[442] Since we parted company with the Viennese school on the question of the interpretive principle in psychoanalysis, namely, whether it be sexuality or simply energy, our concepts have undergone considerable development. Once the prejudice regarding the explanatory cause had been removed by accepting a purely abstract one, the nature of which was not postulated in advance, our interest was directed to the concept of the unconscious.
[202] 443 In Freud’s view, as most people know, the contents of the unconscious are reducible to infantile tendencies which are repressed because of their incompatible character. Repression is a process that begins in early childhood under the moral influence of the environment and continues throughout life. By means of analysis the repressions are removed and the repressed wishes are made conscious again. Theoretically the unconscious would thus find itself emptied and, so to speak, done away with; but in reality the production of infantile-sexual wish-fantasies continues right into old age.
[203] 444 According to this theory, the unconscious would contain only those elements of the personality which could just as well be conscious, and have in fact been suppressed only through the process of education. It follows that the essential content of the unconscious would be of a personal character. Although from one point of view the infantile tendencies of the unconscious are the most conspicuous, it would none the less be a mistake to define or evaluate the unconscious entirely in these terms. The unconscious has still another side to it: it includes not only repressed contents, but also all psychic material that lies below the threshold of consciousness. It is impossible to explain the subliminal nature of all this material on the principle of repression, for in that case the removal of repression ought to endow a person with a prodigious memory which would thenceforth forget nothing. No doubt repression plays a part, but it is not the only factor. If what we call a bad memory were always only the result of repression, those who enjoy an excellent memory ought never to suffer from repression, nor in consequence be neurotic. But experience shows that this is not the case at all. There are certainly cases of abnormally bad memory where it is obvious that the lion’s share must be attributed to repression, but these are relatively rare.
[204] 445 We therefore affirm that in addition to the repressed material the unconscious contains all those psychic components that have fallen below the threshold, as well as subliminal sense-perceptions. Moreover, we know, from abundant experience as well as for theoretical reasons, that besides this the unconscious contains all the material that has not yet reached the threshold of consciousness. These are the seeds of future conscious contents. Equally we have every reason to suppose that the unconscious is never quiescent in the sense of being inactive, but presumably is ceaselessly engaged in the grouping and regrouping of so-called unconscious fantasies. This activity should be thought of as relatively autonomous only in pathological cases; normally it is co-ordinated with consciousness in a compensatory relationship.
[205] 446 It is to be assumed that all these contents are of a personal nature in so far as they are acquired during the individual’s life. Since this life is limited, the number of acquired contents in the unconscious must also be limited. This being so, it might be thought possible to empty the unconscious either by analysis or by making a complete inventory of the unconscious contents, on the ground that the unconscious cannot produce anything more than what is already known and assimilated into consciousness. We should also have to suppose, as we have said, that if one could arrest the descent of conscious contents into the unconscious by doing away with repression, unconscious productivity would be paralysed. This is possible only to a very limited extent, as we know from experience. We urge our patients to hold fast to repressed contents that have been re-associated with consciousness, and to assimilate them into their plan of life. But this procedure, as we may daily convince ourselves, makes no impression on the unconscious, since it calmly goes on producing apparently the same infantile-sexual fantasies which, according to the earlier theory, should be the effects of personal repressions. If in such cases the analysis be continued systematically, one uncovers little by little a medley of incompatible wish-fantasies of a most surprising composition. Besides all the sexual perversions one finds every conceivable kind of criminality, as well as the noblest deeds and the loftiest ideas imaginable, the existence of which one would never have suspected in the subject under analysis.
[228] 447 By way of example I would like to recall the case of a schizophrenic patient of Maeder’s, who used to declare that the world was his picture-book.2 He was a wretched locksmith’s apprentice who fell ill at an early age and had never been blessed with much intelligence. This notion of his, that the world was his picture-book, the leaves of which he was turning over as he looked around him, is exactly the same as Schopenhauer’s “world as will and idea,” but expressed in primitive picture language. His vision is just as sublime as Schopenhauer’s, the only difference being that with the patient it remained at an embryonic stage, whereas in Schopenhauer the same idea is transformed from a vision into an abstraction and expressed in a language that is universally valid.
[229] 448 It would be quite wrong to suppose that the patient’s vision had a personal character and value, for that would be to endow the patient with the dignity of a philosopher. But, as I have indicated, he alone is a philosopher who can transmute a vision born of nature into an abstract idea, thereby translating it into a universally valid language. Schopenhauer’s philosophical conception represents a personal value, but the vision of the patient is an impersonal value, a merely natural growth, the proprietary right to which can be acquired only by him who abstracts it into an idea and expresses it in universal terms. It would, however, be wrong to attribute to the philosopher, by exaggerating the value of his achievement, the additional merit of having actually created or invented the vision itself. It is a primordial idea that grows up quite as naturally in the philosopher and is simply a part of the common property of mankind, in which, in principle, everyone has a share. The golden apples drop from the same tree, whether they be gathered by a locksmith’s apprentice or by a Schopenhauer.
[218] 449 These primordial ideas, of which I have given a great many examples in my work on libido,3 oblige one to make, in regard to unconscious material, a distinction of quite a different character from that between “preconscious” and “unconscious” or “subconscious” and “unconscious.” The justification for these distinctions need not be discussed here. They have their specific value and are well worth elaborating further as points of view. The fundamental distinction which experience has forced upon me claims to be no more than that. It should be evident from the foregoing that we have to distinguish in the unconscious a layer which we may call the personal unconscious. The contents of this layer are of a personal nature in so far as they have the character partly of acquisitions derived from the individual’s life and partly of psychological factors4 which could just as well be conscious.
[218] 450 It can readily be understood that incompatible psychological elements are liable to repression and therefore become unconscious. But this implies the possibility, on the other hand, of making and keeping the repressed contents conscious once they have been recognized. We recognize them as personal contents because their effects, or their partial manifestation, or their source can be discovered in our personal past. They are integral components of the personality, they belong to its inventory, and their loss to consciousness produces an inferiority in one respect or another. This inferiority has the psychological character not so much of an organic lesion or an inborn defect as of a lack which gives rise to a feeling of moral resentment. The sense of moral inferiority always indicates that the missing element is something which, to judge by this feeling about it, really ought not to be missing, or which could be made conscious if only one took sufficient trouble. The moral inferiority does not come from a collision with the generally accepted and, in a sense, arbitrary moral law, but from the conflict with one’s own self, which for reasons of psychic equilibrium demands that the deficit be redressed. Whenever a sense of moral inferiority appears, it indicates not only a need to assimilate an unconscious component, but also the possibility of such assimilation. In the last resort it is a man’s moral qualities which force him, either through direct recognition of the need or indirectly through a painful neurosis, to assimilate his unconscious self and keep himself fully conscious. Whoever progresses along this path of self-realization must inevitably bring into consciousness the contents of his personal unconscious, thus enlarging considerably the scope of his personality.
