astounds me if I am to attribute it to the dream activity, is not
original, but is copied from the neurosis of one of my patients. I have
already spoken on another page of a highly cultured and, in conduct,
kind-hearted man, who began, shortly after the death of his parents, to
accuse himself of murderous inclinations, and who suffered because of
the precautionary measures he had to take to insure himself against
these inclinations. At first walking along the street was made painful
for him by the compulsion impelling him to demand an accounting of all
the persons he met as to whither they had vanished; if one of them
suddenly withdrew from his pursuing glance, there remained a painful
feeling and a thought of the possibility that he might have put the man
out of the way. This compulsive idea concealed, among other things, a
Cain-fancy, for “all men are brothers.” Owing to the impossibility of
accomplishing his task, he gave up taking walks and spent his life
imprisoned within his four walls. But news of murderous acts which have
been committed outside constantly reached his room through the papers,
and his conscience in the form of a doubt kept accusing him of being the
murderer. The certainty of not having left his dwelling for weeks
protected him against these accusations for a time, until one day there
dawned upon him the possibility that he might have left _his house while
in an unconscious condition_, and might thus have committed the murder
without knowing anything about it. From that time on he locked his house
door, and handed the key over to his old housekeeper, and strictly
forbade her to give it into his hands even if he demanded it.
This, then, is the origin of the attempted explanation, that I may have
changed carriages while in an unconscious condition—it has been
transferred from the material of the dream thoughts to the dream in a
finished state, and is obviously intended to identify me with the person
of that patient. My memory of him was awakened by an easy association. I
had made my last night journey with this man a few weeks before. He was
cured, and was escorting me into the country, to his relatives who were
summoning me; as we had a compartment to ourselves, we left all the
windows open through the night, and, as long as I had remained awake, we
had a delightful conversation. I knew that hostile impulses towards his
father from the time of his childhood, in connection with sexual
material, had been at the root of his illness. By identifying myself
with him, I wanted to make an analogous confession to myself. The second
scene of the dream really resolves itself into a wanton fancy to the
effect that my two elderly travelling companions had acted so uncivilly
towards me for the reason that my arrival prevented them from exchanging
love-tokens during the night as they had intended. This fancy, however,
goes back to an early childhood scene in which, probably impelled by
sexual inquisitiveness, I intruded upon the bedroom of my parents, and
was driven from it by my father’s emphatic command.
I consider it superfluous to multiply further examples. All of them
would confirm what we have learned from those which have been already
cited, namely, that an act of judgment in the dream is nothing but the
repetition of a prototype which it has in the dream thoughts. In most
cases it is an inappropriate repetition introduced in an unfitting
connection; occasionally, however, as in our last example, it is so
artfully disposed that it may give the impression of being an
independent thought activity in the dream. At this point we might turn
our attention to that psychic activity which indeed does not seem to
co-operate regularly in the formation of dreams, but whose effort it is,
wherever it does co-operate, to fuse together those dream elements that
are incongruent on account of their origins in an uncontradictory and
intelligible manner. We consider it best, however, first to take up the
expressions of emotion which appear in the dream, and to compare them
with the emotions which analysis reveals to us in the dream thoughts.
(_g_) _The Affects in the Dream._
A profound remark of Stricker’s[77] has called our attention to the fact
that the expressions of emotion in the dream do not permit of being
disposed of in the slighting manner in which we are accustomed to shake
off the dream itself, after we have awakened. “If I am afraid of robbers
in the dream, the robbers, to be sure, are imaginary, but the fear of
them is real,” and the same is true if I am glad in the dream. According
to the testimony of our feelings, the emotion experienced in the dream
is in no way less valid than one of like intensity experienced in waking
life, and the dream makes its claim to be taken up as a part of our real
mental experiences, more energetically on account of its emotional
content than on account of its ideal content. We do not succeed in
accomplishing this separation in waking life, because we do not know how
to estimate an emotion psychically except in connection with a
presentation content. If in kind or in intensity an affect and an idea
are incongruous, our waking judgment becomes confused.
