The
hysterical vomiting of a female patient proved, on the one hand, to be
the realization of an unconscious fancy from the time of puberty, that
she might be continuously pregnant and have a multitude of children,
and this was subsequently united with the wish that she might have them
from as many men as possible.
hysterical vomiting of a female patient proved, on the one hand, to be
the realization of an unconscious fancy from the time of puberty, that
she might be continuously pregnant and have a multitude of children,
and this was subsequently united with the wish that she might have them
from as many men as possible.
Dream Psychology by Sigmund Freud
Or, thirdly, it may have no relation to
daily life, and belong to those wishes that originate during the night
from the suppression. If we now follow our scheme of the psychic
apparatus, we can localize a wish of the first order in the system
Forec. We may assume that a wish of the second order has been forced
back from the Forec. system into the Unc. system, where alone, if
anywhere, it can maintain itself; while a wish-feeling of the third
order we consider altogether incapable of leaving the Unc. system. This
brings up the question whether wishes arising from these different
sources possess the same value for the dream, and whether they have the
same power to incite a dream.
On reviewing the dreams which we have at our disposal for answering this
question, we are at once moved to add as a fourth source of the
dream-wish the actual wish incitements arising during the night, such
as thirst and sexual desire. It then becomes evident that the source of
the dream-wish does not affect its capacity to incite a dream. That a
wish suppressed during the day asserts itself in the dream can be shown
by a great many examples. I shall mention a very simple example of this
class. A somewhat sarcastic young lady, whose younger friend has become
engaged to be married, is asked throughout the day by her acquaintances
whether she knows and what she thinks of the fiance. She answers with
unqualified praise, thereby silencing her own judgment, as she would
prefer to tell the truth, namely, that he is an ordinary person. The
following night she dreams that the same question is put to her, and
that she replies with the formula: "In case of subsequent orders it will
suffice to mention the number. " Finally, we have learned from numerous
analyses that the wish in all dreams that have been subject to
distortion has been derived from the unconscious, and has been unable to
come to perception in the waking state. Thus it would appear that all
wishes are of the same value and force for the dream formation.
I am at present unable to prove that the state of affairs is really
different, but I am strongly inclined to assume a more stringent
determination of the dream-wish. Children's dreams leave no doubt that
an unfulfilled wish of the day may be the instigator of the dream. But
we must not forget that it is, after all, the wish of a child, that it
is a wish-feeling of infantile strength only. I have a strong doubt
whether an unfulfilled wish from the day would suffice to create a dream
in an adult. It would rather seem that as we learn to control our
impulses by intellectual activity, we more and more reject as vain the
formation or retention of such intense wishes as are natural to
childhood. In this, indeed, there may be individual variations; some
retain the infantile type of psychic processes longer than others. The
differences are here the same as those found in the gradual decline of
the originally distinct visual imagination.
In general, however, I am of the opinion that unfulfilled wishes of the
day are insufficient to produce a dream in adults. I readily admit that
the wish instigators originating in conscious like contribute towards
the incitement of dreams, but that is probably all. The dream would not
originate if the foreconscious wish were not reinforced from another
source.
That source is the unconscious. I believe that _the conscious wish is a
dream inciter only if it succeeds in arousing a similar unconscious wish
which reinforces it_. Following the suggestions obtained through the
psychoanalysis of the neuroses, I believe that these unconscious wishes
are always active and ready for expression whenever they find an
opportunity to unite themselves with an emotion from conscious life, and
that they transfer their greater intensity to the lesser intensity of
the latter. [1] It may therefore seem that the conscious wish alone has
been realized in a dream; but a slight peculiarity in the formation of
this dream will put us on the track of the powerful helper from the
unconscious. These ever active and, as it were, immortal wishes from the
unconscious recall the legendary Titans who from time immemorial have
borne the ponderous mountains which were once rolled upon them by the
victorious gods, and which even now quiver from time to time from the
convulsions of their mighty limbs; I say that these wishes found in the
repression are of themselves of an infantile origin, as we have learned
from the psychological investigation of the neuroses. I should like,
therefore, to withdraw the opinion previously expressed that it is
unimportant whence the dream-wish originates, and replace it by another,
as follows: _The wish manifested in the dream must be an infantile one_.
In the adult it originates in the Unc. , while in the child, where no
separation and censor as yet exist between Forec. and Unc. , or where
these are only in the process of formation, it is an unfulfilled and
unrepressed wish from the waking state. I am aware that this conception
cannot be generally demonstrated, but I maintain nevertheless that it
can be frequently demonstrated, even when it was not suspected, and that
it cannot be generally refuted.
The wish-feelings which remain from the conscious waking state are,
therefore, relegated to the background in the dream formation. In the
dream content I shall attribute to them only the part attributed to the
material of actual sensations during sleep. If I now take into account
those other psychic instigations remaining from the waking state which
are not wishes, I shall only adhere to the line mapped out for me by
this train of thought. We may succeed in provisionally terminating the
sum of energy of our waking thoughts by deciding to go to sleep. He is a
good sleeper who can do this; Napoleon I. is reputed to have been a
model of this sort. But we do not always succeed in accomplishing it, or
in accomplishing it perfectly. Unsolved problems, harassing cares,
overwhelming impressions continue the thinking activity even during
sleep, maintaining psychic processes in the system which we have termed
the foreconscious. These mental processes continuing into sleep may be
divided into the following groups: 1, That which has not been terminated
during the day owing to casual prevention; 2, that which has been left
unfinished by temporary paralysis of our mental power, _i. e. _ the
unsolved; 3, that which has been rejected and suppressed during the day.
This unites with a powerful group (4) formed by that which has been
excited in our Unc. during the day by the work of the foreconscious.
Finally, we may add group (5) consisting of the indifferent and hence
unsettled impressions of the day.
We should not underrate the psychic intensities introduced into sleep by
these remnants of waking life, especially those emanating from the group
of the unsolved. These excitations surely continue to strive for
expression during the night, and we may assume with equal certainty that
the sleeping state renders impossible the usual continuation of the
excitement in the foreconscious and the termination of the excitement by
its becoming conscious. As far as we can normally become conscious of
our mental processes, even during the night, in so far we are not
asleep. I shall not venture to state what change is produced in the
Forec. system by the sleeping state, but there is no doubt that the
psychological character of sleep is essentially due to the change of
energy in this very system, which also dominates the approach to
motility, which is paralyzed during sleep. In contradistinction to this,
there seems to be nothing in the psychology of the dream to warrant the
assumption that sleep produces any but secondary changes in the
conditions of the Unc. system. Hence, for the nocturnal excitation in
the Force, there remains no other path than that followed by the wish
excitements from the Unc. This excitation must seek reinforcement from
the Unc. , and follow the detours of the unconscious excitations. But
what is the relation of the foreconscious day remnants to the dream?
There is no doubt that they penetrate abundantly into the dream, that
they utilize the dream content to obtrude themselves upon consciousness
even during the night; indeed, they occasionally even dominate the dream
content, and impel it to continue the work of the day; it is also
certain that the day remnants may just as well have any other character
as that of wishes; but it is highly instructive and even decisive for
the theory of wish-fulfillment to see what conditions they must comply
with in order to be received into the dream.
Let us pick out one of the dreams cited above as examples, _e. g. _, the
dream in which my friend Otto seems to show the symptoms of Basedow's
disease. My friend Otto's appearance occasioned me some concern during
the day, and this worry, like everything else referring to this person,
affected me. I may also assume that these feelings followed me into
sleep. I was probably bent on finding out what was the matter with him.
In the night my worry found expression in the dream which I have
reported, the content of which was not only senseless, but failed to
show any wish-fulfillment. But I began to investigate for the source of
this incongruous expression of the solicitude felt during the day, and
analysis revealed the connection. I identified my friend Otto with a
certain Baron L. and myself with a Professor R. There was only one
explanation for my being impelled to select just this substitution for
the day thought. I must have always been prepared in the Unc. to
identify myself with Professor R. , as it meant the realization of one of
the immortal infantile wishes, viz. that of becoming great. Repulsive
ideas respecting my friend, that would certainly have been repudiated
in a waking state, took advantage of the opportunity to creep into the
dream, but the worry of the day likewise found some form of expression
through a substitution in the dream content. The day thought, which was
no wish in itself but rather a worry, had in some way to find a
connection with the infantile now unconscious and suppressed wish, which
then allowed it, though already properly prepared, to "originate" for
consciousness. The more dominating this worry, the stronger must be the
connection to be established; between the contents of the wish and that
of the worry there need be no connection, nor was there one in any of
our examples.
We can now sharply define the significance of the unconscious wish for
the dream. It may be admitted that there is a whole class of dreams in
which the incitement originates preponderatingly or even exclusively
from the remnants of daily life; and I believe that even my cherished
desire to become at some future time a "professor extraordinarius" would
have allowed me to slumber undisturbed that night had not my worry about
my friend's health been still active. But this worry alone would not
have produced a dream; the motive power needed by the dream had to be
contributed by a wish, and it was the affair of the worriment to
procure for itself such wish as a motive power of the dream. To speak
figuratively, it is quite possible that a day thought plays the part of
the contractor (_entrepreneur_) in the dream. But it is known that no
matter what idea the contractor may have in mind, and how desirous he
may be of putting it into operation, he can do nothing without capital;
he must depend upon a capitalist to defray the necessary expenses, and
this capitalist, who supplies the psychic expenditure for the dream is
invariably and indisputably _a wish from the unconscious_, no matter
what the nature of the waking thought may be.
In other cases the capitalist himself is the contractor for the dream;
this, indeed, seems to be the more usual case. An unconscious wish is
produced by the day's work, which in turn creates the dream. The dream
processes, moreover, run parallel with all the other possibilities of
the economic relationship used here as an illustration. Thus, the
entrepreneur may contribute some capital himself, or several
entrepreneurs may seek the aid of the same capitalist, or several
capitalists may jointly supply the capital required by the entrepreneur.
Thus there are dreams produced by more than one dream-wish, and many
similar variations which may readily be passed over and are of no
further interest to us. What we have left unfinished in this discussion
of the dream-wish we shall be able to develop later.
The "tertium comparationis" in the comparisons just employed--_i. e. _ the
sum placed at our free disposal in proper allotment--admits of still
finer application for the illustration of the dream structure. We can
recognize in most dreams a center especially supplied with perceptible
intensity. This is regularly the direct representation of the
wish-fulfillment; for, if we undo the displacements of the dream-work by
a process of retrogression, we find that the psychic intensity of the
elements in the dream thoughts is replaced by the perceptible intensity
of the elements in the dream content. The elements adjoining the
wish-fulfillment have frequently nothing to do with its sense, but prove
to be descendants of painful thoughts which oppose the wish. But, owing
to their frequently artificial connection with the central element, they
have acquired sufficient intensity to enable them to come to expression.
