“Curiously
enough, running water, which is the fear-symbol in one of the strangest of all
phobias, is also one of the powerful sedatory influences in the treatment of
the violently insane. The patients in asylums situated near streams and rivers
are frequently to be found sitting on the banks staring intently at the water
as it flows by. There is no doubt that there exists in the human soul a
profound relationship with this natural manifestation that exerts its sway over
the subconscious mind. Even among the normal and sane, the attraction of running
water is a commonly observed fact. It is interesting to note, also, the use of
the device in insane asylums known as the continuous bath, for the subduing of
violent patients. They are placed in a kind of canvas hammock and suspended
over a tub. Water at body temperature is allowed to play continually over the
body until the patient has been lulled to quiescence by its healing effect.
“The
psychopathologists believe that in all of us there exists a strong desire to
let ourselves go, in utter weariness, and be carried on the bosom of the stream
to the eternal nothingness that is death. In the potamophobiac, this desire has
been exaggerated to an abnormal degree, and the subconscious, reacting against
its own longing for obliteration, has set up the running stream, the ever-moving
sea, and even such commonplace articles as the wash-stand faucet and the
toilet-bowl, as symbols of fear. In this complex of unbalanced imaginings may
also exist the castration fear – the terror of the unknown, predatory creatures
that lurk in ocean and river.
“The
last stanza of Swinburne’s “Garden of
Proserpine” is an apt expression of a less frenzied mood of potamophobia:
“From
too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We
thank, with brief thanksgiving,
Whatever
gods may be
That
no life lives forever,
That
dead men rise up never,
That
even the weariest river
Winds
somewhere safe to sea.”
John Vassos
New York
May 25th,
1931
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