our reason to affirm our reason, since that is the datum without which we
cannot undertake our task.

If this view is sound, what practical conclusions can we draw from it? I
wish to insist on this question because it was distinctly and positively
with the practical end in mind that I ventured to write this paper, and I
suggest the following as a few of these conclusions.

(I) We should not speak of the "Libido," in whatever sense this word is
taken, as if it were a fixed quantity, like so much heat, or so much fluid,
that is, as representing so much mesaurable force. One current notion which
has played a very useful part in psychoanalytic work, yet is misleading in
its tendency, is that the "Libido" may be likened to a river which if it
cannot find an outlet through its normal channel is bound to overflow its
banks and perhaps furrow out a new path. This conception is based on this
same law of the conservation of energy to which reference has been made.
If, however, I am right in my contention that the "Libido" is only one
manifestation of an energy,-- greater than simply "vital,"--which can be
studied to the best purpose only among men whose powers have been cultivated
to the best advantage, then it will be seen that this conception of "Libido"
as a force of definite amount is not justifiable by the facts.

One does not find that love or reason is subject to this quantitative law.
On the contrary, the persons whom most of us recognize as of the highest
type do not love any given individual less because their love takes in
another. The bond of love holds not only three, but an indefinite number.

The same statement may be made with regard to reason and to will. The power
and quantity of them are not exhausted but are increased by use.