Page:Freud - The interpretation of dreams.djvu/284

266 significance for the dream interpretation. The fact upon which this explanation is based may be expressed in another form: Every element of the dream content turns out to be over-determined—that is, it enjoys a manifold representation in the dream thoughts.

We shall learn more by testing the remaining component parts of the dream as to their occurrence in the dream thoughts. The coloured plate refers (cf. the analysis on p. 145) to a new subject, the criticism passed upon my work by colleagues, and to a subject already represented in the dream—my hobbies—and also to a childish recollection in which I pull to pieces the book with the coloured plates; the dried specimen of the plant relates to an experience at the Gymnasium centering about and particularly emphasizing the herbarium. Thus I see what sort of relation exists between the dream content and dream thoughts: Not only do the elements of the dream have a manifold determination in the dream thoughts, but the individual dream thoughts are represented in the dream by many elements. Starting from an element of the dream the path of associations leads to a number of dream thoughts; and from a dream thought to several elements of the dream. The formation of the dream does not, therefore, take place in such fashion that a single one of the dream thoughts or a group of them furnishes the dream content with an abridgment as its representative therein, and that then another dream thought furnishes another abridgment as its representative—somewhat as popular representatives are elected from among the people—but the whole mass of the dream thoughts is subjected to a certain elaboration, in the course of which those elements that receive the greatest and completest support stand out in relief, analogous, perhaps, to election by scrutins des listes. Whatever dream I may subject to such dismemberment, I always find the same fundamental principle confirmed—that the dream elements are constructed from the entire mass of the dream thoughts and that every one of them appears in relation to the dream thoughts to have a multiple determination.

It is certainly not out of place to demonstrate this relation of the dream content to the dream thoughts by means of a fresh example, which is distinguished by a particularly artful