Quite often they are lines of thought starting out from more than one centre, but not without their points of contact; almost invariably one train of thought is accompanied by its contradictory opposite, associatively linked to it by contrast.

But since the downfall of the mythological hypothesis an interpretation of the dream has been wanting. The conditions of its origin; its relationship to our psychical life when we are awake; its independence of disturbances which, during the state of sleep, seem to compel notice; its many peculiarities repugnant to our waking thought; the incongruence between its images and the feelings they engender; then the dream's evanescence, the way in which, on awakening, our thoughts thrust it aside as something bizarre, and our reminiscences mutilating or rejecting it — all these and many other problems have for many hundred years demanded answers which up till now could never have been satisfactory. Before all there is the question as to the meaning of the dream, a question which is in itself double-sided. There is, firstly, the psychical significance of the dream, its position with regard to the psychical processes, as to a possible biological function; secondly, has the dream a meaning — can sense be made of each single dream as of other mental syntheses?

Most of the 'pain' we experience is of a perceptual order, perception either of the urge of unsatisfied instincts or of something in the external world which may be painful in itself or may arouse painful anticipations in the psychic apparatus and is recognised by it as 'danger.

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Here libido and ego-interest share the same fate and have once more become indistinguishable from each other. The familiar egoism of the sick person covers them both. We find it so natural because we are certain that in the same situation we should behave in just the same way. The way in which the readiness to love, however great, is banished by bodily ailments, and suddenly replaced by complete indifference, is a theme which has been sufficiently exploited by comic writers.

"يبدو أن الكثير من الناس لا يسهل عليهم السماح لكل أفكارهم التلقائية بالتداعي الحر دون أن يمارسوا عليها نقدا عنيفا.
والإبداع الأدبي خير مثال على تداعي حر للأفكار ، هذا إذا أولينا التصديق للشاعر والفيلسوف العظيم فردريك شيللر، إذ يقول في إحدى رسائله إلى صديق يشكو له من نضب قريحته عن الإبداع: "أعتقد أن السبب في شكواك يرجع إلى استبداد عقلك بخيالك، فإن العقل إذا غالى في إكثاب النظر في الأفكار التي ترد عليه كأنه واقف لها بالمرصاد وهي لا تزال على الأبواب، لم يكن في ذلك نفع بل لعله يعرقل قريحة الإبداع! فالفكرة إن أخذتها على حدة قد تبدو تافهة كل التفاهة، غريبة أقصى الغرابة، ولكن أخرى قد تتلوها فإذا هي ذات شأن، أو هي قد ترتبط بأفكار غيرها تلوح في مثل سخفها فإذا هي الحلقة المفقودة ؛ فما يستطيع العقل أن يحكم على الكل إذا هو لم يمسك الفكرة أمدا كافياً يتأملها مقرونة بأخواتها. وأما القريحة المبدعة - فيما يظهر لي - فمعها على العكس يرفع العقل الحراسة عن الأبواب، تاركاً الأفكار تهجم شذر مذر!
وأما أنتم يا حضرات النقاد فتستحيون هذا الجنون العابر الموقوت الذي يعرفه كل مبدع حقيقي، ومن ثم شكواكم من العقم، فأنتم تنبذون سريعاً، وتفرقون عسفا

Individual liberty is not an asset of civilization. It was greatest before there was any civilization, though admittedly even then it was largely worthless, because the individual was hardly in a position to defend it. With the development of civilization it underwent restrictions, and justice requires that no one shall be spared these restrictions. Whatever makes itself felt in a human community as an urge for freedom may amount to a revolt against an existing injustice, thus favouring a further advance of civilization and remaining compatible with it. But it may spring from what remains of the original personality, still untamed by civilization, and so become a basis for hostility to civilization. The urge for freedom is thus directed against particular forms and claims of civilization, or against civilization as a whole. It does not seem as though any influence can induce human beings to change their nature and become like termites; they will probably always defend their claim to individual freedom against the will of the mass.

The view is often defended that sciences should be built up on clear and sharply defined basal concepts. In actual fact no science, not even the most exact, begins with such definitions. The true beginning of scientific activity consists rather in describing phenomena and then in proceeding to group, classify and correlate them.

Dreaming, in short, is one of the devices we employ to circumvent repression, one of the main methods of what may be called indirect representation in the mind.