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In this paper, an attempt was made to re-examine the significance and technical use of the visual image in the analytic session as an aid in overcoming resistances. The visual images are elicited during an interruption in the patient's verbalizations. In some of the patients, after an initial inquiry as to visual imagery during a period of silence, subsequent visual elements were spontaneously described. Freud stated (9, pp. 36-37): "We make our observations through the medium of the same perceptual apparatus, precisely by the help of the breaks in the series of [conscious] mental events, since we fill in the omissions by plausible inferences and translate them into conscious material."
I believe that visual images enable us to be more certain of the plausibility of the inferences. Such images differ from dreams in that the plastic representation is usually more evident, and the relation to preceding material is more difficult to deny. As a rule, there is less distortion than one may see in dreams. In addition, the interval between the image and the patient's talking about it minimizes the time available for secondary elaboration.