,
for amniotic fluid is found in its stomach. It also empties its
bladder, for the amniotic fluid often contains the chemical con- _
stituents of urine.' ;
I do not consider it arbitrary to interpret the sleep actions of , ■
the patient in this way. We seem to have here a slight indication
that the oral phase of the libido is not the first, but that it at-
taches itself to a preceding phase which might be termed the ;
lethargic or apnoeic* In the present case the regression had at- ]
tained the oral stage, which in consequence of its intimate con- X
nections had simultaneously activated elements of the primary , >
sleep state. As for the rest, I see no difficulty theoretically in
' It was only from the effect remaining after waking that she concluded
she had done something during her sleep.
' These are the same two functions which almost all children can be
trained to perform automatically, so that they carry them out in their
sleep.
' The second term is the more appropriate one, as will be shown
by my remarks at the end of this paper.
PLEASURE, IN SLEEP AND DISTURBED CAPAQTY FOR SLEEP 37
drawing the farther conclusion that the pathological regression
of the libido can pass directly to the lethargic stage; tlie hysterical
sleep illness described by Charcot would be an example of this.
Certain peculiarities of this illness, the tendency to attacks of
spasm and inhibitions of breathing, throw a greater light on the
part played by this stage. However, such considerations are outside
the scope of this investigation.
2. The next example is of an amazing disturbance of the ability
to sleep to which was partly due the fatal termination of the
case. I did not obtain my knowledge of the history of this illness
from an analysis carried out in an orthodox manner. But I had
known the patient for more than fifteen years; and her physical
and mental development had been entrusted to my care during
this period. I was also able to observe directly the circumstances
of her decease. This can be taken as equivalent to the results of
an analysis.
The neurotic predisposition of the patient was clearly
manifested, if only in the difficulties of her education when a child.
The years up to the latency period were characterised by a loi^
tarrying in different forms of auto-erotism, among them a strong
oral manifestation of the libido. The suppression of the component
instincts did not take place evenly; a certain precocity remained
as the residue of considerable infantile aggressive tendencies (set
free by the excessive tenderness of her father). When she had
grown up into a beautiful and admired girl a peculiar narcissistic
condition developed. 3he was almost defenceless against the
homage of admirers, and she was disarmed by every interest
shown her, so that she was erroneously considered to be of a very
sensual nature which had to be watched. This was really not
necessary, because she never over-stepped the prescribed limits.
She treated her affairs with remarkable openness and told them
with evident pleasure. It was her wish to be loved and hear
others talk about her. The social environment in which she lived
offered no opportunity for much mental development. Her first
difficulties commenced with her marriage. She failed to enjoy
sexual feeling, which came as a surprise to her relatives. She
proved to be frigid. She soon complained of strong aversion to
the sexual act, although she loved and highly esteemed her
husband. A constant restlessness, associated with hypochondriacal
and anxiety conditions took possession of her, and without
38 MICHAEL JOSEF EISLER
knowing it she took revenge on her husband for tlie unsatisfied
excitations experienced. She kept him in check by frequent and
sudden indispositions. She declined psycho-analytic treatment,
which I proposed at this time, remarking that pregnancy would
be a better remedy for her trouble. The whole restlessness of
the young wife was now turned to this hope; in which was also
evident the secret thought that the new state would offer her the
desired opportunity of obtaining a respite from her obligations
as a wife. The advent of the expected pregnancy found her in
an intolerable frame of mind. On the one hand she very seriously
and ambitiously endeavoured to prove her love for her husband
and to repay his patient constancy with true affection. On the other
hand her physical repugnance— her dread of cohabitation— in- \,'
creased to nausea. New symptoms appeared in a sinister sequence:
hostile impulses against him who had caused her illness, trans-
ference of these impulses to the expected child, and terrifying
feelings as a sequel to repression. A journey taken by her husband,
which she interpreted in her unconscious as his leaving her alone
and helpless in ber miserable condition, led finally to the out-
break of the actual illness, which her relatives could no longer
overlook. One night without any external cause, either accident
or feverish illness, her anxiety and despondency increased to a
psychic shock which put an end to the foetal movements of which
she had just previously become aware. Next day it was obvious
that the child was dead. Owing to unfortunate circumstances tlie
removal of the dead foetus was delayed several days, and only
carried out when threatening symptoms arose (haemolytic icterus
and sterile decomposition of the placenta). An excessive weakness
and complete loss of psychic resistance followed the operation.
The most trifling item in the treatment was used neurotically.
Gynaecological examinations induced almost deUrious states of
excitation. A therapeutic and painfully strict dietary provoked
loss of appetite. When endeavours were made to combat this loss
of appetite in consequence of her increasing weakness, vomiting
was always the result. Haemorrhages from the uterus occurred for
which the gynaecologist could find no organic cause. These haem-
orrhages bore the character of an excessive menstruatio praecox,
and aU symptoms indicated that the chief motive of the illness,
the neurotic anxiety in respect to sexual intercourse which was
again in prospect, had provoked this condition; for the excessive
PLEASURE IN SLEEP AND DISTURBED CAPAQTY FOR SLEEP 39
nausea of the patieot now attached itself to this new symptom.
She ceaselessly complained, 'If only the bleedings would stop
I should be able to eat'. But the vomiting accompanied by violent
physical tension and exhaustion did not allow the bleeding to stop.
A profound mental change took place with the increase of her
symptoms, and her mental attitude took on infantile traits. The sym-
ptoms reacted with a temporary improvement according to the severity
of the treatment. One symptom, however, resisted all efforts at
alleviation — that of insomnia resulting from resistance to the relapse
into the oral phase. It indicated the measure of the pathological
force necessary for the suppression of the oral libido. This alarming
condition was maintained for four whole weeks; for so long was
the robust constitution of the patient able to stand the ravages of
insomnia. At a moment when consciousness was already clouded
she committed suicide in a way explicable by a knowledge of
her predisposition (death from burning).
If we take into consideration the fundamental characteristics
of this case, i. e. its structure, we come to the following con-
clusion. The more active an individual has been in his oral phase,
and the more energetically this stage of development has been
later repressed, the greater is the chance that his ability to sleep
will be aiTected by a pathological regression of the libido. The oral
libido requires a high counter-charge which is in certain circum-
stances apt to remove the general wish-to-sleep of the ego (draw-
ing in of the libido). In support of this idea I will refer the
reader to a case which Abraham * has published in an important
work on the oral organisation. It needs only a very triiling trans-
position of the facts quoted there to make clear the relationship.
Abraham's patient showed in his childhood an utterly ungovernable
oral impulse {gnawing the bed-post). Later, grati6cation of this
zone became a condition of falling asleep, whereupon mastur-
bation which almost always directiy follows oral libidinal activity
appeared as an intermediate link. Every attempt to check the
oral libido or masturbation 'had to be purchased by the patient
with long periods of stubborn sleeplessness'. The insomnia of
melancholies, who (according to Abraham) fall ill in consequence
' ' Untersuchungen tiber die friiheste pragenitale Entwicklungsstufe
der Libido", Internationale Zeitsckrift fUr drzUicke Psychoanalyse,
igie, Bd. IV, S. 86-7.
40 MICHAEL JOSEF EISLER
of 'repulse of a threatening relapse into the oral organisation',
iinds its explanation in this relationship, i
I will attempt by a few short examples to demonstrate the
connection of the capacity to sleep with the oral organisation. It is
in the nature of the clinical material that these examples refer to
disturbances of sleep, for thus they Erst become accessible to obser-
vation. The first case is an exception because there the regressive
hbido did not meet with a resistance in the direction of the oral
instinct but an increase and establishment, by which the previously
great need for sleep was increased and converted into regressive
phenomena.
3. I should like to discuss the following connections from the
analysis of a very complicated neurosis, which however ran its course
with unobtrusive symptoms and only imperceptibly iniluenced the
patient's external life. I shall omit all irrelevant material. This is tlie
case of a man with labile potency who suffered in unusual situations
(new relationships with women) from ejaculatio praecox, but on
other occasions from ejaculatio tardiva, so that he was never very 5
certain about bis virility. He frequently performed coitus with . }
diflerent persons, which however gave him incomplete gratification; ■<
this was expressed amongst other tilings in two symptoms. .\
He masturbated between the occasions of cohabitation, because he
found even a short abstinence irksome, and his sleep was disturbed,
since he could not go to sleep at night directly after sexual inter-
course or onanism, in both of which, therefore, some impulse remained
ungratified.
This latter fact I had to assume from the statement long since
made by Freud, that sleeplessness is the result of unreleased sexual
excitations. The interpretation of this symptom was arrived at
when a considerable oral hbido fixation had been revealed in
the sexual constitution of the patient, and its later history traced.
Great activity in this direction had been evinced in childhood but
at puberty practicaUy no r61e was assigned to it. The patient was
a very great lover of kissing, yet this tendency of his oral libido
never afforded him full satisfaction; his other auto-erotic tendencies, ^
' See also Freud: 'Trauer und Melancholic', IniemaHonale Zeit-
schrift fUr arztliche Psychoanalyse, Bd. IV, S. 288.
Great releases of affect often render possible a temporary regression
to the oral stage; at such moments 'ones feels as though one's throat
were being throttied'.
PLEASURE IN SLEEP AND DISTURBED CAPACITY FOR SLEEP 4I
which managed without a love object, did not permit of its be-
coming a perversion. In this way this component impulse, cut oft
from conscious life, was able to retain in the unconscious its
potential force, so as finally to become effective, i, e. pathological,
after diminution of complete enjoyment in the sexual act, in a
temporary disturbance of sleep. It is worth noting that the oral
libido behind the symptom of sleeplessness did not have to give
up its incognito. This is shovm in the next case similarly.
4. A man of forty-eight became a martyr to insomnia which
set in with the decline of his genital functions, when he had
lost all sexual craving. This insomnia is explained by the fact that-
in the process of ageing the impulses capable of becoming con-
scious were put out of action, while the unconscious — repressed —
impulses had experienced the increase usual at the climacterium,
amongst them an oral libido which had been inactive up to that time.
Since the oral libido could not then come to the fore in the
sexual activity now abandoned, its complement, insomnia, took its
place. It may serve as an indirect proof of the patient's unusual oral
disposition that his daughter up to fifteen years of age was a tliumb-
sucker and later io her sexual indiiference very much recalled
the present condition of her father, whom she resembled in physical
details.
5. In a case of extreme insomnia which developed as the result
of a mentally-conditioned and ■ deeply-rooted aversion to normal
sexual intercourse — its motive was a protest against the immorality
of the mother with whom the patient identified himself— an
oral perversion appeared as the final bearer of the patient's still
existing sexual impulses. Nevertheless, before this broke out in-
somnia had been permanently established. The patient suffered
all his life from salivatio nervosa.
I believe this series of observations might easily be augmented
by following out the leading points of view. We may assume that
under certain conditions there is a complementary relation between
impulses or, in case we do not wish to reduce the need for sleep
to the rank of an impulse, tliat impulses unite with the cardinal
phenomena of life which belong to organic nature. The follow-
ing considerations support this view. Consciousness is a phenomenon
of life of primary significance. Consciousness in the real sense
begins with respiration. In a sense every human being might say
that since he began to breathe he became conscious of himself
42
MICHAEL JOSEF EISLER
Pathology teaches us that there are profound connections between
consciousness and breathing. In all those morbid disturbances or
interruptions of consciousness which we denote by the popular
collective term 'fit' (syncope, epilepsy, certain hysterical attacks),
inliibition in breathing is the dominating symptom that distinguishes
these states from sleep. In the sense of the Freudian libido theory
we have to assume that every regressive process, in so far as it
is not absorbed into the ego, concerns an organ that responds dis-
positionally to it. There is no difficulty in drawing the theoretical
conclusion that also in the respiratory organ such a libido position
can be established. I first obtained this idea from a case of hys-
terical dyspnoea. Later I found the same regressive path to the
respiratory organs in the investigation of a case of infantile anxious
readiness, which had not yet become a phobia and culminated in
something like eclampsic attacks.^ At that time I said to myself
that there must be a retrogressive movement of libido to an
apnoeic phase, which phase I had previously called lethargic.
I have no desire, however, to simplify artificially a great number
of very complicated phenomena by this terminology and will
therefore break off at this point. In the cases related above I was
more concerned to indicate the parallelism. If I have thrown some
light on the parallels between liie oral impulse and the need for
sleep, I have provisionally fulfilled my task. '
' See Freud: Vorlesungen zur Einfiihrung in die Psychoanalyse.
1917, S, 461. He says : ' The word Angst {angusiiae, narrowness)
emphasises the character of constriction in breathing',
* Our therapeutic endeavours have so far shown little success in the
nervous disturbances of sleep. This unfortunate circumstance can be
explained from the fact that the automatic state of sleep, which is
usually related to various auto-erotisms, is at first charged with but
little psychic energy, and only later assumes its relations to the different
mental activities. Psycho-analytic treatment finds a natural limit where
the purely psychic, which is an isolated product, is merged into the
general current of life.
ir
i
i
COMMUNICATIONS .
A FEW 'DON'TS' FOR BEGINNERS IN THE TECHNIQUE OF
PSYCHO-ANALYSIS
BY
ESTELLE MAUDE COLE
LONDON
1. Don't fail to notice the entry of the patient into the con-
sulting room, regarding punctuality, facial expression, tone of voice,
manner and general appearance. Extreme neatness or untidiness of
the person or self-admiration are points of practical value.
2. Don't allow the patient to sit in an upright chair. Provide a
couch to encourage relaxation.
3- Don't sit within the patient's view. The analyst should be
obliterated from view both literally and mentally.
4. Don't talfc once the patient has taken up the supine position.
Keep silent and let the patient break the silence at the beginning
of every hour.
5. Don't fail to note the first remark. This will probably be
found to have a bearing on the analysis and may act as a key
to it.
6. Don't allow the patient to leave the couch or change tlie
supine position so that the analyst is in view. The desire of the
patient to view the analyst is to watch the effect of his disclosures
on the analyst's face. If the patient insists on turning towards the
analyst, this resistance should be analysed at once.
7. Don't give your point of view to the patient Take the patient's
standpoint and work from that.
8. Don't argue with a patient. It takes two to make an argu-
ment and the analyst would be infringing the passive role. The
patient grows tired of trying to argue if there is no response.
9. Don't forget to note the nature of the transference. A heavy
positive transference in the early stages should cause the analyst
to be on the alert for just as heavy a negative.
4S
44 AFEW'DONTS' FOR BEGINNERS OF PSYCHO-ANALYSIS
lo. Don't fail to note signs of a counter transference. These
will be found in the analyst's dreams and should be dealt with
immediately. A counter transference means the need for further
analysis for the analyst. 'The analyst can proceed in an analysis only
so far as he is analysed himself.' (Freud.)
ri. Don't administer cut and dried philosophy. That mode of
procedure is suggestion and not psycho-analysis.
12. Don't divulge any personal affairs to the patient. The instinct
of curiosity in the patient is always uppermost regarding the analyst.
Don't be tempted to relate incidents in one's life to help the
patient. He will probably use such communications for his own
unconscious purposes during the analysis.
13- Don't fail to note the unconscious actions of the patient.
14. Don't fail to note the reactions of the patient, e. g. angry
voice, hushed tone, emphasis, tears, excitement, etc.
15. Don't draw the attention of the patient to the findings in
the analysis too early in the work. The transference may be in-
complete and the egoism of the patient will resent these disclosures.
A serious reaction, such as the contemplation of suicide, may be
the result. Don't forget that the neurotic's chief dictum is: 'I am
not as other men are'.
16. Don't touch the patient. The patient may complain of all
manner of symptoms during the analysis, some of which might involve
a physical examination. They should have attention from a general
physician and not from the analyst; e.g. the development of a skin
rash may cover a desire to expose the person to the analyst
17. Don't continue the analysis after the time has expired even
if the patient has arrived late. Cease and rise from your chair no
matter what the patient happens to be saying at the moment.
18. Don't allow patients who come for analysis to meet either
on entry or departure. This is a frequent cause of jealousy and fresh
resistances are set up.
19- Don't fail to note the manner of the patient's departure.
Heed the facial expression and the tone of voice.
20. Don't forget that some unconscious action or unguarded remark
on departure may furnish material for the next analysis.
A SYMBOLISM OF APPENDICITIS
BY
W. H. B. STODDART
LONDON
A male patient under analysis and during the stage of dealing
with his homosexual complex told me one day that he had swallowed
a grape pip and was afraid it might give him appendicitis. I did
not take the matter seriously and let it pass.
A fortnight later he reverted to the matter and regarded the
fear as a curious one, because he knew quite well that a grape
pip would 'dissolve' in the digestive juices; so I told him to analyse
the fear. His analysis was as follows:
His concept of the appendix was that of a tube leading into a
hollow cavity and that appendicitis was a swelling up — a distension — of
this cavity, which might be caused by a grape pip passing through
the tube into the cavity. A grape pip is a seed which could ger-
minate into life. Seed = Semen. The distension of the cavity would
therefore be with a child. Moreover, until fourteen years of age he
imagined the female to be fashioned just like the male and supposed
fertilization to be induced via the mouth.
45
A SIMPLE LAPSUS LINGUAE
BY
C. D. DALY
PKSHAWUR, INDIA
We had been dining, five men and one lady. After dinner there
was no means of the lady relieving herself; so she had to wait till
late in the night, which must have been particularly trying, as
we were all drinking freely, in a dry heat of iiS".
After dinner on the way home, the lady was talking about
medicines and remarked: 'I have some excellent pills. They are
made of Charcoal, Bepsin, and Pissmuth.' Having said this she
laughed hysterically, and I laughed outright, which put her at her
ease.
However, the next day she very cleverly brought the conversation
round to slips of the tongue, and then said: 'Oh! Wasn't it strange?
Last night I said "Bepsin" instead of "Pepsin" to Major Daly'.
46
1
1
\
Si
THE UNCONSCIOUS ROOT OF AESTHETIC TASTE
BY
S. HERBERT
MANCHESTER
Psycho-analysis has made it evident that the ' source of artistic
inspiration lies in the unconscious, the material worked up by the
artist being his own deeper self, which finds expression in his creation
as a projection of himself. Pfister has further shown that drawings
may have unconscious symbolical meanings, quite apart from their
pictorial value. But it is possible to go a step further still. It
would seem that artistic taste in general is based — at least to a
large extent— on unconscious associations that find a symbolic
expression in conscious aesthetic predilections.
This comes out neatly in the following cases, which have come
under the writer's notice during the course of psycho-analysis. In
each instance aesthetic valuation was dependent entirely upon an
unconscious complex.
Case I. Violent dislike of yellow.
Immediate association; mustard; further with mustard: sUmy,
'mashy' — dislike of 'mashy' food, and finally — diarrhoea. As a
matter of fact, the patient had a strong coprophilic complex, of
which the most obvious symptom was frequent attacks of nervous
diarrhoea.
Case 2. Excessive delight in yellow.
The patient, a homosexual, loves to wear ties with yellow or
orange in them, lives in a room with yellow wall-paper, etc.
Immediate association with yellow: his mother's hair, which
was yellow, and of which she was extremely proud. The patient,
like all homosexuals, passed through a period of strong fixation
on his mother. Further association with yellow: the yellow colour
of the anus (in hght-haired boys). Patient has a strong coprophilic
complex with pederastic phantasies.
Yellow also leads him back to the yellow colour of infantile
faeces and to the remembrance of a scene in his fifth year, when
.47
4S
S. HERBERT
he refused to eat scrambled eggs on account of their resemblance
to a child's motioni
Case J. Dislike of the colour combination red and purple.
Association: tiie reddish -purplish aspect of the vulva. The dis-
like arose for the first time when he saw a large flaunting flower
painted in red and purple, which reminded him of the vulva. The
patient is a voyeur, and often compares the spread-out vulva to a
flower.
Case 4- Strong aesthetic predilection for stone quatries.
The patient, who is a homosexual, finds that tliey have some-
thing 'manly'. Then he thinks they represent something 'naked',
A dream of his reveals the whole truth: he dreams that he sees
at one side of a road a stone quarry, and at the other a beautiful
nude youth. He does not know which to choose. He himself found
the psycho-analytical explanation.
Case s-
A lady finds that she has a strong predilection for certain designs,
which on analysis are all found to have this one thing in common,
that the several parts of the design are repeated, and are chasing
each other, as in a whorl. Thus she divides the small window
panes of a large window by imaginary diagonals, and constructs
the pattern given below; also rose-designs, arranged within a circle or
square have a special attraction for her. On analysis it becomes
quite clear to her that not only do the three sections of the rose
m
chase each other, but two sections together (as i and 2) suggest
the two halves of the nates, and this three times over in the design.
The next association is the Manx coat of arms, three legs arranged
in a circle and 'kicking' each other: this brings us nearer to the
solution. She also remembers the somewhat meaningless geography
rhyme 'Long-legged Italy "kicks" little Sicily', for which she had
a curious fondness. The kicking and the nates together bring out
the person's complex: flagellation ideas. Her earhest recollection is
from school when she was about five years old, when she wit-
nessed a (male) teacher chastizing another little girl on the bare
'i.
THE UNCONSCIOUS ROOT OF AESTHETIC TASTE 49
buttocks. This was resented violently at the time, but nevertheless
was repressed into the unconscious with a lustful tone, which still
expressed itself in a flagellation complex.
These individual examples show clearly that all such apparently
idle fancies as artistic predilections have definite causal foundations,
and are determined by individual unconscious factors. The old adage
De gustibus non est disputandum thus finds its appropriate psychic
interpretation.
A SPERMATOZOA PHANTASY OF AN EPILEPTIC
BY
F. p. MULLER
LEIDEN-OEGSTGEEST, HOLLAND
About nine years ago Herbert Silberer' published an article on
dreams of spermatozoa in whicli he expressed the opinion that
other investigators would come across representations of sperma-
tozoa in many dreams, and he further added that it would be
desirable for them to examine these cases carefully from the point
of view of death wishes, in order to find out whether this con-
nection which he had observed was the rule. Hedwig Schulze^
has since confirmed this connection of dreams of spermatozoa with
death wishes. She further discovered that the wish to be born again
lay behind the wish to be dead. Silberer considered his case parti-
cularly worthy of consideration because it very clearly proved to
him the correctness of a new kind of observation which the majority
of people would accept with incredulity. Many persons who have
only a little knowledge of psycho-analysis will be inclined to be
mistrustful of a phantasy concerning the body of tlie father (much
more so than of one concerning the mother's body), and we can
imagine that the opponents will not admit the striking evidence
upon which the correctness of Silberer's observation is said to be
based, because it concerns the interpretation of symbols which one
might be always justified in doubting. On account of this I am
particularly pleased to be able to publish the following case because
without any interpretation it demonstrates in an indisputable manner
the actual occurrence of the phantasy of being a spermatozoon in
the father's body, and coupled with it thoughts of death and re-birth.
The man was an epileptic who was not being treated psycho-
analytically, and there were no grounds for believing that he had
' 'Spermatozoentramne', yahrb. f. psychoanalyt. ». psychopath. For-
schttwgen^ Bd. VI, S. 141 ff.
' 'Ein Spermatozoentraum im Zusammenhang mit Todeswiinschen ',
IntematioHale ZHtsckrift fur Psychoanalyse, Bd. II, S. 34.
50
A SPERMATOZOA PHANTASY OF AN EPILEPTIC 51
been influenced by psycho-analytical theories or anything of that
nature.
The patient's wife consulted me on account of her husband's
mental confusion which had existed for two days and which follow-
ed three epileptic attacks that had occurred the day before.
He had never been confused previously, but according to her de-
scription had suffered from typical epileptic attacks for the last
eleven years (he smacks his tongue, becomes suddenly unconscious
and falls down with tonic convulsions passing into clonic ones,
passes urine during the attack, and after the fit is stuporose and
gradually falls asleep). He had never had any attacks when he was
a sergeant-major, but only since he had been in a civU post. He
had had convulsions when a child. For several years he had taken
a good deal of alcohol.
On my first visit the patient, who was about forty-five years
old, was moderately orientated in time, but he hallucinated music
and the audience around him, and occupied himself with an imagin-
ary electric wire which was connected with the production of the
music. He was afraid that his wife would touch the wire. He
was cheerful and fairly quiet except that he continually moved his
right arm in order to produce the music from the imaginary wire.
According to his wife's account he played all the time with his
penis and said that clay came from it. He named objects in-
correcdy, and on reading from a paper and writing from dictation
he frequenUy misread and misheard. He had no tremors. Briefly,
the man showed a delirium of occupation with epileptic and alcoholic
features, but we shall see diat the content of this delirium to be
ascribed to intoxication was similar to a dream.
The patient who had not slept for two days and nights was
given 0.1 00 grammes of luminal and fell asleep in five minutes.
When he awoke next morning the delirium had passed. His
emotional state on waking is worth noting. He cried with emotion and
with such violence that he made a kind of bellowing noise, and
assured me that he had recovered. He had retained an accurate
memory of his delirium and also of reality; for instance, he immedia-
tely recognised me.
He told me quite spontaneously and with evident pleasure, but
at the same time as though astonished at something extraordinary,
what had happened to him. 'Just think of it, I have been in my
father's bowels as a littie seed, as phlegm. The door opened and
52 F. P. MULLER
the last to come out was Fritz'. (He meant himself, he used the
childish method of expression in giving his Christian name instead of
employing the pronoun. Fritz is not his actual name). He said that
he had found his deHrium and the dreams following it very pleasant.
1 finally obtained the following details from him.
In his delirium he was promoted to company sergeant-major,
and marched at the head of his company of •Schutterij' (an old
Dutch civil guard). He conducted the music as band-master. He
was accompanied to his grave in Utrecht with music. He also
visited his mother's grave there. He saw the coffin into which
he was to go, and felt how the sexton lowered him in the coffin
into the grave, and how sand was then thrown on tlie coffin. Then
his body putrified, and a large hole came in his breast. There was
' sand between his skin and flesh. He had pain in his sexual organs,
and sound came from his glans penis. The hole in his breast now
became smaller until nothing remained of it but a little animal like
an earth-worm. He was now no longer aHve. Then he was with
his sisters and brodiers and many others as semen in his father's
sexual organs. It was so arranged that none of the semen was
lost. The door moved round and round. (In connection with this
an object which decorated the wall opposite the patient played a
part). First his brothers were born, he who was the youngest child
was hurled out last. He went into the chamber-pot as a little bit
of phlegm. Also his two little sons (whom he actually has) were
bom from his own semen.
I was not able to discover which of these events the patient
experienced in his delirium and which in his dreams. However,
this is immaterial as both delusion and dream are products of the
imagination. The chief fact is that the patient has created a phantasy
and its principal theme, his death and re-birth as a spermatozoon
in his father's body, is represented quite undisguised. Like so many
things ab-eady discovered by analysis that have later been corro-
borated by their occasional undisguised appearance in dreams and
delusions, so here too an undistorted phantasy of the father's body
has shown that a human being is actually able to long to be back
again to his existence as a spermatozoon.
