Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

A man of sixty was brought to my dispensary clinic by his wife (I say "brought" and not "accompanied" by his wife, advisedly). She accompanied him into my examining room. He had an almost complete aphonia, spoke hoarsely and in a whisper and presented all the signs of abductor laryngeal paralysis; added to which there was a partial hemiplegia of the right side involving the upper and lower extremities, but not the face or any of the cranial nerves other than that supplying the right laryngeal abductor. I shall not give any other points in the history except that this paralysis was of four months' duration, there was some resistance to movements at the elbow and knee, but Babinski and other indications of a central organic lesion were absent. The results of the rest of the physical examination need not be mentioned except that the patient presented evidences of arteriosclerosis. The patient was of dull mentality, meek humble and subservient; he was much below par mentally (I did not put him through any special intelligence tests), had little information to offer, constantly resorted to "I don't know" as a reply, and could co-operate but little. I did, however, obtain the important bit of information that seventeen years ago he had had an almost complete aphonia of several weeks' duration and that one day, while on board ship, he became seasick, vomited, became frightened, went to his room, and suddenly his voice returned to him. So sudden was the transformation that many of his fellow-passengers insisted that he had been deceiving them and had purposely simulated the condition he had previously presented. The case was one of hysteria, the patient presenting at the time of my examination signs of abductor laryngeal paralysis (laryngological examination disclosed a right-sided abductor palsy) and right-sided partial hemiplegia.

For the next two visits the wife accompanied, or rather, brought the patient to the clinic and I could get but little information and consequently progressed but little. I asked him, in her presence, to come alone the next time--which he did. The description of the onset of the attack, which was furnished me on his previous visits, proved the hysterical nature of the condition: he had suddenly been attacked by nausea and vomiting, fell to the floor, lay there, more or less unconscious (as he described it) for five or ten or more minutes, was assisted to his feet, went to his bed with practically no assistance, a few hours later found that he could speak little more than above a whisper, and in another few hours or more his right side became weak and failed him. He had insisted that the onset came on suddenly. He had denied any quarrels or trouble at home. Nothing could be obtained from him as to his thoughts just prior to the attack or as to any special emotional shocks.

On his fourth visit I asked him to tell me any dream he had had recently and which had made an impression upon him. He could give me no aid. Nothing came to mind. I asked him if he had dreamed the night before, and he told me he had had a dream the afternoon of the preceding day, during an afternoon nap. Here is the dream: He found himself struggling with a tremendous snake, the upper part of which was in human form, the features being very hazy and not at all recalled. The snake was vigorously endeavoring to enwrap itself about him and to strangle him, and he was desperately and fiercely struggling to defend himself against it and to free himself from it--and yet he could not fight it off. In desperation and in fear he cried aloud for help. This was the end of the dream, for, at this point, members of his family came rushing toward him to inquire what was wrong with him, and due partly to shock and his own activity in the dream, and partly perhaps to the noise of the footsteps and of the conversation of those who came running toward him to inquire into the cause of his distressful cries, he awoke.

The thoughts and reveries just preceding the dream and the thoughts and experiences during the morning preceding the dream, although the true inciters of the dream, and although concerned with the central figure (his wife) in this little drama, need not be detailed since the dream has a wider and more deeply arising significance.

I could not learn definitely from him whether the series of associated thoughts turned first from his wife to his troubles with her, to her attitude toward him, and then to her resemblance in this respect (her nagging, pestering persistence and actual persecution of him) to a snake which is endeavoring to enwrap itself about him, to strangle him, to withdraw from him his very life's blood, etc. This may or may not have been the line of associations just preceding the dream.

He had no idea as to what the dream meant. Using free association, in ordinary face-to-face conversation, I asked him what "snake" reminded him of. The association came in a moment. He smiled, became embarrassed, said it was foolish of him to tell me this, but it reminded him of his wife. He had always looked upon his wife as a snake in human form. He had frequently called her "snake" because of her conduct toward him. She had wound herself about his life in snake-like fashion.

