dream, or does not come into consideration. For there is no doubt as to the elements of the dream thoughts which are of the highest value; our judgment tells us immediately. In the formation of dreams those elements which are emphasized with intense interest may be treated as though they were inferior, and other elements are put in their place which certainly were inferior in the dream thoughts. We are at first given the impression that the psychic intensity[1] of the individual ideas does not come into consideration at all for the selection made by the dream, but only their greater or smaller multiplicity of determination. Not what is important in the dream thoughts gets into the dream, but what is contained in them several times over, one might be inclined to think; but our understanding of the formation of dreams is not much furthered by this assumption, for at the outset it will be impossible to believe that the two factors of manifold determination and of integral value do not tend in the same direction in the influence they exert on the selection made by the dream. Those ideas in the dream thoughts which are most important are probably also those which recur most frequently, for the individual dream thoughts radiate from them as from central points. And still the dream may reject those elements which are especially emphasized and which receive manifold support, and may take up into its content elements which are endowed only with the latter property.
This difficulty may be solved by considering another impression received in the investigation of the manifold determination of the dream content. Perhaps many a reader has already passed his own judgment upon this investigation by saying that the manifold determination of the elements of the dream is not a significant discovery, because it is a self-evident one. In the analysis one starts from the dream elements, and registers all the notions which are connected with them; it is no wonder, then, that these elements should occur with particular frequency in the thought material which is obtained in this manner. I cannot acknowledge the validity of this objection, but shall say something myself which sounds like it. Among
- ↑ Psychic intensity, value, and emphasis due to the interest of an idea are, of course, to be kept distinct from sensational intensity, and from intensity of that which is conceived.
