FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[1]I have recently attempted elsewhere a preliminary treatment of this question. See "On the Biological Basis of Sexual Repression and its Sociological Significance",British Journal of Psychology(Medical Section), 1921, Vol. I, Part 3.[2]H. G. Wells, "The Passionate Friends", 195.[3]I make no attempt here to give a systematic account of the general nature of the methods, discoveries and hypotheses of the psycho-analytic school, except in so far as they directly touch our present problem. Some at least of the general principles underlying the work of the school together with some of the results they have achieved are now becoming fairly well known. Those who would pursue the subject further may be referred to the following books: Brill, "Psychanalysis," 2nd. ed. 1914; Ernest Jones, "Papers on Psycho-Analysis," 2nd. ed. 1918; Pfister, "The Psychoanalytic Method," 1917; White, "Mechanisms of Character Formation," 1916; Barbara Low, "Psycho-Analysis," 1920. A more detailed study would include reference to Prof. Freud's own works, of which the principal are:—"Selected Papers on Hysteria," 1909; "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex," 1910; "The Interpretation of Dreams," 1913; "The Psychopathology of Everyday Life," 1914; "Wit and its Relation to the Unconscious," 1916; "Totem and Taboo," 1918; "Vorlesungen zur Einführung in die Psychoanalyse," 1918; also four volumes of the "Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre," published at various times, and two volumes in the series entitled "Schriften zur angewandten Seelenkunde". For the meaning of the term Unconscious see Hart, "The Conception of the Subconscious,"Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1910, Vol. IV, 351. Hart's small book "The Psychology of Insanity," 1912, affords an excellent general introduction to abnormal psychology. (Here as elsewhere the titles and dates of English translations of foreign works are given, wherever such translations are available.)[4]The most important work dealing with this matter and with other questions of development generally is Freud's "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex."[5]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 219.[6]The dreams falling within this class (together with some others) appear to exhibit what is, at first sight at least, a puzzling exception to the general rule governing the formation of dreams which give expression to repressed tendencies, inasmuch as the obnoxious wish is gratified openly and undisguisedly instead of appearing in an indirect and symbolic form, as is usually the case. It would seem however, that this departure from the rule may to a large extent be explained and reconciled with the ordinary methods of repression by the following considerations:—(1) although the content of the wish appears directly in consciousness, it nevertheless fails (both during the dream and after waking) to be appreciated in its full significance for the mental life of the personality,i. e.there is no realisation of the fact that the dream represents in any way the fulfilment of a wish; there is present a sort of functional agnosia, in virtue of which the thought of the death is dissociated from its actual psychical concomitants, which alone can endow it with its full meaning; (2) in addition to this cognitive dissociation there is an emotional substitution, the emotion actually experienced being one of sorrow instead of one of joy, which the simple gratification of a wish would by itself most naturally occasion. This sorrow corresponds of course to the very genuine grief which would be felt at the conscious level in case of any real mishap to the relatives concerned and at the same time serves as an additional screen to hide the underlying hostile wish in the Unconscious; (3) on rarer occasions it would seem that the process of emotional substitution may be replaced by one of deëmotionalisation which prevents the cognitive elements from calling up any of the feelings which would normally accompany them; thus the death of a near relative will appear not as a sorrowful (or as it would be at certain levels of the Unconscious, a joyful) event, but as one devoid of all affective significance or as one that is absurd, ridiculous or unthinkable.[7]Or sometimes, in the case of women, the Electra complex; though the Electra myth gives a rather less complete expression of the combined love and hate tendencies in the female than is found in the Œdipus story for the corresponding tendencies of the male.The whole subject of the manifestations of these complexes in legend and literature and in the mind of the poet and the artist is treated at length in Otto Rank's comprehensive and most valuable work "Das Inzestmotiv in Dichtung und Sage".[8]This is a most important and far-reaching limitation. In order to avoid entering upon many difficult but weighty matters which are not strictly relevant to our present theme, we have here—and throughout the book—necessarily had to content ourselves with a somewhat one-sided and misleading portrayal of human psychic development as a whole. This deficiency is most marked with regard to the treatment of the great group of self-preserving and self-regarding tendencies, which we have only touched upon occasionally and of which we have nowhere attempted any adequate presentation. As a consequence of this, it must be borne in mind that from the point of view of general psychology, we have frequently laid too much stress upon the object-regarding tendencies (see below), to the relative neglect of much that is more primitive and fundamental in human nature. Our excuse must be that our subject naturally brings us into far closer touch with the social and (to use a convenient term of Ferenczi's) allo-erotic aspects of the mind than with those other aspects which are more intimately concerned with the individual as an independent microcosmic organism. To correct and amplify the inadequate conception of the human mind and of human mental development to which our present treatment might lead if taken by itself, the reader should consult Freud's "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex" and his important paper "Zur Einführung des Narzißmus,"Jahrbuch der Psychoanalyse, VI, 1. The works of Alfred Adler, though often both exaggerated and, especially in their English form, very nearly unreadable, contain some interesting material in this connection.A very illuminating consideration of the problem with which we are immediately concerned at this point—the early development of object love in the child and the relations of this object love to the activities of the auto-erotic stage—will be found in a paper on the "Psychology of the New Born Infant" by David Forsyth. (To be published in theBritish Journal of Psychology).[9]Cp.especially Freud, "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex."[10]"Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex," 80, 81.[11]Among other reasons for the greater liability of women to neurosis, one of great importance is the transference, in the course of sexual development, of the chief seat of erotic sensibility from the clitoris to the vagina.[12]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 219.[13]Many instances of the influence of the father's absence could be observed in connection with the war. Thus a small boy of five known to the writer solemnly assured his mother that now that his father was permanently away, it would be only right for her to marry him, her son, instead.[14]Mr. Cyril Burt informs me that he has encountered two quite definite cases of attempted fratricide in the course of his work as Psychologist to the London County Council.[15]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 215.[16]The earliest manifestation of the disapproval of sexual activities is of course encountered in the autoerotic stage of the child's development and in relation to the autoerotic activities. It is in connection with these activities that the sexual inhibitions in their more general and primitive forms at first arise.[17]Cp.Trotter, "Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War."[18]For a more thorough treatment of the mechanisms of Repression, Displacement and Sublimation by the present writer, see "Freudian Mechanisms as Factors in Moral Development,"British Journal of Psychology, 1915, vol. VIII, 477.[19]"Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex."[20]Mr. Cyril Burt, who possesses both abilities and opportunities of an exceptional degree as regards the observation of children, has suggested to me that two types of transference corresponding roughly to different stages of development, should be distinguished in this connection. In the first type (characteristic of children of between 4 and 9) there is a well marked displacement of the erotic or quasi-erotic aspects to some older person, usually of the opposite sex, while the child continues to feel tenderness for the parent. In the second type (characteristic of children of 10 up to the period of adolescence) the attitude towards the love object (parent substitute) is more reverential, tenderness being complicated by submissiveness and fear and the affection being in general far less physical and demonstrative than in the first type. "The attitude" adds Mr. Burt, "of emotional girls in Standard II and Standard V respectively toward their teachers seems to me typical. The former maul and kiss (if allowed): the latter reverence from afar."If this distinction be generally true, it would seem that there are two main stages of displacement of the parent regarding feelings:—(1) in which the more erotic elements are displaced, the more tender aspects of affection being still directed to the parents; (2) in which these latter are in their turn transferred, in whole or in part, to new love objects.[21]Many of the most important contributions of Jung are contained in "Collected Papers on Analytical Psychology," 2nd. ed. 1917, translated by Constance Long, and "The Psychology of the Unconscious," translated by Beatrice Hinkle.[22]For an important discussion of the general laws of symbolism, see Ernest Jones's "Papers on Psycho-Analysis" 1918, 129. The whole Chapter is worth careful study in connection with the questions considered in the present chapter.