Significant ALS in German, signed “Freud,” one page both sides, 5.5 x 9, personal letterhead, December 15, 1931. Handwritten letter to architect and author Roderick Seidenberg, in full (translated): "You have judged correctly on which side my sympathies lie. I am a pacifist and opposed to the use of violence in human affairs. But I fear I should be unable to establish my personal attitude publicly. My rather pessimistic judgment of human nature leads me to doubt whether anything can be accomplished with the masses without force and coercion; in nature, aside from man, everything is based upon struggle and mutual extinction. I am aware of the ethical demands—or rather the disposition—that we humans should arrange matters differently. But how justify this?
As I do not recognize morality as a divine inspiration but only as an evolutionary tendency, I do not see how I can advocate your stand at this stage of human culture. Wars, it is to be hoped, will probably disappear by themselves in the course of our cultural development toward a fuller mastery over nature. Whoever labors at the advancement of science and technology helps to bring that era nearer. For the present I expect nothing from pleas however well-intentioned and enthusiastic. I beg you therefore to excuse me from contributing to your proposed publication." In fine condition. Accompanied by the original mailing envelope, addressed in Freud's hand. Housed in a handsome custom-made clamshell case with navy morocco spine.
The German-born Roderick Seidenberg emigrated to New York as a young man, where he pursued a number of architectural pursuits: notably, he was responsible for the exterior of the Hotel New Yorker and the Garment Center Tower in NYC. His status as a conscientious objector during World War I led to his interment at Camp Upton in Long Island, and Forts Riley and Leavenworth in Kansas from 1918-1920. In the 1930s, he began contributing to various journals and would go on to publish some significant books: Posthistoric Man: An Inquiry (1950) and Anatomy of the Future (1961). In this case, it appears that Seidenberg had asked Freud for a literary contribution on pacifism—perhaps as part of a study or collection stemming from his own pacifist roots.
In 1932, Freud would famously write to Albert Einstein on the subject, in a letter now published under the title 'Why War?' In it, Freud examines the psychical foundations of the human drive toward warfare and hopes that the 'progress of civilization' will turn all men pacifist—how long that will take, he observes, is unknown. A remarkable letter on an important 20th-century topic.
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