Many details, however, require analysis even in a phantasy so
transparent as the present one, but as a detailed investigation was
not undertaken with this patient I only feel justified in expressing
a few suppositions.
n
A SPERMATOZOA PHANTASY OF AN EPILEPTIC 53
A return to the mother's womb is symbolised by his visit to
his mother's grave, which therefore precedes that to his father's
body: one might say, the patient in his phantasy goes the same
road in an opposite direction to that which he once took when he
entered into hfe. In agreement with this there also occurs a
seeking and finding the mother in the dreams of spermatozoa
quoted by Silberer. It is worth noting that there is a great simiJ-
arity between the events accompanying and subsequent to the
patient's burial and Agatha's last disgusting dream. We find a
similar agreement between the patient's remark that clay comes
out of his penis and symbols of sperm in the dreams Silberer
mentions. On the other hand one misses in Silberer's dreams the
wish to be born again, which in the case I have observed is mani-
festly of more importance than the death wish, hi the present
case death is only a means to a new Ufe, just as it appears to
be in the dreams analysed by Hedwig Schulze, while Silberer's
Agatha did not even wish to be conceived. We can explain this
difference: in a case like Agatha's narcissism wins and diere-
fore one longs for non-existence, in other cases a longing to return
newly born into the world springs from the allo-erotism that is
triumphing.
The patient does not like to end his present life without having
experienced the realisation of a wish unfulfilled during liis military
career, and so he is promoted to company sergeant-major in his
phantasy. Also he is buried to the accompaniment of music, which
in Holland is only done for officers. Music here' is also a symbol
of life, for he who makes music makes life (i.e. noise); further
the patient produces music by means of electricity which is itself ' \
usually a symbol of procreation. When he is afraid that his wife will
touch the wire it coincides very well with her account that he had
only cohabited with her once in one or two months, and then
practised coitus interruptus. (I only learned later that his marriage
was an unhappy one.)
The fact that in reality he lost all his semen stimulated in his
phantasy the opposite with regard to his father's semen. He identified
himself with his father. We may deduce this from the fact that
not only he himself was bom from his father's semen, but also
his two little sons from his own semen. The chamber-pot into
which he fell obviously symbolised the female sex organ, and
likewise probably the coffin in which he was buried represents the
54 F. P. MULLER
same organ. That he is in his father's bowels perhaps points to
the wish for homosexual intercourse with liis father. Finally, the
pleasure which he felt in the events of the dream, and his peculiar
emotional state on waking are, as it seems to me, to be ascribed
chiefly to the idea of being born again.
n
BOOK REVIEWS
PSYCHOPATHOLOGY. By Edward J. Kempf, M. D. {Kimpton, London,
1521, Pp. 762. Price 63s.)
We are apprised of a new Star in the West Before the War
Dr. Kempf's name was not known in Europe, but since the War
sundry rumours have reached us from America announcing the high
esteem in which his work is there held. One gathers that he is re-
garded as an exceedingly original thinker and investigator in psycho-
pathology as well as being the leading psycho-analyst in America. A
certain note in Dr. Kempf's writings, and the tone in which he presum-
ably allows his work to be advertised, makes one wonder whether
he altogether regards this estimate of his standing with disfavour. It
was with no little curiosity- and sense of expectation, therefore, that
we turned to the magnutu opus before us.
And it truly is a ponderous tome. Massive in both size and weight,
excellently produced, and lavishly decked with interesting and beautiful
illustrations, it can be described by no other word. As a first orientation
we inquired into the author's sense of obligation to his precedessors in
this field, a not unnatural procedure with a book which is a passionate
defence of psycho-analysis. We noted that the names of such leading
analysts as Abraham, Brill, Ferenczi, and Rank do not occur at all in
the index, nor does that of Jung. Adler's name occurs once only— a
fact all the more striking since the book is distinctly Adierian in tone—
and Freud's name six times only. Of these six one is given in error ;
in a second one Freud is classed among such analysts as Morton
Prince and Boris Sidis, so that the author seems to conceive of psycho-
analysis in a distinctly catholic sense; in a third one Freud is quoted
as warning against the indiscriminate cultivation of transference- in
two others Freud's conception of ' conversion ' is criticised in the fol-
lowing manner. It is 'a biological riddle and utterly unintelligible'
(p. 5}. 'It is not only confusing but unnecessary ... It is nothing less
than a reducHo ad absurduin to assume that repressed anger can be
"converted" into a physical distortion' (p. 291). The true way of
stating what actually happens is apparently this : ' The repressed affect, or
rather the hypertense repressed autonomic segment, simply forces the ass-
umption and maintenance of a fixed attitude, stereotyped function or
55
56 BOOK REVIEWS
■ an idea, which requires as constant innervation and affective reenforce-
meot as the performance of countless movements to attain an end. ' '
The extent to which a writer acknowledges his obligation to prev-
ious workers cannot always be strictly correlated, however, with the
amount he has actually learned from them, so we next made a. careful
study of the book with a view to determining this point on the one
hand, and on the other ascertaining the nature of Dr. Kempf's own
contributions to the science of psychopathology. It may be said at once
that, although our original expectations were not fulfilled, we were by
^ no means disappointed. Dr. Kempf has evidently learned a good deal
t from psycho-analytical writings and he has also done a great deal of
; independent work. Of his powers of thought we formed a less favour-
* able impression: what might pass with some as original ideas more
often seemed to us to be merely novel modes oi formulation, the util-
ty of which was not always obvious. The tendency to isolate himself
from other workers, hinted at above and shewn in many ways throughout
the book, is perhaps the author's chief weakness. Not only is there not
(. the slightest attempt to correlate his experience and points of view
\ with those of other workers, but there seems to be a positive distaste
against such a procedure ; the task of following the author is made
f extremely difficult not merely by the way in which he adheres through-
i out to his own language and terminology, which he has of course
f every right to do if he finds it more helpful, but by his failure to
*■ indicate the relation of this terminology to that otherwise employed.
* A prominent merit of the book which wins our sympathetic interest
I from the outset is the author's essentially biological outlook. No attempt
is made to describe the findings of psychopathology in terms of some
ethical system, and there is no trace of any of the anagogic or mystical
interpretation of data that has so hampered the scientific work of other
i writers. For Dr. Kempf Man is primarily an imperfect animal who has
L become trained to respond in certain ways to certain stimuli. The
I meaning of man's behaviour he sees in the need to regain a state of
rest and comfort by neutralising, in more or less suitable ways, these
disturbing stimuli. Nothing could be in better accord with this funda-
mental principle of modem clinical psychology than the following
statement. 'These affective-autonomic tensions or cravings, constituting
the zftsk to do, to be, to have, etc., compel the organism to expose the
favorite receptors of the craving so that they may receive from the
environment those stimuli which have the quality, through counter stim-
ulation, of arousing autonomic reactions, which, in turn, neutralize
the undue autonomic tensions and restore a state of comfortable auto-
• It is only fair to say that there are a few other and more compliment-
ary references to Freud in the text which are not entered in the index.
BOOK REVIEWS ' \ 57
nomic tonus. Through this principle, the constant tendency of the
everchanging environment and metabolism to cause a state of autonomic
tension and unrest is relieved, more or less, by a compensatory effort
to reestablish a state of autonomic comfort' (p. 6g8). This mechanistic
view is extended to man's activities as a whole : ' Man's civilization is
simply the building of a more comfortable, controllable environment
within the greater environment . . . Civilization is to be recognized as
a protective compensation against the anxiety and autonomic unrest
caused by the unfulfilled wish and uncontrollable environment' (p. 27).
Further, 'the infant seems to be so constituted that no socialized
interests exist in its personality until the compensations to prevent nn-
pleasant social experiences begin to develop tkem ' (p. 77).
Dr. Kempf's criterion of mental normality is anything that serves
to maintain the functional status of virility, goodness and happiness,
and he devotes a special chapter to the biological definition of this
standard and to its relations to current sociological ones. In his im-
patience of irrational social conventions that ignore the facts of biology
he fulminates against ascetic prudery with a vehemence and out-
spokenness which, for obvious reasons, is commoner in America — one
thinks of social writers like Mencken and Lippmann — than in Europe.
'Vulgarity is as intolerable to the prude as prudery is to the vulgar
and both of these tendencies are to be avoided, because one is con-
ducive to a biological degeneration of Man and the other, to his castra-
tion . . . We must not accept from religious fanatics or purveyors of
sex that the body is a filthy desecration of the soul ' (p. 3). ' The
psychiatrists who avoid the sexual problems of their cases and the
psychoanalytic method of studying them are to be classed with the
medical cults that avoid the study of anatomy and physiology. Their
resistance to the problems of sex is as rational as the medieval per-
secution of dissection ' (p. 17).
The main content of the book is an attempt to express the data
of psychopathology in terms of physiology and biology. In doing so
the author evidently bases himself almost entirely on Sherrington's
work on integration and PavlofTs on the conditioned reflex; he also
takes the more questionable step of accepting the James-Lange hypo-
thesis of the peripheral origin of emotion. He agrees that cortical
localization and the study of the intra-cerebral neurones, important as
such work may be in its own sphere, contribute little to the under-
standing of the problems of personality as a whole. The key to these
he finds in the functioning of the autonomic apparatus. He accepts the
fundamental importance of Freud's conception of the Wish, but 'no
one should be misled into assuming for its source a " psychic energy " ;
it may be completely accounted for if it is recognized to be none
other than a localized autonomic-affective craving and its compelling
58 * BOOK REVIEWS
influence on the striped muscle apparatus of the personality . . . The
term "affective craving" has a distinct advantage in that it can be
clearly correlated with its physiological source in the streams of craving
or itching sensations that are aroused by increased tensions of different
segments of the autonomic apparatus' (p. 2j). All cravings, emotions
and sentiments 'can probably be best understood as having a peri-
pheral origin in characteristic variations of postural tension of autonomic
or visceral segments' (p. 24).
He adopts the same mechanistic view of the personality as does
Freud, that is, he regards behaviour as essentially a series of efforts
to change the environment in such a way as to expose the person to
such stimuli and sensations as will still whatever craving, of either
external or internal origin, that may be at the moment a disturbing
influence. The way in which he prefers to express this may be gleaned
from the following quotations: 'The neutralization theory of the dynamic
or autonomic mechanism of the personality is as follows: The different
segments of the autonomic apparatus are stimulated to assume different
types of postural tensions and activities, which give rise to an affective
nervous stream, which, in turn, coordinates the projicient apparatus and
compels it to act so as to eaipose the receptors of the organism so
that they will acquire certain types of stimuli and avoid others. The
stimuli which must be acquired in order to avoid prolonged unrest
and distress, which may become decidedly maJnutritional in their
influence, must have the capacity to counter-stimulate the autonomic
segment so that it will resume a state of comfortable tonus ' (p. 9).
'The egoistic unity can not attack the segmental cravings directly, but
controls them through controlling the final-common-motor paths of the
projicient apparatus' (p. 13). The same idea is formulated elsewhere
as two laws: ' i. When an autonomic-affective craving is aroused, either
to compensate for the deficiencies due to metabolism (as in hunger)
or through the influence of an exogenous stimulus (as in fear), it com-
pels the projicient (striped muscle) apparatus to shift the exteroceptors
about in the environment so that they will acquire such stimuli as are
necessary to counterstimulate and neutralize the autonomic derangement
so that the segment will assume comfortable tensions. 2. The projicient
apparatus that shifts the receptors about so as to expose them to
appropriate stimuli is organized and coordinated so as to bring a
maximum of affective gratification with a minimum expenditure of
of energy' (p. 24). 'The conditioning of the autonomic apparatus to
react so as to produce pleasure-giving sensations upon the acquisition
of certain classes of stimuli, and unpleasant sensations upon being
exposed to the presence of other stimuli, is the very foundation of the
differences in interests and aversions that are to be met in everyone'
(p. 699). In Dr. Kempf's opinion this mode of formulation has great
BOOK REVIEWS 59
advantages: 'Not until we learned to understand the integrative funct-
ions of the organism were we actually able to explain in a physiological
manner such phenomena as the adjustments of allied and antagonistic
wishes and thoughts, functional conflicts, inhibition or suppression, re-
pression, summation and dissociation of antagonistic cravings, the
necessity of symbolical compromises in methods of thinking, the source
of the pressure of the repressed craving or wish in the postural ten-
sions of visceral segments and its manner of causing delusions and
hallucinations' (p. 8). The rest of the book consists of this 'ex-
planation '.
The inevitable question must now be asked whether this admixture
of Freud, Sherrington and Pavloff brings us any nearer the under-
standing of psychopathological problems, and whether it has enabled
Dr. Kempf to make any original contribution of his own to the solution
of these problems. Here the reviewer has to walk delicately lest he
incurs Dr. Kempf's wrath by being so simple-minded as to accuse
him of mere neurologizing tautology (p. 9). But does Dr. Kempf fore-
stall the accusation because it is fimdamentally true, so that he has to
defend himself by any device he can think of, or is he justifiably
warning the superficial and stupid reader against falling into an easy
trap f We can only say, whatever the consequences, that with the best
will in the world and with anxious attention to his formulation we
have failed to be impressed by its value. After all, the final test in
such matters is in the application. And, although Dr. Kempf himself
may for some reason feel happier when using such language, we do
not find a single example in all the numerous case-histories recorded
where the use of it has seemed to us to throw light on the actual
problems of the case. What really happens is that Dr, Kempf de-
scribes the events in the life-history of his patient just like anyone else
and only here and there suddenly, and as it seems to us irrelevantly,
throws in a remark about their postural tonus or projicient apparatus;
a man is struggling against a homosexual propensity or a jealousy oi
his father, whereupon it is obvious, or should be to the reader, that
his autonomic apparatus is undergoing a compensatory effort to re-
establish a state of comfortable tonus. It may well be so, but we must
believe it purely on Dr. Kempf's authority ; the ' reader will seek in
vain for the faintest evidence of what is actually going on in the
patient's viscera, or for any reason to think there is any causal relation
between what is supposed to be going on and the patient's mental
difficulties. Let us look at an example given by Dr. Kempf: 'When
an artisan loses his right hand in an accident and complains of in-
somnia, loss of appetite and a "sinking feeling" in his abdomen, we
know {sic) that the stomach and viscera in the epigastric region have
-/■
6o
BOOK REVIEWS
assumed postural tensions that are the source of a stream of fearful
feelings ... It is the uncomfortable tension of the viscera that forces
him to go through the dnidgery of learning to apply his left hand'
(p. 185). What is this but an ipe dixit} Against the conclusion may
be advanced all the arguments that have led the vast majority of
psychologists and clinicians to reject the James-Lange hypothesis, and
which need not be repeated here.
Our judgement on this matter is based on purely clinical grounds.
It tallies, however, with that reached on other lines by Dr. Thacker in
his review of Dr. Kempf's first book on the subject (see this Journal,
Vol. n, p. 237). Dr. Thacker, a distinguished pupil of Sherrington's, is
fully qualified to speak on the technical aspects of the conceptions
relating to autonomic functioning, and his opinion coincides with the
present reviewer's to the effect that, by vague and unwarranted ex-
tensions of these conceptions, Dr. Kempf simply erects the autonomic
apparatus into a deus ex machina, the very mention of which is
supposed to explain everything.
We do not wish this criticism, however, to be taken in too sweeping
a sense. That some day a correlation will be established between not
only tiie various emotions, but between every individual wish-impulse,
on the one hand and specific changes in autonomic functioning on the
other is the expectation of most clinical psychologists, including psycho-
analysts. The similar neurological expectation of a generation ago that
a like correlation would be established with changes in the central
nervous system, particularly the cerebral cortex, may also yet be fulfilled.
But we do not imagine that anyone now thinks that if it were so the
correlation would provide us with a knowledge of the source of the
impulses in question. Is there any more reason to suppose that this
source is to be found in the autonomic apparatus, as Dr. Kempf appears
to think? Or will it not prove that both departments of the nervous
system, the cerebro-spinal as the autonomic, are merely executive in
function, systems for registering and carrying out the response to
endocrinic or metabohc intracellular excitation? Our criticism of
Dr. Kempf's work is therefore a double one: we cannot accept his
view of the causal importance of the autonomic apparatus, and we do
not find that he has contributed much of importance to the more
humble task of correlating mental and autonomic functioning.
The book contains in the next place the application of the prin-
ciples considered above, together with an exposition of Dr. Kenjpf s
views as to the mechanism of neurotic and psychotic disorder. These
are far from easy to discuss, for Dr. Kempf does not give us the im-
pression of being a close thinker, and his presentation is often ex-
ceedingly general in nature ; one can therefore only record impressions.
BOOK REVIEWS fii '
To begin with, Dr. Kempf appears to be convinced of the essentially \
sexual nature of neurotic suffering. He writes, for instance: 'Wherever '
we have an individual, male or female, who is conscientiously absorbed
in striving to suppress the sexual functions from making him or her i
aware of their conditioned needs, we have a neurotic individual as the '*
result' (p. 88), and, again: 'No individual can have a psychosis or
anxiety neurosis so long as he can maintain his sexual potency without
jeopardizing his needs for social esteem' (p. 709), The conception of '
conflict is equally fundamental. One passage (p. 28) gives the im- *
pression that this conflict is between different autonomic segments, but '' '
this is doubtless a misunderstanding on the reviewer's part, for else-
where (e.g., p. 20) Dr. Kempf speaks of 'uncontrollable autonomic
affective cravings originating in autonomic segments opposed by the
ego'; for him, symptoms 'gratify autonomic cravings that cannot be
gratified by external realities because social conventions and obligations
force the e^o to prevent the autonomic cravings from acquiring the
external stimuli which they are conditioned to need' (p. 64). ^
We fancy, however, that this last statement must have been care-
lessly formulated, since it does not appear to represent Dr. Kempf's
true position. We take this to be one between Freud's and Adler's,
though nearer to the latter's; it would seem to be Freudian as to the
aetiology of the neuroses, but Adierian as to their mechanism. It will
be remembered that, schematically put, Freud considers symptoms
to be a compromise-formation contributed to equally by the ego and
the sexual instincts in opposition to each other, while Adier holds that
they are created by the ego instincts alone as a compensation for a
real or imagined inferiority (which he first thought was always a sexual
one). Now, so far as we can judge. Dr. Kempf holds, with Adler, that
symptoms are created by the ego as a compensation for some secret,
real or imaginary, inferiority, but, approximating a little to Freud, he
finds that this inferiority is practically always of a sexual nature.
' Compensation is one of the most fundamental attributes of living tissue
and occurs particularly where there exists some sort of painful irritation
or the tendency of the autonomic-affective apparatus to be forced into
the fear state ' (p. 69). The commonest inferiorities leading to patho-
logical compensations are 'segmental cravings for masturbation and
homosexual and heterosexual perversions' (p. 71). The course of events
is, according to him, as follows : when a person is not sexually potent
in the full adult sense (genital heterosexuality) the feeUng of biological
and social inferiority engenders anxiety, and the symptoms result from
the compensatory efforts on the part of the ego to escape from this
fear. The conception of impotency and castration as the main source
of inferiority dominate the book, the criterion being taken very much
from an adult point of view, estimated, that is, by racial and social
62 BOOK REVIEWS
standards ; Dr. Kempf considers that in evolulioii fear has proved the most
successful means of combating 'biological inferiority and perverse waste'
(p. 700). It is evident that the theory, being elaborated essentially from
the point of view of the adult male, is more difficult to apply to
women, and one wonders how it could apply at all to the neuroses of
children.
One sees that the theory is an ingenious one and has further the
merit, fundamentally, of simplicity. It retains Freud's insistence on the
importance of infantile, 'per\-erse' sexuality for the aetiology of the
neuroses, but adopts Adler's views of the conscious (not unconscious)
mechanism of the symptoms as a flight from this, and, like him, erects
an inverted pyramid on the inadequate basis of the castration complex
alone. He falls into Adler's error of overlooking the positive narci.ssistic
basis imderlying the castration complex and sense of inferiority, and
doubtless for the same reason, from lack of adequate training in the
technique of reaching the unconscious proper; he does not, however,
follow Adler in desexualising the supposedly dominating wish for
virility. It is not necessary here to repeat any of the numerous
criticisms of Adler's doctrine that have appeared from the side of
psycho-analysis; the reader may be referred to the latest of them, by
Professor Freud, in this Journal (Vol. I, pp. 393-5).
So far it has been possible, we hope, to follow Dr. Kempf's line
ol thought We cannot, however, say the same for the nosological
section of the book. Here it seems to us that Dr. Kempf has given
his phantasy fullest rein, and the result is a most astonishing classific-
ation of mental disease which is like a maze without a clue. Not
only is it unlike any other scheme of classification, but, what is really
incommoding, the author has made no effort to indicate its connections
with known territory, so that we have to pick our way as best we can.
It starts fairly simply by dividing all mental disorders into 'benign'
and 'pernicious', which one would think might correspond with the
usual division into neuroses and psychoses were it not that some
epileptoid, dementia praecox, manic-depressive and prison cases come
under the first heading, while manias, compulsions and obsessions are
given under both. The main difference between the t\vo groups is that
m the former the patient 'retains tiie tendency to accept the personal
source of the wishes or cravings which cause the distress' (p. 195),
this not being so with the latter; the former can therefore be analysed
and corrected, the latter not
The benign neuroses are divided into two groups, 'suppression
neuroses ' and ' repression neuroses ' respectively, the essential difference
being that in only the former is the patient conscious of the nature of
the cravings that have made him ill. These in no way correspond, as
. 1
BOOK REVIEWS 63
might have been expected, with actual neuroses and psychoneuroses,
for 'psychoneuroses' are listed in both groups and the 'suppression
neuroses' even contain the war neuroses and mild types of manic-
depressive insanity as well. The essential cause of war neurosis is a
maladaptation to the causes of fear, which are (i) potential death or
injury, and (2) an uncontrollable subconscious craving to commit sub-
missive homosexual perversions (p. 287), a guess which is an approxim-
ation to the truth. Morbid fear in general is not always a reaction to
repressed impulses, as Freud holds; it is sometimes this and sometimes
the direct effect of the memory of past danger (as used to be believed
in pre-analytical days and as is still believed by Morton Prince and
others). On the basis of this distinction Dr. Kempf divides phobias into
two classes (p. 730).
The pernicious neuroses are divided into three groups: (l) 'Com-
pensation neuroses', which seem to represent an accentuation of the j
mechanism present in the ' repression neuroses ', (2) ' Regression neur- '
OSes', where the compensation has failed, so that the patient regresses
to an earlier, irresponsible level, and (3) 'Dissociation neuroses', in
which the uncontrollable cravings dominate the personality. Manic cases
come under the first of these captions, depressive cases under the
second. 'The depressives are either types who renounce all competitive
interests in the world, give up hope of winning the love-object through
the striving methods of maturity and regress to an infantile, or intra-
uterine mother dependence ; or, autoerotic, they struggle anxiously,
desperately to escape the obsessing cravings of the pelvic segment' i
(p. 712); there is here no hint of the central part played by hate in ;
the genesis of depression. On the other hand the) importance of repressed
homosexuality in paranoia is recognised, though only fitfully. Dr. Kempf
makes the interesting statement that 'the most important determinant
of the malignancy and incurability of the psychopath's methods of
thinking is hatred ' (p. S5o), one which contains a great deal of truth.
More than half of the book is taken up with descriptions of cases,
and Dr. Kempf deserves great praise for the labour and skill witli
which he has recorded this valuable material. It is most interesting
in itself and is interestingly presented. It is accompanied by a series of
beautiful and well-reproduced illustrations, from classic art, from anti-
quarian finds, photographs of characteristic expressions and postures,
of apparatus invented by insane patients, and so on. One of his main
objects here, successfully achieved, is to demonstrate the wide occur-
rence of unconscious symbolism quite apart from psychopathology :
'When one recalls the ridiculous tirades some inspired psychiatrists
levelled at the psychoanalysts' recognition that the appearance of a
knife, wand or beast in a dream or hallucination probably had
64 BOOK REVIEWS
phallic or erotic significance, it seems worth while to publish illu-
strations of such things having an actual phallic value. These same
thinkers, who would refer to the asocial sexual cravings as "bestial",
seem to be too prejudiced to recognize that the bestialness might be
expressed by the image of a beast, and, conversely, the sacredness of
socially approved love by beautiful images of many varieties' {p. 19).
Since the days of the Salpctriere Iconographie there has been nothing
in the literature of clinical psychology to compare wilh these wonderful
illustrations, which are certainly the most striking feature of the book.
One turns with interest to the matter of the actual analyses and
interpretations offered by Dr. Kempf, but the result is rather disappoint-
ing. On the whole the case-histories are not much more than detailed
anamneses from mainly conscious material, and the strictly analytic side
is distinctly weak. Here and there sharp insight is shewn, as, for in-
stance, where he traces delusions of poisoning to the sexual value of
food conditioned by the sucking experiences of infancy (p. 91), but
on the other hand there are only too many examples — such as the
conclusion that cravings to steal are 'often caused by the erotic affect
trying to get further excitation in order lo become potent enough to
obtain gratification' {p. 732) — where adherence to theory has evidently
been more attractive than actual investigation.
In psychotherapy Dr. Kempf proclaims himself an unhesitating ad-
herent of the psycho-analytic method, in spite of tlie remark that it
'has not, however, been used long enough to justify absolute confidence
in its capacity to effect permanent cures' (p, 733); we wonder what
surgical method would not be satisfied with the period of twenty-five
to thirty years. He gives no account of technique, perhaps wisely, and
refers the reader for instruction in it to the works of Freud, Jung,
Piister and Jelliffe, an astonishing selection that tells one a great deal
about Dr. Kempf.
Special attention should be called to the excellent remarks on the
subject of heredity and transmission {pp. 80, 117, etc.); Dr. Kempf
refers to cases where the transmission of neurotic reactions could be
traced through four generations, each one infecting the next one afresh
in the way now familiar to psycho-analysts.
Mention should also be made of interesting analytic studies of
Bootb, Guiteau and Czolgosz, the assassins of Lincoln, Garfield and
McKinley respectively {pp. 439-448), of the Christ myth apropos of
Michel Angelo's 'Pietk' l^. 565), and of Darwin's neurosis {pp. 208-251).
In the last of these, by the way, there occurs a revealing passage in-
dicating that Dr. Kempf is in the well-known second phase ol the
assimilation of a new theory: he quotes the following very general re-
mark of Darwin's 'I felt convinced that the most complex and fine
shades of expression must all have had a gradual and natural origin '
i
■!
BOOK REVIEWS
65
as evidence that 'Freud's contribution, tiiat the sexual functions evolve
gradually as a variation from nutritional functions, is neither a new nor
a radical departure ' (p. 229).
We do not trace any influence of Jung's recent views, and both he
and Adler are referred to only quite incidentally. Some light on his
attitude towards them may be thrown by the following curious passage
'Darwin's theories were more generally accepted by the younger
naturalists who were training for competition with the established
naturalists; and the older men, who could not reconstruct their work,
were unable to accept the theory, preferring their "standing" rather
than the actual truth. Tlie feud bet\veen Freud, Jung, and Adler has a
similar mechanism' (p. 238). We must regard this as a regression from
the true aims of scientific work to the more primitive method of
appraising the value of investigations by the age of the investigator
The passage italicised by the author in the following sentence is more
cabbahstic and we leave the interpretation of it to the reader: 'The
only critic of psychoanalysis who can be considered at all reliable by
the medical profession is the man who has himself practiced psycho-
analysis and did not have to abandon it because of his own affective
discomforts' (p, 735).