Thus, the force of expression of the wish-fulfillment is diffused over a
certain sphere of association, within which it raises to expression all
elements, including those that are in themselves impotent. In dreams
having several strong wishes we can readily separate from one another
the spheres of the individual wish-fulfillments; the gaps in the dream
likewise can often be explained as boundary zones.
Although the foregoing remarks have considerably limited the
significance of the day remnants for the dream, it will nevertheless be
worth our while to give them some attention. For they must be a
necessary ingredient in the formation of the dream, inasmuch as
experience reveals the surprising fact that every dream shows in its
content a connection with some impression of a recent day, often of the
most indifferent kind. So far we have failed to see any necessity for
this addition to the dream mixture. This necessity appears only when we
follow closely the part played by the unconscious wish, and then seek
information in the psychology of the neuroses. We thus learn that the
unconscious idea, as such, is altogether incapable of entering into the
foreconscious, and that it can exert an influence there only by uniting
with a harmless idea already belonging to the foreconscious, to which it
transfers its intensity and under which it allows itself to be
concealed. This is the fact of transference which furnishes an
explanation for so many surprising occurrences in the psychic life of
neurotics.
The idea from the foreconscious which thus obtains an unmerited
abundance of intensity may be left unchanged by the transference, or it
may have forced upon it a modification from the content of the
transferring idea. I trust the reader will pardon my fondness for
comparisons from daily life, but I feel tempted to say that the
relations existing for the repressed idea are similar to the situations
existing in Austria for the American dentist, who is forbidden to
practise unless he gets permission from a regular physician to use his
name on the public signboard and thus cover the legal requirements.
Moreover, just as it is naturally not the busiest physicians who form
such alliances with dental practitioners, so in the psychic life only
such foreconscious or conscious ideas are chosen to cover a repressed
idea as have not themselves attracted much of the attention which is
operative in the foreconscious. The unconscious entangles with its
connections preferentially either those impressions and ideas of the
foreconscious which have been left unnoticed as indifferent, or those
that have soon been deprived of this attention through rejection. It is
a familiar fact from the association studies confirmed by every
experience, that ideas which have formed intimate connections in one
direction assume an almost negative attitude to whole groups of new
connections. I once tried from this principle to develop a theory for
hysterical paralysis.
If we assume that the same need for the transference of the repressed
ideas which we have learned to know from the analysis of the neuroses
makes its influence felt in the dream as well, we can at once explain
two riddles of the dream, viz. that every dream analysis shows an
interweaving of a recent impression, and that this recent element is
frequently of the most indifferent character. We may add what we have
already learned elsewhere, that these recent and indifferent elements
come so frequently into the dream content as a substitute for the most
deep-lying of the dream thoughts, for the further reason that they have
least to fear from the resisting censor. But while this freedom from
censorship explains only the preference for trivial elements, the
constant presence of recent elements points to the fact that there is a
need for transference. Both groups of impressions satisfy the demand of
the repression for material still free from associations, the
indifferent ones because they have offered no inducement for extensive
associations, and the recent ones because they have had insufficient
time to form such associations.
We thus see that the day remnants, among which we may now include the
indifferent impressions when they participate in the dream formation,
not only borrow from the Unc. the motive power at the disposal of the
repressed wish, but also offer to the unconscious something
indispensable, namely, the attachment necessary to the transference. If
we here attempted to penetrate more deeply into the psychic processes,
we should first have to throw more light on the play of emotions between
the foreconscious and the unconscious, to which, indeed, we are urged by
the study of the psychoneuroses, whereas the dream itself offers no
assistance in this respect.
Just one further remark about the day remnants. There is no doubt that
they are the actual disturbers of sleep, and not the dream, which, on
the contrary, strives to guard sleep. But we shall return to this point
later.
We have so far discussed the dream-wish, we have traced it to the sphere
of the Unc. , and analyzed its relations to the day remnants, which in
turn may be either wishes, psychic emotions of any other kind, or simply
recent impressions. We have thus made room for any claims that may be
made for the importance of conscious thought activity in dream
formations in all its variations. Relying upon our thought series, it
would not be at all impossible for us to explain even those extreme
cases in which the dream as a continuer of the day work brings to a
happy conclusion and unsolved problem possess an example, the analysis
of which might reveal the infantile or repressed wish source furnishing
such alliance and successful strengthening of the efforts of the
foreconscious activity. But we have not come one step nearer a solution
of the riddle: Why can the unconscious furnish the motive power for the
wish-fulfillment only during sleep? The answer to this question must
throw light on the psychic nature of wishes; and it will be given with
the aid of the diagram of the psychic apparatus.
We do not doubt that even this apparatus attained its present perfection
through a long course of development. Let us attempt to restore it as it
existed in an early phase of its activity. From assumptions, to be
confirmed elsewhere, we know that at first the apparatus strove to keep
as free from excitement as possible, and in its first formation,
therefore, the scheme took the form of a reflex apparatus, which enabled
it promptly to discharge through the motor tracts any sensible stimulus
reaching it from without. But this simple function was disturbed by the
wants of life, which likewise furnish the impulse for the further
development of the apparatus. The wants of life first manifested
themselves to it in the form of the great physical needs. The excitement
aroused by the inner want seeks an outlet in motility, which may be
designated as "inner changes" or as an "expression of the emotions. " The
hungry child cries or fidgets helplessly, but its situation remains
unchanged; for the excitation proceeding from an inner want requires,
not a momentary outbreak, but a force working continuously. A change can
occur only if in some way a feeling of gratification is
experienced--which in the case of the child must be through outside
help--in order to remove the inner excitement. An essential constituent
of this experience is the appearance of a certain perception (of food in
our example), the memory picture of which thereafter remains associated
with the memory trace of the excitation of want.
Thanks to the established connection, there results at the next
appearance of this want a psychic feeling which revives the memory
picture of the former perception, and thus recalls the former perception
itself, _i. e. _ it actually re-establishes the situation of the first
gratification. We call such a feeling a wish; the reappearance of the
perception constitutes the wish-fulfillment, and the full revival of the
perception by the want excitement constitutes the shortest road to the
wish-fulfillment. We may assume a primitive condition of the psychic
apparatus in which this road is really followed, _i. e. _ where the
wishing merges into an hallucination, This first psychic activity
therefore aims at an identity of perception, _i. e. _ it aims at a
repetition of that perception which is connected with the fulfillment of
the want.
This primitive mental activity must have been modified by bitter
practical experience into a more expedient secondary activity. The
establishment of the identity perception on the short regressive road
within the apparatus does not in another respect carry with it the
result which inevitably follows the revival of the same perception from
without. The gratification does not take place, and the want continues.
In order to equalize the internal with the external sum of energy, the
former must be continually maintained, just as actually happens in the
hallucinatory psychoses and in the deliriums of hunger which exhaust
their psychic capacity in clinging to the object desired. In order to
make more appropriate use of the psychic force, it becomes necessary to
inhibit the full regression so as to prevent it from extending beyond
the image of memory, whence it can select other paths leading ultimately
to the establishment of the desired identity from the outer world. This
inhibition and consequent deviation from the excitation becomes the
task of a second system which dominates the voluntary motility, _i. e. _
through whose activity the expenditure of motility is now devoted to
previously recalled purposes. But this entire complicated mental
activity which works its way from the memory picture to the
establishment of the perception identity from the outer world merely
represents a detour which has been forced upon the wish-fulfillment by
experience. [2] Thinking is indeed nothing but the equivalent of the
hallucinatory wish; and if the dream be called a wish-fulfillment this
becomes self-evident, as nothing but a wish can impel our psychic
apparatus to activity. The dream, which in fulfilling its wishes follows
the short regressive path, thereby preserves for us only an example of
the primary form of the psychic apparatus which has been abandoned as
inexpedient. What once ruled in the waking state when the psychic life
was still young and unfit seems to have been banished into the sleeping
state, just as we see again in the nursery the bow and arrow, the
discarded primitive weapons of grown-up humanity. _The dream is a
fragment of the abandoned psychic life of the child. _ In the psychoses
these modes of operation of the psychic apparatus, which are normally
suppressed in the waking state, reassert themselves, and then betray
their inability to satisfy our wants in the outer world.
The unconscious wish-feelings evidently strive to assert themselves
during the day also, and the fact of transference and the psychoses
teach us that they endeavor to penetrate to consciousness and dominate
motility by the road leading through the system of the foreconscious. It
is, therefore, the censor lying between the Unc. and the Forec. , the
assumption of which is forced upon us by the dream, that we have to
recognize and honor as the guardian of our psychic health. But is it not
carelessness on the part of this guardian to diminish its vigilance
during the night and to allow the suppressed emotions of the Unc. to
come to expression, thus again making possible the hallucinatory
regression? I think not, for when the critical guardian goes to
rest--and we have proof that his slumber is not profound--he takes care
to close the gate to motility. No matter what feelings from the
otherwise inhibited Unc. may roam about on the scene, they need not be
interfered with; they remain harmless because they are unable to put in
motion the motor apparatus which alone can exert a modifying influence
upon the outer world. Sleep guarantees the security of the fortress
which is under guard. Conditions are less harmless when a displacement
of forces is produced, not through a nocturnal diminution in the
operation of the critical censor, but through pathological enfeeblement
of the latter or through pathological reinforcement of the unconscious
excitations, and this while the foreconscious is charged with energy and
the avenues to motility are open. The guardian is then overpowered, the
unconscious excitations subdue the Forec. ; through it they dominate our
speech and actions, or they enforce the hallucinatory regression, thus
governing an apparatus not designed for them by virtue of the attraction
exerted by the perceptions on the distribution of our psychic energy. We
call this condition a psychosis.
We are now in the best position to complete our psychological
construction, which has been interrupted by the introduction of the two
systems, Unc. and Forec. We have still, however, ample reason for giving
further consideration to the wish as the sole psychic motive power in
the dream. We have explained that the reason why the dream is in every
case a wish realization is because it is a product of the Unc. , which
knows no other aim in its activity but the fulfillment of wishes, and
which has no other forces at its disposal but wish-feelings. If we
avail ourselves for a moment longer of the right to elaborate from the
dream interpretation such far-reaching psychological speculations, we
are in duty bound to demonstrate that we are thereby bringing the dream
into a relationship which may also comprise other psychic structures. If
there exists a system of the Unc. --or something sufficiently analogous
to it for the purpose of our discussion--the dream cannot be its sole
manifestation; every dream may be a wish-fulfillment, but there must be
other forms of abnormal wish-fulfillment beside this of dreams. Indeed,
the theory of all psychoneurotic symptoms culminates in the proposition
_that they too must be taken as wish-fulfillments of the unconscious_.
Our explanation makes the dream only the first member of a group most
important for the psychiatrist, an understanding of which means the
solution of the purely psychological part of the psychiatric problem.
