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1003 Seestrasse, Küsnach-Zürich, 29 August 1911
Dear] Professor Freud,
I was overjoyed by your letter, being, as you know, very receptive to any recognition the father sees fit to bestow. It is more pleasing
than the loud recognition conferred on us by the unremitting malevolence of our opponents. At the same time, your letter has got me on tenterhooks because, for all my “shrewdness,” I can't quite make out what is going on so enigmatically behind the scenes. Together with my wife I have tried to unriddle your words, and we have reached surmises which, for the time being at any rate, I would rather keep to myself. I can only hope that your embargo on discussion will be lifted during your stay here. I, too, have the feeling that this is a time full of marvels, and, if the auguries do not deceive us, it may very well be that, thanks to your discoveries, we are on the threshold of something really sensational, which I scarcely know how to describe except with the Gnostic concept of Ψ,1 an Alexandrian term particularly suited to the reincarnation of ancient wisdom in the shape of ΨA. I daren't say too much, but would only counsel you (very immodestly) to let my “Transf. and Symb. of the Lib.” unleash your associations and/or fantasies: I am sure you will hit upon strange things if you do. (Provided, of course, that the mysterious hint in your letter has not already done so in anagrammatic form. With that letter anything seems possible.)
Well then—I was in Brussels from 11-16 August. The Congress and its proceedings were so idiotic that I played truant most of the time. I was present, so to speak, only at my own lecture.2 It was a colossal piece of cheek. I knew that after all those longueurs the public would fall like rabbits. The speaking time was limited to 20 minutes. I took almost an hour, one can't do a decent report on ΨA in 20 minutes. I felt sure the chairman (van Schuyten,3 who has his knife into ΨA anyway) was going to cut me short. And he did. I told him