Page:Collected Papers on Analytical Psychology (1916).djvu/249

 of these conflicts in infancy is largely proven by means of psychoanalytic experience. It is in the realm of this complex that the fixation is supposed to have taken place. Through the highly potent and effective existence of the nucleus-complex in the unconscious of neurotics, Freud was led to the hypothesis, that the neurotic has a peculiar fixation or attachment to it. Not the mere existence of this complex—for everybody has it in the unconscious—but the very strong attachment to it is what is typical of the neurotic. He is far more influenced by this complex than the normal person; many examples in confirmation of this statement will be found in every one of the recent psychoanalytic histories of neurotic cases.

We must admit that this conception is a very plausible one, because the hypothesis of fixation is based upon the well-known fact, that certain periods of human life, and particularly infancy, do sometimes leave determining traces for ever. The only question is, whether this principle is a sufficient explanation or not. If we examine persons who have been neurotic from infancy it seems to be confirmed, for we see the nucleus-complex as a permanent and powerful activity throughout the whole life. But if we take cases which never show any considerable traces of neurosis except at the particular time when they break down, and there are many such, this principle becomes doubtful. If there is such a thing as fixation, it is not permissible to base upon it a new hypothesis, claiming that at times during certain epochs of life the fixation becomes loosened and ineffective, while at others it suddenly becomes strengthened and effective In such cases we find the nucleus-complex as active and as potent as in those which apparently support the theory of fixation. Here a critical attitude is peculiarly justifiable, when we consider the often-repeated observation that the moment of the outbreak of the disease is by no means indifferent; as a rule it is most critical. It usually occurs at the moment when a new psychological adjustment, that is, a new adaptation, is demanded. Such moments facilitate the outbreak of a neurosis, as every experienced neurologist knows. This fact