[221] 451 The process of assimilating the unconscious gives rise to some very remarkable phenomena. It produces in some patients an unmistakable and often unpleasant increase of self-confidence and conceit: they are full of themselves, they know everything, they imagine themselves to be fully informed of everything concerning their unconscious, and are persuaded that they understand perfectly everything that comes out of it. At every interview with the doctor they get more and more above themselves. Others on the contrary feel themselves more and more crushed under the contents of the unconscious, they lose their self-confidence and abandon themselves with dull resignation to all the extraordinary things that the unconscious produces. The former, overflowing with feelings of their own importance, assume a responsibility for the unconscious that goes much too far, beyond all reasonable bounds; the others finally give up all sense of responsibility, overcome by a sense of the powerlessness of the ego against the fate working through the unconscious.
[222] 452 If we analyse these two modes of reaction more deeply, we find that the optimistic self-confidence of the first conceals a profound sense of impotence, for which their conscious optimism acts as an unsuccessful compensation; while the pessimistic resignation of the others masks a defiant will to power, far surpassing in cocksureness the conscious optimism of the first type.
[224] 453 Adler has employed the term “godlikeness” to characterize certain basic features of neurotic power psychology. If I likewise borrow the same term from Faust, I use it here more in the sense of that well known passage where Mephisto writes “Eritis sicut Deus, scientes bonum et malum” in the student’s album, and makes the following aside:
Just follow the old advice
Of my cousin the snake.
There’ll come a time when your godlikeness
Will make you quiver and quake.5
[454] Godlikeness is certainly not a scientific concept, although it aptly characterizes the psychological state in question. It has yet to be seen whence this attitude arises and why it deserves the name of godlikeness. As the term indicates, the abnormality of the patient’s condition consists in his attributing to himself qualities or values which obviously do not belong to him, for to be “godlike” is to be like a spirit superior to the spirit of man.
[235] 455 If, with a psychological aim in view, we dissect this notion of godlikeness, we find that the term comprises not only the dynamic phenomenon I have discussed in my book on libido, but also a certain psychic function having a collective character supraordinate to the individual mentality. Just as the individual is not merely a unique and separate being, but is also a social being, so the human mind is not a self-contained and wholly individual phenomenon, but also a collective one. And just as certain social functions or instincts are opposed to the egocentric interests of the individual, so certain functions or tendencies of the human mind are opposed, by their collective nature, to the personal mental functions.6 The reason for this is that every man is born with a brain that is highly differentiated. This makes him capable of a wide range of mental functioning which is neither developed ontogenetically nor acquired. But, inasmuch as human brains are uniformly differentiated, the mental functioning thereby made possible is collective and universal. This explains, for example, the interesting fact that the unconscious processes of the most widely separated peoples and races show a quite remarkable correspondence, which displays itself, among other things, in the extraordinary but well-authenticated analogies between the forms and motifs of autochthonous myths.
[235] 456 The universal similarity of human brains leads to the universal possibility of a uniform mental functioning. This functioning is the collective psyche. This can be subdivided into the collective mind and the collective soul.7 Inasmuch as there are differentiations corresponding to race, tribe, and even family, there is also a collective psyche limited to race, tribe, and family over and above the “universal” collective psyche. To borrow an expression from Pierre Janet, the collective psyche comprises the parties inférieures of the mental functions, that is to say those deep-rooted, well-nigh automatic portions of the individual psyche which are inherited and are to be found everywhere, and are thus impersonal or suprapersonal. Consciousness plus the personal unconscious constitutes the parties supérieures of the mental functions, those portions, therefore, that are developed ontogenetically and acquired as a result of personal differentiation.
[235] 457 Consequently, the individual who annexes the unconscious heritage of the collective psyche to what has accrued to him in the course of his ontogenetic development enlarges the scope of his personality in an illegitimate way and suffers the consequences. In so far as the collective psyche comprises the parties inférieures of the mental functions and thus forms the basis of every personality, it has the effect of crushing and devaluing the latter. This shows itself in the aforementioned stifling of self-confidence and in an unconscious heightening of the ego’s importance to the point of a pathological will to power. On the other hand, in so far as the collective psyche is supraordinate to the personality, being the matrix of all personal differentiations and the mental function common to all individuals, it will have the effect, if annexed to the personality, of producing a hypertrophy of self-confidence, which in turn is compensated by an extraordinary sense of inferiority in the unconscious.
[237] 458 If, through assimilation of the unconscious, we make the mistake of including the collective psyche in the inventory of personal mental functions, a dissolution of the personality into its paired opposites inevitably follows. Besides the pair of opposites already discussed, megalomania and the sense of inferiority, which are so painfully evident in neurosis, there are many others, from which I will single out only the specifically moral pair of opposites, namely good and evil (scientes bonum et malum!). The formation of this pair goes hand in hand with the increase and diminution of self-confidence. The specific virtues and vices of humanity are contained in the collective psyche like everything else. One man arrogates collective virtue to himself as his personal merit, another takes collective vice as his personal guilt. Both are as illusory as the megalomania and the inferiority, because the imaginary virtues and the imaginary wickedness are simply the moral pair of opposites contained in the collective psyche, which have become perceptible or have been rendered conscious artificially. How much these paired opposites are contained in the collective psyche is exemplified by primitives: one observer will extol the greatest virtues in them, while another will record the very worst impressions of the selfsame tribe. For the primitive, whose personal differentiation is, as we know, only just beginning, both judgments are true, because his mentality is essentially collective. He is still more or less identical with the collective psyche, and for that reason shares equally in the collective virtues and vices without any personal attribution and without inner contradiction. The contradiction arises only when the personal development of the mind begins, and when reason discovers the irreconcilable nature of the opposites. The consequence of this discovery is the conflict of repression. We want to be good, and therefore must repress evil; and with that the paradise of the collective psyche comes to an end.
[237] 459 Repression of the collective psyche was absolutely necessary for the development of the personality, since collective psychology and personal psychology exclude one another up to a point. History teaches us that whenever a psychological attitude acquires a collective value, schisms begin to break out. Nowhere is this more evident than in the history of religion. A collective attitude is always a threat to the individual, even when it is a necessity. It is dangerous because it is very apt to check and smother all personal differentiation. It derives this characteristic from the collective psyche, which is itself a product of the psychological differentiation of the powerful gregarious instinct in man. Collective thinking and feeling and collective effort are relatively easy in comparison with individual functioning and performance; and from this may arise, all too easily, a dangerous threat to the development of personality through enfeeblement of the personal function. The damage done to the personality is compensated—for everything is compensated in psychology—by a compulsive union and unconscious identity with the collective psyche.
[240] 460 There is now a danger that in the analysis of the unconscious the collective and the personal psyche may be fused together, with, as I have intimated, highly unfortunate results. These results are injurious both to the patient’s life-feeling and to his fellow men, if he has any power at all over his environment. Through his identification with the collective psyche he will infallibly try to force the demands of his unconscious upon others, for identity with the collective psyche always brings with it a feeling of universal validity—“godlikeness”—which completely ignores all differences in the psychology of his fellows.
