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In an earlier paper, called 'On Work and the Instincts', 1 I expressed the observation that although in our analytical practice disturbances of working capacity come next in importance to disturbances of sexuality—the question of what work is, is not treated as a problem. We look upon work as an obvious necessity, the mastering of which is a proof of good adaptation to reality, whereas its neurotic disturbances indicate failure in this adaptation.
I was impressed to find the same considerations in Hendrick's paper on 'Work and the Pleasure Principle'2 where he says: 'Work itself remains a challenging problem. Though working capacity is obviously a most important result of normal ego-organization, its essential contribution to biological survival, its utility to the individual and to society have been taken more or less for granted when no pathology is involved. Work has naturally been accepted by analysts as an essential function which is automatically restored when a neurosis is successfully treated rather than being itself the subject for intensive psychological analysis'.
In a recent paper on the 'Psychopathology of Work'3 Oberndorf gives some metapsychological considerations to the concepts of work and play and their interdependence. His paper is concerned, however, with clinical aspects. It was gratifying to find that his theoretical considerations are running on lines similar to those which were expressed in my previous paper.
Hendrick, in his paper, formulates the problem in metapsychological terms, when asking: 'What instinct provides the energy and the need to exercise the physiological organs available for work and hence leads to the development of the integrated functions of the ego? We have assumed—says Hendrick—that all executant functions at any age are responses to an instinct differing in its goal, purpose, and pleasure-mechanism from the libido and have chosen to call this the " instinct to master " or "mastery-instinct."'
What Hendrick, in his