CONSCIENCE AND SUPEREGO 415 



may not only have ambivalent feelings towards his father and 

 simple affection for his mother, but he may display an affec- 

 tionate, feminine attitude towards the father, and a corre- 

 sponding identification and jealousy towards his mother, for 

 in Freud's opinion, each individual is basically bi-sexual. In 

 this case there is a two-fold Oedipus complex, also called the 

 complete complex. Its parallel, with the proper substitutions, 

 can be found in girls. Generally this secondary or inverted 

 complex is subordinate to the primary complex as described 

 respectively for a boy or a girl; it is possible, however, that it 

 be the dominant complex in the child, in which case the basic 

 instinctual orientation is reversed. In actual practice, the whole 

 range of possibilities is found realized, from simple positive 

 complexes to complete inverted ones. 



However, in the complete Oedipus complex, there are only 

 four instinctual trends to account for, regardless of their or- 

 ganization. For the sake of simplicity, we will limit ourselves 

 to the case of the boy: his primary affection is for his mother, 

 with a sense of identification with his father and a sense of 

 hostility towards him as well. Secondarily, he has affection 

 for the father with identification and jealous reactions towards 

 his mother. 



The next step is the dissolution of this complex. It is evident 

 that the child cannot long endure the tensions aroused by the 

 Oedipus complex. He cannot tolerate feelings of hostility 

 towards his parents on whom he depends for all his love, 

 affection, approval, protection, parents who are so much 

 stronger than he is. He must suppress his hostility and its 

 cause — the Oedipus complex. 



The first step in this dissolution involves giving up the 

 mother as an object of affections, and principally for fear of 

 the father's punishing power. But it is not easy to give up 

 an object one loves — something must take its place. In this 

 dilemma, the boy can respond with either of two alternatives: 

 he can either identify with his mother (we can give up a love 

 object if we take it into ourselves, into imagination and 



