244 Note on Freud's Censor [APP. 



towards the purest determinism at first sight. We must 

 therefore discuss these points in more detail. 



In one case which I have come across within a few 

 days of writing these lines, not personally, but which 

 was related to me by the doctor who is treating it, with- 

 out, of course, giving any clue as to the identity of the 

 patient, the end for which the censor is working is 

 suicide. Unfortunately, from the nature of the case, 

 which those acquainted with the treatment and meaning 

 of repression-complexes may readily make a guess at, 

 I cannot, in a book of the present kind, discuss the 

 symptoms and their origin in detail. But I will attempt 

 to draw such conclusions as I can without doing this 1 . 



The patient had no inclination towards normal 

 pleasures even within perfectly legitimate bounds. He 

 had however a strong leaning towards abnormal ones, 

 which leaning was completely repressed into the un- 

 conscious. This repression, combined with other com- 

 plications to which detailed reference is needless for the 

 present purpose hatred of a brutal uncle (with whom 

 the patient lived) dating from childhood; an equally 

 early poison-complex associated with mercury, to which 

 in later years a suicide-complex associated with morphia 

 became attached ; an anti-religious complex dating from 

 the fifth year resulted in acute physical illness of a 

 grave character. 



When the cause of the repression was brought into 

 consciousness, under treatment, it immediately pro- 

 duced intense loathing. The final result was, that the 

 patient felt himself entirely cut off from all human 

 fellowship 2 , and the only refuge seemed to be suicide. 



1 The details of the case have been slightly altered, and much 

 has been omitted and suppressed, in order to prevent any likeli- 

 hood of recognition, but the main peculiarities are still clearly 

 indicated. 



1 This was partly the result of brutal suggestions on the part of 



