ABSTRACT
In the author's study of all the murderous patients it was striking that they, whether had committed the deed or not, were bogged down in a state of mind in which persecutory anxiety predominated over depressive anxiety. The psychic pain itself became persecutory and so there was a slipping back into a state of mind dominated by persecutory anxiety. Somewhere, it appeared to be true that the low morale and damaged self-esteem resulting from the failure to make a real negotiation of the depressive position compounded the problems of a relapse into a state dominated by persecutory anxiety. It is important to recognize that when the death constellation is active within the individual, a surge of self-preservation impulses may result in what looks like a total relapse, but which is found to lead to token life-risking attacks. Some people do not digest or metabolize intrapsychically the death constellation, but remain for years "suffering" from murderous fantasies and dreams.