And then came the story of their troubles. This was his second wife. She was fifteen years his junior. He was meek, feeble, of weak will-power, without initiative. She was domineering. Although his wife never told him so openly and in so many words, he felt convinced that the trouble had begun more or less because his wife's sexual libido was not satisfied in her sexual relations with him. He admits that she is a passionate woman, her sexual libido was of such strength that he, much older than she, and not too strong physically, could but little gratify her. The first complaints and the sole trouble which appeared on the surface were financial--he barely made a living and she complained thereat continually, bitterly and tyrannically. It seems that her complaint in this direction was justified. It is difficult to determine just what role her lack of sexual gratification played-- whether it only acted as stirring up the embers of dissatisfaction (with his weekly earnings) which already existed, or whether it was the basic factor, led to her dissatisfaction with her matrimonial choice, and caused her to seek some more or less valid cause for complaint, in that way permitting her, more or less consciously, to transfer her dissatisfaction and discontent from the lack of sexual gratification to the hard pressed financial condition (which perhaps she might, for that matter, have been willing to endure, did she but obtain the full gratification of her sexual craving). At any rate, both of these factors played their role in causing domestic disagreement, one factor being openly acknowledged as the cause by his wife, the other factor never mentioned by her, but believed by him to be an important accessory, if not the main, fundamental and primary source of the trouble. His wife, using his poor earning capacity as a weapon, and with the demand for "more money" as her battle-cry, carried on a campaign of complaint, grumbling, nagging, fault-finding, insult and abuse, but little short of persecution, making conditions wretched and miserable at home. Things at length became quite unbearable to him--so much so that, feeble in willpower and lacking in initiative as he was and is, he was compelled to leave home and live with his aunt, since his wife had practically deserted him. Although she had sold out the furniture and the rest of the furnishings of the home, and had pocketed the money thus received, she repeatedly called at his aunt's home for no other purpose than to force him to pay her sums of money for her weekly maintenance. On each such visit she would act the tyrant, would storm and rage furiously, would subject him to stinging rebukes and deliver biting tongue-lashings, causing him in consequence to be much upset and nervous the rest of the day. The very morning on which he had had the attack, which was followed by his present trouble (partial aphonia and partial hemiplegia) his wife had paid him one of these unusually stormy and noisy, and, to say the least, unwelcome visits. She had carried the attack to such a point that our patient became so emotionally upset (he is a harmless, emotional, kindly, unassuming and indifferent sort of old fellow) that he suddenly was attacked with nausea and vomiting, and, frightened, fell to the floor, with the consequences above detailed. I need not go further into the history and analysis of this case, but the story thus far elicited is more than sufficient to show that here we have a specific instance in which, by the analysis of a single dream, we have arrived at the genesis of an hysterical paralytic syndrome of four months' duration. The analysis took but a few minutes. It may be mentioned, in parentheses, that a full knowledge of the cause of the condition did not lead to a disappearance of the palsy. In other words, as we all know, knowledge per se does not lead to action or to the assertion or development of the will-power. I may say, also, that the events here related were not suppressed or repressed, for, as soon as the question of his wife was taken up, the patient admitted that it was she who was the real cause of his present conditions, and he thereupon detailed the story above related. He assured me that he had always been fully aware that it was she who had brought about his present condition, although, of course, he did not know whether he had had an hysterical, apoplectic or other sort of attack. In fact he believed his condition was permanent and incurable-- especially since he had been treated at various neurological clinics for many weeks past without the slightest improvement or progress.

Were we to follow up this history we could unearth the full life history of this patient, including the genesis of his early attack of aphonia. But I deem this unnecessary and inadvisable in this paper, as mentioned previously.

Here, then, we have a definite case in which by the analysis of a single and incidentally the first dream we have arrived at the genesis of the psychoneurotic disorder.

From this same standpoint I have studied another case, a married woman of twenty-nine, with marked neurasthenic and hysterical symptoms (including astasia-abasia, anesthesias, palpitation of the heart, throbbing sensations in the stomach and a great many other symptoms). This case I studied for upwards of four months, with almost daily visits to the hospital where she was being cared for. I made quite an intensive study of her dream life and of her past life history, and I find that had I taken the very first dream which I obtained from her and conducted a thorough analysis with this dream as my first mile-post, I would have arrived at a full genesis of the condition, which was of ten years' duration. In this case, also, I must repeat, there was no indication of repression, the patient having always understood very well the origin and cause of her condition. Here, too, we find that the knowledge alone did not lead to her recovery. This case I shall report in detail at a later date.

In this connection, I cannot keep from reciting the dream of a young girl of twelve which I had the good fortune to study. She came to me complaining about her throat. There was something dry, "a sticking" in her throat. She did not know what it was. Would I look at her throat? I found nothing abnormal, and was about to dismiss her when I observed that her hands were bluish. I felt them. They were cold. I thought at once of probable heart disease. I was soon informed that she had heart disease. She had been told so by other doctors. This proved to be the case, as I learned on examining her.

Being keenly interested in this subject of dreams, I wondered whether, if she were subject to periods of cardiac decompensation of varying degree, she did not have dreams of a terrifying nature (about burglars, robbery and the like), because of embarrassment of breathing during sleep, resulting from her cardiac insufficiency and consequent circulatory and respiratory disturbance. I asked her whether she had been dreaming much of late. She told me she had had a dream the preceding night. What was it? I inquired.

