Victor White Dream that included Jung, Emma and Toni
Dream of December 12th. 1945.
A long dream in the course of which I go to Zurich. The “Zurich” of my dream is quite a small pink town nestling in a fertile green valley.
I notice many church spires, but am surprised that I see no lake. I first see it looking down from a neighboring hill.
Then I am in “Zurich” itself, among a number of people, among whom is Jung.
Conversation is all quite casual and trivial, it does not touch on any deep matters.
It seems to be some sort of party; I know I have not been invited, but my presence is taken as a matter of course.
It seems I have dropped in almost by accident, and in my dream I am aware that I neither have the money to have got to Zurich (from England), nor have
I any money to get home again. But none of these things seem to matter.
Jung is on my left-hand side; he is a very jolly old man with a bright scarf round his neck.
Then I am just outside a house by the seashore on the South Coast ( of England). It is late afternoon, and many people are batheing in the sea.
It seems that my parents are living or staying in the house; there is a raised platform between the sea and the house.
“We” (I do not remember who the others are, but friends and companions of some sort) decide to wait until the crowds have left the shore before we go swimming ourselves; as the sun sets, the crowds disperse.
The next thing I remember is that I am back at Zurich. It is a Sunday, and I am there just for the day.
As all the public churches in this dream-Zurich are Protestant, I had had to say Mass in a nuns’ chapel. I seem now to be inside Jung’s house.
He is sitting at the top of a table on my right; Mrs. Jung is also on my right between him and me; I particularly notice that nobody else is there.
At first the conversation is again quite commonplace and trivial.
But later I am alone with Jung, and talking with him earnestly face to face.
I do not remember exactly what it was we were talking about, but presumably something to do with religion and Catholicism; and I think Jung had been
talking about the Spirit as manifested in the Unconscious.
For at one point he said, with a vehemence that surprised me, “But the Roman Church is all wrong about the Spirit.
The last articles in the Creed don’t go deep enough,” (i.e. “I believe in the Holy Ghost, the holy catholic Church” etc.).
I replied, “But articles don’t go anywhere, deep or shallow.
It is all a matter of how deeply one goes THROUGH them, or INTO them.” I start to tell him about
St Thomas Aquinas’ teaching about Faith in the Unknown and Unseen “Veritas Prima”, and how that, and not the dogma, is the term of Faith (i.e. Summa II,II.i. l and 2. etc.)
As I tell him this, Jung’s face lightens up in an extraordinary way – a moment before it had been quite taut and worried, as though the “last articles in the Creed” somehow threatened to restrict and imprison him.
It is as if a load had fallen off him.
(SOME ASSOCIATIONS AND COMMENTS):
The Dream-Zurich:
SMALL, perhaps I was underestimating its real size and importance, or possibly romanticising it a la Swiss picture postcard.
PINK, redbrick, red-tiled houses had always appealed to me as a child, as contrasted with grey stone and tiles.
VALLEY, I had been reading Chinese symbolism of Valleys in “Secret of Golden Flower”, p.6.
LOOKING DOWN, perhaps ego taking “superior attitude”, but this only a flash, like Ignatian “composition of place” or opening scene of a film.
CASUAL AND TRIVIAL CONVERSATION, perhaps good and proper enough at beginning and in company of “number of people”.
NOT INVITED, etc. This contact with Zurich and Jung not intended or willed by me; it just “happens”
(ACCIDENT); money and other conscious means not essential.
The South Coast Interlude:
SOUTH COAST, Feeling, Warmth, Holidays.
OF ENGLAND, it seems I have to go back home to my own origins and parents to be able to meet Zurich and Jung on deeper level.
There I see the SEA, which I had failed to see at Zurich.
THE PLATFORM, there seems to be some barrier between the parents’ “home” (? personal unconscious)
and the sea (? undifferentiated collective ditto), but this barrier is also a way between them.
It is in this situation that I must wait for the NUMBER OF PEOPLE to disperse, presumably the same NUMBER OF PEOPLE who had got in the way at Zurich. From the parents’ “home”, when the sun of consciousness has set, I can plunge into the sea.
After having done this, I can return to Zurich, and on SUNday (new light, resurrection, 8th Day of New Creation).
I must sacrifice among the women; because the public churches are all Protestant.
I am now INSIDE with Jung, and he is now on my more conscious side (right).
But we are at first at oblong table; Mrs. Jung (only a name to me at time of dream, and presumably an aspect of Jung’s anima – the feminine side of psychology) must first be recognised as between us.
I particularly notice that nobody else is there, though I had somehow expected Miss Wolff – presumably another, perhaps Thinking, aspect.
“Mrs. Jung” seems at first to be both mediator and barrier between Jung and me in first part of dream – rather like the PLATFORM.
But then we come face to face without intermediary or barrier.
JUNG’S VEHEMENT WORDS suggest (taken subjectively) that the psychology-in-me (represented by Jung) still feels restricted and repressed by dogma, especially regarding the Spirit and the Church.
But it seems that ego (if only it will use it) has the means – even the conscious, theological means imparted by St. Thomas – to release this repression, and satisfy the unconscious demands. ~Victor White, Jung-White Letters, Page 106-110
