Page:The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis II 1921 2.djvu/66

 222 COLLECTIVE REVIEWS

energy changes from one form to the other is not quite simple and straightforward; processes of some complexity being involved in the transition.

The subject of symbolism is treated by Ernest Jones in a thoroughgoing manner (17). To obtain a sure foundation for the theory of symbolism he enumerates the principal characteristics of symbols, which are: (1) the symbol stands in the place of some other more important idea, (2) there exists some common element in both ideas, (3) the symbol itself is concrete and sensory in nature, while the represented idea is relatively abstract, (4) the symbolic method of expression is a primitive mode of thought, (5) symbols arise as a result of a process that is unconscious, spontaneous and automatic (as in the case ot wit). In contra- distinction to the views of certain others (e. g. Jung) Ernest Jones is of opinion that symbols originate de novo in each individual and are not transmitted directly by inheritance; the fundamental human interests remain for ever unchanged, and it is the perman- ent nature of these interests that accounts for the constant re- currence of the same symbolic forms. The psychological basis of symbolism is to be found in the process of identification. This process is not due to intellectual failure; it is explicable as a result of the direction of interest, and is a consequence of the operation of the pleasure-principle in all primitive thought and also of the demand made by the reality-principle that the new shall be adapted to the old (so that the unknown may acquire a mean- ing). Only what is repressed is expressed symbolically; the relation between the symbol and the idea it represents is therefore not reversible.

In the process of analogy there is to be found, according to Ferenczi (5), a pleasure connected with the acts of repetition and rediscovery, a pleasure which originates from the narcissistic ele- ments of the Libido.

F. PSYCHOLOGICAL INSTRUCTION

Present-day medicine has — as Bleuler (1) shows in his detailed treatment of the matter — in dealing with man left out of account the most specifically human characteristic, the mind. Medical teaching is *psychophobic' (A. Meyer), to the detriment of patient, physician and medical science.