[461] The worst abuses of this kind can be avoided by a clear understanding and appreciation of the fact that there are differently oriented psychological types whose psychology cannot be forced into the mould of one’s own type. It is hard enough for one type completely to understand another type, but perfect understanding of another individuality is totally impossible. Due regard for the individuality of another is not only advisable but absolutely essential in analysis if the development of the patient’s personality is not to be stifled. Here it is to be observed that, for one type of individual, to show respect for another’s freedom is to grant him freedom of action, while for another it is to grant him freedom of thought. In analysis both must be safeguarded so far as the analyst’s own self-preservation permits him to do so. An excessive desire to understand and enlighten is just as useless and injurious as a lack of understanding.
[241] 462 The collective instincts and fundamental forms of thinking and feeling brought to light by analysis of the unconscious constitute, for the conscious personality, an acquisition which it cannot assimilate completely without injury to itself.8 It is therefore of the utmost importance in practical treatment to keep the goal of the individual’s development constantly in view. For, if the collective psyche is taken to be the personal possession of the individual or as a personal burden, it will result in a distortion or an overloading of the personality which is very difficult to deal with. Hence it is imperative to make a clear distinction between the personal unconscious and the contents of the collective psyche. This distinction is far from easy, because the personal grows out of the collective psyche and is intimately bound up with it. So it is difficult to say exactly what contents are to be called personal and what collective. There is no doubt, for instance, that archaic symbolisms such as we frequently find in fantasies and dreams are collective factors. All basic instincts and basic forms of thinking and feeling are collective. Everything that all men agree in regarding as universal is collective, likewise everything that is universally understood, universally found, universally said and done. On closer examination one is always astonished to see how much of our so-called individual psychology is really collective. So much, indeed, that the individual traits are completely overshadowed by it. Since, however, individuation is an ineluctable psychological necessity, we can see from the ascendency of the collective what very special attention must be paid to this delicate plant “individuality” if it is not to be completely smothered.
[242] 463 Human beings have one faculty which, though it is of the greatest utility for collective purposes, is most pernicious for individuation, and that is the faculty of imitation. Collective psychology cannot dispense with imitation, for without it all mass organizations, the State and the social order, are simply impossible. Society is organized, indeed, less by law than by the propensity to imitation, implying equally suggestibility, suggestion, and mental contagion. But we see every day how people use, or rather abuse, the mechanism of imitation for the purpose of personal differentiation: they are content to ape some eminent personality, some striking characteristic or mode of behaviour, thereby achieving an outward distinction from the circle in which they move. We could almost say that as a punishment for this the uniformity of their minds with those of their neighbours, already real enough, is still further increased until it becomes an unconscious enslavement to their surroundings. As a rule these specious attempts at differentiation stiffen into a pose, and the imitator remains at the same level as he always was, only several degrees more sterile than before. To find out what is truly individual in ourselves, profound reflection is needed; and suddenly we realize how uncommonly difficult the discovery of individuality is.
[243] 464 Here we come to a problem which, if overlooked, is liable to cause the greatest confusion. It will be remembered that in the analysis of the personal unconscious the first things to be added to consciousness are the personal contents, and I suggested that these contents, which have been repressed but are capable of being made conscious again, should be called the personal unconscious. I also showed that to annex the deeper layers of the unconscious, which I have called the impersonal unconscious, produces an enlargement of the personality leading to the state of “godlikeness.” This state is reached by simply continuing the analytical work which has restored to consciousness the repressed portions of the personality. By continuing the analysis we add to the personal consciousness certain fundamental, general, and impersonal characteristics of humanity, thereby bringing about the condition I have described, which might be regarded as one of the disagreeable consequences of analysis.9
[245] 465 From this point of view the conscious personality looks to us like a more or less arbitrary segment of the collective psyche. It owes its existence simply to the fact that it is from the outset unconscious of these fundamental and universal characteristics of humanity, and in addition has repressed, more or less arbitrarily, psychic or characterological elements of which it could just as well be conscious, in order to build up that segment of the collective psyche which we call the persona. The term persona is a very appropriate expression for this, for originally it meant the mask once worn by actors to indicate the role they played. If we endeavour to draw a precise distinction between what psychic material should be considered personal, and what impersonal, we soon find ourselves in the greatest dilemma, for by definition we have to say of the persona’s contents what we have said of the impersonal unconscious, namely, that they are collective. It is only because the persona represents a more or less arbitrary and fortuitous segment of the collective psyche that we can make the mistake of regarding it in toto as something individual. It is, as its name implies, only the mask worn by the collective psyche, a mask that feigns individuality, making others and oneself believe that one is individual, whereas one is simply acting a role through which the collective psyche speaks.
[246] 466 When we analyse the persona we strip off the mask, and discover that what seemed to be individual is at bottom collective. We thus trace the “petty god of this world” back to his origin in the universal god who is a personification of the collective psyche. Whether we reduce the personality to the fundamental instinct of sexuality, like Freud, or to the ego’s elementary will to power, like Adler, or to the general principle of the collective psyche which embraces both the Freudian and the Adlerian principles, we arrive at the same result: the dissolution of the personality in the collective. That is why, in any analysis that is pushed far enough, there comes a moment when the subject experiences that feeling of “godlikeness” of which we have spoken.
[250] 467 This condition frequently announces itself by very peculiar symptoms, as for example dreams in which the dreamer is flying through space like a comet, or feels that he is the earth, the sun, or a star, or that he is of immense size, or dwarfishly small, or that he is dead, is in a strange place, is a stranger to himself, confused, mad, etc. He may also experience body-sensations, such as being too large for his skin, or too fat; or hypnagogic sensations of falling or rising endlessly, of the body growing larger or of vertigo. Psychologically this state is marked by a peculiar disorientation in regard to one’s own personality; one no longer knows who one is, or one is absolutely certain that one actually is what one seems to have become. Intolerance, dogmatism, self-conceit, self-depreciation, and contempt for “people who have not been analysed,” and for their views and activities, are common symptoms. Often enough I have observed an increase in the liability to physical illness, but only when the patients relish their condition and dwell on it too long.
[251] 468 The forces that burst out of the collective psyche are confusing and blinding. One result of the dissolution of the persona is the release of fantasy, which is apparently nothing less than the specific activity of the collective psyche. This outburst of fantasy throws up into consciousness materials and impulses whose existence one had never before suspected. All the treasures of mythological thinking and feeling are unlocked. It is not always easy to hold one’s own against such an overwhelming impression. This phase must be reckoned one of the real dangers of analysis a danger that ought not to be minimized.
