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 as to the doctor’s fecundity, viz. 315 and 342; it is to be noted that the resemblance lies in their sum-total giving 9:9 - 8 = 1. It looks as if here likewise the notion about the differentiation of 1 were carried out. As the patient remarked, 315 seems thus a wish fulfilment, 342 on the other hand a rectification. An ingenious fancy playing round will discover the following difference between the two numbers:

3 X 1 X 5 = 15. 3 X 4 X 2 = 24. 24 - 15 = 9

Here again we come upon the important figure 9, which neatly combines the reckoning of the pregnancies and births.

It is difficult to say where the borderline of play begins; necessarily so, for the unconscious product is the creation of a sportive fancy, of that psychic impulse out of which play itself arises. It is repugnant to the scientific mind to have serious dealings with this element of play, which on all sides loses itself in the vague. But it must be never forgotten that the human mind has for thousands of years amused itself with just this kind of game; it were therefore nothing wonderful if this historic past again compelled admission in dream to similar tendencies. The patient pursues in his waking life similar phantastic tendencies about figures, as is seen in the fact already mentioned of the celebration of the 100th birthday. Their presence in the dream therefore need not surprise us. In a single example of unconscious determination exact proofs are often lacking, but the sum of our experiences entitles us to rely upon the accuracy of the individual discoveries. In the investigation of free creative phantasy we are in the region, almost more than anywhere else, of broad empiricism; a high measure of discretion as to the accuracy of individual results is consequently required, but this in nowise obliges us to pass over in silence what is active and living, for fear of being execrated as unscientific. There must be no parleying with the superstition-phobia of the modern mind; for this itself is a means by which the secrets of the unconscious are kept veiled.

It is of special interest to see how the problems of the patient are mirrored in the unconscious of his wife. His