Dream Psychology

they utilize the dream content to obtrude themselves upon consciousness
even during the night; indeed, they occasionally even dominate the dream
content, and impel it to continue the work of the day; it is also
certain that the day remnants may just as well have any other character
as that of wishes; but it is highly instructive and even decisive for
the theory of wish-fulfillment to see what conditions they must comply
with in order to be received into the dream.

Let us pick out one of the dreams cited above as examples, _e.g._, the
dream in which my friend Otto seems to show the symptoms of Basedow's
disease. My friend Otto's appearance occasioned me some concern during
the day, and this worry, like everything else referring to this person,
affected me. I may also assume that these feelings followed me into
sleep. I was probably bent on finding out what was the matter with him.
In the night my worry found expression in the dream which I have
reported, the content of which was not only senseless, but failed to
show any wish-fulfillment. But I began to investigate for the source of
this incongruous expression of the solicitude felt during the day, and
analysis revealed the connection. I identified my friend Otto with a
certain Baron L. and myself with a Professor R. There was only one
explanation for my being impelled to select just this substitution for
the day thought. I must have always been prepared in the Unc. to
identify myself with Professor R., as it meant the realization of one of
the immortal infantile wishes, viz. that of becoming great. Repulsive
ideas respecting my friend, that would certainly have been repudiated
in a waking state, took advantage of the opportunity to creep into the
dream, but the worry of the day likewise found some form of expression
through a substitution in the dream content. The day thought, which was
no wish in itself but rather a worry, had in some way to find a
connection with the infantile now unconscious and suppressed wish, which
then allowed it, though already properly prepared, to "originate" for
consciousness. The more dominating this worry, the stronger must be the
connection to be established; between the contents of the wish and that
of the worry there need be no connection, nor was there one in any of
our examples.

We can now sharply define the significance of the unconscious wish for
the dream. It may be admitted that there is a whole class of dreams in
which the incitement originates preponderatingly or even exclusively
from the remnants of daily life; and I believe that even my cherished
desire to become at some future time a "professor extraordinarius" would
have allowed me to slumber undisturbed that night had not my worry about
my friend's health been still active. But this worry alone would not
have produced a dream; the motive power needed by the dream had to be
contributed by a wish, and it was the affair of the worriment to
procure for itself such wish as a motive power of the dream. To speak
figuratively, it is quite possible that a day thought plays the part of
the contractor (_entrepreneur_) in the dream. But it is known that no
matter what idea the contractor may have in mind, and how desirous he
may be of putting it into operation, he can do nothing without capital;
he must depend upon a capitalist to defray the necessary expenses, and
this capitalist, who supplies the psychic expenditure for the dream is
invariably and indisputably _a wish from the unconscious_, no matter
what the nature of the waking thought may be.

In other cases the capitalist himself is the contractor for the dream;
this, indeed, seems to be the more usual case. An unconscious wish is
produced by the day's work, which in turn creates the dream. The dream
processes, moreover, run parallel with all the other possibilities of
the economic relationship used here as an illustration. Thus, the
entrepreneur may contribute some capital himself, or several
entrepreneurs may seek the aid of the same capitalist, or several
capitalists may jointly supply the capital required by the entrepreneur.
Thus there are dreams produced by more than one dream-wish, and many
similar variations which may readily be passed over and are of no
further interest to us. What we have left unfinished in this discussion
of the dream-wish we shall be able to develop later.

The "tertium comparationis" in the comparisons just employed--_i.e._ the
sum placed at our free disposal in proper allotment--admits of still
finer application for the illustration of the dream structure. We can
recognize in most dreams a center especially supplied with perceptible
intensity. This is regularly the direct representation of the
wish-fulfillment; for, if we undo the displacements of the dream-work by
a process of retrogression, we find that the psychic intensity of the
elements in the dream thoughts is replaced by the perceptible intensity
of the elements in the dream content. The elements adjoining the
wish-fulfillment have frequently nothing to do with its sense, but prove
to be descendants of painful thoughts which oppose the wish. But, owing
to their frequently artificial connection with the central element, they
have acquired sufficient intensity to enable them to come to expression.
Thus, the force of expression of the wish-fulfillment is diffused over a
certain sphere of association, within which it raises to expression all
elements, including those that are in themselves impotent. In dreams
having several strong wishes we can readily separate from one another
the spheres of the individual wish-fulfillments; the gaps in the dream
likewise can often be explained as boundary zones.

Although the foregoing remarks have considerably limited the
significance of the day remnants for the dream, it will nevertheless be
worth our while to give them some attention. For they must be a
necessary ingredient in the formation of the dream, inasmuch as
experience reveals the surprising fact that every dream shows in its
content a connection with some impression of a recent day, often of the
most indifferent kind. So far we have failed to see any necessity for
this addition to the dream mixture. This necessity appears only when we
follow closely the part played by the unconscious wish, and then seek
information in the psychology of the neuroses. We thus learn that the
unconscious idea, as such, is altogether incapable of entering into the
foreconscious, and that it can exert an influence there only by uniting