But other members of this group of wish-fulfillments, _e. g. _, the
hysterical symptoms, evince one essential quality which I have so far
failed to find in the dream. Thus, from the investigations frequently
referred to in this treatise, I know that the formation of an hysterical
symptom necessitates the combination of both streams of our psychic
life. The symptom is not merely the expression of a realized
unconscious wish, but it must be joined by another wish from the
foreconscious which is fulfilled by the same symptom; so that the
symptom is at least doubly determined, once by each one of the
conflicting systems. Just as in the dream, there is no limit to further
over-determination. The determination not derived from the Unc. is, as
far as I can see, invariably a stream of thought in reaction against the
unconscious wish, _e. g. _, a self-punishment. Hence I may say, in
general, that _an hysterical symptom originates only where two
contrasting wish-fulfillments, having their source in different psychic
systems, are able to combine in one expression_. (Compare my latest
formulation of the origin of the hysterical symptoms in a treatise
published by the _Zeitschrift fur Sexualwissenschaft_, by Hirschfeld and
others, 1908). Examples on this point would prove of little value, as
nothing but a complete unveiling of the complication in question would
carry conviction. I therefore content myself with the mere assertion,
and will cite an example, not for conviction but for explication.
The
hysterical vomiting of a female patient proved, on the one hand, to be
the realization of an unconscious fancy from the time of puberty, that
she might be continuously pregnant and have a multitude of children,
and this was subsequently united with the wish that she might have them
from as many men as possible. Against this immoderate wish there arose a
powerful defensive impulse. But as the vomiting might spoil the
patient's figure and beauty, so that she would not find favor in the
eyes of mankind, the symptom was therefore in keeping with her punitive
trend of thought, and, being thus admissible from both sides, it was
allowed to become a reality. This is the same manner of consenting to a
wish-fulfillment which the queen of the Parthians chose for the triumvir
Crassus. Believing that he had undertaken the campaign out of greed for
gold, she caused molten gold to be poured into the throat of the corpse.
"Now hast thou what thou hast longed for. " As yet we know of the dream
only that it expresses a wish-fulfillment of the unconscious; and
apparently the dominating foreconscious permits this only after it has
subjected the wish to some distortions. We are really in no position to
demonstrate regularly a stream of thought antagonistic to the dream-wish
which is realized in the dream as in its counterpart. Only now and then
have we found in the dream traces of reaction formations, as, for
instance, the tenderness toward friend R. in the "uncle dream. " But the
contribution from the foreconscious, which is missing here, may be
found in another place. While the dominating system has withdrawn on
the wish to sleep, the dream may bring to expression with manifold
distortions a wish from the Unc. , and realize this wish by producing the
necessary changes of energy in the psychic apparatus, and may finally
retain it through the entire duration of sleep. [3]
This persistent wish to sleep on the part of the foreconscious in
general facilitates the formation of the dream. Let us refer to the
dream of the father who, by the gleam of light from the death chamber,
was brought to the conclusion that the body has been set on fire. We
have shown that one of the psychic forces decisive in causing the father
to form this conclusion, instead of being awakened by the gleam of
light, was the wish to prolong the life of the child seen in the dream
by one moment. Other wishes proceeding from the repression probably
escape us, because we are unable to analyze this dream. But as a second
motive power of the dream we may mention the father's desire to sleep,
for, like the life of the child, the sleep of the father is prolonged
for a moment by the dream. The underlying motive is: "Let the dream go
on, otherwise I must wake up. " As in this dream so also in all other
dreams, the wish to sleep lends its support to the unconscious wish. We
reported dreams which were apparently dreams of convenience. But,
properly speaking, all dreams may claim this designation. The efficacy
of the wish to continue to sleep is the most easily recognized in the
waking dreams, which so transform the objective sensory stimulus as to
render it compatible with the continuance of sleep; they interweave this
stimulus with the dream in order to rob it of any claims it might make
as a warning to the outer world. But this wish to continue to sleep must
also participate in the formation of all other dreams which may disturb
the sleeping state from within only. "Now, then, sleep on; why, it's but
a dream"; this is in many cases the suggestion of the Forec. to
consciousness when the dream goes too far; and this also describes in a
general way the attitude of our dominating psychic activity toward
dreaming, though the thought remains tacit. I must draw the conclusion
that _throughout our entire sleeping state we are just as certain that
we are dreaming as we are certain that we are sleeping_. We are
compelled to disregard the objection urged against this conclusion that
our consciousness is never directed to a knowledge of the former, and
that it is directed to a knowledge of the latter only on special
occasions when the censor is unexpectedly surprised. Against this
objection we may say that there are persons who are entirely conscious
of their sleeping and dreaming, and who are apparently endowed with the
conscious faculty of guiding their dream life. Such a dreamer, when
dissatisfied with the course taken by the dream, breaks it off without
awakening, and begins it anew in order to continue it with a different
turn, like the popular author who, on request, gives a happier ending to
his play. Or, at another time, if placed by the dream in a sexually
exciting situation, he thinks in his sleep: "I do not care to continue
this dream and exhaust myself by a pollution; I prefer to defer it in
favor of a real situation. "
[1] They share this character of indestructibility with all psychic acts
that are really unconscious--that is, with psychic acts belonging to the
system of the unconscious only. These paths are constantly open and
never fall into disuse; they conduct the discharge of the exciting
process as often as it becomes endowed with unconscious excitement To
speak metaphorically they suffer the same form of annihilation as the
shades of the lower region in the _Odyssey_, who awoke to new life the
moment they drank blood. The processes depending on the foreconscious
system are destructible in a different way. The psychotherapy of the
neuroses is based on this difference.
[2] Le Lorrain justly extols the wish-fulfilment of the dream: "Sans
fatigue serieuse, sans etre oblige de recourir a cette lutte opinatre et
longue qui use et corrode les jouissances poursuivies. "
[3] This idea has been borrowed from _The Theory of Sleep_ by Liebault,
who revived hypnotic investigation in our days. (_Du Sommeil provoque_,
etc. ; Paris, 1889. )
VII
THE FUNCTION OF THE DREAM
Since we know that the foreconscious is suspended during the night by
the wish to sleep, we can proceed to an intelligent investigation of the
dream process. But let us first sum up the knowledge of this process
already gained. We have shown that the waking activity leaves day
remnants from which the sum of energy cannot be entirely removed; or the
waking activity revives during the day one of the unconscious wishes; or
both conditions occur simultaneously; we have already discovered the
many variations that may take place. The unconscious wish has already
made its way to the day remnants, either during the day or at any rate
with the beginning of sleep, and has effected a transference to it. This
produces a wish transferred to the recent material, or the suppressed
recent wish comes to life again through a reinforcement from the
unconscious. This wish now endeavors to make its way to consciousness on
the normal path of the mental processes through the foreconscious, to
which indeed it belongs through one of its constituent elements. It is
confronted, however, by the censor, which is still active, and to the
influence of which it now succumbs. It now takes on the distortion for
which the way has already been paved by its transference to the recent
material. Thus far it is in the way of becoming something resembling an
obsession, delusion, or the like, _i. e. _ a thought reinforced by a
transference and distorted in expression by the censor. But its further
progress is now checked through the dormant state of the foreconscious;
this system has apparently protected itself against invasion by
diminishing its excitements. The dream process, therefore, takes the
regressive course, which has just been opened by the peculiarity of the
sleeping state, and thereby follows the attraction exerted on it by the
memory groups, which themselves exist in part only as visual energy not
yet translated into terms of the later systems. On its way to regression
the dream takes on the form of dramatization. The subject of compression
will be discussed later. The dream process has now terminated the second
part of its repeatedly impeded course. The first part expended itself
progressively from the unconscious scenes or phantasies to the
foreconscious, while the second part gravitates from the advent of the
censor back to the perceptions. But when the dream process becomes a
content of perception it has, so to speak, eluded the obstacle set up in
the Forec. by the censor and by the sleeping state. It succeeds in
drawing attention to itself and in being noticed by consciousness. For
consciousness, which means to us a sensory organ for the reception of
psychic qualities, may receive stimuli from two sources--first, from the
periphery of the entire apparatus, viz. from the perception system, and,
secondly, from the pleasure and pain stimuli, which constitute the sole
psychic quality produced in the transformation of energy within the
apparatus. All other processes in the system, even those in the
foreconscious, are devoid of any psychic quality, and are therefore not
objects of consciousness inasmuch as they do not furnish pleasure or
pain for perception. We shall have to assume that those liberations of
pleasure and pain automatically regulate the outlet of the occupation
processes. But in order to make possible more delicate functions, it was
later found necessary to render the course of the presentations more
independent of the manifestations of pain. To accomplish this the Forec.
system needed some qualities of its own which could attract
consciousness, and most probably received them through the connection of
the foreconscious processes with the memory system of the signs of
speech, which is not devoid of qualities. Through the qualities of this
system, consciousness, which had hitherto been a sensory organ only for
the perceptions, now becomes also a sensory organ for a part of our
mental processes. Thus we have now, as it were, two sensory surfaces,
one directed to perceptions and the other to the foreconscious mental
processes.
I must assume that the sensory surface of consciousness devoted to the
Forec. is rendered less excitable by sleep than that directed to the
P-systems. The giving up of interest for the nocturnal mental processes
is indeed purposeful. Nothing is to disturb the mind; the Forec. wants
to sleep. But once the dream becomes a perception, it is then capable of
exciting consciousness through the qualities thus gained. The sensory
stimulus accomplishes what it was really destined for, namely, it
directs a part of the energy at the disposal of the Forec. in the form
of attention upon the stimulant. We must, therefore, admit that the
dream invariably awakens us, that is, it puts into activity a part of
the dormant force of the Forec. This force imparts to the dream that
influence which we have designated as secondary elaboration for the sake
of connection and comprehensibility. This means that the dream is
treated by it like any other content of perception; it is subjected to
the same ideas of expectation, as far at least as the material admits.
As far as the direction is concerned in this third part of the dream, it
may be said that here again the movement is progressive.
To avoid misunderstanding, it will not be amiss to say a few words about
the temporal peculiarities of these dream processes. In a very
interesting discussion, apparently suggested by Maury's puzzling
guillotine dream, Goblet tries to demonstrate that the dream requires no
other time than the transition period between sleeping and awakening.
The awakening requires time, as the dream takes place during that
period. One is inclined to believe that the final picture of the dream
is so strong that it forces the dreamer to awaken; but, as a matter of
fact, this picture is strong only because the dreamer is already very
near awakening when it appears. "Un reve c'est un reveil qui commence. "
It has already been emphasized by Dugas that Goblet was forced to
repudiate many facts in order to generalize his theory. There are,
moreover, dreams from which we do not awaken, _e. g. _, some dreams in
which we dream that we dream. From our knowledge of the dream-work, we
can by no means admit that it extends only over the period of awakening.
