The Emotions, Morality And The Brain. by C. V. Monakow., Translated by Gertrude Barnes and Smith Ely Jelliffe. Pp.  95. Washington and New York.  Nervous and Mental Disease Publishing Company. Monograph Series No. 39. 1925.

In this monograph the noted Zurich neurologist has made a bold attempt to bring together and to express in terms of integration the studies of biologists, physiologists, neurologists, psychiatrists and psychologists under a title which he suspects may be objected to by many. He says “The subjects— ‘Morals and Brain ‘may seem, at least at first glance to be separated by an unbridgeable chasm. To describe the feelings anatomically sounds like veritable nonsense. Still, diverse as these conceptions appear, there is nevertheless a broad connecting bond between them, i.e., that of morphological, biological and histological development.”

The author is more tolerant of the psychoanalytic concepts than most neurologists since he emphasizes the sterility of the professional psychologist in dealing with the secrets of the human feelings and extols the studies of Freud, Bleuler, Jung and Adler, as well as giving some credit to the pioneer investigations of Liebault, Forel, Bernheim, and Stoll in the field of suggestion and hypnotism. He recognizes that the psychoanalytic method in the hands of the expert is not only important but practically indispensible to the study of neurotics, and hastens to add that there is still plenty of need for improvement in the technic.