Die Grundlagen Der Psychoanalyse. By Dr. Heinz Hartmann. Leipzig:  Georg Thieme, 1927. Pp.  192.

Among the several expositions of the foundations and programs of the psychoanalytic doctrines, this concise but thoroughgoing monograph by Dr. Hartmann is an outstanding attempt to present the psychoanalytic situation as it stands to-day. He brings forth evidence to fortify the concept that psychoanalysis is a natural science rather than an historical, philosophical system. In fact, he would have us conceive of psychoanalysis as a biologic orientation in psychology.

Psychoanalysis as a mental science and as a body of doctrine in its various phases is then discussed and widely compared with numerous past and contemporary philosophic systems.

An excellent review is given of the mechanisms of the unconscious, and the sections on psychic dynamics, on symbolic productions and representations, and on affective trends are well arranged. Everywhere the reader is impressed with the painstaking references to the literature on these subjects. Special parts of the monograph deal with the instinctive driving forces, with psychic energy or libido, and with the ontogenesis of the sexual instinct.

The section on the relationship between psychoanalysis and psychiatry should be of interest to all psychopathologists. Freud has said that the same relationship exists between psychiatry and psychoanalysis that obtains between anatomy and histology; that is, psychoanalysis treats of the finer structure of the mind and its internal workings. In the light of psychoanalytic research the author offers discussion on various psychiatric topics, such as hallucinations and regressions, the schizophrenias and paranoias, catatonic and schizoid psychopathies, and on some aspects of castration motives. He also mentions what has been attempted in connection with the interpretation of mental reactions released by toxic and organic disorders. Here he refers liberally to Schilder's work and also to the ideas of Ferenczi and Hollós.