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Title: Psychopathology of Everyday Life

Author: Sigmund Freud

Translator: A. A. Brill

Release date: February 6, 2022 [eBook #67332]
Most recently updated: October 18, 2024

Language: English

Original publication: United States: The Macmillan Company, 1914

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK
PSYCHOPATHOLOGY OF EVERYDAY LIFE ***

PSYCHOPATHOLOGY
OF EVERYDAY LIFE

By
Professor Dr. SIGMUND FREUD, LL.D.

AUTHORIZED ENGLISH EDITION, WITH
INTRODUCTION BY

A. A. BRILL, Ph.B., M.D.
Chief of Clinic of Psychiatry Columbia University; Chief of the
Neurological Department, Bronx Hospital and Dispensary;
former Assistant Physician in the Central Islip State
Hospital, and in the Clinic of Psychiatry, Zurich

NEW YORK
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1914

(All rights reserved)

INTRODUCTION
Professor Freud developed his system of psychoanalysis while studying the
so-called border-line cases of mental diseases, such as hysteria and
compulsion neurosis. By discarding the old methods of treatment and
strictly applying himself to a study of the patient’s life he discovered that
the hitherto puzzling symptoms had a definite meaning, and that there was
nothing arbitrary in any morbid manifestation. Psychoanalysis always
showed that they referred to some definite problem or conflict of the person
concerned. It was while tracing back the abnormal to the normal state that
Professor Freud found how faint the line of demarcation was between the
normal and neurotic person, and that the psychopathologic mechanisms so
glaringly observed in the psychoneuroses and psychoses could usually be
demonstrated in a lesser degree in normal persons. This led to a study of the
faulty actions of everyday life and later to the publication of the
Psychopathology of Everyday Life, a book which passed through four
editions in Germany and is considered the author’s most popular work.
With great ingenuity and penetration the author throws much light on the
complex problems of human behaviour, and clearly demonstrates that the
hitherto considered impassable gap between normal and abnormal mental
states is more apparent than real.
This translation is made of the fourth German edition, and while the
original text was strictly followed, linguistic difficulties often made it
necessary to modify or substitute some of the author’s cases by examples
comprehensible to the English-speaking reader.
A. A. BRILL.
New York.

CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
Introduction v
I. Forgetting of Proper Names 3
II. Forgetting of Foreign Words 17
III. Forgetting of Names and Order of Words 29
IV. Childhood and Concealing Memories 57
V. Mistakes in Speech 71
VI. Mistakes in Reading and Writing 117
VII. Forgetting of Impressions and Resolutions 135
VIII. Erroneously Carried-out Actions 177
IX. Symptomatic and Chance Actions 215
X. Errors 249
XI. Combined Faulty Acts 265
XII. Determinism, Chance, and Superstitious beliefs 277
Index 339

I
FORGETTING OF PROPER NAMES

During the year 1898 I published a short essay On the Psychic Mechanism
of Forgetfulness.[1] I shall now repeat its contents and take it as a starting-
point for further discussion. I have there undertaken a psychologic analysis
of a common case of temporary forgetfulness of proper names, and from a
pregnant example of my own observation I have reached the conclusion that
this frequent and practically unimportant occurrence of a failure of a
psychic function—of memory—admits an explanation which goes beyond
the customary utilization of this phenomenon.
If an average psychologist should be asked to explain how it happens that
we often fail to recall a name which we are sure we know, he would
probably content himself with the answer that proper names are more apt to
be forgotten than any other content of memory. He might give plausible
reasons for this “forgetting preference” for proper names, but he would not
assume any deep determinant for the process.
I was led to examine exhaustively the phenomenon of temporary
forgetfulness through the observation of certain peculiarities, which,
although not general, can, nevertheless, be seen clearly in some cases. In
these there is not only forgetfulness, but also false recollection: he who
strives for the escaped name brings to consciousness others—substitutive
names—which, although immediately recognized as false, nevertheless
obtrude themselves with great tenacity. The process which should lead to
the reproduction of the lost name is, as it were, displaced, and thus brings
one to an incorrect substitute.
Now it is my assumption that the displacement is not left to psychic
arbitrariness, but that it follows lawful and rational paths. In other words, I
assume that the substitutive name (or names) stands in direct relation to the
lost name, and I hope, if I succeed in demonstrating this connection, to
throw light on the origin of the forgetting of names.

In the example which I selected for analysis in 1898 I vainly strove to recall
the name of the master who made the imposing frescoes of the “Last
Judgment” in the dome of Orvieto. Instead of the lost name—Signorelli—
two other names of artists—Botticelli and Boltraffio—obtruded themselves,
names which my judgment immediately and definitely rejected as being
incorrect. When the correct name was imparted to me by an outsider I
recognized it at once without any hesitation. The examination of the
influence and association paths which caused the displacement from
Signorelli to Botticelli and Boltraffio led to the following results:—
(a) The reason for the escape of the name Signorelli is neither to be sought
in the strangeness in itself of this name nor in the psychologic character of
the connection in which it was inserted. The forgotten name was just as
familiar to me as one of the substitutive names—Botticelli—and somewhat
more familiar than the other substitute—Boltraffio—of the possessor of
which I could hardly say more than that he belonged to the Milanese
School. The connection, too, in which the forgetting of the name took place
appeared to me harmless, and led to no further explanation. I journeyed by
carriage with a stranger from Ragusa, Dalmatia, to a station in Herzegovina.
Our conversation drifted to travelling in Italy, and I asked my companion
whether he had been in Orvieto and had seen there the famous frescoes of
——
(b) The forgetting of the name could not be explained until after I had
recalled the theme discussed immediately before this conversation. This
forgetting then made itself known as a disturbance of the newly emerging
theme caused by the theme preceding it. In brief, before I asked my
travelling companion if he had been in Orvieto we had been discussing the
customs of the Turks living in Bosnia and Herzegovina. I had related what I
heard from a colleague who was practising medicine among them, namely,
that they show full confidence in the physician and complete submission to
fate. When one is compelled to inform them that there is no help for the
patient, they answer: “Sir (Herr), what can I say? I know that if he could be
saved you would save him.” In these sentences alone we can find the words
and names: Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Herr (sir), which may be inserted in
an association series between Signorelli, Botticelli, and Boltraffio.
(c) I assume that the stream of thoughts concerning the customs of the
Turks in Bosnia, etc., was able to disturb the next thought, because I

withdrew my attention from it before it came to an end. For I recalled that I
wished to relate a second anecdote which was next to the first in my
memory. These Turks value the sexual pleasure above all else, and at sexual
disturbances merge into an utter despair which strangely contrasts with their
resignation at the peril of losing their lives. One of my colleague’s patients
once told him: “For you know, sir (Herr), if that ceases, life no longer has
any charm.”
I refrained from imparting this characteristic feature because I did not wish
to touch upon such a delicate theme in conversation with a stranger. But I
went still further; I also deflected my attention from the continuation of the
thought which might have associated itself in me with the theme “Death
and Sexuality.” I was at that time under the after-effects of a message which
I had received a few weeks before, during a brief sojourn in Trafoi. A
patient on whom I had spent much effort had ended his life on account of an
incurable sexual disturbance. I know positively that this sad event, and
everything connected with it, did not come to my conscious recollection on
that trip in Herzegovina. However, the agreement between Trafoi and
Boltraffio forces me to assume that this reminiscence was at that time
brought to activity despite all the intentional deviation of my attention.
(d) I can no longer conceive the forgetting of the name Signorelli as an
accidental occurrence. I must recognize in this process the influence of a
motive. There were motives which actuated the interruption in the
communication of my thoughts (concerning the customs of the Turks, etc.),
and which later influenced me to exclude from my consciousness the
thought connected with them, and which might have led to the message
concerning the incident in Trafoi—that is, I wanted to forget something, I
repressed something. To be sure, I wished to forget something other than
the name of the master of Orvieto; but this other thought brought about an
associative connection between itself and this name, so that my act of
volition missed the aim, and I forgot the one against my will, while I
intentionally wished to forget the other. The disinclination to recall directed
itself against the one content; the inability to remember appeared in another.
The case would have been obviously simpler if this disinclination and the
inability to remember had concerned the same content. The substitutive
names no longer seem so thoroughly justified as they were before this
explanation. They remind me (after the form of a compromise) as much of

what I wished to forget as of what I wished to remember, and show me that
my object to forget something was neither a perfect success nor a failure.
(e) The nature of the association formed between the lost name and the
repressed theme (death and sexuality, etc.), containing the names of Bosnia,
Herzegovina, and Trafoi, is also very strange. In the scheme inserted here,
which originally appeared in 1898, an attempt is made to graphically
represent these associations.
The name Signorelli was thus divided into two parts. One pair of syllables
(elli) returned unchanged in one of the substitutions, while the other had
gained, through the translation of signor (sir, Herr), many and diverse
relations to the name contained in the repressed theme, but was lost through
it in the reproduction. Its substitution was formed in a way to suggest that a
displacement took place along the same associations—“Herzegovina and
Bosnia”—regardless of the sense and acoustic demarcation. The names
were therefore treated in this process like the written pictures of a sentence
which is to be transformed into a picture-puzzle (rebus). No information
was given to consciousness concerning the whole process, which, instead of
the name Signorelli, was thus changed to the substitutive names. At first
sight no relation is apparent between the theme that contained the name
Signorelli and the repressed one which immediately preceded it.

Perhaps it is not superfluous to remark that the given explanation does not
contradict the conditions of memory reproduction and forgetting assumed
by other psychologists, which they seek in certain relations and
dispositions. Only in certain cases have we added another motive to the
factors long recognized as causative in forgetting names, and have thus laid
bare the mechanism of faulty memory. The assumed dispositions are
indispensable also in our case, in order to make it possible for the repressed
element to associatively gain control over the desired name and take it
along into the repression. Perhaps this would not have occurred in another
name having more favourable conditions of reproduction. For it is quite
probable that a suppressed element continually strives to assert itself in
some other way, but attains this success only where it meets with suitable
conditions. At other times the suppression succeeds without disturbance of
function, or, as we may justly say, without symptoms.
When we recapitulate the conditions for forgetting a name with faulty
recollection we find: (1) a certain disposition to forget the same; (2) a
process of suppression which has taken place shortly before; and (3) the
possibility of establishing an outer association between the concerned name
and the element previously suppressed. The last condition will probably not
have to be much overrated, for the slightest claim on the association is apt
in most cases to bring it about. But it is a different and farther-reaching
question whether such outer association can really furnish the proper
condition to enable the suppressed element to disturb the reproduction of
the desired name, or whether after all a more intimate connection between
the two themes is not necessarily required. On superficial consideration one
may be willing to reject the latter requirement and consider the temporal
meeting in perfectly dissimilar contents as sufficient. But on more thorough
examination one finds more and more frequently that the two elements (the
repressed and the new one) connected by an outer association, possess
besides a connection in content, and this can also be demonstrated in the
example Signorelli.
The value of the understanding gained through the analysis of the example
Signorelli naturally depends on whether we must explain this case as a
typical or as an isolated process. I must now maintain that the forgetting of
a name associated with faulty recollection uncommonly often follows the
same process as was demonstrated in the case of Signorelli. Almost every

time that I observed this phenomenon in myself I was able to explain it in
the manner indicated above as being motivated by repression.
I must mention still another view-point in favour of the typical nature of our
analysis. I believe that one is not justified in separating the cases of name-
forgetting with faulty recollection from those in which incorrect substitutive
names have not obtruded themselves. These substitutive names occur
spontaneously in a number of cases; in other cases, where they do not come
spontaneously, they can be brought to the surface by concentration of
attention, and they then show the same relation to the repressed element and
the lost name as those that come spontaneously. Two factors seem to play a
part in bringing to consciousness the substitutive names: first, the effort of
attention, and second, an inner determinant which adheres to the psychic
material. I could find the latter in the greater or lesser facility which forms
the required outer associations between the two elements. A great many of
the cases of name-forgetting without faulty recollection therefore belong to
the cases with substitutive name formation, the mechanism of which
corresponds to the one in the example Signorelli. But I surely shall not
venture to assert that all cases of name-forgetting belong to the same group.
There is no doubt that there are cases of name-forgetting that proceed in a
much simpler way. We shall represent this state of affairs carefully enough
if we assert that besides the simple forgetting of proper names there is
another forgetting which is motivated by repression.

II
FORGETTING OF FOREIGN WORDS

The ordinary vocabulary of our own language seems to be protected against
forgetting within the limits of normal function, but it is quite different with
words from a foreign language. The tendency to forget such words extends
to all parts of speech. In fact, depending on our own general state and the
degree of fatigue, the first manifestation of functional disturbance evinces
itself in the irregularity of our control over foreign vocabulary. In a series of
cases this forgetting follows the same mechanism as the one revealed in the
example Signorelli. As a demonstration of this I shall report a single
analysis, characterized, however, by valuable features, concerning the
forgetting of a word, not a noun, from a Latin quotation. Before proceeding,
allow me to give a full and clear account of this little episode.
Last summer, while journeying on my vacation, I renewed the acquaintance
of a young man of academic education, who, as I soon noticed, was
conversant with some of my works. In our conversation we drifted—I no
longer remember how—to the social position of the race to which we both
belonged. He, being ambitious, bemoaned the fact that his generation, as he
expressed it, was destined to grow crippled, that it was prevented from
developing its talents and from gratifying its desires. He concluded his
passionately felt speech with the familiar verse from Virgil: Exoriare ... in
which the unhappy Dido leaves her vengeance upon Æneas to posterity.
Instead of “concluded,” I should have said “wished to conclude,” for he
could not bring the quotation to an end, and attempted to conceal the open
gap in his memory by transposing the words:—

“Exoriar(e) ex nostris ossibus ultor!”

He finally became piqued and said: “Please don’t make such a mocking
face, as if you were gloating over my embarrassment, but help me. There is
something missing in this verse. How does it read in its complete form?”
“With pleasure,” I answered, and cited it correctly:—

“Exoriar(e) aliquis nostris ex ossibus ultor!”

“It is too stupid to forget such a word,” he said. “By the way, I understand
you claim that forgetting is not without its reasons; I should be very curious
to find out how I came to forget this indefinite pronoun ‘aliquis.’”
I gladly accepted the challenge, as I hoped to get an addition to my
collection, and said, “We can easily do this, but I must ask you to tell me
frankly and without any criticism everything that occurs to your mind after
you focus your attention, without any particular intention, on the forgotten
word.”[2]
“Very well, the ridiculous idea comes to me to divide the word in the
following way: a and liquis.”
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.”
“What else does that recall to you?”
“The thought goes on to reliques—liquidation—liquidity—fluid.”
“Does that mean anything to you now?”
“No, not by a long shot.”
“Just go ahead.”
“I now think,” he said, laughing sarcastically, “of Simon of Trent, whose
relics I saw two years ago in a church in Trent. I think of the old accusation
which has been brought against the Jews again, and of the work of
Kleinpaul, who sees in these supposed sacrifices reincarnations or revivals,
so to speak, of the Saviour.”
“This stream of thoughts has some connection with the theme which we
discussed before the Latin word escaped you.”
“You are right. I now think of an article in an Italian journal which I have
recently read. I believe it was entitled: ‘What St. Augustine said Concerning
Women.’ What can you do with this?”
I waited.
“Now I think of something which surely has no connection with the theme.”

“Oh, please abstain from all criticism, and——”
“Oh, I know! I recall a handsome old gentleman whom I met on my journey
last week. He was really an original type. He looked like a big bird of prey.
His name, if you care to know, is Benedict.”
“Well, at least you give a grouping of saints and Church fathers: St. Simon,
St. Augustine, and St. Benedict. I believe that there was a Church father
named Origines. Three of these, moreover, are Christian names, like Paul in
the name Kleinpaul.”
“Now I think of St. Januarius and his blood miracle—I find that the
thoughts are running mechanically.”
“Just stop a moment; both St. Januarius and St. Augustine have something
to do with the calendar. Will you recall to me the blood miracle?”
“Don’t you know about it? The blood of St. Januarius is preserved in a phial
in a church in Naples, and on a certain holiday a miracle takes place causing
it to liquefy. The people think a great deal of this miracle, and become very
excited if the liquefying process is retarded, as happened once during the
French occupation. The General in command—or Garibaldi, if I am not
mistaken—then took the priest aside, and with a very significant gesture
pointed out to him the soldiers arrayed without, and expressed his hope that
the miracle would soon take place. And it actually took place....”
“Well, what else comes to your mind? Why do you hesitate?”
“Something really occurred to me ... but it is too intimate a matter to impart
... besides, I see no connection and no necessity for telling it.”
“I will take care of the connection. Of course I cannot compel you to reveal
what is disagreeable to you, but then you should not have demanded that I
tell you why you forgot the word ‘aliquis.’”
“Really? Do you think so? Well, I suddenly thought of a woman from
whom I could easily get a message that would be very annoying to us both.”
“That she missed her courses?”
“How could you guess such a thing?”
“That was not very difficult. You prepared me for it long enough. Just think
of the saints of the calendar, the liquefying of the blood on a certain day, the

excitement if the event does not take place, and the distinct threat that the
miracle must take place.... Indeed, you have elaborated the miracle of St.
Januarius into a clever allusion to the courses of the woman.”
“It was surely without my knowledge. And do you really believe that my
inability to reproduce the word ‘aliquis’ was due to this anxious
expectation?”
“That appears to me absolutely certain. Don’t you recall dividing it into a-
liquis and the associations: reliques, liquidation, fluid? Shall I also add to
this connection the fact that St. Simon, to whom you got by way of the
reliques, was sacrificed as a child?”
“Please stop. I hope you do not take these thoughts—if I really entertained
them—seriously. I will, however, confess to you that the lady is Italian, and
that I visited Naples in her company. But may not all this be coincidental?”
“I must leave to your own judgment whether you can explain all these
connections through the assumption of coincidence. I will tell you,
however, that every similar case that you analyse will lead you to just such
remarkable ‘coincidences!’”
I have more than one reason for valuing this little analysis, for which I am
indebted to my travelling companion. First, because in this case I was able
to make use of a source which is otherwise inaccessible to me. Most of the
examples of psychic disturbances of daily life that I have here compiled I
was obliged to take from observation of myself. I endeavoured to evade the
far richer material furnished me by my neurotic patients, because I had to
preclude the objection that the phenomena in question were only the result
and manifestation of the neurosis. It was therefore of special value for my
purpose to have a stranger free from a neurosis offer himself as a subject for
such examination. This analysis is also important in other respects,
inasmuch as it elucidates a case of word-forgetting without substitutive
recollection, and thus confirms the principle formulated above, namely, that
the appearance or nonappearance of incorrect substitutive recollections does
not constitute an essential distinction[3].
But the principal value of the example aliquis lies in another of its
distinctions from the case Signorelli. In the latter example the reproduction
of the name becomes disturbed through the after-effects of a stream of

thought which began shortly before and was interrupted, but whose content
had no distinct relation to the new theme which contained the name
Signorelli. Between the repression and the theme of the forgotten name
there existed only the relation of temporal contiguity, which reached the
other in order that the two should be able to form a connection through an
outer association.[4] On the other hand, in the example aliquis one can note
no trace of such an independent repressed theme which could occupy
conscious thought immediately before and then re-echo as a disturbance.
The disturbance of the reproduction proceeded here from the inner part of
the theme touched upon, and was brought about by the fact that
unconsciously a contradiction arose against the wish-idea represented in the
quotation.
The origin must be construed in the following manner: The speaker
deplored the fact that the present generation of his people was being
deprived of its rights, and like Dido he presaged that a new generation
would take upon itself vengeance against the oppressors. He therefore
expressed the wish for posterity. In this moment he was interrupted by the
contradictory thought: “Do you really wish so much for posterity? That is
not true. Just think in what a predicament you would be if you should now
receive the information that you must expect posterity from the quarter you
have in mind! No, you want no posterity—as much as you need it for your
vengeance.” This contradiction asserts itself, just as in the example
Signorelli, by forming an outer association between one of his ideation
elements and an element of the repressed wish, but here it is brought about
in a most strained manner through what seems an artificial detour of
associations. Another important agreement with the example Signorelli
results from the fact that the contradiction originates from repressed sources
and emanates from thoughts which would cause a deviation of attention.
So much for the diversity and the inner relationship of both paradigms of
the forgetting of names. We have learned to know a second mechanism of
forgetting, namely, the disturbance of thought through an inner
contradiction emanating from the repression. In the course of this
discussion we shall repeatedly meet with this process, which seems to me to
be the more easily understood.

III
FORGETTING OF NAMES AND ORDER OF WORDS

Experiences like those mentioned concerning the process of forgetting a
part of the order of words from a foreign language may cause one to
wonder whether the forgetting of the order of words in one’s own language
requires an essentially different explanation. To be sure, one is not wont to
be surprised if after awhile a formula or poem learned by heart can only be
reproduced imperfectly, with variations and gaps. Still, as this forgetting
does not affect equally all the things learned together, but seems to pick out
therefrom definite parts, it may be worth our effort to investigate
analytically some examples of such faulty reproductions.
Brill reports the following example:—
“While conversing one day with a very brilliant young woman she had
occasion to quote from Keats. The poem was entitled ‘Ode to Apollo,’ and
she recited the following lines:—

“‘In thy western house of gold
Where thou livest in thy state,
Bards, that once sublimely told
Prosaic truths that came too late.’

She hesitated many times during the recitation, being sure that there was
something wrong with the last line. To her great surprise, on referring to the
book she found that not only was the last line misquoted but that there were
many other mistakes. The correct lines read as follows:—

Ode to Apollo

“‘In thy western halls of gold
When thou sittest in thy state,
Bards, that erst sublimely told
Heroic deeds and sang of fate.’

The words italicized are those that have been forgotten and replaced by
others during the recitation.
“She was astonished at her many mistakes, and attributed them to a failure
of memory. I could readily convince her, however, that there was no
qualitative or quantitative disturbance of memory in her case, and recalled
to her our conversation immediately before quoting these lines.
“We were discussing the over-estimation of personality among lovers, and
she thought it was Victor Hugo who said that love is the greatest thing in
the world because it makes an angel or a god out of a grocery clerk. She
continued: ‘Only when we are in love have we blind faith in humanity;
everything is perfect, everything is beautiful, and ... everything is so
poetically unreal. Still, it is a wonderful experience; worth going through,
notwithstanding the terrible disappointments that usually follow. It puts us
on a level with the gods and incites us to all sorts of artistic activities. We
become real poets; we not only memorize and quote poetry, but we often
become Apollos ourselves.’ She then quoted the lines given above.
“When I asked on what occasion she memorized the lines she could not
recall. As a teacher of elocution she was wont to memorize so much and so
often that it was difficult to tell just when she had memorized these lines.
‘Judging by the conversation,’ I suggested, ‘it would seem that this poem is
intimately associated with the idea of over-estimation of personality of one
in love. Have you perhaps memorized this poem when you were in such a
state?’ She became thoughtful for a while and soon recalled the following
facts: Twelve years before, when she was eighteen years old, she fell in
love. She met the young man while participating in an amateur theatrical
performance. He was at the time studying for the stage, and it was predicted
that some day he would be a matinée idol. He was endowed with all the
attributes needed for such a calling. He was well built, fascinating,
impulsive, very clever, and ... very fickle-minded. She was warned against
him, but she paid no heed, attributing it all to the envy of her counsellors.
Everything went well for a few months, when she suddenly received word
that her Apollo, for whom she had memorized these lines, had eloped with
and married a very wealthy young woman. A few years later she heard that
he was living in a Western city, where he was taking care of his father-in-
law’s interests.

“The misquoted lines are now quite plain. The discussion about the over-
estimation of personality among lovers unconsciously recalled to her a
disagreeable experience, when she herself over-estimated the personality of
the man she loved. She thought he was a god, but he turned out to be even
worse than the average mortal. The episode could not come to the surface
because it was determined by very disagreeable and painful thoughts, but
the unconscious variations in the poem plainly showed her present mental
state. The poetic expressions were not only changed to prosaic ones, but
they clearly alluded to the whole episode.”
Another example of forgetting the order of words of a poem well known to
the person I shall cite from Dr. C. G. Jung,[5] quoting the words of the
author:—
“A man wished to recite the familiar poem, ‘A Pine-tree Stands Alone,’ etc.
In the line ‘He felt drowsy’ he became hopelessly stuck at the words ‘with
the white sheet.’ This forgetting of such a well-known verse seemed to me
rather peculiar, and I therefore asked him to reproduce what came to his
mind when he thought of the words ‘with the white sheet.’ He gave the
following series of associations ‘The white sheet makes one think of a
white sheet on a corpse—a linen sheet with which one covers a dead body
—[pause]—now I think of a near friend—his brother died quite recently—
he is supposed to have died of heart disease—he was also very corpulent—
my friend is corpulent, too, and I thought that he might meet the same fate
—probably he doesn’t exercise enough—when I heard of this death I
suddenly became frightened: the same thing might happen to me, as my
own family is predisposed to obesity—my grandfather died of heart disease
—I, also, am somewhat too corpulent, and for that reason I began an
obesity cure a few days ago.’”
Jung remarks: “The man had unconsciously immediately identified himself
with the pine-tree which was covered with a white sheet.”
For the following example of forgetting the order of words I am indebted to
my friend Dr. Ferenczi, of Budapest. Unlike the former examples, it does
not refer to a verse taken from poetry, but to a self-coined saying. It may
also demonstrate to us the rather unusual case where the forgetting places
itself at the disposal of discretion when the latter is in danger of yielding to
a momentary desire. The mistake thus advances to a useful function. After

we have sobered down we justify that inner striving which at first could
manifest itself only by way of inability, as in forgetting or psychic
impotence.
“At a social gathering some one quoted, Tout comprendre c’est tout
pardonner, to which I remarked that the first part of the sentence should
suffice, as ‘pardoning’ is an exemption which must be left to God and the
priest. One of the guests thought this observation very good, which in turn
emboldened me to remark—probably to ensure myself of the good opinion
of the well-disposed critic—that some time ago I thought of something still
better. But when I was about to repeat this clever idea I was unable to recall
it. Thereupon I immediately withdrew from the company and wrote my
concealing thoughts. I first recalled the name of the friend who had
witnessed the birth of this (desired) thought, and of the street in Budapest
where it took place, and then the name of another friend, whose name was
Max, whom we usually called Maxie. That led me to the word ‘maxim,’ and
to the thought that at that time, as in the present case, it was a question of
varying a well-known maxim. Strangely enough, I did not recall any maxim
but the following sentence: ‘God created man in His own image,’ and its
changed conception, ‘Man created God in his own image.’ Immediately I
recalled the sought-for recollection.
“My friend said to me at that time in Andrassy Street, ‘Nothing human is
foreign to me.’ To which I remarked, basing it on psychoanalytic
experience, ‘You should go further and acknowledge that nothing animal is
foreign to you.’
“But after I had finally found the desired recollection I was even then
prevented from telling it in this social gathering. The young wife of the
friend whom I had reminded of the animality of the unconscious was also
among those present, and I was perforce reminded that she was not at all
prepared for the reception of such unsympathetic views. The forgetting
spared me a number of unpleasant questions from her and a hopeless
discussion, and just that must have been the motive of the ‘temporary
amnesia.’
“It is interesting to note that as a concealing thought there emerged a
sentence in which the deity is degraded to a human invention, while in the
sought-for sentence there was an allusion to the animal in the man. The

capitis diminutio is therefore common to both. The whole matter was
apparently only a continuation of the stream of thought concerning
understanding and forgiving which was stimulated by the discussion.
“That the desired thought so rapidly appeared may be also due to the fact
that I withdrew into a vacant room, away from the society in which it was
censored.”
I have since then analysed a large number of cases of forgetting or faulty
reproduction of the order of words, and the consistent result of these
investigations led me to assume that the mechanisms of forgetting, as
demonstrated in the examples “aliquis” and “Ode to Apollo,” are almost of
universal validity. It is not always very convenient to report such analyses,
for, just as those cited, they usually lead to intimate and painful things in the
person analysed; I shall therefore add no more to the number of such
examples. What is common to all these cases, regardless of the material, is
the fact that the forgotten or distorted material becomes connected through
some associative road with an unconscious stream of thought, which gives
rise to the influence that comes to light as forgetting.
I am now returning to the forgetting of names, concerning which we have
so far considered exhaustively neither the casuistic elements nor the
motives. As this form of faulty acts can at times be abundantly observed in
myself, I am not at a loss for examples. The slight attacks of migraine, from
which I am still suffering, are wont to announce themselves hours before
through the forgetting of names, and at the height of the attack, during
which I am not forced, however, to give up my work, I am often unable to
recall all proper names.
Still, just such cases as mine may furnish the cause for a strong objection to
our analytic efforts. Should not one be forced to conclude from such
observations that the causation of the forgetfulness, especially the forgetting
of names, is to be sought in circulatory or functional disturbances of the
brain, and spare himself the trouble of searching for psychologic
explanations for these phenomena? Not at all; that would mean to
interchange the mechanism of a process, which is the same in all cases, with
its variations. But instead of an analysis I shall cite a comparison which will
settle the argument.

Let us assume that I was so reckless as to take a walk at night in an
uninhabited neighbourhood of a big city, and was attacked and robbed of
my watch and purse. At the nearest police-station I report the matter in the
following words: “I was in this or that street, and was there robbed of my
watch and purse by lonesomeness and darkness.” Although these words
would not express anything that is incorrect, I would, nevertheless, run the
danger of being considered—judging from the wording of this report—as
not quite right in the head. To be correct, the state of affairs could only be
described by saying that, favoured by the lonesomeness of the place and
under cover of darkness, I was robbed of my valuables by unknown
malefactors.
Now, then, the state of affairs in forgetting names need not be different.
Favoured by exhaustion, circulatory disturbances, and intoxication, I am
robbed by an unknown psychic force of the disposal over the proper names
belonging to my memory; it is the same force which in other cases may
bring about the same failure of memory during perfect health and mental
capacity.
When I analyse those cases of name-forgetting occurring in myself, I find
almost regularly that the name withheld shows some relation to a theme
which concerns my own person, and is apt to provoke in me strong and
often painful emotions. Following the convenient and commendable
practice of the Zurich School (Bleuler, Jung, Riklin), I might express the
same thing in the following form: The name withheld has touched a
“personal complex” in me. The relation of the name to my person is an
unexpected one, and is mostly brought about through superficial
associations (words of double meaning and of similar sounds); it may
generally be designated as a side association. A few simple examples will
best illustrate the nature of the same:—
(a) A patient requested me to recommend to him a sanatorium in the
Riviera. I knew of such a place very near Genoa, I also recalled the name of
the German colleague who was in charge of the place, but the place itself I
could not name, well as I believed I knew it. There was nothing left to do
but ask the patient to wait, and to appeal quickly to the women of the
family.