To sum up. The book is one of undoubted value and should be in
every Ubrary of works on clinical psychology. It will provide the reader
with a mass of interesting material and will also make him think. On
the other hand we consider that the value of the theories it propounds
is greatly overestimated by many American writers and that they
signify little more than a strenuous, but only partly successful attempt
to digest the work of Freud and Adler. In our opinion the essential ^^.
defect underlying them proceeds, however much Dr. Kempf may
protest to the contrary, from an imperfect familiarity with the un-
conscious mind. If he would consent to study psycho-analysis by the
only direct and first-hand way possible we are convinced that his
future contributions to the science of psychopathology would be more
fruitful than this one is. y.. J.
The Psychology or Medicine. By T. W. Mitchell, M.D. (Methuen & Co.,
London, 1921. Pp. 187. Price 6s.)
In these days when every tyro thmks it necessary to write a book
on medical psychology it is refreshing to come across one written by
an author of the wide and balanced outlook and critical judgement for
which Dr. Mitchell is so justly known. The book is distinguished by
these qualities and is written with a rare lucidity that makes it a pleasure
to read.
66 BOOK REVIEWS
We have here a review of the recent history of medical psychologn,-
together -with the present position of that science. It begins with
a faultless account of the school of hypnotism and suggestion about
which no one is better qualified to write than Dr. ]\litchel]. He then
discusses the facts and theory of dissociation, in the light particularly
of the work done by Morton Prince and Pierre Janet The rest of the
book is almost entirely devoted to Psycho-Analysis and gives a some-
what impersonal, exceedingly clear and accurate account of it. We would
especially commend to the reader the chapter on the Unconscious, for
we know of nothing better written on the subject than this. His account
of the different conceptions that have been included under this term,
and his distinction between the descriptive and systematic senses in
which it is employed by Freud, are unrivalled. Especially worthy to be
singled out is also the sane chapter on the prevention of neurotic illness,
from which we cannot refrain from quoting the following paragraphs.
'The outcome of a too passionate attachment between mother and
son may lead to a similar wreckage of a boy's life. So, also, a too great
devotion between brotiier and sister may lead to a failure of both to
fulfil their destiny. However beautiful we may consider such devotion
to be, we must remember that it is like the pale and delicate beauty
of disease and death, rather than that of health and the fulfilment of
life. Absorption in the family is a shrinking from the adventure of life ;
and to accept the adventure of life should be the privilege and the
duty of every human being.'
'And when the children grow up, the parents must be ready and
willing to let them go free; to allow them to break from the family
and its attachments; to encourage them to seek objects for their love
in the outside world rather than selfishly to bind them to themselves
and the narrow confines of the home. The respect for filial love and
obedience, instilled into our minds from our earliest years, is but an
echo of the selfishness of those who, when they are growing old, are
unwilling to renounce the gratifications of their youth. The craving for
love, as for life, is perennial in humanity. It has its roots in the un-
conscious, and like all unconscious cravings it is selfish. And youth must
be protected from the selfishness of those who are growing old. Here
lies the justification of the poet when he says:
Therefore I summon age
To grant Youth's heritage."
The book in our judgement does not call for any adverse criticism,
but the following comments may be made on'matters of detail. It is only
a partial truth to say of either Janet or Freud that 'they try to explain
hysteria entirely in psychological tenns ' (p. 24), for, while the work of
both these writers has been mainly psychological, they have been
BOOK REVIEWS
67
equally alive to the physiolo^cal correlates of their findings and have
many times insisted on the importance of connecting the two aspects of
hysteria; it would be truer to say that Janet's doctrine is a medical
and Freud's a biological one. We note three historical slips; Freud did
not treat the celebrated Frau Anna O. with Breuer (p. 42); it was
Adler, not Maeder, who was 'the first to insist that the dream is
occupied with the dreamer's current problems and must be interpreted
as an unconscious effort at adjustment of the difficulties of his life'
(p. 108); it was not Freud, but KrafFt-Ebing, who instituted the con-
ception of the obsessional neurosis, in 1S64 {p. 117). Dr. Mitchell writes
of dream SiTnbols: 'The associations which would lead to tlie discovery
of their meaning have not been formed in the life of the individual"
they were formed in some far back period of the history of the race'
(p. lOS). We consider the first of these statements to be more than
doubtful and think that it would have been well to have worded the
second one more cautiously by inserting the word 'probably'. In the
account given of transference during treatment (pp. 140-1} a misleading
impression is apt to be produced on the reader's mind by the undue
stress laid on the openly erotic manifestations, which in practice are
rather rare, certainly in comparison with the more negative aspects of
transference.
There are a couple of points we should like to see elaborated in
a future edition, cramped though Dr. Mitchell obviously is for space.
In describing the development of the psycho-analytic technique (p. 82)
he seems to convey the impression that the search for memories related
to a particular symptom was replaced by the method of free association,
a method which of course was the essentia] one in all stages of the
development. It would have been better to have contrasted the three
st^es of working from a symptom, search for complexes, and investi-
gation of resistances, which constitute the actual changes in development.
We are a litde surprised that Dr. Mitchell has not taken advantage of
his interest in precise definition to give an account of the three senses
in which the term 'regression* is used in Psycho-Analysis (p. 94). In
his account of the obsessional neurosis (p. 131) there might have been
room for a sentence or two giving the relation of the ambivalency to
the conflict bet\veen love and hate, with an indication of the anal-sadistic
source of the disorder. In discussing McDougall's and Ferencai's views
on suggestion (p. 155) there is no aUusion to Trotter's relation of it to
the herd-instinct. Further we should be glad to see a short account of
the different modes of falling neurotically ill, on the lines of the types
indicated by Freud.
In describing the views of Adler, Jung and Maeder, Dr. Mitchell has
been so anxious to avoid all criticism until the last page of the book
that he has, as we think, unduly refrained from illuminating these views
5"
68 BOOK REVIEWS
with explanatory comment. For instance, the reader would find Adler's
doctrine of the 'will-to-power' (pp. 125-6) much more intelligible if
he were told that it had evolved from the doctrine of ' masculine protest '
and from an over-estimation of the importance of the conflict between
maleness and femaleness. The confusion instituted by Macder, Jung and
Silberer (p. 114) as to the prospective function of dreams could have
been more clearly brought out by indicating that it was one between
the dream as such, i. e. the formation of a dream, and the latent content.
Similarly it would be worth while pointing out the hiatus in Jung's
doctrine that 'regression of the libido results when a person turns back
from any task which life may bring to him' (p. 124)— namely, that no
explanation is given here ol the specific form and direction taken by
the regression, as indeed none can be without taking into account the
influence of infantile fixations.
Dr. Mitchell is scrupulously fair to Jung, and goes so far as to ascribe
the development of his doctrines to an intense desire on the part of Jung to
help his patients more than Psycho-Analysis had been able to. He grants that it
might be justifiable to make guesses along prospective lines to help the patient,
even if the theorj- underlying this procedure was scientifically unsound,
But he is careful to point out the subjective dangers entailed in this
and adds: 'From the psycho-analytic point of view it is a defeat; it is
a return to suggestion — to the personal influence of the physician used
as a means of directly combating the neurotic symptoms rather than as
means of overcoming the resistances to self-knowledge and so securmg
a solution of the conflicts which are at the root of the malady . . . Psycho-
analysis differs from some forms of analytical psychology in that it
adheres strictly to the principles of science and does not pose as an.
ethical system or as an esoteric religion' (pp. 178-9)-
in conclusion we cordially congratulate Dr. Mitchell on producing
what is easily the most valuable book of its scope in medical psychologj-
and can unhesitatingly recommend its use as a text-book to all students
and workers in the subject. E- J-
Addresses on Psycho-Analysis. By Professor J. J. Putnam. (The Inter-
national Psycho-Analytical Press, London, 1921- Pp- ix + 47o- ^""=6
I2S. dd.) S
The International Psycho-Analytical Press is to be congratulated on ■ |
havmg been able to issue as its first volume this interesting collection T
of the late Professor -Putnam's contributions to Psycho-Analysis. In view
of Professor Putnam's eminent position as a neurologist, his championship ^1
of Psycho-Analysis has rightly come to be looked upon as a factor of
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BOOK REVIEWS 6g
great importance in the history of Psycho-Analysis in English-speaking
countries, and there can be no doubt that with his death in 1918 the
movement lost a loyal friend, a staunch supporter and an investigator
distinguished by unusual breadth of view, openness of mind, courage
and ability. His writings on Psycho-Analysis were, however, 'scattered
through a considerable number of European and American periodicals,
some being written in English, others in German, so that the present
volume will be of great service to the English-speaking student at the
same time as it provides a welcome memorial to a remarkable and noble
personality.
The book consists of twenty-two essays: some of these are chiefly
devoted to the exposition of psycho-analytical doctrine ; others present
original clinical material; while still others suggest certain extensions
of the generally accepted psycho-analytical point of view. On all subjects
Professor Putnam writes with a charm and lucidity that is too often
lacking in psycho-analytical literature, and even in matters in which the
reader may be inclined to disagree with the author there is much to
be gained from a close study of his views, which are always tolerant,
broad-minded and suggestive, and which are put forward in a manner
that gives evidence of a most unusual combination of intense earnestness
and engaging modesty.
As regards the expository writings, nothing need be said except
that they are excellent throughout and are of such a kind as to remove
from the doctrines of Psycho-Analysis that appearance of absurdity,
'far-fetchedness', or repulsiveness, which less skilful presentations are
so apt to convey to the student who is approaching the subject for the
first time. In this respect they are nowhere equalled or excelled, except
perhaps in a very few of the didactic writings of Professor Freud
himself.
The clinical articles present some useful material, though the analyses,
as communicated, are sometimes rather tantalizingly incomplete. It is
interesting to note that, while laying full weight upon the psycho-
pathological factors productive of neurosis, Professor Putnam also lays
stress upon the desirabiUty of so modifying the social environment as
to impose somewhat less strain upon those individuals who are unable
to live up to the very high standard of inhibition and sublimation that
is so frequendy demanded; as when he says (p. ni): 'we talk of in-
dependence, but, in fact, the community is almost frantic in its demands
for conformity. The key to the solution of these difficulties must be
sought, not primarily in the education of the younger generation, but
in that of the older. It is with the lack of knowledge on the part of
the parents and the disregard by physicians of the need of acquiring
and imparting adequate information on these subjects that tiie reform
must deal. There can be no doubt but that our social and ethical
70 BOOK REVIEWS
customs, which represent the filtered experience and wisdom of the
race, are of unmense value. But the ends which they mainly seek and
the methods which they follow are not chosen with reference to the
needs of the neurotic child'.
Professor Putnam's most original contribution to Psycho-Analysis is
of course his contention that certain important aspects of human conative
processes have been overlooked by the majority of psycho-analysts, and
it is to this contention that a considerable number of tlie essays here
collected are devoted. Professor Putnam rightly regards this as ' the one
important difference ' between Freud's position and his own, a difference
which, he says (p. 156) consists in the fact that 'in estimating mental
conflicts I attach great importance to an intuitive recognition, which
I believe to be bound up with the very nature of every mental act, of
the contrast between the capacity of the mind for infinitely varied self-
expression and the somewhat painfully felt inadequacy of each partial
attempt at self-expression'. This doctrine, which, as stated thus in its
simplest form, appears to apply only to the sphere of psychology, ac-
quires a metaphysical aspect in virtue of Professor Putnam's views as
to the nature of the whole to which partial expression is given in every
mental act; this whole consisting, in the last resort, not merely of the
individual mind or individual organism but of humanity itself or (by a
fiirther extension) of the total universe. The individual is therefore,
according to Professor Putnam, constantly endeavouring with the in-
adequate means at his disposal to express the whole universe of which
he is a part, a process which, it would appear, is ultimately connected
with the fact that all phenomena are capable of reduction 'to a single
principle, to one single form of activity'. 'Without "comprehending"
this fundamental fact, i. e. without feeling or recognising its identity
with the deepest in us, we cannot really comprehend anything at all —
or, otherwise expressed, without recognising this background for our
speech and our concepts, we can only go on speaking in metaphors and
symbols, without being conscious that we are only using metaphors
and symbols'. But when, on the other hand, wc come to comprehend
this most fundamental truth and become ever more and more aware
of the reality underlying the symbolism of our life, we gain the power
of understanding everything from the deepest and purest essence of
our nature. We then discover that, whereas the form of every mental
process is the same (namely, a striving to manifest itself), its result
varies endlessly, according to its completeness or incompleteness. 'The
manifold phenomena of our life express symbolically the varieties and
graduations of this process. Our feeling of power, our joy in success
or disappointment at failure, indicate that we are continually measuring
ourselves by a fairly definite, though not always definable norm of
perfection' (p. 192).
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BOOK REVIEWS yi
If this view is correct, it becomes almost impossible to study
psychology apart from metaphysics, and accordingly Professor Putnam
is frequently engaged in urging the desirability of introducing meta-
physical considerations into psychology, psychiatry and psycho-analysis.
As is well known, Professor Putnam's position has not so far recommended
itself to the majority of psycho-analysts, and this not necessarily because
they reject his metaphysics, but probably rather because they have
remained unconvinced of the importance or accuracy of his doctrines
on their psychological side. Few if any psycho-analysts, or indeed
psychogists of any school, have so far admitted that Putnam's supposed
universal desire to give complete expression to the universe or even to
the individual organism represents a useful formulation of the ultimate
conations of the human mind, and as long as adequate empirical support
for this side of Putnam's doctrine is lacking, it would seem to be un-
desirable to complicate the already sufficiently difficult psychological
problems by resort to metaphysics. Furthermore, it must be admitted
that the psychological evidence Putnam himself adduces in favour of
his views is verj- deficient. We are nowhere shown the actual working
of the supposed desire to express the whole personality; there is an
almost complete failure to reveal this desire as an active and important
factor in the mental life and mental conflicts of Professor Putnam's
patients. Professor Putnam's views with regard to the operation of this
desire, so far from emerging naturally from his case descriptions, give
the impression of being to a very large extent purely theoretical con-
structions deviftd of foundation in clinical and psychological experience.
Professor Putnam would seem indeed to be himself often doubtful
about the practical use and application of his doctrines, as when he
says (p. 87) . ' I do not feel quite sure how much positive use psycho-
analysts can make of these philosophic principles in the actual treatment
or training of tlieir patients. It is my belief that some use can be made
of them, just as use has been made of them in the teaching of children
in the Kindergarten. The primary requisite, however, is that we as
physicians should have these principles m our minds, for without them
we cannot do adequate justice in thought to our patients' deepest cravings
and intuitions'. And again (p. 412), 'for many situations, and in the
case of many patients, as when the main problem is the discovery of
well defined causes of specific phobias, it does appear unnecessary to
deal much, if at all, witii considerations relating to the " whole meaning "
or possibilities of development or "aspirations" of the individual as a
whole. In other cases however . , . this is, I think, not true'.
In one place, however, Professor Putnam does attempt to give a
definite formulation of the practical consequences of his doctrine
(pp. 305 ff,}, but it appears — to the reviewer at least — that we may
agree with all the more important points here raised without necessarily
72 BOOK REVIEWS
committing ourselves to the doctrine of ' expressive desire ' (as it may
perhaps conveniently be called). Even here, moreover, the conclusions
seem to be advanced, so to speak, in vacuo: there is a total absence
of illustrative material and the reader is left without assistance in the
task of working out these practical consequences in their application to
actual cases.
All this of course docs not prove the incorrectness of Professor
Putnam's views; it indicates however the necessity of much further
detailed study before they can be definitely accepted.
The insistence with which Professor Putnam dwells upon 'the
necessity of metaphysics', in spite of the little practical use to which
he puts his doctrine in his published cases, cannot but raise a suspicion
that in advancing his philosophic views he was under the influence of
certain psychic factors, ol which he was not, or was at best only
partially, aware. It would be fascinating, though of course quite out of
place here, to speculate upon the nature of such unconscious factors.
We must confine ourselves, in passing, to the single suggestion that the
influences which led to Professor Putnam's philosophical position are to
a large extent the same as those which enabled him to welcome the
method and results of Psycho-Analysis in general; inasmuch as he
saw in Psycho-Analysis as a method of psychic integration a potent
weapon for the attainment of more complete and more harmonious
'self-expression' than would otherwise be possible.
Professor Putnam's position has certain important elements in common
with that ofjimg; but differs from Jung's, first, in that it is much more
clearly expressed and defined, secondly (and this is the more important
point), that in Professor Putnam's case metaphysical leanings are never
allowed to obscure the clear recognition of the interplay of primitive
— and above all sexual — influences. Professor Putnam is indeed never
tired ol emphasising 'the importance of these latter influences and of
repeating that his views are to be regarded as extensions rather than
as modifications of psycho-analytic theory.
He is also able to sympathise with Adier; though here again only
in so far as Adler's work can be regarded as affording an addition to,
and not a substitute for, the doctrines of Freud. In accordance with his
own philosophical views, he is inclined to regard 'feelings of inferiority'
as largely due to an intuitive comparison o( each individual effort with
the innate feeling of the greater and more successful effort that we are
capable of making.
Even though we may not agree with the more metaphysical aspects
of Professor Putnam's teaching, there 'is much to be learnt from the
portions of the book devoted to tiis subject — more especially in a
realisation of the modesty and open-mindedness appropriate to the
present stage of the development of Psycho-Analysis. Epoch-making as
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73
they are, the discoveries of Psycho-Analysis as yet have reference to a
portion only of the human mind and are still very far from being able
to provide anything in the nature of a complete psychology. Being well
aware of the various subtle mental influences that may lead to the loss
or distortion of the truth so hardly attained by means of Psycho-Analysis,
analysts are sometimes apt to cultivate the virtue of fidelity to an extent
that may endanger freedom of outlook and receptivity to new points
of view. The lesson to be drawn from Putnam's life and work is that
broad-mindedness and a wide field of interest are not incompatible with
the most unreserved acceptance and retention of the results of psycho-
analytic thought.
The publishers are to be congratulated on the exceptionally attractive
appearance and general get-up of this, the first volume of the Inter-
national Psycho-Analytical Library. On the other hand, the book suffers
from a rather unusually large number of minor printer's errors — a blemish
that it should be possible to avoid in future volumes. The book includes
a preface by Professor Freud, an obituary notice by Dr. Ernest Jones
— reprinted from this Journal — a portrait of Professor Putnam and a
bibliography of his writings on psychological subjects. J. C. F.
Fsvcho-Analysis ajto the War Neuroses. By Drs. S. Ferenai (Buda-
pest), Karl Abraham (Berlin), Ernst Simmel (Berlin) and Ernest Jones
(London). Introduction by Prof. Sigm. Freud (Vienna). (The International
Psycho-Analytical Press, London, 1921. Pp. 59. Price 5s.)
This book on Psycho-Analysis and the War Neuroses is a symposium
to which Freud has written an introduction.
Three of the writers, Abraham, Ferenczi and Jones, deal chiefly with
the psycho-analytic theory of the war neuroses, while Simmel takes up
the question of treatment and essentially a treatment calling for quick
results, which although not psycho-analytic is a useful contribution to
this part of the subject.
The first and perhaps most important fact to be noticed in the three
theoretical papers including Freud's introduction is that all four writers
have arrived at the same fundamental factor operative in the causation
of the war neuroses— namely, injury to the person's narcissism. And
further, they have all approached the solution from somewhat different
angles, and also without any exchange of thoughts on the subject Each
contribution is the individual and independent view of the writer.
Communication between the writers was excluded on account of the
war conditions prevailing at the time. Abraham was in East Prussia,
Ferenczi in Budapest, Freud in Vienna, and Jones in England. The
74 BOOK REVIEWS
priority in point of time for the ideas expressed must certainly go to
Ernest Jones whose paper was read before the Royal Society of Medicine,
April 9, 1918. Abraham's and Ferenczi's papers were read before
the Fifth International Psycho-Analytical Congress, September, 191 8, and
Freud's Introduction appeared in the Spring, igiQ.
The majority of the readers of this book and especially tliose con-
cerned with the treatment of the war neuroses tt'ill be disappointed in
the little that is said or suggested as regards treatment of these con-
ditions, for except in Simmel's paper very little information is given on
this part of the subject. English readers particularly will feel this lack,
as the successfiil treatment of the 'neurasthenic' pensioner is still a very
serious problem confronting the medical profession. Jones states that he
has made an intensive study of some half-dozen cases of war neurosis,
but unfortunately does not tell us what was the therapeutic result.
Abraham makes a few tentative remarks on the therapy of these neuroses,
while Ferenczi does not specifically mention it. However, it must be
admitted that sufficient time had not elapsed when these articles were
written to form an opinion as to the value of this or that method of
treatment. It is hoped that later these writers will again express their
views and experience with especial reference to the treatment of the
war neuroses.
Freud's introduction to this book contains nothing like the force
and clearness usually portrayed in his writings. Perhaps this indefiniteness
is due to his not having had an Qpportunity ol closely investigating
these cases, for we know that Freud is the last person to express
a definite opinion without full investigation. And this fact seems to be
borne out by his statement, ' . . . most of the neurotic diseases which
had been brought about by the war disappeared on the cessation of
war conditions ', Freud is undoubtedly here speaking of Austria and
Germany, and this is apparently to be taken in general as a true state of
affairs as far as these countries are concerned, and would therefore
account for the lack of material for further investigation. However, this
does not apply to England, as we unfortunately know too well.
There is another remark of Freud's that will be criticised. He states
on page 3 that war neuroses could not occur in professional soldiers
and mercenaries. This is certainly not in accordance with our experience,
and I should be very surprised if it were applicable to Austria and
Germany. I am doubtful if Freud really means it as he has stated. I am
rather inclined to think that the paragraph to which it belongs has
been loosely written, for it conveys the idea that Freud considers the
war neuroses are to be explained by the conflict between the old ego
of peace time and the new war-ego of the soldier. Now this explanation
is only correct in part and his above quoted statement is invalidated
by his later remarks.
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BOOK REVIEWS 75
Ferenczi reviews and criticises the literature on the war neuroses
from the standpoint of psycho-analysis. He seems to accept a fact
pointed out by Morchen, BonhOffer and others that the traumatic neuroses
are never seen in prisoners of war. I suppose the ' others ' are also
German or Austrian writers, for no English author could have made
such a statement. Numbers of English soldiers who have been prisoners
of war are still suffering from war 'neuroses.
Ferenczi points out that an advance has taken place in the attitude of
leading neurologists to the teachings of psycho-analysis, and quotes
the writings of many German authorities to this effect '
In his remarks on the theoretical aspects of the war necroses he
deals with the psychical symptoms. He finds that most of these symptoms
are due to increased ego-sensitiveness, the result of the libido being
withdrawn from the object into the ego. The symptom of anxiety is the
sign of the shock to the self-confidence occasioned by the trauma. The
tendency to outbursts of rage and anger is a highly primitive method
of reaction to a superior force. The entire personality of most of the
victims of trauma corresponds to the child who is fretting and naughty
in consequence of a fright.
Abraham approaches the question of the aetiology of the war neuroses
directly from the sexual standpoint. He finds that the war neuroses'
have confirmed his original views regarding the importance of sexualit>-
in the traumatic neuroses of peace time. He considers that at least in
the majority of war neurotics there already existed prior to the war the
predisposition to neurosis in that they were labile people, especially as
regards their sexuality. Their sexual and social capacity of functioning
was dependent on their making certain concessions to their narcissism.
War placed these men under totally different conditions which signified
the renunciation of all narcissistic privileges; these they could not forego
and thus the neurosis broke out. He also makes a short reference to
Uie so-called ' seeking for pension ' of the injured soldier, and shows
that narcissism also explains the conduct of these patients. Narcissistic
avarice dominates, the genital zone has lost its predominance, and anal-
erotism is strengthened.
Jones in his contribution shows how the war neuroses can in a great
measure be explained on the basis of Freud's theories.
He considers that the specific problems characteristic of the war
neuroses are in connection with two broad groups of mental processes.
One of these groups relates to war adaptation, the other to fear. On the
question of war adaptation he points out that the soldier has to adjust
his mental attitude to things to which he is quite unaccustomed and
which repel him. A conflict is thus aroused, and a satisfactory solution
of this conflict being unattainable under war conditions a neurosis develops
as the only way out The ability to adjust will depend upon how far
76 BOOK REVIEWS
he has been able to solve satisfactorily his infantile conflicts. 11 these
have been solved by means of marked reaction-formations then war
conditions are likely to revive the old conflict and now a neurosis is
the result These processes are of course unconscious.
On the question of fear Jones discusses the relation between morbid
anxiety and real fear. He points out that morbid anxiety is a defence
reaction of the ego against the claims ol unrecognised libido. Real fear
consists of three components, two useful ones — various activities suited
to the occasion, and anxious preparedness — and a third useless one
^^developed dread or fear. It is this latter component that resembles
morbid anxiety. He then goes on to show tliat this part of real fear is
directly related to narcissism, and suggests that here we may have the
key to the states of terror in the war neuroses.
Simmel states that his metliod of treatment of the war neuroses is
a combination of analytical-cathartic hypnosis with analytical conversations
during the waking state, and dream interpretation carried out in the
waking state and during deep hypnosis. This treatment he says resulted
in a relief of the symptoms in an average of t\vo or three sittings.
This line of treatment has been carried out by English psychotherapists
during the last two or three years, and in a few cases has also been
followed by a rapid relief of the symptoms. But we have discovered
that the cures are not permanent, in the majority of cases relapses
rapidly occurred, and further treatment along the same lines did not
result in a second relief of the symptoms, except in very rare cases.
Probably when Simmel made his observations he had not had time or
the opportunity of coming across the relapses, for in conversation with
the reviewer in September, 1920 he admitted that the results obtained
by his method were very unsatisfactory as regards pennanence.
Simmel's explanation of the war neuroses is unconvincing and in
parts contradictory. He states on page 3 1 that the unconscious meaning
of the symptoms is for the most part of a non-sexual nature, and in
the same paragraph he says that the war affects and ideas which form
the symptoms have a certain intrinsic relation to sexuality.
Though Simmel's article is useful as giving his experience of a par-
ticular line of treatment of the war neuroses, yet it has very little to
do with psycho-analysis. It seems a pity that it should have been in-
cluded in this book, the purport of which is essentially psycho-analytic,
as it is apt to give readers a wrong impression leading them to believe
that Simmel's methods are included under psycho-analysis. D. B.
What is Psycho-Analysis f By Isador H. Coriat, M.D. (Moffat Yard
and Co., New York, igig. Pp. 127. Price * i-SO.)
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BOOK REVIEWS 77
This book attempts to present mainly the tenets of Freud in the
form of question and answer; the author (already well known for his
other works in abnormal psychology) succeeds in some degree, and he
also provides suggestions for mental hygiene and character formation.