[23]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 286.[24]"Problems of Mysticism and its Symbolism," translated by S. E. Jelliffe.[25]As Silberer points out, students of mythology had already shown the possibility of still a third interpretation, the "naturalistic" one, according to which the representations of the incest motive in myth and legend may be taken as a symbolic portrayal of certain important and impressive natural occurrences—the sequence of day and night, summer and winter etc.[26]"Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," translated by Ernest Jones, 214.[27]It is interesting to note that in the naturalistic interpretation of myths the same influences are pretty clearly at work, as when Max Müller observes that one of the advantages of this naturalistic interpretation is that it absolves us from the necessity of taking literally many of the more objectionable features of the myths as they actually stand.[28]In order to distinguish more clearly between the two kinds of symbolism with which we have been here concerned—that in which an unconscious (repressed) thought or tendency is expressed by something more permissible to consciousness, and that in which the thing expressed is of as high or even higher cultural value than the thing through which it finds expression, Ernest Jones has, in the chapter already referred to ("Papers on Psycho-Analysis," 129 ff.) proposed to confine the term symbolism to the former class, all examples of the latter class being included under the term metaphor.[29]The somewhat sharp distinction here drawn between the sexual aspects of the family relationships and those here under consideration (which for the sake of convenience we may call the dependence aspects), although employed throughout this essay, is made primarily for purposes of exposition and is not intended to imply that the distinction is in fact so sharply cut as the present method of treatment might possibly suggest. In real life the sexual and the dependence aspects are inextricably interwoven, and it is probable that the majority of psycho-analysts would be inclined to lay somewhat less stress on the distinction than does the present writer.[30]This, of course, is especially liable to be the case in those children—for example in most of those technically described as "mentally deficient" and in many of those technically described as "backward"—who do not readily acquire interest in the details of a process leading to a desired end, apart from the end itself (i. e.in whom work does not become pleasurable for its own sake), or in those in whom there is no strong self feeling associated with the idea of successful achievement. The granting of an undue amount of assistance will, however, in its turn tend to retard or prevent the formation of these desirable mental characteristics.[31]There is good reason to believe that revolt against parental authority constitutes an important factor in the production of a certain class of delinquents. Seee. g.several of the cases recorded in Healy's "Mental Conflicts and Misconduct," 1919.[32]An excellent condensed treatment of many of the effects of incestuous fixation will be found in K. Abraham's "Die Stellung der Verwandtenche in der Psychologie der Neurosen."Jahrbuch für psychoanalytische und psychopathologische Forschungen, 1909, I., 110.[33]In a rather extreme case known to the writer a woman of about 35 had never been able to leave home without the most intense feelings of sorrow and loneliness, which usually impelled her to return precipitately after the absence of a day or two. In childhood she could seldom be induced to go more than a mile or so from her home unless accompanied by her parents and in later life neurotic symptoms were developed which effectually prevented her from living apart from her nearest relatives. As was to be expected, analysis revealed a very strong parent fixation, and after treatment she was able to fill a responsible post in a town far removed from the residence of her family.[34]Cp.M. Steiner, "Die funktionelle Impotenz des Mannes und ihre Behandlung," 1913.Freud, "Beiträge zur Psychologie des Liebeslebens."Jahrbuch für psychoanalytische und psychopathologische Forschungen, 1912, IV, 40.Ferenczi, "Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 9.[35]Even if marriage is at first apparently successful, it may be unable to stand the strain of circumstances which would present little or no difficulty in the absence of parent fixation. Thus in a case known to me, after a happy honeymoon spent near home, a wife proved unable to accompany her husband to a distant locality, where business affairs necessitated his residence but (in spite of his protests and entreaties) turned back while on the journey and returned to live with her parents. It appeared that she had very seldom left home before her marriage, having been brought up by kindly but indulgent parents, as regards whom there was a strong emotional fixation. In her youth she had only travelled once without her parents, being then so miserably unhappy that she begged to be sent home again as soon as possible.[36]Cp.especiallyFerenczi, "Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 250.[37]In the case of a woman, the record of whose analysis was kindly shown to me by Dr. E. M. Cole, there appears to have been a complete father fixation (with corresponding hatred of the mother) at one level and at a lower and more unconscious level an equally complete mother fixation (with all the indications of an "inverted" Œdipus complex), the two levels being characterised by a predominance of heterosexual and homosexual tendencies respectively.[38]In three cases of homosexual tendencies in men which I have recently had the opportunity of studying, the desire to be used by the father as a sexual objective was quite clearly apparent.Cp.Freud's "Aus der Geschichte einer infantilen Neurose." Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre. IV. 578 ff.[39]"Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 250 ff.[40]Cp.Rank, "The Myth of the Birth of the Hero," 1913.[41]Freud, "Beiträge zur Psychologie des Liebeslebens,"Jahrbuch für psychoanalytische und psychopathologische Forschungen, 1910, II, 389.[42]See Rank,op. cit., also the more recent treatment by the Questionnaire method by Edmund S. Conklin, "The Foster-Child Fantasy,"American Journal of Psychology, 1920, XXXI, 59.[43]There can be no doubt that this is a factor of very considerable significance. The child projects on to its parents its own desires, ambitions and aspirations, thus finding compensation for the gradual realisation of its own deficiencies, limitations and want of power (in much the same way as parents in their turn find consolation for their own disappointments in contemplating the successes—real or anticipated—of their children.Cp.below Ch. XIV.). In this way certain of the Narcissistic impulses find displaced expression in the idealisation of the parents and the exaggeration of their powers—a factor which probably plays a part of great importance in the Psychology of Religion (Cp.below Ch. XIII.).The following incident in connection with a young boy personally known to me amusingly illustrates the tendency to substitute an ideal parent for a (disappointing) real one, together with the religious and Narcissistic implications of this tendency. S. F., aged 7, insisted on being called Jesus Christ, in spite of the remonstrations of his father who pointed out to him among other things that Jesus Christ was the Son of God; to which S. F. replied "So am I." On receiving the reply: "You cannot be, forIam your father," he retorted, "God is my real father, you are only myprofessionalfather" (referring to the fact that his father was a "professional" musician).[44]There is reason to believe that an influence of this kind was a factor of importance in determining the nature of Darwin's scientific work.Cp.E. J. Kempf, "Charles Darwin. The affective Sources of his Inspiration and Anxiety Neurosis."Psychoanalytic Review, V. 151.[45]For a study of unconscious family influences affecting the careers of childrencp.Stekel, "Berufswahl und Kriminalität,"Archiv für Kriminalanthropologie und Kriminalistik, XLI.[46]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 243 ff.[47]To the same cause is probably due the use of four-poster beds in which the sleeper is completely enclosed by curtains and of those oldfashioned beds (still to be seen in some parts of the world) which could be entirely shut off from the rest of the room by a wooden partition or sliding door containing only one very small circular aperture for the admission of air.[48]Ferenczi, "Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 189. Freud, "Vorlesungen zur Einführung in die Psychoanalyse," 486.[49]Op. cit., 181 ff.[50]Cp.the striking emotional effect of Böcklin's well known picture "The Island of the Dead." In Sir J. M. Barrie's remarkable play "Mary Rose" (which is full of interest in connection with our present subject) this piece of symbolism is duplicated—the "island that likes to be visited" being situated in a lake on a larger island.[51]Rank, "Die Lohengrinsage," 46 ff.[52]Freud, "Interpretations of Dreams," 243. Rank,op. cit., 27 ff.[53]Freud,op. cit.243 ff. C. G. Jung, "Psychology of the Unconscious," 233 ff.[54]O. Rank, "The Myth of the Birth of the Hero."[55]"Vorlesungen zur Einführung in die Psychoanalyse," 461.[56]"Psychology of the Unconscious," 297.[57]Especially Silberer, "Problems of Mysticism and its Symbolism," 307 ff.[58]Cp. Jung and Silberer as above.[59]For an important discussion of certain further aspects of baptism from the psycho-analytical point of view, see Ernest Jones, "Die Bedeutung des Salzes in Sitte und Brauch der Völker",Imago. 1912, I. 463 ff.[60]"Psychology of the Unconscious," 233 ff.[61]"Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild."[62]Silberer,op. cit.[63]Cp.Ernest Jones, "Papers on Psycho-Analysis," 129 ff.[64]Thus in a case known to the present writer a boy frequently indulged in phantasies of entering into the bodies of women and girls whom he admired, the ideas of effecting an entrance into the body, of being carried therein and of re-emerging therefrom, being all accompanied by voluptuous feelings of a sexual character.