“Just what is the name of the place near Genoa where Dr. X. has his small
institution in which Mrs. So-and-so remained so long under treatment?”
“Of course you would forget a name of that sort. The name is Nervi.”
To be sure, I have enough to do with nerves.
(b) Another patient spoke about a neighbouring summer resort, and
maintained that besides the two familiar inns there was a third. I disputed
the existence of any third inn, and referred to the fact that I had spent seven
summers in the vicinity and therefore knew more about the place than he.
Instigated by my contradiction, he recalled the name. The name of the third
inn was “The Hochwartner.” Of course, I had to admit it; indeed, I was
forced to confess that for seven summers I had lived near this very inn
whose existence I had so strenuously denied. But why should I have
forgotten the name and the object? I believe because the name sounded very
much like that of a Vienna colleague who practised the same specialty as
my own. It touched in me the “professional complex.”
(c) On another occasion, when about to buy a railroad ticket on the
Reichenhall Station, I could not recall the very familiar name of the next
big railroad station which I had so often passed. I was forced to look it up in
the time-table. The name was Rosehome (Rosenheim). I soon discovered
through what associations I lost it. An hour earlier I had visited my sister in
her home near Reichenhall; my sister’s name is Rose, hence also a
Rosehome. This name was taken away by my “family complex.”
(d) This predatory influence of the “family complex” I can demonstrate in a
whole series of complexes.
One day I was consulted by a young man, a younger brother of one of my
female patients, whom I saw any number of times, and whom I used to call
by his first name. Later, while wishing to talk about his visit, I forgot his
first name, in no way an unusual one, and could not recall it in any way. I
walked into the street to read the business signs and recognized the name as
soon as it met my eyes.
The analysis showed that I had formed a parallel between the visitor and my
own brother which centred in the question: “Would my brother, in a similar
case, have behaved like him or even more contrarily?” The outer connection
between the thoughts concerning the stranger and my own family was

rendered possible through the accident that the name of the mothers in each
case was the same, Amelia. Subsequently I also understood the substitutive
names, Daniel and Frank, which obtruded themselves without any
explanation. These names, as well as Amelia, belong to Schiller’s play The
Robbers; they are all connected with a joke of the Vienna pedestrian, Daniel
Spitzer.
(e) On another occasion I was unable to find a patient’s name which had a
certain reference to my early life. The analysis had to be followed over a
long devious road before the desired name was discovered. The patient
expressed his apprehension lest he should lose his eyesight; this recalled a
young man who became blind from a gunshot, and this again led to a
picture of another youth who shot himself, and the latter bore the same
name as my first patient, though not at all related to him. The name became
known to me, however, only after the anxious apprehension from these two
juvenile cases was transferred to a person of my own family.
Thus an incessant stream of “self-reference” flows through my thoughts
concerning which I usually have no inkling, but which betrays itself
through such name-forgetting. It seems as if I were forced to compare with
my own person all that I hear about strangers, as if my personal complexes
became stirred up at every information from others. It seems impossible
that this should be an individual peculiarity of my own person; it must, on
the contrary, point to the way we grasp outside matters in general. I have
reasons to assume that other individuals meet with experiences quite similar
to mine.
The best example of this kind was reported to me by a gentleman named
Lederer as a personal experience. While on his wedding trip in Venice he
came across a man with whom he was but slightly acquainted, and whom
he was obliged to introduce to his wife. As he forgot the name of the
stranger he got himself out of the embarrassment the first time by
mumbling the name unintelligibly. But when he met the man a second time,
as is inevitable in Venice, he took him aside and begged him to help him out
of the difficulty by telling him his name, which he unfortunately had
forgotten. The answer of the stranger pointed to a superior knowledge of
human nature: “I readily believe that you did not grasp my name. My name
is like yours—Lederer!”

One cannot suppress a slight feeling of unpleasantness on discovering his
own name in a stranger. I had recently felt it very plainly when I was
consulted during my office hours by a man named S. Freud. However, I am
assured by one of my own critics that in this respect he behaves in quite the
opposite manner.
(f) The effect of personal relation can be recognized also in the following
examples reported by Jung.[6]
“Mr. Y. falls in love with a lady who soon thereafter marries Mr. X. In spite
of the fact that Mr. Y. was an old acquaintance of Mr. X., and had business
relations with him, he repeatedly forgot the name, and on a number of
occasions, when wishing to correspond with X., he was obliged to ask other
people for his name.”
However, the motivation for the forgetting is more evident in this case than
in the preceding ones, which were under the constellation of the personal
reference. Here the forgetting is manifestly a direct result of the dislike of Y.
for the happy rival; he does not wish to know anything about him.
(g) The following case, reported by Ferenczi, the analysis of which is
especially instructive through the explanation of the substitutive thoughts
(like Botticelli-Boltraffio to Signorelli), shows in a somewhat different way
how self-reference leads to the forgetting of a name:—
“A lady who heard something about psychoanalysis could not recall the
name of the psychiatrist, Young (Jung).
“Instead, the following names occurred to her: Kl. (a name)—Wilde—
Nietzsche—Hauptmann.
“I did not tell her the name, and requested her to repeat her free associations
to every thought.
“To Kl. she at once thought of Mrs. Kl., that she was an embellished and
affected person who looked very well for her age. ‘She does not age.’ As a
general and principal conception of Wilde and Nietzsche, she gave the
association ‘mental disease.’ She then added jocosely: ‘The Freudians will
continue looking for the causes of mental diseases until they themselves
become insane.’ She continued: ‘I cannot bear Wilde and Nietzsche. I do
not understand them. I hear that they were both homosexual. Wilde has

occupied himself with young people’ (although she uttered in this sentence
the correct name she still could not remember it).
“To Hauptmann she associated the words half and youth, and only after I
called her attention to the word youth did she become aware that she was
looking for the name Young (Jung).”
It is clear that this lady, who had lost her husband at the age of thirty-nine,
and had no prospect of marrying a second time, had cause enough to avoid
reminiscences recalling youth or old age. The remarkable thing is that the
concealing thoughts of the desired name came to the surface as simple
associations of content without any sound-associations.
(h) Still different and very finely motivated is an example of name-
forgetting which the person concerned has himself explained.
“While taking an examination in philosophy as a minor subject I was
questioned by the examiner about the teachings of Epicurus, and was asked
whether I knew who took up his teachings centuries later. I answered that it
was Pierre Gassendi, whom two days before while in a café I had happened
to hear spoken of as a follower of Epicurus. To the question how I knew this
I boldly replied that I had taken an interest in Gassendi for a long time. This
resulted in a certificate with a magna cum laude, but later, unfortunately,
also in a persistent tendency to forget the name Gassendi. I believe that it is
due to my guilty conscience that even now I cannot retain this name despite
all efforts. I had no business knowing it at that time.”
To have a proper appreciation of the intense repugnance entertained by our
narrator against the recollection of this examination episode, one must have
realized how highly he prizes his doctor’s degree, and for how many other
things this substitute must stand.
I add here another example of forgetting the name of a city, an instance
which is perhaps not as simple as those given before, but which will appear
credible and valuable to those more familiar with such investigations. The
name of an Italian city withdrew itself from memory on account of its far-
reaching sound-similarity to a woman’s first name, which was in turn
connected with various emotional reminiscences which were surely not
exhaustively treated in this report. Dr. S. Ferenczi, who observed this case

of forgetting in himself, treated it—quite justly—as an analysis of a dream
or an erotic idea.
“To-day I visited some old friends, and the conversation turned to cities of
Northern Italy. Some one remarked that they still showed the Austrian
influence. A few of these cities were cited. I, too, wished to mention one,
but the name did not come to me, although I knew that I had spent two very
pleasant days there; this, of course, does not quite concur with Freud’s
theory of forgetting. Instead of the desired name of the city there obtruded
themselves the following thoughts: ‘Capua—Brescia—the lion of Brescia.’
This lion I saw objectively before me in the form of a marble statue, but I
soon noticed that he resembled less the lion of the statue of liberty in
Brescia (which I saw only in a picture) than the other marble lion which I
saw in Lucerne on the monument in honour of the Swiss Guard fallen in the
Tuileries. I finally thought of the desired name: it was Verona.
“I knew at once the cause of this amnesia. No other than a former servant of
the family whom I visited at the time. Her name was Veronica; in
Hungarian Verona. I felt a great antipathy for her on account of her
repulsive physiognomy, as well as her hoarse, shrill voice and her
unbearable self-assertion (to which she thought herself entitled on account
of her long service). Also the tyrannical way in which she treated the
children of the family was insufferable to me. Now I knew the significance
of the substitutive thoughts.
“To Capua I immediately associated caput mortuum. I had often compared
Veronica’s head to a skull. The Hungarian word kapzoi (greed after money)
surely furnished a determinant for the displacement. Naturally I also found
those more direct associations which connected Capua and Verona as
geographical ideas and as Italian words of the same rhythm.
“The same held true for Brescia; here, too, I found concealed side-tracks of
associations of ideas.
“My antipathy at that time was so violent that I thought Veronica very ugly,
and have often expressed my astonishment at the fact that any one should
love her: ‘Why, to kiss her,’ I said, ‘must provoke nausea.’
“Brescia, at least in Hungary, is very often mentioned not in connection
with the lion but with another wild beast. The most hated name in this

country, as well as in North Italy, is that of General Haynau, who is briefly
referred to as the hyena of Brescia. From the hated tyrant Haynau one
stream of thought leads over Brescia to the city of Verona, and the other
over the idea of the grave-digging animal with the hoarse voice (which
corresponds to the thought of a monument to the dead), to the skull, and to
the disagreeable organ of Veronica, which was so cruelly insulted in my
unconscious mind. Veronica in her time ruled as tyrannically as did the
Austrian General after the Hungarian and Italian struggles for liberty.
“Lucerne is associated with the idea of the summer which Veronica spent
with her employers in a place near Lucerne. The Swiss Guard again recalls
that she tyrannized not only the children but also the adult members of the
family, and thus played the part of the ‘Garde-Dame.’
“I expressly observe that this antipathy of mine against V. consciously
belongs to things long overcome. Since that time she has changed in her
appearance and manner, very much to her advantage, so that I am able to
meet her with sincere regard (to be sure I hardly find such occasion). As
usual, however, my unconscious sticks more tenaciously to those
impressions; it is old in its resentment.
“The Tuileries represent an allusion to a second personality, an old French
lady who actually ‘guarded’ the women of the house, and who was in high
regard and somewhat feared by everybody. For a long time I was her élève
in French conversation. The word élève recalls that when I visited the
brother-in-law of my present host in northern Bohemia I had to laugh a
great deal because the rural population referred to the élèves (pupils) of the
school of forestry as löwen (lions). Also this jocose recollection might have
taken part in the displacement of the hyena by the lion.”
(i) The following example can also show how a personal complex swaying
the person at the time being may by devious ways bring about the forgetting
of a name.[7]
Two men, an elder and a younger, who had travelled together in Sicily six
months before, exchanged reminiscences of those pleasant and interesting
days.
“Let’s see, what was the name of that place,” asked the younger, “where we
passed the night before taking the trip to Selinunt? Calatafini, was it not?”

The elder rejected this by saying: “Certainly not; but I have forgotten the
name, too, although I can recall perfectly all the details of the place.
Whenever I hear some one forget a name it immediately produces
forgetfulness in me. Let us look for the name. I cannot think of any other
name except Caltanisetta, which is surely not correct.”
“No,” said the younger, “the name begins with, or contains, a w.”
“But the Italian language contains no w,” retorted the elder.
“I really meant a v, and I said w because I am accustomed to interchange
them in my mother tongue.”
The elder, however, objected to the v. He added: “I believe that I have
already forgotten many of the Sicilian names. Suppose we try to find out.
For example, what is the name of the place situated on a height which was
called Enna in antiquity?”
“Oh, I know that: Castrogiovanni.” In the next moment the younger man
discovered the lost name. He cried out ‘Castelvetrano,’ and was pleased to
be able to demonstrate the supposed v.
For a moment the elder still lacked the feeling of recognition, but after he
accepted the name he was able to state why it had escaped him. He thought:
“Obviously because the second half, vetrano, suggests veteran. I am aware
that I am not quite anxious to think of ageing, and react peculiarly when I
am reminded of it. Thus, e.g., I had recently reminded a very esteemed
friend in most unmistakable terms that he had ‘long ago passed the years of
youth,’ because before this he once remarked in the most flattering manner,
‘I am no longer a young man.’ That my resistance was directed against the
second half of the name Castelvetrano is shown by the fact that the initial
sound of the same returned in the substitutive name Caltanisetta.”
“What about the name Caltanisetta itself?” asked the younger.
“That always seemed to me like a pet name of a young woman,” admitted
the elder.
Somewhat later he added: “The name for Enna was also only a substitutive
name. And now it occurs to me that the name Castrogiovanni, which
obtruded itself with the aid of a rationalization, alludes as expressly to
giovane, young, as the last name, Castelvetrano, to veteran.”

The older man believed that he had thus accounted for his forgetting the
name. What the motive was that led the young man to this memory failure
was not investigated.
In some cases one must have recourse to all the fineness of psychoanalytic
technique in order to explain the forgetting of a name. Those who wish to
read an example of such work I refer to a communication by Professor E.
Jones.[8]
I could multiply the examples of name-forgetting and prolong the
discussion very much further if I did not wish to avoid elucidating here
almost all the view-points which will be considered in later themes. I shall,
however, take the liberty of comprehending in a few sentences the results of
the analyses reported here.
The mechanism of forgetting, or rather of losing or temporary forgetting of
a name, consists in the disturbance of the intended reproduction of the name
through a strange stream of thought unconscious at the time. Between the
disturbed name and the disturbing complex there exists a connection either
from the beginning or such a connection has been formed—perhaps by
artificial means—through superficial (outer) associations.
The self-reference complex (personal, family or professional) proves to be
the most effective of the disturbing complexes.
A name which by virtue of its many meanings belongs to a number of
thought associations (complexes) is frequently disturbed in its connection to
one series of thoughts through a stronger complex belonging to the other
associations.
To avoid the awakening of pain through memory is one of the objects
among the motives of these disturbances.
In general one may distinguish two principal cases of name-forgetting;
when the name itself touches something unpleasant, or when it is brought
into connection with other associations which are influenced by such
effects. So that names can be disturbed on their own account or on account
of their nearer or more remote associative relations in the reproduction.
A review of these general principles readily convinces us that the temporary
forgetting of a name is observed as the most frequent faulty action of our

mental functions.
However, we are far from having described all the peculiarities of this
phenomenon. I also wish to call attention to the fact that name-forgetting is
extremely contagious. In a conversation between two persons the mere
mention of having forgotten this or that name by one often suffices to
induce the same memory slip in the other. But wherever the forgetting is
induced, the sought for name easily comes to the surface.
There is also a continuous forgetting of names in which whole chains of
names are withdrawn from memory. If in the course of endeavouring to
discover an escaped name one finds others with which the latter is
intimately connected, it often happens that these new names also escape.
The forgetting thus jumps from one name to another, as if to demonstrate
the existence of a hindrance not to be easily removed.

IV
CHILDHOOD AND CONCEALING MEMORIES

In a second essay[9] I was able to demonstrate the purposive nature of our
memories in an unexpected field. I started with the remarkable fact that the
earliest recollections of a person often seemed to preserve the unimportant
and accidental, whereas (frequently though not universally!) not a trace is
found in the adult memory of the weighty and affective impressions of this
period. As it is known that the memory exercises a certain selection among
the impressions at its disposal, it would seem logical to suppose that this
selection follows entirely different principles in childhood than at the time
of intellectual maturity. However, close investigation points to the fact that
such an assumption is superfluous. The indifferent childhood memories owe
their existence to a process of displacement. It may be shown by
psychoanalysis that in the reproduction they represent the substitute for
other really significant impressions, whose direct reproduction is hindered
by some resistance. As they do not owe their existence to their own
contents, but to an associative relation of their contents to another repressed
thought, they deserve the title of “concealing memories,” by which I have
designated them.
In the aforementioned essay I only touched upon, but in no way exhausted,
the varieties in the relations and meanings of concealed memories. In the
given example fully analysed I particularly emphasized a peculiarity in the
temporal relation between the concealing memory and the contents of the
memory concealed by it. The content of the concealing memory in that
example belonged to one of the first years of childhood, while the thoughts
represented by it, which remained practically unconscious, belonged to a
later period of the individual in question. I called this form of displacement
a retro-active or regressive one. Perhaps more often one finds the reversed
relation—that is, an indifferent impression of the most remote period
becomes a concealing memory in consciousness, which simply owes its
existence to an association with an earlier experience, against whose direct
reproduction there are resistances. We would call these encroaching or

interposing concealing memories. What most concerns the memory lies
here chronologically beyond the concealing memory. Finally, there may be
a third possible case, namely, the concealing memory may be connected
with the impression it conceals, not only through its contents, but also
through contiguity of time; this is the contemporaneous or contiguous
concealing memory.
How large a portion of the sum total of our memory belongs to the category
of concealing memories, and what part it plays in various neurotic hidden
processes, these are problems into the value of which I have neither
inquired nor shall I enter here. I am concerned only with emphasizing the
sameness between the forgetting of proper names with faulty recollection
and the formation of concealing memories.
At first sight it would seem that the diversities of both phenomena are far
more striking than their exact analogies. There we deal with proper names,
here with complete impressions experienced either in reality or in thought;
there we deal with a manifest failure of the memory function, here with a
memory act which appears strange to us. Again, there we are concerned
with a momentary disturbance—for the name just forgotten could have been
reproduced correctly a hundred times before, and will be so again from to-
morrow on; here we deal with lasting possession without a failure, for the
indifferent childhood memories seem to be able to accompany us through a
great part of life. In both these cases the riddle seems to be solved in an
entirely different way. There it is the forgetting, while here it is the
remembering which excites our scientific curiosity.
After deeper reflection one realizes that, although there is a diversity in the
psychic material and in the duration of time of the two phenomena, yet
these are by far outweighed by the conformities between the two. In both
cases we deal with the failure of remembering: what should be correctly
reproduced by the memory fails to appear, and instead something else
comes as a substitute. In the case of forgetting a name there is no lack of
memory function in the form of name substitution. The formation of a
concealing memory depends on the forgetting of other important
impressions. In both cases we are reminded by an intellectual feeling of the
intervention of a disturbance, which in each case takes a different form. In
the case of forgetting of names we are aware that the substitutive names are
incorrect, while in concealing memories we are surprised that we have them

at all. Hence, if psychologic analysis demonstrates that the substitutive
formation in each case is brought about in the same manner—that is,
through displacement along a superficial association—we are justified in
saying that the diversities in material, in duration of time, and in the
centring of both phenomena serve to enhance our expectation, that we have
discovered something that is important and of general value. This generality
purports that the stopping and straying of the reproducing function indicates
more often than we suppose that there is an intervention of a prejudicial
factor, a tendency which favours one memory and at the same time works
against another.
The subject of childhood memories appears to me so important and
interesting that I would like to devote to it a few additional remarks which
go beyond the views expressed so far.
How far back into childhood do our memories reach? I am familiar with
some investigations on this question by V. and C. Henri[10] and Potwin.[11]
They assert that such examinations show wide individual variations,
inasmuch as some trace their first reminiscences to the sixth month of life,
while others can recall nothing of their lives before the end of the sixth or
even the eighth year. But what connection is there between these variations
in the behaviour of childhood reminiscences, and what signification may be
ascribed to them? It seems that it is not enough to procure the material for
this question by simple inquiry, but it must later be subjected to a study in
which the person furnishing the information must participate.
I believe we accept too indifferently the fact of infantile amnesia—that is,
the failure of memory for the first years of our lives—and fail to find in it a
strange riddle. We forget of what great intellectual accomplishments and of
what complicated emotions a child of four years is capable. We really ought
to wonder why the memory of later years has, as a rule, retained so little of
these psychic processes, especially as we have every reason for assuming
that these same forgotten childhood activities have not glided off without
leaving a trace in the development of the person, but that they have left a
definite influence for all future time. Yet in spite of this unparalleled
effectiveness they were forgotten! This would suggest that there are
particularly formed conditions of memory (in the sense of conscious
reproduction) which have thus far eluded our knowledge. It is quite possible
that the forgetting of childhood may give us the key to the understanding of

those amnesias which, according to our newer studies, lie at the basis of the
formation of all neurotic symptoms.
Of these retained childhood reminiscences, some appear to us readily
comprehensible, while others seem strange or unintelligible. It is not
difficult to correct certain errors in regard to both kinds. If the retained
reminiscences of a person are subjected to an analytic test, it can be readily
ascertained that a guarantee for their correctness does not exist. Some of the
memory pictures are surely falsified and incomplete, or displaced in point
of time and place. The assertions of persons examined that their first
memories reach back perhaps to their second year are evidently unreliable.
Motives can soon be discovered which explain the disfigurement and the
displacement of these experiences, but they also demonstrate that these
memory lapses are not the result of a mere unreliable memory. Powerful
forces from a later period have moulded the memory capacity of our
infantile experiences, and it is probably due to these same forces that the
understanding of our childhood is generally so very strange to us.
The recollection of adults, as is known, proceeds through different psychic
material. Some recall by means of visual pictures—their memories are of a
visual character; other individuals can scarcely reproduce in memory the
most paltry sketch of an experience; we call such persons “auditifs” and
“moteurs” in contrast to the “visuels,” terms proposed by Charcot. These
differences vanish in dreams; all our dreams are preponderatingly visual.
But this development is also found in the childhood memories; the latter are
plastic and visual, even in those people whose later memory lacks the visual
element. The visual memory, therefore, preserves the type of the infantile
recollections. Only my earliest childhood memories are of a visual
character; they represent plastically depicted scenes, comparable only to
stage settings.
In these scenes of childhood, whether they prove true or false, one usually
sees his own childish person both in contour and dress. This circumstance
must excite our wonder, for adults do not see their own persons in their
recollections of later experiences.[12] It is, moreover, against our
experiences to assume that the child’s attention during his experiences is
centred on himself rather than exclusively on outside impressions. Various
sources force us to assume that the so-called earliest childhood recollections
are not true memory traces but later elaborations of the same, elaborations

which might have been subjected to the influences of many later psychic
forces. Thus the “childhood reminiscences” of individuals altogether
advance to the signification of “concealing memories,” and thereby form a
noteworthy analogy to the childhood reminiscences as laid down in the
legends and myths of nations.
Whoever has examined mentally a number of persons by the method of
psychoanalysis must have gathered in this work numerous examples of
concealing memories of every description. However, owing to the
previously discussed nature of the relations of the childhood reminiscences
to later life, it becomes extraordinarily difficult to report such examples.
For, in order to attach the value of the concealing memory to an infantile
reminiscence, it would be often necessary to present the entire life-history
of the person concerned. Only seldom is it possible, as in the following
good example, to take out from its context and report a single childhood
memory.
A twenty-four-year-old man preserved the following picture from the fifth
year of his life: In the garden of a summer-house he sat on a stool next to
his aunt, who was engaged in teaching him the alphabet. He found difficulty
in distinguishing the letter m from n, and he begged his aunt to tell him how
to tell one from the other. His aunt called his attention to the fact that the
letter m had one whole portion (a stroke) more than the letter n. There was
no reason to dispute the reliability of this childhood recollection; its
meaning, however, was discovered only later, when it showed itself to be
the symbolic representation of another boyish inquisitiveness. For just as he
wanted to know the difference between m and n at that time, so he
concerned himself later about the difference between boy and girl, and he
would have been willing that just this aunt should be his teacher. He also
discovered that the difference was a similar one; that the boy again had one
whole portion more than the girl, and at the time of this recognition his
memory awoke to the corresponding childish inquisitiveness.
I would like to show by one more example the sense that may be gained by
a childhood reminiscence through analytic work, although it may seem to
contain no sense before. In my forty-third year, when I began to interest
myself in what remained in my memory of my own childhood, a scene
struck me which for a long time, as I afterwards believed, had repeatedly
come to consciousness, and which through reliable identification could be

traced to a period before the completion of my third year. I saw myself in
front of a chest, the door of which was held open by my half-brother,
twenty years my senior. I stood there demanding something and screaming;
my mother, pretty and slender, then suddenly entered the room, as if
returning from the street.
In these words I formulated this scene so vividly seen, which, however,
furnished no other clue. Whether my brother wished to open or lock the
chest (in the first explanation it was a “cupboard”), why I cried, and what
bearing the arrival of my mother had, all these questions were dim to me; I
was tempted to explain to myself that it dealt with the memory of a hoax by
my older brother, which was interrupted by my mother. Such
misunderstandings of childhood scenes retained in memory are not
uncommon; we recall a situation, but it is not centralized; we do not know
on which of the elements to place the psychic accent. Analytic effort led me
to an entirely unexpected solution of the picture. I missed my mother and
began to suspect that she was locked in this cupboard or chest, and
therefore demanded that my brother should unlock it. As he obliged me, and
I became convinced that she was not in the chest, I began to cry; this is the
moment firmly retained in the memory, which was directly followed by the
appearance of my mother, who appeased my worry and anxiety.
But how did the child get the idea of looking for the absent mother in the
chest? Dreams which occurred at the same time pointed dimly to a nurse,
concerning whom other reminiscences were retained; as, for example, that
she conscientiously urged me to deliver to her the small coins which I
received as gifts, a detail which in itself may lay claim to the value of a
concealing memory for later things. I then concluded to facilitate for myself
this time the task of interpretation, and asked my now aged mother about
that nurse. I found out all sorts of things, among others the fact that this
shrewd but dishonest person had committed extensive robberies during the
confinement of my mother, and that my half-brother was instrumental in
bringing her to justice.
This information gave me the key to the scene from childhood, as through a
sort of inspiration. The sudden disappearance of the nurse was not a matter
of indifference to me; I had just asked this brother where she was, probably
because I had noticed that he had played a part in her disappearance, and
he, evasive and witty as he is to this day, answered that she was “boxed in.”

I understood this answer in the childish way, but asked no more, as there
was nothing else to be discovered. When my mother left me shortly
thereafter I suspected that the naughty brother had treated her in the same
way as he did the nurse, and therefore pressed him to open the chest.
I also understand now why in the translation of the visual childhood scene
my mother’s slenderness was accentuated; she must have struck me as
being newly restored. I am two and a half years older than the sister born at
that time, and when I was three years of age I was separated from my half-
brother.

V
MISTAKES IN SPEECH

Although the ordinary material of speech of our mother-tongue seems to be
guarded against forgetting, its application, however, more often succumbs
to another disturbance which is familiar to us as “slips of the tongue.” What
we observe in normal persons as slips of the tongue gives the same
impression as the first step of the so-called “paraphasias” which manifest
themselves under pathologic conditions.
I am in the exceptional position of being about to refer to a previous work
on the subject. In the year 1895 Meringer and C. Mayer published a study
on Mistakes in Speech and Reading, with whose view-points I do not agree.
One of the authors, who is the spokesman in the text, is a philologist
actuated by a linguistic interest to examine the rules governing those slips.
He hoped to deduce from these rules the existence “of a definite psychic
mechanism,” “whereby the sounds of a word, of a sentence, and even the
words themselves, would be associated and connected with one another in a
quite peculiar manner” (p. 10).
The authors grouped the examples of speech-mistakes collected by them
first according to purely descriptive view-points, such as interchangings
(e.g., the Milo of Venus instead of the Venus of Milo), as anticipations (e.g.,
the shoes made her sorft ... the shoes made her feet sore), as echoes and post
positions, as contaminations (e.g., “I will soon him home,” instead of “I will
soon go home and I will see him”), and substitutions (e.g., “he entrusted his
money to a savings crank,” instead of “a savings bank”).[13] Besides these
principal categories there are some others of lesser importance (or of lesser
significance for our purpose). In this grouping it makes no difference
whether the transposition, disfigurement, fusion, etc., affects single sounds
of the word or syllables, or whole words of the concerned sentence.
To explain the various forms of mistakes in speech, Meringer assumes a
varied psychic value of phonetics. As soon as the innervation affects the
first syllable of a word, or the first word of a sentence, the stimulating

process immediately strikes the succeeding sounds, and the following
words, and in so far as these innervations are synchronous they may effect
some changes in one another. The stimulus of the psychically more
intensive sound “rings” before or continues echoing, and thus disturbs the
less important process of innervation. It is necessary therefore to determine
which are the most important sounds of a word. Meringer states: “If one
wishes to know which sound of a word possesses the greatest intensity he
should examine himself while searching for a forgotten word, for example,
a name. That which first returns to consciousness invariably had the greatest
intensity prior to the forgetting (p. 160). Thus the most important sounds are
the initial sound of the root-syllable and the initial sound of the word itself,
as well as one or another of the accentuated vowels” (p. 162).
Here I cannot help voicing a contradiction. Whether or not the initial sound
of the name belongs to the most important elements of the word, it is surely
not true that in the case of the forgetting of the word it first returns to
consciousness; the above rule is therefore of no use. When we observe
ourselves during the search for a forgotten name we are comparatively often
forced to express the opinion that it begins with a certain letter. This
conviction proves to be as often unfounded as founded. Indeed, I would
even go so far as to assert that in the majority of cases one reproduces a
false initial sound. Also in our example Signorelli the substitutive name
lacked the initial sound, and the principal syllables were lost; on the other
hand, the less important pair of syllables elli returned to consciousness in
the substitutive name Botticelli.
How little substitutive names respect the initial sound of the lost names may
be learned from the following case. One day I found it impossible to recall
the name of the small country whose capital is Monte Carlo. The
substitutive names were as follows: Piedmont, Albania, Montevideo,
Colico. In place of Albania Montenegro soon appeared, and then it struck
me that the syllable Mont (pronounced Mon) occurred in all but the last of
the substitutive names. It thus became easy for me to find from the name of
Prince Albert the forgotten name Monaco. Colico practically imitates the
syllabic sequence and rhythm of the forgotten name.
If we admit the conjecture that a mechanism similar to that pointed out in
the forgetting of names may also play a part in the phenomena of speech-
blunders, we are then led to a better founded judgment of cases of speech-

blunders. The speech disturbance which manifests itself as a speech-blunder
may in the first place be caused by the influence of another component of
the same speech, that is, through a fore-sound or an echo, or through
another meaning within the sentence or context which differs from that
which the speaker wishes to utter. In the second place, however, the
disturbance could be brought about analogously to the process in the case
Signorelli, through influences outside this word, sentence or context, from
elements which we did not intend to express, and of whose incitement we
became conscious only through the disturbance. In both modes of origin of
the mistake in speech the common element lies in the simultaneity of the
stimulus, while the differentiating elements lie in the arrangement within or
without the same sentence or context.
The difference does not at first appear as wide as when it is taken into
consideration in certain conclusions drawn from the symptomatology of
speech-mistakes. It is clear, however, that only in the first case is there a
prospect of drawing conclusions from the manifestations of speech-
blunders concerning a mechanism which connects together sounds and
words for the reciprocal influence of their articulation; that is, conclusions
such as the philologist hopes to gain from the study of speech-blunders. In
the case of disturbance through influence outside of the same sentence or
context, it would before all be a question of becoming acquainted with the
disturbing elements, and then the question would arise whether the
mechanism of this disturbance cannot also suggest the probable laws of the
formation of speech.
We cannot maintain that Meringer and Mayer have overlooked the
possibility of speech disturbance through “complicated psychic influences,”
that is, through elements outside of the same word or sentence or the same
sequence of words. Indeed, they must have observed that the theory of the
psychic variation of sounds applies, strictly speaking, only to the
explanation of sound disturbances as well as to fore-sounds and after-
sounds. Where the word disturbances cannot be reduced to sound
disturbances, as, for example, in the substitutions and contaminations of
words, they, too, have without hesitation sought the cause of the mistake in
speech outside of the intended context, and proved this state of affairs by
means of fitting examples.[14] According to the author’s own understanding
it is some similarity between a certain word in the intended sentence and