[469] It will readily be understood that this condition is so insupportable that one would like to put an end to it as speedily as possible, since the analogy with mental derangement is too close. As we know, the commonest form of insanity, dementia praecox or schizophrenia, consists essentially in the fact that the unconscious in large measure ousts and supplants the function of the conscious mind. The unconscious usurps the reality function and substitutes its own reality. Unconscious thoughts become audible as voices, or are perceived as visions or body-hallucinations, or they manifest themselves in senseless, unshakable judgments upheld in the face of reality.
[470] In a similar but not quite identical manner the unconscious is pushed into consciousness when the persona is dissolved in the collective psyche. The one difference between this state and that of mental alienation is that here the unconscious is brought to the surface with the help of conscious analysis—at least, this is how things go at the beginning of an analysis, when powerful cultural resistances to the unconscious have still to be overcome. Later, when the barriers built up by the years have been broken down, the unconscious intrudes spontaneously, and sometimes irrupts into the conscious mind like a torrent. In this phase the analogy with mental derangement is very close. [In the same way, the moments of inspiration in a genius often bear a decided resemblance to pathological states.] But it would be real insanity only if the contents of the unconscious became a reality that took the place of conscious reality; in other words, if they were believed in without reserve. [Actually, one can believe in the contents of the unconscious without this amounting to insanity in the proper sense, even though actions of an unadapted nature may be performed on the basis of such convictions. Paranoid delusions, for instance, do not depend on belief—they appear to be true a priori and have no need of belief in order to lead an effective and valid existence. In the cases we are discussing the question is still open whether belief or criticism will triumph. This alternative is not found in genuine insanity.]
[471] The unbearable state of identity with the collective psyche drives the patient, as we have said, to some radical solution. Two ways are open to him for getting out of the condition of “godlikeness.” The first possibility is to try to re-establish regressively the previous persona by attempting to control the unconscious through the application of a reductive theory—by declaring, for instance, that it is “nothing but” repressed and long overdue infantile sexuality which would really be best replaced by the normal sexual function. This explanation is based on the undeniably sexual symbolism of the language of the unconscious and on its concretistic interpretation. Alternatively the power theory may be invoked and, relying on the equally undeniable power tendencies of the unconscious, one may interpret the feeling of “godlikeness” as “masculine protest,” as the infantile desire for domination and security. Or one may explain the unconscious in terms of the archaic psychology of primitives, an explanation that would not only cover both the sexual symbolism and the “godlike” power strivings that come to light in the unconscious material but would also seem to do justice to its religious, philosophical, and mythological aspects.
[472] In each case the conclusion will be the same, for what it amounts to is a repudiation of the unconscious as something everybody knows to be useless, infantile, devoid of sense, and altogether impossible and obsolete. After this devaluation, there is nothing to be done but shrug one’s shoulders resignedly. To the patient there seems to be no alternative, if he is to go on living rationally, but to reconstitute, as best he can, that segment of the collective psyche which we have called the persona, and quietly give up analysis, trying to forget if possible that he possesses an unconscious. He will take Faust’s words to heart:
[257] This earthly circle I know well enough.
Towards the Beyond the view has been cut off;
Fool—who directs that way his dazzled eye,
Contrives himself a double in the sky!
Let him look round him here, not stray beyond;
To a sound man this world must needs respond.
To roam into eternity is vain!
What he perceives, he can attain.
Thus let him walk along his earthlong day;
Though phantoms haunt him, let him go his way,
And, moving on, to weal and woe assent—
He at each moment ever discontent.10
[258] 473 Such a solution would be perfect if a man were really able to shake off the unconscious, drain it of libido and render it inactive. But experience shows that it is not possible to drain the energy from the unconscious: it remains active, for it not only contains but is itself the source of libido from which all the psychic elements flow into us—the thought-feelings or feeling-thoughts, the still undifferentiated germs of formal thinking and feeling. It is therefore a delusion to think that by some kind of magical theory or method the unconscious can be finally emptied of libido and thus, as it were, eliminated. One may for a while play with this delusion, but the day comes when one is forced to say with Faust:
But now such spectredom so throngs the air
That none knows how to dodge it, none knows where.
Though one day greet us with a rational gleam,
The night entangles us in webs of dream.
We come back happy from the fields of spring—
And a bird croaks. Croaks what? Some evil thing.
Enmeshed in superstition night and morn,
It forms and shows itself and comes to warn.
And we, so scared, stand without friend or kin,
And the door creaks—and nobody comes in.
Anyone here?
CARE: The answer should be clear.
FAUST: And you, who are you then?
CARE: I am just here.
FAUST: Take yourself off!
CARE: This is where I belong.
FAUST: Take care, Faust, speak no magic spell, be strong.
CARE: Unheard by the outward ear
In the heart I whisper fear;
Changing shape from hour to hour
I employ my savage power.11
[258] 474 The unconscious cannot be analysed to a finish and brought to a standstill. Nothing can deprive it of its power for any length of time. To attempt to do so by the method described is to deceive ourselves, and is nothing but ordinary repression in a new guise.
[258] 475 Mephistopheles leaves an avenue open which should not be overlooked, since it is a real possibility for some people. He tells Faust, who is sick of the “madness of magic” and would gladly escape from the witch’s kitchen:
Right. There is one way that needs
No money, no physician, and no witch.
Pack up your things and get back to the land
And there begin to dig and ditch;
Keep to the narrow round, confine your mind,
And live on fodder of the simplest kind,
A beast among the beasts; and don’t forget
To use your own dung on the crops you set.12
[Anyone who finds it possible to live this kind of life will never be in danger of coming to grief in either of the two ways we are discussing, for his nature does not compel him to tackle a problem that is beyond his powers. But if ever the great problem should be thrust upon him, this way out will be closed.]
[260] 476 The second way leads to identification with the collective psyche. This amounts to an acceptance of “godlikeness,” but now exalted into a system. That is to say, one is the fortunate possessor of the great truth which was only waiting to be discovered, of the eschatological knowledge which spells the healing of the nations. This attitude is not necessarily megalomania in direct form, but in the milder and more familiar form of prophetic inspiration and desire for martyrdom. For weak-minded persons, who as often as not possess more than their fair share of ambition, vanity, and misplaced naïveté, the danger of yielding to this temptation is very great. Access to the collective psyche means a renewal of life for the individual, no matter whether this renewal is felt as pleasant or unpleasant. Everybody would like to hold fast to this renewal: one man because it enhances his life-feeling, another because it promises a rich harvest of knowledge. Therefore both of them, not wishing to deprive themselves of the great treasures that lie buried in the collective psyche, will strive by every means possible to maintain their newly won connection with the primal source of life.13 Identification would seem to be the shortest road to this, for the dissolution of the persona in the collective psyche positively invites one to plunge into that “ocean of divinity” and blot out all memory in its embrace. This piece of mysticism is innate in all better men as the “longing for the mother,” the nostalgia for the source from which we came.
