In the neuroses the patient suffers, according to Jung, from an unconscious tendency to return to this happy state of affairs rather than to face the hard struggle which adult life may entail. This tendency expresses itself in a symbolic way, according to the mechanisms which are characteristic of the neuroses; and what better or more appropriate symbol is possible than some form of exaggerated attachment to, and dependence on, the parents--through whom alone that happy time, to which return is now desired, was possible? Thus it would appear from this point of view that the incestuous fancies and wishes, to which Freud had drawn attention, are not to be taken literally as the expression of ultimate desires, but are only symbols of the wish to escape the hard task which life imposes and to return once more to the irresponsible condition of childhood. [Sidenote: Difficulties presented by this view] There are probably no experienced psycho-analysts who are prepared to follow Jung to this last extreme position, in which he appears to deny all ultimate significance to the sexual aspects of the family complexes. Jung's view would seem indeed to involve a number of serious difficulties, amongst which the following are perhaps the most important. [Sidenote: It does not accord with the general importance of sex] (1) It does not (as does the view expounded in the earlier chapters) cast any light upon the origin and development of, nor is it altogether consistent with, the very important part which the sexual tendencies play in the conscious and unconscious mind, quite apart from incestuous desires and fancies. If the principal problem of the neurotic lies in the difficulty of bracing himself to face the tasks which life imposes, it is hard to see why sexual feelings, thoughts, phantasies and symbols should appear in his mind so frequently and so persistently as they are now generally admitted to do in a very large number of cases. [Sidenote: It does not explain the strong repression of incest] (2) Jung's view does not explain why the thought of incestuous relations should be subject to so much repression as it actually is. If there is in reality no deep-rooted tendency to such relations, there is no need for the formation of any powerful mechanism for preventing the fulfilment of the tendency; whereas if we suppose that the arousal of object love in an incestuous form is a normal stage of libido development--a stage however which is superseded in the course of further normal development--the existence of a strong counter-mechanism, manifesting itself in consciousness as repulsion and disgust, and in social life in the form of sexual taboos and "avoidances" connected with the various prohibited relationships, is precisely what our knowledge of the general conditions of the development of conative tendencies in the human mind would lead us to expect. [Sidenote: Nor the choice of incest as a symbol]