latent content

“We presume Freudians would find in the latent content of all these dreams, particularly in this last one, evidence in favour of their positions, though to us they reveal only, in the blurred and broken way dreams do, the prevailing trend of thoughts governed by morbid religious fears and garbed in the phraseology and symbolism of a judaic faith.”

The Journal of Abnormal Psychology

“(What we should infer from the waking illusion of familiarity, which, Emerson said "almost every person confesses" -- on this basis -- is too absurd to contemplate.) Statements like these, though far from syllogistic in form, are virtually general propositions or laws to the effect that all dreams having the designated earmarks or manifest content, possess additionally and necessarily certain specified qualities in the latent content -- - in this case, the meaning of birth-phantasy. 13”

The Journal of Abnormal Psychology