[65]A striking example of this is to be found in Sir J. M. Barrie's "Mary Rose", in which a grown up son, on returning after many years to the home of his childhood, is earnestly warned and entreated by the housekeeper in charge of the (now empty) house not to enter his former nursery (womb symbol), a small room which is approached by a short passage (vagina symbol). He eventually overcomes his fears and boldly enters the forbidden apartment with a lighted candle (phallic symbol) in his hand. At that moment the ghost of his mother appears!The identification of the processes of birth and coitus is well shown in the following dream of a patient. "I was with difficulty crawling through a very narrow tunnel under a mountain which, I thought, was called the Aalberg. I was a good deal frightened but saw the end of the tunnel a long way off. In trying to get out, I seemed to force my way forward by continually butting with my head against some kind of soft wall". The movement here described is a clear coitus symbol (head = penis), while the mountain would appear to have derived its name from the phallic significance of the eel.In a certain number of cases the idea of returning to the mother's womb or of being born is coloured by the infantile "cloacal theory" of birth, according to which the child imagines birth to take place through the rectum. This is shown with exceptional clearness in the following dream. "I was walking down a long and narrow flight of stairs. They seemed to be thebackstairs of a large house or hotel and were very dirty and ill-lit, and every now and then I would tread in a pool of dirty water. The stairs suddenly (note the words in italics) opened out towards thebottomand I emerged into abackyard. I found I was covered with soot and dust and my boots were filthy." (Cp.the well known passage from St. Augustine, "Inter urinas et faeces nascimur").[66]Freud, "Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre." IV, 693, 694. Further evidence has recently been brought together by Mrs. S. C. Porter in a (not yet published) paper on Brontephobia.[67]Freud, "Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre," II, 169. Jung, "Collected Papers on Analytical Psychology," 132.[68]Rank, "Die Lohengrinsage," 107 ff. "Das Inzestmotiv in Dichtung und Sage," 261 ff. This however does not exhaust the significance of the forbidden question motive, another important aspect of which is referred to later.[69]It is a question of considerable psychological interest, as to how the ideas of birth and intra-uterine life come to acquire the significance which we have found them to possess. In what way for instance do we come to associate life within the womb with freedom from effort, difficulty or danger? In the majority of cases, not from conscious thinking on the subject; on the contrary, the connotation of safety and effortlessness would seem in some way to belong inherently to the idea of pre-natal existence from the very beginning, or at any rate to have become attached to it through a purely unconscious process of association. Again, how do we come into possession of the ideas of birth and pre-natal life themselves? Is the knowledge which has gone to the formation of these ideas entirely acquired after birth, or is there retained in the mind anything in the nature of impression or memory of that early period of existence in which gestation and birth were actually experienced? From the fact of the very general obliviscence which attends the first years of infancy, as well perhaps as from the relatively undeveloped state of the cerebrum in the newly born child, we might, with considerable show of reason, be inclined to disbelieve that any memory traces can be operative. On the other hand, the surprising fact of the sudden recovery in hypnosis, during psycho-analysis or otherwise, of early memories which had been entirely lost for many years, or again the fact that phantasies of birth or intra-uterine life seem sometimes to refer to details (e. g.the amniotic fluid or the different stages of labour) of which there is little opportunity to learn in ordinary life and which play but a small part, if any, in the average adult's conscious notions on these subjects, have made some writers hesitate to affirm too strongly the absolute impossibility of such operation. Again some may suggest that the knowledge which is mysteriously revealed in these phantasies may compel us to assume the existence of some such innate ideas as are perhaps involved in Jung's conception of the impersonal or racial Unconscious, according to which there are present in the unconscious mind certain materials (capable, apparently, of crystallisation into ideas of a certain degree of definiteness) which in their origin are assumed to be independent of personal experience, being, like our more fundamental instincts and tendencies, derived and inherited from a long line of ancestors.It is perhaps possible that more exact information on this important subject might be forthcoming as the result of careful investigations into such questions as the following:(1) To what extent (if at all) do children display—in dreams, phantasies or otherwise—knowledge as to the circumstances of their birth and pre-natal life which they could not possibly have obtained except from memory of their own past experience?(2) Do the phantasies of prematurely born children differ in any way from those of children born at the end of the normal term? If, for instance, there really exist any memory traces of the later period of gestation or of the process of birth, it might be expected that they would be less vivid than usual in prematurely born children, owing to the less developed condition of their brain at the time of birth.(3) Are the phantasies concerning birth in any way more vivid or frequent or of greater emotional intensity in those whose birth has been a process of difficulty and long duration than in those who have enjoyed an easy delivery?(4) Do the womb phantasies of twins indicate any knowledge of the unusual conditions of their pre-natal life?(5) Do the phantasies of children who have been removed from the womb by Caesarian section reveal any peculiarities corresponding to the absence of the usual birth process?[70]The following three dream extracts from the writer's own psycho-analytic experience afford very clear examples of the kind of dream to which reference is here made.(1) "I was trying to catch a train, but a gate leading to the platform was closed and I could not succeed in opening it. Then my father suddenly appeared, shook the gate violently, opened it and hurried me across the platform. He opened the door of a compartment and pushed me in. I found a lady sitting there." The lady here was associated with the mother and the opening of the gate and door symbolised the sexual act.(2) "An elderly man" (father symbol) "led me upstairs" (coitus symbol.Cp.Freud, "Interpretation of Dreams," p. 252) "to the interior of a church or chapel" (mother symbol). "Here hymns were being sung" (initiation ceremony) "I thought I ought to sing too, but had some bother to find the right place in the hymn book. Then one of the people said to me 'You are one of us.'"(3) "I wanted to get into a house, but could not find the way in. Suddenly our doctor" (in this case, as so often, a father substitute) "came along and said: 'A doctor always goes in by the window'. From a bag he brought out a long elastic instrument" (phallic symbol). "with which he opened a window on the first floor" (symbol of sex intercourse). "We entered and I found it was my mother's bedroom. The doctor said 'You should now go to sleep' and I prepared to go to bed."As will be seen from these examples, the initiation idea may be easily combined with the idea of returning to the mother's womb discussed in the last chapter. This combination is perhaps still more clearly shown in the following dream of the patient, who provided Example 2. "I was on a boat sailing on a river or canal which gradually became narrower and shallower. Finally the boat grounded on a sandy bottom. I got out and walked up a staircase into a cathedral where some ceremony was going on, in which I took part."[71]Thus in a case known to me the inhibition in question constituted one of the principal factors in the production of a very prolonged condition of sexual impotence in married life.[72]Sir J.G. Frazer, "Totemism and Exogamy." IV. 228.[73]Sir J.G. Frazer, "Balder the Beautiful." II. 239.[74]Op. cit.II. 243, 246.[75]Op. cit.II. 253, 259.[76]Op. cit.I. 22.[77]A careful study of these all important aspects of the initiation ceremonies has recently been made by Th. Reik (Die Pubertätsriten der Wilden,Imago, 1915, IV. 125, 189) from whose work many of the statements and conclusions here given have been taken.[78]An amnesia the production of which is often facilitated by the use of intoxicants.[79]Sir J.G. Frazer,op. cit., I. 22.[80]Sometimes apparently this procedure is very successful. Thus a well known psychologist has told me: "On passing every illumination during the night of the Jubilee, my father, who was carrying me, smacked me 'to make me remember the day'. I was four, and I have remembered!"[81]In many of these, as for instance the nautical practice of ducking or "keel hauling" those who are crossing the equator for the first time, it is possible also to trace certain typical symbols of the re-birth phantasy.The sexual aspects of initiation are apt to be particularly prominent in the case of boys entering a criminal or anti-social "gang". Thus an acute student of this subject writes to me: "I have often found that a delinquent boy was initiated into sexual knowledge and practices on the first evening that he joined his "gang";e.g.in one such gang every new member had to exhibit himself. He was asked if he knew "what it (the penis) was for"; this was explained; and after certain criticisms were passed, the leader, after a thorough inspection, declared "you will do". There was also a catechism: "Do you know what your mother and father do..." etc; the result being to discredit them in the eyes of the boy and to lead him to emulate them or at least to defy and despise them."[82]A. Schweiger, "Der Ritus der Beschneidung."Anthropos.1914.

