Psychoanalysis : its history theory and practice / [André Tridon].

  • André Tridon
Date:
[1919]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Psychoanalysis : its history theory and practice / [André Tridon]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    pretty images; and so do his statements about ideas knocking at the portals of consciousness. Those pleas¬ antly worded assertions, however, are unilluminating to the student of real life. They have no practical applica¬ tion in the life of the average human being. Psychoanalysis will supersede entirely the guesswork of academic psychologists, bent on generalizing about character, tendencies, instincts. Psychoanalysis is not in¬ terested in mental states as such; it aims at tracing their origin and at bringing about their removal when they prove harmful to the individual. It seeks to direct into useful channels mental activities which are a dangerous or a wasteful display of energy. It searches the unconscious, not for literary illustrations and similes, but for positive, scientific, practical informa¬ tion concerning the operations of the mind. Before Freud began his experiments, the unconscious had been regarded as the province of the theoretical psy¬ chologists who simply filled it with their own personal fancies, then took those fancies out, one by one, and described them to us. Practical men sneered at the word “ unconscious ” and ignored the possibilities which its study held out for many sciences. Our unconscious is a tremendous storage-plant full of potential energy which can be expended for beneficial or harmful ends. Like every apparatus for storing up power, it can be man’s most precious ally, if man is familiar with it and, hence, not afraid of it. Ignorance and fear, on the other hand, can transform a live electric wire into an engine of destruction and death. Many indeed are the mental disturbances which are due to some fear, induced in its turn by lack of under-
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