Letter from Sigmund Freud to C. G. Jung, January 1, 1907

1 January 1907

Dear colleague,

You are quite mistaken in supposing that I was not enthusiastic about your book on dementia praecox. Abandon the idea at once. The very fact that I offered criticism ought to convince you. If my feelings had been different, I should have summoned up enough diplomacy to hide them. For it would have been most unwise to offend you, the ablest helper to have joined me thus far. In reality I regard your essay on D. pr. as the richest and most significant contribution to my labours that has ever come to my attention, and among my students in Vienna, who have the perhaps questionable advantage over you of personal contact with me, I know of only one who might be regarded as your equal in understanding, and of none who is able and willing to do so much for the cause as you. I meant my letter to be longer; I broke it off partly for incidental reasons and partly because my guess, confirmed by you, as to the identity of the dreamer, bade me hold my peace. I merely thought that you might have gone so far as to stress the interpretation log = penis and the “alternative”1 gallop < horse career