[1]I have recently attempted elsewhere a preliminary treatment of this question. See "On the Biological Basis of Sexual Repression and its Sociological Significance",British Journal of Psychology(Medical Section), 1921, Vol. I, Part 3.

[2]H. G. Wells, "The Passionate Friends", 195.

[3]I make no attempt here to give a systematic account of the general nature of the methods, discoveries and hypotheses of the psycho-analytic school, except in so far as they directly touch our present problem. Some at least of the general principles underlying the work of the school together with some of the results they have achieved are now becoming fairly well known. Those who would pursue the subject further may be referred to the following books: Brill, "Psychanalysis," 2nd. ed. 1914; Ernest Jones, "Papers on Psycho-Analysis," 2nd. ed. 1918; Pfister, "The Psychoanalytic Method," 1917; White, "Mechanisms of Character Formation," 1916; Barbara Low, "Psycho-Analysis," 1920. A more detailed study would include reference to Prof. Freud's own works, of which the principal are:—"Selected Papers on Hysteria," 1909; "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex," 1910; "The Interpretation of Dreams," 1913; "The Psychopathology of Everyday Life," 1914; "Wit and its Relation to the Unconscious," 1916; "Totem and Taboo," 1918; "Vorlesungen zur Einführung in die Psychoanalyse," 1918; also four volumes of the "Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre," published at various times, and two volumes in the series entitled "Schriften zur angewandten Seelenkunde". For the meaning of the term Unconscious see Hart, "The Conception of the Subconscious,"Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1910, Vol. IV, 351. Hart's small book "The Psychology of Insanity," 1912, affords an excellent general introduction to abnormal psychology. (Here as elsewhere the titles and dates of English translations of foreign works are given, wherever such translations are available.)

[4]The most important work dealing with this matter and with other questions of development generally is Freud's "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex."

[5]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 219.

[6]The dreams falling within this class (together with some others) appear to exhibit what is, at first sight at least, a puzzling exception to the general rule governing the formation of dreams which give expression to repressed tendencies, inasmuch as the obnoxious wish is gratified openly and undisguisedly instead of appearing in an indirect and symbolic form, as is usually the case. It would seem however, that this departure from the rule may to a large extent be explained and reconciled with the ordinary methods of repression by the following considerations:—(1) although the content of the wish appears directly in consciousness, it nevertheless fails (both during the dream and after waking) to be appreciated in its full significance for the mental life of the personality,i. e.there is no realisation of the fact that the dream represents in any way the fulfilment of a wish; there is present a sort of functional agnosia, in virtue of which the thought of the death is dissociated from its actual psychical concomitants, which alone can endow it with its full meaning; (2) in addition to this cognitive dissociation there is an emotional substitution, the emotion actually experienced being one of sorrow instead of one of joy, which the simple gratification of a wish would by itself most naturally occasion. This sorrow corresponds of course to the very genuine grief which would be felt at the conscious level in case of any real mishap to the relatives concerned and at the same time serves as an additional screen to hide the underlying hostile wish in the Unconscious; (3) on rarer occasions it would seem that the process of emotional substitution may be replaced by one of deëmotionalisation which prevents the cognitive elements from calling up any of the feelings which would normally accompany them; thus the death of a near relative will appear not as a sorrowful (or as it would be at certain levels of the Unconscious, a joyful) event, but as one devoid of all affective significance or as one that is absurd, ridiculous or unthinkable.

