The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-04-21
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
Information Bureau
FREDERIC j. HAsKIN, Director,
washington, d. G.
PsYCHoANALYsIS.


! discovers the early forgotten influence
and the unrealized deprivations which
are inJuring your nerves, impairing
your happiness and perhaps making
you i'll, and which enables you to over
come those handicaps by understand
ing thenv-such is the new science of
/ psychoanalysis at its best.
Naturally, it is calculated to make
a deep impression upon the magma
tions of men, and to awaken a new
hope in the hearts of many who real
/ ize that their minds and nerves are
somehow badly adjusted to life, that
they suffer from ills which medicines
| cannot cure. AS a result, psyche-
analysis is rapidly becoming the most
! popular of all sciences. Not many
years ago it was an obscure new de-
velopment in psychology, froWned
upon by scientists of the orthodox
seheel, stoutly defended by a few pro-
gressive men in Europe and America
| Today popular magazines and SUNDAY
| newspapers publish articles about II,
whole library of books designed to ex-
plain it to the layman has been writ
! ten, and it is new unmedical branch
| of the medical profession, with praeti-
| tieners in every large city and at
taehed to hospitals for nervous and
! mental diseases. An English novelist,
]. D. Beresford, recently published
novel based upon psychoanalysis, ana
an American writer, Floyd Den, has
just published one, the material for
which he is said to have got by nav
ling his own mind analysed by psy-
| choanalyst. It has furnished the basis
| for a new method in writing biogra-
phies.
AS a result of all this, nearly every
one has heard of psychoanalysts Near
ly everyone who reads at all has reaa
something about it. has some idea o.
what it is. And in 90 cases out OF 1oo
tho idea is highly erroneous
Therein lies great danger, all the
true friends of the science are agreed
It's popularity consists chiefly In
widespread misunderstanding or jpsy-
choanalysis, and this Misunderstanding
oan do much harm. In the first place,
it is already bringing into being class
of charlatans who pose as psy-
eheanalysts, tho having no there
knowledge of the subject.
Some Persons Alarmed.
In the second place, many persons
of the sensitive sort, inclined to be
neurotic, have been considerably upset
by their readings of psychoanalysis.
| They have discovered in themselves
neurotic symptoms which were either
in reality veyy slight or else had ne
existence except in their own magma
tons. 1t may be that in some cases
the symptoms were produced sug-
gestively by the reading of books or
articles on the subject. Undoubtedly
some persons have in this way been
caused great worry thru a groundless
fear that they were threatened with
insanity or inclined to various forms
of abnormality.
In addition to these dangers to the
individual from charlatans and from
the influence on his own Imagination
of a srnattering of information or
misinformation, there. is a danger
in fact the probability-that there will
be a reaction against the science as a
result of the spread of erroneous ideas
about it.
I For these reasons, many students of
psychoanalysis are-advising that the
| 1ayman proceed cautiously in his study
of the new science. They by no means
wish him to be discouraged if he feels
inclined to make a study of it. But
they ask him not to form ideas about
1 it. or about himself, merely on the
strength of what he has been told or
of very little reading. Let him read,
they suggest one of the better popular
expositions of the subject. and then,
if he is still interested. let him proceed
to a study of some of the more ina
portant works which he will find men,
toned fn~the handbook. If he does
this, he will speedily be convinced of
two things: first, that psychoa nalysiB
is an extremely complicated subject, of
which only a trained mind can gain a
real understanding by long study and
second that even the practitioners of
the science themselves are in state
of uncertainty about it, and hold most
of their ideas tentatively rather than
: dogmatically. 1t is new science the
fundamental value of which is widely
acknowledged, but the details of
which are just beginning to be worked
out
-
the beginning of psychoanalysis will
: be looked back upon as one of the
great strides forward in mans under
standing of himself. Certainly it has
spread a flood of light into a thou
sand dark corners of human misery.
1t challenges the value of laws and
social customs that are deeply in
trehched IN our lives. 1t is sure to ex-
cite fierce opposition. And it will he
long time before it's proper place in
the scheme of things has been estab-
: llshed. Meanwhile, it is a thing about
Whlch TO be inquiring and skeptfcal
rather than enthusiastic and creduIous.
Not an Excuse for License,
There is a widespread notion that
psyehoanalysis and especially the doc
trines of Freud, tend TO Justify a
{ great deal more freedom of conSuct
r than has generally been enjeyed bv
the majority of people As a matter
or fact this is not true. What the
: psychoanalysts have really shown is
: that the happiness of an Individual
depends upon the proper use of All
his energies, physical and mental
rather than upon conformity to any
given set of rules. But the achieye-
ment of this means the living of a
carefully controlled and directed life
IN TINS point OF view. the psyche.
analysts are in agreement with the
a modern philosophical viewpoint. and
!. with some of the most recent work Of
I research along physiological lines.
s Thus philosophy has proceeded In
!. the past on the assumption that mar
is actuated primarily BY the desire for
= self-preservation. HNietzsche Gpsets
t this idea by simply pointing out thai
$ we see men every day risking theil
| lives, of their own free wills, in orde,
70 do the things they feel impeIle6
: to do. Thus we see poets starving te
2 write their poems.l explorers "a Gin