She had dreamed that she had died. Her mother had put her in a coffin, carried her to the cemetery and then proceeded to bury her. Her mother had first forced something into her mouth (it seemed to be a whitish powder), and then lowered her into the grave and filled the grave with dirt. That is all that she could remember.

I shall not enter into a complete analysis or interpretation of this dream. There is no doubt, however, to every psychoanalyst who has devoted his attention to dreams, that the analysis of such a dream should prove most interesting. It is also apparent that by taking up the various elements of the dream and following them untiringly along the various trails and ramifications which lead on in various directions, one could unmask the entire life history of this twelve-year-old girl.

I wish, however, to direct the reader's attention to only one aspect of this dream--the death of the dreamer. She denied that she feared death or that she thought of death because of her heart disease or from any other cause. I next inquired: "Do you wish or have you ever wished you were dead?" The reaction of the girl was immediate and intense. She stood frightened, embarrassed; her eyelids twitched convulsively in rapid succession, her face gradually assumed a suppressed crying expression, tears came to her eyes, they soon flowed freely and rolled down her cheeks; she sobbed, and, through her tears, she uttered, almost inarticulately, the one word, "Yes." A convulsive, inspiratory grunt, a bashful, receding, turning away of the head and body, a raising of the hands to cover her face and hide her tears, and hasty, running steps to get away, while murmuring audibly "Let me go away," followed rapidly one upon the other. I gently seized her hand, calmed and reassured her. And, through sobs and tears, in almost inaudible tones, in starts and spurts, and reluctantly replying to questions which were forced upon her, producing replies which were literally drawn from her against her will, she told me this little story: A little boy cousin of hers, three years her junior, had begun school two years or so later than she, and yet, in spite of this handicap, this little relative had outstripped her in school, he being now in a higher grade than she herself was. She would not be so much concerned or worried about this not-to-be-proud-of performance, had not the boy's mother that week visited her home and there, in the presence of other people, talked considerably about her boy's progress in school, his rapid advance as compared with that of our little dreamer, her relative stupidity and backwardness. And so this boy's mother had continued for some time in the same strain. This caused our little girl to feel much embarrassed--in fact, ashamed and mortified. She had felt that way for several days past, it had made her cry, had made her feel miserable and unhappy; so much so that she had wished she were dead. I shall not continue this analysis further. But it is plainly seen that here too, by a single dream, we have come upon life-experiences, viewpoints and mental material which affords us efficient and sufficient weapons to boldly attack the fortress of her full life history, her mental qualities, her trends, her psychic depth, her mental makeup in its entirety, in its every dimension.

It is interesting to note that on the morning following the experience which I had with this child, she came to see me a second time, and, on my examining her throat, it presented the typical picture of bilateral tonsillitis, the final result of the initial sticking sensation in her throat, which she had experienced the day before. After taking a culture from her throat as a matter of routine to exclude a possible diphtheria, the patient, greatly disturbed because of her newly-discovered trouble, burst forth into bitter tears, and, still sobbing, rushed abruptly from the room.

A week later, when I saw her again, she had regained her emotional equilibrium and we reviewed her dream and its analysis without any special signs of emotional disturbance.

Very interesting, also, was my experience about a week following this when, casually reciting this little girl's dream, its significance and her conduct, to an old lady whom I know very well, I found that she too was presenting all the signs of emotional upset, for, as I proceeded with my recital, tears gradually came to her eyes, her face assumed a suppressed crying expression, she tried to smile through her tears, and finally, unable to control her emotions, she broke out into a free and unrestrained weeping spell, following which I learned from her that the recital of this girl's condition, her dream and its meaning, recalled to her mind her darling daughter, a noble girl of sixteen years of age, who had died some fifteen years ago, after a long period of incapacitation and a miserable existence brought on by tonsillitis, chorea, rheumatism and, finally, heart disease, with all the extreme signs and symptoms of broken cardiac and renal compensation. Here, then, I had touched another complex, which, if followed up, would lead me into the innermost depths and recesses of this old lady's soul-life, into the holiest of holies of her mental life.

The writer will be pardoned for not here giving fuller histories, or for not carrying out the analyses to their ultimate goals, or for not giving the interpretations of the two dreams presented. That was not the primary object of this communication.

I wish, in conclusion, to repeat that through the conscientious and most far-reaching analysis of a single dream, or, in fact, of a single element of a dream or a single element or stimulus in the objective or subjective world, one may, at least not infrequently, unearth the full life history of normal or abnormal individuals, and the genesis and evolution of psychopathic affections.

The reader may justly inquire why the analyst should resort to dream analysis instead of taking the history of the case in the usual way. In all cases the patient should be permitted to tell her story in her own way. This method of procedure, with cross questioning, may and should indeed be sufficient to unravel the case for us in most cases. But if we find that we have not gained the confidence of the patient and have not that condition of being en rapport with the patient which is essential for progress and success in the analysis, one may resort to dream analysis, not so much for the purpose of following the royal road to what the Freudian school calls "the unconscious," but rather with the object of obtaining the confidence of the patient and of having something definite to start with.

