Symbols arise by displacement of cathexis from the imagoes of objects of primary instinctual interest onto the imagoes of objects that have been perceived in the outside world. The symbol thus formed may be used by either the primary or the secondary process. When used by the primary process, its meaning becomes independent of the object originally represented; it becomes woven instead into the fantasies that produce neurosis and dreams. When used by the secondary process, the symbol represents the appropriate object and becomes part of the conscious and unconscious imaginative processes serving the sense of reality. There are objections to limiting the concept of symbols to their defensive use by the primary process. Such limitation of the concept of symbolism implies qualitative differences between conscious and unconscious mental activity. There is but one kind of symbolism, but symbols are invested with two different kinds of affect, affect from the primary process and affect from the secondary process. Symbolism is not inherited, and it is not exclusively the language of the unconscious.