ABSTRACT
Whenever one examines one’s own emotional reactions, a prominent element seems often to be the mysterious way in which the feeling seems to come from nowhere. One feels possessed, some immaterial influence seems to have seized the body and mind and to be directing both behaviour and thought. This phenomenon, of the cause seeming to lie outside of consciousness, is naturally suggestive of unconscious mental activity. Such being the case, it might be expected that psychopathologists, who are more familiar with the psychology of the unconscious mind, would have furnished us with some theories of emotion more interesting or more adequate than those of the academic psychologists. When we turn to psychopathological literature, however, the search is rather disappointing. No satisfactory theories are found there, although interesting data and pertinent suggestions do appear.