Nevertheless his enthusiasm for a concise catechism apparently leads
him into some misleading and ambiguous statements which are obvious
to the Freudian, but which are apt to confuse his other readers.
The 'division o£ consciousness' (page 57) is a gross error. Since
consciousness is the term used to denote the mental processes of which
a person is aware at a given moment, the unconscious could not be a
division of the conscious. This term, like the analogous ones 'splitting'
or 'dissociation of consciousness' is based on the old confusion between
'consciousness' and 'mind'.
Two conflicting statements are to be found regarding the sexual
symbol (page 5i}, and the latent content of the dream (page 90), the
latter one of which approximates more to the truth than that ' the sexual
symbol is an effort to escape from the more grossly sexual '. It is rather
'an effort to escape' the vigilance of the censorship, and hence gratify
grossly sexual wishes by its use m consciousness.
Also the term ' spiritualised ' (p. 72} used in connection witii dreams
is not compatible with a scientific terminologj'.
No doubt this book will be welcomed by readers who have neither
time nor inclination to pursue a larger work but who wish to gain a
bird's eye view of the subject; and the bibliography in which most of
the standard works are quoted will appeal to those readers who require
more detailed information and accuracy.
EsTELLE Maude Cole.
Deeams and the UNCONSCIOUS;: An Introduction to the Study of
Psycho-Analysis. By C. W. Valentine, M.A., Professor of Education in
the University of Birmingham. (Christophers, London, 1921. Pp. 144.
Price 4s. 6d.)
One can understand the reason for a book written to expound psycho-
analysis and also that for one written in criticism of it, but what is
one to make of an exposition professing to be an 'introduction to the
study of psycho-analysis ' which dissents from most of |the views held
by psycho-analysts and from a good many the author falsely imputes
to them?
The aim of the book is stated to be the [endeavour to provide an
eiqjosition of what the author terms 'the new psychology' and to link
it on to academic psychology. The method of doing this is quite simple.
One enters the familiar third stage of opposition, and decrees that what
78
BOOK REVIEWS
is true in psycho-analysis is not new while what is new is not true.
Those of us who appear to have forgotten what a prominent part the
study of the unconscious played in the psychological lectures and text-
books of our youth, for instance, need to be reminded that 'psychology
has long taught that there are often influences at work on our minds
which are not present in consciousness' (p. 21).
In his aim the author has found assistance in the works of Drs, Rivers,
Myers, McDougall, Bernard Hart, Brown, Crichton Miller and Hadfield.
It would be very difficult to find any element common to this hetero-
geneous collection of writers beyond the scepticism they all evince about
most of Freud's main conclusions, so that the reader will be surprised
to find them christened here as 'neo-Freudians'. The prefix in this
connection, as with the designations ' neo-Malthusian ', ' Neo-Darwinian ',
and so on, should surely signify that the writers thus indicated have
revived an older body of doctrine and have added to it while retaining
its main principles. Psycho-analysis, never having lapsed, is in no need
of being revived, and we cannot see how at any age a harsh opponent
of the most distinctive Freudian principles could well be termed a
' neo-Freudian '.
Professor Valentine begins with a general account of conflict and
repression and endeavours to approximate the latter conception to the
accepted psychological ones of 'avoidance of pain' and the 'experience
of trial and error', He admits three forms of repression: deliberate
putting out of the mind, non-deliberate putting out of the mind, both
of which are functions of consciousness, and the subsequent unconscious
pressure against the return of the elements thus expelled; but not what
is for Freud the most important form of repression — namely, the keeping
of certain unconscious ideas out of consciousness (p. 38), That repression
is ever the cause of neurotic trouble he doubts, for 'the forgetting
(which is al! that repression seems to mean to the author) might have
been an accompaniment of the development of tlie disease, the disease
itself being caused by a more ultimate cause' {p. 37).
Freud's libido theory meets with no acceptance. 'He indulges in
unnecessarily sweeping generalisations. He finds the influence oi sex in
ahnost every abnormal mental process, though he covers this by a
paradoxically wide interpretation of the term sex' (p. 18). What the
words 'unnecessarily' and 'paradojdcal' mean in this context is not
clear, nor how Freud could have avoided making these generalisations
if they corresponded with his experience. Professor Valentine is especially
concerned to defend the innocence of childhood against the imputation
of sexuality, as indeed against other imputations. In quoting, for instance,
from the present reviewer a list of anti-social impulses which have been
modified in the child in the course of education, he makes the irrelevant
complaint that.. 'it gives no hint of the many natural good impulses of
BOOK REVIEWS 79
the child ... A mere infant may be as unselfish in his impulse as an
adult, with a beautiful abandon indeed which is rare in later life'
(p. 75), considerations which were not in question. He thinks that in
the majority of children interest in matters of sex is no greater than
a score of other interests 'unless and until the interest in sex is
stimulated by an attitude of secrecy on the part of adults' (p. 75J, a
contingency which, by implication, he appears to regard as of rare
occurrence. Represents it as a view of Freud that the 'partial impulses'
of sucking, delight in kissing and anal excitation, sadism and masochism
become only later associated with sex (p. 76), whereas of course Freud
holds that they are inherently sexual in nature from the beginning. But
'in any case it seems unnecessarj' to stress the significance of sex in
early childhood' (p. 76).
Professor Valentine is very chary about admitting even ti\e possiii/it}'
of the process of sublimation, since he explains most of the supposed
cases of it as being the diverting of non-sexual impulses to social aims
instead of to the reinforcement of sexual ones. Thus there is no
subHmation in art or religion (p. 121). He even denies to educators the
insight the present reviewer had credited them with of recognising the
sublimating value of sport and work. For him sublimation is conceivable
only when a close association can be set up between the two alternatives.
Professor Valentine does not realise that this is also the psycho-analytical
view, and that we quite agree with his statement that 'anything beyond,
of the nature of a side (i. e. non-associated) outlet for an otherwise-to-
be-repressed impulse, must be regarded as uncertain' (p. 125). Only
he has no inkling of the extent to which such associations can be forged
in the unconscious.
Freud's theory of dreams is made up of three equally important
constituents: (i) that a dream is caused by the disturbing perseveration
of unfinished thoughts from the day; (2) that its sole function is to
guard sleep so far as is possible ; {3) tiiat it does this by associating
the disturbing tiioughts with an imagined wish-fulfilment, usually a
repressed one, in a form that is unrecognisable to the censoring activity
of the conscious mind. Let us see how Professor Valentine deals with
these three constituents, remembering that dreams are the main subject
of the book. Thejirsi of them he states in a slightly different way and
calmly proclaims it to be an original discovery of his own which completes
Freud's theory (pp. 107, no, in). The second Qne he casually refers to as
'Freud's idea that the dream is often {sic) a means of not disturbing
sleep but of guarding it' (p. 105), and he seems willing to accept the
idea provided it is restricted to some dreams only and also supplemented
by ideas about other functions of dreams. By the way, the understatement
of Freud's view in this instance may be matched by an overstatement
in another; Amongst the 'very sweeping generalisations in reference
8o BOOK REVIEWS
to dreams* which 'Freud unfortunately allows himself to make' (p. 88)
we have the following; 'Freud says that all (italics in the original)
dreams have ultimately a sexual significance; yet some of the dreams
which he himself gives are concerned with quite other things' (p. 89).
We fail to see the incompatibility here, for many neurotic phantasies
are 'concerned with quite other things' although they all 'ultimately
have a sexual significance'. But it happens that the premise is quite
untrue. Freud, so far from ever having made this statement, has ex-
pressly denied it {Traumdeuiung, S. 270). The third constituent of the
theory, or rather a part of it, is singled out from the rest and is so
distorted in presentation as to make it appear that the 'dominant
Freudian conception of the dream ' is that it is ' a means of experiencing
in fancy the fulfilment of repressed wishes' (p. no). So, according to
Freud, the object and function of dreaming is to enable us to enjoy
forbidden lascivious pleasures I We wonder whether Professor Valentine
assimilates new theories in his own subject in this fashion. He elsewhere
{p. 92) amiably volunteers to improve Professor Freud's education by
referring him to a well-known passage in Plato's 'Republic' of which
'I believe he nowhere shows a knowledge'. If one is unable to learn
from Freud one can at least teach him.
The wish-fulfihnent constituent of Freud's theory of dreams finds in
general no favour with Professor Valentine. 'There is, I think, no doubt
that some dreams cannot be explained as the obvious or disguised
fulfilment of either repressed or unrepressed wishes, and Freud even
gives some examples himself in the Traumdeuiung' (p. 90). Needless
to say to anyone who has read the Traiimdetitung, Freud does nothing
of the sort With fear-dreams Professor Valentine makes a gallant attempt
to find some sort of wish-fulfilment in the fascination of the fear itself,
since 'in sleep that rational control which would refuse to dwell pain-
fully on imaginary evils is either absent altogether or is reduced to a
minimum . . . Perhaps a profounder psychology might even say that
these thoughts of evil are due to a species of sub-conscious craving,
for there seems to be inherent in man some strange attraction towards
the fearful . . , Thus, in a sense, it may be said that our fear-dreams
may be fulfilling some sub-conscious primitive craving not satisfied in
waking life ' (pp. 0, 97). But in general he finds Freud's interpretation
of fear-dreams 'most unsatisfactory' and 'still more inadequate in view
of the appearance of so many fear-dreams at a very early age, and at
a period when Freud himself holds that dreams are interpretable on
the basis of their manifest content' (p. 95). This is in reference to
dreams of his own boy, between the ages of five and six, which were
in a considerable number of cases dreams of being trampled on by
horses or being chased by bears (i. e. typical father symbols). As to
Freud's imagined statement that all dreams up to a fixed date are
«»
BOOK REVIEWS ' 8r
necessarily of this infantile type which need no interpretation, it would
be very unlike Freud, with his knowledge of the variability of infantile
development, to make any such 'sweeping generalisation'. On the
contrary, when dealing with this topic {Vorlesungen, S. 133), to avoid
any misapprehension he expressly warns his readers against the idea
that all dreams of children are of this nature, points out that distortion
often sets in very early in childhood, but nevertheless maintains that
observation of the first few years of life will disclose a number of such
dreams.
Professor Valentine makes very little reference to symbolism, but
his grasp of the subject may be gathered from the following example.
In a dream of his own he gathered some grapes and offered them to
a (man) friend, ' though they were much over- ripe ' ; the reader will be
relieved to learn that this act was 'symbolic of the long overdue
hospitality' (pp. 102-4). Freud is mistaken in thinking that dreams
never deal with trivialities; on the contrary, even the latent content is
often of quite a trivial nature (p. 8g, etc.). Nor are we to accept Freud's
view that dreams are always egocentric, for they may be due to higher,
moral and religious impulses (pp. 111-13}. There is no need, however,
to continue further with instances of the author's ejqiressions of dis-
belief in one element after another of Freud's theory, especially as he
rarely finds it necessary to give any serious reason for his personal
opinion.
Throughout the book psycho-analytical evidence and conclusions are
repeatedly discounted on the plea that they refer only to neurotic
people, the author being evidently under the illusion that these constitute
a race apart. It was largely in order to meet this quite unfounded
objection that Freud wrote his Traumdejitung from his own dreams,
and yet, in spite of this, we are told here that 'Freud, himself, calls
attention to the fact that his study of dreams is almost entirely based
upon the dreams of neurotics' (p. 113). Sheltering behind this illusion
on the one hand, and making extensive depreciation, restriction and
modification on the other, he naturally comes to the final conclusion
that 'we cannot, in the present state of our knowledge, regard most
dreams as of great significance for the understanding of normal
individuals' (p. 113); this only means that Professor Valentine has learned
little from them for this purpose. In fact, 'we have not adequate evidence
that dreams have any biological function of appreciable importance,
and if that is so it is not surprising that the mechanism of the dream
is irregular and incomplete. Much of the dream activity is probably
due to chance (!) associations of parts of the brain still partially active,
and so many dreams may be of no real significance' (p. 114).
Thus, like a philistine tourist, we refum from our grand iour un-
impressed with what we have seen, with a self-satisfied air of virtue
82 BOOK REVIEWS
at having 'done the sights' ol which everyone is talking, but finding
them vastly over-rated, and glad to be back in the comfortable land
of roast beef where such matters as dreams and emotional conflicts are
left to cranks and hysterical women. For with dreams naturally goes
the rest of the 'new psychology"; since it is to be inferred that 'so
far as the sub-conscious self is concerned we are, indeed, "Such stuff
as dreams are made of" (p. 114).
This wholly superfluous book will not enhance its author's reputation
among those qualified to judge. Unreliable as an exposition and super-
ficial as a criticism, it had better never have been written. E. J,
An Introduction to Psychology. By Susan S. Brierley, M.A. (Metliuen
& Co., London, 1921. Pp. 152. Price 5s.)
This little book differs conspicuously Irom most of the earlier
English text books of psychology, in tliat stress is laid throughout upon
the conative and affective rather than upon the purely cognitive aspects
of the mind and that due account is taken of the widening of psycho-
logical outlook brought about by the results of psycho-analysis. Mrs.
Brierley is, indeed, not content with the mere substitution of a dynamic
for a static point of view, but even ventures to point out the psycho-
logical bases of the errors into which her more rationalistic predecessors
have so often fallen (pp. 48 ff.). The insistence throughout upon the
biological standpoint has had the beneficial result of making the book far
more ' alive ' than most of those conscientious and painstaking but often
somewhat wearisome treatises, in which much space is allotted to
sensation, perception, judgment and reasoning, while emotion, feeling,
behaviour and desire are cramped (almost by way of afterthought, it
would appear) into a brief chapter or two at the extreme end. Not
that the study of the purely intellectual processes or even of the
sensations is in itself unimportant or uninteresting: it is rather that the
treatment of these aspects of the mind in detachment from the rich,
full-blooded life of feeling and desire almost inevitably carries with it
(except to the specialist) a sense of artificiality, dulness or even triviality,
that makes it unsatisfactory to the student who is making his first
acquaintance with psychology. Such a sense of dissatisfaction would
probably be felt with more than usual keenness by the class of student
that Mrs. Brierley has more particularly in view, namely those who are
attending classes organised by the Workers' Educational Association.
She has therefore, it would seem, been very well advised to depart
from the usual arrangement of text books in the past.
The present book is divided into two parts — the first or smaller part
being devoted to the scope, methods and fields of psychology, while
BOOK REVIEWS §,
the second and larger part treats some of the more important general
problems of psychology from the biological standpoint as already indic-
ated. It IS mterestmg to note that in spite of this change in point of
view, sensation, perception and thought still receive their fair share of
attention (though not as so often before, a disproportionate share)
Mrs. Brierley is far too good an all-round psychologist to neglect the
important part played by cognition, as dealt with in the older text
books; the cognitive processes are however everywhere treated as
they actually appear in tlieir conative and affective settings and as sub-
serving biological ends.
Quite apart from the very stimulating and refreshing point of view
from which this text book is writtbn, Mrs. Brierley's treatment of her
subject has the advantage of being extremely lucid without being
superficial (except of course such measure of superficiality as is inevitably
imposed by the small compass of the book). The book is also for the
- most part extremely accurate and careful in its statements, both of
facts and theories. There are of course a few minor points which might
perhaps advantageously be altered in a later edition Thus in tlie
frequency curve illustrating grades of intelligence (p. 29) 'border-line
deficient' would probably not be accepted by most authorities as
a convement or accurate term to represent the equivalent on the sub-
nonnal side to 'slightly superior' upon the super-normal side. Again
It IS surely conb-ary to the practice of most psychologists to talk of
pleasure sensations' (such as 'those aroused by taste and sexual
stimulation') as being comparable to 'pain sensations' (such as toothache
a burn, colic, etc.) (p. 63). ]n this respect Mrs. Brierlev, like a good
many other writers, might have profited by the adoption of the distinctions
made by Wohlgemuth in his recent valuable contributions to the subject
There is also, it would appear, some lack of clearness or consistency
in the concept of the horme and its distinction from the hbido Wliereas
m the earher part of the book the horme is taken to signify die sum
total of the 'bio-psychic' energy of an individual (and therefore to
include ti.e hbido in Freud's sense), on p. 146 we read 'that it is not
possible ... to make an absolute distinction between tiie horme and
the libido, bet^veen the group instincts labelled "self-preservative"
and tiiosc referred to as "sexual*"; where tiie horme seems to take
the place of Freud's 'ego-impulses' and to be a co-ordinate and not
a super-ordinate concept as compared with the libido
But tiiese and a few similar points are but very minor blemishes
upon an excellent and useful piece of work. The chief regret that the
reader is likely to feel is tiiat Mrs. Brierley, witii her undoubted gifts
of clear thought, sound judgment and easy exposition, has not venhired
upon a fuller and more ambitious presentation of her subject than tiiat
contained in the present modest volume. I C F
84 BOOK REVIEWS
Mind and its Disorders. By W. H. B. Stoddart, M.D., F.R.C.P.
(H. K. Lewis & Co., London, 4th Edition 1921. Pp. 592. Price 22s. 6d.)
This is perhaps the most widely read British text book of psychiatry
at tiie present day and is so well known that it is not necessary to give
a general account of it. Its outstanding value is its comprehensiveness,
pathological anatomy and chemical tests being dealt with as adequately
as the clinical and psychological aspects of the subject. The book is
excellently illustrated.
To us it is of especial interest to watch the gradual evolution of
the various editions of the book in an increasingly marked psycho-
analytical direction. Dr. Stoddart is a tliorough-going analyst both in
theory and practice and has incorporated into the book a special chapter
on psycho-analysis as well as numerous other references. It is true that
the fact of this incorporation being subsequent to the original plan and
structure of the book produces a distinctly uneven appearance, for the
attempt to harmonise the newer with the older psychology here cannot-
be called altogedier successful. If Dr. Stoddart will not shrink Irom the
task, there is no doubt he could produce a much more valuable text
book by scrapping the original plan and entirely re-writing the book.
The result would be very instructive, for the reader would then traverse
the whole subject with a more unitary point of view than is now possible
for him.
The chapter on psycho-analysis itself is fairly adequate except that
the subject of resistance is very insufficiently dealt with and tlie importance
of it for both theory and practice not dwelt upon. We consider
Dr. Stoddart is unduly pessismistic in the impression he gives of the
outlook for treatment of homosexuality (p. 191), perversion (p. 194)
and paranoia (p. 315). To allot two thirds of the space to consideration
of the Weir Mitchell therapy in the treatment of hysteria strikes one as
very disproportionate. There is needed a section on hypochondria, for
the nearest approach to the subject comes under the heading of
melancholic hypochondria (p. 313). We doubt whether Dr. Stoddart has
thoroughly thought through his views on the psychology of neurasthenia,
ior the older and newer conception of the condition are here confounded.
His argument that as the disorder is traceable to repressed auto-erotism,
and that as the latter originates in an infantile fixation the condition
must accordingly be classed as psycho-neurosis, is vitiated by the
fallacy that the conditions which he has in mind as thus arising are really
cases of hysteria. If would be wiser to confine the term neurasthenia
to those cases of manifest, not repressed, auto-erotism where there is
no psychical genesis. ^ J-
Ik.
BOOK REVIEWS
8S
PSYCHODIAGNOSTIK. MeTHODIK UND ERGEBNISSE EINES WaHRNEHMUNG«-
DJAGNOSTISCHEN EXPERIMENTES (DeUTENLASSEN VON ZUFAILSFORMEN). By
Dr. med. Hermann Rorschach. (Ernst Bircher, Bern and Leipzig, igzi.
Pp. 174. Ten plates.)
This book contains an account of experiments on the interpretation
of ink blots carried out on 405 subjects, including both normal indi-
viduals (educated and uneducated) and patients suffering from a large
variety of mental disorders. In these experiments attention is directed
almost exclusively to the form (as distinct from the content) of the inter-
pretations given by the subjects— these interpretations being subjected
to a minute analysis, as the result of which the author draws a number
of conclusions, which are in every case interesting and suggestive, but
which are in many instances admittedly in need of further corroboration
and which must be looked upon at present as hopeful indications for
future research rather than as definitely established results.
The most important of these conclusions concerns an apparent
correlation of two distinct groups of mental traits on the one hand with
a relative preponderance (in the experiments) of kinaesthetic or colour
influences on the other. Thus where kinaesthesis or colour appreciation
predominates in the interpretation of the blots, we find respectively
(p. 69):
Kinatiikesis Colour
Differentiated Intelligence. Stereotyped Intelligence.
More original productivity. More reproductivity.
More inner life. More outer life.
Stabilised aifectivity. Labile affcctivity.
Less adaptation to reality. More adaptation to reality.
More intensive than extensive rapport More extensive than intensive rapport
Moderate, stabilised motility. Excitable, labile motility.
Clumsiness and want of skill. Sldl] and dexterity.
Thus in the kinaestheHc class are found 'those who think for them-
selves, the productive intelligences . . . Among the schizophrenics
are the paranoid cases, patients who may indeed have more or less
systematised ideas of persecution and grandeur, but who always exhibit
a self-created delusional system. Paranoids may also be found in the
other class, but these cases show hardly a sign of system in their
delusions. Further, there are to be found on this (kinaesthetic) side such '
Kors^off cases as show a marked pleasure in confabulation. Thus on
the side of predominant kinaesthesis there are collected all those subjects
—both healthy and diseased— who live more in their own thoughts and
phantasies than in the outer world, or a least those for whom "inner
work" is more important than the process of adaptation to reality.
86 BOOK REVIEWS
' On the other side we find, among normals, ' practical men ', those
■who live easy or superficial lives, or whose intelligence is more re-
productive than productive in nature; also the unintelligent and, following
on them, the feeble-minded, the debiles and imbeciles. Among the
schizophrenics we find here the motor-excitable and incoordinated group
of katatonics, the hebephrenics and the querulants; further, all epileptics
■ and, finally, all organic patients with the exception of Korsakoff cases
and arte rio-Ecler otic dements.'
The two opposite types here described are called by Rorschach
' introversive ' and ' extratensive ' respectively, without any implied refer-
ence to introversion or extroversion in Jung's sense.
The division established in this way is thus strongly reminiscent of
that which has been already made by Heymans and Wiersma, Otto
Gross and others, which is perhaps most generally known under the
name of 'perseveration', and on which further hght has been thrown by
the recent British experimental researches of Webb, Lankes and Wynn
Jones, whose work seems to show that not one single factor, but rather
two distinct but easily confused factors, are in reality involved. This
agreement with the results of previous investigations, though not ment-
ioned by Dr. Rorschach, adds of course to the interest of the present
results, which in turn afford additional evidence in favour of the
existence and importance of the factors concerned- Rorschach's factor
of ' introversion ', affecting as it does character rather than sensation,
would appear on the whole to be allied to Webb's ' W ' rather than to
Lankes's or Wynn Jones's 'perseveration', and in this case his experi-
mental methods may eventually prove of great utility, no strictly ex-
perimental diagnosis of 'W' being at present available.
As well as indicating the existence of the ' introversive ' and ' extra-
tensive' types. Dr. Rorschach's experiments appear to show at the
same time that kinaesthesis is negatively correlated with skill in movement
and adaptation to the external world (at first sight, at any rate, a some-
what paradoxical result), while appreciation of colours is positively cor-
. related with freedom from emotional inhibition and control.
Besides the two types already described (which, as the author is
careful to show, represent the two extremes of a continuous series and
not distinct groups without intermediate cases) Dr. Rorschach also distin-
guishes two further opposite types, which cut across the previous two.
These further types he calls the Koartierter and the Ambiaequaler Typus
respectively; the former being characterised in the experiment by an
absolutely small amount of both kinaesthetic and colour influences (mani-
fested by pedants, depressives, melancholies and simple dements), the
latter by an absolutely large amount of such influences (manifested by
persons with many-sided gifts, by compulsion-neurotics, maniacs
and katatonics). In the former both 'introversion' and ' extratenslon '
BOOK REVIEWS 87
i
are supposed to be present in a low degree, while in the latter they I
are both 'present in a high degree. •
For the psycho-anaiyst, Dr. Rorschach thinks the blot interpretation l
test, as employed by himself, may be useful in a variety of ways: j
(l) as a means of differential diagnosis as regards the presence of neurosis
or of schizophrenia, (2) as a means of prognosis (extension kmaesthesis "■";
being probably more favourable in this respect than flexion kinaesthesis) 1
(3) as affording clues with regard to the genesis of a neurosis or to \
possible paths of sublimation, (4} when applied before and after analysis, '
it may afford interesting experimental evidence as to the nature of the , ■'
mental changes produced by analysis (p. 115), ■ 1
Since the book thus contains much interesting material, it is greatly
to be regretted that the presentation of the experimental results is in .
certain important respects unsatisfactory. Although the author's con-
clusions are based on 'statistics', no full numerical presentation or ' '
analysis of the records obtained is anywhere attempted; one of the
great advantages of the experimental method being thereby sacrificed,
and the reader being left with no opportunity of estimating for himself
the validity of the inferences drawn from the experimental data. The
numerous examples furnished at the end of the book should be of use
to future experimenters on the same lines, but they in no way com-
pensate for the lack of a more complete presentation of the results.
A reproduction, in exact colours, of the ten ink blots used in the
experiments is supplied with each copy of the book. T C- F
PSYCHOPATHOLOGIE DKR AUSNAHMEZUSTANDEUNDPSYCHOPATHOLOGIE DES
Alltags. By Professor Dr. Erwin Sb-ansky. (Ernst Bircher, Bern and
Leipzig, J92I. Pp. 35.)
The author reviews a large number of 'exceptional states', ranging
from trivial everyday lapses to severe pathological conditions. He
endeavours to show that nothing is gamed by the assumption of a
dissociation or splitting of the personality, and himself considers these
conditions in the light of the general lability characteristic of all affective
mental life. Though interesting in certain respects, tiie explanations
offered would seem to be too general in nature, and— in tiieir present
state— to take too littie regard of specific mechanisms to be of much
assistance. I C F
*
Suggestion and Autosuggestion. A Psychological and Pedagogical
Study based upon the Investigations made by M. Com6 at Nancy. By
gg BOOK REVIEWS
Charles Baudouin, Professor of the Jean Jacques Rousseau Institute, Geneva.
(Allen & Unwin, London. 1920. Pp. 288. Price los. 6d.)
This much-advertised book is certainly written in a lively and interest-
ing fashion, but so far as we can see that is its chief merit. The author
gives an account of Coup's psychotherapeutic work and views, illustrated
from his own experience and quickened here and there by an elementary
knowledge of psycho-analysis. We cannot find that Cou^ has added
anytiiing of value to what was long known about suggestion and auto-
suggestion, nor anything at all in fact beyond a few questionable novel
formulations. The French passion for simplistic certitude, which so often
creates the illusion of lucidity, is well seen in the so-called 'law'
that 'the force of the imagination is in direct ratio to the square of
the will', or in the 'formula of suggestibility':
fi X f2 X fa X fo
s=.
s
How can readers with any scientific discipline be expected to take
such a work seriously? It seems to us that Cou6 has merely exploited
the partial oblivion into which the subject of suggestion has fallen of
late years and revived our ancient knowledge of it as a new discovery.
