CONCEPTIONS AND MISCONCEPTIONS 221 



dreams which is by far the most important resource of the 

 psychoanalyst. 



In Freud's conception, the actual dream, as revealed 

 to consciousness, that is, the manifest content of the 

 dream, is but an enigmatic congeries of psychic images 

 a charade that condenses in scenic productions a whole 

 mass of related, interconnected meanings or dream 

 thoughts, and it is the latter which constitute the real or 

 latent content of the dream. Dream analysis or dream 

 interpretation consists precisely in reaching these con- 

 cealed fancies and so correlating them in accordance with 

 precepts empirically determined as to render them co- 

 herent and significant. To do this it is required that the 

 patient retrace the mental threads out of which he has 

 woven together the elements of his dream tapestry. Such 

 threads are composed of links in interconnected chains of 

 associations, and it is the task of psychoanalysis to follow 

 these threads of associations to their source, in order to 

 reach the material out of which the dream images were 

 originally spun. 



Such a proceeding is fraught with difficulties, for ob- 

 viously as the dream creation is precisely the outcome of 

 the effort of consciousness to disguise, and so evade, the 

 real meaning underlying the manifest dream elements, 

 analysis involves a task no less formidable than that of 

 pitting the patient against his own inherent will. It really 

 means setting the patient at cross purposes with himself 

 by forcing him to face frankly the thoughts and wishes 

 which he has perhaps for a lifetime sought to repudiate; 

 that is to say, the ideas which have been ruthlessly de- 

 barred entrance into consciousness and which in conse- 

 quence pursue their career beyond the pale of appercep- 

 tion, manifesting themselves subtly in the symptoms and 

 obsessions characteristic of neurotic states. These ideas 

 are one by one readmitted into consciousness and are 

 through this procedure deprived de facto of the essential 

 motive of their existence. 



