[Sidenote: Ambivalent attitude towards the king]
As regards the attitude adopted by the individual member of a state towards the king or ruler, Freud has shown[156] that it tends to be, in Bleuler's useful phrase, ambivalent, _i. e._, to be determined by two motives of opposite character, in one of which hate is the principal element, in the other love. This ambivalency manifests itself most clearly in the many restrictions and taboos that are attached to, or connected with, the office of king in different parts of the world, and that are to some extent still operative even in civilised societies at the present day. These taboos are in the main of two kinds:--
[Sidenote: Taboos affecting the king as manifestations of this attitude]
(1) Those that restrict the activities of the king himself, such as the rules in virtue of which he may only live in certain places, go out at certain times or eat certain foods, must avoid all situations involving danger of any kind and must submit to a cumbrous, wearisome and often exhausting system of court routine and ceremony. Taboos of this kind would seem on analysis to have two main objects:--(a) to guard the king from any harm, (b) to limit his power in a variety of ways, and generally to make his life burdensome and unpleasant (under the guise of assuring his dignity or safety). The exaggerated fear of some harm coming to the king, which is manifested in (a), arises by way of a reaction against the unconscious _desire_ that some harm _may_ befall him, in the same way as an exaggerated and unreasonable anxiety as regards the health and welfare of some relative usually indicates a repressed feeling of hostility towards that relative (_cp._ above p. 57); while (b) even more obviously involves elements of fear and of hostility.
(2) Taboos that affect the subjects in their relations to the king, such as those which forbid looking at, or touching, the king, or the touching or eating of his food, or the touching or removal of his personal effects. These may likewise be traced to two predominant motives:--(a) the desire, as before, to preserve the king from any harm--in this case more especially from harm that may result from the actions of those about him; (b) the desire to avoid any harm befalling the subjects as a result of influences emanating from the king, the latter being regarded as a potent but mysterious source of danger to all who rashly approach or come in contact with him. The latter tendency, with its correlative belief, arises as the result of a projection of the hostility felt towards the king; this hostility (in accordance with the mechanism of Projection--now well recognised both in normal and in abnormal psychology)[157], being falsely attributed to its object, instead of to the person in whose mind it really originates.