On the contrary, we must consider it probable that the first part of
the dream-work begins during the day when we are still under the
domination of the foreconscious. The second phase of the dream-work,
viz. the modification through the censor, the attraction by the
unconscious scenes, and the penetration to perception must continue
throughout the night. And we are probably always right when we assert
that we feel as though we had been dreaming the whole night, although we
cannot say what. I do not, however, think it necessary to assume that,
up to the time of becoming conscious, the dream processes really follow
the temporal sequence which we have described, viz. that there is first
the transferred dream-wish, then the distortion of the censor, and
consequently the change of direction to regression, and so on. We were
forced to form such a succession for the sake of _description_; in
reality, however, it is much rather a matter of simultaneously trying
this path and that, and of emotions fluctuating to and fro, until
finally, owing to the most expedient distribution, one particular
grouping is secured which remains. From certain personal experiences, I
am myself inclined to believe that the dream-work often requires more
than one day and one night to produce its result; if this be true, the
extraordinary art manifested in the construction of the dream loses all
its marvels. In my opinion, even the regard for comprehensibility as an
occurrence of perception may take effect before the dream attracts
consciousness to itself. To be sure, from now on the process is
accelerated, as the dream is henceforth subjected to the same treatment
as any other perception. It is like fireworks, which require hours of
preparation and only a moment for ignition.
Through the dream-work the dream process now gains either sufficient
intensity to attract consciousness to itself and arouse the
foreconscious, which is quite independent of the time or profundity of
sleep, or, its intensity being insufficient it must wait until it meets
the attention which is set in motion immediately before awakening. Most
dreams seem to operate with relatively slight psychic intensities, for
they wait for the awakening. This, however, explains the fact that we
regularly perceive something dreamt on being suddenly aroused from a
sound sleep. Here, as well as in spontaneous awakening, the first glance
strikes the perception content created by the dream-work, while the next
strikes the one produced from without.
But of greater theoretical interest are those dreams which are capable
of waking us in the midst of sleep. We must bear in mind the expediency
elsewhere universally demonstrated, and ask ourselves why the dream or
the unconscious wish has the power to disturb sleep, _i. e. _ the
fulfillment of the foreconscious wish. This is probably due to certain
relations of energy into which we have no insight. If we possessed such
insight we should probably find that the freedom given to the dream and
the expenditure of a certain amount of detached attention represent for
the dream an economy in energy, keeping in view the fact that the
unconscious must be held in check at night just as during the day. We
know from experience that the dream, even if it interrupts sleep,
repeatedly during the same night, still remains compatible with sleep.
We wake up for an instant, and immediately resume our sleep. It is like
driving off a fly during sleep, we awake _ad hoc_, and when we resume
our sleep we have removed the disturbance. As demonstrated by familiar
examples from the sleep of wet nurses, &c. , the fulfillment of the wish
to sleep is quite compatible with the retention of a certain amount of
attention in a given direction.
But we must here take cognizance of an objection that is based on a
better knowledge of the unconscious processes. Although we have
ourselves described the unconscious wishes as always active, we have,
nevertheless, asserted that they are not sufficiently strong during the
day to make themselves perceptible. But when we sleep, and the
unconscious wish has shown its power to form a dream, and with it to
awaken the foreconscious, why, then, does this power become exhausted
after the dream has been taken cognizance of? Would it not seem more
probable that the dream should continually renew itself, like the
troublesome fly which, when driven away, takes pleasure in returning
again and again? What justifies our assertion that the dream removes the
disturbance of sleep?
That the unconscious wishes always remain active is quite true. They
represent paths which are passable whenever a sum of excitement makes
use of them. Moreover, a remarkable peculiarity of the unconscious
processes is the fact that they remain indestructible. Nothing can be
brought to an end in the unconscious; nothing can cease or be forgotten.
This impression is most strongly gained in the study of the neuroses,
especially of hysteria. The unconscious stream of thought which leads to
the discharge through an attack becomes passable again as soon as there
is an accumulation of a sufficient amount of excitement. The
mortification brought on thirty years ago, after having gained access to
the unconscious affective source, operates during all these thirty years
like a recent one. Whenever its memory is touched, it is revived and
shows itself to be supplied with the excitement which is discharged in
a motor attack. It is just here that the office of psychotherapy begins,
its task being to bring about adjustment and forgetfulness for the
unconscious processes. Indeed, the fading of memories and the flagging
of affects, which we are apt to take as self-evident and to explain as a
primary influence of time on the psychic memories, are in reality
secondary changes brought about by painstaking work. It is the
foreconscious that accomplishes this work; and the only course to be
pursued by psychotherapy is the subjugate the Unc, to the domination of
the Forec.
There are, therefore, two exits for the individual unconscious emotional
process. It is either left to itself, in which case it ultimately breaks
through somewhere and secures for once a discharge for its excitation
into motility; or it succumbs to the influence of the foreconscious, and
its excitation becomes confined through this influence instead of being
discharged. It is the latter process that occurs in the dream. Owing to
the fact that it is directed by the conscious excitement, the energy
from the Forec. , which confronts the dream when grown to perception,
restricts the unconscious excitement of the dream and renders it
harmless as a disturbing factor. When the dreamer wakes up for a moment,
he has actually chased away the fly that has threatened to disturb his
sleep. We can now understand that it is really more expedient and
economical to give full sway to the unconscious wish, and clear its way
to regression so that it may form a dream, and then restrict and adjust
this dream by means of a small expenditure of foreconscious labor, than
to curb the unconscious throughout the entire period of sleep. We
should, indeed, expect that the dream, even if it was not originally an
expedient process, would have acquired some function in the play of
forces of the psychic life. We now see what this function is. The dream
has taken it upon itself to bring the liberated excitement of the Unc.
back under the domination of the foreconscious; it thus affords relief
for the excitement of the Unc. and acts as a safety-valve for the
latter, and at the same time it insures the sleep of the foreconscious
at a slight expenditure of the waking state. Like the other psychic
formations of its group, the dream offers itself as a compromise serving
simultaneously both systems by fulfilling both wishes in so far as they
are compatible with each other. A glance at Robert's "elimination
theory," will show that we must agree with this author in his main
point, viz. in the determination of the function of the dream, though we
differ from him in our hypotheses and in our treatment of the dream
process.
The above qualification--in so far as the two wishes are compatible with
each other--contains a suggestion that there may be cases in which the
function of the dream suffers shipwreck. The dream process is in the
first instance admitted as a wish-fulfillment of the unconscious, but if
this tentative wish-fulfillment disturbs the foreconscious to such an
extent that the latter can no longer maintain its rest, the dream then
breaks the compromise and fails to perform the second part of its task.
It is then at once broken off, and replaced by complete wakefulness.
Here, too, it is not really the fault of the dream, if, while ordinarily
the guardian of sleep, it is here compelled to appear as the disturber
of sleep, nor should this cause us to entertain any doubts as to its
efficacy. This is not the only case in the organism in which an
otherwise efficacious arrangement became inefficacious and disturbing as
soon as some element is changed in the conditions of its origin; the
disturbance then serves at least the new purpose of announcing the
change, and calling into play against it the means of adjustment of the
organism. In this connection, I naturally bear in mind the case of the
anxiety dream, and in order not to have the appearance of trying to
exclude this testimony against the theory of wish-fulfillment wherever
I encounter it, I will attempt an explanation of the anxiety dream, at
least offering some suggestions.
That a psychic process developing anxiety may still be a
wish-fulfillment has long ceased to impress us as a contradiction. We
may explain this occurrence by the fact that the wish belongs to one
system (the Unc. ), while by the other system (the Forec. ), this wish has
been rejected and suppressed. The subjection of the Unc. by the Forec.
is not complete even in perfect psychic health; the amount of this
suppression shows the degree of our psychic normality. Neurotic symptoms
show that there is a conflict between the two systems; the symptoms are
the results of a compromise of this conflict, and they temporarily put
an end to it. On the one hand, they afford the Unc. an outlet for the
discharge of its excitement, and serve it as a sally port, while, on the
other hand, they give the Forec. the capability of dominating the Unc.
to some extent. It is highly instructive to consider, _e. g. _, the
significance of any hysterical phobia or of an agoraphobia. Suppose a
neurotic incapable of crossing the street alone, which we would justly
call a "symptom. " We attempt to remove this symptom by urging him to the
action which he deems himself incapable of. The result will be an
attack of anxiety, just as an attack of anxiety in the street has often
been the cause of establishing an agoraphobia. We thus learn that the
symptom has been constituted in order to guard against the outbreak of
the anxiety. The phobia is thrown before the anxiety like a fortress on
the frontier.
Unless we enter into the part played by the affects in these processes,
which can be done here only imperfectly, we cannot continue our
discussion. Let us therefore advance the proposition that the reason why
the suppression of the unconscious becomes absolutely necessary is
because, if the discharge of presentation should be left to itself, it
would develop an affect in the Unc. which originally bore the character
of pleasure, but which, since the appearance of the repression, bears
the character of pain. The aim, as well as the result, of the
suppression is to stop the development of this pain. The suppression
extends over the unconscious ideation, because the liberation of pain
might emanate from the ideation. The foundation is here laid for a very
definite assumption concerning the nature of the affective development.
It is regarded as a motor or secondary activity, the key to the
innervation of which is located in the presentations of the Unc. Through
the domination of the Forec. these presentations become, as it were,
throttled and inhibited at the exit of the emotion-developing impulses.
The danger, which is due to the fact that the Forec. ceases to occupy
the energy, therefore consists in the fact that the unconscious
excitations liberate such an affect as--in consequence of the repression
that has previously taken place--can only be perceived as pain or
anxiety.
This danger is released through the full sway of the dream process. The
determinations for its realization consist in the fact that repressions
have taken place, and that the suppressed emotional wishes shall become
sufficiently strong. They thus stand entirely without the psychological
realm of the dream structure. Were it not for the fact that our subject
is connected through just one factor, namely, the freeing of the Unc.
during sleep, with the subject of the development of anxiety, I could
dispense with discussion of the anxiety dream, and thus avoid all
obscurities connected with it.
As I have often repeated, the theory of the anxiety belongs to the
psychology of the neuroses. I would say that the anxiety in the dream is
an anxiety problem and not a dream problem. We have nothing further to
do with it after having once demonstrated its point of contact with the
subject of the dream process. There is only one thing left for me to do.
As I have asserted that the neurotic anxiety originates from sexual
sources, I can subject anxiety dreams to analysis in order to
demonstrate the sexual material in their dream thoughts.
For good reasons I refrain from citing here any of the numerous examples
placed at my disposal by neurotic patients, but prefer to give anxiety
dreams from young persons.