[261] 477 As I have shown in my book on libido, there lie at the root of the regressive longing, which Freud conceives as “infantile fixation” or the “incest wish,” a specific value and a specific need which are made explicit in myths. It is precisely the strongest and best among men, the heroes, who give way to their regressive longing and purposely expose themselves to the danger of being devoured by the monster of the maternal abyss. But if a man is a hero, he is a hero because, in the final reckoning, he did not let the monster devour him, but subdued it, not once but many times. Victory over the collective psyche alone yields the true value—the capture of the hoard, the invincible weapon, the magic talisman, or whatever it be that the myth deems most desirable. Anyone who identifies with the collective psyche—or, in mythological terms, lets himself be devoured by the monster—and vanishes in it, attains the treasure that the dragon guards, but he does so in spite of himself and to his own greatest harm.
[478] [The danger, therefore, of falling victim to the collective psyche by identification is not to be minimized. Identification is a retrograde step, one more stupidity has been committed, and on top of that the principle of individuation is denied and repressed under the cloak of the individual deed and in the nebulous conceit that one has discovered what is truly one’s own. In reality one has not discovered one’s own at all, but rather the eternal truths and errors of the collective psyche. In the collective psyche one’s true individuality is lost.]
[479] Identification with the collective psyche is thus a mistake that, in another form, ends as disastrously as the first way, which led to the separation of the persona from the collective psyche.
[480] In order to solve the problem presented by the assimilation of the collective psyche, and to find a practical method of treatment, we have first of all to take account of the error of the two procedures we have just described. We have seen that neither the one nor the other can lead to good results.
[481] The first, by abandoning the vital values in the collective psyche, simply leads back to the point of departure. The second penetrates directly into the collective psyche, but at the price of losing that separate human existence which alone can render life supportable and satisfying. Yet each of these ways proffers absolute values that should not be lost to the individual.
[482] The mischief, then, lies neither with the collective psyche nor with the individual psyche, but in allowing the one to exclude the other. The disposition to do this is encouraged by the monistic tendency, which always and everywhere looks for a unique principle. Monism, as a general psychological tendency, is a characteristic of all civilized thinking and feeling, and it proceeds from the desire to set up one function or the other as the supreme psychological principle. The introverted type knows only the principle of thinking, the extraverted type only that of feeling.14 This psychological monism, or rather monotheism, has the advantage of simplicity but the defect of one-sidedness. It implies on the one hand exclusion of the diversity and rich reality of life and the world, and on the other the practicality of realizing the ideals of the present and the immediate past, but it holds out no real possibility of human development.
[483] The disposition to exclusiveness is encouraged no less by rationalism. The essence of this consists in the flat denial of whatever is opposed to one’s own way of seeing things either from the logic of the intellect or from the logic of feeling. It is equally monistic and tyrannical in regard to reason itself. We ought to be particularly grateful to Bergson for having broken a lance in defence of the irrational. Although it may not be at all to the taste of the scientific mind, psychology will nonetheless have to recognize a plurality of principles and accommodate itself to them. It is the only way to prevent psychology from getting stranded. In this matter we owe a great deal to the pioneer work of William James.
[484] With regard to individual psychology, however, science must waive its claims. To speak of a science of individual psychology is already a contradiction in terms. It is only the collective element in the psychology of an individual that constitutes an object for science; for the individual is by definition something unique that cannot be compared with anything else. A psychologist who professes a “scientific” individual psychology is simply denying individual psychology. He exposes his individual psychology to the legitimate suspicion of being merely his own psychology. The psychology of every individual would need its own manual, for the general manual can deal only with collective psychology.
[485] These remarks are intended as a prelude to what I have to say about the handling of the aforesaid problem. The fundamental error of both procedures consists in identifying the subject with one side or the other of his psychology. His psychology is as much individual as collective, but not in the sense that the individual ought to merge himself in the collective, nor the collective in the individual. We must rigorously separate the concept of the individual from that of the persona, for the persona can be entirely dissolved in the collective. But the individual is precisely that which can never be merged with the collective and is never identical with it. That is why identification with the collective and voluntary segregation from it are alike synonymous with disease.
[486 It is simply impossible to effect a clear division of the individual from the collective, and even if it were possible it would be quite pointless and valueless for our purpose. It is sufficient to know that the human psyche is both individual and collective, and that its well-being depends on the natural co-operation of these two apparently contradictory sides. Their union is essentially an irrational life process that can, at most, be described in individual cases, but can neither be brought about, nor understood, nor explained rationally.15
[487] If I may be forgiven a humorous illustration of the starting-point for the solution of our problem, I would cite Buridan’s ass between the two bundles of hay. Obviously his question was wrongly put. The important thing was not whether the bundle on the right or the one on the left was the better, or which one he ought to start eating, but what he wanted in the depths of his being—which did he feel pushed towards? The ass wanted the object to make up his mind for him.
[488] What is it, at this moment and in this individual, that represents the natural urge of life? That is the question.
[489] That question neither science, nor worldly wisdom, nor religion, nor the best of advice can resolve for him. The resolution can come solely from absolutely impartial observation of those psychological germs of life which are born of the natural collaboration of the conscious and the unconscious on the one hand and of the individual and the collective on the other. Where do we find these germs of life? One man seeks them in the conscious, another in the unconscious. But the conscious is only one side, and the unconscious is only its reverse. We should never forget that dreams are the compensators of consciousness. If it were not so, we would have to regard them as a source of knowledge superior to consciousness: we should then be degraded to the mental level of fortune tellers and would be obliged to accept all the futility of superstition, or else, following vulgar opinion, deny any value at all to dreams.
[490] It is in creative fantasies that we find the unifying function we seek. All the functions that are active in the psyche converge in fantasy. Fantasy has, it is true, a poor reputation among psychologists, and up to the present psychoanalytic theories have treated it accordingly. For Freud as for Adler it is nothing but a “symbolic” disguise for the basic drives and intentions presupposed by these two investigators. As against these opinions it must be emphasized—not on theoretical grounds but essentially for practical reasons—that although fantasy can be causally explained and devalued in this way, it nevertheless remains the creative matrix of everything that has made progress possible for humanity. Fantasy has its own irreducible value, for it is a psychic function that has its roots in the conscious and the unconscious alike, in the individual as much as in the collective.
[491] Whence has fantasy acquired its bad reputation? Above all from the circumstance that it cannot be taken literally. Concretely understood, it is worthless. If it is understood semiotically, as Freud understands it, it is interesting from the scientific point of view; but if it is understood hermeneutically, as an authentic symbol, it acts as a signpost, providing the clues we need in order to carry on our lives in harmony with ourselves.
[492] The symbol is not a sign that disguises something generally known.16 Its meaning resides in the fact that it is an attempt to elucidate, by a more or less apt analogy, something that is still entirely unknown or still in the process of formation.17 If we reduce this by analysis to something that is generally known, we destroy the true value of the symbol; but to attribute hermeneutic significance to it is consistent with its value and meaning.
