On the other hand we must assume, or we may convince ourselves through
psychological observations on others, that the very impressions which we
have forgotten have nevertheless left the deepest traces in our psychic
life, and acted as determinants for our whole future development. We
conclude therefore that we do not deal with a real forgetting of
infantile impressions but rather with an amnesia similar to that
observed in neurotics for later experiences, the nature of which
consists in their being detained from consciousness (repression). But
what forces bring about this repression of the infantile impressions? He
who can solve this riddle will also explain hysterical amnesia.

We shall not, however, hesitate to assert that the existence of the
infantile amnesia gives us a new point of comparison between the psychic
states of the child and those of the psychoneurotic. We have already
encountered another point of comparison when confronted by the fact that
the sexuality of the psychoneurotic preserves the infantile character or
has returned to it. May there not be an ultimate connection between the
infantile and the hysterical amnesias?

The connection between the infantile and the hysterical amnesias is
really more than a mere play of wit. The hysterical amnesia which serves
the repression can only be explained by the fact that the individual
already possesses a sum of recollections which have been withdrawn from
conscious disposal and which by associative connection now seize that
which is acted upon by the repelling forces of the repression emanating
from consciousness.[4] We may say that without infantile amnesia there
would be no hysterical amnesia.

I believe that the infantile amnesia which causes the individual to look
upon his childhood as if it were a _prehistoric_ time and conceals from