Personally, I have had no real anxiety dream for decades, but I recall
one from my seventh or eighth year which I subjected to interpretation
about thirty years later. The dream was very vivid, and showed me _my
beloved mother, with peculiarly calm sleeping countenance, carried into
the room and laid on the bed by two (or three) persons with birds'
beaks_. I awoke crying and screaming, and disturbed my parents. The very
tall figures--draped in a peculiar manner--with beaks, I had taken from
the illustrations of Philippson's bible; I believe they represented
deities with heads of sparrowhawks from an Egyptian tomb relief. The
analysis also introduced the reminiscence of a naughty janitor's boy,
who used to play with us children on the meadow in front of the house; I
would add that his name was Philip. I feel that I first heard from this
boy the vulgar word signifying sexual intercourse, which is replaced
among the educated by the Latin "coitus," but to which the dream
distinctly alludes by the selection of the birds' heads.
daily life, and belong to those wishes that originate during the night
from the suppression. If we now follow our scheme of the psychic
apparatus, we can localize a wish of the first order in the system
Forec. We may assume that a wish of the second order has been forced
back from the Forec. system into the Unc. system, where alone, if
anywhere, it can maintain itself; while a wish-feeling of the third
order we consider altogether incapable of leaving the Unc. system. This
brings up the question whether wishes arising from these different
sources possess the same value for the dream, and whether they have the
same power to incite a dream.
On reviewing the dreams which we have at our disposal for answering this
question, we are at once moved to add as a fourth source of the
dream-wish the actual wish incitements arising during the night, such
as thirst and sexual desire. It then becomes evident that the source of
the dream-wish does not affect its capacity to incite a dream. That a
wish suppressed during the day asserts itself in the dream can be shown
by a great many examples. I shall mention a very simple example of this
class. A somewhat sarcastic young lady, whose younger friend has become
engaged to be married, is asked throughout the day by her acquaintances
whether she knows and what she thinks of the fiance. She answers with
unqualified praise, thereby silencing her own judgment, as she would
prefer to tell the truth, namely, that he is an ordinary person. The
following night she dreams that the same question is put to her, and
that she replies with the formula: "In case of subsequent orders it will
suffice to mention the number. " Finally, we have learned from numerous
analyses that the wish in all dreams that have been subject to
distortion has been derived from the unconscious, and has been unable to
come to perception in the waking state. Thus it would appear that all
wishes are of the same value and force for the dream formation.
I am at present unable to prove that the state of affairs is really
different, but I am strongly inclined to assume a more stringent
determination of the dream-wish. Children's dreams leave no doubt that
an unfulfilled wish of the day may be the instigator of the dream. But
we must not forget that it is, after all, the wish of a child, that it
is a wish-feeling of infantile strength only. I have a strong doubt
whether an unfulfilled wish from the day would suffice to create a dream
in an adult. It would rather seem that as we learn to control our
impulses by intellectual activity, we more and more reject as vain the
formation or retention of such intense wishes as are natural to
childhood. In this, indeed, there may be individual variations; some
retain the infantile type of psychic processes longer than others. The
differences are here the same as those found in the gradual decline of
the originally distinct visual imagination.
In general, however, I am of the opinion that unfulfilled wishes of the
day are insufficient to produce a dream in adults. I readily admit that
the wish instigators originating in conscious like contribute towards
the incitement of dreams, but that is probably all. The dream would not
originate if the foreconscious wish were not reinforced from another
source.
That source is the unconscious. I believe that _the conscious wish is a
dream inciter only if it succeeds in arousing a similar unconscious wish
which reinforces it_. Following the suggestions obtained through the
psychoanalysis of the neuroses, I believe that these unconscious wishes
are always active and ready for expression whenever they find an
opportunity to unite themselves with an emotion from conscious life, and
that they transfer their greater intensity to the lesser intensity of
the latter. [1] It may therefore seem that the conscious wish alone has
been realized in a dream; but a slight peculiarity in the formation of
this dream will put us on the track of the powerful helper from the
unconscious. These ever active and, as it were, immortal wishes from the
unconscious recall the legendary Titans who from time immemorial have
borne the ponderous mountains which were once rolled upon them by the
victorious gods, and which even now quiver from time to time from the
convulsions of their mighty limbs; I say that these wishes found in the
repression are of themselves of an infantile origin, as we have learned
from the psychological investigation of the neuroses. I should like,
therefore, to withdraw the opinion previously expressed that it is
unimportant whence the dream-wish originates, and replace it by another,
as follows: _The wish manifested in the dream must be an infantile one_.
In the adult it originates in the Unc. , while in the child, where no
separation and censor as yet exist between Forec. and Unc. , or where
these are only in the process of formation, it is an unfulfilled and
unrepressed wish from the waking state. I am aware that this conception
cannot be generally demonstrated, but I maintain nevertheless that it
can be frequently demonstrated, even when it was not suspected, and that
it cannot be generally refuted.
The wish-feelings which remain from the conscious waking state are,
therefore, relegated to the background in the dream formation. In the
dream content I shall attribute to them only the part attributed to the
material of actual sensations during sleep. If I now take into account
those other psychic instigations remaining from the waking state which
are not wishes, I shall only adhere to the line mapped out for me by
this train of thought. We may succeed in provisionally terminating the
sum of energy of our waking thoughts by deciding to go to sleep. He is a
good sleeper who can do this; Napoleon I. is reputed to have been a
model of this sort. But we do not always succeed in accomplishing it, or
in accomplishing it perfectly. Unsolved problems, harassing cares,
overwhelming impressions continue the thinking activity even during
sleep, maintaining psychic processes in the system which we have termed
the foreconscious. These mental processes continuing into sleep may be
divided into the following groups: 1, That which has not been terminated
during the day owing to casual prevention; 2, that which has been left
unfinished by temporary paralysis of our mental power, _i. e. _ the
unsolved; 3, that which has been rejected and suppressed during the day.
This unites with a powerful group (4) formed by that which has been
excited in our Unc. during the day by the work of the foreconscious.
Finally, we may add group (5) consisting of the indifferent and hence
unsettled impressions of the day.
We should not underrate the psychic intensities introduced into sleep by
these remnants of waking life, especially those emanating from the group
of the unsolved. These excitations surely continue to strive for
expression during the night, and we may assume with equal certainty that
the sleeping state renders impossible the usual continuation of the
excitement in the foreconscious and the termination of the excitement by
its becoming conscious. As far as we can normally become conscious of
our mental processes, even during the night, in so far we are not
asleep. I shall not venture to state what change is produced in the
Forec. system by the sleeping state, but there is no doubt that the
psychological character of sleep is essentially due to the change of
energy in this very system, which also dominates the approach to
motility, which is paralyzed during sleep. In contradistinction to this,
there seems to be nothing in the psychology of the dream to warrant the
assumption that sleep produces any but secondary changes in the
conditions of the Unc. system. Hence, for the nocturnal excitation in
the Force, there remains no other path than that followed by the wish
excitements from the Unc. This excitation must seek reinforcement from
the Unc. , and follow the detours of the unconscious excitations. But
what is the relation of the foreconscious day remnants to the dream?
There is no doubt that they penetrate abundantly into the dream, that
they utilize the dream content to obtrude themselves upon consciousness
even during the night; indeed, they occasionally even dominate the dream
content, and impel it to continue the work of the day; it is also
certain that the day remnants may just as well have any other character
as that of wishes; but it is highly instructive and even decisive for
the theory of wish-fulfillment to see what conditions they must comply
with in order to be received into the dream.
Let us pick out one of the dreams cited above as examples, _e. g. _, the
dream in which my friend Otto seems to show the symptoms of Basedow's
disease. My friend Otto's appearance occasioned me some concern during
the day, and this worry, like everything else referring to this person,
affected me. I may also assume that these feelings followed me into
sleep. I was probably bent on finding out what was the matter with him.
In the night my worry found expression in the dream which I have
reported, the content of which was not only senseless, but failed to
show any wish-fulfillment. But I began to investigate for the source of
this incongruous expression of the solicitude felt during the day, and
analysis revealed the connection. I identified my friend Otto with a
certain Baron L. and myself with a Professor R. There was only one
explanation for my being impelled to select just this substitution for
the day thought. I must have always been prepared in the Unc. to
identify myself with Professor R. , as it meant the realization of one of
the immortal infantile wishes, viz. that of becoming great. Repulsive
ideas respecting my friend, that would certainly have been repudiated
in a waking state, took advantage of the opportunity to creep into the
dream, but the worry of the day likewise found some form of expression
through a substitution in the dream content. The day thought, which was
no wish in itself but rather a worry, had in some way to find a
connection with the infantile now unconscious and suppressed wish, which
then allowed it, though already properly prepared, to "originate" for
consciousness. The more dominating this worry, the stronger must be the
connection to be established; between the contents of the wish and that
of the worry there need be no connection, nor was there one in any of
our examples.
We can now sharply define the significance of the unconscious wish for
the dream. It may be admitted that there is a whole class of dreams in
which the incitement originates preponderatingly or even exclusively
from the remnants of daily life; and I believe that even my cherished
desire to become at some future time a "professor extraordinarius" would
have allowed me to slumber undisturbed that night had not my worry about
my friend's health been still active. But this worry alone would not
have produced a dream; the motive power needed by the dream had to be
contributed by a wish, and it was the affair of the worriment to
procure for itself such wish as a motive power of the dream. To speak
figuratively, it is quite possible that a day thought plays the part of
the contractor (_entrepreneur_) in the dream. But it is known that no
matter what idea the contractor may have in mind, and how desirous he
may be of putting it into operation, he can do nothing without capital;
he must depend upon a capitalist to defray the necessary expenses, and
this capitalist, who supplies the psychic expenditure for the dream is
invariably and indisputably _a wish from the unconscious_, no matter
what the nature of the waking thought may be.
In other cases the capitalist himself is the contractor for the dream;
this, indeed, seems to be the more usual case. An unconscious wish is
produced by the day's work, which in turn creates the dream. The dream
processes, moreover, run parallel with all the other possibilities of
the economic relationship used here as an illustration. Thus, the
entrepreneur may contribute some capital himself, or several
entrepreneurs may seek the aid of the same capitalist, or several
capitalists may jointly supply the capital required by the entrepreneur.
Thus there are dreams produced by more than one dream-wish, and many
similar variations which may readily be passed over and are of no
further interest to us. What we have left unfinished in this discussion
of the dream-wish we shall be able to develop later.
The "tertium comparationis" in the comparisons just employed--_i. e. _ the
sum placed at our free disposal in proper allotment--admits of still
finer application for the illustration of the dream structure. We can
recognize in most dreams a center especially supplied with perceptible
intensity. This is regularly the direct representation of the
wish-fulfillment; for, if we undo the displacements of the dream-work by
a process of retrogression, we find that the psychic intensity of the
elements in the dream thoughts is replaced by the perceptible intensity
of the elements in the dream content. The elements adjoining the
wish-fulfillment have frequently nothing to do with its sense, but prove
to be descendants of painful thoughts which oppose the wish. But, owing
to their frequently artificial connection with the central element, they
have acquired sufficient intensity to enable them to come to expression.
Thus, the force of expression of the wish-fulfillment is diffused over a
certain sphere of association, within which it raises to expression all
elements, including those that are in themselves impotent. In dreams
having several strong wishes we can readily separate from one another
the spheres of the individual wish-fulfillments; the gaps in the dream
likewise can often be explained as boundary zones.
