attention) to the a parte existing complex. During the normal activity of the ego-complex the other complexes must be inhibited else the conscious function of the directed association would be impossible. We therefore see that the complex can only indirectly reveal itself by indefinite symptomatic association (symbolic actions), all of which show a more or less symbolic charicter.[1] (See all examples mentioned above.) The effects emaniting from the complex must in the normal be weak and obscure because they are not in possession of their full attention which is taken up by the ego-complex. Therefore in the experiment on distraction the ego-complex and the autonomous complex must be directly compared to both psychic activities, just as in the experiment most of the attention is bestowed on the writing and only a fraction on the association, so in activity most of the attention lies in the ego-complex while the autonomous complex receives only a fraction of it (provided the autonomous complex is not abnormally excited). It is for this reason that the autonomous complex can think only superficially and vaguely, that is, symbolically. Its productions (automatism, constellations) which it sends into the activity of the ego-complex and into consciousness must be created in a similar manner.
We shall here give a brief analysis of the symbolic. We use the symbolic in contradistinction to the allegoric. Allegory is an intentional interpretation of a thought reinforced by emblems, while symbols are only indistinct by-associations of a thought, causing more vagueness than perspicuity. Says Pelletier:[2] "The symbol is a very inferior form of thought. One can define the symbol as a false perception of a relation of identity or of a very great analogy between two objects which in reality present but a
- ↑ Stadelmann (Geisteskrankh. u. Naturwissensch., München, 1905) in his regretably affected manner of representation, says: "The psychotic furnishes the partially or completely deranged feeling of his ego with a symbol, but unlike the normal he does not compare this feeling with other processes or objects, but it is stretched to such an extent that the picture which he has brought in for comparison he allows to become a reality, a subjective reality which in the judgment of others is a delusion." "The genius finds the necessity of forms in his inner life which he projects outwardly, and whereas the symbolized associations in the psychotic become delusions, in the genius it only manifests itself as a somewhat exaggerated experience."
- ↑ L'Association des Idées dans la Manie aiguë, etc. Thèse de Paris, 1903.