[7]Or sometimes, in the case of women, the Electra complex; though the Electra myth gives a rather less complete expression of the combined love and hate tendencies in the female than is found in the Œdipus story for the corresponding tendencies of the male.The whole subject of the manifestations of these complexes in legend and literature and in the mind of the poet and the artist is treated at length in Otto Rank's comprehensive and most valuable work "Das Inzestmotiv in Dichtung und Sage".

The whole subject of the manifestations of these complexes in legend and literature and in the mind of the poet and the artist is treated at length in Otto Rank's comprehensive and most valuable work "Das Inzestmotiv in Dichtung und Sage".

[8]This is a most important and far-reaching limitation. In order to avoid entering upon many difficult but weighty matters which are not strictly relevant to our present theme, we have here—and throughout the book—necessarily had to content ourselves with a somewhat one-sided and misleading portrayal of human psychic development as a whole. This deficiency is most marked with regard to the treatment of the great group of self-preserving and self-regarding tendencies, which we have only touched upon occasionally and of which we have nowhere attempted any adequate presentation. As a consequence of this, it must be borne in mind that from the point of view of general psychology, we have frequently laid too much stress upon the object-regarding tendencies (see below), to the relative neglect of much that is more primitive and fundamental in human nature. Our excuse must be that our subject naturally brings us into far closer touch with the social and (to use a convenient term of Ferenczi's) allo-erotic aspects of the mind than with those other aspects which are more intimately concerned with the individual as an independent microcosmic organism. To correct and amplify the inadequate conception of the human mind and of human mental development to which our present treatment might lead if taken by itself, the reader should consult Freud's "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex" and his important paper "Zur Einführung des Narzißmus,"Jahrbuch der Psychoanalyse, VI, 1. The works of Alfred Adler, though often both exaggerated and, especially in their English form, very nearly unreadable, contain some interesting material in this connection.A very illuminating consideration of the problem with which we are immediately concerned at this point—the early development of object love in the child and the relations of this object love to the activities of the auto-erotic stage—will be found in a paper on the "Psychology of the New Born Infant" by David Forsyth. (To be published in theBritish Journal of Psychology).

A very illuminating consideration of the problem with which we are immediately concerned at this point—the early development of object love in the child and the relations of this object love to the activities of the auto-erotic stage—will be found in a paper on the "Psychology of the New Born Infant" by David Forsyth. (To be published in theBritish Journal of Psychology).

[9]Cp.especially Freud, "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex."

[10]"Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex," 80, 81.

[11]Among other reasons for the greater liability of women to neurosis, one of great importance is the transference, in the course of sexual development, of the chief seat of erotic sensibility from the clitoris to the vagina.

[12]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 219.

[13]Many instances of the influence of the father's absence could be observed in connection with the war. Thus a small boy of five known to the writer solemnly assured his mother that now that his father was permanently away, it would be only right for her to marry him, her son, instead.

[14]Mr. Cyril Burt informs me that he has encountered two quite definite cases of attempted fratricide in the course of his work as Psychologist to the London County Council.

[15]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 215.

[16]The earliest manifestation of the disapproval of sexual activities is of course encountered in the autoerotic stage of the child's development and in relation to the autoerotic activities. It is in connection with these activities that the sexual inhibitions in their more general and primitive forms at first arise.

[17]Cp.Trotter, "Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War."

[18]For a more thorough treatment of the mechanisms of Repression, Displacement and Sublimation by the present writer, see "Freudian Mechanisms as Factors in Moral Development,"British Journal of Psychology, 1915, vol. VIII, 477.

[19]"Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex."

[20]Mr. Cyril Burt, who possesses both abilities and opportunities of an exceptional degree as regards the observation of children, has suggested to me that two types of transference corresponding roughly to different stages of development, should be distinguished in this connection. In the first type (characteristic of children of between 4 and 9) there is a well marked displacement of the erotic or quasi-erotic aspects to some older person, usually of the opposite sex, while the child continues to feel tenderness for the parent. In the second type (characteristic of children of 10 up to the period of adolescence) the attitude towards the love object (parent substitute) is more reverential, tenderness being complicated by submissiveness and fear and the affection being in general far less physical and demonstrative than in the first type. "The attitude" adds Mr. Burt, "of emotional girls in Standard II and Standard V respectively toward their teachers seems to me typical. The former maul and kiss (if allowed): the latter reverence from afar."If this distinction be generally true, it would seem that there are two main stages of displacement of the parent regarding feelings:—(1) in which the more erotic elements are displaced, the more tender aspects of affection being still directed to the parents; (2) in which these latter are in their turn transferred, in whole or in part, to new love objects.

If this distinction be generally true, it would seem that there are two main stages of displacement of the parent regarding feelings:—(1) in which the more erotic elements are displaced, the more tender aspects of affection being still directed to the parents; (2) in which these latter are in their turn transferred, in whole or in part, to new love objects.

[21]Many of the most important contributions of Jung are contained in "Collected Papers on Analytical Psychology," 2nd. ed. 1917, translated by Constance Long, and "The Psychology of the Unconscious," translated by Beatrice Hinkle.

[22]For an important discussion of the general laws of symbolism, see Ernest Jones's "Papers on Psycho-Analysis" 1918, 129. The whole Chapter is worth careful study in connection with the questions considered in the present chapter.

[23]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 286.

[24]"Problems of Mysticism and its Symbolism," translated by S. E. Jelliffe.

[25]As Silberer points out, students of mythology had already shown the possibility of still a third interpretation, the "naturalistic" one, according to which the representations of the incest motive in myth and legend may be taken as a symbolic portrayal of certain important and impressive natural occurrences—the sequence of day and night, summer and winter etc.

[26]"Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," translated by Ernest Jones, 214.

[27]It is interesting to note that in the naturalistic interpretation of myths the same influences are pretty clearly at work, as when Max Müller observes that one of the advantages of this naturalistic interpretation is that it absolves us from the necessity of taking literally many of the more objectionable features of the myths as they actually stand.

[28]In order to distinguish more clearly between the two kinds of symbolism with which we have been here concerned—that in which an unconscious (repressed) thought or tendency is expressed by something more permissible to consciousness, and that in which the thing expressed is of as high or even higher cultural value than the thing through which it finds expression, Ernest Jones has, in the chapter already referred to ("Papers on Psycho-Analysis," 129 ff.) proposed to confine the term symbolism to the former class, all examples of the latter class being included under the term metaphor.