Although the foregoing remarks have considerably limited the
significance of the day remnants for the dream, it will nevertheless be
worth our while to give them some attention. For they must be a
necessary ingredient in the formation of the dream, inasmuch as
experience reveals the surprising fact that every dream shows in its
content a connection with some impression of a recent day, often of the
most indifferent kind. So far we have failed to see any necessity for
this addition to the dream mixture. This necessity appears only when we
follow closely the part played by the unconscious wish, and then seek
information in the psychology of the neuroses. We thus learn that the
unconscious idea, as such, is altogether incapable of entering into the
foreconscious, and that it can exert an influence there only by uniting
with a harmless idea already belonging to the foreconscious, to which it
transfers its intensity and under which it allows itself to be
concealed. This is the fact of transference which furnishes an
explanation for so many surprising occurrences in the psychic life of
neurotics.
The idea from the foreconscious which thus obtains an unmerited
abundance of intensity may be left unchanged by the transference, or it
may have forced upon it a modification from the content of the
transferring idea. I trust the reader will pardon my fondness for
comparisons from daily life, but I feel tempted to say that the
relations existing for the repressed idea are similar to the situations
existing in Austria for the American dentist, who is forbidden to
practise unless he gets permission from a regular physician to use his
name on the public signboard and thus cover the legal requirements.
Moreover, just as it is naturally not the busiest physicians who form
such alliances with dental practitioners, so in the psychic life only
such foreconscious or conscious ideas are chosen to cover a repressed
idea as have not themselves attracted much of the attention which is
operative in the foreconscious. The unconscious entangles with its
connections preferentially either those impressions and ideas of the
foreconscious which have been left unnoticed as indifferent, or those
that have soon been deprived of this attention through rejection. It is
a familiar fact from the association studies confirmed by every
experience, that ideas which have formed intimate connections in one
direction assume an almost negative attitude to whole groups of new
connections. I once tried from this principle to develop a theory for
hysterical paralysis.
If we assume that the same need for the transference of the repressed
ideas which we have learned to know from the analysis of the neuroses
makes its influence felt in the dream as well, we can at once explain
two riddles of the dream, viz. that every dream analysis shows an
interweaving of a recent impression, and that this recent element is
frequently of the most indifferent character. We may add what we have
already learned elsewhere, that these recent and indifferent elements
come so frequently into the dream content as a substitute for the most
deep-lying of the dream thoughts, for the further reason that they have
least to fear from the resisting censor. But while this freedom from
censorship explains only the preference for trivial elements, the
constant presence of recent elements points to the fact that there is a
need for transference. Both groups of impressions satisfy the demand of
the repression for material still free from associations, the
indifferent ones because they have offered no inducement for extensive
associations, and the recent ones because they have had insufficient
time to form such associations.
We thus see that the day remnants, among which we may now include the
indifferent impressions when they participate in the dream formation,
not only borrow from the Unc. the motive power at the disposal of the
repressed wish, but also offer to the unconscious something
indispensable, namely, the attachment necessary to the transference. If
we here attempted to penetrate more deeply into the psychic processes,
we should first have to throw more light on the play of emotions between
the foreconscious and the unconscious, to which, indeed, we are urged by
the study of the psychoneuroses, whereas the dream itself offers no
assistance in this respect.
Just one further remark about the day remnants. There is no doubt that
they are the actual disturbers of sleep, and not the dream, which, on
the contrary, strives to guard sleep. But we shall return to this point
later.
We have so far discussed the dream-wish, we have traced it to the sphere
of the Unc. , and analyzed its relations to the day remnants, which in
turn may be either wishes, psychic emotions of any other kind, or simply
recent impressions. We have thus made room for any claims that may be
made for the importance of conscious thought activity in dream
formations in all its variations. Relying upon our thought series, it
would not be at all impossible for us to explain even those extreme
cases in which the dream as a continuer of the day work brings to a
happy conclusion and unsolved problem possess an example, the analysis
of which might reveal the infantile or repressed wish source furnishing
such alliance and successful strengthening of the efforts of the
foreconscious activity. But we have not come one step nearer a solution
of the riddle: Why can the unconscious furnish the motive power for the
wish-fulfillment only during sleep? The answer to this question must
throw light on the psychic nature of wishes; and it will be given with
the aid of the diagram of the psychic apparatus.
We do not doubt that even this apparatus attained its present perfection
through a long course of development. Let us attempt to restore it as it
existed in an early phase of its activity. From assumptions, to be
confirmed elsewhere, we know that at first the apparatus strove to keep
as free from excitement as possible, and in its first formation,
therefore, the scheme took the form of a reflex apparatus, which enabled
it promptly to discharge through the motor tracts any sensible stimulus
reaching it from without. But this simple function was disturbed by the
wants of life, which likewise furnish the impulse for the further
development of the apparatus. The wants of life first manifested
themselves to it in the form of the great physical needs. The excitement
aroused by the inner want seeks an outlet in motility, which may be
designated as "inner changes" or as an "expression of the emotions. " The
hungry child cries or fidgets helplessly, but its situation remains
unchanged; for the excitation proceeding from an inner want requires,
not a momentary outbreak, but a force working continuously. A change can
occur only if in some way a feeling of gratification is
experienced--which in the case of the child must be through outside
help--in order to remove the inner excitement. An essential constituent
of this experience is the appearance of a certain perception (of food in
our example), the memory picture of which thereafter remains associated
with the memory trace of the excitation of want.
Thanks to the established connection, there results at the next
appearance of this want a psychic feeling which revives the memory
picture of the former perception, and thus recalls the former perception
itself, _i. e. _ it actually re-establishes the situation of the first
gratification. We call such a feeling a wish; the reappearance of the
perception constitutes the wish-fulfillment, and the full revival of the
perception by the want excitement constitutes the shortest road to the
wish-fulfillment. We may assume a primitive condition of the psychic
apparatus in which this road is really followed, _i. e. _ where the
wishing merges into an hallucination, This first psychic activity
therefore aims at an identity of perception, _i. e. _ it aims at a
repetition of that perception which is connected with the fulfillment of
the want.
This primitive mental activity must have been modified by bitter
practical experience into a more expedient secondary activity. The
establishment of the identity perception on the short regressive road
within the apparatus does not in another respect carry with it the
result which inevitably follows the revival of the same perception from
without. The gratification does not take place, and the want continues.
In order to equalize the internal with the external sum of energy, the
former must be continually maintained, just as actually happens in the
hallucinatory psychoses and in the deliriums of hunger which exhaust
their psychic capacity in clinging to the object desired. In order to
make more appropriate use of the psychic force, it becomes necessary to
inhibit the full regression so as to prevent it from extending beyond
the image of memory, whence it can select other paths leading ultimately
to the establishment of the desired identity from the outer world. This
inhibition and consequent deviation from the excitation becomes the
task of a second system which dominates the voluntary motility, _i. e. _
through whose activity the expenditure of motility is now devoted to
previously recalled purposes. But this entire complicated mental
activity which works its way from the memory picture to the
establishment of the perception identity from the outer world merely
represents a detour which has been forced upon the wish-fulfillment by
experience. [2] Thinking is indeed nothing but the equivalent of the
hallucinatory wish; and if the dream be called a wish-fulfillment this
becomes self-evident, as nothing but a wish can impel our psychic
apparatus to activity. The dream, which in fulfilling its wishes follows
the short regressive path, thereby preserves for us only an example of
the primary form of the psychic apparatus which has been abandoned as
inexpedient. What once ruled in the waking state when the psychic life
was still young and unfit seems to have been banished into the sleeping
state, just as we see again in the nursery the bow and arrow, the
discarded primitive weapons of grown-up humanity. _The dream is a
fragment of the abandoned psychic life of the child. _ In the psychoses
these modes of operation of the psychic apparatus, which are normally
suppressed in the waking state, reassert themselves, and then betray
their inability to satisfy our wants in the outer world.
The unconscious wish-feelings evidently strive to assert themselves
during the day also, and the fact of transference and the psychoses
teach us that they endeavor to penetrate to consciousness and dominate
motility by the road leading through the system of the foreconscious. It
is, therefore, the censor lying between the Unc. and the Forec. , the
assumption of which is forced upon us by the dream, that we have to
recognize and honor as the guardian of our psychic health. But is it not
carelessness on the part of this guardian to diminish its vigilance
during the night and to allow the suppressed emotions of the Unc. to
come to expression, thus again making possible the hallucinatory
regression? I think not, for when the critical guardian goes to
rest--and we have proof that his slumber is not profound--he takes care
to close the gate to motility. No matter what feelings from the
otherwise inhibited Unc. may roam about on the scene, they need not be
interfered with; they remain harmless because they are unable to put in
motion the motor apparatus which alone can exert a modifying influence
upon the outer world. Sleep guarantees the security of the fortress
which is under guard. Conditions are less harmless when a displacement
of forces is produced, not through a nocturnal diminution in the
operation of the critical censor, but through pathological enfeeblement
of the latter or through pathological reinforcement of the unconscious
excitations, and this while the foreconscious is charged with energy and
the avenues to motility are open. The guardian is then overpowered, the
unconscious excitations subdue the Forec. ; through it they dominate our
speech and actions, or they enforce the hallucinatory regression, thus
governing an apparatus not designed for them by virtue of the attraction
exerted by the perceptions on the distribution of our psychic energy. We
call this condition a psychosis.
We are now in the best position to complete our psychological
construction, which has been interrupted by the introduction of the two
systems, Unc. and Forec. We have still, however, ample reason for giving
further consideration to the wish as the sole psychic motive power in
the dream. We have explained that the reason why the dream is in every
case a wish realization is because it is a product of the Unc. , which
knows no other aim in its activity but the fulfillment of wishes, and
which has no other forces at its disposal but wish-feelings. If we
avail ourselves for a moment longer of the right to elaborate from the
dream interpretation such far-reaching psychological speculations, we
are in duty bound to demonstrate that we are thereby bringing the dream
into a relationship which may also comprise other psychic structures. If
there exists a system of the Unc. --or something sufficiently analogous
to it for the purpose of our discussion--the dream cannot be its sole
manifestation; every dream may be a wish-fulfillment, but there must be
other forms of abnormal wish-fulfillment beside this of dreams. Indeed,
the theory of all psychoneurotic symptoms culminates in the proposition
_that they too must be taken as wish-fulfillments of the unconscious_.
Our explanation makes the dream only the first member of a group most
important for the psychiatrist, an understanding of which means the
solution of the purely psychological part of the psychiatric problem.