The translation, by Eden and Cedar Paul, is well done, like all their
translation work, but in the Glossary we note two points calling for
comment. The 'preconscious' is said to be 'usually spoken of by
psychoanalysts as the "foreconscious"'; we do not think that the latter
word wiirbe found in the writings of any English psycho-analyst Then
the 'subconscious' is said to be 'usually spoken of by psychoanalysts
as the " unconscious " '. This is obviously untrue, for by the ' unconscious '
we mean something totally different from the 'subconscious' and the
two terms are in no sense interchangeable. '''■ J-
He
Au viEiL EvANGiLE PAR ON CHEMiN NOUVEAU. La psychanalyse au service
de la cure d'ame. Par O. Pfister. Traduit par H. Malan. (E. BLrcher,
Berne, 1920.)
Ce petit volume de 91 pages s'adresse aux pasteurs dont le v6ritabre
ministfere est la cure d'Ame. L'auteur s'applique k leur faire entrevoir,
k I'aide de quelques exemples, I'espoir qu'ils peuvent fonder sur la
psychanalyse. Ces exemples n'ont pas la pretention d'initier les lecteurs
k la pratique de la psychanalyse; ils illustrent remarquablement Tadjuvant
precieux qu'est la psychanalyse pour le pasteur des ftmes qui voit vemr
k soi, au cours de sa carrifere, tant d'anxieux, d'inhibtSs, de scrupuleux,
d'obs^d^s, de non satisfaits d'eux-mfemes ni des autres et qui menacent
de verser dans le sectarisme, ou dans I'asc^tisme.
BOOK REVIEWS 89
L'auteur montte it ses lecteurs comment la psychanalyse petit les
aider k d^bfouiller les difficult^, qui relfevent autant de la conduite
morale que de la vie religieuse, de ceux qui s'adressent k eux. D indique
que c'est le moyen de les amener k la constatation de la ndcessite d'une
r^g6n6ration morale et religieuse, et de preparer une reeducation com-
pile. Celle-ci aura son point d'appui k I'origine meme des deviations,
et elle sera effective, parce qu'elle enseignera au patient k faire usage
de ses puissances affectives d^tenues dans les complexes inconscients.
La traductrice a su trouver un frangais clair et simple que ses lecteurs
certes n'auront aucun mal k comprendre.
F. Morel.
QtmLQUESTBAlTSDELAVIEDE JeSUS AU POINT DE VUE PSYCHOLOGIQUE ET
PSYCHANALYTiouE. By Georges Berguer, Docteur en Th^ologie. {Edition
Atar, Paris and Geneva, 1920. Pp. cviii+267. Price 15 Swiss Francs.)
The immense influence that Christianity has exercised over a large
portion of civilised humamty for a period of nearly 2,000 years must
make any serious study of the founder of Christianity from the psycho-
logical point of view worthy of profound attention on the part of the
psycho-analyst. The discoveries of Psycho-Analysis on their part seem
to call imperiously for application not only to the religious consciousness
of the individual worshipper {an application which has to some extent
already been made^or at least begun) but also to the personalities of
those religious heroes or geniuses who have profoundly modified the
nature and course of the religious consciousness of mankind. Dr. Berguer
is to be congratulated therefore in his courageous attempt to apply the
results of his obviously extensive studies in psychology and comparative
theology to the person of Christ himself. . ,
The book is divided into two parts, the first of which consists of an
extensive introduction of over 100 pages devoted to the methods of theo- •
logy, psychology and psycho-analysis, to the relations between Christianity
and the religious mysteries of antiquity, to the nature and documentary
value of the historical material bearing on the life of Christ and to the
arguments of those who have denied Christ's real existence.
In the course of this introduction. Dr. Berguer admits that the
documentary evidence available is insufficient for the formation of a
satisfactory historical life of Christ, and insists that it is all the more
important to shift the emphasis from the historical to the psychological
point of view, to understand the personality of Christ as depicted in
the accounts we possess, the effect he made by his teaching and
example, and the mentality of the persons through whose agency our
knowledge of Christ is obtained. With this insistence on the psycho-
logical as distinct from the theological or historical point of view every
90 BOOK REVIEWS
psycho-analyst will heartily agree. Historical problems are of course
important enough in their own sphere, but for the understanding of
the nature and influence of religion and of religious founders it is
doubtless to psychology far more than to history that we must look
for enlightenment It is in fact the psychological realities rather than
the historical realities that are important in religion, and, as accentuating
the former in place of the latter, Dr. Berguer's altitude represents an
immense advance on that adopted by most ministers of Christianity at
the present day.
Dr. Berguer proceeds however to take a further step, the correctness
of which is less immediately obvious and which is likely indeed to
arouse some misgivings among his psycho-analytical colleagues. Although
Dr. Berguer lays little stress upon the historical accuracy of the in-
cidents of Christ's life, he nevertheless considers Christ's real existence,
the fact of his having actually lived and died, to be of immense
psychological importance. It is, he thinks, owing to the actual life and
death of Christ that Christianity has been able to exercise so great an
influence on the spiritual life of mankind. Thus, when comparing the
developments of Hellenistic paganism with those of Jewish theology,
he says (p. txxiv):
'C'est \k !a grande difference qu'il faut signaler entre !e proph^tisme
h^breu et ce qu'on pourrait appeler le d^veloppement proph<itique du
paganisme gr^co-romain. Des deux parts, I'ame humaine a travaill^
selon les memes lois ; des deux parts la poussde vitale profonde appelant
im dieu s'est manifest^e sur les mftnies voies et a models des figures
raessianiques. Seulement, sur la ligne juive il s'est trouv6 k un certain
moment de I'histoire de la race, une personnalit^ historique qui a con-
centre sur elle les lignes proph^tiquement dessin^es et qui a trouv6 en
elle-raeme le secret et la force de vivre ce que sa race avail r^v6 de
plus haut et de plus divin, de le vouloir realist, de s'offrir h sa realisation.
II y a eu quelqu'un chez les Juifs, qui ... a v^cu la vie du Messie
pressenti. Get accomplissement heroique, du reste, I'a brisi, I'a immoW,
parce que, au sein d'un monde attache au mal, il a laisse lomber tous
les traits inferieurs de I'image esquissee pour n'en realiser que la
sublimits. Dans la ligne du paganisme helienistique, aucune personnalite
ne s'est rencontree, qui prtt sur soi d'etre le Sauveur atlendu. Sur cette
ligne, le r&ve est reste un rgve, qui nc s'est traduit au dehors que par
la sympbolique expressive des cultes des mystferes. Personne n'a projete
dans une vie vecue ce que I'tane humaine chantait au plus profond
d'elle-in6me sur le mode prophetique ... En fin de compte, si le
Chrislianisme a vaincu, c'est parce que jesus Christ a \6c\i '.
And again (p. Ixxxvi):
'Cette vie constitue, nous en sommes convaincu, le point de depart
et la puissance !a plus forte qui aient ete donnas aux individus humaios
BOOK REVIEWS 9I
pour arriver a effectuer la sublimation k laquelle ils aspirant ... La vie
de J^sus est une affirmation et une demonstration de la sublimation
jusqu'au divin des instincts humains et, par consequent, une garantie
inalienable qui s'est inscrite dans I'histoire, qui permet de ne jamais
desesperer de i'effort et qui lui fournit une base certaine. La vie du ,
Christ introduit ainsi dans le monde des valeurs nouvelles que rien ne
peut plus arracher k I'humanite. En ce sens elle modifie la psychologique
meme de Thomme; an plut6t elle y ajoute une dynamique nouvelle qui,
sans en changer le mecanisme interne, hii permet de franchir des
bomes qu'elle n'aurait jamais franchies autrement '
We have cited these passages almost in full because they seem to
represent most clearly the fundamental standpoint of the book:. It was,
according to this view, to the fact that Christ actually lived, lived as a
personality of supreme moral excellence (i. e. possessing the highest
degree of sublimation), that the success of Christianity (i. e. the satis-
faction it has been able to give to human needs and aspirations) is
principally due.
To psycho-analysts, who have become more and more habituated
to accept purely psychological causes (including imagined events) as,
for many purposes, equally significant with external occurrences in the
determination of thought, feeling and conduct, this insistence upon the
aetiological importance of the real (as distinguished from the merely
imaginary) event, will doubtless come as something in the nature of a
shock. It is true that they will agree with Dr. Berguer as to the
immense importance of converting dreams into reality (i. e. the transition
from the Pleasure-Principle to the Reality-Principle). They will also
perhaps agree that the personality of Christ itself represents, in many
important respects, such a transition. But they will certainly feel less
inclined to believe that the actual existence of a particular person
possessing unusual powers of sublimation represented the essential
cause of the success of Christianity' and of its religious adequacy.
Still less perhaps wiU they be willing to regard Christ as an actual
historical instance of perfect sublimation; such a phenomenon would
be so unusual that it could scarcely be accepted without good
(historical) evidence, whereas, as Dr. Berguer himself points out, the
historical evidence concerning Christ is lamentably inadequate and,
moreover, most certainly biassed in nature, being written from the
point of view of religious edification rather than from that of historical
accuracy.
It would seem indeed that in insisting on the historicity of Christ
as a perfect moral being Dr. Berguer is needlessly sacrificing one of
the principal advantages to be derived from his adoption of the
psychological point of view. From this latter point of view it would
appear that, just as in the individual a train of psychological events of
92
BOOK REVIEWS
great importance — sublimatory or neurotic— may be started either by
an important real event or else by a trivial or imaginary one, so in
mankind a religious conversion may be brought about either by an
event which is really quite exceptional in nature, or else (and this is
more probable) by one of quite an ordinary kind, but which is wrongly
interpreted as strange or miraculous, owing to a mental predisposition.
In either case it is, we are inclined to think, this mental predisposition
that is important, since, when it exists, vast changes may be brought
about by relatively insignificant stimuli, while in its absence the most
powerful stimuli will be without effect. In our present case, since the
significance for the mental history of mankind of Christ's personality
cannot well be doubted, this personality would appear— from the
psychological point of view — to be equally important, whether our
traditional ideas concerning Christ are true historically or not. In view
then of the unsatisfactory nature of the historical evidence, Dr. Berguer
would seem to have weighted himself with an unnecessary burden in
making so much of his case depend thus upon the real existence of
Christ as a being possessing moral qualities of an exceptional kind.
This, or something like it, must, we think, be the judgement that
is passed on Dr. Berguer's attitude from the point of view adopted by
most psycho-analysts. Criticism of this kind must not however blind us
to the fact that Dr. Berguer's view is a genuine attempt do deal with a
tremendous problem that is as yet far from being solved— the question
why the religion of Christ prospered where its rivals so largely failed,
what were the elements that gave it a success immensely greater in
extent and duration than that enjoyed by the (in many respects similar)
cults of Isis, Osiris, Serapis, Mithra, the Eleusinian mysteries, etc. To
this question Dr. Berguer's answer is simple and is given in the quotations
we have made above from his book. It is to the effect that Christ by
actually living the perfect life, which in other cases had proved possible
in imagination only, introduced new values into human existence which
were not capable of being introduced by the working of phantasy alone.
In view of the importance of this statement for Dr. Berguer's position,
it is much to be regretted that he has not considered in greater detail
the psychological mechanisms by which this conversion to Christianity
was achieved ; such reasons as these given in the second passage cited
being obviously far too vague and brief to be of much assistance.
Though the present reviewer cannot help thinking that Dr. Berguer's
explanation is insufficient and that a more complete solution will
ultimately be found in analysing the psychological appeal of Christian
doctrine and teaching,, it remains of course undoubtedly true that the
personality of Christ (as it actually existed or as it was imagined to
exist) did exercise a very potent influence over the early Christian
Church. We turn therefore with all the greater interest to the second
BOOK REVIEWS 93
part of Dr. Berguer's book wiich deals psychologically with this personality,
remembering that the fruits of the psychological study of Christ would
remain of importance, even though Dr. Berguer's views concerning the
actual existence of Christ as a representative of the highest degree of
sublimation proved to be groundless.
In the first chapter of this second part Dr. Berguer treats the story
of the birth of Christ in the light of Rank's 'Myth of the Birth of the
Hero ' and also of the teleological and anagogic interpretations associated
with Jung and Silberer. While admitting the correctness of Rank's causal
treatment, he considers the latter interpretations to be of at least equal
importance, and gives two distinct meanings of this kind with reference
to Christ: (i) the two pairs of parents in the myth symbohse the
existence of two aspects of man's nature and descent — his animal origin
on the one hand and his more mysterious, idealistic, quasi-divine
tendencies on the other; (2) the overcoming of difficulties and the
reunion with the real parents in the myth symbolise the finding of
the ' real father ', in the sense of the most complete and harmonious
expressions of man's inner nature — a concept which is developed more
fully as the book proceeds.
The second chapter considers the infancy and youth Of Christ, while
the third deals with the Baptism and Temptation. As regards the
Baptism, Dr. Berguer again finds the existence of both material and
functional symbohsm. Thus the dove, besides its well-known sexual
significance, signifies also the union with the 'Father' (which in turn
has itself a double meaning— one, the actual reconciliation between
Father and Son; the other, a reconciliation with Christ's own moral
tendencies which are projected and personified as the 'Father' — this
point being of fundamental importance for Dr. Berguer's conception of
Christ's personality). The opening of the Heavens also signifies the
gratification of an incestuous desire directed to the mother and at the
same time the breaking down of the barrier between Earth and Heaven,
between ourselves and the Divinity,
The three temptations on their part, Dr. Berguer suggests, exhibit
a correspondence to what are, according to Silberer, the three possible
issues of a 'crisis of introversion': (i) magic, (2} dementia praecox,
(3) mysticism. The temptation to make stones into breid corresponds
to magic, an analogy being drawn here with the temptation that may
beset all reformers to become rich or celebrated (i. e. to satisfy their own
desires) in order— as they rationalise it— to be able to help humanity
the better. The falling from the temple corresponds to fanaticism and
loss of touch with reality (dementia praecox), while the third temptation
corresponds to false mysticism, inasmuch as it demands a concession
to existing prejudices.
The next chapter is devoted to Christ's teaching. After rightly
94 BOOK REVIEWS
emphasising the positive nature of this teaching in contradistinction to
the more negative injunctions of so many ol Christ's followers, Dr. Berguer
deals interestingly with the influence on Christ of contemporary thought
(particularly as regards Jewish Messianism and Eschatology), with the
symbols employed by Christ in his teaching and with the parables. As
regards these two latter points however, the explanations offered seem
to be, in some respects, seriously incomplete, as when it is said
(p. 102):
'Ui, oil tons les conseils demeurent infruciueux parce qu'ils n'en-
grfenent pas avec la vie, parce qu'ils restent ext^rieurs h la personne,
revocation des symboles litemels et universels p^nfctrc plus profond^ment ;
elle laisse, en effet, le champ libre h I'intcqir^tation personnelle, et
ainsi elle nfi risque pas, comma les commandements precis et les conseils
directs de violer !a conscience. Et puis, elle ouvrc aux developpements
ult^rieurs un horizon beaucoup plus vaste. '
Surely the much more satisfactory and fundamental explanation is that
advanced by Ernest Jones, i, e. that abstract, difficult or relatively un-
attractive ideas gain in intensity and motive power by being clothed in
symbolic form, inasmuch as the symbols employed (being, as they are,
in the nature of compromise formations) stand nearer to the original
sources ol feeling than do the ideas themselves. The matter is of
importance because a realisation of the dynamic relationships involved
in such cases would appear to be essential to a full understanding of
the nature of anagogic symbolism, and those who (like Dr. Berguer in
this book) are largely concerned with the interpretation of symbolism
on this level are liable to misunderstand tlie ultimate psychological
significance and ethical value of this symbolism unless they keep these
dynamic relationships constantly in view. Religious and moral symbolism
owes its value to the fact that it renders possible tlie deflection of desire
to sublimated aims to an extent that would not otherwise be possible.
At the same time it must be borne in mind that this symbolism
represents always to som"e extent a compromise with primitive un-
conscious forces and a departure from strict adlierence to the Realit\--
Principle, and is therefore to be regarded as a concession to our
relatively feeble powers of sublimation rather than as something that is
inherently valuable in itself. Any attempt to insist on the retention of
this symbolism among individuals, classes or races, who are capable of
more direct efforts of sublimation and more efficient comprehension of
abstract ideas constitutes therefore a retrograde rather than a progressive
moral influence — an influence of which orthodox ministers of religion
are however often guilty.
The fifth chapter is devoted to the Miracles. After certain general
considerations, in the course of which we are reminded (i) that to
Christ's contemporaries there was nothing impossible in the occurrence
BOOK REVIEWS ge
of miracles, since they knew of no natural order which would be in
conflict with them, (2) that miracles were expected from the Messiah
Dr. Berguer divides the recorded miracles into three categories'
(a) cures, which can for the most part be satisfactorily explained in the
hght of modem psycho-therapy (the healing of the Gadarene beine
taken as an example and coasidered in detail), (b) events, such as the
feedmg of the five thousand, in which-according to the view here
propounded-a moral significance was mistaken for a material significance
(whence the miraculous element), (c) a third class, such as the tumine
water mto wme, which cannot be explained on either of the above
prmciples and as regards which it is probable that we have to do with
simple legendary growdis based on inaccurate reports and memories
of real events.
After a brief chapter devoted to the Transfiguration, Dr. Berguer
deals m the seventh chapter-perhaps the most difficult in the book-
with 'The Personality of Jesus.' He first considers the difficulties with
which Christ was confronted owing to the fact that the adoption of the
r61e of the long expected Messiah represented the only way of fulfilling
his mission, while on the other hand this role was much too narrow
and nabonal for his purposes. Then follows (and this is the difficult
part) a more detailed treatment of Christ's conception of the 'Father-
In the course of this we leam, among other things: (i) that Christ's
Father corresponds to what psycho-analysts have called Libido
(obviously in Jung's enlarged sense), to Schopenhauer's Will, to Gaston
Fromrael's obligahOH morale and Bergson's ^lan vital; {2) that in Christ
there were absent those elements of intra-psychica! conflict which lead
to dissociation and neurosis, the whole personality proceeding in an
orderly and harmonious manner towards the self-appointed end ('I and
my Father are one"), there being thus no necessity in the case of Christ
for anything in the nature of a religious conversion; this continuity
between the Father' and himself was in the last resort an experience
which was mystical in nature (p. 163); (3) that his hatred of the 'Father'
corresponding to the ordinary hate aspects of the Oedipus complex-
was directed on to certain false ideas of the 'Father' it being these
false -ideas that he requires his followers to abandon, when he says
If any man come to me and hate not his father, and mother, and wife
and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and .his own life also he
cannot be my disciple.' Interesting as this chapter is, the psycho-analytic
reader will probably feel that the importance of the material as
distinguished from the functional aspects, of Christ's symbolism is-here
also-not infrequently underrated, and, in particular, that the ideas
leading Christ to identify himself with the 'Father' have a more literal
as well as an anagogic significance. To the present reviewer, at any rate,
It seems a matter for regret that some of the relevant suggestions
1
, I
96 BOOK REVIEWS
contained in Freud's 'Totem and Taboo' were not taken up and
elaborated in this connection.
The eighth chapter is devoted to ' The Death of Jesus '. Here, after
dwelling on the mythical, mystical and ritual significance of death and
re-birth, Dr. Berguer returns to the theme we have already discussed
in dealing with the Preface— the importance of Christ's ' having translated
into real life the secular dream of peoples ', of his having really died
whereas his predecessors in other religions died in imagination only.
The last chapter treats of the Resurrection, which event is regarded
as due to a process of materialisation as time passed — this process
depending itself on a tendency to projection: the spiritual meaning of
fresh life being exteriorised and converted into the idea of a literal
revival from death.
An appendix on 'The Poetry of Jesus' and a useful bibliography
extending to twenty-five pages bring the book to an end.
One cannot close the book without a regret that more use has not
been made of the comparative method, which the author shows occas-
sionally that he is well able to handle. A comparison of Christ with
the numerous array of 'Pagan Christs' would, we believe, have thrown
light on many points that still remain obscure as regards the actual
psychology of Christ himself and would certainly have been of great
utility in understanding the general attitude of mankind to Christ's life
and teaching. Dr. Berguer has, we are inclined to think, been so intent
on giving prominence to what he regards as the essential difference
between Christ and those who have resembled him as regards the
mythical details of their lives, that he has omitted to give due consideration
to the advantages to be gained from psycho-analytic inquiry into the
points of similarity in question.
Another matter which the reader will regret to find but slightly
treated is the content (as distinguished from the form) of Christ's ethical
and social teachings— his insistence on humility, love and mercy, his
rejection of hostility between man and man and his substitution of a
reign of clemency for the harsher patriarchal regime of Judaism. These
matters are of immense importance as regards the psychological appeal
of Christianity and to many, we suspect, they will seem far more
significant than the historicity of Christ as an exceptionally sublimated
individual to which Dr. Berguer attaches so much weight. They axe
matters too on which it would seem that psycho-analysis might have
thrown much light
However, we are not justified in expecting a complete exploration
of the whole field at a first endeavour to apply modem psychology to
the understanding of Christ's personality pr. Berguer's book was, we
. understand, written quite independently and without knowledge of
Stanley Hall's recent work on the same subject), especially since
%
BOOK REVIEWS gy
Dr. Berguer explicitly disclaims any attempt at exhaustive treatment.
As it is, our review has perhaps brought into undue prominence certain
fundamental criticisms that might be aimed at Dr. Berguer's attitude
-without giving adequate recognition to the numerous interesting'
ingenious and suggestive ideas with which the book abounds. Any book
on such a subject is bound to be exposed to criticism— from one point
of view or another— in an exceptional degree. Whatever may be our
personal tendencies as regards the questions at issue, it may be said
widiout fear of contradiction that the book desen'es careful study by
all students of religious psychology, and that it affords encouraging
evidence of the way in which psychology (and paiticularly psycho-
analysis) can infuse new life into a subject which— from the theological
and historical points of view— appeared to have been well nigh ex-
hausted. J C F
Die Herkunft Jesu. Im Lichte freier Forschung. By Dr. Emil Jung,
Innsbruck. (Ernst Eeinhardt, Munich, 1920. Pp. 246.)
This exceedingly detailed and learned treatise' is an investigation
of all the known historical sources relating to the birth of Jesus, con-
taining also an inquiry into the Jewish laws and customs on the matter
of adultery and divorce at that period. The author comes to the con-
clusion that Jesus was an illegitimate son of Mary's, the father probably
being a Roman soldier, and that Joseph knew of the state of affairs'
Whether Ihis be true or not the book is certainly a valuable contri-
bution to the httle knowledge we possess on this problem.
E.J.
MiTHRAiSM AND CHRiSTiANi-fv. A study in Comparative religion By
L. Patterson, M.A., Vice-Principal of Chichester Theological College.
(Cambridge University Press, 1921. Pp. 102. Price 6s)
This iittle volume appears to have been written with the two aimii
of providing a simple and popular account of Mithraism and of demon-
strating its inferiority to Christianity, both theologically and etiiically
It provides no new facts about Mithraism and is evidently based in
the main on the epoch-making studies of Cumont
There are two versions oJ the birth of Mithra, one that he pro-
ceeded from an act of self-conception with the mother, the other that
he was the product of incest between his fatiier and the latter's mother.
The author comments that 'in neither case is this what we would call
a virgin-birth ' and criticizes Jung's attempt to assimilate the myth to
7
gS BOOKEICVIEWS
Christian beliei as being 'mere mythology, not true theology'; he does
not explain, however, why the mother's virginity should be impaired
more in the one case than in the other. He points out that there is no
reason to believe that the Christian doctrine of the Virgin-birth was
borrowed from MithraJsm and adds, rather surprisingly, 'nor are there
any other pre-Christian myths from which the Christian doctrine can
have been borrowed '. His reason for so thinking is that ' it is hardly
conceivable that the Christians would have taken over these myths,
which they regarded with unfeigned abhorrence, and then branded the
originals as diabolic imitations', his view being 'that the mind of the
savage or the more civilized pagan was groping blindly for a truth
which was clearly revealed in Christianity'.
The famous bull sacrifice which forms the central part of the Mith-
raic cult is lightly dismissed as 'the symbolic representation of a
nature-myth, intended to signify or to stimulate the renewal of plant-
life'. He sees no resemblance between this rite and the central Christ-
ian one, and we are asked to believe that the Mithraic worshippers
obtained no spiritual benefit from their rite, as Christians do in the
form of salvation. It is a pity that the author is unacquainted widi
Ralik's studies on the significance of sacrifice and Freud's important
parallelism between the alternative methods oi salvation offered by
Mithra and Christ.
Similarly for the other ritual of the two cults: 'There is only a
superficial resemblance between the repeated lustrations of the Mithraic
cult or the mystic banquet, and the two great Sacraments of the
Christian Church. Whether the baptism of Mithra took the form of
water or blood, whether the mystics partook of the Draona cakes, meat,
and Haoma juice, or unleavened cakes and wine, the atmosphere and
accompaniments of these rites are far different from the Christian
Baptism and Eucharist'.
The audior thinks that the integrity of Mithraism became impaired
as die result of its syncretism, and in fact it is remarkable how Mithra
became in different countries identified with other divine son-lovers,
Shamash, Men, Sabazius, Helios, Attis, etc. This, he holds, is funda-
mentally different from what other writers have considered to be the
remarkable syncretlzing capacity of Christianity. 'The most that can
reasonably be proved is that Christianity took over some popular
customs of heathen religions, and purified them from unworthy and
idolatrous associations '.
