Page:Jung - The psychology of dementia praecox.djvu/122

98 remain the same, namely, the psyche never rids itself of the complex. With the desolation of the complex an improvement takes place, but this is also accompanied by a destruction of a more or less greater portion of the personality, so that the precocious dement at best escapes with a psychic mutilation. The separation of the precocious dement from reality, the loss of interest in objective happenings, is not difficult to explain when we consider that he persistently stands under the ban of an invincible complex. He whose whole interest is chained by a complex must be like one dead to all surroundings. Janet's normal "fonction du réel" must cease with it. He who is possessed by a strong complex continues to think in the complex, he dreams with open eyes and psychologically no more adapts himself to his surroundings. That which Janet says about the "fonction du réel" in hysteria is, in a certain measure, also true in dementia præcox: "The patient constructs in his imagination small, very coherent and very logical stories; it is when reality is to be dealt with that he is no more capable of paying attention or of understanding." The greatest difficulty in these really not simple problems is the hypothetic X, the metabolic toxin (?) and its effects on the psyche. It is uncommonly difficult to characterize, in a measure, these effects from the psychological side. If I may be allowed to give expression to a supposition I would say that to me it seems that the effects most distinctly manifest themselves in the enormous tendencies towards automatization and fixation; in other words, in the persistence of complex effects. Accordingly, the toxin (?) is to be considered as a highly developed body which adheres everywhere to the psychic processes, especially to those which are emotionally accentuated, reinforcing and automatizing them. Finally it must be considered that the complex to a great extent absorbs the brain activity, on account of which something like a deencephalization takes place. The results of this may be the origin of those forms of automatism which are principally developed in the motor system.

This more programmatic than exhaustive review of the parallels between hysteria and dementia præcox may probably sound hypothetical to those readers not accustomed to Freud's views. By no means do I intend to give here anything conclusive, but rather something preparatory in order to support and simplify the illustrations in the following experimental investigation.