AN ACT OF EVERYDAY LIFE TREATED AS A PRETENDED DREAM AND INTERPRETED BY PSYCHOANALYSIS

BY RAYMOND BELLAMY

Professor of Education, Emory and Henry College, Emory, Va.

A RECENT article by Brill, entitled "Artificial Dreams and Lying,"[1] recalled to me a little work I did two years ago while engaged in making an introductory study of dreams as a thesis at Clark University. The part which is hereby submitted is a fragment of a larger work and, being only a sort of side issue, was never included in the thesis proper. I have made only such changes as were made necessary by the fact that this is a fragment and needed one or two minor changes to make it complete.

[1] Journal Abnormal Psychology, Vol. 9, No. 5.

Let me say at the beginning that I have the greatest and most profound respect for Freudian theories as interpreted by G. Stanley Hall and other men of like scholarly ability, but I have never been able to accept the more extreme form of Freudianism as interpreted by some of the most prolific writers in this field. I have found that the charges made by Habermann[2] are substantially true. I find it very helpful indeed, to try to interpret my own dreams and to assist some of my students to do so according to the Freudian formula, and to a certain point I believe these interpretations are undoubtedly true. The question is to find the point beyond which the interpretation becomes artificial. Personally, I believe that this will always have to be decided finally by the individual himself rather than by some outsider who insists on reading in a certain interpretation. I have come to believe that it is possible for one to become trained to the point at which he is able to decide just how far the interpretation goes, or, at least, to approximate it.

[2] Journal Abnormal Psychology, Vol. 9, No. 4.

With these few introductory remarks I shall submit the paper, which was written in 1912. I have not appended the rather long and cumbersome bibliography from which I drew these references, but I can supply any reference that is wanted.

If we examine the Freudian system, we find that it is impossible to disprove this theory of dreams. If we demonstrate that a dream has no sexual connection whatever, they have only to say that it is the censor that blinds, and, by resorting to symbolism and other such very present helps in time of trouble, they show plainly that we were mistaken. The situation is the same as it would be if I declared that what I saw as blue appeared yellow to the rest of the world. The disproof of this and of Freudianism are equally impossible. But, on the other hand, have the Freudians presented any proof or argument on the affirmative side of this question? They are over fond of saying, "Freud has proven thus and so," but in what did the proof consist? The great answer to all objections has been to analyze dreams and, so far as I know, the attempt has never failed to show that the dream in question conformed to the prescribed requirements. And in truth, it is not a difficult matter to analyze a dream a la Freud. After a little practice, especially if one has a vivid imagination and is somewhat suggestible, It is possible to find the repressed sexual wish in every dream. But if we use such flexible and wonderful factors as the four mechanisms, and, above all, symbolism, we can find the same things in any other experience. By this I mean that if we take a bit out of our daily life, a dream of some one else, a fictitious story, an historical incident, or any other pictured situation and PRETEND THAT IT IS ONE OF OUR OWN DREAMS and apply the Freudian analysis, we find that it serves for this purpose as well as a real dream. When this is the case, it is absurd to put any faith in the analysis of real dreams, when carried to extremes.

As an illustration of the above statement, the following is a fairly typical example. The supposed "dream" is a commonplace bit out of my daily life. This is chosen at random (although Jones would say such a thing is impossible) and subjected to a dream analysis.

ANALYSIS OF FALSE DREAM

Dream. I was walking along a street on a cold winter night. I looked down at the cement walk and in this was set a piece of granite on which the letters "W. H." were cut. Coming to the corner, I looked up and saw on a short board which was nailed to a post, the name of the street, "Queen Street," The street running at right angles to this was King Street, and I turned and went down this. After walking a short distance, I came to a house from a window of which a light was shining. The house number was "23." I took a key from my pocket, unlocked the door and entered.

Analysis. In attempting to analyze this (so-called) dream, I was amazed to find with how many past longings and emotionally-colored experiences it was associated. I first took up the letters on the sidewalk, and as I repeated them, letting my mind be as blank as possible in order that the associations might be free, I gained an immediate response. "W. H."--"Which House"--came out as in answer to a question. With these words there was a definite visual image of a young country farm youth standing talking to two persons in a buggy. I remembered the incident in all its details. I was the young man and these people were asking the way to a certain place, or at WHICH HOUSE they should stop. As it so happened, I was at that time keeping company with a young lady who lived at the very house concerning which they asked. I will not go into detail any further at this point, for this is a real case and I should be trespassing on personal ground. But any one who yet remembers his boyhood courtship, with all its agonies and fears, its hopes and joys, its disappointments and its pleasures, can see at a glance how important this occasion is in throwing light on the meaning of the dream. Of course "W. H." stood for "Which House."

