Page:The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis III 1922 1.djvu/67

 BOOK REVIEWS 59

advantages: 'Not until we learned to understand the integrative funct- ions of the organism were we actually able to explain in a physiological manner such phenomena as the adjustments of allied and antagonistic wishes and thoughts, functional conflicts, inhibition or suppression, re- pression, summation and dissociation of antagonistic cravings, the necessity of symbolical compromises in methods of thinking, the source of the pressure of the repressed craving or wish in the postural ten- sions of visceral segments and its manner of causing delusions and hallucinations' (p. 8). The rest of the book consists of this 'ex- planation '.

The inevitable question must now be asked whether this admixture of Freud, Sherrington and Pavloff brings us any nearer the under- standing of psychopathological problems, and whether it has enabled Dr. Kempf to make any original contribution of his own to the solution of these problems. Here the reviewer has to walk delicately lest he incurs Dr. Kempf's wrath by being so simple-minded as to accuse him of mere neurologizing tautology (p. 9). But does Dr. Kempf fore- stall the accusation because it is fimdamentally true, so that he has to defend himself by any device he can think of, or is he justifiably warning the superficial and stupid reader against falling into an easy trap f We can only say, whatever the consequences, that with the best will in the world and with anxious attention to his formulation we have failed to be impressed by its value. After all, the final test in such matters is in the application. And, although Dr. Kempf himself may for some reason feel happier when using such language, we do not find a single example in all the numerous case-histories recorded where the use of it has seemed to us to throw light on the actual problems of the case. What really happens is that Dr, Kempf de- scribes the events in the life-history of his patient just like anyone else and only here and there suddenly, and as it seems to us irrelevantly, throws in a remark about their postural tonus or projicient apparatus; a man is struggling against a homosexual propensity or a jealousy oi his father, whereupon it is obvious, or should be to the reader, that his autonomic apparatus is undergoing a compensatory effort to re- establish a state of comfortable tonus. It may well be so, but we must believe it purely on Dr. Kempf's authority ; the ' reader will seek in vain for the faintest evidence of what is actually going on in the patient's viscera, or for any reason to think there is any causal relation between what is supposed to be going on and the patient's mental difficulties. Let us look at an example given by Dr. Kempf: 'When an artisan loses his right hand in an accident and complains of in- somnia, loss of appetite and a "sinking feeling" in his abdomen, we know {sic) that the stomach and viscera in the epigastric region have

-/■