Page:Jung - The psychology of dementia praecox.djvu/84

60 desire. As shown by the above-mentioned recollections, the dreamer feared that the horse would fall or that the force of the moving trunk might thrust it into something. This vis a tergo can readily be perceived as X.'s own impetuous temperament which he feared might sometimes force him into many thoughtless acts.

The dream continues: Then a rider on a small horse came along and slowly rode toward the unruly horse which also assumed a somewhat slower gait. His sexual impetuosity is bridled. X. states that the rider by his dress and from his general appearance resembled his superior. This fits the first interpretation of the dream. His superior moderates the rash pace of the horse; in other words, he hinders the too rapid advancement of the dreamer because he is his superior. Now we have to search for the further development of the sexual thought. Perhaps there is something behind this peculiar expression, "a little horse." X. states that the horse was little and pretty like a child's toy and recalls to him an incident of his youth. While still a boy he noticed a woman far advanced in pregnancy, wearing hoops. It was then the style. This appeared to him very comical and he asked his mother whether this woman wore a horse under her dress. (He thought of horses worn at carnivals or circuses which are buckled to the body.) Since then, whenever he saw a woman in a pregnant state, it recalled to him this childish hypothesis. His wife, as we mentioned above, is pregnant. Pregnancy was also mentioned above as a hindrance to travelling. Here it bridled the impetuosity which we were obliged to designate as sexual. This part of the dream apparently means that pregnancy of the wife imposes restraints on the husband. Here we have a very clear thought which is evidently intensely repressed and extraordinarily well hidden in the meshes of the dream. It is composed entirely of symbols of the upward striving conduct. Pregnancy, however, does not seem to be the only reason for the restraint, for the dreamer feared "that the horses may in spite of all overrun the rider." But then we have the slowly advancing cab which moderated still more the gait of the horse. On asking X. who was in the cab, he recalled that there were children. The children therefore were apparently subjected to some repression, as the dreamer recalled them only