[29]The somewhat sharp distinction here drawn between the sexual aspects of the family relationships and those here under consideration (which for the sake of convenience we may call the dependence aspects), although employed throughout this essay, is made primarily for purposes of exposition and is not intended to imply that the distinction is in fact so sharply cut as the present method of treatment might possibly suggest. In real life the sexual and the dependence aspects are inextricably interwoven, and it is probable that the majority of psycho-analysts would be inclined to lay somewhat less stress on the distinction than does the present writer.

[30]This, of course, is especially liable to be the case in those children—for example in most of those technically described as "mentally deficient" and in many of those technically described as "backward"—who do not readily acquire interest in the details of a process leading to a desired end, apart from the end itself (i. e.in whom work does not become pleasurable for its own sake), or in those in whom there is no strong self feeling associated with the idea of successful achievement. The granting of an undue amount of assistance will, however, in its turn tend to retard or prevent the formation of these desirable mental characteristics.

[31]There is good reason to believe that revolt against parental authority constitutes an important factor in the production of a certain class of delinquents. Seee. g.several of the cases recorded in Healy's "Mental Conflicts and Misconduct," 1919.

[32]An excellent condensed treatment of many of the effects of incestuous fixation will be found in K. Abraham's "Die Stellung der Verwandtenche in der Psychologie der Neurosen."Jahrbuch für psychoanalytische und psychopathologische Forschungen, 1909, I., 110.

[33]In a rather extreme case known to the writer a woman of about 35 had never been able to leave home without the most intense feelings of sorrow and loneliness, which usually impelled her to return precipitately after the absence of a day or two. In childhood she could seldom be induced to go more than a mile or so from her home unless accompanied by her parents and in later life neurotic symptoms were developed which effectually prevented her from living apart from her nearest relatives. As was to be expected, analysis revealed a very strong parent fixation, and after treatment she was able to fill a responsible post in a town far removed from the residence of her family.

[34]Cp.M. Steiner, "Die funktionelle Impotenz des Mannes und ihre Behandlung," 1913.Freud, "Beiträge zur Psychologie des Liebeslebens."Jahrbuch für psychoanalytische und psychopathologische Forschungen, 1912, IV, 40.Ferenczi, "Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 9.

[34]Cp.M. Steiner, "Die funktionelle Impotenz des Mannes und ihre Behandlung," 1913.

Freud, "Beiträge zur Psychologie des Liebeslebens."Jahrbuch für psychoanalytische und psychopathologische Forschungen, 1912, IV, 40.

Ferenczi, "Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 9.

[35]Even if marriage is at first apparently successful, it may be unable to stand the strain of circumstances which would present little or no difficulty in the absence of parent fixation. Thus in a case known to me, after a happy honeymoon spent near home, a wife proved unable to accompany her husband to a distant locality, where business affairs necessitated his residence but (in spite of his protests and entreaties) turned back while on the journey and returned to live with her parents. It appeared that she had very seldom left home before her marriage, having been brought up by kindly but indulgent parents, as regards whom there was a strong emotional fixation. In her youth she had only travelled once without her parents, being then so miserably unhappy that she begged to be sent home again as soon as possible.

[36]Cp.especiallyFerenczi, "Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 250.

[37]In the case of a woman, the record of whose analysis was kindly shown to me by Dr. E. M. Cole, there appears to have been a complete father fixation (with corresponding hatred of the mother) at one level and at a lower and more unconscious level an equally complete mother fixation (with all the indications of an "inverted" Œdipus complex), the two levels being characterised by a predominance of heterosexual and homosexual tendencies respectively.

[38]In three cases of homosexual tendencies in men which I have recently had the opportunity of studying, the desire to be used by the father as a sexual objective was quite clearly apparent.Cp.Freud's "Aus der Geschichte einer infantilen Neurose." Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre. IV. 578 ff.

[39]"Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 250 ff.

[40]Cp.Rank, "The Myth of the Birth of the Hero," 1913.

[41]Freud, "Beiträge zur Psychologie des Liebeslebens,"Jahrbuch für psychoanalytische und psychopathologische Forschungen, 1910, II, 389.

[42]See Rank,op. cit., also the more recent treatment by the Questionnaire method by Edmund S. Conklin, "The Foster-Child Fantasy,"American Journal of Psychology, 1920, XXXI, 59.

[43]There can be no doubt that this is a factor of very considerable significance. The child projects on to its parents its own desires, ambitions and aspirations, thus finding compensation for the gradual realisation of its own deficiencies, limitations and want of power (in much the same way as parents in their turn find consolation for their own disappointments in contemplating the successes—real or anticipated—of their children.Cp.below Ch. XIV.). In this way certain of the Narcissistic impulses find displaced expression in the idealisation of the parents and the exaggeration of their powers—a factor which probably plays a part of great importance in the Psychology of Religion (Cp.below Ch. XIII.).The following incident in connection with a young boy personally known to me amusingly illustrates the tendency to substitute an ideal parent for a (disappointing) real one, together with the religious and Narcissistic implications of this tendency. S. F., aged 7, insisted on being called Jesus Christ, in spite of the remonstrations of his father who pointed out to him among other things that Jesus Christ was the Son of God; to which S. F. replied "So am I." On receiving the reply: "You cannot be, forIam your father," he retorted, "God is my real father, you are only myprofessionalfather" (referring to the fact that his father was a "professional" musician).

The following incident in connection with a young boy personally known to me amusingly illustrates the tendency to substitute an ideal parent for a (disappointing) real one, together with the religious and Narcissistic implications of this tendency. S. F., aged 7, insisted on being called Jesus Christ, in spite of the remonstrations of his father who pointed out to him among other things that Jesus Christ was the Son of God; to which S. F. replied "So am I." On receiving the reply: "You cannot be, forIam your father," he retorted, "God is my real father, you are only myprofessionalfather" (referring to the fact that his father was a "professional" musician).

[44]There is reason to believe that an influence of this kind was a factor of importance in determining the nature of Darwin's scientific work.Cp.E. J. Kempf, "Charles Darwin. The affective Sources of his Inspiration and Anxiety Neurosis."Psychoanalytic Review, V. 151.

[45]For a study of unconscious family influences affecting the careers of childrencp.Stekel, "Berufswahl und Kriminalität,"Archiv für Kriminalanthropologie und Kriminalistik, XLI.

[46]"The Interpretation of Dreams," 243 ff.

[47]To the same cause is probably due the use of four-poster beds in which the sleeper is completely enclosed by curtains and of those oldfashioned beds (still to be seen in some parts of the world) which could be entirely shut off from the rest of the room by a wooden partition or sliding door containing only one very small circular aperture for the admission of air.

[48]Ferenczi, "Contributions to Psycho-Analysis," 189. Freud, "Vorlesungen zur Einführung in die Psychoanalyse," 486.

[49]Op. cit., 181 ff.

[50]Cp.the striking emotional effect of Böcklin's well known picture "The Island of the Dead." In Sir J. M. Barrie's remarkable play "Mary Rose" (which is full of interest in connection with our present subject) this piece of symbolism is duplicated—the "island that likes to be visited" being situated in a lake on a larger island.