I seemed to get no further in my associations with these letters at this time, and my thoughts spontaneously turned to the name of the street. "Queen Street." Even more readily and completely than in the other case, there came a whole complex of associations. First there was the name and image of Miss Agnes Queen, whom I had known for years. But, strange to say, the image was of this young lady standing and talking to a certain Mr. Harding. I saw them together but once, and it seemed passing strange that this incident should be the one remembered in connection with the name. But the associations were rapidly progressing, and I mentally reviewed parts of three or four years during which I was working and closely associating with this Mr. Harding. Here I began to see some light. This Mr. Harding was in all respects, at least as far as I knew him a man of good morals, but he was much less particular in his social habits than I was. He was engaged to a young lady all the time I was with him, and wrote letters to her constantly; but this fact did not prevent him from paying attentions to other young women, and I was aware that he was more familiar with them than conventionality would warrant. In fact he made no attempt to be secret in the matter, and often poked fun at me for my over sensitivity on the subject. Here was the key to a whole lot of meaning. The first year I was with him, I had no sweetheart or any lady friend on whom to center my affection or to whom I could write. There were a number of young men in our "squad," as it was called, and nearly all of them had correspondents and it was a joke among us that I was "out in the cold world with no one to love." In reality, this was not so much a joke for me at the time, as I tried to give the impression that it was, and I longed for the very thing of which we joked. The fact that I was out on the street on a cold winter night in this dream symbolized being "out in the cold world," as we had used the term then.

I now took up the letters "W. H." again, and the words "White Horse" came in response to the stimulus. With little hesitation I placed this as connected with the Knights of the White Horse of whom Tennyson writes in his poems of "King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table." I got very little out of this, but still the White Horse was a band of men who were unrestrained in their desires and bore about the same relation to King Arthur's Knights that Harding did to me. However, the associations did not stop here but went on, giving what at first seemed to be a meaningless list of words. "W. H." first called up the words, "Wish Harding"; next, "Will Harding"; next, "With Harding"; and last, "Walk Harding." In a minute it flashed on me what this all meant. "I WISH to do as Harding is doing, to WALK the way he is WITH him and I WILL." To walk up Queen Street meant, then, to follow his example, as he at one time paid some attention to this Miss Agnes Queen. Perhaps the reason why her name was selected instead of some others was because his relations to her had been very slight and formal, and thus the idea was easier for the censor to let into sleeping consciousness than it would have been if some other names had been taken. "W. H.," then, symbolized the four expressions that arose in the analysis.

The meaning of "King Street" came last of anything in the dream, but I will give it now. I did not seem to be able to get anywhere on this for some time, and the idea kept presenting itself that it symbolized that I was king of the situation which seemed innocent enough; but at last there came an association with Nero as portrayed in "Quo Vadis." I then remembered how I read this book while in the adolescent stage, and how a cousin made remarks, very sensuous in their nature, about parts of it. I then got a vision of the book, "Mad Majesties," which I saw on the library table not long since. Next came a memory of the French kings as portrayed in the works of Dumas. At this point, I realized that the idea suggested by the word king is very often, though not always, an idea or image of a very loose person as far as his social life is concerned. Thus to walk Queen Street or follow the example of Harding finds a parallel in walking King Street or following the example of a king.

With the light in the window, I came into an entirely new field of associations. I cannot go far into detail here as it would involve others as well as myself, but suffice to say that the light in the window called up a paper on the subject of light which was written by a Mr. X. and read in my hearing. Now Mr. X. and I had both kept company with the same young lady at different times, and here was another group of emotionally colored experiences. However, the important function performed by the light was that it symbolized (together with the house in which it was) the comforts, warmth and pleasures of the very opposite condition from that of being "out in the cold world with no one to love."

The house number "23" is associated with at least two occasions. One Sunday evening; a few of the boys of our "squad," myself among them, went out with the daughter of our landlady, and one or two other young ladies and took a boat ride in the park. It was a beautiful summer night and the park was full of young people who were treating each other to very endearing caresses. There were so many who wanted boats that only one boat was unoccupied, and it was No. 23. It had been left because it was a hoodoo number, and the other boaters were all superstitious. As we were not, we took this boat and used it. My longing lonesomeness was about at its maximum height on this night. The other occasion associated with this number is that I became engaged when I was twenty-three years old and at that time desired greatly to be married; but, as I was in school, it had to be postponed.

