We have learnt by experience that wishing costs little; so we generously present
one another with the best and warmest of wishes. And of these the foremost is
for a long life. A well known Eastern tale reveals the double-sidedness of
precisely this wish. The Sultan had his horoscope cast by two wise men. ‘Thy lot
is happy, master!’ said one of them. ‘It is written in the stars that thou shalt
see all thy kinsmen die before thee.’ This prophet was executed. ‘Thy lot is
happy!’ said the other too, ‘for I read in the stars that thou shalt outlive all
thy kinsmen.’ This one was richly rewarded. Both had given expression to the
fulfilment of the same wish.
在1926年一月,那时我给我们难忘的朋友——卡尔·亚伯拉罕写讣告,这让我很伤心。几年之前,在1923年,我可以祝贺圣多尔·弗伦兹50岁生日。今天,不到十年之后,我很伤心我也失去他了。在我为他生日写的东西中,我可以公开地祝贺他的多才多艺,他的原创才能,还有他天赋的富足。但是谨慎禁止我对一个朋友说他可爱而亲切的个性,(因为)他准备的是欢迎每一件更有意义的事物。
It fell to me in January, 1926, to write an obituary of our unforgettable
friend, Karl Abraham. A few years earlier, in 1923, I could congratulate Sándor
Ferenczi on the completion of his fiftieth year. To-day, scarcely a decade
later, it grieves me that I have outlived him too. In what I wrote for his
birthday I was able to celebrate openly his versatility and originality and the
richness of his gifts; but the discretion imposed on a friend forbade my
speaking of his lovable and affectionate personality, with its readiness to
welcome everything of significance.
Since the days when he was led to me by his interest in psycho-analysis, still
in its youth, we have shared many things with each other. I invited him to go
with me to Worcester, Massachusetts, when in 1909 I was called upon to lecture
there during a week of celebrations. In the morning, before the time had come
for my lecture to begin, we would walk together in front of the University
building and I would ask him to suggest what I should talk about that day. He
thereupon gave me a sketch of what, half an hour later, I improvised in my
lecture. In this way he had a share in the origin of the Five Lectures. Soon
after this, at the Nuremberg Congress of 1910, I arranged that he should propose
the organization of analysts into an international association - a scheme which
we had thought out together. With slight modifications it was accepted and is in
force to this day. For many successive years we spent the autumn holidays
together in Italy, and a number of papers that appeared later in the literature
under his or my name took their first shape in our talks there. When the
outbreak of the World War put an end to our freedom of movement, and paralysed
our analytic activity as well, he made use of the interval to begin his analysis
with me. This met with a break when he was called up for military service, but
he was able to resume it later. The feeling of a secure common bond, which grew
up between us from so many shared experiences, was not interrupted when, late in
life unfortunately, he was united to the outstanding woman who mourns him to-day
as his widow.