DISCOVERY 



275 



Reviews of Books 



THE DEVELOPJIENT AND APPLICATION OF 

 PSYCHO-ANALYSIS 



Introductory Lectures on Psycho-analysis. By Prof. 



SiGMUND Freud, M.D., LL.D. (George Allen & 



Unwin, Ltd., 185.) 

 Fundamental Conceptions of Psycho-analysis. By A. A, 



Brill, M.D. (George AUen & Unwin, Ltd., 12s. 6d.) 



The Psycho-Analytic Study of the Family. By J. C. 

 Flugel, B.A. (The International Psycho-analytic 

 Press and George AUen & Unwin, Ltd., los. 6d.) 



The publication of Professor Freud's recent lectures on 

 Psycho-analysis is an event of considerable importance 

 to those who are interested in modern psychology, for it 

 is now more than twenty years since the theories were 

 first propounded, and during this time, as fresh material 

 was brought under survey, they have undergone almost 

 continuous modification and development, though it is 

 chiefly only in their earlier — and cruder — form that they 

 are known to the general public. The theories were 

 received for the most part with an indignant opposition 

 which was unhesitatingly attributed by those who upheld 

 them to prejudice due to sexual repression or to wounded 

 amour propre. This may well have been true, at least 

 in part, but some of the opposition may also be ascribed 

 to the singular infelicity with which the theories were 

 presented, and to the failure of many of those who 

 undertook to expound the theories to understand them 

 or to follow their development. 



As a typical modification we may take the change of 

 attitude concerning the effect of shocks, especially of a 

 sexual character, experienced during early childhood. 

 These shocks were at first held to be important factors in 

 causing nervous trouble in later life, though they had often 

 been forgotten, and were only recalled to memory during 

 the anah^sis of the nervous symptoms. It was found, how- 

 ever, that many of the more lurid experiences of childhood 

 related during psycho-analj-sis were — as often as not — 

 imaginary, that is phantasies " projected backwards " 

 from a later period of life. A deeper and more con- 

 tinuously operative cause had therefore to be sought as 

 a .determining factor of the trouble. 



As another example we may take an aphorism, which 

 gained a wide currency, from Freud's Studies in Hysteria 

 (1895) — the generalisation that " in a normal sexual 

 life no neurosis is possible." In his recent lectures he 

 says (p. 322) : " In a very short time my efforts had 

 brought me to the conclusion that no neurosis — actual 

 neurosis I meant — is present when sexual life is normal." 

 This is a very important modification, for the "actual 

 neuroses " comprise but two types of nervous disorder, 

 and two that are but rarely met with ; yet Dr. Brill on 

 p. 29 of his Fundamental Conceptions of Psycho-analysis 

 says, " Freud"s dictum that no neurosis is possible in a 

 normal sexual life holds true even in the psychics," thus 

 perpetuating and extending an error that has long been 

 recognised as such, and has been corrected by Freud 

 himself. 



It is not very surprising that the Freudian school has 

 bsen described as " deriving everything from sex," but 

 the actual position is given by Professor Freud when he 

 says : " Psycho-analysis has never forgotten that non- 

 sexual instincts also exist ; it has been built upon the 

 sharp distinction between sexual instincts and Ego- 

 instincts ; and in the face of all opposition it has insisted, 

 not that they arise from sexuality, but that the neuroses 

 owe their origin to a conflict between Ego and sexuality." 



In the later developments of Psycho-analysis, the focus 

 of interest seems to be shifting from the study of the 

 libido (" the instinctive forces of the sexual life ") to the 

 study of the " Ego-instincts," that is, to the instincts of 

 self-preservation and those impulses by which the indi- 

 \-idual endeavours to adapt himself to the demands of 

 reality. 



But Professor Freud deals only briefly with these later 

 developments of Psycho-analysis, for their field of investi- 

 gation lies for the most part in the difficult region of the 

 more severe mental disorders, and the lectures are essen- 

 tially an introduction. He begins with a series of 

 lectures on the psychopathology of everyday life, and 

 devotes a second course of lectures to the psychology of 

 dreams, leading on to the third and last course, w-hich 

 deals with the general theory of the neuroses. 



Professor Freud seems a little angry sometimes with 

 those who have opposed his doctrines, and there is rather 

 more than a hint of irony in his elaboration of the 

 difficulties that his hearers \vill find in accepting his 

 theories. Early in the book there is an echo of the 

 pessimism, that to some of us seems to be faintly heard 

 in all his writings, when he says of sleep : " Our relation- 

 ship with the world which we entered so unwillingly 

 seems to be endurable only with intermissions ; hence we 

 withdraw again periodically into that condition prior to 

 our entrance into the world ; that is to say into intra- 

 uterine existence " — a discouraging view of life that would 

 seem rather to be the expression of the writer's feslings, 

 than a necessary corollary to his theories. 



Dr. BriU approaches the subject in a very different 

 spirit. The material of his book was taken from a 

 course of lectures, and must have retained much of the 

 form in which it was delivered, for it is written in a 

 hearty, conversational style that recaUs the confident 

 experienced physician addressing an audience of students. 



The greater part of the book is taken up by a vivid 

 description of the practical application of psycho-analytical 

 methods with many illuminating examples, and so much 

 the reader wiU learn in the easiest possible way. But 

 the fundamental conceptions of psycho-analysis are very 

 lightly dealt with, and it is doubtful if the reader will 

 carry away a very clear idea of them. 



Dr. Brill is a psychiatrist of long experience, and many 

 of his examples are drawn from cases of insanity, so that, 

 although he touches upon other aspects, it is chiefly in 

 its relationship to morbid conditions that the subject is 

 presented. But, though analytical psychology grew out of 

 the study of nervous disorders, it has far wider applications, 

 as, for example, in the fields of anthropology, education, 

 and sociology, and it may even be found that its greatest 



