Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido. A Contribution to the History of the Evolution of ThoughtJung, C. G. (Carl Gustav)
Philosophy
Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido. A Contribution to the History of the Evolution of Thought
Jung, C. G. (Carl Gustav)
Libido (Psychology); Mother and child; Psychoanalysis; Subconsciousness; Symbolism (Psychology)
There are those who have not yet learned to recognize sexuality as a
function equivalent to hunger and who, therefore, consider it as
disgraceful that certain taboo institutions which were considered as
asexual refuges are now recognized as overflowing with sexual symbolism.
Those people are doomed to the painful realization that such is still
the case, in spite of their great revolt. One must learn to understand
that, opposed to the customary habit of thought, psychoanalytic thinking
reduces and resolves those symbolic structures which have become more
and more complicated through countless elaboration. This means a course
of reduction which would be an intellectual enjoyment if the object were
different. But here it becomes distressing, not only æsthetically, but
apparently also ethically, because the repressions which are to be
overcome have been brought about by our best intentions. We must
commence to overcome our virtuousness with the certain fear of falling
into baseness on the other side. This is certainly true, for
virtuousness is always inwardly compensated by a great tendency towards
baseness; and how many profligates are there who inwardly preserve a
mawkish virtue and moral megalomania? Both categories of men turn out to
be snobs when they come in contact with analytic psychology, because the
moral man has imagined an objective and cheap verdict on sexuality and
the unmoral man is entirely unaware of the vulgarity of his sexuality
and of his incapacity for an unselfish love. One completely forgets that
one can most miserably be carried away, not only by a vice, but also by
a virtue. There is a fanatic orgiastic self-righteousness which is just
as base and which entails just as much injustice and violence as a vice.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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