Page:Psychology of the Unconscious (1916).djvu/575

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pp. 87-126]
THE SONG OF THE MOTH
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at the end. I speak now of the twelve images borne on the back of this).

This inner connection of the ζῴδια (small images) with the zodiacal snake is worthy of notice and gives food for thought. The Manichæan system attributes to Christ the symbol of the snake, and indeed of the snake on the tree of Paradise. For this the quotation from John gives far-reaching justification (John iii:i4): "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be lifted up." An old theologian, Hauff ("Biblische Real- und Verbalkonkordanz," 1834), makes this careful observation concerning this quotation: "Christ considered the Old Testament story an unintentional symbol of the idea of the atonement." The almost bodily connection of the followers with Christ is well known. (Romans xii:4): "For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office, so we being many are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another." If confirmation is needed that the zodiacal signs are symbols of the libido, then the sentence in John i:29, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," assumes a significant meaning.

61 According to an eleventh-century manuscript in Munich; Albrecht Wirth: "Aus orientalischen Chroniken," p. 151. Frankfurt 1894.

62 Abeghian: "Der armenische Volksglaube," p. 41, 1899.

63 Compare Aigremont: "Fuss- und Schuhsymbolik," Leipzig 1909.

64 Attis was later assimilated with Mithra. Like Mithra he was represented with the Phrygian cap (Cumont: "Myst. des Mith.," p. 65). According to the testimony of Hieronymus, the manger (Gelaurtshöhle) at Bethlehem was originally a sanctuary (Spelaeum) of Attis (Usener: "Weihnachtsfest," p. 283).

65 Cumont ("Die Mysterien des Mithra," p. 4) says of Christianity and Mithracism: "Both opponents perceived with astonishment how similar they were in many respects, without being able to account for the causes of this similarity."

66 Our present-day moral views come into conflict with this wish in so far as it concerns the erotic fate. The erotic adventures necessary for so many people are often all too easily given up because of moral opposition, and one willingly allows himself to be discouraged because of the social advantages of being moral.

67 The poetical works of Lord Byron.

68 Edmond Rostand: "Cyrano de Bergerac," Paris 1898.

69 The projection into the "cosmic" is the primitive privilege of the libido, for it enters into our perception naturally through all the avenues of the senses, apparently from without, and in the form of pain and pleasure connected with the objects. This we attribute to the object without further thought, and we are inclined, in spite of our philosophic considerations, to seek the causes in the object, which often has very little concern with it. (Compare this with the Freudian conception of Transference, especially Firenczi's remarks in his paper, "Introjektion und Übertragung," Jahrbuch, Vol. I, p. 422.) Beautiful examples of direct libido projection are found in erotic songs:

"Down on the strand, down on the shore,
A maiden washed the kerchief of her lover;
And a soft west wind came blowing over the shore,