In a moment in our history beset with grave doubts, Erik H. Erickson inquires into the nature and structure of the shared visions which invigorate some eras and seemed so fatefully lacking in others. He illustrates the human propensity for play and vision, from the toy world of childhood to the dream life of adults, and from the artist's imagination to the scientist's reason. Finally, he enlarges on the origins and structure of one shared vision of universal significance, namely, the American Dream. Such a worldview, he concludes, consists of both vision and counter vision (political and religious, economic and technological, artistic and scientific) which vie with each other to give a coherent meaning to shared realities and to liberate individual and communal energy.