The fact that in dreams the presentation content does not entail the
affective influence which we should expect as necessary in waking
thought has always caused astonishment. Strümpell was of the opinion
that ideas in the dream are stripped of their psychic values. But
neither does the dream lack opposite instances, where the expression of
intense affect appears in a content, which seems to offer no occasion
for its development. I am in a horrible, dangerous, or disgusting
situation in the dream, but I feel nothing of fear or aversion; on the
other hand, I am sometimes terrified at harmless things and glad at
childish ones.
This enigma of the dream disappears more suddenly and more completely
than perhaps any other of the dream problems, if we pass from the
manifest to the latent content. We shall then no longer be concerned to
explain it, for it will no longer exist. Analysis teaches us _that
presentation contents have undergone displacements and substitutions,
while affects have remained unchanged_. No wonder, then, that the
presentation content which has been altered by dream disfigurement no
longer fits the affect that has remained intact; but there is no cause
for wonder either after analysis has put the correct content in its
former place.
In a psychic complex which has been subjected to the influence of the
resisting censor the affects are the unyielding constituent, which alone
is capable of guiding us to a correct supplementation. This state of
affairs is revealed in psychoneuroses even more distinctly than in the
dream. Here the affect is always in the right, at least as far as its
quality goes; its intensity may even be increased by means of a
displacement of neurotic attention. If a hysteric is surprised that he
is so very afraid of a trifle, or if the patient with compulsive ideas
is astonished that he develops such painful self-reproach out of a
nonentity, both of them err in that they regard the presentation
content—the trifle or the nonentity—as the essential thing, and they
defend themselves in vain because they make this presentation content
the starting point in their thought. Psychoanalysis, however, shows them
the right way by recognising that, on the contrary, the affect is
justified, and by searching for the presentation which belongs to it and
which has been suppressed by means of replacement. The assumption is
here made that the development of affect and the presentation content do
not constitute such an indissoluble organic union as we are accustomed
to think, but that the two parts may be, so to speak, soldered together
in such a way that they may be detached from one another by means of
analysis. Dream interpretation shows that this is actually the case.
I give first an example in which analysis explains the apparent absence
of affect in a presentation content which ought to force a development
of emotion.
I. _The dreamer sees three lions in a desert, one of which is laughing,
but she is not afraid of them. Then, however, she must have fled from
them, for she is trying to climb a tree, but she finds that her cousin,
who is a teacher of French, is already up in the tree, &c._
The analysis gives us the following material for this dream: A sentence
in the dreamer’s English lesson had become the indifferent occasion for
it: “The _lion’s_ greatest beauty is his mane.” Her father wore a beard
which surrounded his face like a mane. The name of her English teacher
was Miss _Lyons_. An acquaintance of hers had sent her the ballads of
_Loewe_ (German, Loewe—lion). These, then, are the three lions; why
should she have been afraid of them? She has read a story in which a
negro who has incited his fellows to revolt is hunted with bloodhounds
and climbs a tree to save himself. Then follow fragments in wanton mood,
like the following. Directions for catching lions from _Die Fliegende
Blaetter_: “Take a desert and strain it; the lions will remain.” Also a
very amusing, but not very proper anecdote about an official who is
asked why he does not take greater pains to win the favour of his
superior officer, and who answers that he has been trying to insinuate
himself, but that the man ahead of him _is already up_. The whole matter
becomes intelligible as soon as one learns that on the day of the dream
the lady had received a visit from her husband’s superior. He was very
polite to her, kissed her hand, and _she was not afraid of him at all_,
although he is a “big bug” (German—_Grosses Tier_ = “big animal”) and
plays the part of a “social lion” in the capital of her country. This
lion is, therefore, like the lion in the _Midsummer Night’s Dream_, who
unmasks as Snug, the joiner, and of such stuff are all dream lions made
when one is not afraid.
II. As my second example, I cite the dream of the girl who saw her
sister’s little son lying dead in a coffin, but who, I may now add, felt
no pain or sorrow thereat. We know from analysis why not. The dream only
concealed her wish to see the man she loved again; the affect must be
attuned to the wish, and not to its concealment. There was no occasion
for sorrow at all.