some other not intended, which allows the latter to assert itself in
consciousness by causing a disfigurement, a composition, or a compromise
formation (contamination).
Now, in my work on the Interpretation of Dreams I have shown the part
played by the process of condensation in the origin of the so-called manifest
contents of the dream from the latent thoughts of the dream. Any similarity
of objects or of word-presentations between two elements of the
unconscious material is taken as a cause for the formation of a third, which
is a composite or compromise formation. This element represents both
components in the dream content, and in view of this origin it is frequently
endowed with numerous contradictory individual determinants. The
formation of substitutions and contaminations in speech-mistakes is,
therefore, the beginning of that work of condensation which we find taking
a most active part in the construction of the dream.
In a small essay destined for the general reader,[15] Meringer advanced a
theory of very practical significance for certain cases of interchanging of
words, especially for such cases where one word is substituted by another
of opposite meaning. He says: “We may still recall the manner in which the
President of the Austrian House of Deputies opened the session some time
ago: ‘Honoured Sirs! I announce the presence of so and so many gentlemen,
and therefore declare the session as “closed”’!” The general merriment first
attracted his attention and he corrected his mistake. In the present case the
probable explanation is that the President wished himself in a position to
close this session, from which he had little good to expect, and the thought
broke through at least partially—a frequent manifestation—resulting in his
use of “closed” in place of “opened,” that is, the opposite of the statement
intended. Numerous observations have taught me, however, that we
frequently interchange contrasting words; they are already associated in our
speech consciousness; they lie very close together and are easily incorrectly
evoked.
Still, not in all cases of contrast substitution is it so simple as in the example
of the President as to appear plausible that the speech-mistake occurs
merely as a contradiction which arises in the inner thought of the speaker
opposing the sentence uttered. We have found the analogous mechanism in
the analysis of the example aliquis; there the inner contradiction asserts
itself in the form of forgetting a word instead of a substitution through its

opposite. But in order to adjust the difference we may remark that the little
word aliquis is incapable of a contrast similar to “closing” and “opening,”
and that the word “opening” cannot be subject to forgetting on account of
its being a common component of speech.
Having been shown by the last examples of Meringer and Mayer that
speech disturbance may be caused through the influence of fore-sounds,
after-sounds, words from the same sentence that were intended for
expression, as well as through the effect of words outside the sentence
intended, the stimulus of which would otherwise not have been suspected,
we shall next wish to discover whether we can definitely separate the two
classes of mistakes in speech, and how we can distinguish the example of
the one from a case of the other class.
But at this stage of the discussion we must also think of the assertions of
Wundt, who deals with the manifestations of speech-mistakes in his recent
work on the development of language.[16] Psychic influences, according to
Wundt, never lack in these as well as in other phenomena related to them.
“The uninhibited stream of sound and word associations stimulated by
spoken sounds belongs here in the first place as a positive determinant. This
is supported as a negative factor by the relaxation or suppression of the
influences of the will which inhibit this stream, and by the active attention
which is here a function of volition. Whether that play of association
manifests itself in the fact that a coming sound is anticipated or a preceding
sound reproduced, or whether a familiar practised sound becomes
intercalated between others, or finally, whether it manifests itself in the fact
that altogether different sounds associatively related to the spoken sounds
act upon these—all these questions designate only differences in the
direction, and at most in the play of the occurring associations but not in the
general nature of the same. In some cases it may be also doubtful to which
form a certain disturbance may be attributed, or whether it would not be
more correct to refer such disturbance to a concurrence of many motives,
following the principle of the complication of causes[17] (cf. pp. 380-81).”
I consider these observations of Wundt as absolutely justified and very
instructive. Perhaps we could emphasize with even greater firmness than
Wundt that the positive factor favouring mistakes in speech (the uninhibited
stream of associations, and its negative, the relaxation of the inhibiting
attention) regularly attain synchronous action, so that both factors become

only different determinants of the same process. With the relaxation, or,
more unequivocally expressed, through this relaxation, of the inhibiting
attention the uninhibited stream of associations becomes active.
Among the examples of the mistakes in speech collected by me I can
scarcely find one in which I would be obliged to attribute the speech
disturbance simply and solely to what Wundt calls “contact effect of
sound.” Almost invariably I discover besides this a disturbing influence of
something outside of the intended speech. The disturbing element is either a
single unconscious thought, which comes to light through the speech-
blunder, and can only be brought to consciousness through a searching
analysis, or it is a more general psychic motive, which directs itself against
the entire speech.
(Example a) Seeing my daughter make an unpleasant face while biting into
an apple, I wished to quote the following couplet:—

“The ape he is a funny sight,
When in the apple he takes a bite.”

But I began: “The apel....” This seems to be a contamination of “ape” and
“apple” (compromise formation), or it may be also conceived as an
anticipation of the prepared “apple.” The true state of affairs, however, was
this: I began the quotation once before, and made no mistake the first time.
I made the mistake only during the repetition, which was necessary because
my daughter, having been distracted from another side, did not listen to me.
This repetition with the added impatience to disburden myself of the
sentence I must include in the motivation of the speech-blunder, which
represented itself as a function of condensation.
(b) My daughter said, “I wrote to Mrs. Schresinger.” The woman’s name
was Schlesinger. This speech-blunder may depend on the tendency to
facilitate articulation. I must state, however, that this mistake was made by
my daughter a few moments after I had said apel instead of ape. Mistakes
in speech are in a great measure contagious; a similar peculiarity was
noticed by Meringer and Mayer in the forgetting of names. I know of no
reason for this psychic contagiousness.
(c) “I sut up like a pocket-knife,” said a patient in the beginning of
treatment, instead of “I shut up.” This suggests a difficulty of articulation

which may serve as an excuse for the interchanging of sounds. When her
attention was called to the speech-blunder, she promptly replied, “Yes, that
happened because you said ‘earnesht’ instead of ‘earnest.’” As a matter of
fact I received her with the remark, “To-day we shall be in earnest”
(because it was the last hour before her discharge from treatment), and I
jokingly changed the word into earnesht. In the course of the hour she
repeatedly made mistakes in speech, and I finally observed that it was not
only because she imitated me but because she had a special reason in her
unconscious to linger at the word earnest (Ernst) as a name.[18]
(d) A woman, speaking about a game invented by her children and called by
them “the man in the box,” said “the manx in the boc.” I could readily
understand her mistake. It was while analysing her dream, in which her
husband is depicted as very generous in money matters—just the reverse of
reality—that she made this speech-blunder. The day before she had asked
for a new set of furs, which her husband denied her, claiming that he could
not afford to spend so much money. She upbraided him for his stinginess,
“for putting away so much into the strong-box,” and mentioned a friend
whose husband has not nearly his income, and yet he presented his wife
with a mink coat for her birthday. The mistake is now comprehensible. The
word manx (manks) reduces itself to the “minks” which she longs for, and
the box refers to her husband’s stinginess.
(e) A similar mechanism is shown in the mistake of another patient whose
memory deserted her in the midst of a long-forgotten childish reminiscence.
Her memory failed to inform her on what part of the body the prying and
lustful hand of another had touched her. Soon thereafter she visited one of
her friends, with whom she discussed summer homes. Asked where her
cottage in M. was located, she answered, “Near the mountain loin” instead
of “mountain lane.”
(f) Another patient, whom I asked at the end of her visit how her uncle was,
answered: “I don’t know, I only see him now in flagranti.”
The following day she said, “I am really ashamed of myself for having
given you yesterday such a stupid answer. Naturally you must have thought
me a very uneducated person who always mistakes the meaning of foreign
words. I wished to say en passant.” We did not know at the time where she
got the incorrectly used foreign words, but during the same session she

reproduced a reminiscence as a continuation of the theme from the previous
day, in which being caught in flagranti played the principal part. The
mistake of the previous day had therefore anticipated the recollection,
which at that time had not yet become conscious.
(g) In discussing her summer plans, a patient said, “I shall remain most of
the summer in Elberlon.” She noted her mistake, and asked me to analyse
it. The associations to Elberlon elicited: seashore on the Jersey coast—
summer resort—vacation travelling. This recalled travelling in Europe with
her cousin, a topic which we had discussed the day before during the
analysis of a dream. The dream dealt with her dislike for this cousin, and
she admitted that it was mainly due to the fact that the latter was the
favourite of the man whom they met together while travelling abroad.
During the dream analysis she could not recall the name of the city in which
they met this man, and I did not make any effort at the time to bring it to her
consciousness, as we were engrossed in a totally different problem. When
asked to focus her attention again on Elberlon and reproduce her
associations, she said, “It brings to mind Elberlawn—lawn—field—and
Elberfield.” Elberfeld was the lost name of the city in Germany. Here the
mistake served to bring to consciousness in a concealed manner a memory
which was connected with a painful feeling.
(h) A woman said to me, “If you wish to buy a carpet, go to Merchant
(Kaufmann) in Matthew Street (Mathäusgasse).” I repeated, “Then at
Matthew’s—I mean at Merchant’s——” It would seem that my repeating of
one name in place of the other was simply the result of distraction. The
woman’s remark really did distract me, as she turned my attention to
something else much more vital to me than carpet. In Matthew Street stands
the house in which my wife lived as a bride. The entrance to the house was
in another street, and now I noticed that I had forgotten its name and could
only recall it through a roundabout method. The name Matthew, which kept
my attention, is thus a substitutive name for the forgotten name of the street.
It is more suitable than the name Merchant, for Matthew is exclusively the
name of a person, while Merchant is not. The forgotten street, too, bears the
name of a person: Radetzky.
(i) A patient consulted me for the first time, and from her history it became
apparent that the cause of her nervousness was largely an unhappy married
life. Without any encouragement she went into details about her marital

troubles. She had not lived with her husband for about six months, and she
saw him last at the theatre, when she saw the play Officer 606. I called her
attention to the mistake, and she immediately corrected herself, saying that
she meant to say Officer 666 (the name of a recent popular play). I decided
to find out the reason for the mistake, and as the patient came to me for
analytic treatment, I discovered that the immediate cause of the rupture
between herself and husband was the disease which is treated by “606.”[19]
(k) Before calling on me a patient telephoned for an appointment, and also
wished to be informed about my consultation fee. He was told that the first
consultation was ten dollars; after the examination was over he again asked
what he was to pay, and added: “I don’t like to owe money to any one,
especially to doctors; I prefer to pay right away.” Instead of pay he said
play. His last voluntary remarks and his mistake put me on my guard, but
after a few more uncalled-for remarks he set me at ease by taking money
from his pocket. He counted four paper dollars and was very chagrined and
surprised because he had no more money with him, and promised to send
me a cheque for the balance. I was sure that his mistake betrayed him, that
he was only playing with me, but there was nothing to be done. At the end
of a few weeks I sent him a bill for the balance, and the letter was returned
to me by the post-office authorities marked “Not found.”
(l) Miss X. spoke very warmly of Mr. Y., which was rather strange, as
before this she had always expressed her indifference, not to say her
contempt, for him. On being asked about this sudden change of heart she
said: “I really never had anything against him; he was always nice to me,
but I never gave him the chance to cultivate my acquaintance.” She said
“cuptivate.” This neologism was a contamination of cultivate and captivate,
and foretold the coming betrothal.
(m) An illustration of the mechanisms of contamination and condensation
will be found in the following lapsus linguæ. Speaking of Miss Z., Miss W.
depicted her as a very “straitlaced” person who was not given to levities,
etc. Miss X. thereupon remarked: “Yes, that is a very characteristic
description, she always appealed to me as very ‘straicet-brazed.’” Here the
mistake resolved itself into straitlaced and brazen-faced, which
corresponded to Miss W.’s opinion of Miss Z.

(n) I shall quote a number of examples from a paper by my colleague, Dr.
W. Stekel, which appeared in the Berlin Tageblatt of January, 1904, entitled
“Unconscious Confessions.”
“An unpleasant trick of my unpleasant thoughts was revealed by the
following example: To begin with, I may state that in my capacity as a
physician I never consider my remuneration, but always keep in view the
patient’s interest only: this goes without saying. I was visiting a patient who
was convalescing from a serious illness. We had passed through hard days
and nights. I was happy to find her improved, and I portrayed to her the
pleasures of a sojourn in Abbazia, concluding with: ‘If, as I hope, you will
not soon leave your bed.’ This obviously came from an unconscious selfish
motive, to be able to continue treating this wealthy patient, a wish which is
entirely foreign to my waking consciousness, and which I would reject with
indignation.”
(o) Another example (Dr. W. Stekel): “My wife engaged a French governess
for the afternoons, and later, coming to a satisfactory agreement, wished to
retain her testimonials. The governess begged to be allowed to keep them,
saying, ‘Je cherche encore pour les après-midis—pardons, pour les avant-
midis.’ She apparently intended to seek another place which would perhaps
offer more profitable arrangements—an intention which she carried out.”
(p) I was to give a lecture to a woman. Her husband, upon whose request
this was done, stood behind the door listening. At the end of my
sermonizing, which had made a visible impression, I said: “Good-bye, sir!”
To the experienced person I thus betrayed the fact that the words were
directed towards the husband; that I had spoken to oblige him.
(q) Dr. Stekel reports about himself that he had under treatment at the same
time two patients from Triest, each of whom he always addressed
incorrectly. “Good morning, Mr. Peloni!” he would say to Askoli, and to
Peloni, “Good morning, Mr. Askoli!” He was at first inclined to attribute no
deeper motive to this mistake, but to explain it through a number of
similarities in both persons. However, he easily convinced himself that here
the interchange of names bespoke a sort of boast—that is, he was
acquainting each of his Italian patients with the fact that neither was the
only resident of Triest who came to Vienna in search of his medical advice.

(r) Two women stopped in front of a drug-store, and one said to her
companion, “If you will wait a few moments I’ll soon be back,” but she said
movements instead. She was on her way to buy some castoria for her child.
(s) Mr. L., who is fonder of being called on than of calling, spoke to me
through the telephone from a nearby summer resort. He wanted to know
when I would pay him a visit. I reminded him that it was his turn to visit
me, and called his attention to the fact that, as he was the happy possessor
of an automobile, it would be easier for him to call on me. (We were at
different summer resorts, separated by about one half-hour’s railway trip.)
He gladly promised to call, and asked: “How about Labour Day (September
1st), will it be convenient for you?” When I answered affirmatively, he said,
“Very well, then, put me down for Election Day” (November). His mistake
was quite plain. He likes to visit me, but it was inconvenient to travel so far.
In November we would both be in the city. My analysis proved correct.
(t) A friend described to me a nervous patient, and wished to know whether
I could benefit him. I remarked: “I believe that in time I can remove all his
symptoms by psychoanalysis, because it is a durable case,” wishing to say
“curable”!
(u) I repeatedly addressed my patient as Mrs. Smith, her married daughter’s
name, when her real name is Mrs. James. My attention having been called
to it, I soon discovered that I had another patient of the same name who
refused to pay for the treatment. Mrs. Smith was also my patient and paid
her bills promptly.
(v) A lapsus linguæ sometimes stands for a particular characteristic. A
young woman, who is the domineering spirit in her home, said of her ailing
husband that he had consulted the doctor about a wholesome diet for
himself, and then added: “The doctor said that diet has nothing to do with
his ailments, and that he can eat and drink what I want.”
(w) I cannot omit this excellent and instructive example, although,
according to my authority, it is about twenty years old. A lady once
expressed herself in society—the very words show that they were uttered
with fervour and under the pressure of a great many secret emotions: “Yes,
a woman must be pretty if she is to please the men. A man is much better
off. As long as he has five straight limbs, he needs no more!”

This example affords us a good insight into the intimate mechanisms of a
mistake in speech by means of condensation and contamination (cf. p. 72).
It is quite obvious that we have here a fusion of two similar modes of
expression:—
“As long as he has his four straight limbs.”
“As long as he has all his five senses.”
Or the term “straight” may be the common element of the two intended
expressions:—
“As long as he has his straight limbs.”
“All five should be straight.”
It may also be assumed that both modes of expression—viz., those of the
five senses and those of the straight five—have co-operated to introduce
into the sentence about the straight limbs first a number and then the
mysterious five instead of the simple four. But this fusion surely would not
have succeeded if it had not expressed good sense in the form resulting
from the mistake; if it had not expressed a cynical truth which, naturally,
could not be uttered unconcealed, coming as it did from a woman.
Finally, we shall not hesitate to call attention to the fact that the woman’s
saying, following its wording, could just as well be an excellent witticism
as a jocose speech-blunder. It is simply a question whether she uttered these
words with conscious or unconscious intention. The behaviour of the
speaker in this case certainly speaks against the conscious intention, and
thus excludes wit.
(x) Owing to similarity of material, I add here another case of speech-
blunder, the interpretation of which requires less skill. A professor of
anatomy strove to explain the nostril, which, as is known, is a very difficult
anatomical structure. To his question whether his audience grasped his ideas
he received an affirmative reply. The professor, known for his self-esteem,
thereupon remarked: “I can hardly believe this, for the number of people
who understand the nostril, even in a city of millions like Vienna, can be
counted on a finger—pardon me, I meant to say on the fingers of a hand.”
(y) I am indebted to Dr. Alf. Robitsek, of Vienna, for calling my attention to
two speech-blunders from an old French author, which I shall reproduce in
the original.

Brantôme (1527-1614), Vies des Dames galantes, Discours second: “Si ay-
je cogneu une très belle et honneste dame de par le monde, qui, devisant
avec un honneste gentilhomme de la cour des affaires de la guerre durant
ces civiles, elle luy dit: ‘J’ay ouy dire que le roy a faiet rompre tous les c
—— de ce pays là.’ Elle vouloit dire le ponts. Pensez que, venant de
coucher d’avec son mary, ou songeant à son amant, elle avoit encor ce nom
frais en la bouche; et le gentilhomme s’en eschauffer en amours d’elle pour
ce mot.
“Une autre dame que j’ai cogneue, entretenant une autre grand dame plus
qu’elle, et luy louant et exaltant ses beautez, elle luy dit après: ‘Non,
madame, ce que je vous en dis, ce n’est point pour vous adultérer’; voulant
dire adulater, comme elle le rhabilla ainsi: pensez qu’elle songeoit à
adultérer.”
In the psychotherapeutic procedure which I employ in the solution and
removal of neurotic symptoms, I am often confronted with the task of
discovering from the accidental utterances and fancies of the patient the
thought contents, which, though striving for concealment, nevertheless
unintentionally betray themselves. In doing this the mistakes often perform
the most valuable service, as I can show through most convincing and still
most singular examples.
For example, patients speak of an aunt and later, without noting the
mistake, call her “my mother,” or designate a husband as a “brother.” In this
way they attract my attention to the fact that they have “identified” these
persons with each other, that they have placed them in the same category,
which for their emotional life signifies the recurrence of the same type. Or,
a young man of twenty years presents himself during my office hours with
these words: “I am the father of N. N., whom you have treated—pardon me,
I mean the brother; why, he is four years older than I.” I understand through
this mistake that he wishes to express that, like the brother, he, too, is ill
through the fault of the father; like his brother, he wishes to be cured, but
that the father is the one most in need of treatment. At other times an
unusual arrangement of words, or a forced expression, is sufficient to
disclose in the speech of the patient the participation of a repressed thought
having a different motive.

Hence, in coarse as well as in finer speech disturbances, which may,
nevertheless, be subsumed as “speech-blunders,” I find that it is not the
contact effects of the sound, but the thoughts outside the intended speech,
which determine the origin of the speech-blunder, and also suffice to
explain the newly formed mistakes in speech. I do not doubt the laws
whereby the sounds produce changes upon one another; but they alone do
not appear to me sufficiently forcible to mar the correct execution of
speech. In those cases which I have studied and investigated more closely
they merely represent the preformed mechanism, which is conveniently
utilized by a more remote psychic motive. The latter does not, however,
form a part of the sphere of influence of these sound relations. In a large
number of substitutions caused by mistakes in talking there is an entire
absence of such phonetic laws. In this respect I am in full accord with
Wundt, who likewise assumes that the conditions underlying speech-
blunders are complex and go far beyond the contact effect of the sounds.
If I accept as certain “these more remote psychic influences,” following
Wundt’s expression, there is still nothing to detain me from conceding also
that in accelerated speech, with a certain amount of diverted attention, the
causes of speech-blunder may be easily limited to the definite law of
Meringer and Mayer. However, in a number of examples gathered by these
authors a more complicated solution is quite apparent.
In some forms of speech-blunders we may assume that the disturbing factor
is the result of striking against obscene words and meanings. The purposive
disfigurement and distortion of words and phrases, which is so popular with
vulgar persons, aims at nothing else but the employing of a harmless motive
as a reminder of the obscene, and this sport is so frequent that it would not
be at all remarkable if it appeared unintentionally and contrary to the will.
I trust that the readers will not depreciate the value of these interpretations,
for which there is no proof, and of these examples which I have myself
collected and explained by means of analysis. But if secretly I still cherish
the expectation that even the apparently simple cases of speech-blunder will
be traced to a disturbance caused by a half-repressed idea outside of the
intended context, I am tempted to it by a noteworthy observation of
Meringer. This author asserts that it is remarkable that nobody wishes to
admit having made a mistake in speaking. There are many intelligent and
honest people who are offended if we tell them that they made a mistake in

speaking. I would not risk making this assertion as general as does
Meringer, using the term “nobody.” But the emotional trace which clings to
the demonstration of the mistake, which manifestly belongs to the nature of
shame, has its significance. It may be classed with the anger displayed at
the inability to recall a forgotten name, and with the surprise at the
tenaciousness of an apparently indifferent memory, and it invariably points
to the participation of a motive in the formation of the disturbance.
The distorting of names amounts to an insult when done intentionally, and
could have the same significance in a whole series of cases where it appears
as unintentional speech-blunders. The person who, according to Mayer’s
report, once said “Freuder” instead of “Freud,” because shortly before he
pronounced the name “Breuer” (p. 38), and who at another time spoke of
the “Freuer-Breudian” method (p. 28), was certainly not particularly
enthusiastic over this method. Later, under the mistakes in writing, I shall
report a case of name disfigurement which certainly admits of no other
explanation.[20]
As a disturbing element in these cases there is an intermingling of a
criticism which must be omitted, because at the time being it does not
correspond to the intention of the speaker.
Or it may be just the reverse; the substituted name, or the adoption of the
strange name, signifies an appreciation of the same. The identification
which is brought about by the mistake is equivalent to a recognition which
for the moment must remain in the background. An experience of this kind
from his schooldays is related by Dr. Ferenczi:—
“While in my first year at college I was obliged to recite a poem before the
whole class. It was the first experience of the kind in my life, but I was well
prepared. As soon as I began my recitation I was dismayed at being
disturbed by an outburst of laughter. The professor later explained to me
this strange reception. I started by giving the title ‘From the Distance,’
which was correct, but instead of giving the name of the real author, I
mentioned—my own. The name of the poet is Alexander Petöfi. The
identity of the first name with my own favoured the interchange of names,
but the real reason was surely the fact that I identified myself at that time
with the celebrated poet-hero. Even consciously I entertained for him a love

and respect which verged on adoration. The whole ambition-complex hides
itself under this faulty action.”
A similar identification was reported to me concerning a young physician
who timidly and reverently introduced himself to the celebrated Virchow
with the following words: “I am Dr. Virchow.” The surprised professor
turned to him and asked, “Is your name also Virchow?” I do not know how
the ambitious young man justified his speech-blunder, whether he thought
of the charming excuse that he imagined himself so insignificant next to
this big man that his own name slipped from him, or whether he had the
courage to admit that he hoped that he, too, would some day be as great a
man as Virchow, and that the professor should therefore not treat him in too
disparaging a manner. One or both of these thoughts may have put this
young man in an embarrassing position during the introduction.
Owing to very personal motives I must leave it undecided whether a similar
interpretation may also apply in the case to be cited. At the International
Congress in Amsterdam, in 1907, my theories of hysteria were the subject
of a lively discussion. One of my most violent opponents, in his diatribe
against me, repeatedly made mistakes in speech in such a manner that he
put himself in my place and spoke in my name. He said, for example,
“Breuer and I, as is well known, have demonstrated,” etc., when he wished
to say “Breuer and Freud.” The name of this opponent does not show the
slightest sound similarity to my own. From this example, as well as from
other cases of interchanging names in speech-blunders, we are reminded of
the fact that the speech-blunder can fully forego the facility afforded to it
through similar sounds, and can achieve its purpose if only supported in
content by concealed relations.
In other and more significant cases it is a self-criticism, an internal
contradiction against one’s own utterance, which causes the speech-blunder,
and even forces a contrasting substitution for the one intended. We then
observe with surprise how the wording of an assertion removes the purpose
of the same, and how the error in speech lays bare the inner dishonesty.
Here the lapsus linguæ becomes a mimicking form of expression, often,
indeed, for the expression of what one does not wish to say. It is thus a
means of self-betrayal.

Brill relates: “I had recently been consulted by a woman who showed many
paranoid trends, and as she had no relatives who could co-operate with me,
I urged her to enter a State hospital as a voluntary patient. She was quite
willing to do so, but on the following day she told me that her friends with
whom she leased an apartment objected to her going to a hospital, as it
would interfere with their plans, and so on. I lost patience and said: ‘There
is no use listening to your friends who know nothing about your mental
condition; you are quite incompetent to take care of your own affairs.’ I
meant to say ‘competent.’ Here the lapsus linguæ expressed my true
opinion.”
Favoured by chance the speech material often gives origin to examples of
speech-blunders which serve to bring about an overwhelming revelation or
a full comic effect, as shown by the following examples reported by Brill:
—
“A wealthy but not very generous host invited his friends for an evening
dance. Everything went well until about 11.30 p.m., when there was an
intermission, presumably for supper. To the great disappointment of most of
the guests there was no supper; instead, they were regaled with thin
sandwiches and lemonade. As it was close to Election day the conversation
centred on the different candidates; and as the discussion grew warmer, one
of the guests, an ardent admirer of the Progressive Party candidate,
remarked to the host: ‘You may say what you please about Teddy, but there
is one thing—he can always be relied upon; he always gives you a square
meal,’ wishing to say square deal. The assembled guests burst into a roar of
laughter, to the great embarrassment of the speaker and the host, who fully
understood each other.”
“While writing a prescription for a woman who was especially weighed
down by the financial burden of the treatment, I was interested to hear her
say suddenly: ‘Please do not give me big bills, because I cannot swallow
them.’ Of course she meant to say pills.”
The following example illustrates a rather serious case of self-betrayal
through a mistake in talking. Some accessory details justify full
reproduction as first printed by Dr. A. A. Brill.[21]
“While walking one night with Dr. Frink we accidentally met a colleague,
Dr. P., whom I had not seen for years, and of whose private life I knew

nothing. We were naturally very pleased to meet again, and on my
invitation he accompanied us to a café, where we spent about two hours in
pleasant conversation. To my question as to whether he was married he
gave a negative answer, and added, ‘Why should a man like me marry?’
“On leaving the café, he suddenly turned to me and said: ‘I should like to
know what you would do in a case like this: I know a nurse who was named
as co-respondent in a divorce case. The wife sued the husband for divorce
and named her as co-respondent, and he got the divorce.’ I interrupted him,
saying, ‘You mean she got the divorce.’ He immediately corrected himself,
saying, ‘Yes, she got the divorce,’ and continued to tell how the excitement
of the trial had affected this nurse to such an extent that she became nervous
and took to drink. He wanted me to advise him how to treat her.
“As soon as I had corrected his mistake I asked him to explain it, but, as is
usually the case, he was surprised at my question. He wanted to know
whether a person had no right to make mistakes in talking. I explained to
him that there is a reason for every mistake, and that if he had not told me
that he was unmarried, I would say that he was the hero of the divorce case
in question, and that the mistake showed that he wished he had obtained the
divorce instead of his wife, so as not to be obliged to pay alimony and to be
permitted to marry again in New York State.
“He stoutly denied my interpretation, but his emotional agitation, followed
by loud laughter, only strengthened my suspicions. To my appeal that he
should tell the truth ‘for science’ sake,’ he said, ‘Unless you wish me to lie
you must believe that I was never married, and hence your psychoanalytic
interpretation is all wrong.’ He, however, added that it was dangerous to be
with a person who paid attention to such little things. Then he suddenly
remembered that he had another appointment and left us.
“Both Dr. Frink and I were convinced that my interpretation of his lapsus
linguæ was correct, and I decided to corroborate or disprove it by further
investigation. The next day I found a neighbour and old friend of Dr. P.,
who confirmed my interpretation in every particular. The divorce was
granted to Dr. P.’s wife a few weeks before, and a nurse was named as co-
respondent. A few weeks later I met Dr. P., and he told me that he was
thoroughly convinced of the Freudian mechanisms.”

