Don’t you see that the parting is inevitable? For your sake and Toni Wolff
17- I. 1922.
[I]. I haven’t obeyed you as much as I wanted to. I’m not yet free enough for that. I’m lso oppressed by great weariness.
S. Yes, it’s difficult. But cut back on your work. You have too many patients. You should have fewer.
[I]. I’ll try to do what I can. But I hardly have the strength for it. Where can I gain the strength to fulfill all this?
S. I’ll give it to you. But you must fulfill my conditions.
[I]. What are they? Before I promise anything.
S. You needn’t be so mistrustful. Nothing impossible is demanded from you. But it’s difficult to get these conditions across to you.
Won’t you wait until you are stronger, that is, less tired?
[I]. No, I want to know them now, so that there is light and I can find my way.
S. So listen: you have grown older, your strength is no longer what it was. Therefore simplify. Become simple. You give too much.
You can be more sober. leave the greater burden to others.
[I]. But what are your terms for granting me strength?
S. How can I rightly say, if you’ re so tired? Rest yourself and come again.
- I. 1922.
[I]. Why are all these things so dark and bleak?
S. Because everything is a process of change. The times that previously were have become old and strive for new order.
That’s why everything is dark. Gloomy for you, but alive and active within.
[I]. But what should happen? Where does the change of fate lead? Is there no message that you could read me?
S. None. The former has not yet been fulfilled and the way to fulfilment is full of torment.
[I]. Tell me, is my manner of acting and letting be somewhere incorrect? Why did you deprive me of sleep?
S. I didn’t: deprive you. You deprived yourself through your injustice. Don’t you see that the parting is inevitable?
For your sake and her [Toni Wolff] sake. The measure of suffering is full and the light of joy and life is burnt out.
Another light is to be found elsewhere.
[I]. Is there no escape?
S. No, this fate is not to be overcome. A miracle? You’re thinking of a miracle? I can’t see any.
[I]. So look around, gather all your visionary’s strength, reach through even the eternal darkness a:ru:l for the sake of human suffering.
S. I will for your sake, but the gigantic cloud of eternal night is awful.
I see a yellow shining stroke from the top left of this cloud in the irregular shape of a streak of lightning, and behind it an indeterminate reddish light in the cloud. It does not move.
Beneath the cloud I see a dead black serpent and the lightning stuck in its head like a spear.
A hand, as large as that of a God, has thrown the spear and everything has frozen into a gloomy vivid image. What is it trying to say?
Do you recall that image that you painted years ago, in which the black and red man with the black and white serpent is struck by the ray of God?
This image is connected to it, since you also later painted the dead serpent, and did you not behold a gloomy image this morning, of that man in a white robe with a black face, like a mummy?
[I]. What is all this?
S. An image of yourself.
[I]. But what is meant?
S. How shall I interpret it to you? It hangs deep in the dark cloud. Who can tear it out?
[I]. I say unto you once more, gather your strength, your fly’s boldness, your visionary’s defiance.
Tonight’s miserable suffering is too deep. Grasp the root of the mystery, as you’ve already done so often. You must.
S. My hand does not have the strength of the Gods. It can force daimons but not Gods, and truly a God sent this fate.
[I]. Then there will also be a divine good in it, since Gods cannot just be devils. What kind of God?
S. Truly a God of ore, a servant of the Great Mother. What man would be able to compete with the love and the severity of the Mother?
hat is the gruesomeness of the eternal Mother. You overcome the Mother only through submission.
[I]. But what submission does it require-?, to solve this mystery?
S. First you should paint the image that stands before your eyes today. It will bewitch your nature.
But the Mother is in your nature, she is the Mother.
[I]. I will do this. (Image executed).
I have painted the image. What do you say now?
S. I saw it. So it is. What should I say? Your arts leave me cold.
(I]. What does that mean? It sounds like before. Should you arrogate something to yourself again?
S. Why not?
(I]. Has the image granted you treacherous power?
S. The power you wanted.
(I]. I wanted to give you power so that you could give me light in this hellish darkness.
S. Do you believe that you could get light for yourself through magic?
(I] . I don’t want to bewitch you. The image is entitled: The end of the magician. Do you understand this?
S. Whether I understand it? Better than you, it seems to me. That’s why your magic leaves me cold.
(I] . You fool, I didn’t want to bewitch you, but myself Why do you make this damned confusion?
S. This perplexity is necessary. Everything must be mixed up together(!].
So that you can be above and play the vampire?
S. No, no, no. You don’t understand. It has to be an end.
(I]. What do you mean by that? Speak clearly.
S. The disorder makes an end. It comes first and last. However, there must be a new day.
(I]. What can you do about this this, impotent daimon?
S. I can only look.
(I]. But what do you then hide behind your ambiguity?
S. All the severity that befalls you.
(I] . Do you then see no hope?
S. Hope, yes- but beyond the chaos. It’s not me sitting on you, but stark actuality. I can’t bring salvation, but you can.
You must make order patiently.
Actuality against actuality. You must defend your life. Go to your work, step by step, and do not let yourself be disturbed.
You will find the strength. Don’t let off. Take up the next book, do your duty. Close your eyes and ears. look at your image.
There is unconcern in agony. Agony, that is your actuality. The primordial man lived and died.
He has given you everything that the past could give you. Now you must create the present and build the future.
The future will be created. The past lived. It outlived itself What evidence is still needed? Your complaint changes nothing. ~The Black Books, Vol. VII, Page 219-221
It appears that Jung heeded this advice and reduced the size of his practice.
In the four last months of 1921, he saw about sixty-two patients, most several times per week and many daily.
In the first four months of 1922, he saw only about forty-five, and in the last four months of 1922 about forty-four.
Nevertheless, his workload remained an issue. On February 10, 1925 he wrote to Frances Wickes:
“Thank you for your kind letter. I am rather ashamed that I have not yet written to you.
But it was not just negligence that kept me from writing, but very urgent matters that called my attention elsewhere.
I am eaten up by patients, so that I can hardly breathe.
In the end of the week I become a violent fanatic of Jewish and Christian belief in the the sanctity of Sabbath on Saturdays and Sunday.
My tendency to an Islamic solution of problems shows itself in a veneration of Friday, but this new cult still interferes with correspondence.”
On March 19, 1925, he again wrote to Wickes: “Lately there has been such an afflux of business that I have been forced to invent a new scheme how to keep up with my obligations.
I am going to reduce the hours of individual analysis, i.e., the amount of strictly therapeutic work for the teaching.
It has become unavoidable.
Last week I almost collapsed. No more of this!” (Wickes Collection, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress). ~The Black Books, Vol. VII, Page 219, fn 191
