Page:Psychology of the Unconscious (1916).djvu/486

 Self-incubation and self-castigation and introversion are very closely connected ideas.[117] The Zosimos vision mentioned above betrays the same train of thought, where it is said of the place of transformation: [Greek: o( to/pos tê~s a)skê/seôs]. We have already observed that the place of transformation is really the uterus. Absorption in one's self (introversion) is an entrance into one's own uterus, and also at the same time asceticism. In the philosophy of the Brahmans the world arose from this activity; among the post-Christian Gnostics it produced the revival and spiritual rebirth of the individual, who was born into a new spiritual world. The Hindoo philosophy is considerably more daring and logical, and assumes that creation results from introversion in general, as in the wonderful hymn of Rigveda, 10, 29, it is said:

"What was hidden in the shell, Was born through the power of fiery torments. From this first arose love, As the germ of knowledge, The wise found the roots of existence in non-existence, By investigating the hearts impulses."[118]

This philosophical view interprets the world as an emanation of the libido, and this must be widely accepted from the theoretic as well as the psychologic standpoint, for the function of reality is an instinctive function, having the character of biological adaptation. When the insane Schreber brought about the end of the world through his libido-introversion, he expressed an entirely rational psychologic view, just as Schopenhauer wished to abolish