The self-betrayal is just as plain in the following case reported by Otto
Rank:—
A father who was devoid of all patriotic feeling and desirous of educating
his children to be just as free from this superfluous sentiment, reproached
his sons for participating in a patriotic demonstration, and rejected their
reference to a similar behaviour of their uncle with these words: “You are
not obliged to imitate him; why, he is an idiot.” The astonished features of
the children at their father’s unusual tone aroused him to the fact that he had
made a mistake, and he remarked apologetically, “Of course, I wished to
say patriot.”
When such a speech-blunder occurs in a serious squabble and reverses the
intended meaning of one of the disputants, at once it puts him at a
disadvantage with his adversary—a disadvantage which the latter seldom
fails to utilize.
This clearly shows that although people are unwilling to accept the theory
of my conception and are not inclined to forego the convenience that is
connected with the tolerance of a faulty action, they nevertheless interpret
speech-blunders and other faulty acts in a manner similar to the one
presented in this book. The merriment and derision which are sure to be
evoked at the decisive moment through such linguistic mistakes speak
conclusively against the generally accepted convention that such a speech-
blunder is a lapsus linguæ and psychologically of no importance. It was no
less a man than the German Chancellor, Prince Bülow, who endeavoured to
save the situation through such a protest when the wording of his defence of
his Emperor (November, 1907) turned into the opposite through a speech-
blunder.
“Concerning the present, the new epoch of Emperor Wilhelm II, I can only
repeat what I said a year ago, that it would be unfair and unjust to speak of
a coterie of responsible advisers around our Emperor (loud calls,
‘Irresponsible!’)—to speak of irresponsible advisers. Pardon the lapsus
linguæ” (hilarity).
A nice example of speech-blunder, which aims not so much at the betrayal
of the speaker as at the enlightenment of the listener outside the scene, is
found in Wallenstein (Piccolomini, Act I, Scene 5), and shows us that the
poet who here uses this means is well versed in the mechanism and intent of

speech-blunders. In the preceding scene Max Piccolomini was passionately
in favour of the ducal party, and was enthusiastic over the blessings of the
peace which became known to him in the course of a journey while
accompanying Wallenstein’s daughter to the encampment. He leaves his
father and the Court ambassador, Questenberg, in great consternation. The
scene proceeds as follows:—
Questenberg. Woe unto us! Are matters thus? Friend, should we
allow him to go there with this false opinion, and not recall him
at once in order to open his eyes instantly.
Octavio (rousing himself from profound meditation). He has
already opened mine, and I see more than pleases me.
Questenberg. What is it, friend?
Octavio. A curse on that journey!
Questenberg. Why? What is it?
Octavio. Come! I must immediately follow the unlucky trail,
must see with my own eyes—come——(Wishes to lead him
away.)
Questenberg. What is the matter? Where?
Octavio (urging). To her!
Questenberg. To——?
Octavio (corrects himself). To the duke! Let us go, etc.
The slight speech-blunder to her in place of to him is meant to betray to us
the fact that the father has seen through his son’s motive for espousing the
other cause, while the courtier complains that “he speaks to him altogether
in riddles.”
Another example wherein a poet makes use of a speech-blunder was
discovered by Otto Rank in Shakespeare. I quote Rank’s report from the
Zentralblatt für Psychoanalyse, I. 3.
“A poetic speech-blunder, very delicately motivated and technically
remarkably well utilized, which, like the one pointed out by Freud in
Wallenstein (Zur Psychopathologie des Alltagslebens, 2nd Edition, p. 48),

not only shows that poets knew the mechanism and sense of this error, but
also presupposes an understanding of it on the part of the hearer, can be
found in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice (Act III, Scene 2). By the will
of her father, Portia was bound to select a husband through a lottery. She
escaped all her distasteful suitors by lucky chance. When she finally found
in Bassanio the suitor after her own heart, she had cause to fear lest he, too,
should draw the unlucky lottery. In the scene she would like to tell him that
even if he chose the wrong casket, he might, nevertheless, be sure of her
love. But she is hampered by her vow. In this mental conflict the poet puts
these words in her mouth, which were directed to the welcome suitor:—

“There is something tells me (but it is not love),
I would not lose you; and you know yourself
Hate counsels not in such a quality.
But lest you should not understand me well
(And yet a maiden hath no tongue but thought),
I would detain you here some month or two,
Before you venture for me. I could teach you
How to choose right, but then I am forsworn;
So will I never be; so may you miss me;
But if you do, you’ll make me wish a sin,
That I had been forsworn. Beshrew your eyes,
They have o’erlooked me, and divided me:
One half of me is yours, the other half yours—
Mine own, I would say; but if mine, then yours—
And so all yours.”

“Just the very thing which she would like to hint to him gently, because
really she should keep it from him, namely, that even before the choice she
is wholly his—that she loves him, the poet, with admirable psychologic
sensitiveness, allows to come to the surface in the speech-blunder. It is
through this artifice that he manages to allay the intolerable uncertainty of
the lover as well as the like tension of the hearer concerning the outcome of
the choice.”
The interest merited by the confirmation of our conception of speech-
blunders through the great poets justifies the citation of a third example
which was reported by Dr. E. Jones.[22]

“Our great novelist, George Meredith, in his masterpiece, The Egoist, shows
an even finer understanding of the mechanism. The plot of the novel is,
shortly, as follows: Sir Willoughby Patterne, an aristocrat greatly admired
by his circle, becomes engaged to a Miss Constantia Durham. She discovers
in him an intense egoism, which he skilfully conceals from the world, and
to escape the marriage she elopes with a Captain Oxford. Some years later
Patterne becomes engaged to a Miss Clara Middleton, and most of the book
is taken up with a detailed description of the conflict that arises in her mind
on also discovering his egoism. External circumstances and her conception
of honour hold her to her pledge, while he becomes more and more
distasteful in her eyes. She partly confided in his cousin and secretary,
Vernon Whitford, the man whom she ultimately marries, but from a mixture
of motives he stands aloof.
“In the soliloquy Clara speaks as follows: ‘If some noble gentleman could
see me as I am and not disdain to aid me! Oh! to be caught out of this
prison of thorns and brambles. I cannot tear my own way out. I am a
coward. A beckoning of a finger would change me, I believe. I could fly
bleeding and through hootings to a comrade.... Constantia met a soldier.
Perhaps she prayed and her prayer was answered. She did ill. But, oh, how I
love her for it! His name was Harry Oxford.... She did not waver, she cut
the links, she signed herself over. Oh, brave girl, what do you think of me?
But I have no Harry Whitford; I am alone....’ The sudden consciousness that
she had put another name for Oxford struck her a buffet, drowning her in
crimson.
“The fact that both men’s names end in ‘ford’ evidently renders the
confounding of them more easy, and would by many be regarded as an
adequate cause for this, but the real underlying motive for it is plainly
indicated by the author. In another passage the same lapsus occurs, and is
followed by the hesitation and change of subject that one is familiar with in
psychoanalysis when a half-conscious complex is touched. Sir Willoughby
patronizingly says of Whitford: ‘False alarm. The resolution to do anything
unaccustomed is quite beyond poor old Vernon.’ Clara replies: ‘But if Mr.
Oxford—Whitford ... your swans, coming sailing up the lake; how beautiful
they look when they are indignant! I was going to ask you, surely men
witnessing a marked admiration for some one else will naturally be
discouraged?’ Sir Willoughby stiffened with sudden enlightenment.

“In still another passage Clara, by another lapsus, betrays her secret wish
that she was on a more intimate footing with Vernon Whitford. Speaking to
a boy friend, she says, ‘Tell Mr. Vernon—tell Mr. Whitford.’”
The conception of speech-blunders here defended can be readily verified in
the smallest details. I have been able to demonstrate repeatedly that the
most insignificant and most natural cases of speech-blunders have their
good sense, and admit of the same interpretation as the more striking
examples. A patient who, contrary to my wishes but with firm personal
motives, decided upon a short trip to Budapest, justified herself by saying
that she was going for only three days, but she blundered and said for only
three weeks. She betrayed her secret feeling that, to spite me, she preferred
spending three weeks to three days in that society which I considered unfit
for her.
One evening, wishing to excuse myself for not having called for my wife at
the theatre, I said: “I was at the theatre at ten minutes after ten.” I was
corrected: “You meant to say before ten o’clock.” Naturally I wanted to say
before ten. After ten would certainly be no excuse. I had been told that the
theatre programme read, “Finished before ten o’clock.” When I arrived at
the theatre I found the foyer dark and the theatre empty. Evidently the
performance was over earlier and my wife did not wait for me. When I
looked at the clock it still wanted five minutes to ten. I determined to make
my case more favourable at home, and say that it was ten minutes to ten.
Unfortunately, the speech-blunder spoiled the intent and laid bare my
dishonesty, in which I acknowledged more than there really was to confess.
This leads us to those speech disturbances which can no longer be described
as speech-blunders, for they do not injure the individual word, but affect the
rhythm and execution of the entire speech, as, for example, the stammering
and stuttering of embarrassment. But here, as in the former cases, it is the
inner conflict that is betrayed to us through the disturbance in speech. I
really do not believe that any one will make mistakes in talking in an
audience with His Majesty, in a serious love declaration, or in defending
one’s name and honour before a jury; in short, people make no mistakes
where they are all there, as the saying goes. Even in criticizing an author’s
style we are allowed and accustomed to follow the principle of explanation,
which we cannot miss in the origin of a single speech-blunder. A clear and
unequivocal manner of writing shows us that here the author is in harmony

with himself, but where we find a forced and involved expression, aiming at
more than one target, as appropriately expressed, we can thereby recognize
the participation of an unfinished and complicated thought, or we can hear
through it the stifled voice of the author’s self-criticism.[23]

VI
MISTAKES IN READING AND WRITING

That the same view-points and observation should hold true for mistakes in
reading and writing as for lapses in speech is not at all surprising when one
remembers the inner relation of these functions. I shall here confine myself
to the reports of several carefully analysed examples and shall make no
attempt to include all of the phenomena.

A. Lapses in Reading.

(a) While looking over a number of the Leipziger Illustrierten, which I was
holding obliquely, I read as the title of the front-page picture, “A Wedding
Celebration in the Odyssey.” Astonished and with my attention aroused, I
moved the page into the proper position only to read correctly, “A Wedding
Celebration in the Ostsee (Baltic Sea).” How did this senseless mistake in
reading come about?
Immediately my thoughts turned to a book by Ruth, Experimental
Investigations of “Music Phantoms”, etc., with which I had recently been
much occupied, as it closely touched the psychologic problems that are of
interest to me. The author promised a work in the near future to be called
Analysis and Principles of Dream Phenomena. No wonder that I, having
just published an Interpretation of Dreams, awaited the appearance of this
book with the most intense interest. In Ruth’s work concerning music
phantoms I found an announcement in the beginning of the table of contents
of the detailed inductive proof that the old Hellenic myths and traditions
originated mainly from slumber and music phantoms, from dream
phenomena and from deliria. Thereupon I had immediately plunged into the
text in order to find out whether he was also aware that the scene where
Odysseus appears before Nausicaa was based upon the common dream of
nakedness. One of my friends called my attention to the clever passage in
G. Keller’s Grünem Heinrich, which explains this episode in the Odyssey

as an objective representation of the dream of the mariner straying far from
home. I added to it the reference to the exhibition dream of nakedness.[24]
(b) A woman who is very anxious to get children always reads storks
instead of stocks.
(c) One day I received a letter which contained very disturbing news. I
immediately called my wife and informed her that poor Mrs. Wm. H. was
seriously ill and was given up by the doctors. There must have been a false
ring to the words in which I expressed my sympathy, as my wife grew
suspicious, asked to see the letter, and expressed her opinion that it could
not read as stated by me, because no one calls the wife by the husband’s
name. Moreover, the correspondent was well acquainted with the Christian
name of the woman concerned. I defended my assertion obstinately and
referred to the customary visiting-cards, on which a woman designates
herself by the Christian name of her husband. I was finally compelled to
take up the letter, and, as a matter of fact, we read therein “Poor W. M.”
What is more, I had even overlooked “Poor Dr. W. M.” My mistake in
reading signified a spasmodic effort, so to speak, to turn the sad news from
the man towards the woman. The title between the adjective and the name
did not go well with my claim that the woman must have been meant. That
is why it was omitted in the reading. The motive for this falsifying was not
that the woman was less an object of my sympathy than the man, but the
fate of this poor man had excited my fears regarding another and nearer
person who, I was aware, had the same disease.
(d) Both irritating and laughable is a lapse in reading to which I am
frequently subject when I walk through the streets of a strange city during
my vacation. I then read antiquities on every shop sign that shows the
slightest resemblance to the word; this displays the questing spirit of the
collector.
(e) In his important work[25] Bleuler relates: “While reading I once had the
intellectual feeling of seeing my name two lines below. To my astonishment
I found only the words blood corpuscles. Of the many thousands of lapses
in reading in the peripheral as well as in the central field of vision that I
have analysed, this was the most striking case. Whenever I imagined that I
saw my name, the word that induced this illusion usually showed a greater
resemblance to my name than the word bloodcorpuscles. In most cases all

the letters of my name had to be close together before I could commit such
an error. In this case, however, I could readily explain the delusion of
reference and the illusion. What I had just read was the end of a statement
concerning a form of bad style in scientific works, a tendency from which I
am not entirely free.”

B. Lapses in Writing.

(a) On a sheet of paper containing principally short daily notes of business
interest, I found, to my surprise, the incorrect date, “Thursday, October
20th,” bracketed under the correct date of the month of September. It was
not difficult to explain this anticipation as the expression of a wish. A few
days before I had returned fresh from my vacation and felt ready for any
amount of professional work, but as yet there were few patients. On my
arrival I had found a letter from a patient announcing her arrival on the 20th
of October. As I wrote the same date in September I may certainly have
thought “X. ought to be here already; what a pity about that whole month!”
and with this thought I pushed the current date a month ahead. In this case
the disturbing thought can scarcely be called unpleasant; therefore after
noticing this lapse in writing, I immediately knew the solution. In the fall of
the following year I experienced an entirely analogous and similarly
motivated lapse in writing. E. Jones has made a study of similar cases, and
found that most mistakes in writing dates are motivated.
(b) I received the proof sheets of my contribution to the annual report on
neurology and psychiatry, and I was naturally obliged to review with
special care the names of authors, which, because of the many different
nationalities represented, offer the greatest difficulties to the compositor. As
a matter of fact, I found some strange-sounding names still in need of
correction; but, oddly enough, the compositor had corrected one single
name in my manuscript, and with very good reason. I had written
Buckrhard, which the compositor guessed to be Burckhard. I had praised
the treatise of this obstetrician entitled The Influence of Birth on the Origin
of Infantile Paralysis, and I was not conscious of the least enmity toward
him. But an author in Vienna, who had angered me by an adverse criticism
of my Traumdeutung, bears the same name. It was as if in writing the name
Burckhard, meaning the obstetrician, a wicked thought concerning the other

B. had obtruded itself. The twisting of the name, as I have already stated in
regard to lapses in speech, often signifies a depreciation.[26]
(c) The following is seemingly a serious case of lapsus calami, which it
would be equally correct to describe as an erroneously carried out action. I
intended to withdraw from the postal savings bank the sum of 300 crowns,
which I wished to send to an absent relative to enable him to take treatment
at a watering-place. I noted that my account was 4,380 crowns, and I
decided to bring it down to the round sum of 4,000 crowns, which was not
to be touched in the near future. After making out the regular cheque I
suddenly noticed that I had written not 380 crowns, as I had intended, but
exactly 438 crowns. I was frightened at the untrustworthiness of my action.
I soon realized that my fear was groundless, as I had not grown poorer than
I was before. But I had to reflect for quite a while in order to discover what
influence diverted me from my first intention without making itself known
to my consciousness.
First I got on a wrong track: I subtracted 380 from 438, but after that I did
not know what to do with the difference. Finally an idea occurred to me
which showed me the true connection. 438 is exactly 10 per cent. of the
entire account of 4,380 crowns! But the bookseller, too, gives a 10 per cent.
discount! I recalled that a few days before I had selected several books, in
which I was no longer interested, in order to offer them to the bookseller for
300 crowns. He thought the price demanded too high, but promised to give
me a final answer within the next few days. If he should accept my first
offer he would replace the exact sum that I was to spend on the sufferer.
There is no doubt that I was sorry about this expenditure. The emotion at
the realization of my mistakes can be more easily understood as a fear of
growing poor through such outlays. But both the sorrow over this expense
and the fear of poverty connected with it were entirely foreign to my
consciousness; I did not regret this expense when I promised the sum, and
would have laughed at the idea of any such underlying motive. I should
probably not have assigned such feelings to myself had not my
psychoanalytic practice made me quite familiar with the repressed elements
of psychic life, and if I had not had a dream a few days before which
brought forth the same solution.
(d) Although it is usually difficult to find the person responsible for
printers’ errors, the psychologic mechanisms underlying them are the same

as in other mistakes. Typographical errors also well demonstrate the fact
that people are not at all indifferent to such trivialities as “mistakes,” and,
judging by the indignant reactions of the parties concerned, one is forced to
the conclusion that mistakes are not treated by the public at large as mere
accidents. This state of affairs is very well summed up in the following
editorial from the New York Times of April 14, 1913. Not the least
interesting are the comments of the keen-witted editor, who seems to share
our views:—

“A Blunder Truly Unfortunate.
“Typographical errors come only too frequently from even the
best-regulated newspaper presses. They are always humiliating,
often a cause of anger, and occasionally dangerous, but now and
then they are distinctly amusing. This latter quality they are
most apt to have when they are made in the office of a
journalistic neighbour, a fact that probably explains why we can
read with smiling composure an elaborate editorial apology
which appears in the Hartford Courant.
“Its able political commentator tried the other day to say that,
unfortunately for Connecticut, ‘J. H. is no longer a Member of
Congress. Printer and proof-reader combined to deprive the
adverb of its negative particle.’ At least, the able political
commentator so declares, and we wouldn’t question his veracity
for the world; but sorrowful experience has taught most of us
that it’s safer to get that sort of editorial disclaimer of
responsibility into print before looking up the copy, and perhaps
—just perhaps—the world-enlightener, who knows that he wrote
unfortunate, because that is what he intended to write, didn’t
rashly chance the discovery of his own guilt before he convicted
the composing-room of it.
“Be that as it may, the meaning of the sentence was cruelly
changed, and a friend was grieved or offended. Not so long ago
a more astonishing error than this one crept into a book review
of ours—a very solemn and scientific book. It consisted of the
substitution of the word ‘caribou’ for the word ‘carbon’ in a

paragraph dealing with the chemical composition of the stars. In
that case the writer’s fierce self-exculpation is at least highly
plausible, as it seems hardly possible that he wrote ‘caribou’
when he intended to write ‘carbon,’ but even he was cautious
enough to make no deep inquiry into the matter.”

(e) I cite the following case contributed by Dr. W. Stekel, for the
authenticity of which I can vouch: “An almost unbelievable example of
miswriting and misreading occurred in the editing of a widely circulated
weekly. It concerned an article of defence and vindication which was
written with much warmth and great pathos. The editor-in-chief of the paper
read the article, while the author himself naturally read it from the
manuscript and proof-sheets more than once. Everybody was satisfied,
when the printer’s reader suddenly noticed a slight error which had escaped
the attention of all. There it was, plainly enough: ‘Our readers will bear
witness to the fact that we have always acted in a selfish manner for the
good of the community.’ It is quite evident that it was meant to read
unselfish. The real thoughts, however, broke through the pathetic speech
with elemental force.”
(f) The following example of misprinting is taken from a Western gazette:
The teacher was giving an instruction paper on mathematical methods, and
spoke of a plan “for the instruction of youth that might be carried out ad
libidinem.”
(g) Even the Bible did not escape misprints. Thus we have the “Wicked
Bible,” so called from the fact that the negative was left out of the seventh
commandment. This authorized edition of the Bible was published in
London in 1631, and it is said that the printer had to pay a fine of two
thousand pounds for the omission.
Another biblical misprint dates back to the year 1580, and is found in the
Bible of the famous library of Wolfenbuttel, in Hesse. In the passage in
Genesis where God tells Eve that Adam shall be her master and shall rule
over her, the German translation is “Und er soll dein Herr sein.” The word
Herr (master) was substituted by Narr, which means fool. Newly
discovered evidence seems to show that the error was a conscious

machination of the printer’s suffragette wife, who refused to be ruled by her
husband.
(h) Dr. Ernest Jones reports the following case concerning A. A. Brill:
“Although by custom almost a teetotaler, he yielded to a friend’s
importunity one evening, in order to avoid offending him, and took a little
wine. During the next morning an exacerbation of an eye-strain headache
gave him cause to regret this slight indulgence, and his reflection on the
subject found expression in the following slip of the pen. Having occasion
to write the name of a girl mentioned by a patient, he wrote not Ethel but
Ethyl.[27] It happened that the girl in question was rather too fond of drink,
and in Dr. Brill’s mood at the time this characteristic of hers stood out with
conspicuous significance.”[28]
(i) A woman wrote to her sister, felicitating her on the occasion of taking
possession of a new and spacious residence. A friend who was present
noticed that the writer put the wrong address on the letter, and what was still
more remarkable was the fact that she did not address it to the previous
residence, but to one long ago given up, but which her sister had occupied
when she first married. When the friend called her attention to it the writer
remarked, “You are right; but what in the world made me do this?” to which
her friend replied: “Perhaps you begrudge her the nice big apartment into
which she has just moved because you yourself are cramped for space, and
for that reason you put her back into her first residence, where she was no
better off than yourself.” “Of course I begrudge her the new apartment,” she
honestly admitted. As an afterthought she added, “It is a pity that one is so
mean in such matters.”
(k) Ernest Jones reports the following example given to him by Dr. A. A.
Brill. In a letter to Dr. Brill a patient tried to attribute his nervousness to
business worries and excitement during the cotton crisis. He went on to say:
“My trouble is all due to that d—— frigid wave; there isn’t even any seed
to be obtained for new crops.” He referred to a cold wave which had
destroyed the cotton crops, but instead of writing “wave” he wrote “wife.”
In the bottom of his heart he entertained reproaches against his wife on
account of her marital frigidity and childlessness, and he was not far from
the cognition that the enforced abstinence played no little part in the
causation of his malady.

Omissions in writing are naturally explained in the same manner as
mistakes in writing. A remarkable example of omission which is of historic
importance was reported by Dr. B. Dattner.[29] In one of the legal articles
dealing with the financial obligations of both countries, which was drawn
up in the year 1867 during the readjustment between Austria and Hungary,
the word “effective” was accidentally omitted in the Hungarian translation.
Dattner thinks it probable that the unconscious desire of the Hungarian law-
makers to grant Austria the least possible advantages had something to do
with this omission.
Another example of omission is the following related by Brill: “A
prospective patient, who had corresponded with me relative to treatment,
finally wrote for an appointment for a certain day. Instead of keeping his
appointment he sent regrets which began as follows: ‘Owing to foreseen
circumstances I am unable to keep my appointment.’ He naturally meant to
write unforeseen. He finally came to me months later, and in the course of
the analysis I discovered that my suspicions at the time were justified; there
were no unforeseen circumstances to prevent his coming at that time; he
was advised not to come to me. The unconscious does not lie.”
Wundt gives a most noteworthy proof for the easily ascertained fact that we
more easily make mistakes in writing than in speaking (loc. cit., p. 374). He
states: “In the course of normal conversation the inhibiting function of the
will is constantly directed toward bringing into harmony the course of
ideation with the movement of articulation. If the articulation following the
ideas becomes retarded through mechanical causes, as in writing, such
anticipations then readily make their appearance.”
Observation of the determinants which favour lapses in reading gives rise to
doubt, which I do not like to leave unmentioned, because I am of the
opinion that it may become the starting-point of a fruitful investigation. It is
a familiar fact that in reading aloud the attention of the reader often wanders
from the text and is directed toward his own thoughts. The results of this
deviation of attention are often such that when interrupted and questioned
he cannot even state what he has read. In other words, he has read
automatically, although the reading was nearly always correct. I do not
think that such conditions favour any noticeable increase in the mistakes.
We are accustomed to assume concerning a whole series of functions that
they are most precisely performed when done automatically, with scarcely

any conscious attention. This argues that the conditions governing attention
in mistakes in speaking, writing, and reading must be differently determined
than assumed by Wundt (cessation or diminution of attention). The
examples which we have subjected to analysis have really not given us the
right to take for granted a quantitative diminution of attention. We found
what is probably not exactly the same thing, a disturbance of the attention
through a strange obtruding thought.

VII
FORGETTING OF IMPRESSIONS AND RESOLUTIONS

If any one should be inclined to overrate the state of our present knowledge
of mental life, all that would be needed to force him to assume a modest
attitude would be to remind him of the function of memory. No psychologic
theory has yet been able to account for the connection between the
fundamental phenomena of remembering and forgetting; indeed, even the
complete analysis of that which one can actually observe has as yet scarcely
been grasped. To-day forgetting has perhaps grown more puzzling than
remembering, especially since we have learned from the study of dreams
and pathologic states that even what for a long time we believed forgotten
may suddenly return to consciousness.
To be sure, we are in possession of some view-points which we hope will
receive general recognition. Thus we assume that forgetting is a
spontaneous process to which we may ascribe a certain temporal discharge.
We emphasize the fact that, just as among the units of every impression or
experience, in forgetting, too, a certain selection takes place among the
existing impressions. We are acquainted with some of the conditions that
underlie the tenaciousness of memory and the awakening of that which
would otherwise remain forgotten. Nevertheless, we can observe in
innumerable cases of daily life how unreliable and unsatisfactory our
knowledge of the mechanism is. Thus we may listen to two persons
exchanging reminiscences concerning the same outward impressions, say of
a journey that they have taken together some time before. What remains
most firmly in the memory of the one is often forgotten by the other, as if it
had never occurred, even when there is not the slightest reason to assume
that this impression is of greater psychic importance for the one than for the
other. A great many of those factors which determine the selective power of
memory are obviously still beyond our ken.
With the purpose of adding some small contribution to the knowledge of the
conditions of forgetting, I was wont to subject to a psychologic analysis

those cases in which forgetting concerned me personally. As a rule I took up
only a certain group of those cases, namely, those in which the forgetting
astonished me, because, in my opinion, I should have remembered the
experience in question. I wish further to remark that I am generally not
inclined to forgetfulness (of things experienced, not of things learned), and
that for a short period of my youth I was able to perform extraordinary feats
of memory. When I was a schoolboy it was quite natural for me to be able
to repeat from memory the page of a book which I had read; and shortly
before I entered the University I could write down practically verbatim the
popular lectures on scientific subjects directly after hearing them. In the
tension before the final medical examination I must have made use of the
remnant of this ability, for in certain subjects I gave the examiners
apparently automatic answers, which proved to be exact reproductions of
the text-book, which I had skimmed through but once and then in greatest
haste.
Since those days I have steadily lost control over my memory; of late,
however, I became convinced that with the aid of a certain artifice I can
recall far more than I would otherwise credit myself with remembering. For
example, when, during my office hours, a patient states that I have seen him
before and I cannot recall either the fact or the time, then I help myself by
guessing—that is, I allow a number of years, beginning from the present
time, to come to my mind quickly. Whenever this could be controlled by
records of definite information from the patient, it was always shown that in
over ten years[30] I have seldom missed it by more than six months. The
same thing happens when I meet a casual acquaintance and, from
politeness, inquire about his small child. When he tells of its progress I try
to fancy how old the child now is. I control my estimate by the information
given by the father, and at most I make a mistake of a month, and in older
children of three months. I cannot state, however, what basis I have for this
estimate. Of late I have grown so bold that I always offer my estimate
spontaneously, and still run no risk of grieving the father by displaying my
ignorance in regard to his offspring. Thus I extend my conscious memory
by invoking my larger unconscious memory.
I shall report some striking examples of forgetting which for the most part I
have observed in myself. I distinguish forgetting of impressions and
experiences, that is, the forgetting of knowledge, from forgetting of

resolutions, that is, the forgetting of omissions. The uniform result of the
entire series of observations I can formulate as follows: The forgetting in all
cases is proved to be founded on a motive of displeasure.

A. Forgetting of Impressions and Knowledge.

(a) During the summer my wife once made me very angry, although the
cause in itself was trifling. We sat in a restaurant opposite a gentleman from
Vienna whom I knew, and who had cause to know me, and whose
acquaintance I had reasons for not wishing to renew. My wife, who had
heard nothing to the disrepute of the man opposite her, showed by her
actions that she was listening to his conversation with his neighbours, for
from time to time she asked me questions which took up the thread of their
discussion. I became impatient and finally irritated. A few weeks later I
complained to a relative about this behaviour on the part of my wife, but I
was not able to recall even a single word of the conversation of the
gentleman in the case. As I am usually rather resentful and cannot forget a
single incident of an episode that has annoyed me, my amnesia in this case
was undoubtedly determined by respect for my wife.
A short time ago I had a similar experience. I wished to make merry with an
intimate friend over a statement made by my wife only a few hours earlier,
but I found myself hindered by the noteworthy fact that I had entirely
forgotten the statement. I had first to beg my wife to recall it to me. It is
easy to understand that my forgetting in this case may be analogous to the
typical disturbance of judgment which dominates us when it concerns those
nearest to us.
(b) To oblige a woman who was a stranger in Vienna I had undertaken to
procure a small iron safe for the preservation of documents and money.
When I offered my services, the image of an establishment in the heart of
the city where I was sure I had seen such safes floated before me with
extraordinary visual vividness. To be sure, I could not recall the name of the
street, but I felt certain that I would discover the store in a walk through the
city, for my memory told me that I had passed it countless times. To my
chagrin I could not find this establishment with the safes, though I walked
through the inner part of the city in every direction. I concluded that the
only thing left to do was to search through a business directory, and if that

failed, to try to identify the establishment in a second round of the city. It
did not, however, require so much effort; among the addresses in the
directory I found one which immediately presented itself as that which had
been forgotten. It was true that I had passed the show window countless
times, each time, however, when I had gone to visit the M. family, who
have lived a great many years in this identical building. After this intimate
friendship had turned to an absolute estrangement, I had taken care to avoid
the neighbourhood as well as the house, though without ever thinking of the
reason for my action. In my walk through the city searching for the safe in
the show window I had traversed every street in the neighbourhood but the
right one, and I had avoided this as if it were forbidden ground.
The motive of displeasure which was at the bottom of my disorientation is
thus comprehensible. But the mechanism of forgetting is no longer so
simple as in the former example. Here my aversion naturally does not
extend to the vendor of safes, but to another person, concerning whom I
wish to know nothing, and later transfers itself from the latter to this
incident where it brings about the forgetting. Similarly, in the case of
Burckhard mentioned above, the grudge against the one brought about the
error in writing the name of the other. The similarity of names which here
established a connection between two essentially different streams of
thought was accomplished in the showcase window instance by the
contiguity of space and the inseparable environment. Moreover, this latter
case was more closely knit together, for money played a great part in the
causation of the estrangement from the family living in this house.
(c) The B. and R. Company requested me to pay a professional call on one
of their officers. On my way to him I was engrossed in the thought that I
must already have been in the building occupied by the firm. It seemed as if
I used to see their signboard in a lower story while my professional visit
was taking me to a higher story. I could not recall, however, which house it
was nor when I had called there. Although the entire matter was indifferent
and of no consequence, I nevertheless occupied myself with it, and at last
learned in the usual roundabout way, by collecting the thoughts that
occurred to me in this connection, that one story above the floor occupied
by the firm B. and R. was the Pension Fischer, where I had frequently
visited patients. Then I remembered the building which sheltered both the
company and the pension.