[493] The essence of hermeneutics, an art widely practised in former times, consists in adding further analogies to the one already supplied by the symbol: in the first place subjective analogies produced at random by the patient, then objective analogies provided by the analyst out of his general knowledge. This procedure widens and enriches the initial symbol, and the final outcome is an infinitely complex and variegated picture the elements of which can be reduced to their respective tertia comparationis. Certain lines of psychological development then stand out that are at once individual and collective. There is no science on earth by which these lines could be proved “right”; on the contrary, rationalism could very easily prove that they are wrong. Their validity is proved by their intense value for life. And that is what matters in practical treatment: that human beings should get a hold on their own lives, not that the principles by which they live should be proved rationally to be “right.”
[494] [This view will seem the only acceptable one to the man of our time who thinks and feels scientifically, but not to the extraordinarily large number of so-called educated people for whom science is not a principle of intellectual ethics superior to their own minds, but rather a means of corroborating their inner experiences and giving them general validity. No one who is concerned with psychology should blind himself to the fact that besides the relatively small number of those who pay homage to scientific principles and techniques, humanity fairly swarms with adherents of quite another principle. It is entirely in keeping with the spirit of our present-day culture that one can read in an encyclopaedia, in an article on astrology, the following remark: “One of its last adherents was I. W. Pfaff, whose Astrologie (Bamberg, 1816) and Der Stern der Drei Weisen (1821) must be called strange anachronisms. Even today, however, astrology is still highly regarded in the East, particularly in Persia, India, and China.” One must be smitten with blindness to write such a thing nowadays. The truth is that astrology flourishes as never before. There is a regular library of astrological books and magazines that sell for far better than the best scientific works. The Europeans and Americans who have horoscopes cast for them may be counted not by the hundred thousand but by the million. Astrology is a flourishing industry. Yet the encyclopaedia can say: “The poet Dryden (d. 1701) still had horoscopes cast for his children.” Christian Science, too, has swamped Europe and America. Hundreds and thousands of people on both sides of the Atlantic swear by theosophy and anthroposophy, and anyone who believes that the Rosicrucians are a legend of the dim bygone has only to open his eyes to see them as much alive today as they ever were. Folk magic and secret lore have by no means died out. Nor should it be imagined that only the dregs of the populace fall for such superstitions. We have, as we know, to climb very high on the social scale to find the champions of this other principle.]
[495] [Anyone who is interested in the real psychology of man must bear such facts in mind. For if such a large percentage of the population has an insatiable need for this counterpole to the scientific spirit, we can be sure that the collective psyche in every individual—be he never so scientific—has this psychological requirement in equally high degree. A certain kind of “scientific” scepticism and criticism in our time is nothing but a misplaced compensation of the powerful and deep-rooted superstitious impulses of the collective psyche. We have seen from experience that extremely critical minds have succumbed completely to this demand of the collective psyche, either directly, or indirectly by making a fetish of their particular scientific theory.]18
[496] Faithful to the spirit of scientific superstition, someone may now begin to talk about suggestion. But we ought to have realized long ago that a suggestion is not accepted unless it is agreeable to the person concerned. Unless it is acceptable, all suggestion is futile; otherwise the treatment of neurosis would be an extremely simple affair: one would merely have to suggest the state of health. This pseudo-scientific talk about suggestion is based on the unconscious superstition that suggestion is possessed of some self-generated magical power. No one succumbs to suggestion unless from the very bottom of his heart he is willing to comply with it.
[497] By means of the hermeneutic treatment of fantasies we arrive, in theory, at a synthesis of the individual with the collective psyche; but in practice one indispensable condition remains to be fulfilled. It belongs essentially to the regressive nature of the neurotic—and this is something he has also learnt in the course of his illness—never to take himself or the world seriously, but always to rely first on one doctor and then on another, by this or that method, and in such and such circumstances, to cure him, without any serious cooperation on his part. Now, no dog can be washed without getting wet. Without the complete willingness and absolute seriousness of the patient, no recovery is possible. There are no magical cures for neurosis. The moment we begin to map out the lines of advance that are symbolically indicated, the patient himself must proceed along them. If he shirks this by his own deceit, he automatically precludes any cure. He must in very truth take the way of the individual lifeline he has recognized as his own, and continue along it until such time as an unmistakable reaction from the unconscious tells him that he is on the wrong track.
[498] He who does not possess this moral function, this loyalty to himself, will never get rid of his neurosis. But he who has this capacity will certainly find the way to cure himself.
[499] Neither the doctor nor the patient, therefore, should let himself slip into the belief that analysis by itself is sufficient to remove a neurosis. That would be a delusion and a deception. Infallibly, in the last resort, it is the moral factor that decides between health and sickness.
[500] The construction of “life-lines” reveals to consciousness the ever-changing direction of the currents of libido. These life-lines are not to be confused with the “guiding fictions” discovered by Adler, for the latter are nothing but arbitrary attempts to cut off the persona from the collective psyche and lend it an independent existence. One might rather say that the guiding fiction is an unsuccessful attempt to construct a life-line. Moreover—and this shows the uselessness of the fiction—such a line as it does produce persists far too long; it has the tenacity of a cramp.
[501] The life-line constructed by the hermeneutic method is, on the contrary, temporary, for life does not follow straight lines whose course can be predicted far in advance. “All truth is crooked,” says Nietzsche. These life-lines, therefore, are never general principles or universally accepted ideals, but points of view and attitudes that have a provisional value. A decline in vital intensity, a noticeable loss of libido, or, on the contrary, an upsurge of feeling indicate the moment when one line has been quitted and a new line begins, or rather ought to begin. Sometimes it is enough to leave the unconscious to discover the new line, but this attitude is not to be recommended to the neurotic under all circumstances, although there are indeed cases where this is just what the patient needs to learn—how to put his trust in so-called chance. However, it is not advisable to let oneself drift for any length of time; a watchful eye should at least be kept on the reactions of the unconscious, that is, on dreams, which indicate like a barometer the one-sidedness of our attitude.19 Unlike other psychologists, I therefore consider it necessary for the patient to remain in contact with his unconscious, even after analysis, if he wishes to avoid a relapse.20 I am persuaded that the true end of analysis is reached when the patient has gained an adequate knowledge of the methods by which he can maintain contact with the unconscious, and has acquired a psychological understanding sufficient for him to discern the direction of his life-line at the moment. Without this his conscious mind will not be able to follow the currents of libido and consciously sustain the individuality he has achieved. A patient who has had any serious neurosis needs to be equipped in this way if he is to persevere in his cure.
[502] Analysis, thus understood, is by no means a therapeutic method of which the medical profession holds a monopoly. It is an art, a technique, a science of psychological life, which the patient, when cured, should continue to practise for his own good and for the good of those amongst whom he lives. If he understands it in this way, he will not set himself up as a prophet, nor as a world reformer; but, with a sound sense of the general good, he will profit by the knowledge he has acquired during treatment, and his influence will make itself felt more by the example of his own life than by any high discourse or missionary propaganda.