Apart from the obvious prejudice indicated by these passages, the
book can be recommended as being a trustworthy and adequate account
oi the main features of Mithraism. E, J-
BOOK REVIEWS oq
THE GROUP MIND, By William McDougall M.B., F.R.S. (Cambridge
University Press, 1921. Pp. 304. Price 2is.) tv^amonage
The most remarkable thing about books that deal with the 'GrAnn
Mind ■ is that they \re frequently difficult to distinguish from te le^Z
articles of a daily paper. Mr. McDougall's book is^ot one " ^hele S
err the most in this line, but still, from a purely scientific pit of view
we must ask why the author finds it necessary to state that 'politically'
n.y sympathies are w:th mdividualism and internationalism, although i
have, I tiiink. fully recogn^ed the great and necessary part playel in
human hfe by tiie "Group Spirit - and by that specialTorm of it whi h
wenowcallnauonahsm' (p. xi Preface). What have 'sympathies' to
do with the top,cs in quesbon, which concern a department of applied
psychology, localised on the border-line between psychology and social
anthropology or sociology? We do not generally 'sympathise' with
totemism or animism: why should we not be able to adhere to this
^^s.»^^ess.„.eni when discussing other questions of collective psycho-
]T\^" fr ^\ 'T ^^" ^''''"■^ ^P^'^^^^' ^- ^™ "^ - book
{the Study of Sociology) in which the authors of books on this subject
might see, as m a mirror held before their eyes, how nation and party
distort ^eir view of facts. But it has had remarkably litde eifect o^
hem and books are still written, calling themselves scientific, which try
to show that one nabon was 'wrong' another 'right', that certain
pohtcs are justified-, others 'condemned' by sciencl The superiorit^
of fte British type of social organisation over the German is one of the
fading themes of W. Trotter's 'Instincts of the Herd in Peace ^d
War . 1916, whilst the defeat of Prassian militarism has not cured the
Gennans or their leading philosopher of thefr old ideals (cf. W. Wundf
Voikerpsychologie. Vol. X. 1920; Kultur und Geschichte. S. 44^)'
The learned author of the 'Group Mind' is of course fiali; aware of
tins remarkable dependence of science on politics (cf. p 3) but he
does not aiink it necessary to explain the fact Vet we Lk that this
abnormal' character of books which touch these questions shou^ be
explamed, and that the reason why authors cannot get rid T'bi^-
IS simply that then they would be rid of the subject; for it is justISs
bias , or rather the unconsaous impulse for which it is a substitute
m consciousness that draws their attention to the problems of group ■
psychology, and perhaps contains the key to the problem of the
group mind'. ^
Although this 'group mind- is. properly speaking, the subject of
group or collective psychology, it is yet a matter of much S^u^
between authors whether, and m what sense, such a thing as a group
mmd can be sa.d to exist at all. McDougall answers thi! questfon i^
ti.ealfirmative by saying that 'society when it enjoys a lon^ life and '
becomes highly orgamzed acquires a structure and qualities which are
jqo BOOK REVIEWS
largely independent of the qualities of the individuals who enter into
its composition and take part for a brief time in its life' (p. 9). Such
a society, our author tells us, has the power of perpetuating itself as a
self-identical system. He refers to the German naUon in connection
with the Great War as a proof that society is not merely the sum-total
of the individuals it is composed of. After the war Germany may have
become organized on a completely different basis from pre-war Ger-
many, so that the type of society and the attitude of the world towards
the Germans as a nation may be completely changed, although the
group called 'German nation' is made up of exactly the same indivi-
duals as before. Or, we may add, generation after generation may come
and go, without changing the psychical portrait of a group which is
united by race and common tradition.
After accepting the idea of a group mind but rejecting that of a
'superindividual consciousness' McDougall tells us that the essential
theme of his book is the 'resolution of a paradox'. 'Participation in
group life degrades the individual, assimilating his mental processes to
those of a crowd's, whose brutality, inconstancy and unreasoning im-
pulsiveness have been the tiieme of many writers; yet only by parti-
cipation in group life does man become fully man, only so does he
rise above die level of the savage' (p. 20). Here again we must raise the
same protest as before. We asked what have political ideas to do witii
these questions and now we feel that caution is needed when the
author, at the very outset, applies a standard of absolute ethics to
human actions. We know very well that a successful general or popular
leader is a hero, but that defeat inevitably (or frequently) stamps him
as a criminal for whom a common jail is tiiought even too good by
his one-time adulators. With a legion of these examples under our eyes
it is better to take up a standpoint 'beyond good and evil" and then
try and see whetiier we cannot rather deduce tiie moral categories
from group life, instead of applying certain concepts to modes of behaviour
which are probably far more archaic than die concepts in question.
A homogeneous group without any organisation of any sort is what
we usually call a crowd (Chapter II). In a crowd the individual sur-
passes his own boundaries and is carried out of his own self, for all
the emotions are intensified by the similar emotions of his fellows. 'The
panic is the crudest and simplest example of collective mental life.
Groups of gregarious animals are liable to panic; and die panic of a
crowd of human beings seems to be generated by tiie same instinctive
reactions as the panic of animals. The essence of the panic is the
collective intensification of the instinctive excitement widi its emotion
of fear and its instinct to flight' (pp. 24, 25). An important factor is
the consciousness of being on die same side as tiie majority, which is
always the 'right' side in any given question and hence frees the m-
1
BOOK REVIEWS lOi
dividual from the control of those restraining forces which are the
products of civilisation. The theory of a 'collective consciousness" de-
rives some support if we consider tiie relation of the cell to tiie organ-
ism as a whole. The divisibility of lower animals as well as the fact
of multiplication by division points to the organic origin of what we
call the group mind (pp. 32, 33). This is the basis of the Spencerian
view of society. As an organism certain lower multicellular organisms
are what are called compound or colonial animals; that is, tiiey form
a single living mass with interdependent parts, each of which is an
individual in itself (pp. 33, 35). The emotional life of a simple crowd
is characterized by tiie primary emotions and lower and coarser sent-
iments, which although hidden under a thin layer of cultural differen-
tiation form the common property of mankind at large. Sublimation in
the crowd is conditioned by full publicity which tends to suppress the
more selfish current of feelings. One of the reasons why an individual
is more apt to give free vent to his brutal tendencies when acting in
a crowd is a sense of becoming depersonalised, a feeling of reduced
responsibility (p. 40).
McDougalt passes on to consider the differences and similarities '
between the crowd and the highly organised group such as an army or
regiment We will not follow him into details here, but will rattier sum
up the question from our point of view; in the crowd we have
unrestrained impulse, in the organised group we have impulse plus
inhibition. The former is represented by tiie common members, the
latter by the officials and organisation of tiie group. The question of
traditional group consciousness (p. 51) seems to be a special case of the
principle of universal repetition ; once victorious a regiment will always
be expected botii by friend and foe to repeat this victory, and tiie
expectation will produce tiie expected result (p. 51). A weapon which
has been wielded with success by a Maori is said to be imbued with
magical essence, 'rnana', and will give tiie man who uses it the self-
confidence which is an essential condition of success. Interaction and
contact witii other groups is anotiier impoi-tant factor in tiie organi-
sation of tiie group, but we must translate the remarks of our author
from tiie language of consciousness to tiiat of tiie unconscious if we
are to gain insight into the mechanism of the processes involved in
this interaction. The most important of tiiese is that q{ projection-, tiie
primitive impulses which have been repressed into tiie unconscious, or
at least relegated by tiie second censorship to the preconscious, are
projected into tiie alien group, which thus becomes an insbiiment of
abreaction and national sublimation. McDougall distinguishes five levels
of collective conation, from the purely impulsive to that in which an &
organisation and the idea of the group as a super-individual entity "■«
come into action. The various degrees of evolution explain the success ■
102 BOOK REVIEWS
achieved by Boer armies against the British as well as by the Japanese
against the Russians; it is the nation which has its back to the wall
without a possibility of retreat that carries the day. It is from energies
that have been drawn away from the instinct of self-preservation that
the national idea gains additional force.
Chapter IV deals with the group spirit which in the sense the
author uses the word is a translation of the French 'esprit de corps'.
'In considering the mental lile of a patriot army as the type of a highly
organised group, we saw that group self-consciousness is a factor of
very great importance — that it is a principal condition of the elevation
of its collective mental life and behaviour above the level of the merely
impulsive violence and impulsive fickleness of the mob' (p. 62). Here
we seem to be getting near to the pith of the whole argument; we
shall get an answer to the question which has been indicated by the
author on the principal problem to be solved in his book; that the
crowd (group) both elevates and debases the individual. The answer
we get is that the 'group spirit plays an important part in raising the
intellectual level of the group, for it leads each member deliberately
to subordinate his own judgment and opinion to that of the whole,
and in any properly organised group this collective opinion will be
superior to that of the average individual because in its formation the
best minds . . . will be of predominant influence ' (p. 63). We remember
that the crowd was said to debase its members because the more archaic
impulses which are common to all its members obtain the mastery over
the sublimated and individualised products of civilisation, and we also
know that the group self-consciousness can only be formed after the
pattern of the consciousness of kind, which again goes back to organic
sources. The spirit of the crowd and that of the group thus go back
to a common origin, and if one of them is said to ' degrade ' the in-
dividual while the other 'elevates' him, this answer is only arguing in
a vicious circle and at the best serves to show how the introduction
of an ' ethical ' point of view is apt to mar all scientific effort. There
is a 'higher' and a 'lower' form of nearly all things, for instance,
military discipline (p. 65) ; which fatally reminds us of the attitude of
tfie Bakairi with whom the word kura means ' we ' and ' good ', while
kura-pa means 'not we, they' and 'bad'.
It is rather remarkable to hear that intolerance of the members of
other groups is a sign of cultural advance ('to the uncultivated any
society is better than none ' p. 6g), for in that case savages and ani-
mals are in advance of even the most exclusive of Tories. The idea
that the complex structure of Australian society is simply due to the
satisfaction and pleasure derived from group consciousness, a sort of
playful variation of the group ideal, is a view which is hardly hkely to
commend itself to ethnologists (p. 68). McDougall is undoubtedly right
'k
BOOK REVIEWS
103
in asserting the strong individualism of the savage (p 72) Its co
existence with the prominence of the group can be understood if M-e
explain these phenomena by the strong narcissism of savage man This
IS what makes him observe an individual religion (secret name cult of
guardian spirit, etc.; seeRoheim: 'Das Selbst", Imago, Bd VII)' and at
the same time it is the projection of the narcissistic ego-ideal which
forms the affective background of all his concepts concerning the srouD
Ultimately we must say that the organism is continually wagint war
against the stimuli of the outward world, so that everything ttiat is
'not we- {kura-pd) is 'bad', i.e. unpleasant. The Group is that part of
the World which has been introjected into the Ego; and this in slightlv
different terms is also the conclusion arrived at by McDougall (pp ?q 80)
'In this way, that is by extension to the group the egoistic impulses
are transmuted, sublimated and deprived of their individualistic selfish
character'. He justly criticises the erroneous ideas of collectivists of
all ages, who to get additional energy for the State, desire to eJiminate
the family in education, for, as we all know, the smaller group is the
prototype and foundation of the larger one, and if these reformers
could succeed in their efforts they would destroy the mental foun-
dations of all possibility of collective life of the higher type (p. S3)
The next chapter gives us a classification of human groups as
natural and artificial, traditional and purposive, showing how occupational
and purposive groups are slowly replacing those formed by common
geographical circumstances. In dealing with the question 'What is a
nation?' the author sides with those who regard nationhood as essen-
tially a psychological problem. The problem of national deities would
well deserve a more thorough discussion in this connection (p. 102),
Chapter vn is concerned chiefly with the part played by racial factors
in 'forming the mind of a nation'. Although the author professes to
take a via media between the views of Gobineau and Houston Stewart
Chamberlain on the one side and Mills and Buckle on the other, yet
on the whole he seems to be following rather the lead of 'Racial' An-
thropology' than of evolutionism. He regards racial qualities as being
evolved in an immeasurably long period before the dawn of historj-
and tending to repress certain other variations which are contrary to
their general tendency, thus moulding the whole complex known as
the culture of a given area. He even goes so far in this view of un-
changed inherited faculties as to deny progress in a certain sense
saying that we have only the advantage of accumulated tradition over
our savage ancestors who were in other respects our equals- while the
superiority of Europeans over negroes is not derived from civilisation
but IS rather the reason why the European has reached a level beyond
the limited faculties of the negro (p. 120). I do not think that biology
has deiimtely settled the problem of the transmissibiUty of acquired
104
BOOK REVIEWS
qualities (p. 119) in the negative, and I refer to the investigation of
Boas on the changes in the stature and cranial index of American im-
migrants as a striking and well authenticated corroboration of Lamarckian
ideas. But even the most extreme exponents of race theories must
assume that races acquired the qualities they actually possess in some
prehistoric phase of their development. We can perhaps help to bridge
over difficulties by applying what we know of the evolution of the in-
dividual to the evolution of the race. A man is formed by the im-
pressions ol the child, and it has been reserved for psycho-analysis to
show how .our infantile life determines our whole life-history. In the
same manner we must also accept the idea that the plasticity of the
race is greatest at the dawn of its history, though the possibility of
adaptation to environment is never quite lost; if it is, the nation or
race must perish. Thus the racial peculiarities and ideals would represent
the unconscious survivals not so much of histoi-y in the usual sense of
the word but of phylogenetic infancy. It is remarkable how the memory
of the dawn of nations which must in reality have been a very humble
one is transformed and glorified into an heroic age by secular repression
and national narcissism, just as the defeats of the infantile sexual life
aie transformed into so many glorious achievements in dream life {See
Freud: Kleine Schriften zur Neurosenlehre, IV. 1918. 'Aus der Ge-
schichte einer infantilen Neurose'). A case of this phenomenon in racial
history has been demonstrated by the researches of the well-known
Hungarian ethnologist J. Sebestyen. He shows that the Hungarian
traditions which recount the victories of their ancestors (identified by
tradition both with the Huns and Avars) over the 'Romans' do not
refer to the really victorious inroads of the Huns on Western civili-
sation, but recount the national catastrophe suffered by the Avars at
the hands of Charlemagne and his successors. Only with this difference:
the events are faithfully recorded, but with a reversal; victories are
substituted for defeats, and the campaign goes from east to west instead
of from west to east,
McDougall goes on to discuss the part played by leading individuals
in national life, but without arriving at a deterministic view of the
relation between these individuals and the masses. Chapter X tells us
that geographical contiguity and common origin alone do not make a
nation in the modem sense unless we add to these tiia dominant idea
of a common purpose. This psychical attitude is often attained in a
national war. The danger which threatens the organism in disease
results in what Ferenczi has called a pathoneurosis, a condensation of
narcissistic libido in the imperilled part of the body, and a similar
superabundance of national narcissism is also the usual reaction of a
people in threatening danger (see pp. 142, 143). Hence perhaps we
may by arguing from the present to the past conclude that the nation
BOOK REVIEWS 105
as such, that is, the distinction of a number of human bein^ from
other members of the same species, was born in the crisis in which
that distinction is still most marked, i.e. in war. It was after the re-
pression of the natural aggressiveness of the parricidal brothers towards
one another that the repressed aggressiveness could be projected beyond
the limits of the horde into a national ideal, whilst the homoerotic im-
pulse of the ' Mdnnerbund' became sublimated into patriotism. This
projection and sublimation is still the most marked feature of the
nationalistic attitude in peace and war. By the 'will of the nation' the
autlior means something over and above tlie unconscious tendencies
and strivings which dominate the collectivity; he accepts an active
and combative nationalism and lays great stress on the conscious and
self-conscious character of national volition (Ch, XI), Nations evolve
from the unconscious to the conscious, from an organism to a 'social
contract'. McDougall calls the nation a 'contractual organism', thus
projecting the ideas of Rousseau into the future instead of the past
Cp- i7S)-
In our opinion and terminology 'the psychological justification of
patriotism' which our author attempts to give as against the anti-
nationalists (p. 180) consists in the fact that it affords a goal of subli-
mation which stands midway between the family and humanity and is
thus in a position to draw away parts of the Oedipus complex from
its original point of fixation. On the other hand, the fundamental con-
dition for the existence of a real national spirit is the existence of
the foreigner, the enemy. All the ill-wili existing among the members
of the same family (nation) become repressed and will be projected
on to the foreigner, who is thus transformed into a veritable demon.
National life is a perpetual war (psychic and real) against this extra-
territorial objectivation of our own Unconscious,
The question of the various ideals that dominate the psyche cA
nations is one of high interest (p. 183), Perhaps we may hope for a
differential psychology of nations built up on the study of their various
ideals, or rather on the study of the unconscious complexes for which
these ideals are the substitutes. The desire to conquer the whole world
would be an ideal actuated by the unsatisfied part of the Oedipus
complex, the Earth being one of the most frequent substitutes for the
mother (cf: the oracle on the triumph of him who first kisses his
mother, Brutus kissing the symbol instead of the original), whilst the
caste-system of India is a reversion to endogamy which completely
arrested the development of an originally active people. The desire
of France with a stagnant population for territorial increase and colonies
looks like an over-compensation of the fear of losing what she actually
possesses : a dread which is probably connected with national infecundity
in a specially deeply rooted castration-complex. (For McDougall's views
I06 BOOK REVIEWS
on these subjects compare p. 184.) The French ideal of equality and
the British of liberty are both specially powerful reaction-formations
against the encroachments of a tyrannous aristocracy suffered in the
past, and both correspond to the infantile wish to be equal with the
adults and not hampered by their will. Hunian nature really finds its
pleasure only in the repetition of the past; conservatism is the natural
attitude of mankind (See Freud: Jenseits des Lustprinzips), so that we
must class the ideal of progress as another reaction-formation — this time
against the tendency to relapse into the past — as a libidinisation of tlie
comparative readjustments dictated by the Reality Principle, The influence
of the past is rightly insisted on throughout the book; public opinion,
we are told, is not a mere sum of individual opinions upon any particular
question, it is rather the expression of that tone or attitude of mind
which prevails throughout the nation and owes its quality far more to
the influence of the dead than of the living (p. 1S9).
But it is the third part of the book (Chapters XIV— XX) which is
concerned with the processes by which national mind and character
are gradually built up and shaped in the long course of ages. For 'just
as we cannot understand individual minds, their peculiarities and differ-
ences, without studying their development, so we cannot hope to
understand national mind and character and the peculiarities and differ-
ences of nations without studying the slow processes tlirough which
they have been built up in the course of centuries ' (p. 200J. Psycho-
Analysis can with full right lay claim to the merit ot having made more
headway in the genetic study of the individual mind than any other
method, and can therefore expect to find the same or analogous mechan-
isms at work in the formation of the group spirit. McDougall starts
on his road with a remark which seems to be strikingly correct and
of great importance for future investigation. 'The differentiation of
racial types in the prehistoric period must have been in the main
the work oJ differences of physical environment, operating directly by
way of selection, by way of adaptation of each race to its environment
through the extermination of the strains least suited to exist under
those physical conditions. But this process, this direct moulding of
racial types by physical environment must have been well-nigh arrested
as soon as the nations began to form. For the formation of nations
implies the beginning of civilisation; and civilisation very largely con-
sists in the capacity of a people to subdue their physical environment
to their needs to a degree that renders tliem far less the sport of it
than was primitive man ; it consists in short, in replacing man's natural
environment by an artificial environment largely of his own choice and
creadon' (pp. 201, 202). If races must have been formed before the
social and religious evolution of mankind began, the problem of psych-
ical differences and psychical parallelism between nations belonging
BOOK REVIEWS
107
to various races of mankind presents a new aspect and demands new
solutions. Leaving the question of historical contact aside, such agree-
ments can only be due to the same psychical mechanisms operating
on the same inherited and unconscious material, and identity of psychical
functions such as is involved in the current theory of the ' Elementar-
gedanke ' (Bastian) being insufficient to explain all the agreements. In
other words the Unconscious, as we know it, with its central complex
(die Oedipus conflict), is older than race, and the age from the pre-
human Cyclopean family to the differentiation of races may be called
the real prehistoric period of humanity. Thus we should distinguish
two permanent and two variable factors the interaction of which gives
what we call human progress. The two permanent quantities are the
Oedipus complex and the various mechanisms of repression and distor-
tion; the two variables are enviromnent and the Reality Principle, that
is, the sum-total of readjustments to which the Pleasure Principle is
compelled by a variable environment. McDougall classifies as follows:
(l) Evolution of innate or racial qualities. (2) Development of civili-
sation. (3) Social evolution or the development of social organisation
(p. 20s).
In the chapter on the 'Race-making period' (Ch. XV) the chief
stumbling-block in our author's path is his rigid adherence to the Neo-
Darwinian principle that acquired modifications are not transmitted. His
theory is that the new qualities determined by spontaneous variation
react on mental evolution by creating a social environment which mod-
ifies physical environment and becomes a principal factor in the trend
of racial evolution (p. 209). The original social organisation 'among
that primitive human stock from which all races have been evolved
was probably an organisation in small groups based on the family
under the rule and leadership of a patriarch' (p. 208), which looks
like a somewhat uncertain adherence to Atkinson's views. He discusses
the effects of climate on nascent races, a subject on which many
brilliant but uncertain theories have been propagated but hardly any-
thing can be said to be established. 'The Arabs and the fiery Sikhs
may be held to illustrate the effect of dry heat. The Englishman and
the Dutchman seem to show the effects of a moist cool climate, a
certain sluggishness embodied with great energy and perseverance'
{p. 214). An interesting theory of M. Boutmy according to which a
Southern landscape, offering more vivid objects for the eye to rest on,
tends to promote an imitation of nature, an objective temperament,
whilst the hazy outiines of the North compel man to direct his energy
towards his own Self, is quoted with approval (p. 215). The inhabitants
of the tropics can get the minimum necessary for life without any
special effort or activity on their part, hence the indolent have not
been weeded out in this struggle for life and they have not obtained
108 BOOK REVIEWS
that !ove of effort in itself which is so characteristic of'Northemers
and especially of the English people (pp. 220, 221). Northern races
have taken more time to subdue nature, but in the battle with en-
vironment they have acquired qualities in which the representatives of
Southern civilisation were lacking and which enabled them to outdo
the Southerners in the race for power (p. 222). We might also add
that the races of the North have had a prolonged puberty as compared
with Southern people, which corresponds to what takes place with
individual representatives of the race to this very day.
The action of psychical environment is illustrated by the case of
the French and English people. Demolins shows that the bulk of the
population of Gaul belonged to tlie short dark round-headed race which
started on its migration from the Eurasian steppe region. These tribes
were pastoral nomads organised on what may be called patriarchal
communistic principles. The clati represented by the patriarch was
everything, the individual nothing. Tending the herds was an occupation
which offered an easy subsistence, but no scope for individual effort.
This is the prototype of the French system as we see it at present;
a centralised government with sociable but not individualistic subjects.
On the other hand the ancestors of the English were the Nordic tribes
who settled in Scandinavia, where the indented coast and their seafaring
occupation compelled them to adopt the small individual family as their
unit of social organisation; hence for the Englishman to this very day
his house is his castle and he relies on himself and not on the state
to help him in emergency (p. 237). The theory really seems to account
for the facts, but when we come to look into the matter with a critical
eye we shall see that the relation between cause and effect is far from
certain. We hear that pastoral nomads are necessarily communistic and
lack individuality, and then we remember the data of an eye-witness
like Vamb^ry who describes his Turkomans as 'an unruly folk with a
superabundant quantity of individualism '. ' We are a folk without rulers '
is one of their proverbs. Well, if this is the prototype of the rule of
the Roi Soieil, we must say that it is ' diablement chang4e en route'.
And as for the small family, with seafaring or fishing as an occupation,
we know many races who possess these forms of social and economic
organisation without becoming the founders of the British Empire.
McDougal! has much to say on the disadvantages of the crossing of
races unless they are sub-races of the same stock, but he forgets to
mention that some of these disadvantages such as the unreliable, un-
stable character of the cross-breeds may be due to social rather than
biological causes (p. 240). Following Sir H. Maine he thinks it possible
that the chief difference between progressive and stationary people lies
in the period of social evolution at which customs were codified in
written law. An all too early fixation at a certain period of development
BOOK REVIEWS
.109
■was the cause of the decay of Oriental people, while the Nordic race
acquired sufficient plasticity in what we must again describe as its
prolonged puberty to counteract the innate antipathy of mankind against
all new readjustments (p. 271). The author concludes his book with the
hope that a progress of knowledge, especially of the knowledge of
social laws, will emancipate mankind from the thralMom of blind in-
stinct and custom as well as from the intellectual errors into which
rationaUsm is prone to fall. We think that this knowledge is still to be
acquired, and the science which will be in the position to grapple with
these problems has yet to be born.
G. ROHEIM.
The Origin of Man and op his Superstitionb. By Carveth Read, M,A.
(Cambridge University Press, 1920. Pp. xii-f 350.)
Students of psychology and anthropology who are already in any way
acquainted with Mr. Carveth Read's work during the years in which he was
lecturer in Comparative Psychology at University Coilege, London (sub-
sequent to his resignation of the Grote Chair of philosophy) will wel-
come this volume, which contains in a convenient form many of the principal
fruits of his scientific labours during these years. It is to be hoped
however that the book will also make a strong appeal to the general
reading public, and that its wide diffusion may help to make amends
for the relatively small number of listeners who found their way to
Mr. Read's somewhat remote and inaccessible lecture room, there to be
rewarded by lectures which— in virtue of their combination of sound
common sense with charm of expression and originality of exposition
—undoubtedly deserved a larger audience and a wider recognition. To
psycho-analysts in particular the book should be of interest as dealing
with a variety of questions of the greatest importance in the development
and history of the human mind and as suggesting a niunber of problems
where psycho-analysis should be of service.
The work falls mto two fairly distinct sections, the relative evaluation
of which will no doubt differ according to the tastes and interests of
the reader. In the first or smaller section (comprising the first 7g paMs)
there is developed a theory as to the differentiation of man from the
anthropoids, this theory being that all the differences between man and
his nearest relatives may be traced to the influence of a single variation
operatmg among the original 'anthropoid conditions, i.e. 'the adoption
of a flesh diet and the habits of a hunter in order to obtain it'. The
chief advantages which such a variation may have brought with it lie it is
suggested, first in an increased supply of food (and therefore the
possibility of a denser population), secondly in the ability to live in open
no . BOOK REVIEWS
country as well as in the forest [and therefore the possibility of inhabiting
all portions of the earth's surface where animal food can be obtained).
Among the numerous characteristics and changes held by Mr. Read to
be indirectly consequent on the adoption of the hunting Hfe may be
mentioned: on the physical side, the adoption of the upright gait, the
specialisation and modification of hands, teeth, skull, jaw and skin;
on the social and psychological side, a great increase of cooperation
and gregariousness, the development of certain forms of sympathy, the
loss of seasonal marriage, cannibalism, aggressivess, claim to property,
strategy, persistence, generally increased intelligence, emulation, war,
constructiveness {at first in the use of weapons), recognition of leaders
and submission to their authority. Writing perhaps mider the influence
of the War, Mr. Read takes a rather gloomy view of the number and
strength of the undesirable tendencies fostered in men by their past
life as hunters, even suggesting that we must explain ' the more amiable
side of human nature, partly at least by derivation from the frugivorous
Primates, extensively modified by our wolfish adaptation, but surviving
as a latent character' (p. 6i). He admits however that a certain amount
of friendliness, together with such virtues as generosity and mercy on
the one hand and charity and long-suffering on the other, may have
been fostered by the conditions of the hunting pack. A relatively
small influence in specifically human development is attributed to the
institution of the family, Mr. Read's view differing in this respect from
that which Freud (following Darwin and Atkinson) has put forward in
'Totem and Taboo'. The hunting hypothesis here developed fails indeed
to throw light upon most of the problems with which Freud was there
concerned, but this Mr. Read would probably regard as inevitable, for
he says that in his opinion ' it is altogether vain to try to deduce from
the primitive form of societj', which may have existed three or four
million years ago, any of the known customs ot savages concerning
marriage, such as avoidance, totemism, exogamy; which would be of
comparatively recent date if we put back their origin 500,000 years. Many
such rules can only have arisen when there was already a tradition and
a language capable of expressing relationships' (p. 40).
