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The opening chapter deals with a summary and restatement of familiar material about the rôles played by the superego and the ego in various manifestations of anxiety. This is followed by an able presentation of the conflicts and fears which arise during the emotional development of the individual while passing through the oral, anal, phallic, and Oedipal periods. Here, as in the subsequent chapters, the author emphasizes the homosexual alignment of the so called preoedipal stage and the attendant castration anxiety, in contrast to the fear of death arising from death wishes against the parent of the same sex during the full-fledged Oedipus phase. The development of the ego is then correlated with these emotional developmental levels, with particular attention to the growth and the synthesizing capacity of the ego. This part of the book is a well condensed and interestingly presented formulation of subject matter which is not original, but which forms an essential introduction to Laforgue's central theme, namely, that the adjustment to reality of the social group like that of the individual ego, depends upon the predominant level of the libido organization, and that the attendant anxieties are dealt with accordingly. The so called 'intellect' is similarly determined and limited.
The detailed exposition of this subject may perhaps be briefly summarized as follows, although this outline perhaps suggests a rigidity of formulation which is not found in the book, since the author repeatedly points to the countless possible variations among and within these typical groups.
As the sense of reality in the Oral Phase is poorly developed and the ego is very weak, Laforgue passes over this developmental period with little comment.
a.Reality and the Ego of the Child.