BOOK REVIEWS
Collected Papers on the Psychology of Phantasy. By Constance E. Long, M. D. (Baillifere, Tindall and Cox, London 1920. Pp. 228. Price 10s. 6d.)
In this volume eleven previously published papers are put together. They are well written, interesting to read, and present the author's points of view in a harmonious and satisfactory fashion. As is well known. Dr. Long is a thorough-going follower of Jung, and those who sympathise with his attitude towards psychology have the right to con- gratulate the author and themselves on this successful production.
Jung's views demand such extensive criticism that it is not possible to do them justice in a review oi this particular volume. We note here throughout their characteristic tendency towards undermining the signif- icance of the results so laboriously arrived at by means of psycho- analysis. Thus the concept of repression falls into the background, that of the intrapsychic censorship is dispensed with, that oi libido is de- sexualised (and of course that of incest), determinism is held to be a principle of only partial validity in psychology, and imaginary moral and teleological attributes are ascribed to the unconscious, without any evidence being adduced in support of this. Dr. Long makes it fairly plain that the terms 'functional', 'hermeneutic', 'subjective', 'tele- ological', as used by the Jung school, are really superfluous synonyms for 'moral', and great stress is laid on this aspect of analytic psych- ology. "Moral instincts are as much an essential content of the un- conscious mind as are the sexual instincts" (p. 78) ; "in no department of human activity can an ethical bearing be excluded" (p. 99). This naturally applies also to dreams, and has to supplement Freud's wish- fulfilment theory of these. From the numerous casuistic examples given it is clear that the mode of interpretation used bears little resemblance to the technique of psycho-analysis.
In these circumstances we must again protest against the mis- leading custom of appropriating the term psycho-analysis, which is a clearly enough defined one, to matters so remote from it and to methods and views in such sharp contradiction to its own. Nor can we regard Dr. Long's lame excuse that it is impossible to disentangle the two as at all valid. On the contrary, psycho-analysts have not the least difficulty in distinguishing the characteristics of their work from that which preceded psycho-analysis, to which Jung's is nothing but a reversion.
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