[51]Rank, "Die Lohengrinsage," 46 ff.

[52]Freud, "Interpretations of Dreams," 243. Rank,op. cit., 27 ff.

[53]Freud,op. cit.243 ff. C. G. Jung, "Psychology of the Unconscious," 233 ff.

[54]O. Rank, "The Myth of the Birth of the Hero."

[55]"Vorlesungen zur Einführung in die Psychoanalyse," 461.

[56]"Psychology of the Unconscious," 297.

[57]Especially Silberer, "Problems of Mysticism and its Symbolism," 307 ff.

[58]Cp. Jung and Silberer as above.

[59]For an important discussion of certain further aspects of baptism from the psycho-analytical point of view, see Ernest Jones, "Die Bedeutung des Salzes in Sitte und Brauch der Völker",Imago. 1912, I. 463 ff.

[60]"Psychology of the Unconscious," 233 ff.

[61]"Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild."

[62]Silberer,op. cit.

[63]Cp.Ernest Jones, "Papers on Psycho-Analysis," 129 ff.

[64]Thus in a case known to the present writer a boy frequently indulged in phantasies of entering into the bodies of women and girls whom he admired, the ideas of effecting an entrance into the body, of being carried therein and of re-emerging therefrom, being all accompanied by voluptuous feelings of a sexual character.

[65]A striking example of this is to be found in Sir J. M. Barrie's "Mary Rose", in which a grown up son, on returning after many years to the home of his childhood, is earnestly warned and entreated by the housekeeper in charge of the (now empty) house not to enter his former nursery (womb symbol), a small room which is approached by a short passage (vagina symbol). He eventually overcomes his fears and boldly enters the forbidden apartment with a lighted candle (phallic symbol) in his hand. At that moment the ghost of his mother appears!The identification of the processes of birth and coitus is well shown in the following dream of a patient. "I was with difficulty crawling through a very narrow tunnel under a mountain which, I thought, was called the Aalberg. I was a good deal frightened but saw the end of the tunnel a long way off. In trying to get out, I seemed to force my way forward by continually butting with my head against some kind of soft wall". The movement here described is a clear coitus symbol (head = penis), while the mountain would appear to have derived its name from the phallic significance of the eel.In a certain number of cases the idea of returning to the mother's womb or of being born is coloured by the infantile "cloacal theory" of birth, according to which the child imagines birth to take place through the rectum. This is shown with exceptional clearness in the following dream. "I was walking down a long and narrow flight of stairs. They seemed to be thebackstairs of a large house or hotel and were very dirty and ill-lit, and every now and then I would tread in a pool of dirty water. The stairs suddenly (note the words in italics) opened out towards thebottomand I emerged into abackyard. I found I was covered with soot and dust and my boots were filthy." (Cp.the well known passage from St. Augustine, "Inter urinas et faeces nascimur").

The identification of the processes of birth and coitus is well shown in the following dream of a patient. "I was with difficulty crawling through a very narrow tunnel under a mountain which, I thought, was called the Aalberg. I was a good deal frightened but saw the end of the tunnel a long way off. In trying to get out, I seemed to force my way forward by continually butting with my head against some kind of soft wall". The movement here described is a clear coitus symbol (head = penis), while the mountain would appear to have derived its name from the phallic significance of the eel.

In a certain number of cases the idea of returning to the mother's womb or of being born is coloured by the infantile "cloacal theory" of birth, according to which the child imagines birth to take place through the rectum. This is shown with exceptional clearness in the following dream. "I was walking down a long and narrow flight of stairs. They seemed to be thebackstairs of a large house or hotel and were very dirty and ill-lit, and every now and then I would tread in a pool of dirty water. The stairs suddenly (note the words in italics) opened out towards thebottomand I emerged into abackyard. I found I was covered with soot and dust and my boots were filthy." (Cp.the well known passage from St. Augustine, "Inter urinas et faeces nascimur").

[66]Freud, "Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre." IV, 693, 694. Further evidence has recently been brought together by Mrs. S. C. Porter in a (not yet published) paper on Brontephobia.

[67]Freud, "Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre," II, 169. Jung, "Collected Papers on Analytical Psychology," 132.

[68]Rank, "Die Lohengrinsage," 107 ff. "Das Inzestmotiv in Dichtung und Sage," 261 ff. This however does not exhaust the significance of the forbidden question motive, another important aspect of which is referred to later.

[69]It is a question of considerable psychological interest, as to how the ideas of birth and intra-uterine life come to acquire the significance which we have found them to possess. In what way for instance do we come to associate life within the womb with freedom from effort, difficulty or danger? In the majority of cases, not from conscious thinking on the subject; on the contrary, the connotation of safety and effortlessness would seem in some way to belong inherently to the idea of pre-natal existence from the very beginning, or at any rate to have become attached to it through a purely unconscious process of association. Again, how do we come into possession of the ideas of birth and pre-natal life themselves? Is the knowledge which has gone to the formation of these ideas entirely acquired after birth, or is there retained in the mind anything in the nature of impression or memory of that early period of existence in which gestation and birth were actually experienced? From the fact of the very general obliviscence which attends the first years of infancy, as well perhaps as from the relatively undeveloped state of the cerebrum in the newly born child, we might, with considerable show of reason, be inclined to disbelieve that any memory traces can be operative. On the other hand, the surprising fact of the sudden recovery in hypnosis, during psycho-analysis or otherwise, of early memories which had been entirely lost for many years, or again the fact that phantasies of birth or intra-uterine life seem sometimes to refer to details (e. g.the amniotic fluid or the different stages of labour) of which there is little opportunity to learn in ordinary life and which play but a small part, if any, in the average adult's conscious notions on these subjects, have made some writers hesitate to affirm too strongly the absolute impossibility of such operation. Again some may suggest that the knowledge which is mysteriously revealed in these phantasies may compel us to assume the existence of some such innate ideas as are perhaps involved in Jung's conception of the impersonal or racial Unconscious, according to which there are present in the unconscious mind certain materials (capable, apparently, of crystallisation into ideas of a certain degree of definiteness) which in their origin are assumed to be independent of personal experience, being, like our more fundamental instincts and tendencies, derived and inherited from a long line of ancestors.It is perhaps possible that more exact information on this important subject might be forthcoming as the result of careful investigations into such questions as the following:(1) To what extent (if at all) do children display—in dreams, phantasies or otherwise—knowledge as to the circumstances of their birth and pre-natal life which they could not possibly have obtained except from memory of their own past experience?(2) Do the phantasies of prematurely born children differ in any way from those of children born at the end of the normal term? If, for instance, there really exist any memory traces of the later period of gestation or of the process of birth, it might be expected that they would be less vivid than usual in prematurely born children, owing to the less developed condition of their brain at the time of birth.(3) Are the phantasies concerning birth in any way more vivid or frequent or of greater emotional intensity in those whose birth has been a process of difficulty and long duration than in those who have enjoyed an easy delivery?(4) Do the womb phantasies of twins indicate any knowledge of the unusual conditions of their pre-natal life?(5) Do the phantasies of children who have been removed from the womb by Caesarian section reveal any peculiarities corresponding to the absence of the usual birth process?