But other members of this group of wish-fulfillments, _e. g. _, the
hysterical symptoms, evince one essential quality which I have so far
failed to find in the dream. Thus, from the investigations frequently
referred to in this treatise, I know that the formation of an hysterical
symptom necessitates the combination of both streams of our psychic
life. The symptom is not merely the expression of a realized
unconscious wish, but it must be joined by another wish from the
foreconscious which is fulfilled by the same symptom; so that the
symptom is at least doubly determined, once by each one of the
conflicting systems. Just as in the dream, there is no limit to further
over-determination. The determination not derived from the Unc. is, as
far as I can see, invariably a stream of thought in reaction against the
unconscious wish, _e. g. _, a self-punishment. Hence I may say, in
general, that _an hysterical symptom originates only where two
contrasting wish-fulfillments, having their source in different psychic
systems, are able to combine in one expression_. (Compare my latest
formulation of the origin of the hysterical symptoms in a treatise
published by the _Zeitschrift fur Sexualwissenschaft_, by Hirschfeld and
others, 1908). Examples on this point would prove of little value, as
nothing but a complete unveiling of the complication in question would
carry conviction. I therefore content myself with the mere assertion,
and will cite an example, not for conviction but for explication.
The
hysterical vomiting of a female patient proved, on the one hand, to be
the realization of an unconscious fancy from the time of puberty, that
she might be continuously pregnant and have a multitude of children,
and this was subsequently united with the wish that she might have them
from as many men as possible. Against this immoderate wish there arose a
powerful defensive impulse. But as the vomiting might spoil the
patient's figure and beauty, so that she would not find favor in the
eyes of mankind, the symptom was therefore in keeping with her punitive
trend of thought, and, being thus admissible from both sides, it was
allowed to become a reality. This is the same manner of consenting to a
wish-fulfillment which the queen of the Parthians chose for the triumvir
Crassus. Believing that he had undertaken the campaign out of greed for
gold, she caused molten gold to be poured into the throat of the corpse.
"Now hast thou what thou hast longed for. " As yet we know of the dream
only that it expresses a wish-fulfillment of the unconscious; and
apparently the dominating foreconscious permits this only after it has
subjected the wish to some distortions. We are really in no position to
demonstrate regularly a stream of thought antagonistic to the dream-wish
which is realized in the dream as in its counterpart. Only now and then
have we found in the dream traces of reaction formations, as, for
instance, the tenderness toward friend R. in the "uncle dream. " But the
contribution from the foreconscious, which is missing here, may be
found in another place. While the dominating system has withdrawn on
the wish to sleep, the dream may bring to expression with manifold
distortions a wish from the Unc. , and realize this wish by producing the
necessary changes of energy in the psychic apparatus, and may finally
retain it through the entire duration of sleep. [3]
This persistent wish to sleep on the part of the foreconscious in
general facilitates the formation of the dream. Let us refer to the
dream of the father who, by the gleam of light from the death chamber,
was brought to the conclusion that the body has been set on fire. We
have shown that one of the psychic forces decisive in causing the father
to form this conclusion, instead of being awakened by the gleam of
light, was the wish to prolong the life of the child seen in the dream
by one moment. Other wishes proceeding from the repression probably
escape us, because we are unable to analyze this dream. But as a second
motive power of the dream we may mention the father's desire to sleep,
for, like the life of the child, the sleep of the father is prolonged
for a moment by the dream. The underlying motive is: "Let the dream go
on, otherwise I must wake up. " As in this dream so also in all other
dreams, the wish to sleep lends its support to the unconscious wish. We
reported dreams which were apparently dreams of convenience. But,
properly speaking, all dreams may claim this designation. The efficacy
of the wish to continue to sleep is the most easily recognized in the
waking dreams, which so transform the objective sensory stimulus as to
render it compatible with the continuance of sleep; they interweave this
stimulus with the dream in order to rob it of any claims it might make
as a warning to the outer world. But this wish to continue to sleep must
also participate in the formation of all other dreams which may disturb
the sleeping state from within only. "Now, then, sleep on; why, it's but
a dream"; this is in many cases the suggestion of the Forec. to
consciousness when the dream goes too far; and this also describes in a
general way the attitude of our dominating psychic activity toward
dreaming, though the thought remains tacit. I must draw the conclusion
that _throughout our entire sleeping state we are just as certain that
we are dreaming as we are certain that we are sleeping_. We are
compelled to disregard the objection urged against this conclusion that
our consciousness is never directed to a knowledge of the former, and
that it is directed to a knowledge of the latter only on special
occasions when the censor is unexpectedly surprised. Against this
objection we may say that there are persons who are entirely conscious
of their sleeping and dreaming, and who are apparently endowed with the
conscious faculty of guiding their dream life. Such a dreamer, when
dissatisfied with the course taken by the dream, breaks it off without
awakening, and begins it anew in order to continue it with a different
turn, like the popular author who, on request, gives a happier ending to
his play. Or, at another time, if placed by the dream in a sexually
exciting situation, he thinks in his sleep: "I do not care to continue
this dream and exhaust myself by a pollution; I prefer to defer it in
favor of a real situation. "
[1] They share this character of indestructibility with all psychic acts
that are really unconscious--that is, with psychic acts belonging to the
system of the unconscious only. These paths are constantly open and
never fall into disuse; they conduct the discharge of the exciting
process as often as it becomes endowed with unconscious excitement To
speak metaphorically they suffer the same form of annihilation as the
shades of the lower region in the _Odyssey_, who awoke to new life the
moment they drank blood. The processes depending on the foreconscious
system are destructible in a different way. The psychotherapy of the
neuroses is based on this difference.
[2] Le Lorrain justly extols the wish-fulfilment of the dream: "Sans
fatigue serieuse, sans etre oblige de recourir a cette lutte opinatre et
longue qui use et corrode les jouissances poursuivies. "
[3] This idea has been borrowed from _The Theory of Sleep_ by Liebault,
who revived hypnotic investigation in our days. (_Du Sommeil provoque_,
etc. ; Paris, 1889. )
VII
THE FUNCTION OF THE DREAM
Since we know that the foreconscious is suspended during the night by
the wish to sleep, we can proceed to an intelligent investigation of the
dream process. But let us first sum up the knowledge of this process
already gained. We have shown that the waking activity leaves day
remnants from which the sum of energy cannot be entirely removed; or the
waking activity revives during the day one of the unconscious wishes; or
both conditions occur simultaneously; we have already discovered the
many variations that may take place. The unconscious wish has already
made its way to the day remnants, either during the day or at any rate
with the beginning of sleep, and has effected a transference to it. This
produces a wish transferred to the recent material, or the suppressed
recent wish comes to life again through a reinforcement from the
unconscious. This wish now endeavors to make its way to consciousness on
the normal path of the mental processes through the foreconscious, to
which indeed it belongs through one of its constituent elements. It is
confronted, however, by the censor, which is still active, and to the
influence of which it now succumbs. It now takes on the distortion for
which the way has already been paved by its transference to the recent
material. Thus far it is in the way of becoming something resembling an
obsession, delusion, or the like, _i. e. _ a thought reinforced by a
transference and distorted in expression by the censor. But its further
progress is now checked through the dormant state of the foreconscious;
this system has apparently protected itself against invasion by
diminishing its excitements. The dream process, therefore, takes the
regressive course, which has just been opened by the peculiarity of the
sleeping state, and thereby follows the attraction exerted on it by the
memory groups, which themselves exist in part only as visual energy not
yet translated into terms of the later systems. On its way to regression
the dream takes on the form of dramatization. The subject of compression
will be discussed later. The dream process has now terminated the second
part of its repeatedly impeded course. The first part expended itself
progressively from the unconscious scenes or phantasies to the
foreconscious, while the second part gravitates from the advent of the
censor back to the perceptions. But when the dream process becomes a
content of perception it has, so to speak, eluded the obstacle set up in
the Forec. by the censor and by the sleeping state. It succeeds in
drawing attention to itself and in being noticed by consciousness. For
consciousness, which means to us a sensory organ for the reception of
psychic qualities, may receive stimuli from two sources--first, from the
periphery of the entire apparatus, viz. from the perception system, and,
secondly, from the pleasure and pain stimuli, which constitute the sole
psychic quality produced in the transformation of energy within the
apparatus. All other processes in the system, even those in the
foreconscious, are devoid of any psychic quality, and are therefore not
objects of consciousness inasmuch as they do not furnish pleasure or
pain for perception. We shall have to assume that those liberations of
pleasure and pain automatically regulate the outlet of the occupation
processes. But in order to make possible more delicate functions, it was
later found necessary to render the course of the presentations more
independent of the manifestations of pain. To accomplish this the Forec.
system needed some qualities of its own which could attract
consciousness, and most probably received them through the connection of
the foreconscious processes with the memory system of the signs of
speech, which is not devoid of qualities. Through the qualities of this
system, consciousness, which had hitherto been a sensory organ only for
the perceptions, now becomes also a sensory organ for a part of our
mental processes. Thus we have now, as it were, two sensory surfaces,
one directed to perceptions and the other to the foreconscious mental
processes.
I must assume that the sensory surface of consciousness devoted to the
Forec. is rendered less excitable by sleep than that directed to the
P-systems. The giving up of interest for the nocturnal mental processes
is indeed purposeful. Nothing is to disturb the mind; the Forec. wants
to sleep. But once the dream becomes a perception, it is then capable of
exciting consciousness through the qualities thus gained. The sensory
stimulus accomplishes what it was really destined for, namely, it
directs a part of the energy at the disposal of the Forec. in the form
of attention upon the stimulant. We must, therefore, admit that the
dream invariably awakens us, that is, it puts into activity a part of
the dormant force of the Forec. This force imparts to the dream that
influence which we have designated as secondary elaboration for the sake
of connection and comprehensibility. This means that the dream is
treated by it like any other content of perception; it is subjected to
the same ideas of expectation, as far at least as the material admits.
As far as the direction is concerned in this third part of the dream, it
may be said that here again the movement is progressive.
To avoid misunderstanding, it will not be amiss to say a few words about
the temporal peculiarities of these dream processes. In a very
interesting discussion, apparently suggested by Maury's puzzling
guillotine dream, Goblet tries to demonstrate that the dream requires no
other time than the transition period between sleeping and awakening.
The awakening requires time, as the dream takes place during that
period. One is inclined to believe that the final picture of the dream
is so strong that it forces the dreamer to awaken; but, as a matter of
fact, this picture is strong only because the dreamer is already very
near awakening when it appears. "Un reve c'est un reveil qui commence. "
It has already been emphasized by Dugas that Goblet was forced to
repudiate many facts in order to generalize his theory. There are,
moreover, dreams from which we do not awaken, _e. g. _, some dreams in
which we dream that we dream. From our knowledge of the dream-work, we
can by no means admit that it extends only over the period of awakening.