Now the climax of the dream! I took a key from my pocket, unlocked the door and entered. This is so plain that it hardly needs comment. Being in the cold world, as symbolized by the cold street, I enter the warmth and comfort of the lighted house. The key and lock are, of course, phallic symbols and have special significance for me as I once took a young lady to a banquet at which the favors were paper keys and hearts. Thus symbolically are fulfilled all the longings I felt while with Harding, all my desires to be married when twenty-three, all my adolescent courtship yearnings, and all my remaining repressed sexual longings.

As a point which may have a little bearing on this, I have recently received a letter from Harding and in it was information that he is for a time away from home, and I wondered if he is still careless in his behavior.

This analysis will seem foolish in the extreme to many, and I am one of the number, but my excuse is that I have copied as closely after the Freudians as possible. I have only to invite a comparison. This is not a "made up" dream, but a little bit out of my daily life; just an experience occurring on the way home from the seminary. The analysis is real in the sense that the associations arose as I have recorded them.

Perhaps some ardent Freudian might find it in his heart to say that this analysis only strengthened their position, as it showed how a whole sexual background underlies our entire life, and therefore our dreams must have a sexual origin. But the reason why I found a sexual solution of this was that I started the analysis with a definite Bewnssteinlage, as Titchener would call it, which consisted of a knowledge that I had started for a certain kind of solution, and the whole course of the associations was governed by this. If Freud had at first come into the possession of a theory that every dream fulfills a fear, or pictures a state of anger or any other emotion, he would have had just as good success in demonstrating the truth of his statements. The following analysis will illustrate this. This is a real dream, but before beginning the analysis, I took the attitude that the analysis would reveal the fulfillment of a fear or show that the dream was the dramatic representation of a feared condition as actually existing. It took some time to get into this attitude, it is true, but when the result was finally accomplished, the analysis was begun and the attempt was made to follow the Freudian method as closely as possible under the changed conditions.

The Dream. On the night of February first, I dreamed that I was going down a little hill in company with my brother and Mr. N. We seemed to be in Colorado, and at the foot of the hill was a little stream which was very pretty. There was a little waterfall, and a green pool below it, and a mist hung over the pool. I am not sure I saw the color of this pool. There was also a huge rock around which the water dashed. Some people were fishing in the stream. Some one asked if we could see the rainbows, and Mr. N. replied that he could see only one. I then looked carefully and saw a purple haze in the mist over the pool and supposed this was what was meant. But, as I continued to look, I saw a great number of rainbows, or at least patches in the mist over the water which showed the spectral colors. These were about two feet in diameter and extraordinarily beautiful. I was very anxious to get some of the trout which I felt sure were In the stream. As we came nearer, it seemed that the stream had overflowed and there were several shallow pools not over a foot deep and eight or ten feet long. In these pools could be seen fish by the dozen from a foot to eight feet long. I was slightly troubled because it would muddy my shoes, but I began to try to get some of them out. I got one very big one by the gill slit, but could not manage him and had to let him go. I handled several in the dream, but do not know whether or not I got any out.

ANALYSIS OF DREAM SHOWING FULFILLMENT OF A FEAR

I had some trouble in getting any light on this dream, but suddenly much of the meaning became clear and a whole group of associations came up. Undoubtedly the trouble I experienced at first was caused by the resistance of the censor. I will give the associated memories first and explain them later.

I delight in fishing and have spent many happy hours fishing for trout In the clear waters of the Colorado streams; but, strange as it may seem, it was not a memory of any of these which come into consciousness. Instead, there came up memories of three different instances, each accompanied with definite visual imagery, and in such rapid succession that I could hardly tell which came first.

Six years ago last summer, I crossed the Ohio River to spend a day in Carrolton, Kentucky, and on the way back, I bought some fish of a fisherman at the river's edge. This man was barefooted and wore a little greasy wool hat and very ragged clothes. I remember thinking at the time that his work must be very degrading, and that the river fisherman must be about the lowest type in that part of the country. I especially noticed his feet and legs, which were bare to the knees, and which were so sunburned that they hardly looked like parts of a white man's body. In the analysis of this dream, the image of the man as he stood there and the memory of the incident came back with great vividness.

A year or two later, my brother and I were riding along the road at about the same place, and we met a very miserable-looking specimen of humanity, driving a poor limping horse to a rickety wagon in which were some pieces of driftwood. My brother was in a "spell of the blues" at this time, and he remarked that he was coming to just that condition as fast as he could. The image and memory of this incident also came into consciousness as if it had been waiting repressed just under the surface.

The other memory was one in which I did not figure personally. A year or so ago, my brother was telling me how he and his boy had gone to the river several times and gone fishing with an old fisherman who lived there. My nephew, like most boys, had a desire to become a fisherman or hunter, and my brother had suspected that a little close acquaintance with the way a fisherman lived would cure him of this desire; in this he was entirely right, and after a few trips to visit the old fellow, he had expressed himself as cured of any desire to live the beautiful, pleasant life of a river fisherman.

