Key Arguments

• Freud recalls his earlier explanation of melancholia "through the supposition that a lost object 52 in the Ego is set up anew, so the object-cathexis 53 is replaced by an identification. 54"
• He states that since that earlier account "we have understood that such substitution has a large share in the shaping of the Ego, and significantly contributes to establishing what we call character/personality. 55"
• He suggests that "At the start of the individual’s primitive oral phase, 56 object cathexis and identification must be indistinguishable from each other," indicating the foundational role of identification from the very beginning.
• He notes that when "a sexual object should or must be given up, not infrequently Ego alteration occurs, which we must describe as the setting up of the object in the Ego, as in melancholia’s case," generalizing the melancholia mechanism.
• He concludes broadly that "the process is, especially in early stages of development, very common" and that this "can enable the view that the Ego’s character is a precipitate of abandoned object-cathexes, and contains the history of these object choices."
• He acknowledges individual differences via "a spectrum of resistance ability, 60 which determines to what extent a person’s character fends off or accepts these influences of the history of erotic object choices."

Source Quotes

We must stride a bit further here. We were able to explain the painful affliction of melancholia 51 through the supposition that a lost object 52 in the Ego is set up anew, so the object-cathexis 53 is replaced by an identification. 54 At that time, however, we had not yet recognized the total significance of this process and did not know how frequent and typical it is. Since then, we have understood that such substitution has a large share in the shaping of the Ego, and significantly contributes to establishing what we call character/personality.

54 At that time, however, we had not yet recognized the total significance of this process and did not know how frequent and typical it is. Since then, we have understood that such substitution has a large share in the shaping of the Ego, and significantly contributes to establishing what we call character/personality. 55 At the start of the individual’s primitive oral phase, 56 object cathexis and identification must be indistinguishable from each other. One can only conjecture that the object cathexis later emits from the Id, which experiences erotic tendencies as needs.

In the beginning, the still weak Ego gets from the object cathexes awareness, which it can let itself drop into or try, through the process of repression, to fend off. 57 If a sexual object should or must be given up, not infrequently Ego alteration occurs, which we must describe as the setting up of the object in the Ego, as in melancholia’s case, the circumstances surrounding this substitution are not yet known. Maybe it facilitates or enables for the Ego through this introjection, 58 which is a kind of regression 59 to the oral phase mechanism, the surrender of the object.

Maybe this identification overall is the condition under which the Id gives up its objects. In any case, the process is, especially in early stages of development, very common and can enable the view that the Ego’s character is a precipitate of abandoned object-cathexes, and contains the history of these object choices. It is, of course, accepted from the outset that there is a spectrum of resistance ability, 60 which determines to what extent a person’s character fends off or accepts these influences of the history of erotic object choices.

In any case, the process is, especially in early stages of development, very common and can enable the view that the Ego’s character is a precipitate of abandoned object-cathexes, and contains the history of these object choices. It is, of course, accepted from the outset that there is a spectrum of resistance ability, 60 which determines to what extent a person’s character fends off or accepts these influences of the history of erotic object choices. In women who have had a lot of love experience, we believe, it will be easy to verify the residues of their object cathexes in their characteristics.

Key Concepts

• we were able to explain the painful affliction of melancholia 51 through the supposition that a lost object 52 in the Ego is set up anew, so the object-cathexis 53 is replaced by an identification. 54
• we have understood that such substitution has a large share in the shaping of the Ego, and significantly contributes to establishing what we call character/personality. 55
• If a sexual object should or must be given up, not infrequently Ego alteration occurs, which we must describe as the setting up of the object in the Ego, as in melancholia’s case
• the process is, especially in early stages of development, very common and can enable the view that the Ego’s character is a precipitate of abandoned object-cathexes, and contains the history of these object choices.
• there is a spectrum of resistance ability, 60 which determines to what extent a person’s character fends off or accepts these influences of the history of erotic object choices.

Context

Early in Chapter III, Freud generalizes his earlier melancholia theory into a general mechanism of ego-formation and character development through identifications with lost objects.