I was still puzzled, however, as to the motive that entered into play in this
forgetting. I found nothing disagreeable in my memory concerning the firm
itself or the Pension Fischer, or the patients living there. I was also aware
that it could not deal with anything very painful, otherwise I hardly would
have been successful in tracing the thing forgotten in a roundabout way
without resorting to external aid, as happened in the preceding example.
Finally it occurred to me that a little before, while starting on my way to a
new patient, a gentleman whom I had difficulty in recalling greeted me in
the street. Some months previously I had seen this man in an apparently
serious condition and had made the diagnosis of general paresis, but later I
had learned of his recovery, consequently my judgment had been incorrect.
Was it not possible that we had in this case a remission, which one usually
finds in dementia paralytica? In that contingency my diagnosis would still
be justified. The influence emanating from this meeting caused me to forget
the neighbourhood of the B. and R. Company, and my interest to discover
the thing forgotten was transferred from this case of disputed diagnosis. But
the associative connection in this loose inner relation was effected by means
of a similarity of names: the man who recovered, contrary to expectation,
was also an officer of a large company that recommends patients to me.
And the physician with whom I had seen the supposed paretic bore the
name of Fischer, the name of the pension in the house which I had
forgotten.
(d) Mislaying a thing really has the same significance as forgetting where
we have placed it. Like most people delving in pamphlets and books, I am
well oriented about my desk, and can produce what I want with one lunge.
What appears to others as disorder has become for me perfect order. Why,
then, did I mislay a catalogue which was sent to me not long ago so that it
could not be found? What is more, it had been my intention to order a book
which I found announced therein, entitled Ueber die Sprache, because it
was written by an author whose spirited, vivacious style I like, whose
insight into psychology and whose knowledge of the cultural world I have
learned to appreciate. I believe that was just why I mislaid the catalogue. It
was my habit to lend the books of this author among my friends for their
enlightenment, and a few days before, on returning one, somebody had
said: “His style reminds me altogether of yours, and his way of thinking is
identical.” The speaker did not know what he was stirring up with this
remark. Years ago, when I was younger and in greater need of forming

alliances, I was told practically the same thing by an older colleague, to
whom I had recommended the writings of a familiar medical author. To put
it in his words, “It is absolutely your style and manner.” I was so influenced
by these remarks that I wrote a letter to this author with the object of
bringing about a closer relation, but a rather cool answer put me back “in
my place.” Perhaps still earlier discouraging experiences conceal
themselves behind this last one, for I did not find the mislaid catalogue.
Through this premonition I was actually prevented from ordering the
advertised book, although the disappearance of the catalogue formed no real
hindrance, as I remembered well both the name of the book and the author.
(e) Another case of mislaying merits our interest on account of the
conditions under which the mislaid object was rediscovered. A younger man
narrates as follows: “Several years ago there were some misunderstandings
between me and my wife. I found her too cold, and though I fully
appreciated her excellent qualities, we lived together without evincing any
tenderness for each other. One day on her return from a walk she gave me a
book which she had bought because she thought it would interest me. I
thanked her for this mark of ‘attention,’ promised to read the book, put it
away, and did not find it again. So months passed, during which I
occasionally remembered the lost book, and also tried in vain to find it.
“About six months later my beloved mother, who was not living with us,
became ill. My wife left home to nurse her mother-in-law. The patient’s
condition became serious and gave my wife the opportunity to show the
best side of herself. One evening I returned home full of enthusiasm over
what my wife had accomplished, and felt very grateful to her. I stepped to
my desk and, without definite intention but with the certainty of a
somnambulist, I opened a certain drawer, and in the very top of it I found
the long-missing, mislaid book.”
The following example of “misplacing” belongs to a type well known to
every psychoanalyst. I must add that the patient who experienced this
misplacing has himself found the solution of it.
This patient, whose psychoanalytic treatment had to be interrupted through
the summer vacation when he was in a state of resistance and ill-health, put
away his keys in the evening in their usual place, or so he thought. He then
remembered that he wished to take some things from his desk, where he

also had put the money which he needed on the journey. He was to depart
the next day, which was the last day of treatment and the date when the
doctor’s fee was due. But the keys had disappeared.
He began a thorough and systematic search through his small apartment. He
became more and more excited over it, but his search was unsuccessful. As
he recognized this “misplacement” as a symptomatic act—that is, as being
intentional—he aroused his servant in order to continue his search with the
help of an “unprejudiced” person. After another hour he gave up the search
and feared that he had lost the keys. The next morning he ordered new keys
from the desk factory, which were hurriedly made for him. Two
acquaintances who had been with him in a cab even recalled hearing
something fall to the ground as he stepped out of the cab, and he was
therefore convinced that the keys had slipped from his pocket. They were
found lying between a thick book and a thin pamphlet, the latter a work of
one of my pupils, which he wished to take along as reading matter for his
vacation; and they were so skilfully placed that no one would have
supposed that they were there. He himself was unable to replace the keys in
such a position as to render them invisible. The unconscious skill with
which an object is misplaced on account of secret but strong motives
reminds one of “somnambulistic sureness.” The motive was naturally ill-
humour over the interruption of the treatment and the secret rage over the
fact that he had to pay such a high fee when he felt so ill.
(f) Brill relates:[31] “A man was urged by his wife to attend a social function
in which he really took no interest. Yielding to his wife’s entreaties, he
began to take his dress-suit from the trunk when he suddenly thought of
shaving. After accomplishing this he returned to the trunk and found it
locked. Despite a long, earnest search the key could not be found. A
locksmith could not be found on Sunday evening, so that the couple had to
send their regrets. On having the trunk opened the next morning the lost key
was found within. The husband had absent-mindedly dropped the key into
the trunk and sprung the lock. He assured me that this was wholly
unintentional and unconscious, but we know that he did not wish to go to
this social affair. The mislaying of the key therefore lacked no motive.”
Ernest Jones noticed in himself that he was in the habit of mislaying his
pipe whenever he suffered from the effects of over-smoking. The pipe was

then found in some unusual place where it did not belong and which it
normally did not occupy.
If one looks over the cases of mislaying it will be difficult to assume that
mislaying is anything other than the result of an unconscious intention.
(g) In the summer of 1901 I once remarked to a friend with whom I was
then actively engaged in exchanging ideas on scientific questions: “These
neurotic problems can be solved only if we take the position of absolutely
accepting an original bi-sexuality in every individual.” To which he replied:
“I told you that two and a half years ago while we were taking an evening
walk in Br. At that time you wouldn’t listen to it.”
It is truly painful to be thus requested to renounce one’s originality. I could
neither recall such a conversation nor my friend’s revelation. One of us
must be mistaken; and according to the principle of the question cui
prodest? I must be the one. Indeed, in the course of the following weeks
everything came back to me just as my friend had recalled it. I myself
remembered that at that time I gave the answer: “I have not yet got so far,
and I do not care to discuss it.” But since this incident I have grown more
tolerant when I miss any mention of my name in medical literature in
connection with ideas for which I deserve credit.
It is scarcely accidental that the numerous examples of forgetting which
have been collected without any selection should require for their solution
the introduction of such painful themes as exposing of one’s wife; a
friendship that has turned into the opposite; a mistake in medical diagnosis;
enmity on account of similar pursuits, or the borrowing of somebody’s
ideas. I am rather inclined to believe that every person who will undertake
an inquiry into the motives underlying his forgetting will be able to fill up a
similar sample card of vexatious circumstances. The tendency to forget the
disagreeable seems to me to be quite general; the capacity for it is naturally
differently developed in different persons. Certain denials which we
encounter in medical practice can probably be ascribed to forgetting.[32] Our
conception of such forgetting confines the distinction between this and that
behaviour to purely psychologic relations, and permits us to see in both
forms of reaction the expression of the same motive. Of the numerous
examples of denials of unpleasant recollection which I have observed in
kinsmen of patients, one remains in my memory as especially singular.

A mother telling me of the childhood of her nervous son, now in his
puberty, made the statement that, like his brothers and sisters, he was
subject to bed-wetting throughout his childhood, a symptom which
certainly has some significance in a history of a neurotic patient. Some
weeks later, while seeking information regarding the treatment, I had
occasion to call her attention to signs of a constitutional morbid
predisposition in the young man, and at the same time referred to the bed-
wetting recounted in the anamnesis. To my surprise she contested this fact
concerning him, denying it as well for the other children, and asked me how
I could possibly know this. Finally I let her know that she herself had told
me a short time before what she had thus forgotten.[33]
One also finds abundant indications which show that even in healthy, not
neurotic, persons resistances are found against the memory of disagreeable
impressions and the idea of painful thoughts.[34] But the full significance of
this fact can be estimated only when we enter into the psychology of
neurotic persons. One is forced to make such elementary defensive striving
against ideas which can awaken painful feelings, a striving which can be
put side by side only with the flight-reflex in painful stimuli, as the main
pillar of the mechanism which carries the hysterical symptoms. One need
not offer any objection to the acceptance of such defensive tendency on the
ground that we frequently find it impossible to rid ourselves of painful
memories which cling to us, or to banish such painful emotions as remorse
and reproaches of conscience. No one maintains that this defensive
tendency invariably gains the upper hand, that in the play of psychic forces
it may not strike against factors which stir up the contrary feeling for other
purposes and bring it about in spite of it.
As the architectural principle of the psychic apparatus we may conjecture a
certain stratification or structure of instances deposited in strata. And it is
quite possible that this defensive tendency belongs to a lower psychic
instance, and is inhibited by higher instances. At all events, it speaks for the
existence and force of this defensive tendency, when we can trace it to
processes such as those found in our examples of forgetting. We see then
that something is forgotten for its own sake, and where this is not possible
the defensive tendency misses the target and causes something else to be
forgotten—something less significant, but which has fallen into associative
connection with the disagreeable material.

The views here developed, namely, that painful memories merge into
motivated forgetting with special ease, merits application in many spheres
where as yet it has found no, or scarcely any, recognition. Thus it seems to
me that it has not yet been strongly enough emphasized in the estimation of
testimony taken in court,[35] where the putting of a witness under oath
obviously leads us to place too great a trust on the purifying influence of his
psychic play of forces. It is universally admitted that in the origin of the
traditions and folklore of a people care must be taken to eliminate from
memory such a motive as would be painful to the national feeling. Perhaps
on closer investigation it may be possible to form a perfect analogy between
the manner of development of national traditions and infantile
reminiscences of the individual. The great Darwin has formulated a “golden
rule” for the scientific worker from his insight into this pain-motive of
forgetting.[36]
Almost exactly as in the forgetting of names, faulty recollections can also
appear in the forgetting of impressions, and when finding credence they
may be designated as delusions of memory. The memory disturbance in
pathologic cases (in paranoia it actually plays the rôle of a constituting
factor in the formation of delusions) has brought to light an extensive
literature in which there is no reference whatever to its being motivated. As
this theme also belongs to the psychology of the neuroses it goes beyond
our present treatment. Instead, I will give from my own experience a
curious example of memory disturbance showing clearly enough its
determination through unconscious repressed material and its connection
with this material.
While writing the latter chapters of my volume on the interpretation of
dreams, I happened to be in a summer resort without access to libraries and
reference books, so that I was compelled to introduce into the manuscript
all kinds of references and citations from memory. These I naturally
reserved for future correction. In the chapter on day-dreams I thought of the
distinguished figure of the poor book-keeper in Alphonse Daudet’s Nabab,
through whom the author probably described his own day-dreams. I
imagined that I distinctly remembered one fantasy of this man, whom I
called Mr. Jocelyn, which he hatched while walking the streets of Paris, and
I began to reproduce it from memory. This fantasy described how Mr.
Jocelyn boldly hurled himself at a runaway horse and brought it to a

standstill; how the carriage door opened and a great personage stepped from
the coupé, pressed Mr. Jocelyn’s hand and said: “You are my saviour—I
owe my life to you! What can I do for you?”
I assured myself that casual inaccuracies in the rendition of this fantasy
could readily be corrected at home on consulting the book. But when I
perused Nabab in order to compare it with my manuscript, I found to my
very great shame and consternation that there was nothing to suggest such a
dream by Mr. Jocelyn; indeed, the poor book-keeper did not even bear this
name—he was called Mr. Joyeuse.
This second error then furnished the key for the solution of the first
mistake, the faulty reminiscence. Joyeux, of which Joyeuse is the feminine
form, was the only possible word which would translate my own name
Freud into French. Whence, therefore, came this falsely remembered
fantasy which I had attributed to Daudet? It could only be a product of my
own, a day-dream which I myself had spun, and which did not become
conscious, or which was once conscious and had since been absolutely
forgotten. Perhaps I invented it myself in Paris, where frequently enough I
walked the streets alone, and full of longing for a helper and protector, until
Charcot took me into his circle. I had often met the author of Nabab in
Charcot’s house. But the provoking part of it all is the fact that there is
scarcely anything to which I am so hostile as the thought of being some
one’s protégé. What we see of this sort of thing in our country spoils all
desire for it, and my character is little suited to the rôle of a protected child.
I have always entertained an immense desire to “be the strong man myself.”
And it had to happen that I should be reminded of such a, to be sure, never
fulfilled, day-dream! Besides, this incident is a good example of how the
restraint relation to one’s ego, which breaks forth triumphantly in paranoia,
disturbs and entangles us in the objective grasp of things.
Another case of faulty recollection which can be satisfactorily explained
resembles the fausse reconnaissance to be discussed later. I related to one
of my patients, an ambitious and very capable man, that a young student
had recently gained admittance into the circle of my pupils by means of an
interesting work, Der Künstler, Versuch einer Sexualpsychologie. When, a
year and a quarter later, this work lay before me in print, my patient
maintained that he remembered with certainty having read somewhere,
perhaps in a bookseller’s advertisement, the announcement of the same

book even before I first mentioned it to him. He remembered that this
announcement came to his mind at that time, and he ascertained besides that
the author had changed the title, that it no longer read “Versuch” but
“Ansätze zu einer Sexualpsychologie.”
Careful inquiry of the author and comparison of all dates showed
conclusively that my patient was trying to recall the impossible. No notice
of this work had appeared anywhere before its publication, certainly not a
year and a quarter before it went to print. However, I neglected to seek a
solution for this false recollection until the same man brought about an
equally valuable renewal of it. He thought that he had recently noticed a
work on “agoraphobia” in the show window of a bookshop, and as he was
now looking for it in all available catalogues I was able to explain to him
why his effort must remain fruitless. The work on agoraphobia existed only
in his fantasy as an unconscious resolution to write such a book himself.
His ambition to emulate that young man, and through such a scientific work
to become one of my pupils, had led him to the first as well as to the second
false recollection. He also recalled later that the bookseller’s announcement
which had occasioned his false reminiscence dealt with a work entitled
Genesis, Das Gesetz der Zeugung (“Genesis, The Law of Generation”). But
the change in the title as mentioned by him was really instigated by me; I
recalled that I myself have perpetrated the same inaccuracy in the repetition
of the title by saying “Ansätze” in place of “Versuch.”

B. Forgetting of Intentions.

No other group of phenomena is better qualified to demonstrate the thesis
that lack of attention does not in itself suffice to explain faulty acts as the
forgetting of intentions. An intention is an impulse for an action which has
already found approbation, but whose execution is postponed for a suitable
occasion. Now, in the interval thus created sufficient change may take place
in the motive to prevent the intention from coming to execution. It is not,
however, forgotten, it is simply revised and omitted.
We are naturally not in the habit of explaining the forgetting of intentions
which we daily experience in every possible situation as being due to a
recent change in the adjustment of motives. We generally leave it
unexplained, or we seek a psychologic explanation in the assumption that at

the time of execution the required attention for the action, which was an
indispensable condition for the occurrence of the intention, and was then at
the disposal of the same action, no longer exists. Observation of our normal
behaviour towards intentions urges us to reject this tentative explanation as
arbitrary. If I resolve in the morning to carry out a certain intention in the
evening, I may be reminded of it several times in the course of the day, but
it is not at all necessary that it should become conscious throughout the day.
As the time for its execution approaches it suddenly occurs to me and
induces me to make the necessary preparation for the intended action. If I
go walking and take a letter with me to be posted, it is not at all necessary
that I, as a normal not nervous individual, should carry it in my hand and
continually look for a letter-box. As a matter of fact I am accustomed to put
it in my pocket and give my thoughts free rein on my way, feeling confident
that the first letter-box will attract my attention and cause me to put my
hand in my pocket and draw out the letter.
This normal behaviour in a formed intention corresponds perfectly with the
experimentally produced conduct of persons who are under a so-called
“post-hypnotic suggestion” to perform something after a certain time.[37]
We are accustomed to describe the phenomenon in the following manner:
the suggested intention slumbers in the person concerned until the time for
its execution approaches. Then it awakes and excites the action.
In two positions of life even the layman is cognizant of the fact that
forgetting referring to intended purposes can in no wise claim consideration
as an elementary phenomenon no further reducible, but realizes that it
ultimately depends on unadmitted motives. I refer to affairs of love and
military service. A lover who is late at the appointed place will vainly tell
his sweetheart that unfortunately he has entirely forgotten their rendezvous.
She will not hesitate to answer him: “A year ago you would not have
forgotten. Evidently you no longer care for me.” Even if he should grasp the
above cited psychologic explanation, and should wish to excuse his
forgetting on the plea of important business, he would only elicit the answer
from the woman, who has become as keen-sighted as the physician in the
psychoanalytic treatment, “How remarkable that such business disturbances
did not occur before!” Of course the woman does not wish to deny the
possibility of forgetting; but she believes, and not without reason, that

practically the same inference of a certain unwillingness may be drawn
from the unintentional forgetting as from a conscious subterfuge.
Similarly, in military service no distinction is recognized between an
omission resulting from forgetting and one in consequence of intentional
neglect. And rightly so. The soldier dares forget nothing that military
service demands of him. If he forgets in spite of this, even when he is
acquainted with the demands, then it is due to the fact that the motives
which urge the fulfilment of the military exactions are opposed by contrary
motives. Thus the one year’s volunteer[38] who at inspection pleads
forgetting as an excuse for not having polished his buttons is sure to be
punished. But this punishment is small in comparison to the one he courts if
he admits to his superiors that the motive for his negligence is because “this
miserable menial service is altogether disgusting to me.” Owing to this
saving of punishment for economic reasons, as it were, he makes use of
forgetting as an excuse, or it comes about as a compromise.
The service of women (as well as the military service of the State) demands
that nothing relating to that service be subject to forgetting. Thus it but
suggests that forgetting is permissible in unimportant matters, but in
weighty matters its occurrence is an indication that one wishes to treat
weighty matters as unimportant: that is, that their importance is disputed.[39]
The view-point of psychic validity is in fact not to be contested here. No
person forgets to carry out actions that seem important to himself without
exposing himself to the suspicion of being a sufferer from mental weakness.
Our investigations therefore can extend only to the forgetting of more or
less secondary intentions, for no intention do we deem absolutely
indifferent, otherwise it would certainly never have been formed.
As in the preceding functional disturbances, I have collected the cases of
neglect through forgetting which I have observed in myself, and
endeavoured to explain them. I have found that they could invariably be
traced to some interference of unknown and unadmitted motives—or, as
may be said, they were due to a counter-will. In a number of these cases I
found myself in a position similar to that of being in some distasteful
service: I was under a constraint to which I had not entirely resigned
myself, so that I showed my protest in the form of forgetting. This accounts
for the fact that I am particularly prone to forget to send congratulations on
such occasions as birthdays, jubilees, wedding celebrations, and promotions

to higher rank. I continually make new resolutions, but I am more than ever
convinced that I shall not succeed. I am now on the point of giving it up
altogether, and to admit consciously the striving motives. In a period of
transition, I told a friend who asked me to send a congratulatory telegram
for him, at a certain time when I was to send one myself, that I would
probably forget both. It was not surprising that the prophecy came true. It is
undoubtedly due to painful experiences in life that I am unable to manifest
sympathy where this manifestation must necessarily appear exaggerated, for
the small amount of my feeling does not admit the corresponding
expression. Since I have learned that I often mistook the pretended
sympathy of others for real, I am in rebellion against the conventions of
expressing sympathy, the social expediency of which I naturally
acknowledge. Condolences in cases of death are excepted from this double
treatment; once I determine to send them I do not neglect them. Where my
emotional participation has nothing more to do with social duty, its
expression is never inhibited by forgetting.
Cases in which we forget to carry out actions which we have promised to do
as a favour for others can similarly be explained as antagonism to
conventional duty and as an unfavourable inward opinion. Here it regularly
proves correct, inasmuch as the only person appealed to believes in the
excusing power of forgetfulness, while the one requesting the favour has no
doubt about the right answer: he has no interest in this matter, otherwise he
would not have forgotten it.
There are some who are noted as generally forgetful, and we excuse their
lapses in the same manner as we excuse those who are short-sighted when
they do not greet us in the street.[40] Such persons forget all small promises
which they have made; they leave unexecuted all orders which they have
received; they prove themselves unreliable in little things; and at the same
time demand that we shall not take these slight offences amiss—that is, they
do not want us to attribute these failings to personal characteristics but to
refer them to an organic peculiarity.[41] I am not one of these people myself,
and have had no opportunity to analyse the actions of such a person in order
to discover from the selection of forgetting the motive underlying the same.
I cannot forego, however, the conjecture per analogiam, that here the
motive is an unusual large amount of unavowed disregard for others which
exploits the constitutional factor for its purpose.[42]

In other cases the motives for forgetting are less easy to discover, and when
found excite greater astonishment. Thus, in former years I observed that of
a great number of professional calls I only forgot those that I was to make
on patients whom I treated gratis or on colleagues. The mortification caused
by this discovery led me to the habit of noting every morning the calls of
the day in a form of resolution. I do not know if other physicians have come
to the same practice by a similar road. Thus we get an idea of what causes
the so-called neurasthenic to make a memorandum of the communications
he wishes to make to the doctor. He apparently lacks confidence in the
reproductive capacity of his memory. This is true, but the scene usually
proceeds in this manner. The patient has recounted his various complaints
and inquiries at considerable length. After he has finished he pauses for a
moment, then he pulls out the memorandum and says apologetically, “I
have made some notes because I cannot remember anything.” As a rule he
finds nothing new on the memorandum. He repeats each point and answers
it himself: “Yes, I have already asked about that.” By means of the
memorandum he probably only demonstrates one of his symptoms, the
frequency with which his resolutions are disturbed through the interference
of obscure motives.
I am touching, moreover, on an affliction to which even most of my healthy
acquaintances are subject, when I admit that especially in former years I
had the habit of easily forgetting for a long time to return borrowed books,
also that it very often happened that I deferred payments through
forgetfulness. One morning not long ago I left the tobacco-shop where I
make my daily purchase of cigars without paying. It was a most harmless
omission, as I am known there and could therefore expect to be reminded of
my debt the next morning. But this slight neglect, the attempt to contract a
debt, was surely not unconnected with reflections concerning the budget
with which I had occupied myself throughout the preceding day. Even
among the so-called respectable people one can readily demonstrate a
double behaviour when it concerns the theme of money and possession. The
primitive greed of the suckling which wishes to seize every object (in order
to put it in its mouth) has generally been only imperfectly subdued through
culture and training.[43]
I fear that in all the examples thus far given I have grown quite
commonplace. But it can be only a pleasure to me if I happen upon familiar

matters which every one understands, for my main object is to collect
everyday material and utilize it scientifically. I cannot conceive why
wisdom, which is, so to speak, the sediment of everyday experiences,
should be denied admission among the acquisitions of knowledge. For it is
not the diversity of objects but the stricter method of verification and the
striving for far-reaching connections which make up the essential character
of scientific work.
We have invariably found that intentions of some importance are forgotten
when obscure motives arise to disturb them. In still less important
intentions we find a second mechanism of forgetting. Here a counter-will
becomes transferred to the resolution from something else after an external
association has been formed between the latter and the content of the
resolution. The following example reported by Brill illustrates this: “A
patient found that she had suddenly become very negligent in her
correspondence. She was naturally punctual and took pleasure in letter-
writing, but for the last few weeks she simply could not bring herself to
write a letter without exerting the greatest amount of effort. The explanation
was quite simple. Some weeks before she had received an important letter
calling for a categorical answer. She was undecided what to say, and
therefore did not answer it at all. This indecision in the form of inhibition
was unconsciously transferred to other letters and caused the inhibition
against letter-writing in general.”
Direct counter-will and more remote motivation are found together in the
following example of delaying: I had written a short treatise on the dream
for the series Grenzfragen des Nerven- und Seelenlebens, in which I gave
an abstract of my book, The Interpretation of Dreams.[44] Bergmann, the
publisher, had sent me the proof sheets and asked for a speedy return of the
same as he wished to issue the pamphlet before Christmas. I corrected the
sheets the same night, and placed them on my desk in order to take them to
the post office the next morning. In the morning I forgot all about it, and
only thought of it in the afternoon at the sight of the paper cover on my
desk. In the same way I forgot the proofs that evening and the following
morning, and until the afternoon of the second day, when I quickly took
them to a letter-box, wondering what might be the basis of this
procrastination. Obviously I did not want to send them off, although I could
find no explanation for such an attitude.

After posting the letter I entered the shop of my Vienna publisher, who put
out my Interpretation of Dreams. I left a few orders; then, as if impelled by
a sudden thought, said, “You undoubtedly know that I have written the
‘Dream’ book a second time?” “Ah!” he exclaimed, “then I must ask you to
——” “Calm yourself,” I interposed; “it is only a short treatise for the
Löwenfeld-Kurella collection.” But still he was not satisfied; he feared that
the abstract would hurt the sale of the book. I disagreed with him, and
finally asked: “If I had come to you before, would you have objected to the
publication?” “No; under no circumstances,” he answered.
Personally I believe I acted within my full rights and did nothing contrary to
the general practice; still it seems certain to me that a thought similar to that
entertained by the publisher was the motive for my procrastination in
dispatching the proof sheets.
This reflection leads back to a former occasion when another publisher
raised some difficulties because I was obliged to take out several pages of
the text from an earlier work on cerebral infantile paralysis, and put them
unchanged into a work on the same theme in Nothnagel’s handbook. There
again the reproach received no recognition; that time also I had loyally
informed my first publisher (the same who published The Interpretation of
Dreams) of my intention.
However, if this series of recollections is followed back still farther it brings
to light a still earlier occasion relating to a translation from the French, in
which I really violated the property rights that should be considered in a
publication. I had added notes to the text without asking the author’s
permission, and some years later I had cause to think that the author was
dissatisfied with this arbitrary action.
There is a proverb which indicates the popular knowledge that the
forgetting of intentions is not accidental. It says: “What one forgets once he
will often forget again.”
Indeed, we sometimes cannot help feeling that no matter what may be said
about forgetting and faulty actions, the whole subject is already known to
everybody as something self-evident. It is strange enough that it is still
necessary to push before consciousness such well-known facts. How often I
have heard people remark: “Please do not ask me to do this, I shall surely
forget it.” The coming true of this prophecy later is surely nothing

mysterious in itself. He who speaks thus perceives the inner resolution not
to carry out the request, and only hesitates to acknowledge it to himself.
Much light is thrown, moreover, on the forgetting of resolutions through
something which could be designated as “forming false resolutions.” I had
once promised a young author to write a review of his short work, but on
account of inner resistances, not unknown to me, I promised him that it
would be done the same evening. I really had serious intentions of doing so,
but I had forgotten that I had set aside that evening for the preparation of an
expert testimony that could not be deferred. After I thus recognized my
resolution as false, I gave up the struggle against my resistances and refused
the author’s request.

VIII
ERRONEOUSLY CARRIED-OUT ACTIONS

I shall give another passage from the above-mentioned work of Meringer
and Mayer (p. 98):
“Lapses in speech do not stand entirely alone. They resemble the errors
which often occur in our other activities and are quite foolishly termed
‘forgetfulness.’”
I am therefore in no way the first to presume that there is a sense and
purpose behind the slight functional disturbances of the daily life of healthy
people.[45]
If the lapse in speech, which is without doubt a motor function, admits of
such a conception, it is quite natural to transfer to the lapses of our other
motor functions the same expectation. I have here formed two groups of
cases; all these cases in which the faulty effect seems to be the essential
element—that is, the deviation from the intention—I denote as erroneously
carried-out actions (Vergreifen); the others, in which the entire action
appears rather inexpedient, I call “symptomatic and chance actions.” But no
distinct line of demarcation can be formed; indeed, we are forced to
conclude that all divisions used in this treatise are of only descriptive
significance and contradict the inner unity of the sphere of manifestation.
The psychologic understanding of erroneous actions apparently gains little
in clearness when we place it under the head of “ataxia,” and especially
under “cortical ataxia.” Let us rather try to trace the individual examples to
their proper determinants. To do this I shall again resort to personal
observations, the opportunities for which I could not very frequently find in
myself.
(a) In former years, when I made more calls at the homes of patients than I
do at present, it often happened, when I stood before a door where I should
have knocked or rung the bell, that I would pull the key of my own house
from my pocket, only to replace it, quite abashed. When I investigated in

what patients’ homes this occurred, I had to admit that the faulty action—
taking out my key instead of ringing the bell—signified paying a certain
tribute to the house where the error occurred. It was equivalent to the
thought “Here I feel at home,” as it happened only where I possessed the
patient’s regard. (Naturally, I never rang my own door-bell.)
The faulty action was therefore a symbolic representation of a definite
thought which was not accepted consciously as serious; for in reality the
neurologist is well aware that the patient seeks him only so long as he
expects to be benefited by him, and that his own excessively warm interest
for his patient is evinced only as a means of psychic treatment.
An almost identical repetition of my experience is described by A. Maeder
(“Contrib. à la psychopathologie de la vie quotidienne,” Arch. de Psychol.,
vi., 1906): “Il est arrivé à chacun de sortir son trousseau, en arrivant à la
porte d’un ami particulièrement cher, de se surprendre pour ainsi dire, en
train d’ouvrir avec sa clé comme chez soi. C’est un retard, puisqu’il faut
sonner malgré tout, mais c’est une preuve qu’on se sent—ou qu’on voudrait
se sentir—comme chez soi, auprès de cet ami.”
Jones speaks as follows about the use of keys:[46] “The use of keys is a
fertile source of occurrences of this kind, of which two examples may be
given. If I am disturbed in the midst of some engrossing work at home by
having to go to the hospital to carry out some routine work, I am very apt to
find myself trying to open the door of my laboratory there with the key of
my desk at home, although the two keys are quite unlike each other. The
mistake unconsciously demonstrates where I would rather be at the
moment.
“Some years ago I was acting in a subordinate position at a certain
institution, the front door of which was kept locked, so that it was necessary
to ring for admission. On several occasions I found myself making serious
attempts to open the door with my house key. Each one of the permanent
visiting staff, of which I aspired to be a member, was provided with a key to
avoid the trouble of having to wait at the door. My mistake thus expressed
the desire to be on a similar footing and to be quite ‘at home’ there.”
A similar experience is reported by Dr. Hans Sachs of Vienna: “I always
carry two keys with me, one for the door of my office and one for my
residence. They are not by any means easily interchanged, as the office key

is at least three times as big as my house key. Besides, I carry the first in my
trouser pocket and the other in my vest pocket. Yet it often happened that I
noticed on reaching the door that while ascending the stairs I had taken out
the wrong key. I decided to undertake a statistical examination; as I was
daily in about the same emotional state when I stood before both doors, I
thought that the interchanging of the two keys must show a regular
tendency, if they were differently determined psychically. Observation of
later occurrences showed that I regularly took out my house key before the
office door. Only on one occasion was this reversed: I came home tired,
knowing that I would find there a guest. I made an attempt to unlock the
door with the, naturally too big, office key.”
(b) At a certain time twice a day for six years I was accustomed to wait for
admission before a door in the second story of the same house, and during
this long period of time it happened twice (within a short interval) that I
climbed a story higher. On the first of these occasions I was in an ambitious
day-dream, which allowed me to “mount always higher and higher.” In fact,
at that time I heard the door in question open as I put my foot on the first
step of the third flight. On the other occasion I again went too far
“engrossed in thought.” As soon as I became aware of it, I turned back and
sought to snatch the dominating fantasy; I found that I was irritated over a
criticism of my works, in which the reproach was made that I “always went
too far,” which I replaced by the less respectful expression “climbed too
high.”
(c) For many years a reflex hammer and a tuning-fork lay side by side on
my desk. One day I hurried off at the close of my office hours, as I wished
to catch a certain train, and, despite broad daylight, put the tuning-fork in
my coat pocket in place of the reflex hammer. My attention was called to
the mistake through the weight of the object drawing down my pocket. Any
one unaccustomed to reflect on such slight occurrences would without
hesitation explain the faulty action by the hurry of the moment, and excuse
it. In spite of that, I preferred to ask myself why I took the tuning-fork
instead of the hammer. The haste could just as well have been a motive for
carrying out the action properly in order not to waste time over the
correction.
“Who last grasped the tuning-fork?” was the question which immediately
flashed through my mind. It happened that only a few days ago an idiotic

child, whose attention to sensory impressions I was testing, had been so
fascinated by the tuning-fork that I found it difficult to tear it away from
him. Could it mean, therefore, that I was an idiot? To be sure, so it would
seem, as the next thought which associated itself with the hammer was
chamer (Hebrew for “ass”).
But what was the meaning of this abusive language? We must here inquire
into the situation. I hurried to a consultation at a place on the Western
railroad to see a patient who, according to the anamnesis which I received
by letter, had fallen from a balcony some months before, and since then had
been unable to walk. The physician who invited me wrote that he was still
unable to say whether he was dealing with a spinal injury or traumatic
neurosis—hysteria. That was what I was to decide. This could therefore be
a reminder to be particularly careful in this delicate differential diagnosis.
As it is, my colleagues think that hysteria is diagnosed far too carelessly
where more serious matters are concerned. But the abuse is not yet justified.
Yes, the next association was that the small railroad station is the same
place in which, some years previous, I saw a young man who, after a certain
emotional experience, could not walk properly. At that time I diagnosed his
malady as hysteria, and later put him under psychic treatment; but it
afterward turned out that my diagnosis was neither incorrect nor correct. A
large number of the patient’s symptoms were hysterical, and they promptly
disappeared in the course of treatment. But back of these there was a visible
remnant that could not be reached by therapy, and could be referred only to
a multiple sclerosis. Those who saw the patient after me had no difficulty in
recognizing the organic affection. I could scarcely have acted or judged
differently, still the impression was that of a serious mistake; the promise of
a cure which I had given him could naturally not be kept.
The mistake in grasping the tuning-fork instead of the hammer could
therefore be translated into the following words: “You fool, you ass, get
yourself together this time, and be careful not to diagnose again a case of
hysteria where there is an incurable disease, as you did in this place years
ago in the case of the poor man!” And fortunately for this little analysis,
even if unfortunately for my mood, this same man, now having a very
spastic gait, had been to my office a few days before, one day after the
examination of the idiotic child.