In a number of dreams the emotion at least remains connected with that
presentation content which has replaced the one really belonging to it.
In others the breaking up of the complex is carried further. The affect
seems to be entirely separated from the idea belonging to it, and finds
a place somewhere else in the dream where it fits into the new
arrangement of the dream elements. This is similar to what we have
learned of acts of judgment of the dream. If there is a significant
inference in the dream thoughts, the dream also contains one; but in the
dream the inference may be shifted to entirely different material. Not
infrequently this shifting takes place according to the principle of
antithesis.
I illustrate the latter possibility by the following dream, which I have
subjected to the most exhaustive analysis.
III. _A castle by the sea; afterwards it lies not directly on the sea,
but on a narrow canal that leads to the sea. A certain Mr. P. is the
governor of it. I stand with him in a large salon with three windows, in
front of which rise the projections of a wall, like battlements of a
fort. I belong to the garrison, perhaps as a volunteer marine officer.
We fear the arrival of hostile warships, for we are in a state of war.
Mr. P. has the intention of leaving; he gives me instructions as to what
must be done in case the dreaded event happens. His sick wife is in the
threatened castle with her children. As soon as the bombardment begins
the large hall should be cleared. He breathes heavily, and tries to get
away; I hold him back, and ask him in what way I should send him news in
case of need. He says something else, and then all at once falls over
dead. I have probably taxed him unnecessarily with my questions. After
his death, which makes no further impression upon me, I think whether
the widow is to remain in the castle, whether I should give notice of
the death to the commander-in-chief, and whether I should take over the
direction of the castle as the next in command. I now stand at the
window, and muster the ships as they pass by; they are merchantmen that
dart past upon the dark water, several of them with more than one
smokestack, others with bulging decks_ (that are quite similar to the
railway stations in the preliminary dream which has not been told).
_Then my brother stands next to me, and both of us look out of the
window on to the canal. At the sight of a ship we are frightened, and
call out: “Here comes the warship!” It turns out, however, that it is
only the same ships which I have already known that are returning. Now
comes a little ship, strangely cut off, so that it ends in the middle of
its breadth; curious things like cups or salt-cellars are seen on the
deck. We call as though with one voice: “That is the breakfast-ship.”_
The rapid motion of the ships, the deep blue of the water, the brown
smoke of the funnels, all this together makes a highly tense, sombre
impression.
The localities in this dream are put together from several journeys to
the Adriatic Sea (Miramare, Duino, Venice, Aquileja). A short but
enjoyable Easter trip to Aquileja with my brother, a few weeks before
the dream, was still fresh in my memory. Besides, the naval war between
America and Spain, and the worry connected with it about my relatives
living in America, play a part. Manifestations of emotion appear at two
places in this dream. In one place an emotion that would be expected is
lacking—it is expressly emphasized that the death of the governor makes
no impression upon me; at another point, where I see the warships I am
_frightened_, and experience all the sensations of fright while I sleep.
The distribution of affects in this well-constructed dream has been made
in such a way that every obvious contradiction is avoided. For there is
no reason why I should be frightened at the governor’s death, and it is
fitting that as the commander of the castle I should be alarmed by the
sight of the warship. Now analysis shows that Mr. P. is nothing but a
substitute for my own Ego (in the dream I am his substitute). I am the
governor who suddenly dies. The dream thoughts deal with the future of
those dear to me after my premature death. No other disagreeable thought
is to be found among the dream thoughts. The fright which is attached to
the sight of the warship must be transferred from it to this
disagreeable thought. Inversely, the analysis shows that the region of
the dream thoughts from which the warship comes is filled with most
joyous reminiscences. It was at Venice a year before, one charmingly
beautiful day, that we stood at the windows of our room on the Riva
Schiavoni and looked upon the blue lagoon, in which more activity could
be seen that day than usually. English ships were being expected, they
were to be festively received; and suddenly my wife called out, happy as
a child: “_There come the English warships!_” In the dream I am
frightened at the very same words; we see again that speeches in the
dream originate from speeches in life. I shall soon show that even the
element “English” in this speech has not been lost for the dream
activity. I thus convert joy into fright on the way from the dream
thoughts to the dream content, and I need only intimate that by means of
this very transformation I give expression to a part of the latent dream
content. The example shows, however, that the dream activity is at
liberty to detach the occasion for an affect from its context in the
dream thoughts, and to insert it at any other place it chooses in the
dream content.
