Page:Freud - The history of the psychoanalytic movement.djvu/32

 psychoanalysis. In the critical city of Berlin, we have K. Abraham, one of the most prominent representatives of psychoanalysis. He was formerly an assistant of Bleuler. One might wonder that this state of things has thus continued for a number of years without any change, if it was not known that the above account merely describes the superficial appearances. One must not overestimate the significance of the rejection of psychoanalysis by the official representatives of science, the heads of institutions, as well as their young following. It is easy to understand why the opponents loudly raise their voices whilst the followers, being intimidated, keep silent. Many of the latter, whose first contributions to analysis raised high expectations, later withdrew from the movement under the pressure of circumstances. But the movement itself strides ahead quietly. It is always gaining new supporters among psychiatrists and the laity. It constantly increases the number of readers of psychoanalytic literature and thus forces the opponents to a more violent attempt at defense. In the course of these years I have read, perhaps a dozen times, in the reports of the transactions of certain congresses and of meetings of scientific societies, or in reviews of certain publications, that psychoanalysis was now dead, that it was finally overcome and settled. The answer to all this would have to read like the telegram from Mark Twain to the newspaper that falsely announced his death: "The report of my death is grossly exaggerated." After each of these death-notices, psychoanalysis has gained new followers and co-workers and has created for itself new organs. Surely to be reported dead is an advance over being treated with dead silence!

Hand in hand with its territorial expansion just described psychoanalysis became enlarged with regard to its contents through its encroaching upon fields of knowledge outside of the study of the neuroses and psychiatry. I will not treat in detail the development of this part of our branch of science since this was excellently done by Rank and Sachs (in Löwenfeld's "Grenzfragen") which