[503] [I am well aware that this discussion has landed me on perilous ground. It is virgin territory which psychology has still to conquer, and I am obliged to do pioneer work. I am painfully conscious of the inadequacy of many of my formulations, though unfortunately this knowledge is of little avail when it comes to improving on them. I must therefore beg the reader not to be put off by the shortcomings of my presentation, but to try to feel his way into what I am endeavouring to describe. I would like to say a few words more about the concept of individuality in relation to the personal and the collective in order to clarify this central problem.
[504] As I have already pointed out, individuality reveals itself primarily in the particular selection of those elements of the collective psyche which constitute the persona. These components, as we have seen, are not individual but collective. It is only their combination, or the selection of a group already combined in a pattern, that is individual. Thus we have an individual nucleus which is covered by the personal mask. It is in the particular differentiation of the persona that the individuality exhibits its resistance to the collective psyche. By analysing the persona we confer a greater value on the individuality and thus accentuate its conflict with the collectivity. This conflict consists, of course, in a psychological opposition within the subject. The dissolution of the compromise between the two halves of a pair of opposites renders their activity more intense. In purely unconscious, natural life this conflict does not exist, despite the fact that purely physiological life has to satisfy individual and collective requirements equally. The natural and unconscious attitude is harmonious. The body, its faculties, and its needs furnish of their own nature the rules and limitations that prevent any excess or disproportion. But because of its one-sidedness, which is fostered by conscious and rational intention, a differentiated psychological function always tends to disproportion. The body also forms the basis of what we might call the mental individuality, which is, as it were, an expression of corporeal individuality and can never come into being unless the rights of the body are acknowledged. Conversely, the body cannot thrive unless the mental individuality is accepted. At the same time, it is in the body that the individual is in the highest degree similar to other individuals, although each individual body is distinguishable from all other bodies. Equally, every mental or moral individuality differs from all the others, and yet is so constituted as to render every man equal to all other men. Every living being that is able to develop itself individually, without constraint, will best realize, by the very perfection of its individuality, the ideal type of its species, and by the same token will achieve a collective value.
[505] The persona is always identical with a typical attitude dominated by a single psychological function, for example, by thinking, feeling, or intuition. This one-sidedness necessarily results in the relative repression of the other functions. In consequence, the persona is an obstacle to the individual’s development. The dissolution of the persona is therefore an indispensable condition for individuation. It is, however, impossible to achieve individuation by conscious intention, because conscious intention invariably leads to a typical attitude that excludes whatever does not fit in with it. The assimilation of unconscious contents leads, on the contrary, to a condition in which conscious intention is excluded and is supplanted by a process of development that seems to us irrational. This process alone signifies individuation, and its product is individuality as we have just defined it: particular and universal at once. So long as the persona persists, individuality is repressed, and hardly betrays its existence except in the choice of its personal accessories—by its actor’s wardrobe, one might say. Only when the unconscious is assimilated does the individuality emerge more clearly, together with the psychological phenomenon which links the ego with the non-ego and is designated by the word attitude. But this time it is no longer a typical attitude but an individual one.
[506] The paradox in this formulation arises from the same root as the ancient dispute about universals. The proposition: animal nullumque animal genus est makes the fundamental paradox clear and intelligible. The realia—these are the particular, the individual; the universalia exist psychologically, but are based on a real resemblance between particulars. Thus the individual is that particular thing which possesses in greater or lesser degree the qualities upon which we base the general conception of “collectivity”; and the more individual it is, the more it develops those qualities which are fundamental to the collective conception of humanity.
[507] In the hope of unravelling these tangled problems, I would like to emphasize the architectonics of the factors to be considered. We have to do with the following fundamental concepts:
1. The world of consciousness and reality. By this is meant those contents of consciousness which consist of perceived images of the world, and of our conscious thoughts and feelings about it.
2. The collective unconscious. By this is meant that part of the unconscious which consists on the one hand of unconscious perceptions of external reality and, on the other, of all the residues of the phylogenetic perceptive and adaptive functions. A reconstruction of the unconscious view of the world would yield a picture showing how external reality has been perceived from time immemorial. The collective unconscious contains, or is, an historical mirror-image of the world. It too is a world, but a world of images.
3. Since the world of consciousness, like the world of the unconscious, is to a large extent collective, these two spheres together form the collective psyche in the individual.
4. The collective psyche must be contrasted with a fourth concept, namely, the concept of individuality. The individual stands, as it were, between the conscious part of the collective psyche and the unconscious part. He is the reflecting surface in which the world of consciousness can perceive its own unconscious, historical image, even as Schopenhauer says that the intellect holds up a mirror to the universal Will. Accordingly, the individual would be a point of intersection or a dividing line, neither conscious nor unconscious, but a bit of both.
5. The paradoxical nature of the psychological individual must be contrasted with that of the persona. The persona is conscious all round, so to speak, or is at least capable of becoming so. It represents a compromise formation between external reality and the individual. In essence, therefore, it is a function for adapting the individual to the real world. The persona thus occupies a place midway between the real world and individuality.
6. Beyond individuality, which appears to be the innermost core of ego-consciousness and of the unconscious alike, we find the collective unconscious. The place between the individual and the collective unconscious, corresponding to the persona’s position between the individual and external reality, appears to be empty. Experience has taught me, however, that here too a kind of persona exists, but a persona of a compensatory nature which (in a man) could be called the anima. The anima would thus be a compromise formation between the individual and the unconscious world, that is, the world of historical images, or “primordial images.” We frequently meet the anima in dreams, where it appears as a feminine being in a man, and as a man (animus) in a woman. A good description of the anima figure can be found in Spitteler’s Imago. In his Prometheus and Epimetheus she appears as the soul of Prometheus, and in his Olympian Spring as the soul of Zeus.
[508] To the degree that the ego identifies with the persona, the anima, like everything unconscious, is projected into the real objects of our environment. She is regularly to be found, therefore, in the woman we are in love with. This can be seen easily enough from the expressions we use when in love. The poets, too, have supplied a good deal of evidence in this respect. The more normal a person is, the less will the daemonic qualities of the anima appear in the objects of his immediate environment. They are projected upon more distant objects, from which no immediate disturbance is to be feared. But the more sensitive a person is, the closer these daemonic projections will come, until in the end they break through the family taboo and produce the typical neurotic complications of a family romance.
[509] If the ego identifies with the persona, the subject’s centre of gravity lies in the unconscious. It is then practically identical with the collective unconscious, because the whole personality is collective. In these cases there is a strong pull towards the unconscious and, at the same time, violent resistance to it on the part of consciousness because the destruction of conscious ideals is feared.
[510] In certain cases, found chiefly among artists or highly emotional people, the ego is localized not in the persona (the function of relationship to the real world) but in the anima (the function of relationship to the collective unconscious). Here individual and persona are alike unconscious. The collective unconscious then intrudes into the conscious world, and a large part of the real world becomes an unconscious content. Such persons have the same daemonic fear of reality as ordinary people have of the unconscious.]
