Psyche and Symbol

Book excerpt: The archetypes of human experience which derive from the deepest unconscious mind and reveal themselves in the universal symbols of art and religion as well as in the individual symbolic creations of particular people are, for C. G. Jung, the key to the cure of souls, the cornerstone of his therapeutic work. This volume explains the function and origin of these symbols. Here the reader will find not only a general orientation to Jung's point of view but extensive studies of the symbolic process and its integrating function in human psychology as it is reflected in the characteristic spiritual productions of Europe and Asia. Violet de Laszlo has selected for inclusion in Psyche and Symbol five selections from Aion: "The Ego," "The Shadow," "The Syzygy: Anima and Animus," "The Self," and "Christ, A Symbol of the Self." The book continues with "The Phenomenology of the Spirit in Fairy Tales," "The Psychology of the Child Archetype," and "Transformation Symbolism in the Mass." Also included are the foreword to the Cary Banes translation of the I Ching, two chapters from Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, "Psychological Commentary on The Tibetan Book of the Dead," and "Commentary on The Secret of the Golden Flower."