Without going any further, it can easily be seen that a fisherman symbolizes for me everything that is synonymous with failure. Thus, when I stepped out into the muddy water and began fishing I symbolically became a failure, a no-account, a man who had failed in the struggle and had not achieved success. The very fact that we came DOWN HILL to the place of fishing shows, on the face of it, that a downhill career is symbolized. My brother was with me, and that is easily explained as a dramatization of the fact that I was accompanying him on that downhill road to the state of the man in the rickety wagon which he had prophesied as his future. The water in the shallow pools was muddy, and I stepped into it just after experiencing a fear that I would get my shoes wet. Remembering the fisherman's bare brown feet, this can be interpreted as nothing but a very strong symbolization of a drop from a cultured and successful circle to a low and unsuccessful one. I grasp a fish bigger than myself and struggle with it, but am compelled to give it up. Another symbol: my work is plainly too big for me; this question is too much for me to handle, and this thesis will ultimately have to be given up as the big fish is. In fact, I cannot say that I succeeded in getting ANY fish out of the water and, therefore, I shall never succeed at anything I undertake, but will land figuratively, if not actually, in the fisherman's hut.

The Mr. N. who was with us, was cross-eyed which, in itself, seemed to have no special meaning; but it immediately called up an image of a cross-eyed man standing at the river's edge at Vevay, Indiana. This fellow was the picture of ignorance and want. He was telling another man about catching a big fish a few days before and how he liked that kind of fish boiled so well, but he could not wait for it to boil, but had fried part of it and eaten it that way. As I heard him relate this and watched his face, the whole event seemed to me to be most disgusting. As I was watching him, some one at my side told me that, because of a drunken spree, he had been disfranchised. He was also a fisherman and another typical specimen of the class. Mr. N., having the same facial defect, though in a much less noticeable way, became identified with him, and I am again found walking down the hill to oblivion in company with this brother in distress. This is bad for Mr. N., but it cannot be helped.

The rainbows seem bright enough, but they bring in another disquieting group of associations. The rainbow is almost, if not quite, a universal symbol of failure. We all know the old story of going to the end of the rainbow for a pot of gold, and if we want to belittle any effort we say that the individual is chasing the rainbow. So here I am again on the downhill road between two failures, following the rainbow to a hopeless condition of muddy uselessness. And if it were not bad enough to be following one rainbow, I am following a great number which must mean that I shall always end in failure whatever I undertake.

But, besides this, the rainbow has special associations for me. The first of these associations which came into consciousness was a little booklet made by a Latin student and handed her professor. I had several years of Greek and Latin under this teacher and at a certain place in the course, he asked each student to make a little booklet of some kind, using as much originality as possible, copy some favorite quotations from De Senectute and hand in the finished product. Every year he gets these out and exhibits them as a kind of inspiration. One of them had a rainbow and a pot of gold on the cover. I spent a great deal of time and work on mine and made a more elaborate booklet than any other that had been made, but I purposely left it unfinished and inscribed a statement that this was to typify the kind of work I did in that department. Of course it was a joke, but I have often thought that there was method in this madness, and that it really approximated the true state of affairs. This seeming chance association, then, is closely connected with my fear of making a failure which is so clearly dramatized in this dream.

The fact that the dream is placed in Colorado is also important. Two years ago, I spent the summer in Colorado and had a very delightful time, as was natural, being on a wedding trip. But during this stay, I did make a total failure at fishing. I had been a fairly successful trout fisher a few years before, but I had forgotten the art and did not do enough fishing to relearn. In other words, my dream gives me to understand that I cannot be successful even in fishing. One evening my bride and I witnessed a most beautiful sunset, a rainbow figuring largely in the scene. At this time we were debating whether or not to go on farther West as I had originally planned; but circumstances prevented this and instead of going on farther, we came back East or toward the rainbow. This is just one more place where the dream so clearly symbolizes a failure to do what I undertake. I will not carry the analysis any further, though I could find associations by the hundred which would strengthen the meaning given.

Of course I am not at all conscious of having any such fear as this. In fact I am rather inclined to be over-confident; but this is, of course, due to the repressing influence of the censor and only strengthens the analysis.

Examples could be given until the last trump is sounded and the world rolled up like a scroll, but I do not want to keep any one so long. Whatever we wish to make out of a dream--the dramatization of a fear, a joy, a joke (really this is what the Freudians often do), a tragedy, anything that can be suggested, the result can easily be accomplished if only we be allowed the use of Freud's mechanisms and a moderate amount of symbolism.