The second and larger portion of the book deals with the origin
and development of human superstitions ; successive chapters dealing
with: Belief and Superstition, Magic, Animism, The Relations between
Magic and Animism, Omens, The Mind of the Wizard, Totemism, Magic
and Science. It is impossible to deal even cursorily in a review of this
kind with the very large number of interesting and important topics
treated under each of these headings. Only a few outstanding features
can be mentioned here. Mr. Read finds the ultimate distinction between
true and false beliefs in that 'true beliefs seem to rest on perception
or inferences verified by perception, and false beliefs seem to depend
BOOK REVIEWS m
I
upon imagination that cannot be verified' (p. 72); the power of the
non-evidential causes of belief being excessive in immature minds and
in tlie lower stages of culture. 'The peculiarity of savage beliefs is due
not to corrupt and clouded perception, but to the influence of desire
and anxiety upon their imagination, unrestrained by self criticism and
reinforced by popular consensus. The savage's imagination is excited
by the pressing needs of his life in hunting, love, war, agriculture, and
therefore by hunger and emulation, hate and grief, fear and suspicion.
Imaginations spring up in his mind by analogy with experience ; but
often by remote or absurd analogies; and there is no logic at hand
and not enough common sense to distinguish the wildest imaginative
analogies from trustworthy conclusions ' (p. 86). The two most widespread
and important superstitions are Magic and Animism; Magic being prior
to Animism, a view in which Mr. Read agrees with Freud and dissents
from "Wundt. Not the least important difference bet^veen Magic and
Animism is that, whereas Animism necessarily assumes that the universe
is governed by caprice, and tends to develop into Religion, Magic
postulates a rigid sequence of cause and effect, thus having some
important elements in common with the scientific point of view. Magic
and Science both start from Common Sense and ' expand at very unequal
rates in opposite directions . . . Whilst Magic rapidly distorts, perverts
and mystifies it out of recognition by innumerable imaginations, Science
slowly connects its fragments together, corrects, defines and extends it,
without ever altering its original positive character' (p. 327).
The psychological and historical basis of both Magic and Animism
(those twin errors with which the human mind is ' everywhere befogged ')
are treated at length and afford most interesting, though often melancholy,
reading. In view of the immense blunders, ineptitudes and misconceptions
into which they have lead humanity, the question arises as to the nature
of the biological factors which permitted their growth and vast develop-
ment in human society. Mr, Read's answer to this question is that ' these
superstitions were useful and (apparently) even necessary in giving to
elders enough prestige to preserve tradition and custom when the leader
of the hunt was no longer conspicuous in authority. A magic-working
gerontocracy was the second form of society; and the third form was
governed by a wizard-king or a priest-ldng, or by a king supported by
wizards or priests ' (p. vi). In later stages of culture Animism (especially
in its religious developments) has indirectly been of immense service
to civilisation, since the development of art and science has been so
largely connected with the priestly castes. Even here however humanity
has had to pay dearly for the progress it has made, counterbalanced
as this is by a weight of superstition, which has prevented the applic-
ation of human powers to the understanding and control of nature.
'It is the tragedy of the world that for thousands of years the specula-
112 BOOK REVIEWS
tive powers of man— of some men— expanded without any power-
except in the classical age, of discriminating sense from nonsense. There-
fore, looking back, we see everywhere superstition and the kingdom ol
darkness' (p. 341).
As an ex-professor of Philosophy Mr. Read is hard on many of his
predecessors. ' Philosophy has derived from Animism most of her problems
— free-will and predestination, final causes, creation and miracles,
emanation and intuition, ideaHsm and materialism, immortality, the being
and attributes of God, eternity, infinity — in some of which, indeed, magical
ideas are deeply concerned; all of them the exercise of the most
eminent minds, exercise so delightful and so disappointing. Considering
their source, we cannot wonder that these problems remain problems,
and that philosophical discussion has, of late years, turned from them to
questions concerning the theory of knowledge ' (p. 342).
Not only as regards the past but as regards the future Mr. Read
is by no means optimistic. While some beliefs concerning supernatural
things are being lost, others are being resuscitated, but whereas 'the
lapsing beliefs arc noble and venerable and have exerted great public
power and authority . , . those now eagerly propagated are the raw
infatuation of quacks, on a level with the Animism of an Australian
medicine-man and, indeed, much inferior to his, as having no moral
influence or authority. What must come of this is so dubious as to dis-
courage one about the future of the world' (p- 343)- Furthermore, while
our evolution from the hunting pack has ensured us leaders of a certain
level of abilitj' (since Natural Selection has operated in producing the
necessary degree of variability) and while ' the leading nations have of
late years made wonderful progress in science and in everything that
can be done by machinery . . . there is no reason to suppose that anything
has been done towards raising the average intelligence and character;
and in default of that, in my judgement, nothing has been done to
advance civilisation. The world is no safer against war, revolution,
demagogy, despotism, degeneration' (p. 343). 'Anyone who anxiously
desires to foresee the future of our race is in a position to sympathise
with the ancients. Go, inquire at Delphi orDodona; or sleep in Stone-
henge, or at the tomb of Merlin, or by the barrows at Upsala,
and dream of things to come; or consult the stars, cast the
nativity of Ly cop itli ecus, and read in heaven the fate of his
posterity. If these methods are not very hopeful any one of them is
as good as guessing. The only safe refiection is tliat he who lives longest
will see most'.
These brief excerpts and comments will perhaps suffice to show
something of the outlook, style and nature of this interesting and
important book— a book which (though in itself in no sense technically
psycho-analytic) will certainly repay careful thought and study on the
BOOK REVIEWS ,,,
h^/r "E^ ''^ ?*"''''^ -n the contributions of psycho-analysis to
human thought and human welfare i A ir
Primitive Society, the Beginnings of the Family and the RECKONmr
OF Descent By Edwin Sidney Hartland, LL.D., F.S.A., Hon F R S A
(Ireland). (Methuen & Co., London, 1921. Pp. jgo. Price 6s.)
This book is a vmdication of the priority "ot matrilineal descent in
early forms of human society. As the author says, the work of Spencer
and Gillen in Australia and of Morgan in America has of recent years
somewhat shaken the belief in this priority, which up to the end of the
nmeteenth century had been gradually gaining ground among anthropo-
logists. 'The time therefore seems to have arrived for a brief restatement
m popular form of the facts and arguments leading to the conclusion
that the earliest ascertainable systematic method of deriving human
kinship is through the woman only, and that patrilineal reckoning is a
subsequent development '
After a brief consideration ol the most primitive forms of society,
as exemplified by Bushmen, Fuegians, Andamanese, Eskimo and (the
now extinct) Tasmanians, and an exposition of the principal characteristics
of 'Mother-right', Dr. Hartland passes in review all the chief populations
of the world (with special emphasis of course on those whose culture
is still relatively primitive), showing in a few cases the actual existence
of pure matrilineal descent, in a number of others a state of transition
between matrilineal and patrilineal descent, in many more the remnants
of matrilineal descent (such as matrilocal marriage and a preponderating
influence on the part of the maternal uncle) persisting among patrilineal
institutions. His general conclusion is that matrilineal descent has
everywhere been the primitive method of reckoning kinship, but that
for a variety of reasons (chief among which are economic factors and
the effects of conquest and immigration, the mere knowledge of the
nature of paternity being comparatively unimportant) this method tends
nearly always to be supplanted in the course of evolution by the system
of reckoning descent by the father which is now in use among all the
more cultured races. -
It is perhaps to be regretted (especially as the volume is intended
as an exposition of the subject 'in popular form') that Dr. HarUand
has not given a clearer and more detailed summary of his views as to
the different mechanisms that are operative in producing this change
as these views actually emerge from the facts he passes in re*iew The
reader who is not an expert anthropologist is apt to be a Uttle
bewildered by the mass of detail, and a few more words of guidance
- ■*•*-- . . --.— '^^
114
BOOK REVIEWS
from the author here and there would sometimes be of considerable
assistance. Nevertheless the book is a mine of useful and conveniently
arranged information for all students of social, family and sexual insti-
tutions. As regards his main thesis also, Dr. Hartland would seem to
have made out a strong case and, although he modestly bids us
remember that 'scientific conclusions are never more than provisional"
and 'are liable at any time to be revised and modified by a wider
knowledge and a more accurate reasoning', we have little doubt that
the work here presented is (so far as the limitation of its scope
permits) destined to become a permanent landmark in the history of
that branch of anthropology to which it belongs. J C. F.
Dritam Psvchology. By Sigm. Freud. Authorized Translation by
M. D. Eder. With a Preface by Andre Tridon. 0ames McCann & Co.,
New York. 1921.)
We mention this book here only to warn our readers as to its
nature. From the announcement it might be supposed that it is a nev/
book by Professor Freud, containing his latest views on the psycholog^-
of dreams, that it was translated by Dr. Eder, that Professor Freud
chose Mr. Tridon to introduce Mm to the American public, and that
its publication is an authorized one. It has, in fact, been received ay
such and been given reviews on these assumptions, e. g. in the Psycho-
analytic Review. None of the assumptions, however, are in accord with
the truth; they are merely suggestions fabricated by the publisher in
order to sell a book under false pretences.
The facts are these. Only two books on dreams by Professor Freud
have so far been translated and published in English, the translators
being Dr. Brill and Dr. Eder respectively. The present book is simply
made up from a series of cuttings from the two authorized ones. These
were re-arranged, given new chapter-headings, naturally without the
knowledge of the author or either of the two previous translators or
publishers, and offered to a publisher as a new book. We have reason
to believe that the person guilty of this dishonourable act was Mr. Tridon.
More surprising, however, is the circumstance Uiat the publisher appears
to have made no inquiry as to Mr. Tridon's bona fides, as to the
authenticity of the book, or as to any arrangement for acquiring the
publication rights from the author or original publisher. In logical accord
with this behaviour the publisher, on being acquainted with the true
state of affairs, refused to make the only possible reparation— namely,
of at once withdrawing the book from sale.
B^^
BOOK REVIEWS nj
It is not necessary for us to stigmatize conduct of this nature, about
which no honest man can have two opinions. We have no doubt that
It will meet with the opprobrium it deserves among publishing circles-
publishers, though a much maUgned race-or perhaps just for that ver.^
reason, have their own strict code of honour and know how to iudee
oiose of their members who transgress it. FT
8*
.J
-e---_t
REPORTS OF THE INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-
ANALYTICAL ASSOCIATION
BERUN PSYCHO- ANALYTICAL SOCIETY
September 13, 1921 —January 24, 192^
September 13 and October 4, ip2i, Short Communications.
October 11, Dr. K. MtUler: Review of Freud's ' Group Psychology
and the Analysis of the Ego', and discussion.
October 18,
(a) Continuation of the discussion.
(b) Short Communications.
November i. Dr. Liebermann: Report of an Analysis.
November 8, Short Communications.
November 15, Frau Dr. Homey: Contribution on the Female Ca-
stration-Complex.
December 6, Short Communications.
December 13, Frau Dr. J. Miiller: Report of an Analysis.
January 4., 1922, Dr. Nachraansohn (KOnigsberg) : On the effects
of Onanism.
January 10, General Meeting:
(a) Chairman's Report (Dr. Abraham).
(b) Statement of Accounts.
(c) Report on the Polyclinic (Dr. Eitingon) which will be pub-
lished shortly.
(d) It was decided to levy a contribution of Mk. 200—400
yearly on the members for the Polyclinic.
(e) Dr. Abraham was re-elected President.
(f ) Dr. Eitingon was elected Secretary in place of Dr. Lieber-
mann who is temporarily prevented on grounds of health
from carrying out the duties of Secretary.
January 24, Short Communications:
(a) Dr. Simmel: A Patient who didn't speak.
(b) Dr. Alexander: Exhibitionism among women.
(c) Dr. Boehm: An observation on a small child.
116
REPORTS jiy
(d) Frau Klein: An anecdote from Walter Scott's life j
(e) Frau Dr. Benedek (Leipzig): On the Psycho-Analytical '
Society in Leipzig, *
(f) Dr. Eitingon: Psycho-Analytical Material from France. '
M. Eitingon, Hon. Sec. '•'
Berlin W, RauchstraCe 4. ■
THE BRITISH PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY 1
Annua/ General Meeting 1
The Annual General Meeting of the Members of the British
Psycho-Analytical Society was held on October 13, 1921.
The foUowing Officers of the Society were re-elected for the
ensuing year:
President: Dr. Ernest Jones.
Han. Treasurer: Dr. W. H. B. Stoddart.
Hon. Secretary: Dr. Douglas Bryan.
Dr. Stoddart proposed and Dr. Read seconded the foUowing
alteration in Rule 5 ('The management of the Society shall be in
the hands «f a Council consisting of the President, Hon. Treasurer,
Hon. Secretary and not fewer than two other Members who shall
be elected annually m October'.) After the words 'Hon. Secretary'
read *and one other Member' etc. instead of 'and not fewer than
two other Members ' etc.
Dr. Cole proposed and Miss Low seconded the following
amendment ' That the Council should be increased by having more ^
than two Members in addition to the President, Hon. Treasurer,
and Hon. Secretary'.
After some discussion the amendment was put to the Meeting
and was lost. The original proposal was then voted upon and
carried.
Mr. J. C. Fliigel was re-elected a Member of the Council.
The following Associate Members nominated by the CouncQ
were re-elected: Dr. Mitchell, Dr. Hart, Dr. Rivers, Prof. Percy
Nunn, Dr. Brend, Mrs. Porter, Dr. Davison, Dr. Jago, Major Ryan,
Dr. Wright, Dr. Bowen, Dr. Culpin, Dr. Thacker, Dr. Rickman
Dr. Chuckerbutty, Dr. Smith, Major McWatters, Rev P Gouffh
Dr. Williams, Mrs. Walker, Dr. Glover, Dr. Thomas. ,
Il8 REPORTS
The following were elected Associate Members. Dr. C Bose.
Mrs. Brierley, Dr. Herford, Miss Ella Sharp.
The following alteration of Rule 8 ('All elections shall be made
by ballot. Absent Members may communicate their vote to the
Hon. Secretary. One adverse vote in six shall exclude'.) was
proposed by the Council. After 'Hon. Secretary.' read 'One ad-
verse vote in four shall exclude' instead of 'One adverse vote in
six shall exclude'. This was carried.
Dr. Estelle Cole who had sent in the following resolution 'That
there should be a woman representative on the Council of the
Society' withdrew it after the discussion and voting upon Dr.
Stoddart's alteration of Rule 5.
The two following resolutions (proposed by Dr. Cole):
1. That there should be some rule regarding the continual
non-attendance of Associate Members at the Meetings.
2. That there should be some rule regarding the attendance
of Members and Associate Members outside the London area.
were withdrawn after some discussion.
Miss Low moved that 'There should be a fixed date for the
Annual General Meeting'. After a short discussion such a fixed
date was considered impracticable.
Miss Low moved the following resolution, 'That nominations
for Ofhcers and Council be sent to the Secretary not later than
one month before the Annual General Meeting*. After some dis-
cussion it was decided to add the following rule to the present
rules, 'That nominations for Officers and Council, proposed alteration
of rules, resolutions, etc. be sent in to the Hon. Secretary not
later than one month before the date of the Annual General
'Meeting.'
It was decided to hold fortnightly meetil^s of Members and
Associate Members.
The Hon. Treasurer's report of the finances of tlie Society
showed that the receipts amounted to £87 1 8s. gd., which included a
balance from the previous year of &7 OS. od. The expenses were
subscription to the Journal *3 8 os. od., subscription to the Association
£15 l2s.6d., and Secretarial expenses £9 3s. jd-. leaving abalance in
hand of S25 2S. gd.
The Hon. Secretary reported that the Society now consisted
of thirteen Members and twenty-seven Associate Members. One
Member, Mr. HiUer, had resigned, having joined the Vienna
REPORTS ug
Society. Fourteen new Associate Members had been elected during
the year. Dr. Ferenczi and Dr. Otto Rank had been elected ^
Honorary Members. During the year there had been ten Meetings
of Members and Associate Members, seven Meetings of Members
and seven Council Meetings. '
Quarterly Report
There have been five Meetings of Members and Associate
Members since the last report. The attendance at the Meetings
has been very good, and some interesting discussions have taken
place.
At a Meeting held on October 19, 1921 Dr. Bryan read a paper
on 'The Psycho-Analyst'. He drew attention to certain character-
istics usually found in medical men that would have to be renounced
in those wlio contemplated taking up treatment by psycho-analysis.
He discussed the various motives that led to the taking up of
psycho-analysis, and then dealt more specifically with the quali-
fications necessary for the work. He made a few remarks with
special reference to lay analysts, and concluded by referring to
the future training of psycho-analysts.
In the discussion that followed Dr. Jones amplified some of
the points mentioned in the paper and criticised others. Other
Members expressed their views.
On November 2, Dr. Stoddart read a paper on ' The Emotional
Factor in Enteroptosis'. He pointed out that in anxiety states
there is an outpouring of adrenalin which causes gastric dilatation
by stimulating the sympathetic. This allows tlie transverse and
ascending colon to fall, the latter dragging the right kidney from
its fatty bed. Both stomach and colon sometimes reach the true
pelvis. The question arises whether such extreme cases of enter-
optosis could be cured by psycho-analysis alone.
An interesting discussion followed.
On November 16, Dr. Ernest Jones made some remarks on
'Introjection and Projection'. After discussing the general topic
of the two processes he quoted a question raised by Prof. Freud
of wheUier many instances of apparent projection in paranoia were
not really cases where the subject correctly divined the unconscious
of the other person. A discussion followed.
i
I20 REPORTS
On December 7, Dr. Culpin read notes on a case of severe and
long-standing asthma related to remorse from adolescent mastur-
bation and to fears of child-birth; any situation suggesting these
emotions produced an attack. The trouble almost completely
disappeared after a superficial analysis.
In another case attacks of respiratory disturbance apparently-
dangerous to life and associated with complicated anxiety states
were related to masturbation and conscious masochistic phantasies-
Deeper analysis was followed by cessation of the physical symptoms
and great relief of tlie anxiety.
Many points arising out of these cases were discussed by the
members.
On December 21, Dr. Estelle Maude Cole read notes on 'The
Abreaction of Fear in relation to Circumcision '. The notes referred
to the case of a patient (medical man) who was undergoing
psycho-analytic treatment, and who during this treatment had
an endocrine investigation carried out on himself by another
medical man, an ana:sdietic being administered for this purpose. On
describing tliis to the analyst the patient developed violent agitation
of the limbs and body, his skin became cold and clammy, the pulse
fell to fifty-two, and he cried piteously in extreme distress. His
condition appearing serious the analyst took his pulse; this act
had the effect of controlling him. On his becoming quiet the
memory immediately emerged of his terror when he was circum-
cised at six years of age. This memory Dr. Cole pointed out
was evidently related to a strong and prior castration complex.
The interest in this case was the extremely severe abreaction.
Dr. Jago read a paper on 'Tuberculosis and Neurosis'. He
pointed out that many cases are to be found with combined
symptoms of anxiety neurosis and neurasthenia, but in which a
direct sexual cause cannot be discovered. The same symptoms
are present in the 'closed' type of tuberculosis. The symptoms
can often be traced to their appearance after a period of physical
stress or a debilitating illness, conditions which cause auto-intoxic-
ation in tuberculosis. Treatment on similar lines to tuberculosis
causes improvement in the symptoms.
Tubercle toxin has an excitant effect on the sexual centres,
thereby leading to a physical (inner) increase of the libido. Social
reasons may prevent the patient from gratifying the libido, and
thus conflict results. The exhaustion following continued auto-
REPORTS 121
intoxication leads to neurasthenic symptoms. He suggested that
tuberculous auto-intoxication may give rise to an anxiety neurosis
or a neurasthenia, and that it may precipitate a psycho-neurosis
in a person psychically predisposed.
Members joined in a discussion of this paper.
HUNGARIAN PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY
Report of the Society for 1921 (Continued)
A, Scientific Meetings^
October 3, ipsi. Dr. G^za Rbheim: Stone-shrine and Tomb.
(Ethnological Remarks on Totemism and Cultural Stages in
Australia.)
The totemism of the Northern and Central tribes of Australia
differs from the similar forms of the Southern and Eastern groups
chiefly with respect to these three distinguishing features ; the ideas
concerning conception, the eating of the totem and the Intichiuma
rites. In connection with this positive totemism (R6heim designates
as negative the totemism of the Eastern tribes distinguished by
the taboo of the totem-animal) appears a definite form of stone
civilization (P.W.Schmidt); sacred stones occupy the chief place
in the ritual, more especially in the magic of fruitfulness. The
traditions of the Arunta indicate the northern origin of Uiese tribes,
and it appears that a connection might well be estabHshed between
the stone civilizations of Central Australia and that of Indonesia
(J. W. Perry). In Indonesia as well as in Central Australia the estab-
lishing of stone civilization is ascribed to divine powers. In Indo-
nesia, as well, round stones having magical significance are to be
found; they bear a definite relation to the tomb and are taken
along on migrations in place of the corpse. If one could accept
similar customs for the tribes considered to be the ancestors of
the Arunta, the origin of Churinga would be easy to explain, The |
migrating tribes could not drag the corpse with them, therefore
the stone took the place of the body. Since there persisted among
the Arunta a faint memory that these ancestors used to be buried
' The minutes are made up from the written notes of the various
speakers.
I
122 REPORTS
in caves, they hid these Churinga stones in similar fashion in tlie
Ertnatulunga caves. However, if these assumptions are correct,
various conclusions of psychological importance may be drawn
from them. According to them the Alcheringa-ancestors are the dead,
the Nanja-stones memorial heaps erected by the hand of men
above the grave. However, the legend tells us nothing about the
part played by men in the death or the erection of memorial
monuments to the Alcheringa-ancestors; probably it has been
suppressed for some reason or other. The so-called 'tales of pun-
ishment' seem to contain the solution of the riddle. For, in the
tale ten variations report that the hero found death by drowning
or being turned to stone because he ridiculed the animals, six
versions report his deatli because he had committed incest. To
ridicule something signifies as much as to disregard it, to take no
notice of it; the subjects of ridicule in this instance, however, are
not so much the animals as the penalties connected with them,
that is the totemistic taboos. In this respect both infringements
of the law are revealed as being identical, for the breaking of
the totemistic command is, in fact, incest. Many traditions also
show the methods of this transformation into stone; the hero was
stoned by the crowd as a punishment for the incest committed
by him. The throwing of stones in religious rites is a remnant
of the primal battles of mankind, the flying stone being the right
weapon in the hands of the crowd to overpower tlie stronger
individual whom one feared to approach close by. The stone
permitted the attack on the inviolable person of the father, in as
much as the taboo was not broken by direct touch but only
by the throwing of the projectile. The Alcheringa-ancestor and
the hero of the tales of punishment is the father of the primal
horde, who is stoned by his insurgent sons, and on whose corpse
the stone heap which is to prevent him from returning to life is
piled up. Now Freud has shown the existence of the unconscious
feelings of remorse in the funeral rites of primitive men; the dead
man becomes the evil spirit because he wants to revenge himself
on the living for their evil wishes concerning him. Then the living
look for the magician who has been guilty of his death and on
whom they intend to push their own guilt. Every death is the
result of a murder because the first death which left an ineradicable
impression on the memory of the horde was in reality the violent
death of the first father. The funeral rites of primitive man
liil
REPORTS 123
represent compromise formations. On the one hand the libido wants
to cling to the lost object, on the other hand the inimical impulses
want to destroy the dead utterly, and thirdly, the psychical re-
pression which is to overcome the coming into consciousness of
the feelings of remorse connected with the death is at work. The
stone which holds the corpse to the ground stands for the primi-
tive material form of the repression: but already it also represents
the return of tlie repressed. For the stone fulfils its original
purpose to drive the corpse from sight and from memory in such
an inadequate fashion that soon it is changed into an image of
the dead man; yet other shapes are given to it also, it assumes
phallic form. Herewith the cause of the conflict becomes clear: the
primal father had to die because he wished to keep the women
of the horde for himself. In the cult of the phallic tombstone
R6heim sees the formation oi a reaction against the wish for the
castration of the father. If the ancestor makes all the women of
the horde pregnant and brings fruitfulness to the fields, then he
really receives back after death everything for which he should
have suffered death; now he possesses and makes pregnant tlie
women of the horde — to the dead everything is granted for
which the living had to fight in bloody battles.
Everywhere in Oceania a connection exists between the con-
centric stone circles and human sacrifice on the one hand, and
cannibalism and funeral rites on the other hand. This relation
becomes intelligible as soon as one assumes that the first occasions
for the erection of the stone heaps were the murder and the
eating of the remains of the primal father. But Psycho-Analysis
has recognised that the tomb is a symbol of the womb, death is
therefore a return to the body of the mother, and the Churinga,
therefore, signifies not only the corpse in the tomb but also tlie
embryo (and the penis) in the mother's womb. Therefore children
are born from rocks. In Central Australia this is the normal manner
of coming into the world; in Indonesia this idea prevails only as
regards the ancestors of the tribe, which facts permit us to con-
ceive a time in which this belief of the Australians was also pre-
dominant in Indonesia. The more prominent the member of the
tribe, the more often the funeral ceremonies are repeated in his
honour; yet no common mortal can compete in importance with
those semi-animal heroes of earhest times. These impressions of
the childhood days of humanity are the deepest, and therefore the
124 REPORTS
mourning action is continued and the intichiuma ceremonies, the
funeral rite of the primal father, are repeated year by year in the
desert tracts of Central Australia. But if one conceives the most
important totemistic ceremonies as a ritual which evolved from
the funeral rite, the hypothesis assuming that totemism is a definite
form (metempsychosis) of ancestor worship receives new support.
In Lidonesia, the species of animal visiting the tomb is regarded
as sacred; in Australia the tomb is watched so that the totem-
animal of the murderer may be recognised. The days and hours
after the murder are determinative as being the psychological
moment for the projection into the world of the animals; tortured
by the sense of his guilt, the murderer sees the images of his
victim everywhere. Thus the animal at the tomb becomes a sym-
bol of the father and also the representative of the fraternal horde.
For the animals which come to the grave are attracted by the
odour of decomposition, they are ghouls, in this respect comrades and
helpmates of the brothers, who really also consume the dead
father. The Arunta consider the scavenger eagle taboo, in the
South-East and in Borneo this bird is the symbol of the highest
spirit. If the customs of cannibalism as they prevail to-day are
examined, two remarkable prohibitions may be found: among the
Dieri the son may not eat of the flesh of tlie father; in the North,
women only may not eat human flesh, for they might then become
barren. The conclusion may be drawn from these facts that the
prohibition represents the primitive condition. The son consumed
the father's flesh and the women as well partook of the meal. For
them this meal was as sexual intercourse with tlie father: after
consuming this flesh (as in later times the meat of the totem) they
became pregnant Gradually the suppression gained a foothold.
First came the prohibition of conception by eating of the flesh of
the primal father, later followed also tlie suppression of the totem
meal. Everything, therefore, points to the fact that the intichiuma
rites originated in a funeral rite which had also an orgiastic aspect.
