LOUIS A. SASS
597
destroy, I destroy," he wrote in his personal notebooks), he is an excep–
tionally negative philosopher, far more inclined to criticize than to justify
or defend. But this is no reason to ignore Wittgenstein's statements of
admiration for and kinship with Freud, or to downplay the similarities that
exist between psychoanalysis and Wittgenstein's own project of intellec–
tual clarification and self-criticism.
Wittgenstein did often warn against being preoccupied with depths,
with what "lies
beneath
the surface," and stated that what he wanted to
understand was "already in plain view." In fact, however, he was powerful–
ly interested in delving below the surface of grammar in order to
clarify-and ultimately, to dissolve-underlying pictures that captivate and
mislead us. "In our language there is an entire mythology embedded," he
wrote. "The problems arising through a misinterpretation of our forms of
language have the character of
depth.
They are deep disquietudes; their
roots are as deep in us as the forms of our language." All this is certainly
reminiscent of psychoanalysis. Other resemblances to psychoanalysis
include Wittgenstein's fondness for illness metaphors, his predilection for
constructing illuminating metaphors and similes, his inclination, at times,
to connect philosophy with the personality that produced it, and his belief
that the insight one seeks is ultimately directed toward a transformation of
personality or self. "A philosopher," he wrote, "is a man who has to cure
many intellectual diseases in himself before he can arrive at the notions of
common sense."
"It
is sometimes said that a man's philosophy is a matter
of temperament, and there is something in this. A preference for certain
similes. . .." In a passage from an unpublished manuscript which
Bouveresse neglects to quote or to mention, Wittgenstein explains why
psychoanalysis, which he elsewhere compares with metaphysical philoso–
phy, can also be likened to his own brand of philosophical clarification and
critique:
It
is a principle function of philosophy to warn against false analo–
gies. To warn against the false analogies which lie embedded in our
forms of expression without our being fully conscious of them.
I believe our method here resembles psychoanalysis which also
makes conscious the unconscious and thereby renders it harmless,
and I believe that this resemblance is not purely superficial.
It is with regard to Wittgenstein's second ideal, that of awe or wonder,
that the sensibilities of Freud and Wittgenstein most truly and most
sharply diverge. To appreciate this point, one must consider their respective
