Reflections on War and Death

Sigmund Freud

• Publisher: White Press
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9781473319943
• eBook ISBN: 9781473396388
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: History & Theory in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

This early work by Sigmund Freud was originally published in 1918 and we are now republishing it with a brand new introductory biography. 'Reflections on War and Death' is a work on the psychology and social attitudes toward war and death. Sigismund Schlomo Freud was born on 6th May 1856, in the Moravian town of Príbor, now part of the Czech Republic. He studied a variety of subjects, including philosophy, physiology, and zoology, graduating with an MD in 1881. Freud made a huge and lasting contribution to the field of psychology with many of his methods still being used in modern psychoanalysis. He inspired much discussion on the wealth of theories he produced and the reactions to his works began a century of great psychological investigation.

REFLECTIONS
ON WAR AND DEATH

I, II

I
THE DISAPPOINTMENTS OF WAR

CAUGHT in the whirlwind of these war times, without any real information or any perspective upon the great changes that have already occurred or are about to be enacted, lacking all premonition of the future, it is small wonder that we ourselves become confused as to the meaning of impressions which crowd in upon us or of the value of the judgments we are forming. It would seem as though no event had ever destroyed so much of the precious heritage of mankind, confused so many of the clearest intellects or so thoroughly debased what is highest.

Even science has lost her dispassionate impartiality. Her deeply embittered votaries are intent upon seizing her weapons to do their share in the battle against the enemy. The anthropologist has to declare his opponent inferior and degenerate, the psychiatrist must diagnose him as mentally deranged. Yet it is probable that we are affected out of all proportion by the evils of these times and have no right to compare them with the evils of other times through which we have not lived.

The individual who is not himself a combatant and therefore has not become a cog in the gigantic war machinery, feels confused in his bearings and hampered in his activities. I think any little suggestion that will make it easier for him to see his way more clearly will be welcome. Among the factors which cause the stay-at-home so much spiritual misery and are so hard to endure there are two in particular which I should like to emphasize and discuss. I mean the disappointment that this war has called forth and the altered attitude towards death to which it, in common with other wars, forces us.

When I speak of disappointment everybody knows at once what I mean. One need not be a sentimentalist, one may realize the biological and physiological necessity of suffering in the economy of human life, and yet one may condemn the methods and the aims of war and long for its termination. To be sure, we used to say that wars cannot cease as long as nations live under such varied conditions, as long as they place such different values upon the individual life, and as long as the animosities which divide them represent such powerful psychic forces. We were therefore quite ready to believe that for some time to come there would be wars between primitive and civilized nations and between those divided by color, as well as with and among the partly enlightened and more or less civilized peoples of Europe. But we dared to hope differently. We expected that the great ruling nations of the white race, the leaders of mankind, who had cultivated world wide interests, and to whom we owe the technical progress in the control of nature as well as the creation of artistic and scientific cultural standards—we expected that these nations would find some other way of settling their differences and conflicting interests.

Each of these nations had set a high moral standard to which the individual had to conform if he wished to be a member of the civilized community.

These frequently over strict precepts demanded a great deal of him, a great self-restraint and a marked renunciation of his impulses. Above all he was forbidden to resort to lying and cheating, which are so extraordinarily useful in competition with others. The civilized state considered these moral standards the foundation of its existence, it drastically interfered if anyone dared to question them and often declared it improper even to submit them to the test of intellectual criticism. It was therefore assumed that the state itself would respect them and would do nothing that might contradict the foundations of its own existence. To be sure, one was aware that scattered among these civilized nations there were certain remnants of races that were quite universally disliked, and were therefore reluctantly and only to a certain extent permitted to participate in the common work of civilization where they had proved themselves sufficiently fit for the task. But the great nations themselves, one should have thought, had acquired sufficient understanding for the qualities they had in common and enough tolerance for their differences so that, unlike in the days of classical antiquity, the words “foreign” and “hostile” should no longer be synonyms.

Trusting to this unity of civilized races countless people left hearth and home to live in strange lands and trusted their fortunes to the friendly relations existing between the various countries. And even he who was not tied down to the same spot by the exigencies of life could combine all the advantages and charms of civilized countries into a newer and greater fatherland which he could enjoy without hindrance or suspicion. He thus took delight in the blue and the grey ocean, the beauty of snow clad mountains and of the green lowlands, the magic of the north woods and the grandeur of southern vegetation, the atmosphere of landscapes upon which great historical memories rest, and the peace of untouched nature. The new fatherland was to him also a museum, filled with the treasure that all the artists of the world for many centuries had created and left behind. While he wandered from one hall to another in this museum he could give his impartial appreciation to the varied types of perfection that had been developed among his distant compatriots by the mixture of blood, by history, and by the peculiarities of physical environment. Here cool, inflexible energy was developed to the highest degree, there the graceful art of beautifying life, elsewhere the sense of law and order, or other qualities that have made man master of the earth.

We must not forget that every civilized citizen of the world had created his own special “Parnassus” and his own “School of Athens.” Among the great philosophers, poets, and artists of all nations he had selected those to whom he considered himself indebted for the best enjoyment and understanding of life, and he associated them in his homage both with the immortal ancients and with the familiar masters of his own tongue. Not one of these great figures seemed alien to him just because he spoke in a different language; be it the incomparable explorer of human passions or the intoxicated worshiper of beauty, the mighty and threatening seer or the sensitive scoffer, and yet he never reproached himself with having become an apostate to his own nation and his beloved mother tongue.

The enjoyment of this common civilization was occasionally disturbed by voices which warned that in consequence of traditional differences wars were unavoidable even between those who shared this civilization. One did not want to believe this, but what did one imagine such a war to be like if it should ever come about? No doubt it was to be an opportunity to show the progress in man’s community feeling since the days when the Greek amphictyonies had forbidden the destruction of a city belonging to the league, the felling of her oil trees and the cutting off of her water supply. It would be a chivalrous bout of arms for the sole purpose of establishing the superiority of one side or the other with the greatest possible avoidance of severe suffering which could contribute nothing to the decision, with complete protection for the wounded, who must withdraw from the battle, and for the physicians and nurses who devote themselves to their care. With every consideration, of course, for noncombatants, for the women who are removed from the activities of war, and for the children who, when grown up, are to become friends and co-workers on both sides. And with the maintenance, finally, of all the international projects and institutions in which the civilized community of peace times had expressed its corporate life.

Such a war would still be horrible enough and full of burdens, but it would not have interrupted the development of ethical relations between the large human units, between nations and states. But the war in which we did not want to believe broke out and brought—disappointment. It is not only bloodier and more destructive than any foregoing war, as a result of the tremendous development of weapons of attack and defense, but it is at least as cruel, bitter, and merciless as any earlier war. It places itself above all the restrictions pledged in times of peace, the so-called rights of nations, it does not acknowledge the prerogatives of the wounded and of physicians, the distinction between peaceful and fighting members of the population, or the claims of private property. It hurls down in blind rage whatever bars its way, as though there were to be no future and no peace after it is over. It tears asunder all community bonds among the struggling peoples and threatens to leave a bitterness which will make impossible any re-establishment of these ties for a long time to come.

It has also brought to light the barely conceivable phenomen...

Table of contents

• Reflections on War and Death
• Sigmund Freud
• REFLECTIONS ON WAR AND DEATH I, II
• II OUR ATTITUDE TOWARDS DEATH