Page:Freud - Wit and its relation to the unconscious.djvu/223

 covering the long circuitous route through which I arrived at an understanding of this relationship, I shall endeavor to demonstrate it by a short synthetic route.

G. Th. Fechner has established the principle of æsthetic assistance or enhancement which he explains in the following words: “From the unopposed meeting of pleasurable states (Bedingungen) which individually accomplish little, there results a greater, often much greater resultant pleasure than is warranted by the sum of the pleasure values of the separate states, or a greater result than could be accounted for as the sum of the individual effects; in fact the mere meeting of this kind can result in a positive pleasure product which overflows the threshold of pleasure when the factors taken separately are too weak to accomplish this. The only condition is that in comparison to others they must produce a greater sense of satisfaction.” I am of the opinion that the theme of wit does not give us the opportunity to test the correctness of this principle which is demonstrable in many other artistic fields. But from wit we have learned something, which at least comes near this principle, namely, that in a co-operation of many pleasure-