[511] A. We have to divide psychological material into conscious and unconscious contents.
1. The conscious contents are in part personal inasmuch as their general validity is not recognized, and in part impersonal, that is, collective, inasmuch as their general validity is recognized.
2. The unconscious contents are in part personal inasmuch as they consist of personal material that was once conscious but was then repressed, and whose general validity is therefore not recognized when it becomes conscious again. They are impersonal inasmuch as the material is recognized as having general validity, and of which it is impossible to prove any anterior or even relative consciousness.
[512] B. The Composition of the Persona.
1. The conscious personal contents constitute the conscious personality, the conscious ego.
2. The unconscious personal contents constitute the self, the unconscious or subconscious ego.
3. The conscious and unconscious contents of a personal nature constitute the persona.
[513] C. The Composition of the Collective Psyche.
1. The conscious and unconscious contents of an impersonal or collective nature constitute the psychological non-ego, the object-imago. These contents may appear in analysis as projections of feelings or judgments, but they are a priori collective and are identical with the object-imago; that is, they appear to be qualities of the object, and it is only a posteriori that they are recognized as subjective psychological qualities.
2. The persona is a grouping of conscious and unconscious contents which is opposed as ego to the non-ego. A general comparison of the personal contents belonging to different individuals shows the surprising resemblance between them, which may even amount to identity, and largely cancels out the individual nature of the personal contents as well as of the persona. To this extent the persona must be considered a segment and also a constituent of the collective psyche.
3. The collective psyche is thus composed of the object-imago and the persona.
1. Individuality manifests itself partly as the principle which selects and sets limits to contents that are recognized as personal.
2. Individuality is the principle which makes possible, and if need be compels, a progressive differentiation from the collective psyche.
3. Individuality manifests itself partly as an obstacle to collective functioning, and partly as resistance to collective thinking and feeling.
4. Individuality is that which is peculiar and unique in a given combination of collective psychological elements.
5. Individuality corresponds to the systole, and collective psychology to the diastole, of the movement of libido.
[515] E. The conscious and unconscious contents are subdivided into those that are individual and those that are collective.
1. A content whose developmental tendency is towards differentiation from the collective is individual.
2. A content whose developmental tendency is towards a general value is collective.
3. There are insufficient criteria by which to determine whether a given content is purely individual or purely collective, for individuality is very difficult to determine, although always and everywhere present.
4. The life-line of an individual is the resultant of the individual and collective tendencies of the psychological process at a given moment.
[516] A. We have to divide psychological material into conscious and unconscious contents.
1. The conscious contents are in part personal inasmuch as their general validity is not recognized, and in part impersonal, that is, collective, inasmuch as their general validity is recognized.
2. The unconscious contents are in part personal inasmuch as they consist of personal material that was once conscious but was then repressed, and whose general validity is therefore not recognized when it becomes conscious again. They are impersonal inasmuch as the material is recognized as having general validity, and of which it is impossible to prove any anterior or even relative consciousness.
[517] B. The Composition of the Persona.
1. The conscious personal contents constitute the conscious persona[lity], the conscious ego.
2. The unconscious personal contents are combined with the germs of the still undeveloped individuality and with the collective unconscious. All these elements appear in combination with the repressed personal contents (i.e., the personal unconscious), and, when assimilated by consciousness, dissolve the persona into the collective material.
[518] C. The Composition of the Collective Psyche.
1. The conscious and unconscious contents of an impersonal or collective nature constitute the psychological non-ego, the object-imago. These materials, in so far as they are unconscious, are a priori identical with the object-imago; that is, they appear to be qualities of the object, and it is only a posteriori that they are recognized as subjective psychological qualities.
2. The persona is a subject-imago, which, like the object-imago, largely consists of collective material inasmuch as the persona represents a compromise with society, the ego identifying more with the persona than with individuality. The more the ego identifies with the persona, the more the subject becomes what he appears to be, and is de-individualized.
3. The collective psyche is thus composed of the object-imago and the persona. When the ego is completely identical with the persona, individuality is wholly repressed, and the entire conscious psyche becomes collective. This represents the maximum adaptation to society and the minimum adaptation to one’s own individuality.
1. Individuality is that which is unique in the combination of collective elements of the persona and its manifestations.
2. Individuality is the principle of resistance to collective functioning. It makes possible, and if need be compels, differentiation from the collective psyche.
3. Individuality is a developmental tendency constantly aiming at differentiation and separation from the collective.
4. A distinction must be made between individuality and the individual. The individual is determined on the one hand by the principle of uniqueness and distinctiveness, and on the other by the society to which he belongs. He is an indispensable link in the social structure.
5. Development of individuality is simultaneously a development of society. Suppression of individuality through the predominance of collective ideals and organizations is a moral defeat for society.
6. The development of individuality can never take place through personal relationships alone, but requires a psychic relationship to the collective unconscious.
[520] E. The Collective Unconscious.
1. The collective unconscious is the unconscious portion of the collective psyche. It is the unconscious object-imago.
2. The collective unconscious is composed of:
a. Subliminal perceptions, thoughts and feelings that were not repressed because of their incompatibility with personal values, but were subliminal from the start because of their low stimulus value or low libido investment.
b. Subliminal vestiges of archaic functions that exist a priori and can be brought back into function at any time through an accumulation of libido. These vestiges are not merely formal but have the dynamic nature of instincts. They represent the primitive and the animal in civilized man.
c. Subliminal combinations in symbolic form, not yet capable of becoming conscious.
3. An actual content of the collective unconscious always consists of an amalgamation of the elements enumerated in a–c, and its expression varies accordingly.
4. The collective unconscious always appears projected on a conscious [external] object.
5. The collective unconscious in individual A bears a greater resemblance to the collective unconscious in individual B than the conscious ideas in the minds of A and B do to one another.
6. The most important contents of the collective unconscious appear to be “primordial images,” that is, unconscious collective ideas (mythical thinking) and vital instincts.
7. So long as the ego is identical with the persona, individuality forms an essential content of the collective unconscious. In the dreams and fantasies of men it begins by appearing as a masculine figure, and in those of women as a feminine figure. Later it shows hermaphroditic traits which characterize its intermediate position. (Good examples in Meyrink’s Golem and in the Walpurgisnacht.)
1. The anima is an unconscious subject-imago analogous to the persona. Just as the persona is the image of himself which the subject presents to the world, and which is seen by the world, so the anima is the image of the subject in his relation to the collective unconscious, or an expression of unconscious collective contents unconsciously constellated by him. One could also say: the anima is the face of the subject as seen by the collective unconscious.
2. If the ego adopts the standpoint of the anima, adaptation to reality is severely compromised. The subject is fully adapted to the collective unconscious but has no adaptation to reality. In this case too he is de-individualized.