It is perhaps possible that more exact information on this important subject might be forthcoming as the result of careful investigations into such questions as the following:

(1) To what extent (if at all) do children display—in dreams, phantasies or otherwise—knowledge as to the circumstances of their birth and pre-natal life which they could not possibly have obtained except from memory of their own past experience?

(2) Do the phantasies of prematurely born children differ in any way from those of children born at the end of the normal term? If, for instance, there really exist any memory traces of the later period of gestation or of the process of birth, it might be expected that they would be less vivid than usual in prematurely born children, owing to the less developed condition of their brain at the time of birth.

(3) Are the phantasies concerning birth in any way more vivid or frequent or of greater emotional intensity in those whose birth has been a process of difficulty and long duration than in those who have enjoyed an easy delivery?

(4) Do the womb phantasies of twins indicate any knowledge of the unusual conditions of their pre-natal life?

(5) Do the phantasies of children who have been removed from the womb by Caesarian section reveal any peculiarities corresponding to the absence of the usual birth process?

[70]The following three dream extracts from the writer's own psycho-analytic experience afford very clear examples of the kind of dream to which reference is here made.(1) "I was trying to catch a train, but a gate leading to the platform was closed and I could not succeed in opening it. Then my father suddenly appeared, shook the gate violently, opened it and hurried me across the platform. He opened the door of a compartment and pushed me in. I found a lady sitting there." The lady here was associated with the mother and the opening of the gate and door symbolised the sexual act.(2) "An elderly man" (father symbol) "led me upstairs" (coitus symbol.Cp.Freud, "Interpretation of Dreams," p. 252) "to the interior of a church or chapel" (mother symbol). "Here hymns were being sung" (initiation ceremony) "I thought I ought to sing too, but had some bother to find the right place in the hymn book. Then one of the people said to me 'You are one of us.'"(3) "I wanted to get into a house, but could not find the way in. Suddenly our doctor" (in this case, as so often, a father substitute) "came along and said: 'A doctor always goes in by the window'. From a bag he brought out a long elastic instrument" (phallic symbol). "with which he opened a window on the first floor" (symbol of sex intercourse). "We entered and I found it was my mother's bedroom. The doctor said 'You should now go to sleep' and I prepared to go to bed."As will be seen from these examples, the initiation idea may be easily combined with the idea of returning to the mother's womb discussed in the last chapter. This combination is perhaps still more clearly shown in the following dream of the patient, who provided Example 2. "I was on a boat sailing on a river or canal which gradually became narrower and shallower. Finally the boat grounded on a sandy bottom. I got out and walked up a staircase into a cathedral where some ceremony was going on, in which I took part."

[70]The following three dream extracts from the writer's own psycho-analytic experience afford very clear examples of the kind of dream to which reference is here made.

(1) "I was trying to catch a train, but a gate leading to the platform was closed and I could not succeed in opening it. Then my father suddenly appeared, shook the gate violently, opened it and hurried me across the platform. He opened the door of a compartment and pushed me in. I found a lady sitting there." The lady here was associated with the mother and the opening of the gate and door symbolised the sexual act.

(2) "An elderly man" (father symbol) "led me upstairs" (coitus symbol.Cp.Freud, "Interpretation of Dreams," p. 252) "to the interior of a church or chapel" (mother symbol). "Here hymns were being sung" (initiation ceremony) "I thought I ought to sing too, but had some bother to find the right place in the hymn book. Then one of the people said to me 'You are one of us.'"

(3) "I wanted to get into a house, but could not find the way in. Suddenly our doctor" (in this case, as so often, a father substitute) "came along and said: 'A doctor always goes in by the window'. From a bag he brought out a long elastic instrument" (phallic symbol). "with which he opened a window on the first floor" (symbol of sex intercourse). "We entered and I found it was my mother's bedroom. The doctor said 'You should now go to sleep' and I prepared to go to bed."

As will be seen from these examples, the initiation idea may be easily combined with the idea of returning to the mother's womb discussed in the last chapter. This combination is perhaps still more clearly shown in the following dream of the patient, who provided Example 2. "I was on a boat sailing on a river or canal which gradually became narrower and shallower. Finally the boat grounded on a sandy bottom. I got out and walked up a staircase into a cathedral where some ceremony was going on, in which I took part."

[71]Thus in a case known to me the inhibition in question constituted one of the principal factors in the production of a very prolonged condition of sexual impotence in married life.

[72]Sir J.G. Frazer, "Totemism and Exogamy." IV. 228.

[73]Sir J.G. Frazer, "Balder the Beautiful." II. 239.

[74]Op. cit.II. 243, 246.

[75]Op. cit.II. 253, 259.

[76]Op. cit.I. 22.

[77]A careful study of these all important aspects of the initiation ceremonies has recently been made by Th. Reik (Die Pubertätsriten der Wilden,Imago, 1915, IV. 125, 189) from whose work many of the statements and conclusions here given have been taken.

[78]An amnesia the production of which is often facilitated by the use of intoxicants.

[79]Sir J.G. Frazer,op. cit., I. 22.

[80]Sometimes apparently this procedure is very successful. Thus a well known psychologist has told me: "On passing every illumination during the night of the Jubilee, my father, who was carrying me, smacked me 'to make me remember the day'. I was four, and I have remembered!"

[81]In many of these, as for instance the nautical practice of ducking or "keel hauling" those who are crossing the equator for the first time, it is possible also to trace certain typical symbols of the re-birth phantasy.The sexual aspects of initiation are apt to be particularly prominent in the case of boys entering a criminal or anti-social "gang". Thus an acute student of this subject writes to me: "I have often found that a delinquent boy was initiated into sexual knowledge and practices on the first evening that he joined his "gang";e.g.in one such gang every new member had to exhibit himself. He was asked if he knew "what it (the penis) was for"; this was explained; and after certain criticisms were passed, the leader, after a thorough inspection, declared "you will do". There was also a catechism: "Do you know what your mother and father do..." etc; the result being to discredit them in the eyes of the boy and to lead him to emulate them or at least to defy and despise them."

The sexual aspects of initiation are apt to be particularly prominent in the case of boys entering a criminal or anti-social "gang". Thus an acute student of this subject writes to me: "I have often found that a delinquent boy was initiated into sexual knowledge and practices on the first evening that he joined his "gang";e.g.in one such gang every new member had to exhibit himself. He was asked if he knew "what it (the penis) was for"; this was explained; and after certain criticisms were passed, the leader, after a thorough inspection, declared "you will do". There was also a catechism: "Do you know what your mother and father do..." etc; the result being to discredit them in the eyes of the boy and to lead him to emulate them or at least to defy and despise them."

[82]A. Schweiger, "Der Ritus der Beschneidung."Anthropos.1914.

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