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October 26, 1929.
a.The meeting discussed Dr. van Ophuijsen's proposal that a Psycho-Analytical Institute should be founded at The Hague. At present more stress is being laid on exposition of the science of psycho-analysis to the medical profession and the laity than on the instruction of the future psycho-analysts. It is hoped that in the first quarter of 1930 a beginning may be made with a series of lectures which several University
Lecturers have offered to give. The lectures are to be held in a house of historic interest: that in which the Dutch philosopher, Spinoza, once lived.
b.J. H. W. van Ophuijsen discussed part of Lytton Strachey's book, Elizabeth and Essex.
December 21, 1929.
a.A. Endtz: 'Thoughts suggested by Politzer's criticisms of Psycho-Analysis'. The speaker gave a survey of the new journal, Revue de Psychologie concrète and of the works of Politzer. Politzer's criticism differs fundamentally from the criticisms usually made of psycho-analysis, if only in that he accepts the importance of the sexual factor and the Oedipus complex. Politzer's criticism in relation to the unconscious must be rejected, and while Politzer's views on a concrete psychology could be accepted, one could not see in them any such revolutionary novelty as their author claimed for them.
b.J. H. W. van Ophuijsen spoke on the difficulty of differentiating between obsessions, phobias and similar symptoms—a train of thought suggested by the case of a woman patient. Some phobias must probably come under the heading of anxiety-neurosis rather than that of obsessional neurosis, this being supported by a reference to the different regressions of the libido in the two forms of illness. Instead of classifying diseases under the present clinical headings, as is the practice to-day, it would be better to differentiate the individual cases according to the fixation-point of the libido.