ABSTRACT
Sigmund Freud's work was received with incredulity because it dealt with unconscious forces in the mind, with horror because he broke the silence regarding infantile sexuality. To Freud belongs the distinction more than to any other man of giving people the beginning of the laws which in time will clear away the confusion between the two ways of regarding the universe without and the world of feeling and values within the mind of man. The supreme importance of the research instrument lies in the power it gives the user of it to check the validity of theories, Freud's or anyone else's, concerning the relation of thought to impulse and the quality of the 'social forces' in the unconscious. Freud responded to the abuse by withdrawing from public controversies and giving his energies to his work and to writing.
