154 Some Implications of the Incarnation [CH. 



was disastrous; all kinds of symptoms manifested them- 

 selves. Voyages, rest-cures, drugs were without avail. 

 Mr X. was dying of fear. Eventually he went to a nerve- 

 specialist who recognised the probability that some 

 repression underlay the physical symptoms. The clue 

 was in this case obtained by automatic writing under 

 light hypnosis. As a child of twelve Mr X. had been in 

 the room when his father had a fatal seizure of pulmon- 

 ary embolism in middle age. The shock of this had been 

 so great, and the memory of it so painful, that it had 

 been completely driven from the consciousness. Under 

 light hypnosis the doctor's questions recalled it : to the 

 "question "What are you afraid of?" came the reply 

 "Father's death 1 ." "Why?" "Shall die same." With 

 the approach of the age at which the father died, the 

 repressed fear of childhood became operative! The 

 patient had, of course, only to be told that this was the 

 origin of his formless fear, and that medical examina- 

 tion showed that there was no symptom of the disease, 

 to ensure complete immunity from the paroxysms of 

 fear; and restoration to normal health rapidly followed. 

 But we can trace the work of repression in lesser things 

 too. The slip of the tongue or pen has a clear meaning 

 for those who know how to interpret it 2 . A simple ex- 

 ample that happened in my own presence a few weeks 

 ago may illustrate this. One of the little boys of a lady 

 who has suffered all her life with great pain in the eyes, 

 has weak eyes, though otherwise he is exceptionally 

 muscular and vigorous. I know that she is always 



1 The patient did not know what he had written. 



* Cf. Freud, Psychopathology of Every-day Life; Ernest Jones, 

 Papers on Psychoanalysis ; Bernard Hart, Psychology of Insanity, 

 etc. ; as well as Freud's chief work The Interpretation of Dreams. 

 Many careful readers and students will doubtless come to the con- 

 clusion that here, as in many other matters, Freud extends his 

 generalisations beyond legitimate bounds. 