We observe that this time it is the voice of self-criticism which makes itself
perceptible through the mistake in grasping. The erroneously carried-out
action is specially suited to express self-reproach. The present mistake
attempts to represent the mistake which was committed elsewhere.
(d) It is quite obvious that grasping the wrong thing may also serve a whole
series of other obscure purposes. Here is a first example: It is very seldom
that I break anything. I am not particularly dexterous, but by virtue of the
anatomic integrity of my nervous and muscular apparatus there are
apparently no grounds in me for such awkward movements with
undesirable results. I can recall no object in my home the counterpart of
which I have ever broken. Owing to the narrowness of my study it has often
been necessary for me to work in the most uncomfortable position among
my numerous antique clay and stone objects, of which I have a small
collection. So much is this true that onlookers have expressed fear lest I
topple down something and shatter it. But it never happened. Then why did
I brush to the floor the cover of my simple inkwell so that it broke into
pieces?
My inkstand is made of a flat piece of marble which is hollowed out for the
reception of the glass inkwell; the inkwell has a marble cover with a knob
of the same stone. A circle of bronze statuettes with small terra-cotta figures
is set behind this inkstand. I seated myself at the desk to write, I made a
remarkably awkward outward movement with the hand holding the pen-
holder, and so swept the cover of the inkstand, which already lay on the
desk, to the floor.
It is not difficult to find the explanation. Some hours before my sister had
been in the room to look at some of my new acquisitions. She found them
very pretty, and then remarked: “Now the desk really looks very well, only
the inkstand does not match. You must get a prettier one.” I accompanied
my sister out and did not return for several hours. But then, as it seems, I
performed the execution of the condemned inkstand.
Did I perhaps conclude from my sister’s words that she intended to present
me with a prettier inkstand on the next festive occasion, and did I shatter the
unsightly old one in order to force her to carry out her signified intention? If
that be so, then my swinging motion was only apparently awkward; in

reality it was most skilful and designed, as it understood how to avoid all
the valuable objects located near it.
I actually believe that we must accept this explanation for a whole series of
seemingly accidental awkward movements. It is true that on the surface
these seem to show something violent and irregular, similar to spastic-
ataxic movements, but on examination they seem to be dominated by some
intention, and they accomplish their aim with a certainty that cannot be
generally credited to conscious arbitrary motions. In both characteristics,
the force as well as the sure aim, they show besides a resemblance to the
motor manifestations of the hysterical neurosis, and in part also to the motor
accomplishments of somnambulism, which here as well as there point to the
same unfamiliar modification of the functions of innervation.
In latter years, since I have been collecting such observations, it has
happened several times that I have shattered and broken objects of some
value, but the examination of these cases convinced me that it was never the
result of accident or of my unintentional awkwardness. Thus, one morning
while in my bath-robe and straw slippers I followed a sudden impulse as I
passed a room, and hurled a slipper from my foot against the wall so that it
brought down a beautiful little marble Venus from its bracket. As it fell to
pieces I recited quite unmoved the following verse from Busch:—

“Ach! Die Venus ist perdü—[47]
Klickeradoms!—von Medici!”

This crazy action and my calmness at the sight of the damage is explained
in the then existing situation. We had a very sick person in the family, of
whose recovery I had personally despaired. That morning I had been
informed that there was a great improvement; I know that I had said to
myself, “After all she will live.” My attack of destructive madness served
therefore as the expression of a grateful feeling toward fate, and afforded
me the opportunity of performing an “act of sacrifice,” just as if I had
vowed, “If she gets well I will give this or that as a sacrifice.” That I chose
the Venus of Medici as this sacrifice was only gallant homage to the
convalescent. But even to-day it is still incomprehensible to me that I
decided so quickly, aimed so accurately, and struck no other object in close
proximity.

Another breaking, in which I utilized a pen-holder falling from my hand,
also signified a sacrifice, but this time it was a pious offering to avert some
evil. I had once allowed myself to reproach a true and worthy friend for no
other reason than certain manifestations which I interpreted from his
unconscious activity. He took it amiss and wrote me a letter in which he
bade me not to treat my friends by psychoanalysis. I had to admit that he
was right and appeased him with my answer. While writing this letter I had
before me my latest acquisition—a small, handsome glazed Egyptian
figure. I broke it in the manner mentioned, and then immediately knew that
I had caused this mischief to avert a greater one. Luckily, both the
friendship and the figure could be so cemented that the break would not be
noticed.
A third case of breaking had a less serious connection; it was only a
disguised “execution,” to use an expression from Th. Vischer’s Auch Einer,
of an object that no longer suited my taste. For quite a while I had carried a
cane with a silver handle; through no fault of mine the thin silver plate was
once damaged and poorly repaired. Soon after the cane was returned I
mirthfully used the handle to angle for the leg of one of my children. In that
way it naturally broke, and I got rid of it.
The indifference with which we accept the resulting damage in all these
cases may certainly be taken as evidence for the existence of an
unconscious purpose in their execution.
(e) As can sometimes be demonstrated by analysis, the dropping of objects
or the overturning and breaking of the same are very frequently utilized as
the expression of unconscious streams of thought, but more often they serve
to represent the superstitious or odd significances connected therewith in
popular sayings. The meanings attached to the spilling of salt, the
overturning of a wineglass, the sticking of a knife dropped to the floor, and
so on, are well known. I shall discuss later the right to investigate such
superstitious interpretations; here I shall simply observe that the individual
awkward acts do not by any means always have the same meaning, but,
depending on the circumstances, they serve to represent now this or that
purpose.
Recently we passed through a period in my house during which an unusual
number of glass and china dishes were broken. I myself largely contributed

to this damage. This little endemic was readily explained by the fact that it
preceded the public betrothal of my eldest daughter. On such festivities it is
customary to break some dishes and utter at the same time some felicitating
expression. This custom may signify a sacrifice or express any other
symbolic sense.
When servants destroy fragile objects through dropping them, we certainly
do not think in the first place of a psychologic motive for it; still, some
obscure motives are not improbable even here. Nothing lies farther from the
uneducated than the appreciation of art and works of art. Our servants are
dominated by a foolish hostility against these productions, especially when
the objects, whose worth they do not realize, become a source of a great
deal of work for them. On the other hand, persons of the same education
and origin employed in scientific institutions often distinguish themselves
by great dexterity and reliability in the handling of delicate objects, as soon
as they begin to identify themselves with their masters and consider
themselves an essential part of the staff.
I shall here add the report of a young mechanical engineer, which gives
some insight into the mechanism of damaging things.
“Some time ago I worked with many others in the laboratory of the High
School on a series of complicated experiments on the subject of elasticity. It
was a work that we undertook of our own volition, but it turned out that it
took up more of our time than we expected. One day, while going to the
laboratory with F., he complained of losing so much time, especially on this
day, when he had so many other things to do at home. I could only agree
with him, and he added half jokingly, alluding to an incident of the previous
week: ‘Let us hope that the machine will refuse to work, so that we can
interrupt the experiment and go home earlier.’
“In arranging the work, it happened that F. was assigned to the regulation of
the pressure valve, that is, it was his duty to carefully open the valve and let
the fluid under pressure flow from the accumulator into the cylinder of the
hydraulic press. The leader of the experiment stood at the manometer and
called a loud ‘Stop!’ when the maximum pressure was reached. At this
command F. grasped the valve and turned it with all his force—to the left
(all valves, without any exception, are closed to the right). This caused a
sudden full pressure in the accumulator of the press, and as there was no

outlet, the connecting pipe burst. This was quite a trifling accident to the
machine, but enough to force us to stop our work for the day and go home.
“It is characteristic, moreover, that some time later, on discussing this
occurrence, my friend F. could not recall the remark that I positively
remember his having made.”
Similarly, to fall, to make a misstep, or to slip need not always be
interpreted as an entirely accidental miscarriage of a motor action. The
linguistic double meaning of these expressions points to diverse hidden
fantasies, which may present themselves through the giving up of bodily
equilibrium. I recall a number of lighter nervous ailments in women and
girls which made their appearance after falling without injury, and which
were conceived as traumatic hysteria as a result of the shock of the fall. At
that time I already entertained the impression that these conditions had a
different connection, that the fall was already a preparation of the neurosis,
and an expression of the same unconscious fantasies of sexual content
which may be taken as the moving forces behind the symptoms. Was not
this very thing meant in the proverb which says, “When a maiden falls, she
falls on her back?”
We can also add to these mistakes the case of one who gives a beggar a gold
piece in place of a copper or a silver coin. The solution of such mishandling
is simple: it is an act of sacrifice designed to mollify fate, to avert evil, and
so on. If we hear a tender mother or aunt express concern regarding the
health of a child, directly before taking a walk during which she displays
her charity, contrary to her usual habit, we can no longer doubt the sense of
this apparently undesirable accident. In this manner our faulty acts make
possible the practice of all those pious and superstitious customs which
must shun the light of consciousness, because of the strivings against them
of our unbelieving reason.
(f) That accidental actions are really intentional will find no greater
credence in any other sphere than in sexual activity, where the border
between the intention and accident hardly seems discernible. That an
apparently clumsy movement may be utilized in a most refined way for
sexual purposes I can verify by a nice example from my own experience. In
a friend’s house I met a young girl visitor who excited in me a feeling of
fondness which I had long believed extinct, thus putting me in a jovial,

loquacious, and complaisant mood. At that time I endeavoured to find out
how this came about, as a year before this same girl made no impression on
me.
As the girl’s uncle, a very old man, entered the room, we both jumped to
our feet to bring him a chair which stood in the corner. She was more agile
than I and also nearer the object, so that she was the first to take possession
of the chair. She carried it with its back to her, holding both hands on the
edge of the seat. As I got there later and did not give up the claim to
carrying the chair, I suddenly stood directly back of her, and with both my
arms was embracing her from behind, and for a moment my hands touched
her lap. I naturally solved the situation as quickly as it came about. Nor did
it occur to anybody how dexterously I had taken advantage of this awkward
movement.
Occasionally I have had to admit to myself that the annoying, awkward
stepping aside on the street, whereby for some seconds one steps here and
there, yet always in the same direction as the other person, until finally both
stop facing each other, that this “barring one’s way” repeats an ill-
mannered, provoking conduct of earlier times and conceals erotic purposes
under the mask of awkwardness. From my psychoanalysis of neurotics I
know that the so-called naïveté of young people and children is frequently
only such a mask, employed in order that the subject may say or do the
indecent without restraint.
W. Stekel has reported similar observations in regard to himself: “I entered
a house and offered my right hand to the hostess. In a most remarkable way
I thereby loosened the bow which held together her loose morning-gown. I
was conscious of no dishonourable intent, still I executed this awkward
movement with the agility of a juggler.”
(g) The effects which result from mistakes of normal persons are, as a rule,
of a most harmless nature. Just for this reason it would be particularly
interesting to find out whether mistakes of considerable importance, which
could be followed by serious results, as, for example, those of physicians or
druggists, fall within the range of our point of view.
As I am seldom in a position to deal with active medical matters, I can only
report one mistake from my own experience. I treated a very old woman,
whom I visited twice daily for several years. My medical activities were

limited to two acts, which I performed during my morning visits: I dropped
a few drops of an eye lotion into her eyes and gave her a hypodermic
injection of morphine. I prepared regularly two bottles—a blue one,
containing the eye lotion, and a white one, containing the morphine
solution. While performing these duties my thoughts were mostly occupied
with something else, for they had been repeated so often that the attention
acted as if free. One morning I noticed that the automaton worked wrong; I
had put the dropper into the white instead of into the blue bottle, and had
dropped into the eyes the morphine instead of the lotion. I was greatly
frightened, but then calmed myself through the reflection that a few drops
of a two per cent. solution of morphine would not likely do any harm even
if left in the conjunctival sac. The cause of the fright manifestly belonged
elsewhere.
In attempting to analyse the slight mistake I first thought of the phrase, “to
seize the old woman by mistake,” which pointed out the short way to the
solution. I had been impressed by a dream which a young man had told me
the previous evening, the contents of which could be explained only on the
basis of sexual intercourse with his own mother.[48] The strangeness of the
fact that the Œdipus legend takes no offence at the age of Queen Jocasta
seemed to me to agree with the assumption that in being in love with one’s
mother we never deal with the present personality, but with her youthful
memory picture carried over from our childhood. Such incongruities always
show themselves where one fantasy fluctuating between two periods is
made conscious, and is then bound to one definite period.
Deep in thoughts of this kind, I came to my patient of over ninety; I must
have been well on the way to grasp the universal character of the Œdipus
fable as the correlation of the fate which the oracle pronounces, for I made a
blunder in reference to or on the old woman. Here, again, the mistake was
harmless; of the two possible errors, taking the morphine solution for the
eye, or the eye lotion for the injection, I chose the one by far the least
harmful. The question still remains open whether in mistakes in handling
things which may cause serious harm we can assume an unconscious
intention as in the cases here discussed.
The following case from Brill’s experience corroborates the assumption that
even serious mistakes are determined by unconscious intentions: “A
physician received a telegram informing him that his aged uncle was very

sick. In spite of important family affairs at home he at once repaired to that
distant town because his uncle was really his father, who had cared for him
since he was one and a half years old, when his own father had died. On
reaching there he found his uncle suffering from pneumonia, and, as the old
man was an octogenarian, the doctors held out no hope for his recovery. ‘It
was simply a question of a day or two,’ was the local doctor’s verdict.
Although a prominent physician in a big city, he refused to co-operate in the
treatment, as he found that the case was properly managed by the local
doctor, and he could not suggest anything to improve matters.
“Since death was daily expected, he decided to remain to the end. He
waited a few days, but the sick man struggled hard, and although there was
no question of any recovery, because of the many new complications which
had arisen, death seemed to be deferred for a while. One night before
retiring he went into the sick-room and took his uncle’s pulse. As it was
quite weak, he decided not to wait for the doctor, and administered a
hypodermic injection. The patient grew rapidly worse and died within a few
hours. There was something strange in the last symptoms, and on later
attempting to replace the tube of hypodermic tablets into the case, he found
to his consternation that he had taken out the wrong tube, and instead of a
small dose of digitalis he had given a large dose of hyoscine.
“This case was related to me by the doctor after he read my paper on the
Œdipus Complex.[49] We agreed that this mistake was determined not only
by his impatience to get home to his sick child, but also by an old
resentment and unconscious hostility toward his uncle (father).”
It is known that in the more serious cases of psychoneuroses one sometimes
finds self-mutilations as symptoms of the disease. That the psychic conflict
may end in suicide can never be excluded in these cases. Thus I know from
experience, which some day I shall support with convincing examples, that
many apparently accidental injuries happening to such patients are really
self-inflicted. This is brought about by the fact that there is a constantly
lurking tendency to self-punishment, usually expressing itself in self-
reproach, or contributing to the formation of a symptom, which skilfully
makes use of an external situation. The required external situation may
accidentally present itself or the punishment tendency may assist it until the
way is open for the desired injurious effect.

Such occurrences are by no means rare even in cases of moderate severity,
and they betray the portion of unconscious intention through a series of
special features—for example, through the striking presence of mind which
the patients show in the pretended accidents.[50]
I will report exhaustively one in place of many such examples from my
professional experience. A young woman broke her leg below the knee in a
carriage accident so that she was bedridden for weeks. The striking part of it
was the lack of any manifestation of pain and the calmness with which she
bore her misfortune. This calamity ushered in a long and serious neurotic
illness, from which she was finally cured by psychotherapy. During the
treatment I discovered the circumstances surrounding the accident, as well
as certain impressions which preceded it. The young woman with her
jealous husband spent some time on the farm of her married sister, in
company with her numerous other brothers and sisters with their wives and
husbands. One evening she gave an exhibition of one of her talents before
this intimate circle; she danced artistically the “cancan,” to the great delight
of her relatives, but to the great annoyance of her husband, who afterward
whispered to her, “Again you have behaved like a prostitute.” The words
took effect; we will leave it undecided whether it was just on account of the
dance. That night she was restless in her sleep, and the next forenoon she
decided to go out driving. She chose the horses herself, refusing one team
and demanding another. Her youngest sister wished to have her baby with
its nurse accompany her, but she opposed this vehemently. During the drive
she was nervous; she reminded the coachman that the horses were getting
skittish, and as the fidgety animals really produced a momentary difficulty
she jumped from the carriage in fright and broke her leg, while those
remaining in the carriage were uninjured. Although after the disclosure of
these details we can hardly doubt that this accident was really contrived, we
cannot fail to admire the skill which forced the accident to mete out a
punishment so suitable to the crime. For as it happened “cancan” dancing
with her became impossible for a long time.
Concerning self-inflicted injuries of my own experience, I cannot report
anything in calm times, but under extraordinary conditions I do not believe
myself incapable of such acts. When a member of my family complains that
he or she has bitten his tongue, bruised her finger, and so on, instead of the
expected sympathy I put the question, “Why did you do that?” But I have

most painfully squeezed my thumb, after a youthful patient acquainted me
during the treatment with his intention (naturally not to be taken seriously)
of marrying my eldest daughter, while I knew that she was then in a private
hospital in extreme danger of losing her life.
One of my boys, whose vivacious temperament was wont to put difficulties
in the management of nursing him in his illness, had a fit of anger one
morning because he was ordered to remain in bed during the forenoon, and
threatened to kill himself: a way out suggested to him by the newspapers. In
the evening he showed me a swelling on the side of his chest which was the
result of bumping against the door knob. To my ironical question why he
did it, and what he meant by it, the eleven-year-old child explained, “That
was my attempt at suicide which I threatened this morning.” However, I do
not believe that my views on self-inflicted wounds were accessible to my
children at that time.
Whoever believes in the occurrence of semi-intentional self-inflicted injury
—if this awkward expression be permitted—will become prepared to accept
through it the fact that aside from conscious intentional suicide there also
exists semi-intentional annihilation—with unconscious intention—which is
capable of aptly utilizing a threat against life and masking it as a casual
mishap. Such mechanism is by no means rare. For the tendency to self-
destruction exists to a certain degree in many more persons than in those
who bring it to completion. Self-inflicted injuries are, as a rule, a
compromise between this impulse and the forces working against it, and
even where it really comes to suicide the inclination has existed for a long
time with less strength or as an unconscious and repressed tendency.
Even suicide consciously committed chooses its time, means, and
opportunity; it is quite natural that unconscious suicide should wait for a
motive to take upon itself one part of the causation and thus free it from its
oppression by taking up the defensive forces of the person.[51] These are in
no way idle discussions which I here bring up; more than one case of
apparently accidental misfortune (on a horse or out of a carriage) has
become known to me whose surrounding circumstances justified the
suspicion of suicide.
For example, during an officers’ horse-race one of the riders fell from his
horse and was so seriously injured that a few days later he succumbed to his

injuries. His behaviour after regaining consciousness was remarkable in
more than one way, and his conduct previous to the accident was still more
remarkable. He had been greatly depressed by the death of his beloved
mother, had crying spells in the society of his comrades, and to his trusted
friend had spoken of the tædium vitæ. He had wished to quit the service in
order to take part in a war in Africa which had no interest for him.[52]
Formerly a keen rider, he had later evaded riding whenever possible.
Finally, before the horse-race, from which he could not withdraw, he
expressed a sad foreboding, which most expectedly in the light of our
conception came true. It may be contended that it is quite comprehensible
without any further cause that a person in such a state of nervous depression
cannot manage a horse as well as on normal days. I quite agree with that,
only I should like to look for the mechanism of this motor inhibition
through “nervousness” in the intention of self-destruction here emphasized.
Dr. Ferenczi has left to me for publication the analysis of an apparently
accidental injury by shooting which he explained as an unconscious attempt
at suicide. I can only agree with his deduction:—
“J. Ad., 22 years old, carpenter, visited me on the 18th of January, 1908. He
wished to know whether the bullet which pierced his left temple March 20,
1907, could or should be removed by operation. Aside from occasional, not
very severe, headaches, he felt quite well, also the objective examination
showed nothing besides the characteristic powder wound on the left temple,
so that I advised against an operation. When questioned concerning the
circumstances of the case he asserted that he injured himself accidentally.
He was playing with his brother’s revolver, and believing that it was not
loaded he pressed it with his left hand against the left temple (he is not left-
handed), put his finger on the trigger, and the shot went off. There were
three bullets in the six-shooter.
“I asked him how he came to carry the revolver, and he answered that it was
at the time of his army conscription, that he took it to the inn the evening
before because he feared fights. At the army examination he was considered
unfit for service on account of varicose veins, which caused him much
mortification. He went home and played with the revolver. He had no
intention of hurting himself, but the accident occurred. On further
questioning whether he was otherwise satisfied with his fortune, he
answered with a sigh, and related a love affair with a girl who loved him in

return, but nevertheless left him. She emigrated to America out of sheer
avariciousness. He wanted to follow her, but his parents prevented him. His
lady-love left on the 20th of January, 1907, just two months before the
accident.
“Despite all these suspicious elements the patient insisted that the shot was
an ‘accident.’ I was firmly convinced, however, that the neglect to find out
whether the revolver was loaded before he began to play with it, as well as
the self-inflicted injury, were psychically determined. He was still under the
depressing effects of the unhappy love affair, and apparently wanted ‘to
forget everything’ in the army. When this hope, too, was taken away from
him he resorted to playing with the weapon—that is, to an unconscious
attempt at suicide. The fact that he did not hold the revolver in the right but
in the left hand speaks conclusively in favour of the fact that he was really
only ‘playing’—that is, he did not wish consciously to commit suicide.”
Another analysis of an apparently accidental self-inflicted wound, detailed
to me by an observer, recalls the saying, “He who digs a pit for others falls
in himself.”[53]
“Mrs. X., belonging to a good middle-class family, is married and has three
children. She is somewhat nervous, but never needed any strenuous
treatment, as she could sufficiently adapt herself to life. One day she
sustained a rather striking though transitory disfigurement of her face in the
following manner: She stumbled in a street that was in process of repair and
struck her face against the house wall. The whole face was bruised, the
eyelids blue and œdematous, and as she feared that something might
happen to her eyes she sent for the doctor. After she was calmed I asked her,
‘But why did you fall in such a manner?’ She answered that just before this
accident she warned her husband, who had been suffering for some months
from a joint affection, to be very careful in the street, and she often had the
experience that in some remarkable way those things occurred to her
against which she warned others.
“I was not satisfied with this as the determination of her accident, and asked
her whether she had not something else to tell me. ‘Yes, just before the
accident she noticed a nice picture in a shop on the other side of the street,
which she suddenly desired as an ornament for her nursery, and wished to
buy it at once. She thereupon walked across to the shop without looking at

the street, stumbled over a heap of stones, and fell with her face against the
wall without making the slightest effort to shield herself with her hands.
The intention to buy the picture was immediately forgotten, and she walked
home in haste.’
“‘But why were you not more careful?’ I asked.
“‘Oh!’ she answered, ‘perhaps it was only a punishment for that episode
which I confided to you!’
“‘Has this episode still bothered you?’
“‘Yes, later I regretted it very much; I considered myself wicked, criminal,
and immoral, but at the time I was almost crazy with nervousness.’
“She referred to an abortion which was started by a quack and had to be
brought to completion by a gynecologist. This abortion was initiated with
the consent of her husband, as both wished, on account of their pecuniary
circumstances, to be spared from being additionally blessed with children.
“She said: ‘I had often reproached myself with the words, “You really had
your child killed,” and I feared that such a crime could not remain
unpunished. Now that you have assured me that there is nothing seriously
wrong with my eyes I am quite assured I have already been sufficiently
punished.’
“This accident, therefore, was, on the one hand, a retribution for her sin,
but, on the other hand, it may have served as an escape from a more dire
punishment which she had feared for many months. In the moment that she
ran to the shop to buy the picture the memory of this whole history, with its
fears (already quite active in her unconscious at the time she warned her
husband), became overwhelming and could perhaps find expression in
words like these: ‘But why do you want an ornament for the nursery?—you
who had your child killed! You are a murderer! The great punishment is
surely approaching!’
“This thought did not become conscious, but instead of it she made use of
the situation—I might say of the psychologic moment—to utilize in a
commonplace manner the heap of stones to inflict upon herself this
punishment. It was for this reason that she did not even attempt to put out
her arms while falling and was not much frightened. The second, and
probably lesser, determinant of her accident was obviously the self-

punishment for her unconscious wish to be rid of her husband, who was an
accessory to the crime in this affair. This was betrayed by her absolutely
superfluous warning to be very careful in the street on account of the
stones. For, just because her husband had a weak leg, he was very careful in
walking.”
If such a rage against one’s own integrity and one’s own life can be hidden
behind apparently accidental awkwardness and motor insufficiency, then it
is not a big step forward to grasp the possibility of transferring the same
conception to mistakes which seriously endanger the life and health of
others. What I can put forward as evidence for the validity of this
conception was taken from my experience with neurotics, and hence does
not fully meet the demands of this situation. I will report a case in which it
was not an erroneously carried-out action, but what may be more aptly
termed a symbolic or chance action that gave me the clue which later made
possible the solution of the patient’s conflict.
I once undertook to improve the marriage relations of a very intelligent
man, whose differences with his tenderly attached young wife could surely
be traced to real causes, but as he himself admitted could not be altogether
explained through them. He continually occupied himself with the thought
of a separation, which he repeatedly rejected because he dearly loved his
two small children. In spite of this he always returned to that resolution and
sought no means to make the situation bearable to himself. Such an
unsettlement of a conflict served to prove to me that there were unconscious
and repressed motives which enforced the conflicting conscious thoughts,
and in such cases I always undertake to end the conflict by psychic analysis.
One day the man related to me a slight occurrence which had extremely
frightened him. He was sporting with the older child, by far his favourite.
He tossed it high in the air and repeated this tossing till finally he thrust it
so high that its head almost struck the massive gas chandelier. Almost, but
not quite, or say “just about!” Nothing happened to the child except that it
became dizzy from fright. The father stood transfixed with the child in his
arms, while the mother merged into an hysterical attack. The particular
facility of this careless movement, with the violent reaction in the parents,
suggested to me to look upon this accident as a symbolic action which gave
expression to an evil intention toward the beloved child.

I could remove the contradiction of the actual tenderness of this father for
his child by referring the impulse to injure it to the time when it was the
only one, and so small that as yet the father had no occasion for tender
interest in it. Then it was easy to assume that this man, so little pleased with
his wife at that time, might have thought: “If this small being for whom I
have no regard whatever should die, I would be free and could separate
from my wife.” The wish for the death of this much loved being must
therefore have continued unconsciously. From here it was easy to find the
way to the unconscious fixation of this wish.
There was indeed a powerful determinant in a memory from the patient’s
childhood: it referred to the death of a little brother, which the mother laid
to his father’s negligence, and which led to serious quarrels with threats of
separation between the parents. The continued course of my patient’s life,
as well as the therapeutic success confirmed my analysis.