I seize the opportunity which is incidentally offered, of subjecting to
closer analysis the “breakfast ship,” whose appearance in the dream so
nonsensically concludes a situation that has been rationally adhered to.
If I take a closer view of this object in the dream, I am now struck by
the fact that it was black, and that on account of its being cut off at
its greatest breadth it closely resembled, at the end where it was cut
off, an object which had aroused our interest in the museums of the
Etruscan cities. This object was a rectangular cup of black clay with
two handles, upon which stood things like coffee cups, or tea cups, very
similar to our modern _breakfast_ table service. Upon inquiring, we
learned that this was the toilet set of an Etruscan lady, with little
boxes for rouge and powder; and we said jokingly to each other that it
would not be a bad idea to take a thing like that home to the lady of
the house. The dream object, therefore, signifies “_black toilet_”
(German, _toilette_—dress)—mourning—and has direct reference to a death.
The other end of the dream object reminds us of the “boat” (German,
_Nachen_), from the root νέχυς, as a philological friend has told me,
upon which corpses were laid in prehistoric times and were left to be
buried by the sea. With this circumstance is connected the reason for
the return of the ships in the dream.
“Quietly the old man on his rescued boat drifts into the harbour.”
It is the return voyage after the ship_wreck_ (German, schiff_bruch_;
ship-_breaking_, _i.e._ shipwreck), the breakfast-ship looks as though
it were _broken_ off in the middle. But whence comes the name
“breakfast”-ship? Here is where the “English” comes in, which we have
left over from the warships. _Breakfast—a breaking of the fast._
Breaking again belongs to ship-_wreck_ (Schiff_bruch_), and _fasting_ is
connected with the mourning dress.
The only thing about this breakfast-ship, which has been newly created
by the dream, is its name. The thing has existed in reality, and recalls
to me the merriest hours of my last journey. As we distrusted the fare
in Aquileja, we took some food with us from Goerz, and bought a bottle
of excellent Istrian wine in Aquileja, and while the little mail-steamer
slowly travelled through the Canal delle Mee and into the lonely stretch
of lagoon towards Grado, we took our breakfast on deck—we were the only
passengers—and it tasted to us as few breakfasts have ever tasted. This,
then, was the “_breakfast-ship_,” and it is behind this very
recollection of great enjoyment that the dream hides the saddest
thoughts about an unknown and ominous future.
The detachment of emotions from the groups of ideas which have been
responsible for their development is the most striking thing that
happens to them in the course of dream formation, but it is neither the
only nor even the most essential change which they undergo on the way
from the dream thoughts to the manifest dream. If the affects in the
dream thoughts are compared with those in the dream, it at once becomes
clear that wherever there is an emotion in the dream, this is also to be
found in the dream thoughts; the converse, however, is not true. In
general, the dream is less rich in affects than the psychic material
from which it is elaborated. As soon as I have reconstructed the dream
thoughts I see that the most intense psychic impulses are regularly
striving in them for self-assertion, usually in conflict with others
that are sharply opposed to them. If I turn back to the dream, I often
find it colourless and without any of the more intense strains of
feeling. Not only the content, but also the affective tone of my
thoughts has been brought by the dream activity to the level of the
indifferent. I might say that a _suppression of the affects_ has taken
place. Take, for example, the dream of the botanical monograph. It
answers to a passionate plea for my freedom to act as I am acting and to
arrange my life as seems right to me and to me alone. The dream which
results from it sounds indifferent; I have written a monograph; it is
lying before me; it is fitted with coloured plates, and dried plants are
to be found with each copy. It is like the peacefulness of a
battlefield; there is no trace left of the tumult of battle.
