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7 August 1912
13 Princes St., Cavendish Sq.
London
Dear Professor Freud,
It was a charming sight, if I may say so, to catch your imagination at work, in the fire of creation, and I am very happy that the suggestion in question is in harmony with your views. It should prove a stern test of what ψα, ruthlessly and courageously carried through, can do in the way of objectivity, and if it is successful it must surely be a valuable achievement, therefore one worth a great effort. My own thought is that the council should be quite unofficial and informal, therefore necessarily secret, and in the closest possible touch with you for the purposes both of criticism and instruction. Fortunately the last condition is not difficult, for you are delightfully approachable and generous with your knowledge and advice, as I can personally bear witness with the greatest gratitude. What we shall have to do will be to purge away all excrescences of the theory, so far as possible, and to coordinate our own unconscious aims with the demands and interests of the movement. It would be impossible to do this quite thoroughly without your constant guidance, for I suppose that, strictly speaking, you, the creator of the movement, are the only person [of]1 in whom this coordination is complete.
When you have the chance of talking to Ferenczi and Rank I hope to hear what they feel in the matter. In our conversation the only subject discussed, raised I think by Ferenczi, was the possibility of a few men being analysed by you, so that they could serve as representatives in different places to teach other beginners. The idea of a united small body, designed, like the Paladins of Charlemagne, to guard the kingdom and policy of their master, was a product of my own romanticism, and I did not venture to speak about it to the others until I had broached it to you. We must surely have some serious discussion of the whole situation when you are in London.
And this brings me to a concrete demand of reality, na