IX
SYMPTOMATIC AND CHANCE ACTIONS

The actions described so far, in which we recognize the execution of an
unconscious intention, appeared as disturbances of other unintended
actions, and hid themselves under the pretext of awkwardness. Chance
actions, which we shall now discuss, differ from erroneously carried out
actions only in that they disdain the support of a conscious intention and
really need no pretext. They appear independently and are accepted because
one does not credit them with any aim or purpose. We execute them
“without thinking anything of them,” “by mere chance,” “just to keep the
hands busy,” and we feel confident that such information will be quite
sufficient should one inquire as to their significance. In order to enjoy the
advantage of this exceptional position these actions which no longer claim
awkwardness as an excuse must fulfil certain conditions: they must not be
striking, and their effects must be insignificant.
I have collected a large number of such “chance actions” from myself and
others, and after thoroughly investigating the individual examples, I believe
that the name “symptomatic actions” is more suitable. They give expression
to something which the actor himself does not suspect in them, and which
as a rule he has no intention of imparting to others, but aims to keep to
himself. Like the other phenomena considered so far, they thus play the part
of symptoms.
The richest output of such chance or symptomatic actions is above all
obtained in the psychoanalytic treatment of neurotics. I cannot deny myself
the pleasure of showing by two examples of this nature how far and how
delicately the determination of these plain occurrences are swayed by
unconscious thoughts. The line of demarcation between the symptomatic
actions and the erroneously carried out actions is so indefinite that I could
have disposed of these examples in the preceding chapter.
(a) During the analysis a young woman reproduced this idea which
suddenly occurred to her. Yesterday while cutting her nails “she had cut into

the flesh while engaged in trimming the cuticle.” This is of so little interest
that we ask in astonishment why it is at all remembered and mentioned, and
therefore come to the conclusion that we deal with a symptomatic action. It
was really the finger upon which the wedding-ring is worn which was
injured through this slight awkwardness. It happened, moreover, on her
wedding-day, which thus gives to the injury of the delicate skin a very
definite and easily guessed meaning. At the same time she also related a
dream which alluded to the awkwardness of her husband and her anesthesia
as a woman. But why did she injure the ring finger of her left hand when
the wedding-ring is worn on the right? Her husband is a jurist, a “Doctor of
Laws” (Doktor der Rechte, literally a Doctor of Rights), and her secret
affection as a girl belonged to a physician who was jokingly called Doktor
der Linke (literally Doctor of Left). Incidentally a left-handed marriage has
a definite meaning.
(b) A single young woman relates: “Yesterday, quite unintentionally, I tore a
hundred-dollar note in two pieces and gave half to a woman who was
visiting me. Is that, too, a symptomatic action?” After closer investigation
the matter of the hundred-dollar note elicited the following associations:
She dedicated a part of her time and her fortune to charitable work.
Together with another woman she was taking care of the rearing of an
orphan. The hundred dollars was the contribution sent her by that woman,
which she enclosed in an envelope and provisionally deposited on her
writing-desk.
The visitor was a prominent woman with whom she was associated in
another act of charity. This woman wished to note the names of a number of
persons to whom she could apply for charitable aid. There was no paper, so
my patient grasped the envelope from her desk, and without thinking of its
contents tore it in two pieces, one of which she kept, in order to have a
duplicate list of names, and gave the other to her visitor.
Note the harmlessness of this aimless occurrence. It is known that a
hundred-dollar note suffers no loss in value when it is torn, provided all the
pieces are produced. That the woman would not throw away the piece of
paper was assumed by the importance of the names on it, and there was just
as little doubt that she would return the valuable content as soon as she
noticed it.

But to what unconscious thought should this chance action, which was
made possible through forgetfulness, give expression? The visitor in this
case had a very definite relation to my patient and myself. It was she who at
one time had recommended me as physician to the suffering girl, and if I
am not mistaken my patient considered herself indebted for this advice.
Should this halved hundred-dollar note perhaps represent a fee for her
mediation? That still remained enigmatic.
But other material was added to this beginning. Several days before a
woman mediator of a different sort had inquired of a relative whether the
gracious young lady wished to make the acquaintance of a certain
gentleman, and that morning, some hours before the woman’s visit, the
wooing letter of the suitor arrived, giving occasion for much mirth. When
therefore the visitor opened the conversation with inquiries regarding the
health of my patient, the latter could well have thought: “You certainly
found me the right doctor, but if you could assist me in obtaining the right
husband (and a child) I should be still more grateful.”
Both mediators became fused into one in this repressed thought, and she
handed the visitor the fee which her fantasy was ready to give the other.
This resolution became perfectly convincing when I add that I had told her
of such chance or symptomatic actions only the previous evening. She then
took advantage of the next occasion to produce an analogous action.
We can undertake a grouping of these extremely frequent chance and
symptomatic actions according to their occurrence as habitual, regular
under certain circumstances, and as isolated ones. The first group (such as
playing with the watch-chain, fingering one’s beard, and so on), which can
almost serve as a characteristic of the person concerned, is related to the
numerous tic movements, and certainly deserves to be dealt with in
connection with the latter. In the second group I place the playing with
one’s cane, the scribbling with one’s pencil, the jingling of coins in one’s
pocket, kneading dough and other plastic materials, all sorts of handling of
one’s clothing, and many other actions of the same order.
These playful occupations during psychic treatment regularly conceal sense
and meaning to which other expression is denied. Generally the person in
question knows nothing about it; he is unaware whether he is doing the
same thing or whether he has imitated certain modifications in his

customary playing, and he also fails to see or hear the effects of these
actions. For example, he does not hear the noise which is produced by the
jingling of coins, and he is astonished and incredulous when his attention is
called to it. Of equal significance to the physician, and worthy of his
observation, is everything that one does with his clothing often without
noticing it. Every change in the customary attire, every little negligence,
such as an unfastened button, every trace of exposure means to express
something that the wearer of the apparel does not wish to say directly,
usually he is entirely unconscious of it.
The interpretation of these trifling chance actions, as well as the proof for
their interpretation, can be demonstrated every time with sufficient certainty
from the surrounding circumstances during the treatment, from the themes
under discussion, and from the ideas that come to the surface when
attention is directed to the seeming accident. Because of this connection I
will refrain from supporting my assertions by reporting examples with their
analyses; but I mention these matters because I believe that they have the
same meaning in normal persons as in my patients.
I cannot, however, refrain from showing by at least one example how
closely an habitually accomplished symbolic action may be connected with
the most intimate and important part of the life of a normal individual.[54]
“As Professor Freud has taught us, the symbolism in the infantile life of the
normal plays a greater rôle than was expected from earlier psychoanalytic
experiences. In view of this the following brief analysis may be of general
interest, especially on account of its medical aspects.
“A doctor on rearranging his furniture in a new house came across a
straight, wooden stethoscope, and, after pausing to decide where he should
put it, was impelled to place it on the side of his writing-desk in such a
position that it stood exactly between his chair and the one reserved for his
patients. The act in itself was certainly odd, for in the first place the straight
stethoscope served no purpose, as he invariably used a binaural one; and in
the second place all his medical apparatus and instruments were always
kept in drawers, with the sole exception of this one. However, he gave no
thought to the matter until one day it was brought to his notice by a patient
who had never seen a wooden stethoscope, asking him what it was. On
being told, she asked why he kept it there. He answered in an offhand way

that that place was as good as any other. This, however, started him
thinking, and he wondered whether there had been an unconscious motive
in his action. Being interested in the psychoanalytic method, he asked me to
investigate the matter.
“The first memory that occurred to him was the fact that when a medical
student he had been struck by the habit his hospital interne had of always
carrying in his hand a wooden stethoscope on his ward visits, although he
never used it. He greatly admired this interne, and was much attached to
him. Later on, when he himself became an interne he contracted the same
habit, and would feel very uncomfortable if by mistake he left the room
without having the instrument to swing in his hand. The aimlessness of the
habit was shown, not only by the fact that the only stethoscope he ever used
was a binaural one, which he carried in his pocket, but also in that it was
continued when he was a surgical interne and never needed any stethoscope
at all.
“From this it was evident that the idea of the instrument in question had in
some way or other become invested with a greater psychic significance than
normally belongs to it—in other words, that to the subject it stood for more
than it does for other people. The idea must have got unconsciously
associated with some other one, which it symbolized, and from which it
derived its additional fulness of meaning. I will forestall the rest of the
analysis by saying what this secondary idea was—namely, a phallic one; the
way in which this curious association had been formed will presently be
related. The discomfort he experienced in hospital on missing the
instrument, and the relief and assurance the presence of it gave him, was
related to what is known as a ‘castration-complex’—namely, a childhood
fear, often continued in a disguised form into adult life, lest a private part of
his body should be taken away from him, just as playthings so often were.
The fear was due to paternal threats that it would be cut off if he were not a
good boy, particularly in a certain direction. This is a very common
complex, and accounts for a great deal of general nervousness and lack of
confidence in later years.
“Then came a number of childhood memories relating to his family doctor.
He had been strongly attached to this doctor as a child, and during the
analysis long-buried memories were recovered of a double phantasy he had
in his fourth year concerning the birth of a younger sister—namely, that she

was the child (1) of himself and his mother, the father being relegated to the
background, and (2) of the doctor and himself; in this he thus played both a
masculine and feminine part.[55] At the time, when his curiosity was being
aroused by the event, he could not help noticing the prominent share taken
by the doctor in the proceedings, and the subordinate position occupied by
the father: the significance of this for his later life will presently be pointed
out.
“The stethoscope association was formed through many connections. In the
first place, the physical appearance of the instrument—a straight, rigid,
hollow tube, having a small bulbous summit at one extremity and a broad
base at the other—and the fact of its being the essential part of the medical
paraphernalia, the instrument with which the doctor performed his magical
and interesting feats, were matters that attracted his boyish attention. He
had had his chest repeatedly examined by the doctor at the age of six, and
distinctly recollected the voluptuous sensation of feeling the latter’s head
near him pressing the wooden stethoscope into his chest, and of the
rhythmic to-and-fro respiratory movement. He had been struck by the
doctor’s habit of carrying his stethoscope inside his hat; he found it
interesting that the doctor should carry his chief instrument concealed about
his person, always handy when he went to see patients, and that he only had
to take off his hat (i.e., a part of his clothing) and ‘pull it out.’ At the age of
eight he was impressed by being told by an older boy that it was the
doctor’s custom to get into bed with his women patients. It is certain that
the doctor, who was young and handsome, was extremely popular among
the women of the neighbourhood, including the subject’s own mother. The
doctor and his ‘instrument’ were therefore the objects of great interest
throughout his boyhood.
“It is probable that, as in many other cases, unconscious identification with
the family doctor had been a main motive in determining the subject’s
choice of profession. It was here doubly conditioned (1) by the superiority
of the doctor on certain interesting occasions to the father, of whom the
subject was very jealous, and (2) by the doctor’s knowledge of forbidden
topics[56] and his opportunity for illicit indulgence. The subject admitted
that he had on several occasions experienced erotic temptations in regard to
his women patients; he had twice fallen in love with one, and finally had
married one.

“The next memory was of a dream, plainly of a homosexual-masochistic
nature; in it a man, who proved to be a replacement figure of the family
doctor, attacked the subject with a ‘sword.’ The idea of a sword, as is so
frequently the case in dreams, represented the same idea that was
mentioned above to be associated with that of a wooden stethoscope. The
thought of a sword reminded the subject of the passage in the Nibelung
Saga, where Sigurd sleeps with his naked sword (Gram) between him and
Brunhilda, an incident that had always greatly struck his imagination.
“The meaning of the symptomatic act now at last became clear. The subject
had placed his wooden stethoscope between him and his patients, just as
Sigurd had placed his sword (an equivalent symbol) between him and the
maiden he was not to touch. The act was a compromise-formation; it served
both to gratify in his imagination the repressed wish to enter into nearer
relations with an attractive patient (interposition of phallus), and at the same
time to remind him that this wish was not to become a reality (interposition
of sword). It was, so to speak, a charm against yielding to temptation.
“I might add that the following passage from Lord Lytton’s Richelieu made
a great impression on the boy:—

‘Beneath the rule of men entirely great
The pen is mightier than the sword,’[57]

and that he became a prolific writer and uses an unusually large fountain-
pen. When I asked him what need he had of this pen, he replied in a
characteristic manner, ‘I have so much to express.’
“This analysis again reminds us of the profound views that are afforded us
in the psychic life through the ‘harmless’ and ‘senseless’ actions, and how
early in life the tendency to symbolization develops.”
I can also relate an experience from my psychotherapeutic practice in which
the hand, playing with a mass of bread-crumbs, gave evidence of an
eloquent declaration. My patient was a boy not yet thirteen years of age,
who had been very hysterical for two years. I finally took him for
psychoanalytic treatment, after a lengthy stay at a hydrotherapeutic
institution had proved futile. My supposition was that he must have had
sexual experiences, and that, corresponding to his age, he had been troubled

by sexual questions; but I was cautious about helping him with explanations
as I wished to test further my assumption. I was therefore curious as to the
manner in which the desired material would evince itself in him.
One day it struck me that he was rolling something between the fingers of
his right hand; he would thrust it into his pocket and there continue playing
with it, then would draw it out again, and so on. I did not ask what he had in
his hand; but as he suddenly opened his hand he showed it to me. It was
bread-crumbs kneaded into a mass. At the next session he again brought
along a mass, and in the course of our conversation, although his eyes were
closed, modelled a figure with an incredible rapidity which excited my
interest. Without doubt it was a manikin like the crudest prehistoric idols,
with a head, two arms, two legs, and an appendage between the legs which
he drew out to a long point.
This was scarcely completed when he kneaded the manikin together again:
later he allowed it to remain, but modelled an identical appendage on the
flat of the back and on other parts in order to veil the meaning of the first. I
wished to show him that I had understood him, but at the same time I
wanted to deprive him of the evasion that he had thought of nothing while
actively forming these figures. With this intention I suddenly asked him
whether he remembered the story of the Roman king who gave his son’s
envoy a pantomimic answer in his garden.
The boy did not wish to recall what he must have learned so much more
recently than I. He asked if that was the story of the slave on whose bald
skull the answer was written. I told him, “No, that belonged to Greek
history,” and related the following: “King Tarquinius Superbus had induced
his son Sextus to steal into a Latin city. The son, who had later obtained a
foothold in the city, sent a messenger to the king asking what steps he
should take next. The king gave no answer, but went into his garden, had
the question repeated there, and silently struck off the heads of the largest
and most beautiful poppies. All that the messenger could do was to report
this to Sextus, who understood his father, and caused the most distinguished
citizens of the city to be removed by assassination.”
While I was speaking the boy stopped kneading, and as I was relating what
the king did in his garden, I noticed that at the words “silently struck” he
tore off the head of the manikin with a movement as quick as lightning. He

therefore understood me, and showed that he was also understood by me.
Now I could question him directly, and gave him the information that he
desired, and in a short time the neurosis came to an end.
The symptomatic actions which we observe in inexhaustible abundance in
healthy as well as in nervous people are worthy of our interest for more
than one reason. To the physician they often serve as valuable indications
for orienting himself in new or unfamiliar conditions; to the keen observer
they often betray everything, occasionally even more than he cares to know.
He who is familiar with its application sometimes feels like King Solomon,
who, according to the Oriental legend, understood the language of animals.
One day I was to examine a strange young man at his mother’s home. As he
came towards me I was attracted by a large stain on his trousers, which by
its peculiar stiff edges I recognized as one produced by albumen. After a
moment’s embarrassment the young man excused this stain by remarking
that he was hoarse and therefore drank a raw egg, and that some of the
slippery white of the egg had probably fallen on his clothes. To confirm his
statements he showed the eggshell which could still be seen on a small plate
in the room. The suspicious spot was thus explained in this harmless way;
but as his mother left us alone I thanked him for having so greatly
facilitated the diagnosis for me, and without further procedure I took as the
topic of our discussion his confession that he was suffering from the effects
of masturbation.
Another time I called on a woman as rich as she was miserly and foolish,
who was in the habit of giving the physician the task of working his way
through a heap of her complaints before he could reach the simple cause of
her condition. As I entered she was sitting at a small table engaged in
arranging silver dollars in little piles: as she rose she tumbled some of the
pieces of money to the floor. I helped her pick them up, but interrupted the
recitation of her misery by remarking: “Has your good son-in-law been
spending so much of your money again?” She bitterly denied this, only to
relate a few moments later the lamentable story of the aggravation caused
by her son-in-law’s extravagances. And she has not sent for me since. I
cannot maintain that one always makes friends of those to whom he tells the
meaning of their symptomatic actions.

He who observes his fellow-men while at table will be able to verify in
them the nicest and most instructive symptomatic actions.
Dr. Hans Sachs relates the following:—
“I happened to be present when an elderly couple related to me partook of
their supper. The lady had stomach trouble and was forced to follow a strict
diet. A roast was put before the husband, and he requested his wife, who
was not allowed to partake of this food, to give him the mustard. The wife
opened the closet and took out the small bottle of stomach drops, and
placed it on the table before her husband. Between the barrel-shaped
mustard-glass and the small drop-bottle there was naturally no similarity
through which the mishandling could be explained; yet the wife only
noticed the mistake after her husband laughingly called her attention to it.
The sense of this symptomatic action needs no explanation.”
For an excellent example of this kind which was very skilfully utilized by
the observer, I am indebted to Dr. Bernh. Dattner (Vienna):—
“I dined in a restaurant with my colleague H., a doctor of philosophy. He
spoke about the injustice done to probationary students, and added that even
before he finished his studies he was placed as secretary to the ambassador,
or rather the extraordinary plenipotentiary Minister to Chili. ‘But,’ he
added, ‘the minister was afterwards transferred, and I did not make any
effort to meet the newly appointed.’ While uttering the last sentence he was
lifting a piece of pie to his mouth, but he let it drop as if out of
awkwardness. I immediately grasped the hidden sense of this symptomatic
action, and remarked to my colleague, who was unacquainted with
psychoanalysis, ‘You really allowed a very choice morsel to slip from you.’
He did not realize, however, that my words could equally refer to his
symptomatic action, and he repeated the same words I uttered with a
peculiarly agreeable and surprising vividness, as if I had actually taken the
words from his mouth: ‘It was really a very choice morsel that I allowed to
get away from me.’ He then followed this remark with a detailed
description of his clumsiness, which has cost him this very remunerative
position.
“The sense of this symbolic action becomes clearer if we remember that my
colleague had scruples about telling me, almost a perfect stranger,
concerning his precarious material situation, and his repressed thought took

on the mask of symptomatic action which expressed symbolically what was
meant to be concealed, and the speaker thus got relief from his
unconscious.”
That the taking away or taking along things without any apparent intention
may prove to be senseful may be shown by the following examples.
I. Dr. B. Dattner relates: “An acquaintance paid the first after-marriage visit
to a highly regarded lady friend of his youth. He told me of this visit and
expressed his surprise at the fact that he failed in his resolution to visit with
her only a short time, and then reported to me a rather strange faulty act
which happened to him there.
“The husband of this friend, who took part in the conversation, was looking
for a box of matches which he was sure was on the table when he came
there. My acquaintance, too, looked through his pockets to ascertain
whether he had not put it in his pocket, but without avail. Some time later
he actually found it in his pocket, and was struck by the fact that there was
only one match in the box.
“A dream a few days later showing the box symbolism in reference to the
friend of his youth confirmed my explanation. With the symptomatic action
my acquaintance meant to announce his priority-right and the exclusiveness
of his possession (it contained only one match).”
Dr. Hans Sachs relates the following: “Our cook is very fond of a certain
kind of pie. There is no possible doubt about this, as it is the only kind of
pastry which she always prepares well. One Sunday she brought this pie to
the table, took it off the pie-plate, and proceeded to remove the dishes used
in the former course, but on the top of this pile she placed the pie, and
disappeared with it into the kitchen. We first thought that she had something
to improve on the pie, but as she failed to appear my wife rang the bell and
asked, ‘Betty, what happened to the pie?’ to which the girl answered,
without comprehending the question, ‘How is that?’ We had to call her
attention to the fact that she carried the pie back to the kitchen. She had put
it on the pile of dishes, taken it out, and put it away ‘without noticing it.’
“The next day, when we were about to consume the rest of the pie, my wife
noticed that there was as much of it as we had left the day before—that is,
the girl had disdained to eat the portion of her favourite dish which was

rightly hers. Questioned why she did not eat the pie, she answered,
somewhat embarrassed, that she did not care for it.
“The infantile attitude is distinctly noticeable on both occasions—first the
childish insatiableness in refusing to share with anybody the object of her
wishes, then the reaction of spite which is just as childish: ‘If you grudge it
to me, keep it for yourself, I want nothing of it.’”
Chance or symptomatic actions occurring in affairs of married life have
often a most serious significance, and could lead those who do not concern
themselves with the psychology of the unconscious to a belief in omens. It
is not an auspicious beginning if a young woman loses her wedding-ring on
her wedding-tour, even if it were only mislaid and soon found.
I know a woman, now divorced, who in the management of her business
affairs frequently signed her maiden name many years before she actually
resumed it.
Once I was the guest of a newly married couple and heard the young
woman laughingly relate her latest experience, how, on the day succeeding
her return from the wedding tour she had sought out her single sister in
order to go shopping with her as in former times, while her husband was
attending business. Suddenly she noticed a man on the opposite side of the
street; nudging her sister she said, “Why, that is surely Mr. L.” She forgot
that for some weeks this man had been her husband. I was chilled at this
tale, but I did not dare draw any inferences. The little story came back to me
only several years later, after this marriage had ended most unhappily.
The following observation, which could as well have found a place among
the examples of forgetting, was taken from a noteworthy work published in
French by A. Maeder.[58]
“Une dame nous racontait récement qu’elle avait oublie d’essayer sa robe
de noce et s’en souvint la veille du marriage, à huit heur du soir, la
couturière désespérait de voir sa cliente. Ce détail suffit à montrer que la
fiancée ne se sentait pas très heureuse de porter une robe d’épouse, elle
cherchait à oublier cette représentation pénible. Elle est aujourd’hui ...
divorcée.”
A friend who has learned to observe signs related to me that the great
actress Eleanora Duse introduces a symptomatic action into one of her rôles

which shows very nicely from what depth she draws her acting. It is a
drama dealing with adultery; she has just been discussing with her husband
and now stands soliloquizing before the seducer makes his appearance.
During this short interval she plays with her wedding-ring, she pulls it off,
replaces it, and finally takes it off again. She is now ready for the other.
I know of an elderly man who married a young girl, and instead of starting
at once on his wedding tour he decided to spend the night in a hotel.
Scarcely had they reached the hotel, when he noticed with fright that he was
without his wallet, in which he had the entire sum of money for the
wedding tour; he must have mislaid or lost it. He was still able to reach his
servant by telephone; the latter found the missing article in the coat
discarded for the travelling clothes and brought it to the hotel to the waiting
bridegroom, who had thus entered upon his marriage without means.
It is consoling to think that the “losing of objects” by people is merely an
unsuspected extension of a symptomatic action, and is thus welcome at
least to the secret intention of the loser. Often it is only an expression of
slight appreciation of the lost article, a secret dislike for the same, or
perhaps for the person from whom it came, or the desire to lose this object
was transferred to it from other and more important objects through
symbolic association. The loss of valuable articles serves as an expression
of diverse feelings; it may either symbolically represent a repressed thought
—that is, it may bring back a memory which one would rather not hear—or
it may represent a sacrifice to the obscure forces of fate, the worship of
which is not yet entirely extinct even with us.[59]
The following examples will illustrate these statements concerning the
losing of objects:—
Dr. B. Dattner states: “A colleague related to me that he lost his steel pencil
which he had had for over two years, and which, on account of its superior
quality, was highly prized by him. Analysis elicited the following facts: The
day before he had received a very disagreeable letter from his brother-in-
law, the concluding sentence of which read: ‘At present I have neither the
desire nor the time to assist you in your carelessness and laziness.’ The
effect connected with this letter was so powerful that the next day he
promptly sacrificed the pencil which was a present from this brother-in-law
in order not to be burdened with his favours.”

Brill reports the following example: “A doctor took exception to the
following statement in my book, ‘We never lose what we really want’
(Psychanalysis, its Theories and Practical Application, p. 214). His wife,
who is very interested in psychologic subjects, read with him the chapter on
“Psychopathology of Everyday Life”; they were both very much impressed
with the novelty of the ideas, and so on, and were very willing to accept
most of the statements. He could not, however, agree with the above-given
statement because, as he said to his wife, ‘I surely did not wish to lose my
knife.’ He referred to a valuable knife given to him by his wife, which he
highly prized, the loss of which caused him much pain.
“It did not take his wife very long to discover the solution for this loss in a
manner to convince them both of the accuracy of my statement. When she
presented him with this knife he was a bit loath to accept it. Although he
considered himself quite emancipated, he nevertheless entertained some
superstition about giving or accepting a knife as a gift, because it is said that
a knife cuts friendship. He even remarked this to his wife, who only
laughed at his superstition. He had the knife for years before it disappeared.
“Analysis brought out the fact that the disappearance of the knife was
directly connected with a period when there were violent quarrels between
himself and his wife, which threatened to end in separation. They lived
happily together until his step-daughter (it was his second marriage) came
to live with them. His daughter was the cause of many misunderstandings,
and it was at the height of these quarrels that he lost the knife.
“The unconscious activity is very nicely shown in this symptomatic action.
In spite of his apparent freedom from superstition, he still unconsciously
believed that a donated knife may cut friendship between the persons
concerned. The losing of it was simply an unconscious defence against
losing his wife, and by sacrificing the knife he made the superstitious ban
impotent.”
In a lengthy discussion and with the aid of dream analysis[60] Otto Rank
made clear the sacrificial tendency with its deep-reaching motivation. It
must be said that just such symptomatic actions often give us access to the
understanding of the intimate psychic life of the person.
Of the many isolated chance-actions, I will relate one example which
showed a deeper meaning even without analysis. This example clearly

explains the conditions under which such symptoms may be produced most
casually, and also shows that an observation of practical importance may be
attached to it. During a summer tour it happened that I had to wait several
days at a certain place for the arrival of my travelling companions. In the
meantime I made the acquaintance of a young man, who also seemed lonely
and was quite willing to join me. As we lived at the same hotel it was quite
natural that we should take all our meals and our walks together.
On the afternoon of the third day he suddenly informed me that he expected
his wife to arrive on that evening’s express train. My psychologic interest
was now aroused, as it had already struck me that morning that my
companion rejected my proposal to make a long excursion, and in our short
walk he objected to a certain path as too steep and dangerous. During our
afternoon walk he suddenly thought that I must be hungry and insisted that I
should not delay my evening meal on his account, that he would not sup
before his wife’s arrival. I understood the hint and seated myself at the table
while he went to the station.
The next morning we met in the foyer of the hotel. He presented me to his
wife, and added, “Of course, you will breakfast with us?” I had to attend
first to a small matter in the next street, but assured him that I would return
shortly. Later, as I entered the breakfast-room, I noticed that the couple
were at a small table near the window, both seated on the same side of it.
On the opposite side there was only one chair, which was covered, however,
with a man’s large and heavy coat. I understood well the meaning of this
unintentional, none the less expressive, disposition of the coat. It meant
this: “There is no room for you here, you are superfluous now.”
The man did not notice that I remained standing before the table, being
unable to take the seat, but his wife noticed it, and quickly nudged her
husband and whispered: “Why, you have covered the gentleman’s place
with your coat.”
These as well as other similar experiences have caused me to think that the
actions executed unintentionally must inevitably become the source of
misunderstanding in human relations. The perpetrator of the act, who is
unaware of any associated intention, takes no account of it, and does not
hold himself responsible for it. On the other hand, the second party, having
regularly utilized even such acts as those of his partner to draw conclusions

as to their purpose and meaning, recognizes more of the stranger’s psychic
processes than the latter is ready either to admit or believe that he has
imparted. He becomes indignant when these conclusions drawn from his
symptomatic actions are held up to him; he declares them baseless because
he does not see any conscious intention in their execution, and complains of
being misunderstood by the other. Close examination shows that such
misunderstandings are based on the fact that the person is too fine an
observer and understands too much. The more “nervous” two persons are
the more readily will they give each other cause for disputes, which are
based on the fact that one as definitely denies about his own person what he
is sure to accept about the other.
And this is, indeed, the punishment for the inner dishonesty to which people
grant expression under the guise of “forgetting,” of erroneous actions and
accidental emotions, a feeling which they would do better to confess to
themselves and others when they can no longer control it. As a matter of
fact it can be generally affirmed that every one is continually practising
psychoanalysis on his neighbours, and consequently learns to know them
better than each individual knows himself. The road following the
admonition γνῶθι σεαυτὁν leads through the study of one’s own apparently
casual commissions and omissions.

X
ERRORS

Errors of memory are distinguished from forgetting and false recollections
through one feature only, namely, that the error (false recollection) is not
recognized as such but finds credence. However, the use of the expression
“error” seems to depend on still another condition. We speak of “erring”
instead of “falsely recollecting” where the character of the objective reality
is emphasized in the psychic material to be reproduced—that is, where
something other than a fact of my own psychic life is to be remembered, or
rather something that may be confirmed or refuted through the memory of
others. The reverse of the error in memory in this sense is formed by
ignorance.
In my book The Interpretation of Dreams,[61] I was responsible for a series
of errors in historical, and above all, in material facts, which I was
astonished to discover after the appearance of the book. On closer
examination I found that they did not originate from my ignorance, but
could be traced to errors of memory explainable by means of analysis.
(a) On page 361 I indicated as Schiller’s birthplace the city of Marburg, a
name which recurs in Styria. The error is found in the analysis of a dream
during a night journey from which I was awakened by the conductor calling
out the name of the station Marburg. In the contents of the dream inquiry is
made concerning a book by Schiller. But Schiller was not born in the
university town of Marburg but in the Swabian city Marbach. I maintain
that I always knew this.
(b) On page 165 Hannibal’s father is called Hasdrubal. This error was
particularly annoying to me, but it was most corroborative of my
conception of such errors. Few readers of the book are better posted on the
history of the Barkides than the author who wrote this error and overlooked
it in three proofs. The name of Hannibal’s father was Hamilcar Barkas;
Hasdrubal was the name of Hannibal’s brother as well as that of his
brother-in-law and predecessor in command.

