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Page 25
In order to disguise her wish she had obviously selected a situation in
which wishes of that sort are commonly suppressed--a situation which is
so filled with sorrow that love is not thought of. And yet, it is very
easily probable that even in the actual situation at the bier of the
second, more dearly loved boy, which the dream copied faithfully, she
had not been able to suppress her feelings of affection for the visitor
whom she had missed for so long a time.
A different explanation was found in the case of a similar dream of
another female patient, who was distinguished in her earlier years by
her quick wit and her cheerful demeanors and who still showed these
qualities at least in the notion, which occurred to her in the course of
treatment. In connection with a longer dream, it seemed to this lady
that she saw her fifteen-year-old daughter lying dead before her in a
box. She was strongly inclined to convert this dream-image into an
objection to the theory of wish-fulfillment, but herself suspected that
the detail of the box must lead to a different conception of the
dream.[3] In the course of the analysis it occurred to her that on the
evening before, the conversation of the company had turned upon the
English word "box," and upon the numerous translations of it into
German, such as box, theater box, chest, box on the ear, &c. From other
components of the same dream it is now possible to add that the lady had
guessed the relationship between the English word "box" and the German
_B�chse_, and had then been haunted by the memory that _B�chse_ (as well
as "box") is used in vulgar speech to designate the female genital
organ. It was therefore possible, making a certain allowance for her
notions on the subject of topographical anatomy, to assume that the
child in the box signified a child in the womb of the mother. At this
stage of the explanation she no longer denied that the picture of the
dream really corresponded to one of her wishes. Like so many other young
women, she was by no means happy when she became pregnant, and admitted
to me more than once the wish that her child might die before its birth;
in a fit of anger following a violent scene with her husband she had
even struck her abdomen with her fists in order to hit the child within.
The dead child was, therefore, really the fulfillment of a wish, but a
wish which had been put aside for fifteen years, and it is not
surprising that the fulfillment of the wish was no longer recognized
after so long an interval. For there had been many changes meanwhile.
The group of dreams to which the two last mentioned belong, having as
content the death of beloved relatives, will be considered again under
the head of "Typical Dreams." I shall there be able to show by new
examples that in spite of their undesirable content, all these dreams
must be interpreted as wish-fulfillments. For the following dream, which
again was told me in order to deter me from a hasty generalization of
the theory of wishing in dreams, I am indebted, not to a patient, but to
an intelligent jurist of my acquaintance. "_I dream_," my informant
tells me, "_that I am walking in front of my house with a lady on my
arm. Here a closed wagon is waiting, a gentleman steps up to me, gives
his authority as an agent of the police, and demands that I should
follow him. I only ask for time in which to arrange my affairs._ Can you
possibly suppose this is a wish of mine to be arrested?" "Of course
not," I must admit. "Do you happen to know upon what charge you were
arrested?" "Yes; I believe for infanticide." "Infanticide? But you know
that only a mother can commit this crime upon her newly born child?"
"That is true."[4] "And under what circumstances did you dream; what
happened on the evening before?" "I would rather not tell you that; it
is a delicate matter." "But I must have it, otherwise we must forgo the
interpretation of the dream." "Well, then, I will tell you. I spent the
night, not at home, but at the house of a lady who means very much to
me. When we awoke in the morning, something again passed between us.
Then I went to sleep again, and dreamt what I have told you." "The woman
is married?" "Yes." "And you do not wish her to conceive a child?" "No;
that might betray us." "Then you do not practice normal coitus?" "I take
the precaution to withdraw before ejaculation." "Am I permitted to
assume that you did this trick several times during the night, and that
in the morning you were not quite sure whether you had succeeded?" "That
might be the case." "Then your dream is the fulfillment of a wish. By
means of it you secure the assurance that you have not begotten a child,
or, what amounts to the same thing, that you have killed a child. I can
easily demonstrate the connecting links. Do you remember, a few days ago
we were talking about the distress of matrimony (Ehenot), and about the
inconsistency of permitting the practice of coitus as long as no
impregnation takes place, while every delinquency after the ovum and
the semen meet and a foetus is formed is punished as a crime? In
connection with this, we also recalled the medi�val controversy about
the moment of time at which the soul is really lodged in the foetus,
since the concept of murder becomes admissible only from that point on.
Doubtless you also know the gruesome poem by Lenau, which puts
infanticide and the prevention of children on the same plane."
"Strangely enough, I had happened to think of Lenau during the
afternoon." "Another echo of your dream. And now I shall demonstrate to
you another subordinate wish-fulfillment in your dream. You walk in
front of your house with the lady on your arm. So you take her home,
instead of spending the night at her house, as you do in actuality. The
fact that the wish-fulfillment, which is the essence of the dream,
disguises itself in such an unpleasant form, has perhaps more than one
reason. From my essay on the etiology of anxiety neuroses, you will see
that I note interrupted coitus as one of the factors which cause the
development of neurotic fear. It would be consistent with this that if
after repeated cohabitation of the kind mentioned you should be left in
an uncomfortable mood, which now becomes an element in the composition
of your dream. You also make use of this unpleasant state of mind to
conceal the wish-fulfillment. Furthermore, the mention of infanticide
has not yet been explained. Why does this crime, which is peculiar to
females, occur to you?" "I shall confess to you that I was involved in
such an affair years ago. Through my fault a girl tried to protect
herself from the consequences of a _liaison_ with me by securing an
abortion. I had nothing to do with carrying out the plan, but I was
naturally for a long time worried lest the affair might be discovered."
"I understand; this recollection furnished a second reason why the
supposition that you had done your trick badly must have been painful to
you."
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