Page:Freud - The interpretation of dreams.djvu/365

Rh having brought myself into opposition to most physicians by claiming sexual etiology for the psychoneuroses. I may say to myself: "The same kind of criticism your friend met with you will meet with too, and have already met with to some extent," and now I may replace the "he" in the dream thoughts by "we." "Yes, you are right; we two are the fools." That mea res agitur, is clearly shown by the mention of the short, incomparably beautiful essay of Goethe, for it was a public reading of this essay which induced me to study the natural science while I was still undecided in the graduating class of the Gymnasium.

VI. I am also bound to show of another dream in which my ego does not occur that it is egotistic. On page 228 I mentioned a short dream in which Professor M. says: "My son, the myopic..."; and I stated that this was only a preliminary dream to another one, in which I play a part. Here is the main dream, omitted above, which challenges us to explain its absurd and unintelligible word-formation.

''On account of some happenings or other in the city of Rome it is necessary for the children to flee, and this they do. The scene is then laid before a gate, a two-winged gate in antique style (the Porta Romana in Siena, as I know while I am still dreaming). I am sitting on the edge of a well, and am very sad; I almost weep. A feminine person—nurse, nun—brings out the two boys and hands them over to their father, who is not myself. The elder of the two is distinctly my eldest son, and I do not see the face of the other; the woman who brings the boy asks him for a parting kiss. She is distinguished by a red nose. The boy denies her the kiss, but says to her, extending his hand to her in parting, "Auf Geseres" and to both of us (or to one of us) "Auf Ungeseres." I have the idea that the latter indicates an advantage.''

This dream is built upon a tangle of thoughts induced by a play I saw at the theatre, called Das neue Ghetto ("The New Ghetto.") The Jewish question, anxiety about the future of my children who cannot be given a native country of their own, anxiety about bringing them up so that they may have the right of native citizens—all these features may easily be recognised in the accompanying dream thoughts.

"We sat by the waters of Babylon and wept." Siena, like Rome, is famous for its beautiful fountains. In the dream