«FR»14 November 1912  Pension White  2 Piazza dei Cavalleggieri  Firenze

«FL»Dear Professor Freud,

«IP4,0»I got today a letter from my wife of a very different tone, full of sunniness and life, and you may imagine how much it cheered me.  The other was evidently an outburst of feeling, which perhaps will do her good; she ought to pour it on to you as well, but no doubt she will do so.  I find her wonderful good ("«MDUL»brav«MDNM»")«FN1.××German word for good, honest, or worthy.» in the endeavours she makes, do you also?

«IP4,0»I have news.  This morning came a long letter from Putnam, from which I make the following abstracts.: "What Dr. Jung said, in effect, was that while he still held to the importance of the |×/ technique, he had come to rate the infantile fixations as of far less importance than formerly as an etiological factor, and, indeed, as I understood him, as an almost negligible factor in most cases ‑‑ though I hardly think he could really maintain this if he were pushed for a positive opinion.  At any rate, the point on which he seems now inclined to lay emphasis is the difficulty of meeting new problems and environmental conditions which arise at the time of the actual onset of the neurosis.  It seems to me that we all recognise the importance of these influences, but I cannot as yet feel anything is won through minimising the significance of the other factor.....  The point which seemed to me to indicate most strongly the idea of a breaking‑off on his part was that he said he thought the significance of the whole conception of infantile sexual tendencies in Freud's sense had been overrated; that all persons, sick or well, have about the same phantasies, and that he did not any longer believe that the sensations which a nursing child (Säugling) has could be classified as sexual in any sense, but only as related to nutritional necessities.  This does not coincide with my present beliefs, but of course it will go far (although possibly in an unfortunate way) towards gaining adherents for the |×/ method.  Perhaps, after all, that is the important thing, because whatever ideas are really the most sound will in the end (far away) come most strongly to the front."«FN1.××Excerpt from Putnam's letter is not to be found in Hale (1971a).

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So you see that Putnam's intelligence and intellectual honesty, with his experience of the neuroses rather than the psychoses, and possibly aided by my warning letters, seem to be bringing him in the right track.  Meyer's hostility to Jung, which is even greater than that to you may help us, and if so Hoch will follow him.  Burrow I am sure I can control, inspite of his devotion to Jung, and no doubt Brill is safe.  So altogether I am hopeful that we shall prevent any serious inroads being made on the theory in America.  Pierce Clark is made of weaker stuff.«FN1.××L. Pierce Clark (1870‑1933), M. D. 1892 New York University Medical College, specialist in neurology and psychiatry.

»  In a letter to Putnam, which the latter encloses, he says: "I think |×/ in the light in which Jung formulates it is bound to have a very wide and rapid extension from now on.  It certainly removes some of the disagreeable barriers heretofore impeding the progress of the movement."  The aesthetic criterion is certainly a strange one for a scientific man to rely on, though unfortunately not novel.

«IP0,0»              Yours always affectionately  Jones.