ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to study guilt-feeling not as a thing to be inculcated, but as an aspect of the development of the human individual. The infant's anxiety arises from a threat to its dependence, that is the loss of the object on which it depends. That dependence is not felt until there is some kind of deprivation. The mother or nurse reacts to this display of anger and aggression in a manner which baby senses as disapproval, and the fear of losing the loved object is also experienced; and that means anxiety. The fear of consequences is the most dangerous type of control a parent or teacher can instil into the mind of a child. Neurotic guilt-feelings in an adult are invariably a sign that the conscience is still in the immature stage of the Super-ego. Willing obedience to a love-Super-ego is sometimes described by Freud as following the Ego-Ideal, and it might be useful to adopt this word and keep the word Super-ego for the punitive kind of conscience which is motivated by fear.
