Selected papers on hysteria and other psychoneurosesFreud, Sigmund
Science
Selected papers on hysteria and other psychoneuroses
Freud, Sigmund
Hysteria; Neuroses; Psychoanalysis
(_a_) I notice that this method is often mistaken for the hypnotic
suggestive treatment. I notice this by the fact that quite frequently
colleagues whose confidant I am not by any means, send patients to me,
refractory patients of course, with the request that I should hypnotize
them. Now, for eight years I have not practiced hypnotism (individual
cases excluded) as a therapeutic aim, and hence I used to return the
patients with the advice that he who relies on hypnosis should do it
himself. In truth, the greatest possible contrast exists between the
suggestive and the analytic technique, that contrast which the great
Leonardo da Vinci has expressed for the arts in the formulæ per via di
porre and per via di levare. Said Leonardo, “the art of painting works
per via di levare, that is to say, places little heaps of paint where
they have not been before on the uncolored canvas; sculpturing, on the
other hand, goes per via di levare, that is to say, it takes away from
the stone as much as covers the surface of the statue therein
contained.” Quite similarly, gentlemen, the suggestive technique acts
per via di porre, it does not concern itself about the origin, force,
and significance of the morbid symptoms, but puts on something, to wit,
the suggestion which it expects will be strong enough to prevent the
pathogenic idea from expression. On the other hand the analytic therapy
does not wish to put on anything, or introduce anything new, but to take
away, and extract, and for this purpose it concerns itself with the
genesis of the morbid symptoms, and the psychic connection of the
pathogenic idea the removal of which is its aim. This manner of
investigation has considerably furthered our understanding. I have so
early given up the technique of suggestion, and with it hypnosis,
because I despaired of making the suggestion as strong and persistent as
would be necessary for a lasting cure. In all grave cases I noticed that
the suggestions which were put on crumbled off again, and then the
disease, or one replacing it, reappeared. Besides, I charge this
technique with concealing from us the psychic play of forces, for
example, it does not permit us to recognize the resistance with which
the patients adhere to their malady, with which they also strive against
the recovery, and which alone can give us an understanding of their
behavior in life.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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