On the contrary, we must consider it probable that the first part of
the dream-work begins during the day when we are still under the
domination of the foreconscious. The second phase of the dream-work,
viz. the modification through the censor, the attraction by the
unconscious scenes, and the penetration to perception must continue
throughout the night. And we are probably always right when we assert
that we feel as though we had been dreaming the whole night, although we
cannot say what. I do not, however, think it necessary to assume that,
up to the time of becoming conscious, the dream processes really follow
the temporal sequence which we have described, viz. that there is first
the transferred dream-wish, then the distortion of the censor, and
consequently the change of direction to regression, and so on. We were
forced to form such a succession for the sake of _description_; in
reality, however, it is much rather a matter of simultaneously trying
this path and that, and of emotions fluctuating to and fro, until
finally, owing to the most expedient distribution, one particular
grouping is secured which remains. From certain personal experiences, I
am myself inclined to believe that the dream-work often requires more
than one day and one night to produce its result; if this be true, the
extraordinary art manifested in the construction of the dream loses all
its marvels. In my opinion, even the regard for comprehensibility as an
occurrence of perception may take effect before the dream attracts
consciousness to itself. To be sure, from now on the process is
accelerated, as the dream is henceforth subjected to the same treatment
as any other perception. It is like fireworks, which require hours of
preparation and only a moment for ignition.
Through the dream-work the dream process now gains either sufficient
intensity to attract consciousness to itself and arouse the
foreconscious, which is quite independent of the time or profundity of
sleep, or, its intensity being insufficient it must wait until it meets
the attention which is set in motion immediately before awakening. Most
dreams seem to operate with relatively slight psychic intensities, for
they wait for the awakening. This, however, explains the fact that we
regularly perceive something dreamt on being suddenly aroused from a
sound sleep. Here, as well as in spontaneous awakening, the first glance
strikes the perception content created by the dream-work, while the next
strikes the one produced from without.
But of greater theoretical interest are those dreams which are capable
of waking us in the midst of sleep. We must bear in mind the expediency
elsewhere universally demonstrated, and ask ourselves why the dream or
the unconscious wish has the power to disturb sleep, _i. e. _ the
fulfillment of the foreconscious wish. This is probably due to certain
relations of energy into which we have no insight. If we possessed such
insight we should probably find that the freedom given to the dream and
the expenditure of a certain amount of detached attention represent for
the dream an economy in energy, keeping in view the fact that the
unconscious must be held in check at night just as during the day. We
know from experience that the dream, even if it interrupts sleep,
repeatedly during the same night, still remains compatible with sleep.
We wake up for an instant, and immediately resume our sleep. It is like
driving off a fly during sleep, we awake _ad hoc_, and when we resume
our sleep we have removed the disturbance. As demonstrated by familiar
examples from the sleep of wet nurses, &c. , the fulfillment of the wish
to sleep is quite compatible with the retention of a certain amount of
attention in a given direction.
But we must here take cognizance of an objection that is based on a
better knowledge of the unconscious processes. Although we have
ourselves described the unconscious wishes as always active, we have,
nevertheless, asserted that they are not sufficiently strong during the
day to make themselves perceptible. But when we sleep, and the
unconscious wish has shown its power to form a dream, and with it to
awaken the foreconscious, why, then, does this power become exhausted
after the dream has been taken cognizance of? Would it not seem more
probable that the dream should continually renew itself, like the
troublesome fly which, when driven away, takes pleasure in returning
again and again? What justifies our assertion that the dream removes the
disturbance of sleep?
That the unconscious wishes always remain active is quite true. They
represent paths which are passable whenever a sum of excitement makes
use of them. Moreover, a remarkable peculiarity of the unconscious
processes is the fact that they remain indestructible. Nothing can be
brought to an end in the unconscious; nothing can cease or be forgotten.
This impression is most strongly gained in the study of the neuroses,
especially of hysteria. The unconscious stream of thought which leads to
the discharge through an attack becomes passable again as soon as there
is an accumulation of a sufficient amount of excitement. The
mortification brought on thirty years ago, after having gained access to
the unconscious affective source, operates during all these thirty years
like a recent one. Whenever its memory is touched, it is revived and
shows itself to be supplied with the excitement which is discharged in
a motor attack. It is just here that the office of psychotherapy begins,
its task being to bring about adjustment and forgetfulness for the
unconscious processes. Indeed, the fading of memories and the flagging
of affects, which we are apt to take as self-evident and to explain as a
primary influence of time on the psychic memories, are in reality
secondary changes brought about by painstaking work. It is the
foreconscious that accomplishes this work; and the only course to be
pursued by psychotherapy is the subjugate the Unc, to the domination of
the Forec.
There are, therefore, two exits for the individual unconscious emotional
process. It is either left to itself, in which case it ultimately breaks
through somewhere and secures for once a discharge for its excitation
into motility; or it succumbs to the influence of the foreconscious, and
its excitation becomes confined through this influence instead of being
discharged. It is the latter process that occurs in the dream. Owing to
the fact that it is directed by the conscious excitement, the energy
from the Forec. , which confronts the dream when grown to perception,
restricts the unconscious excitement of the dream and renders it
harmless as a disturbing factor. When the dreamer wakes up for a moment,
he has actually chased away the fly that has threatened to disturb his
sleep. We can now understand that it is really more expedient and
economical to give full sway to the unconscious wish, and clear its way
to regression so that it may form a dream, and then restrict and adjust
this dream by means of a small expenditure of foreconscious labor, than
to curb the unconscious throughout the entire period of sleep. We
should, indeed, expect that the dream, even if it was not originally an
expedient process, would have acquired some function in the play of
forces of the psychic life. We now see what this function is. The dream
has taken it upon itself to bring the liberated excitement of the Unc.
back under the domination of the foreconscious; it thus affords relief
for the excitement of the Unc. and acts as a safety-valve for the
latter, and at the same time it insures the sleep of the foreconscious
at a slight expenditure of the waking state. Like the other psychic
formations of its group, the dream offers itself as a compromise serving
simultaneously both systems by fulfilling both wishes in so far as they
are compatible with each other. A glance at Robert's "elimination
theory," will show that we must agree with this author in his main
point, viz. in the determination of the function of the dream, though we
differ from him in our hypotheses and in our treatment of the dream
process.
The above qualification--in so far as the two wishes are compatible with
each other--contains a suggestion that there may be cases in which the
function of the dream suffers shipwreck. The dream process is in the
first instance admitted as a wish-fulfillment of the unconscious, but if
this tentative wish-fulfillment disturbs the foreconscious to such an
extent that the latter can no longer maintain its rest, the dream then
breaks the compromise and fails to perform the second part of its task.
It is then at once broken off, and replaced by complete wakefulness.
Here, too, it is not really the fault of the dream, if, while ordinarily
the guardian of sleep, it is here compelled to appear as the disturber
of sleep, nor should this cause us to entertain any doubts as to its
efficacy. This is not the only case in the organism in which an
otherwise efficacious arrangement became inefficacious and disturbing as
soon as some element is changed in the conditions of its origin; the
disturbance then serves at least the new purpose of announcing the
change, and calling into play against it the means of adjustment of the
organism. In this connection, I naturally bear in mind the case of the
anxiety dream, and in order not to have the appearance of trying to
exclude this testimony against the theory of wish-fulfillment wherever
I encounter it, I will attempt an explanation of the anxiety dream, at
least offering some suggestions.
That a psychic process developing anxiety may still be a
wish-fulfillment has long ceased to impress us as a contradiction. We
may explain this occurrence by the fact that the wish belongs to one
system (the Unc. ), while by the other system (the Forec. ), this wish has
been rejected and suppressed. The subjection of the Unc. by the Forec.
is not complete even in perfect psychic health; the amount of this
suppression shows the degree of our psychic normality. Neurotic symptoms
show that there is a conflict between the two systems; the symptoms are
the results of a compromise of this conflict, and they temporarily put
an end to it. On the one hand, they afford the Unc. an outlet for the
discharge of its excitement, and serve it as a sally port, while, on the
other hand, they give the Forec. the capability of dominating the Unc.
to some extent. It is highly instructive to consider, _e. g. _, the
significance of any hysterical phobia or of an agoraphobia. Suppose a
neurotic incapable of crossing the street alone, which we would justly
call a "symptom. " We attempt to remove this symptom by urging him to the
action which he deems himself incapable of. The result will be an
attack of anxiety, just as an attack of anxiety in the street has often
been the cause of establishing an agoraphobia. We thus learn that the
symptom has been constituted in order to guard against the outbreak of
the anxiety. The phobia is thrown before the anxiety like a fortress on
the frontier.
Unless we enter into the part played by the affects in these processes,
which can be done here only imperfectly, we cannot continue our
discussion. Let us therefore advance the proposition that the reason why
the suppression of the unconscious becomes absolutely necessary is
because, if the discharge of presentation should be left to itself, it
would develop an affect in the Unc. which originally bore the character
of pleasure, but which, since the appearance of the repression, bears
the character of pain. The aim, as well as the result, of the
suppression is to stop the development of this pain. The suppression
extends over the unconscious ideation, because the liberation of pain
might emanate from the ideation. The foundation is here laid for a very
definite assumption concerning the nature of the affective development.
It is regarded as a motor or secondary activity, the key to the
innervation of which is located in the presentations of the Unc. Through
the domination of the Forec. these presentations become, as it were,
throttled and inhibited at the exit of the emotion-developing impulses.
The danger, which is due to the fact that the Forec. ceases to occupy
the energy, therefore consists in the fact that the unconscious
excitations liberate such an affect as--in consequence of the repression
that has previously taken place--can only be perceived as pain or
anxiety.
This danger is released through the full sway of the dream process. The
determinations for its realization consist in the fact that repressions
have taken place, and that the suppressed emotional wishes shall become
sufficiently strong. They thus stand entirely without the psychological
realm of the dream structure. Were it not for the fact that our subject
is connected through just one factor, namely, the freeing of the Unc.
during sleep, with the subject of the development of anxiety, I could
dispense with discussion of the anxiety dream, and thus avoid all
obscurities connected with it.
As I have often repeated, the theory of the anxiety belongs to the
psychology of the neuroses. I would say that the anxiety in the dream is
an anxiety problem and not a dream problem. We have nothing further to
do with it after having once demonstrated its point of contact with the
subject of the dream process. There is only one thing left for me to do.
As I have asserted that the neurotic anxiety originates from sexual
sources, I can subject anxiety dreams to analysis in order to
demonstrate the sexual material in their dream thoughts.
For good reasons I refrain from citing here any of the numerous examples
placed at my disposal by neurotic patients, but prefer to give anxiety
dreams from young persons.
Personally, I have had no real anxiety dream for decades, but I recall
one from my seventh or eighth year which I subjected to interpretation
about thirty years later. The dream was very vivid, and showed me _my
beloved mother, with peculiarly calm sleeping countenance, carried into
the room and laid on the bed by two (or three) persons with birds'
beaks_. I awoke crying and screaming, and disturbed my parents. The very
tall figures--draped in a peculiar manner--with beaks, I had taken from
the illustrations of Philippson's bible; I believe they represented
deities with heads of sparrowhawks from an Egyptian tomb relief. The
analysis also introduced the reminiscence of a naughty janitor's boy,
who used to play with us children on the meadow in front of the house; I
would add that his name was Philip. I feel that I first heard from this
boy the vulgar word signifying sexual intercourse, which is replaced
among the educated by the Latin "coitus," but to which the dream
distinctly alludes by the selection of the birds' heads.
