The Theory of Psychoanalysis

by C. G. Jung

Many critics do not admit that the infantile libido is simply less intense or is essentially of the same kind as the libido of adults. The emotions among adults are correlated with the genital functions. This is not the case in children, or it is only so in miniature, or exceptionally, and this gives rise to an important distinction, which must not be undervalued.

I believe such an objection is justified. There is really a considerable difference between immature and fully developed functions, as there is a difference between play and reality, between shooting with blank and with loaded cartridges. That the childish libido has the harmlessness demanded by common sense cannot be contested. But of course none can deny that blank shooting is shooting. We must get accustomed to the idea that sexuality really exists, even before puberty, right back in early childhood, and that we have no right to pretend that manifestations of this immature sexuality are not sexual. This does not indeed refute the objection, which, while recognizing the existence of infantile sexuality in the form already described, yet denies Freud’s claim to regard as sexual early infantile manifestations such as sucking. We have mentioned already the motives which induced Freud to enlarge the sexual terminology in such a way. We mentioned, too, how this very act of sucking, for instance, could be conceived from the standpoint of pleasure in the function of nutrition, and that, on biological grounds, there was more justification for this derivation than for Freud’s view. It might be objected that these and similar activities of the oral zones are found in later life in an undoubted sexual use. This only means that these activities can in later life be used for sexual purposes, but that does not tell us anything concerning the primitive sexual nature of these forms. I must, therefore, admit that I find no ground for regarding the activities of the suckling, which provoke pleasure and satisfaction, from the standpoint of sexuality. Indeed there are many objections against this conception. It seems to me, in so far as I am capable of judging these difficult problems, that from the standpoint of sexuality it is necessary to divide human life into three phases.

The Three Phases of Life

The first phase embraces the first years of life. I call this part of life the pre-sexual stage. These years correspond to the caterpillar-stage of butterflies, and are characterized almost exclusively by the functions of nutrition and growth.

The second phase embraces the later years of childhood up to puberty, and might be called the pre-pubertal stage.

The third phase is that of riper years, proceeding only from puberty onwards, and could be called the time of maturity.

You cannot have failed to notice that we become conscious of the greatest difficulty when we arrive at the question at what age we must put the limit of the pre-sexual stage. I am ready to confess my uncertainty with regard to this problem. If I survey the psychoanalytical experiences with children, as yet insufficiently numerous, at the same time keeping in mind the observations made by Freud, it seems to me that the limit of this phase lies between the third and fifth years. This, of course, with due consideration for the greatest individual diversities. From various aspects this is an important age. The child has emancipated itself already from the helplessness of the baby, and a series of important psychological functions have acquired a firm hold. From this period on, the obscurity of the early infantile “amnesia,” or the discontinuity of the early infantile consciousness, begins to clear up through the sporadic continuity of memory. It seems as if, at this age, a considerable step had been made towards emancipation and the formation of a new and independent personality. As far as we know, the first signs of interest and activity which may fairly be called sexual fall into this period, although these sexual indications have still the infantile characteristics of harmlessness and naiveté. I think I have sufficiently demonstrated why a sexual terminology cannot be given to the pre-sexual stage, and so we may now consider the other problems from the standpoint we have just reached. You will remember that we dropped the problem of the libido in childhood, because it seemed impossible to arrive at any clearness in that way. But now we are obliged to take up the question again, if only to see whether the energic conception harmonizes with the principles just advanced. We saw, following Freud’s conception, that the altered manifestations of the infantile sexuality, if compared with those of maturity, are to be explained by the diminution of sexuality in childhood.

The Sexual Definition of Libido Must be Abandoned

The intensity of the libido is said to be diminished relatively to the early age. But we advanced just now several considerations to show why it seems doubtful if we can regard the vital functions of a child, sexuality excepted, as of less intensity than those of adults. We can really say that, sexuality excepted, the emotional phenomena, and, if nervous symptoms are present, then these likewise are quite as intense as those of adults. On the energic conception of the libido all these things are but manifestations of the libido. But it becomes rather difficult to conceive that the intensity of the libido can ever constitute the difference between a mature and an immature sexuality. The explanation of this difference seems rather to postulate a change in the localization of the libido (if the expression be allowed). In contradistinction to the medical definition the libido in children is occupied far more with certain side-functions of a mental and physiological nature than with local sexual functions. One is here already tempted to remove from the term libido the predicate “sexualis,” and thus to have done with the sexual definition of the term given in Freud’s “Three Contributions.” This necessity becomes imperative, when we put it in the form of a question: The child in the first years of its life is intensely living—suffering and enjoying—the question is, whether his striving, his suffering, his enjoyment are by reason of his libido sexualis? Freud has pronounced himself in favor of this supposition. There is no need to repeat the reasons through which I am compelled to accept the pre-sexual stage. The larva stage possesses a libido of nutrition, if I may so express it, but not yet the libido sexualis. It is thus we must put it, if we wish to keep the energic conception which the libido theory offers us. I think there is nothing for it but to abandon the sexual definition of libido, or we shall lose what there is valuable in the libido theory, that is, the energic conception. For a long time past the desire to extend the meaning of libido, and to remove it from its narrow and sexual limitations, has forced itself upon Freud’s school. One was never weary of insisting that sexuality in the psychological sense was not to be taken too literally, but in a broader connotation; but exactly how, that remained obscure, and thus too, sincere criticism remained unsatisfied.

I do not think I am going astray if I see the real value of the libido theory in the energic conception, and not in its sexual definition. Thanks to the former, we are in possession of a most valuable heuristic principle. We owe to the energic conception the possibility of dynamic ideas and relationships, which are of inestimable value for us in the chaos of the psychic world. The Freudians would be wrong not to listen to the voice of criticism, which reproaches our conception of libido with mysticism and inaccessibility. We deceived ourselves in believing that we could ever make the libido sexualis the bearer of the energic conception of the psychical life, and if many of Freud’s school still believe they possess a well-defined and almost complete conception of libido, they are not aware that this conception has been put to use far beyond the bounds of its sexual definition. The critics are right when they object to our theory of libido as explaining things which cannot belong to its sphere. It must be admitted that Freud’s school makes use of a conception of libido which passes beyond the bounds of its primary definition. Indeed, this must produce the impression that one is working with a mystical principle.