Introductory lectures on psycho-analysis · Sigmund Freud
HÂTEM:
These are some of the results yielded by the application of psycho-analysis to the narcissistic disorders. They are still not very numerous, and many of them still lack that sharpness of outline which cannot be achieved in a new field until some degree of familiarity has been attained. All of them have been made possible by employing the conception of Ego-Libido, or narcissistic Libido, by means of which we can extend the conclusions established for the transference neuroses on to the narcissistic neuroses. But now you will put the question whether it is possible for us to bring all the disorders of the narcissistic neuroses and of the psychoses into the range of the Libido-theory, for us to find the libidinal factor in mental life always and everywhere responsible for the development of disease, and for us never to have to attribute any part in the causation to the same alteration in the functions of the self-preservative instincts. Well now, it seems to me that decision on this point is not very urgent, and above all that the time is not yet ripe for us to make it; we may leave it calmly to be decided by advance in the work of science. I should not be astonished if it should prove that the capacity to induce a pathogenic effect were actually a prerogative of the libidinal impulses, so that the theory of the Libido would triumph all along the line from the actual neuroses to the severest psychotic form of individual derangement. For we know it to be characteristic of the Libido that it refuses to subordinate itself to reality in life, to Necessity. But I consider it extremely probable that the Ego-instincts are involved secondarily and that disturbances in their functions may be necessitated by the pathogenic affections of the Libido. Nor can I see that the direction taken by our investigations will be invalidated if we should have to recognize that in severe psychosis the Ego-instincts themselves are primarily deranged; the future will decide—for you, at least.
Let me return for a moment to anxiety, in order to throw light upon the one obscure point we left there. We said that the relation between anxiety and Libido, otherwise so well defined, is with difficulty harmonized with the almost indisputable assumption that real anxiety in the face of danger is the expression of the self-preservative instincts. But how if the anxiety-affect is provided, not by self-interest on the part of the Ego-instincts, but by the Ego-Libido? The condition of anxiety is after all invariably detrimental; its disadvantage becomes conspicuous when it reaches an intense degree. It then interferes with the action that alone would be expedient and would serve the purposes of self-preservation, whether it be flight or self-defence. Therefore if we ascribe the affective component of real anxiety to the Ego-Libido, and the action undertaken to the Ego-preservative instincts, every theoretical difficulty will be overcome. You will hardly maintain seriously that we run away _because_ we perceive fear? No, we perceive fear _and_ we take to flight, out of the common impulse that is roused by the perception of danger. Men who have survived experiences of imminent danger to life tell us that they did not perceive any fear, that they simply acted—for instance, pointed their gun at the oncoming beast—which was undoubtedly the best thing they could do.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.