The attack of the young men on the leader of the horde could
only occur in the rutting period, for then only the craving for the
female, which was the cause of the struggle, existed. If they
succeeded, after many vain attempts, a period of shock, a condition
of immobility (sorrow) would follow, to be succeeded immediately
by the heat of liberated youth, by sexual intercourse. In con-
junction with the funeral rites and intichiuma, the initiation rites
REPORTS 125
may be regarded as a third offshoot from the same root. The
youths must obey the same commands as the mourners (absti-
nence from food, silence and painting with white); the funeral
ceremony of the primal father is thus repeated. No one is con-
sidered a grown-up man who has not killed the father (mourned
for him) and thereupon not consorted with the women of the
horde (Intichiuma.). Urged by fear of reprisal (Reik) the brothers
force the next generation to skip tlie murder stage and pass at
once into the repentance period of the mourning rites; for that
is the point of departure of the initiation. The farther the
ancestors of the Central Australians were pushed from their primal
home, the more difficult did it become for them to show the youths
the real corpse and the grave of the fathers. A substitute arose
for these in the sacred ceremonial ground and the boomerang.
The spiral form of ornamentation of the Churinga comes from
New Guinea where its origin may be traced to the human form.
If all the links of the chain were at hand the evolution could be
traced from the engraving of the human figure to its plastic repre-
sentation and from this further on to the corpse itself.
The speaker continued in this connection with ethnological
observations on the origin and the succession of different stages
of culture in Australia. From the psychological point of view, the
difference, according to him, between the Central and the Eastern
tribes is based on the repression and the return of the repressed
material. For the social organisation of the Central tribes may also
be traced back to a two-class society with patrilineal descent.
This is based on the victory of the fraternal horde (insurgent
group) for this organisation makes marriage between son and
mother possible while father and daughter as members of the same
phratry are taboo for one another. This assumption is confirmed by
the fact that the Central tribes trace all their institutions to the
fraternal horde (Alcheringa-ancestors) while tlie Eastern peoples
hark back to the primal father (heavenly deity).
Discussion: Dr. S, Pfeifer: As the report has shown, it is a most
grateful task to dig out of ethnological material the traces of
prehistoric periods in the evolution of mankind. Other psychic
material also lends itself to this process, for instance the play of
children, which, because of its regressive character, has retained
the imprint of evolutionary stages long since past. For example,
there are certain games which reveal the same content and the
126 REPORTS
I
same tendencies as the tales of punishment cited by the previous
speaker: the game of the great Mogul (French) in which the revolt
of the children against someone in authority (father) is expressed
by laughter, while their remorse is shown in a taboo of this
character. The punishment is ambivalent, tlie laughing child be-
comes the ridiculed and tabooed father (great Mogul) or, as in
other versions, is attacked by the whole group of playmates, tickled 5
and pinched, etc., all this being perhaps the refinement of the
original murderous attack on the leader of the horde. The heap
of stones mentioned by the speaker as the origin of the tomb and
the tombstone occurs in the game, being represented by the
children who throw themselves in a heap on the leader. The
psychological relation of these games to the totemistic rites is
proved by the existence of a totem, called 'laughing boy' {I'komme
qui rit, Durkheim, Vie religieuse) the impersonator of which tries
to persuade the participants in the rite to laugh by making funny
gestures, just as the great Mogul does in tlie game.
Dr. S. Ferenczi draws attention to the fact that the most t.
valuable discoveries of ethnology (cf. totem -~ ancestor, father) |
again and again corroborate the naive expressions of savages; this
is also the case in the research concerning the meaning of the
stone monuments of primitive peoples. The 'punishments' of the
Indonesians — turning to stone and drowning — permit (according to
talion law) a symbolic interpretation; possibly they also contain
reminiscences of geological changes of the earth's surface. Finally
he reminds his hearers of certain difficulties of mediod in the use
of the heterogeneous materials supplied by ethnology, and expresses
the opinion that, however valuable it may be for us to have psycho-
analytically trained ethnologists make tlie investigations, the con-
vincing force of facts gathered by unprejudiced observers should
be estimated at its full value. The reconciliation of the doctrines
of primitive thought and of social organization in tliis open-minded
presentation by Rbheim is of great theoretical importance.
Dr. S. Rado; The supposition of the speaker that tlie fraternal
horde killed the fatlier by stoning him is an important contribution
to the hypothesis of the primal struggle as Freud has developed
it. The speaker has derived this conclusion from the examination
of an abundance of ethnological material by excellent methods;
however he has not adduced sufficient evidence when he represents
as the unique motive for the choice of stoning as a method of
i
•
REPORTS 127
murder the 'suitability' of the stones to serve the ambivalent
crowd as a weapon in the battle against the sacred primal father.
Perhaps it would be less superficial to interpret the choice of the
stones as symbols of the lost virility; since other points of support
for the theory do not exist, speculation may set in at this point.
Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions which must have occurred
frequently and over wide areas at this period may serve as a
connecting link. The impression of such catastrophes on the sur-
vivors was perhaps re-inforced by inherited premonitions which
the tribal fathers of the human animal acquired in the days be-
fore the prehistoric times of humanity. (Consider, for example,
the drying up of the marine animals cited by Ferenczi.) Accord-
ingly, taking everything into consideration, the horde might have
been following the example of Nature in covering the father
with stones, while later, oppressed by the sense of guilt, it might
in its myths have projected back the deed on to Nature as it
were. Then indeed the manifest content of these myths might have
been right, in as much as the burying stones moved 'by tliem-
selves'. The speaker compared, as Freud has already done, the
repression with the burying under stones (Verschuttung^ In so
far as the repression (in the sense of the withdrawal of cathexis
and anti-cathexis) has developed in the mind as a result of this
crime, the origin of the repression would become intelligible as
the intrapsychic repetition of the hberating act dealing with its
memory, or perhaps as tlie psychic imprint of a geophysical pro-
cess, and behind the analogy drawn by Freud and R6heim a piece
of evolutionary truth would be revealed. The latter consideration
presupposes furthermore that the phylogenetic preparatory phase
of the repression was the hasty withdrawal of the cathexis; the
evolution towards (primal) repression was accomplished — correspond-
ing with the increasing differentiation of mental life — by the develop-
ment of the faculty of being able to turn the withdrawn quantity
of cathexis (cf above lost virility) into an effective anti-cathexis.
October 22, ip2i. Dr. Pfeifer: Problems of the Psychology of
Music in the Light of Psych o-Analysis. ist part: The Psycho-physio-
logy of Musical Sound.
The speaker establishes the following theory concerning musical
sound and its agreeable impression, basing his doctrine on biolog-
ical and evolutionary fact as well as on psycho-analytical experience
with the currents and the developmental stages of the Ubido;
T
,28 REPORTS
musical sound is found in species which have in the course of theur
evolution just succeeded in establishing genital sexuality, in the
moment just before copulation. The seasonal commencement of
their libido created in the first place a narcissistic tension (also
shown by various somatic extensions of their organism, swollen
' body, pockets filled with blood or often with air, horns, ornamental
plumage, etc.) which the animal is perhaps not able to get rid of
through the outlet of its genital system because the libido has to
pass through a period of ripening in which it probably repeats
the phases of its evolution. At first it attempts to confine the
superfluous quantity of libido to die erotogenic zones of its own
body, thereby letting this libido retain its cadiexis and placing
the muscles in a state of characteristic tonic stiffness. As the
Ubidinal tension increases this limitation to the erotogenic zones
is insufBcient and the animal in availing itself of a formerly used
instrument attempts to liberate itself from this tension by now
emitting a substitute— air{thus imitating the manner of division
and separation of a part of the libido-bearing body). Because this
air as the bearer of the narcissistic libido escapes through an ero-
togenic zone charged with libido— a contracted sphincter— it acquires
the characteristic quality of the sensuaUy agreeable impression and
its meaning as a simple objectless expression of the internal pro-
\ cesses of the ego. The speaker also designates this process as a
"P normal hysteria which is founded on a primal repression and
i mentions furthermore several other connections of this theme with
I • individual psychology and with pathology.
Discmsim: Dr. S. Rado has objections to the methods of this
report as it dealt exclusively witli phylogenetical-biological specu-
lations. Even though Freud has lately introduced die ethnological
point of view mto analytical research by tlie side of metapsych-
ological speculation, he has done this surely to complement
rather than to displace the present ontogenetically orientated empiric
method of approach. The analyst as investigator of the psychology
of music could assemble observations in great numbers and ought
to obtain from experience the points of attack for the theoretic
treatment of die subject. Though the psycho-analytical fictions of
the speaker concerning the psycho-physiology of the creation of
sound by birds, frogs and the like, may be here and there ever
so ingenious and plausible, they are dangerously hasty before such
phenomena have been studied on the human being.
REPORTS 129
Dr. I. Hermann believes that the libidioal cathexis of the larynx
is just as inadequate to explain musical tone production as the
genitalisation of the hand in the cases, here reported, of two
draughtsmen could indicate why drawing and no other form of
artistic expression performed by the hand was developed in their
case; not to mention the fact that it would be impossible to estab-
lish artistic canons of drawing from this piece of investigation.
Musical tone production on the other hand is subject to many
artistic canons. He condemns the uncritical generalisation of the
libidinai cathexis of the sphincter and finally propounds the ques-
tion whether the speaker's assumption according to which song
production is found in the animal world where the period of
rutting occurs seasonally may not be interpreted in another way,
namely, that both manifestations are subject to the primary function
of periodicity.
Dr. S. Ferenczi points to the fact that this evolutionary con-
ception of the genesis of musical sound (which is, moreover, an
offshoot of the phylogeny of genital development in the animal-
world already reported on in a cursory manner in the Hungarian
Society and which he hopes to be able soon to examine at length)
brings up many interesting and original ideas. The most valuable
and plausible seems to be repetition of the narcissistic and object-
phase in the producdon of musical sound. This is, however, equally
true for the simple phonetic expressions and it would imply tliat
a special explanation is required for that which produces the art-
istic impres.sion. He thinks that the phylogenetic characterisation of
the specifically artistic element cannot be arrived at before the
erotic is not separated psychologically from other kinds of psy-
chic emotions; and then he tells what historic, that is evolutionary,
opinion he was forced to adopt. He considers the Aict\im ' i'ari
pour I'arf as a 'functional' modification of an Art originally
always filled with psychic content. He defends the speaker against
the accusation of having erred in method and points to the fact
that Freud, as well, was able to explain problems of individual
psychology (suggestion and hypnosis) with the help of group psych-
ology. On the otlier hand Pfeifer omits entirely the causation
based on the individual psycho-analytical factors. Finally Ferenczi says
that narcissism, the accumulation of organ libido in certain parts
of the body, might be at work as an important factor not only
in the formation of sound-producing organs, but also in every
.V'
I30
REPORTS
process of evolution and adaptation to the environment, just as it
is in the pathological processes of adaptation (patho-neuroses, re-
generation, etc.)- He hopes that by this accumulation we shall be
able to explain the most delicate, processes of organic evolution
which he considers thoroughly Lamarckian in character, agreeing
in this respect with Professor Freud.
Dr. B. von Felszeghy thinks that certain expressions of aiTect,
as for example weeping and laughing, are in close genetic con-
nection with singing and should not be omitted in tlie investigation
of the latter mode of expression. The theory of the speaker goes
too far in this respect, as it is also quite applicable to these ex-
pressions of affect. As examples of the psychic bond between
weeping and singing he cites certain mourning rites [Beweinen
mid Besingen^ to chant and weep for the dead.).
B. Business Meeting
October 8, ip2i. The resolution is adopted that the minutes
of the scientific meetings should be published henceforth under
the heading of the work of the Society in the ' Korrespondenz-
blatt'.
S. Raoo,
Secretary.
*
SWISS PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY
Meeting on March /, 1^21.
Present: Fiirst, Geiser, Lathy, Meier-MOller, Nachmansohn,
E. Oberholzer, M. Oberholzer, Pfister, Wehrli.
New Member: Dr. med. H. Christoffel, BSle.
Dr. M. Nachmansohn: 'Analysis of a Case of Homosexuality'.
Meeting on April 22, ip2i.
Present : Brun, Etter, Fiirst, Geiser, Griininger, Hofmann, Meier-
Mliller, Minkowski, E. Oberholzer, M. Oberholzer, Peter, Pfister,
Tobler, and visitors.
Dr. O. Pfister: 'Analysis of Capitalist Mentality'.
REPORTS 131
Annual Meeting on May 7, 7^57.
Present ; Behn-Eschenburg, Brun, Etter, Ffirst, Griininger Hof-
mann, Liithy, Meier'-MuUer, Minkowski, E. Oberholzer, M. Ober-
holzer, Peter, Pfister, Rorscliach, Tobler, Wehrii, and visitors.
Resigned : Fri, Dr. med. S. Kempner.
Transferred to the Berlin Society: Dr. M. Nachmansohn. -
Dr. E. Oberholzer: 'An Infantile Screen Memory',
It was resolved :
1. Attlie instance of the Special Committee, and of a majority
ot the Executive Committee of the Society, that both medical and
non-medical members of the Society should be prohibited from
giving publicity to the fact of their membership in circulars,
newspaper advertisements, etc., where there is a risk of its appearing
that this has been done on business grounds or for purposes of
advertisement.
2. With regard to "visitors (a matter upon which there is much
division of opinion), that one tliird of tlie meetings tn each year
should be held without visitors, and that the choice of them
should be left to the President and to the reader of the paper.
< 3. In view of the superior number of the non-resident members
that the meetings should be held on Fridays and Saturdays alternately.
4. That the proposal to postpone the next Congress of the
International Association to the autumn of 1922 should be supported.
(The questionnaire from the Central Executive upon qualifi-
cation for membership and the possibility of a diploma has' been
circulated to members individually}.
The Executive Committee, consisting of F. Morel, Geneva,
E. Oberholzer, Zflrich (President), O. Pfister, Zurich, H. Rohrschach,
Herisau (Vice President), and P. Sarasin, Rheinau, was re-elected.
E. Liithy, Bale, has taken over the office of Treasurer ; Frh
E. Furst (Zflrich) will undertake the distribution of jouinals.
Meeting on yune 18, ipsi.
Present : Brun, Etter, Furrer, Furst, Geiser, Griininger, Hofmann,
Kielholz, Liithy, Meier-MiiUer, E. Oberholzer, M. Oberholzer, Peter,
Pfister, Tobler, Wehrii, and visitors.
H. Zulliger (Visitor): 'Psycho-Analytic Side-Lights from Ex-
perience in Primary Schools '.^
' See H. Zulliger, Schriften zur Seelenkunde und Erziehun^kunst.
Bd. v., E. Bircher, Bern, 1921.
132 REPORTS
The question raised is as to the relations of psychology and
psycho-analysis to schools and education, and as to whether in
particular circumstances a teacher may be justified in making prac-
tical use of psycho-analysis.
Educational science is inconceivable without a knowledge of
the pupil's mental processes. For this reason future teachers are
instructed in psychology at 'the training-colleges. This instruction,
and the text-books upon which it is based, give as a rule an
outline of the physiology of the brain and nervous system together
with a mixture of old-fashioned academic school-psychology and
of psycho-physics. They deal chiefiy with the intellect, and give only
the most summary and slight information upon the emotions and
will. From the point of view of educational practice there is
little to be gained from them. A teacher must obtain knowledge
of individual psychology, in contradistinction to universal truths
about the human mind.
{By way of illustration a chapter was read out from a modern
psychology text-book for use in training colleges.)
Psycho-analysis, in virtue of being an individual psychology,
is the most valuable psychology for educators.
We must distinguish :
I. Psycho-analysis as a scientific study of the mind.
3. Psycho-analysis as a practice, based upon this study, and
directed to certain aims.
The future teacher ought to be acquainted with the conclusions
of psycho-analysis regarded as a science. Not in order to 'go
analyzing around', but in order to recognize as such his pupils'
mental disturbances (e. g. dreaminess, laziness, absent-mindedness,
insolence, refractoriness, gluttony, stealing, blushing, boastfulness,
destructiveness, torturing animals, etc.), to give the children intel-
ligent help, and at the first sign of a mal-development to draw
the parents' attention to the possibility of consulting an analytical
physician.
A new attitude towards children, the recognition and preven-
tion of mental complications at their very beginning— such should
be the gain to the teacher from a study of psycho-anaiysis, and
such should be tlie task of 'ped-analysis'.
Analytical quackery is not to be encouraged. The educator
must not interfere with the neurologist For tlie practice of psycho-
analysis, therefore, three conditions are essential :
REPORTS 133
1. A many years' study of psycho-analytical literature,
2. Analysis by a competent physician,
3. Constant contact with a competent physician.
A teacher who is a competent analyst and thus thoroughly pre-
pared for his work will in certain cases feel it his moral duty
to help where he knows he has the means to hand. But he should
proceed with the greatest care ■ and tact, he should be contented
as a rule with a symptom-analysis, and not start upon an analysis
of the sexual complex unless he wishes to risk the loss of hjs
position. In the case of less healthy children, whose mal-develop-
ment requires a somewhat deeper analysis, he should begin by
coming to an arrangement with their parents.
Meeting on November 18, ipsi.
Present : Furrer, Ftirst, Grilninger, Hofmann, Kielholz, Liithy,
Minkowski, E. Oberholzer, M. Oberholzer, Pfister, Wehrii, and
visitors.
New Member : H. ZuUiger, Ittigen near Bern.
Dir. Dr. A. Kielholz; 'Schizophrenic Inventors'.
Changes of Address:
Dr. H. Behn-Eschenburg, Kantonspital Herisau.
Dr. M. Geiser, Dufoursfrasse 39, B^e.
E. Ltithy, Birsigstrasse 76, Bale.
Dr. H. Meier-MUIler, Fiisslisb-asse 4, Zurich.
Dr. F. Morel, 8 Rue Beauregard, Genfeve.
Dr. R. de Saussure, Asile de Cery, pres Lausanne.
THE VIENNA PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL SOCIETY
I
1. October 12, ipsi. Dr. Prinzhoro (Heidelberg) as visitor: On
drawings by the mentally deranged and by primitive peoples.
The lecturer presented a collection of spontaneously created
pictures drawn by uninstructed mentally deranged patients of the
psychiatric clinic at Heidelberg. These are attempts at representation
of form uninfluenced by tradition or schooling; the draughtsmen,
that is JS^U of them, are suffering from schizophrenia. The lecturer
134 REPORTS
propounded the question of the relation of mental disease to artistic
production. The main sources of the representations are eroticism
and religion often viewed from the blasphemous side. In content
there is a preference for symbolic and delusional analogies, in the
matter of form there is shown an exuberance of the means of re-
presentation. The general attitude to existence of the mentally
deranged is characteristic as well of the artist: dehght in play, .re-
version to the ego, arbitrariness, and self-assurance. The question
arises whether the morbid condition creates new talents or merely
awakens existing ones. In the progress of the psychotic condition,
the creative factor must be taken into account.
The lecturer pointed to those modern art forms which show a
special relation to the pictures by the mentally deranged and sought
to emphasize the difference existing between the latter and the
work of creative artists. The mentally deranged labours under the
estrangement from the real world as under a compulsion while this
estrangement is consciously accomplished by the creative artist.
The mentally deranged have been producing sufficient unto them-
selves, responsible to no one but to themselves. The artistic ex-
pression of the diseased is so akin to modern art because it lies
along the line of the fulfillment of longing. The ability to express
oneself in plastic form is given to every one to a greater or lesser
degree.
The lecturer pointed to the interrelation of primitive art and
that of mentally deranged patients particularly with reference to
the hermaphroditic figures, the stiff posture, and the grotesque traits.
Some of the pictures would cause one to hesitate in deciding
whether they are made by savages or by mental patients. The
speaker went on to explain the new direction given to racial psychol-
ogy which has left behind the former rationalistic interpretation,
and expressed the opinion that the close kinship between primitive
art and that of the mentally diseased might be regarded as cor-
roborating the existence of primal, elemental ideas.
Discussion by Federn, Nunberg, Schilder, Poetzl, Rank, Reik
and Freud.
2. Oclober z(f,ip2T.Dr.Eem^eld: Some Remarks on Sublimation.
The lecturer began with a review of the various formulations
of the concept of sublimation found in psycho-analytical literature,
more particularly in the works of Freud. Sublimation, in contrast
to repression, is the resultant issue of instinct and may overcome
REPORTS 135
the object-libido, as well as it may imply a redirection of the aim
towards non-sexual, culturally valuable ends. Basing his remarks
on observations made on the poetry and the club-life of adolescents,
and on children's games, the lecturer attempted to formulate more
precisely the concept of sublimation, laying stress at the same time
on these two main points: (i) We must try to replace the evalution
which we tacidy include in the idea of sublimation by a descrip-
tive concept; as this, the lecturer proposes to take the consistency
with the ego contained in the diversion from the aim, that is, he
virould call 'sublimation* only those diversions from the aim, of
the above-mentioned mechanism, which serve the ego aims (ego-
instincts or ego-libido). (2) The capacity for sublimation is apparently
directly related to the quantity of libidinal cathexis of the ego-
instincts.
Discussion by Fedem, Kohiai, Deutsch, Reik, Nunberg and
Freud.
3. November p, ipsi. Short communications:
a. Dr. Helene Deutsch: 'An observation.' Two brothers quite
unlike one another, of which the elder dies. Later the younger
brother comes to ressemble both physically and mentally the dead
brother in a quite remarkable manner: he wished to take the
elder brother's place in his mother's estimation; this was the clear
motive of his metamorphosis.
b. Dr. Bemfeld: 'On the symbolism of neckties.' A five-year
old little girl models a boy with a necktie in plasticine.
The tie is placed low and has the shape of a penis. Just be-
fore, she had seen a little boy undressed, apparently for the first
time.
c. Dr. Nunberg reports on two cases of particularly strong erotic
relations between fathers and daughters. One father in his forty-
second year had sexual leanings towards his fourteen-year old
daughter. Another father had severe incestuous phantasies regarding
his daughter. The first case went to the length of at committing incest; his
relations with the daughter bore narcissistic traits. The patient indenti-
fied himself with his father (on a homosexual basis) and with his
daughter.
In the second case there were phantasies of a marriage with
the daughter, then only three years old: the patient sought in the
little girl his own infantile ego-ideal. The defloration-phantasy is
linked not only with sadism, but also with anal-eroticism.
>
136
REPORTS
d. Dr. Schilder: 'Psychosis after an operation for glaucoma.'
After an operation for glaucoma a woman patient asserts that they
want to. cut off her nose, breasts, etc. as well as castrate her. In
imagination she experienced attacks by animals and saw small ani-
mals cut to pieces. The operation on the eyes is followed by
castradon-phantasies. She also showed characteristics of transference.
The operation calls forth the complex of the peril to life and to
the genital organ. Birth-phantasies play an important part in the
psychosis. The castration complex is the one to appear last. The
later-appearing hypomanic phantasy closes the psychosis. The
psychosis represents a kind of re-arrangement of the complexes.
Coosequendy the appearance of the later hypomanic phase. The
organic is expressed by mental means.
e. Kolnai propounds several problems relating to the connection
between the ego-instincts and the sexual instincts. Though the ego-
instincts are also designated an egoistic, the sexual instincts are not
altruistic. The attitude of ego-instincts and of sexual instincts to
sublimation is quite different. Can one assume that ego-instincts
function in the repression of the sex-instincts? What is the relation
of the apparent parallelism of the ego-instincts and the sexual instincts
to the preference shown for the ego-Instincts by consciousness?
What factor holds the ego-instincts in check? Why is society
grounded in ego-instincts and not in race-instincts?
f. Dr. Hitschmami: 'On pedagogic method in Psycho-Analysis.'
He showed charts for visualizing the concepts conscious, un-
conscious, etc.
Discussion by Schilder, Nunberg, Rank, Reik, Friedjung, Freud,
Hitschmann and Deutsch.
4. November 3j, ip2i. Dr. Bychowski tvisitor); A contribution
to the psychology of schizophrenic delusion of persecution. Dis-
cussion by Federn, Schilder, Fokschaner and Freud.
5. November JO. ipzi. Professor Hans Kelsen (visitor): The
conception of the State and Freud's group psychology. (This paper
will appear in Imago) Discussion by Silberer, Reik, Fedem, Rank,
Bemfeld and Freud.
6. December i^, ipsi. Short communications : (a) Dr. Bychowski:
A buddhistic womb-phantasy. (b) Dr. Reich: A contribution to the
syndrome of conversion-hysteria, (c) Dr. Nunberg; A case of pro-
jection, (d) Dr. Schilder: On the pathology of the ego-ideal,
(e) Dr. Kauders (visitor): A contribution to the psychology of
' REPORTS 137
hypnosis, (f) Dr. Hitschmann: HirschlafTs statistics on cures by
hypnosis. Wassermann on poetic day-dreaming. Discussion by Rank,
Schilder, Fedem, Freud and Bernfeld.
7. Decetaber 21, ipsi. Short communications: (a) Dr. Helene
Deutsch : Drawing as an expression of the unconscious, (b) Dr. Federn :
A motive of sea-sickness, (c) Dr. Bernfeld: A motive for the writing
of comroemorative verse, (d) Dr. Jokl: On religious motives in neur-
oses, (e) Dr. Hug-Hellmuth; The dream of a child, (f) Dr. Schilder:
On the rebirth-phantasy in epileptic dream state. Discussion by
Nunberg, Friedjung, Deutsch, Bernfeld, Blumgart, Meyer, Freud,
Jekels, Jokl, Federn and Reich.
U
New members: Dr. Felix Deutsch, Vienna, I., Wollzeile 33.
Prof. M. Levi-Bianchini, Nocera Inferiore (Salerno).
Chan('"e of address: Prof. Otto Poetzl, Psychiatric Clinic, Prague.
8. January 4, ip22. Dr. Felix Deutsch: Psycho-Analysis and
Organic Diseases. Discussion by Freud, Reich, Hitschmann, Federn,
Rank, Poetzl, Reik and PoUak (visitor).
9. Jammry 18. 1922. Dr. Hans Sperber (visitor): A linguistic
observation as a contribution to Grillparzer's father-complex. Dis-
cussion by Freud, Federn, Bernfeld, Reich, Jokl, Hitschmann, Winter-
stein, Frau Kohscher and FrI. Sperber (visitors).
10. Janwary 2^, ip22. Short communications: (a) Dr. H. Deutsch:
Dream analyses. Observations on a child, (b) Dr. Meyer (New York) : The
form of the dream as a representation of the content (c) Dr. Abraham
(Berhn): The spider as a dream symbol, (d) Dr. Fedem: On
sciendfic plagiarism. Discussion by Freud, Fedem, Nunberg, Reik
and Reich.
11. Feb^-uary 16. 1922. Dr. Bernfeld: On a typical form of mas-
culine puberty. Dr.Oberndorf (NewYork): On a caseinferiority in
the neurosis. Discussion by Freud, Federn, Hitschmann and Reik.
12. March I, 1922. Short communications: (a) Dr. Hitschmann:
Glands and Psychology, (b) Dr. Fennichel: Two Contributions.
(c) Dr. F. Deutsch : A Contribution on the Formation of the Symptom
of Conversion, (d) Dr. Reik: From the Neurosis of a Child. Dis-
cussion by Freud, Federn, Hitschmann, Deutsch, Hug-Hellmuth and
Friedjung.
13. March 15, 1922. Dr. Fokschaner: On the game of chess.
Discussion by Freud, Bernfeld, Fedem, Kolnai and Schmiedeberg.
Volume in. Part i
Issued April 1922
V
Open Library