It may also turn out differently—vivid affective expressions may make
their appearance in the dream; but we shall first dwell upon the
unquestionable fact that many dreams appear indifferent, while it is
never possible to go deeply into the dream thoughts without deep
emotion.
A complete theoretical explanation of this suppression of emotions in
the course of the dream activity cannot be given here; it would require
a most careful investigation of the theory of the emotions and of the
mechanism of suppression. I shall find a place here for two thoughts
only. I am forced—on other grounds—to conceive the development of
affects as a centrifugal process directed towards the interior of the
body, analogous to the processes of motor and secretory innervation.
Just as in the sleeping condition the omission of motor impulses towards
the outside world seems to be suspended, so a centrifugal excitement of
emotions through unconscious thought may be made more difficult during
sleep. Thus the affective impulses aroused during the discharge of the
dream thoughts would themselves be weak excitements, and therefore those
getting into the dream would not be stronger. According to this line of
argument the “suppression of the affects” would not be a result of the
dream activity at all, but a result of the sleeping condition. This may
be so, but this cannot possibly be all. We must also remember that all
the more complex dreams have shown themselves to be a compromised result
from the conflict of psychic forces. On the one hand, the thoughts that
constitute the wish must fight the opposition of a censorship; on the
other hand, we have often seen how, even in unconscious thinking, each
train of thought is harnessed to its contradictory opposite. Since all
of these trains of thought are capable of emotion, we shall hardly make
a mistake, broadly speaking, if we regard the suppression of emotion as
the result of the restraint which the contrasts impose upon one another
and which the censor imposes upon the tendencies which it has
suppressed. _The restraint of affects would accordingly he the second
result of the dream censor as the disfigurement of the dream was the
first._
I shall insert an example of a dream in which the indifferent affective
tone of the dream content may be explained by a contrast in the dream
thoughts. I have the following short dream to relate, which every reader
will read with disgust:
IV. _A bit of rising ground, and on it something like a toilet in the
open; a very long bench, at the end of which is a large toilet aperture.
All of the back edge is thickly covered with little heaps of excrement
of all sizes and degrees of freshness. A shrub behind the bench. I
urinate upon the bench; a long stream of urine rinses everything clean,
the patches of excrement easily come off and fall into the opening. It
seems as though something remained at the end nevertheless._
Why did I experience no disgust in this dream?
Because, as the analysis shows, the most pleasant and satisfying
thoughts have co-operated in the formation of this dream. Upon analysing
it I immediately think of the Augean stables cleansed by Hercules. I am
this Hercules. The rising ground and the shrub belong to Aussee, where
my children are now staying. I have discovered the infantile etiology of
the neuroses and have thus guarded my own children from becoming ill.
The bench (omitting the aperture, of course) is the faithful copy of a
piece of furniture which an affectionate female patient has made me a
present of. This recalls how my patients honour me. Even the museum of
human excrement is susceptible of less disagreeable interpretation.
However much I am disgusted with it, it is a souvenir of the beautiful
land of Italy, where in little cities, as everyone knows, water-closets
are not equipped in any other way. The stream of urine that washes
everything clean is an unmistakable allusion to greatness. It is in this
manner that Gulliver extinguishes the great fire in Lilliput; to be
sure, he thereby incurs the displeasure of the tiniest of queens. In
this way, too, Gargantua, the superman in Master Rabelais, takes
vengeance upon the Parisians, straddling Notre Dame and training his
stream of urine upon the city. Only yesterday I was turning over the
leaves of Garnier’s illustrations of Rabelais before I went to bed. And,
strangely enough, this is another proof that I am the superman! The
platform of Notre Dame was my favourite nook in Paris; every free
afternoon I was accustomed to go up into the towers of the church and
climb about among the monsters and devil-masks there. The circumstances
that all the excrement vanishes so rapidly before the stream correspond
to the motto: _Afflavit et dissipati sunt_, which I shall some day make
the title of a chapter on the therapeutics of hysteria.