William J. Mcgrath’s scientific contributions

... Covering the years 1871-1881, Freud's letters to Silberstein enable us to trace the development of those buried thoughts and feelings which flourished during his late adolescence and early adulthood, as he experienced his first stirrings of love (directed ambiguously towards both the twelve-year-old Gisela Fluss and her mother) and pursued his various intellectual passions with far greater fervor. The letters tantalize us with references to Freud's youthful poems, diaries, fragments of novels, a cherished "biblical study with modern themes" tragically lost in the mail, an essay on "the teleological argument" for God's existence for an abortive student journal of philosophy, and a treatise on "the means poets are accustomed to use in matters of love," as well as commentary and remarks-sometimes jesting, sometimes serious-on a wide range of literary and philosophical figures (FSil,12,26,(49)(50)(53)(54)(89)(90)(110)(111). 2 They also attest to Freud's surprisingly intense involvement with the Leseverein der deutschen Studenten Wien, a German nationalist organization committed to democratic reform and cultural change, to which Freud belonged throughout his university years, until it was banned in 1878 (FSil, 96-97;Gödde 1991;McGrath 1967McGrath , 1986. ...

Reference:

Freud as a Social and Cultural Theorist: On Human Nature and the Civilizing Process