I have tried to show: First, that any situation or experience can be analyzed with as good success as a dream, and second, that a dream may be made to mean anything. In other words, with Freud's method, one can demonstrate anything to suit his taste or belief. Long ago, the saying was formulated that all roads lead to Rome. This being true, it must also be true that all roads lead everywhere else. Freud employs a wonderful figure of a mystical sphere, with its layers and cross veins and other mineralogical characteristics, to represent the part of consciousness with the repressed factor at the center well guarded. It would be far more to the point if he should represent the whole of past experience as the surface of a country, with its various roads connecting the different centers. The stations would then represent the experiences, and the roads the association tracks between them. If one should travel at random over these roads, he would in time pass through all kinds of towns and cities, but if he started in quest of a certain type, say mountain villages, he would arrive at his goal much more quickly than he would otherwise. The Freudians themselves acknowledge that they have difficulty in knowing when to stop the analysis. Their plan seems to be to travel until the landscape suits them and then get off and camp.

Thus, while I have made no attempt to give positive proof or argument that Freud's theory, in its extreme form is at fault, I have tried to substantiate my argument that there has been no real argument on the other side. And when a theory so spectacular and altogether out of the ordinary is presented, the burden of the proof should very decidedly be thrown on the positive side. We have no obligation or even excuse for accepting such a theory on the mere presumption of the originator.

And that Freud's theory is weird and fantastic is a self-evident fact. Perhaps the Clark University student who very carefully worked it up a few years ago went a little too far when he said it was a chaotic inferno, but at any rate, it is far removed from celestial harmony. Sidis takes about the sanest attitude possible when he refers to certain Freudian writings as being full of unconscious sexual humor. He observes further as does Prince and others that the Freudian school is in reality a religious or philosophical sect. He says that Freud's writings constitute the psychoanalytic Bible and are quoted with reverence and awe. Kronfeld, in a most valuable criticism, says that in comparison with Freud's conception of the vorconscious and its work, Henroth's Demonomania appears a modest scientific theory.

The attitude of the Freudians is, itself, worth noticing. They are very prone to consider any criticism as very personal, and fly to the rescue with all the fervor of a religious fanatic. A work on dreams, because it does not bear out Freud in all details, calls forth thunderbolts from two continents. This over-anxious attitude indicates that the belief in the theory is based on an emotional condition rather than logical reasoning. Bernard Hart, who is one of those happy individuals who get the best out of Freudianism, shows the difference between the two kinds of belief by comparing our belief that the earth goes around the sun and that the man who abuses a woman is a cad. The cold, indifferent attitude toward the former is in marked contrast to our warm lively interest in the latter, and the reason is that the belief in the one is founded on scientific demonstration and in the other on our feeling in the matter. If we allow this as a gauge by which to measure, it is not difficult to place the Freudians.

We must not overlook the immense opportunity for suggestion in the work of psychoanalysis, both on the subject and the one who is in the work. The Freudians vehemently deny that any of the results of dream analysis are suggested into the mind of the dreamer, but the evidences are all on the other side. Freud, in referring to psychoanalysis of hysterical patients, says, "It is not possible to press upon the patient things which he apparently does not know, or to influence the results of the analysis by exciting his expectations." Such an attitude is fatal when it comes to a question of accurate work. And no less important is the self-suggestion practiced by the Freudians. When we read of Freud's long struggle in an attempt to find something which he felt surely was to be found, we see that he had abundant opportunity to acquire almost an obsession. The long years since, which he has spent in analyzing dreams and making them all come out right some way, would serve to more firmly ground his conviction, and the same is true of his disciples. Put a man to drawing square moons for ten years, and at the end of the time he will swear that the moon is square.

A large portion of the scientific world seems to have gone mad over the term "psychoanalysis." But this kind of work has been done by all peoples and times under different names. There can be no objection to such an analysis of a dream if it is done by the right person. The dream may be used to aid the dreamer in finding out his own life, it is true, and when we understand psychoanalysis as this process, and only this, it is not objectionable. But if such is the case there is no need of all the mechanism and symbolism. The preacher who uses the Old Testament stories of the wars with the Philistines to illustrate a moral struggle is not to be criticised; but if he maintains that they were written for that purpose, we should hardly feel inclined to accept his position. A very inspiring message might be builded on the text, "The ants are a people not strong, but they prepare their meat in the summer"; but it is hardly possible that such thoughts were in the mind of the writer. Just so, a dream or a story or any other situation may be used to open the locked doors of a life, but to say that the dream has slipped stealthily out of the keyholes and over the transoms and wonderfully, mysteriously and magically clothed itself is quite another matter.

FREUD AND HIS SCHOOL

NEW PATHS OF PSYCHOLOGY

BY A. W. VAN RENTERGHEM M.D., AMSTERDAM

(Concluded)