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This was about as far as I got at the time when Ferenczi died in May 1933, more than thirty years ago. The general view at that time was that Ferenczi's experiments had shown that responding to a regressed patient's cravings was a mistake; it caused endless and useless troubles both for the patient and the analyst, and was anyway condemned by Freud. For some time I tried to reopen the case by pointing out that this wholesale condemnation was both unjust and unprofitable (Balint, M., 1934, 1935, 1937, 1949, 1951, etc.). What I asked for was a critical reappraisal — not an uncritical acceptance - of what was valuable in the ideas developed in Budapest under Ferenczi's leadership. There was no response. Having failed, the only policy remaining to me was to continue with my clinical work and test the validity of these ideas by further experience. In recent years I think there have perhaps been some signs of a change in the general attitude, though I may be mistaken. So I am trying again.
Of the events in the new beginning phase described in my list at the end of Chapter 20, I thought there were three that appeared promising, that is, worth further study and research. The most conspicuous of them was the primitive gratification itself; the second the sudden changes in the intensity of the analytic atmosphere, a most passionate demand for gratification as long as the urge remained unsatisfied, and an almost complete disappearance of any passion immediately after satisfaction; and third, the absolute condition that all this had to happen in the analytic situation, that is, in an object relationship.
Let us start with the aspect of gratification. There can be no question that something must be satisfied, but it is rather difficult to identify this something as a derivative of a particular component instinct. In some cases this can be done by stretching a point, for instance, in the case of my patient who did a somersault. Another patient—also a successful treatment with a fol