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The consideration that the past plays a role in the current life of an adult subject is one of psychoanalysis'most stimulating propositions. All the more so, in so far as this proposition remains a subject for discussion. On what elements is this continuity founded, what is it made of and how does it affect the psyche ? Today, we can work on the improbable and indirect appearance of furtive elements coming from the past, in order to bind them to the subject's drive activity, as it is expressed in current complaints. Analytic work aims in this way to construct openings both forwards and backwards. It opens up apparently new perspectives on the past, attempts to establish a dynamic continuity between the past, also in its infantile drive forms, and what the subject is becoming.