Page:Psychology of the Unconscious (1916).djvu/130

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PSYCHOLOGY OF THE UNCONSCIOUS

of the dynamic states of religious activity. These are those impulses which in childhood are withdrawn from incestuous application through the intervention of the incest barrier and which, especially at the time of puberty, as a result of affluxes of libido coming from the still incompletely employed sexuality, are aroused to their own peculiar activity. As is easily understood, that which is valuable in the God-creating idea is not the form but the power, the libido. The primitive power which Job's Hymn of Creation vindicates, the unconditional and inexorable, the unjust and the superhuman, are truly and rightly attributes of libido, which "lead us unto life," which "let the poor be guilty," and against which struggle is in vain. Nothing remains for mankind but to work in harmony with this will. Nietzsche's "Zarathustra" teaches us this impressively.

We see that in Miss Miller the religious hymn arising from the unconscious is the compensating amend for the erotic; it takes a great part of its materials from the infantile reminiscences which she re-awakened into life by the introversion of the libido. Had this religious creation not succeeded (and also had another sublimated application been eliminated) then Miss Miller would have yielded to the erotic impression, either to its natural consequence or to a negative issue, which would have replaced the lost success in love by a correspondingly strong sorrow. It is well known that opinions are much divided concerning the worth of this issue of an erotic conflict, such as Miss Miller has presented to us. It is thought to be much more beautiful to solve unnoticed an