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Letters, so it has been said, reveal the personality ‘sine fuco ac fallaciis’ (without powder or paint), as Cicero put it. Jung's letters are no exception: he emerges from these letters as a very human giant. The range of his correspondence was enormous; from all over the world friends, pupils, patients ask questions, want his advice, send him their dreams. The bulk of the letters are, however, to medical and psychological colleagues and other scientists, and, last but not least, to theologians and clergy of all denominations.
I never cease to be amazed at the manner in which Jung approached all the different types of people he wrote to, and the various ways in which he was able to communicate his thoughts in a form compatible to their particular situation. His comments and observations are always very much to the point without being offensive, and his insight into an individual's psychic situation is particularly apparent in his interpretation of dreams.
He answered questions about his concepts, theories and ideas at great length and often with greater clarity than he did in his other writings. It is of particular interest to read what his general attitude to psychological treatment was, and how he linked psychological events with the organic nervous system.
The vexed question of synchronicity crops up in letters to physicists and also the problem of the interplay of psyche and soma, problems which open a dimension of thought as new as man's exploration of the moon.
In his letters to theologians Jung is much more explicit about his position with regard to theology and religion. He obviously found it very difficult to understand why his ideas were so frequently misunderstood and misconstrued, and he took much trouble in his attempts to clarify his meaning.
On a different level there are letters of great historical interest; those to Freud and a few psychoanalysts for example show how early on Jung voiced his objections to a theory which seemed to him to be far too limite