(c) On pages 217 and 492 I assert that Zeus emasculates his father Kronos,
and hurls him from the throne. This horror I have erroneously advanced by
a generation; according to Greek mythology it was Kronos who committed
this on his father Uranos.[62]
How is it to be explained that my memory furnished me with false material
on these points, while it usually places the most remote and unusual
material at my disposal, as the readers of my books can verify? And, what is
more, in three carefully executed proof-readings I passed over these errors
as if struck blind.
Goethe said of Lichtenberg: “Where he cracks a joke, there lies a concealed
problem.” Similarly we can affirm of these passages cited from my book:
back of every error is a repression. More accurately stated: the error
conceals a falsehood, a disfigurement which is ultimately based on
repressed material. In the analysis of the dreams there reported, I was
compelled by the very nature of the theme to which the dream thoughts
related, on the one hand, to break off the analysis in some places before it
had reached its completion, and on the other hand, to remove an indiscreet
detail through a slight disfigurement of its outline. I could not act
differently, and had no other choice if I was at all to offer examples and
illustrations. My constrained position was necessarily brought about by the
peculiarity of dreams, which give expression to repressed thoughts, or to
material which is incapable of becoming conscious. In spite of this it is said
that enough material remained to offend the more sensitive souls. The
disfigurement or concealment of the continuing thoughts known to me
could not be accomplished without leaving some trace. What I wished to
repress has often against my will obtruded itself on what I have taken up,
and evinced itself in the matter as an unnoticeable error. Indeed, each of the
three examples given is based on the same theme: the errors are the results
of repressed thoughts which occupy themselves with my deceased father.
(ad a) Whoever reads through the dream analysed on page 361 will find
some parts unveiled; in some parts he will be able to divine through
allusions that I have broken off the thoughts which would have contained an
unfavourable criticism of my father. In the continuation of this line of
thoughts and memories there lies an annoying tale, in which books and a
business friend of my father, named Marburg, play a part; it is the same
name the calling out of which in the southern railway-station had aroused

me from sleep. I wished to suppress this Mr. Marburg in the analysis from
myself and my readers: he avenged himself by intruding where he did not
belong, and changed the name of Schiller’s birthplace from Marbach to
Marburg.
(ad b) The error Hasdrubal in place of Hamilcar, the name of the brother
instead of that of the father, originated from an association which dealt with
the Hannibal fantasies of my college years and my dissatisfaction with the
conduct of my father towards the “enemies of our people.” I could have
continued and recounted how my attitude toward my father was changed by
a visit to England, where I made the acquaintance of my half-brother, by a
previous marriage of my father. My brother’s oldest son was my age
exactly. Thus the age relations were no hindrance to a fantasy which may be
stated thus: how much pleasanter it would be had I been born the son of my
brother instead of the son of my father! This suppressed fantasy then
falsified the text of my book at the point where I broke off the analysis, by
forcing me to put the name of the brother for that of the father.
(ad c) The influence of the memory of this same brother is responsible for
my having advanced by a generation the mythological horror of the Greek
deities. One of the admonitions of my brother has lingered long in my
memory. “Do not forget one thing concerning your conduct in life,” he said:
“you belong not to the second but really to the third generation of your
father.” Our father had remarried at an advanced age, and was therefore an
old man to his children by the second marriage. I commit the error
mentioned where I discuss the piety between parents and children.
Several times friends and patients have called my attention to the fact that
in reporting their dreams or alluding to them in dream analyses, I have
related inaccurately the circumstances experienced by us in common. These
are also historic errors. On re-examining such individual cases I have found
that my recollection of the facts was unreliable only where I had purposely
disfigured or concealed something in the analysis. Here again we have an
unobserved error as a substitute for an intentional concealment or
repression.
From these errors, which originate from repression, we must sharply
distinguish those which are based on actual ignorance. Thus, for example, it
was ignorance when on my excursion to Wachau I believed that I had

passed the resting-place of the revolutionary leader Fischof. Only the name
is common to both places. Fischof’s Emmersdorf is located in Kärnthen.
But I did not know any better.
Here is another embarrassing but instructive error, an example of temporary
ignorance if you like. One day a patient reminded me to give him the two
books on Venice which I had promised him, as he wished to use them in
planning his Easter tour. I answered that I had them ready and went into the
library to fetch them, though the truth of the matter was that I had forgotten
to look them up, since I did not quite approve of my patient’s journey,
looking upon it as an unnecessary interruption to the treatment, and as a
material loss to the physician. Thereupon I made a quick survey of the
library for the books.
One was Venedig als Kunststätte, and besides this I imagined I had an
historic work of a similar order. Certainly there was Die Mediceer (The
Medicis); I took them and brought them in to him, then, embarrassed, I
confessed my error. Of course I really knew that the Medicis had nothing to
do with Venice, but for a short time it did not appear to me at all incorrect.
Now I was compelled to practise justice; as I had so frequently interpreted
my patient’s symptomatic actions I could save my prestige only by being
honest and admitting to him the secret motives of my averseness to his trip.
It may cause general astonishment to learn how much stronger is the
impulse to tell the truth than is usually supposed. Perhaps it is a result of my
occupation with psychoanalysis that I can scarcely lie any more. As often as
I attempt a distortion I succumb to an error or some other faulty act, which
betrays my dishonesty, as was manifest in this and in the preceding
examples.
Of all faulty actions the mechanism of the error seems to be the most
superficial. That is, the occurrence of the error invariably indicates that the
mental activity concerned had to struggle with some disturbing influence,
although the nature of the error need not be determined by the quality of the
disturbing idea, which may have remained obscure. It is not out of place to
add that the same state of affairs may be assumed in many simple cases of
lapses in speaking and writing. Every time we commit a lapse in speaking
or writing we may conclude that through mental processes there has come a
disturbance which is beyond our intention. It may be conceded, however,

that lapses in speaking and writing often follow the laws of similarity and
convenience, or the tendency to acceleration, without allowing the
disturbing element to leave a trace of its own character in the error resulting
from the lapses in speaking or writing. It is the responsiveness of the
linguistic material which at first makes possible the determination of the
error, but it also limits the same.
In order not to confine myself exclusively to personal errors I will relate a
few examples which could just as well have been ranged under “Lapses in
Speech” or under “Erroneously Carried-out Actions,” but as all these forms
of faulty action have the same value they may as well be reported here.
(a) I forbade a patient to speak on the telephone to his lady-love, with
whom he himself was willing to break off all relations, as each conversation
only renewed the struggling against it. He was to write her his final
decision, although there were some difficulties in the way of delivering the
letter to her. He visited me at one o’clock to tell me that he had found a way
of avoiding these difficulties, and among other things he asked me whether
he might refer to me in my professional capacity.
At two o’clock while he was engaged in composing the letter of refusal, he
interrupted himself suddenly, and said to his mother, “Well, I have forgotten
to ask the Professor whether I may use his name in the letter.” He hurried to
the telephone, got the connection, and asked the question, “May I speak to
the Professor after his dinner?” In answer he got an astonished “Adolf, have
you gone crazy!” The answering voice was the very voice which at my
command he had listened to for the last time. He had simply “made a
mistake,” and in place of the physician’s number had called up that of his
beloved.
(b) During a summer vacation a schoolteacher, a poor but excellent young
man, courted the daughter of a summer resident, until the girl fell
passionately in love with him, and even prevailed upon her family to
countenance the matrimonial alliance in spite of the difference in position
and race. One day, however, the teacher wrote his brother a letter in which
he said: “Pretty, the lass is not at all, but she is very amiable, and so far so
good. But whether I can make up my mind to marry a Jewess I cannot yet
tell.” This letter got into the hands of the fiancée, who put an end to the
engagement, while at the same time his brother was wondering at the

protestations of love directed to him. My informer assured me that this was
really an error and not a cunning trick.
I am familiar with another case in which a woman who was dissatisfied
with her old physician, and still did not openly wish to discharge him,
accomplished this purpose through the interchange of letters. Here, at least,
I can assert confidently that it was error and not conscious cunning that
made use of this familiar comedy-motive.
(c) Brill[63] tells of a woman who, inquiring about a mutual friend,
erroneously called her by her maiden name. Her attention having been
directed to this error, she had to admit that she disliked her friend’s husband
and had never been satisfied with her marriage.
Maeder[64] relates a good example of how a reluctantly repressed wish can
be satisfied by means of an “error.” A colleague wanted to enjoy his day of
leave of absence absolutely undisturbed, but he also felt that he ought to go
to Lucerne to pay a call which he did not anticipate with any pleasure. After
long reflection, however, he concluded to go. For pastime on the train he
read the daily newspapers. He journeyed from Zurich to Arth Goldau,
where he changed trains for Lucerne, all the time engrossed in reading.
Presently the conductor informed him that he was in the wrong train—that
is, he had got into the one which was returning from Goldau to Zurich,
whereas his ticket was for Lucerne.
A very similar trick was played by me quite recently. I had promised my
oldest brother to pay him a long-due visit at a sea-shore in England; as the
time was short I felt obliged to travel by the shortest route and without
interruption. I begged for a day’s sojourn in Holland, but he thought that I
could stop there on my return trip. Accordingly I journeyed from Munich
through Cologne to Rotterdam—Hook of Holland—where I was to take the
steamer at midnight to Harwich. In Cologne I had to change cars; I left my
train to go into the Rotterdam express, but it was not to be found. I asked
various railway employees, was sent from one platform to another, got into
an exaggerated state of despair, and could easily reckon that during this
fruitless search I had probably missed my connection.
After this was corroborated, I pondered whether or not I should spend the
night in Cologne. This was favoured by a feeling of piety, for according to
an old family tradition, my ancestors were once expelled from this city

during a persecution of the Jews. But eventually I came to another decision;
I took a later train to Rotterdam, where I arrived late at night and was thus
compelled to spend a day in Holland. This brought me the fulfilment of a
long-fostered wish—the sight of the beautiful Rembrandt paintings at The
Hague and in the Royal Museum at Amsterdam. Not before the next
forenoon, while collecting my impressions during the railway journey in
England, did I definitely remember that only a few steps from the place
where I got off at the railroad station in Cologne, indeed, on the same
platform, I had seen a large sign, “Rotterdam—Hook of Holland.” There
stood the train in which I should have continued my journey.
If one does not wish to assume that, contrary to my brother’s orders, I had
really resolved to admire the Rembrandt pictures on my way to him, then
the fact that despite clear directions I hurried away and looked for another
train must be designated as an incomprehensible “blinding.” Everything
else—my well-acted perplexity, the emergence of the pious intention to
spend the night in Cologne—was only a contrivance to hide my resolution
until it had been fully accomplished.
One may possibly be disinclined to consider the class of errors which I have
here explained as very numerous or particularly significant. But I leave it to
your consideration whether there is no ground for extending the same points
of view also to the more important errors of judgment, as evinced by people
in life and science. Only for the most select and most balanced minds does
it seem possible to guard the perceived picture of external reality against the
distortion to which it is otherwise subjected in its transit through the
psychic individuality of the one perceiving it.

XI
COMBINED FAULTY ACTS

Two of the last-mentioned examples, my error which transfers the Medici to
Venice and that of the young man who knew how to circumvent a command
against a conversation on the telephone with his lady love, have really not
been fully discussed, as after careful consideration they may be shown to
represent a union of forgetting with an error. I can show the same union still
more clearly in certain other examples.
(a) A friend related to me the following experience: “Some years ago I
consented to be elected to the committee of a certain literary society, as I
supposed the organization might some time be of use to me in assisting me
in the production of my drama. Although not much interested, I attended the
meetings regularly every Friday. Some months ago I was definitely assured
that one of my dramas would be presented at the theatre in F., and since that
time it regularly happened that I forgot the meeting of the association. As I
read their programme announcements I was ashamed of my forgetfulness. I
reproached myself, feeling that it was certainly rude of me to stay away
now when I no longer needed them, and determined that I would certainly
not forget the next Friday. Continually I reminded myself of this resolution
until the hour came and I stood before the door of the meeting-room. To my
astonishment it was locked; the meeting was already over. I had mistaken
my day; it was already Saturday!”
(b) The next example is the combination of a symptomatic action with a
case of mislaying; it reached me by remote byways, but from a reliable
source.
A woman travelled to Rome with her brother-in-law, a renowned artist. The
visitor was highly honoured by the German residents of Rome, and among
other things received a gold medal of antique origin. The woman was
grieved that her brother-in-law did not sufficiently appreciate the value of
this beautiful gift. After she had returned home she discovered in unpacking
that—without knowing how—she had brought the medal home with her.

She immediately notified her brother-in-law of this by letter, and informed
him that she would send it back to Rome the next day. The next day,
however, the medal was so aptly mislaid that it could not be found and
could not be sent back, and then it dawned on the woman what her “absent-
mindedness” signified—namely, that she wished to keep the medal herself.
(c) Here are some cases in which the falsified action persistently repeats
itself, and at the same time also changes its mode of action:—
Due to unknown motives, Jones[65] left a letter for several days on his desk,
forgetting each time to post it. He ultimately posted it, but it was returned to
him from the Dead-letter Office because he forgot to address it. After
addressing and posting it a second time it was again returned to him, this
time without a stamp. He was then forced to recognize the unconscious
opposition to the sending of the letter.
(d) A short account by Dr. Karl Weiss (Vienna)[66] of a case of forgetting
impressively describes the futile effort to accomplish something in the face
of opposition. “How persistently the unconscious activity can achieve its
purpose if it has cause to prevent a resolution from being executed, and how
difficult it is to guard against this tendency, will be illustrated by the
following incident: An acquaintance requested me to lend him a book and
bring it to him the next day. I immediately promised it, but perceived a
distinct feeling of displeasure which I could not explain at the time. Later it
became clear to me: this acquaintance had owed me for years a sum of
money which he evidently had no intention of returning. I did not give this
matter any more thought, but I recalled it the following forenoon with the
same feeling of displeasure, and at once said to myself: ‘Your unconscious
will see to it that you forget the book, but you don’t wish to appear
unobliging and will therefore do everything not to forget it.’ I came home,
wrapped the book in paper, and put it near me on the desk while I wrote
some letters.
“A little later I went away, but after a few steps I recollected that I had left
on the desk the letters which I wished to post. (By the way, one of the
letters was written to a person who urged me to undertake something
disagreeable.) I returned, took the letters, and again left. While in the street-
car it occurred to me that I had undertaken to purchase something for my
wife, and I was pleased at the thought that it would be only a small package.

The association, ‘small package,’ suddenly recalled ‘book’—and only then I
noticed that I did not have the book with me. Not only had I forgotten it
when I left my home the first time, but I had overlooked it again when I got
the letters near which it lay.”
(e) A similar mechanism is shown in the following fully analysed
observation of Otto Rank[67]:—
“A scrupulously orderly and pedantically precise man reported the
following occurrence, which he considered quite remarkable: One afternoon
on the street wishing to find out the time, he discovered that he had left his
watch at home, an omission which to his knowledge had never occurred
before. As he had an engagement elsewhere and had not enough time to
return for his watch, he made use of a visit to a woman friend to borrow her
watch for the evening. This was the most convenient way out of the
dilemma, as he had a previous engagement to visit this lady the next day.
Accordingly, he promised to return her watch at that time.
“But the following day when about to consummate this he found to his
surprise that he had left the watch at home; his own watch he had with him.
He then firmly resolved to return the lady’s property that same afternoon,
and even followed out his resolution. But on wishing to see the time on
leaving her he found to his chagrin and astonishment that he had again
forgotten to take his own watch.
“The repetition of this faulty action seemed so pathologic to this order-
loving man that he was quite anxious to know its psychologic motivation,
and when questioned whether he experienced anything disagreeable on the
critical day of the first forgetting, and in what connection it had occurred,
the motive was promptly found. He related that he had conversed with his
mother after luncheon, shortly before leaving the house. She told him that
an irresponsible relative, who had already caused him much worry and loss
of money, had pawned his (the relative’s) watch, and, as it was needed in
the house, the relative had asked for money to redeem it. This almost
“forced” loan affected our man very painfully and brought back to his
memory all the disagreeable episodes perpetrated by this relative for many
years.
“His symptomatic action therefore proves to be manifoldly determined.
First, it gives expression to a stream of thought which runs perhaps as

follows: ‘I won’t allow my money to be extorted this way, and if a watch is
needed I will leave my own at home.’ But as he needed it for the evening to
keep his appointment, this intention could only be brought about on an
unconscious path in the form of a symptomatic action. Second, the
forgetting expresses a sentiment something like the following: ‘This
everlasting sacrificing of money for this good-for-nothing is bound to ruin
me altogether, so that I will have to give up everything.’ Although the anger,
according to the report of this man, was only momentary, the repetition of
the same symptomatic action conclusively shows that in the unconscious it
continued to act more intensely, and may be equivalent to the conscious
expression: ‘I cannot get this story out of my head.[68] That the lady’s watch
should later meet the same fate will not surprise us after knowing this
attitude of the unconscious.’
“Yet there may be still other special motives which favour the transference
on the ‘innocent’ lady’s watch. The nearest motive is probably that he
would have liked to keep it as a substitute for his own sacrificed watch, and
that hence he forgot to return it the next day. He also might have liked to
possess this watch as a souvenir of the lady. Moreover, the forgetting of the
lady’s watch gave him the excuse for calling on the admired one a second
time; for he was obliged to visit her in the morning in reference to another
matter, and with the forgetting of the watch he seemed to indicate that this
visit for which an appointment had been made so long ago was too good for
him to be used simply for the return of a watch.
“Twice forgetting his own watch and thus making possible the substitution
of the lady’s watch speaks for the fact that our man unconsciously
endeavoured to avoid carrying both watches at the same time. He obviously
thought of avoiding the appearance of superfluity which would have stood
out in striking contrast to the want of the relative; but, on the other hand, he
utilized this as a self-admonition against his apparent intention to marry this
lady, reminding himself that he was tied to his family (mother) by
indissoluble obligations.
“Finally, another reason for the forgetting of the lady’s watch may be
sought in the fact that the evening before he, a bachelor, was ashamed to be
seen with a lady’s watch by his friends, so that he only looked at it
stealthily, and in order to evade the repetition of this painful situation he
could not take the watch along. But as he was obliged to return it, there

resulted here, too, an unconsciously performed symptomatic action which
proved to be a compromise formation between conflicting emotional
feelings and a dearly bought victory of the unconscious instance.”
In the same discussion Rank has also paid attention to the very interesting
relation of “faulty actions and dreams,” which cannot, however, be followed
here without a comprehensive analysis of the dream with which the faulty
action is connected. I once dreamed at great length that I had lost my
pocket-book. In the morning while dressing I actually missed it; while
undressing the night before the dream I had forgotten to take it out of my
trousers pocket and put it in its usual place. This forgetting was therefore
not unknown to me; probably it was to give expression to an unconscious
thought which was ready to appear in the dream content.
I do not mean to assert that such cases of combined faulty actions can teach
anything new that we have not already seen in the individual cases. But this
change in form of the faulty action, which nevertheless attains the same
result, gives the plastic impression of a will working towards a definite end,
and in a far more energetic way contradicts the idea that the faulty action
represents something fortuitous and requires no explanation. Not less
remarkable is the fact that the conscious intention thoroughly fails to check
the success of the faulty action. Despite all, my friend did not pay his visit
to the meeting of the literary society, and the woman found it impossible to
give up the medal. That unconscious something which worked against these
resolutions found another outlet after the first road was closed to it. It
requires something other than the conscious counter-resolution to overcome
the unknown motive; it requires a psychic work which makes the unknown
known to consciousness.

XII
DETERMINISM—CHANCE—AND SUPERSTITIOUS
BELIEFS

Points of View.

As the general result of the preceding separate discussions we must put
down the following principle: Certain inadequacies of our psychic
capacities—whose common character will soon be more definitely
determined—and certain performances which are apparently unintentional
prove to be well motivated when subjected to the psychoanalytic
investigation, and are determined through the consciousness of unknown
motives.
In order to belong to this class of phenomena thus explained a faulty
psychic action must satisfy the following conditions:—
(a) It must not exceed a certain measure, which is firmly established
through our estimation, and is designated by the expression “within normal
limits.”
(b) It must evince the character of the momentary and temporary
disturbance. The same action must have been previously performed more
correctly or we must always rely on ourselves to perform it more correctly;
if we are corrected by others we must immediately recognize the truth of
the correction and the incorrectness of our psychic action.
(c) If we at all perceive a faulty action, we must not perceive in ourselves
any motivation of the same, but must attempt to explain it through
“inattention” or attribute it to an “accident.”
Thus there remain in this group the cases of forgetting and the errors,
despite better knowledge, the lapses in speaking, reading, writing, the
erroneously carried-out actions, and the so-called chance actions. The

explanations of these so definite psychic processes are connected with a
series of observations which may in part arouse further interest.
I. By abandoning a part of our psychic capacity as unexplainable through
purposive ideas we ignore the realms of determinism in our mental life.
Here, as in still other spheres, determinism reaches farther than we suppose.
In the year 1900 I read an essay published in the Zeit written by the literary
historian R. M. Meyer, in which he maintains, and illustrates by examples,
that it is impossible to compose nonsense intentionally and arbitrarily. For
some time I have been aware that it is impossible to think of a number, or
even of a name, of one’s own free will. If one investigates this seeming
voluntary formation, let us say, of a number of many digits uttered in
unrestrained mirth, it always proves to be so strictly determined that the
determination seems impossible. I will now briefly discuss an example of
an “arbitrarily chosen” first name, and then exhaustively analyse an
analogous example of a “thoughtlessly uttered” number.
While preparing the history of one of my patients for publication I
considered what first name I should give her in the article. There seemed to
be a wide choice; of course, certain names were at once excluded by me, in
the first place the real name, then the names of members of my family to
which I would have objected, also some female names having an especially
peculiar pronunciation. But, excluding these, there should have been no
need of being puzzled about such a name. It would be thought, and I myself
supposed, that a whole multitude of feminine names would be placed at my
disposal. Instead of this only one sprang up, no other besides it; it was the
name Dora.
I inquired as to its determination: “Who else is called Dora?” I wished to
reject the next idea as incredulous; it occurred to me that the nurse of my
sister’s children was named Dora. But I possess so much self-control, or
practice in analysis, if you like, that I held firmly to the idea and proceeded.
Then a slight incident of the previous evening soon flashed through my
mind which brought the looked-for determination. On my sister’s dining-
room table I noticed a letter bearing the address, “Miss Rosa W.”
Astonished, I asked whose name this was, and was informed that the right
name of the supposed Dora was really Rosa, and that on accepting the
position she had to lay aside her name, because Rosa would also refer to my
sister. I said pityingly, “Poor people! They cannot even retain their own

names!” I now recall that on hearing this I became quiet for a moment and
began to think of all sorts of serious matters which merged into the obscure,
but which I could now easily bring into my consciousness. Thus when I
sought a name for a person who could not retain her own name no other
except “Dora” occurred to me. The exclusiveness here is based, moreover,
on firmer internal associations, for in the history of my patient it was a
stranger in the house, the governess, who exerted a decisive influence on
the course of the treatment.
This slight incident found its unexpected continuation many years later.
While discussing in a lecture the long-since published history of the girl
called Dora it occurred to me that one of my two women pupils had the
very name Dora which I was obliged to utter so often in the different
associations of the case. I turned to the young student, whom I knew
personally, with the apology that I had really not thought that she bore the
same name, and that I was ready to substitute it in my lecture by another
name.
I was now confronted with the task of rapidly choosing another name, and
reflected that I must not now choose the first name of the other woman
student, and so set a poor example to the class, who were already quite
conversant with psychoanalysis. I was therefore well pleased when the
name “Erna” occurred to me as the substitute for Dora, and Erna I used in
the discourse. After the lecture I asked myself whence the name “Erna”
could possibly have originated, and had to laugh as I observed that the
feared possibility in the choice of the substitutive name had come to pass, in
part at least. The other lady’s family name was Lucerna, of which Erna was
a part.
In a letter to a friend I informed him that I had finished reading the proof-
sheets of The Interpretation of Dreams, and that I did not intend to make
any further changes in it, “even if it contained 2,467 mistakes.” I
immediately attempted to explain to myself the number, and added this little
analysis as a postscript to the letter. It will be best to quote it now as I wrote
it when I caught myself in this transaction:—
“I will add hastily another contribution to the Psychopathology of Everyday
Life. You will find in the letter the number 2,467 as a jocose and arbitrary
estimation of the number of errors that may be found in the dream-book. I

meant to write: no matter how large the number might be, and this one
presented itself. But there is nothing arbitrary or undetermined in the
psychic life. You will therefore rightly suppose that the unconscious
hastened to determine the number which was liberated by consciousness.
Just previous to this I had read in the paper that General E. M. had been
retired as Inspector-General of Ordnance. You must know that I am
interested in this man. While I was serving as military medical student he,
then a colonel, once came into the hospital and said to the physician: ‘You
must make me well in eight days, as I have some work to do for which the
Emperor is waiting.’
“At that time I decided to follow this man’s career, and just think, to-day
(1899) he is at the end of it—Inspector-General of Ordnance and already
retired. I wished to figure out in what time he had covered this road, and
assumed that I had seen him in the hospital in 1882. That would make 17
years. I related this to my wife, and she remarked, ‘Then you, too, should be
retired.’ And I protested, ‘The Lord forbid!’ After this conversation I seated
myself at the table to write to you. The previous train of thought continued,
and for good reason. The figuring was incorrect; I had a definite
recollection of the circumstances in my mind. I had celebrated my coming
of age, my 24th birthday, in the military prison (for being absent without
permission). Therefore I must have seen him in 1880, which makes it 19
years ago. You then have the number 24 in 2,467! Now take the number that
represents my age, 43, and add 24 years to it and you get 67! That is, to the
question whether I wished to retire I had expressed the wish to work 24
years more. Obviously I am annoyed that in the interval during which I
followed Colonel M. I have not accomplished much myself, and still there
is a sort of triumph in the fact that he is already finished, while I still have
all before me. Thus we may justly say that not even the unintentionally
thrown-out number 2,467 lacks its determination from the unconscious.”
Since this first example of the interpretation of an apparently arbitrary
choice of a number I have repeated a similar test with the same result; but
most cases are of such intimate content that they do not lend themselves to
report.
It is for this reason that I shall not hesitate to add here a very interesting
analysis of a “chance number” which Dr. Alfred Adler (Vienna) received
from a “perfectly healthy” man.[69] A. wrote to me: “Last night I devoted

myself to the Psychopathology of Everyday Life, and I would have read it
all through had I not been hindered by a remarkable coincidence. When I
read that every number that we apparently conjure up quite arbitrarily in our
consciousness has a definite meaning, I decided to test it. The number 1,734
occurred to my mind. The following associations then came up: 1,734 ÷ 17
= 102; 102 ÷ 17 = 6. I then separated the number into 17 and 34. I am 34
years old. I believe that I once told you that I consider 34 the last year of
youth, and for this reason I felt miserable on my last birthday. The end of
my 17th year was the beginning of a very nice and interesting period of my
development. I divide my life into periods of 17 years. What do the
divisions signify? The number 102 recalls the fact that volume 102 of the
Reclam Universal Library is Kotzebue’s play Menschenhass und Reue
(Human Hatred and Repentance).
“My present psychic state is ‘human hatred and repentance.’ No. 6 of the U.
L. (I know a great many numbers by heart) is Mullner’s ‘Schuld’ (Fault). I
am constantly annoyed at the thought that it is through my own fault that I
have not become what I could have been with my abilities.
“I then asked myself, ‘What is No. 17 of the U. L.?’ But I could not recall it.
But as I positively knew it before, I assumed that I wished to forget this
number. All reflection was in vain. I wished to continue with my reading,
but I read only mechanically without understanding a word, for I was
annoyed by the number 17. I extinguished the light and continued my
search. It finally came to me that number 17 must be a play by Shakespeare.
But which one? I thought of Hero and Leander. Apparently a stupid attempt
of my will to distract me. I finally arose and consulted the catalogue of the
U. L. Number 17 was Macbeth! To my surprise I had to discover that I
knew nothing of the play, despite the fact that it did not interest me any less
than any other Shakespearean drama. I only thought of: murder, Lady
Macbeth, witches, ‘nice is ugly,’ and that I found Schiller’s version of
Macbeth very nice. Undoubtedly I also wished to forget the play. Then it
occurred to me that 17 and 34 may be divided by 17 and result in 1 and 2.
Numbers 1 and 2 of the U. L. is Goethe’s Faust. Formerly I found much of
Faust in me.”
We must regret that the discretion of the physician did not allow us to see
the significance of ideas. Adler remarked that the man did not succeed in
the synthesis of his analysis. His association would hardly be worth

reporting unless their continuation would bring out something that would
give us the key to the understanding of the number 1,734 and the whole
series of ideas.
To quote further: “To be sure this morning I had an experience which
speaks much for the correctness of the Freudian conception. My wife,
whom I awakened through my getting up at night, asked me what I wanted
with the catalogue of the U. L. I told her the story. She found it all
pettifogging but—very interesting. Macbeth, which caused me so much
trouble, she simply passed over. She said that nothing came to her mind
when she thought of a number. I answered, ‘Let us try it.’ She named the
number 117. To this I immediately replied: ‘17 refers to what I just told
you; furthermore, I told you yesterday that if a wife is in the 82nd year and
the husband is in the 35th year it must be a gross misunderstanding.’ For the
last few days I have been teasing my wife by maintaining that she was a
little old mother of 82 years. 82 + 35 = 117.”
The man who did not know how to determine his own number at once
found the solution when his wife named a number which was apparently
arbitrarily chosen. As a matter of fact, the woman understood very well
from which complex the number of her husband originated, and chose her
own number from the same complex, which was surely common to both, as
it dealt in his case with their relative ages. Now, we find it easy to interpret
the number that occurred to the man. As Dr. Adler indicates, it expressed a
repressed wish of the husband which, fully developed, would read: “For a
man of 34 years as I am, only a woman of 17 would be suitable.”
Lest one should think too lightly of such “playing,” I will add that I was
recently informed by Dr. Adler that a year after the publication of this
analysis the man was divorced from his wife.[70]
Adler gives a similar explanation for the origin of obsessive numbers. Also
the choice of so-called “favourite numbers” is not without relation to the
life of the person concerned, and does not lack a certain psychologic
interest. A gentleman who evinced a particular partiality for the numbers 17
and 19 could specify, after brief reflection, that at the age of 17 he attained
the greatly longed-for academic freedom by having been admitted to the
university, that at 19 he made his first long journey, and shortly thereafter
made his first scientific discovery. But the fixation of this preference

followed later, after two questionable affairs, when the same numbers were
invested with importance in his “love-life.”
Indeed, even those numbers which we use in a particular connection
extremely often and with apparent arbitrariness can be traced by analysis to
an unexpected meaning. Thus, one day it struck one of my patients that he
was particularly fond of saying, “I have already told you this from 17 to 36
times.” And he asked himself whether there was any motive for it. It soon
occurred to him that he was born on the 27th day of the month, and that his
younger brother was born on the 26th day of another month, and he had
grounds for complaint that Fate had robbed him of so many of the benefits
of life only to bestow them on his younger brother. Thus he represented this
partiality of Fate by deducting 10 from the date of his birth and adding it to
the date of his brother’s birthday. I am the elder and yet am so “cut short.”
I shall tarry a little longer at the analysis of chance numbers, for I know of
no other individual observation which would so readily demonstrate the
existence of highly organized thinking processes of which consciousness
has no knowledge. Moreover, there is no better example of analysis in
which the suggestion of the position, a frequent accusation, is so distinctly
out of consideration. I shall therefore report the analysis of a chance number
of one of my patients (with his consent), to which I will only add that he is
the youngest of many children and that he lost his beloved father in his
young years.
While in a particularly happy mood he let the number 426,718 come to his
mind, and put to himself the question, “Well, what does it bring to your
mind?” First came a joke he had heard: “If your catarrh of the nose is
treated by a doctor it lasts 42 days, if it is not treated it lasts—6 weeks.”
This corresponds to the first digit of the number (42 = 6 × 7). During the
obstruction that followed this first solution I called his attention to the fact
that the number of six digits selected by him contains all the first numbers
except 3 and 5. He at once found the continuation of this solution:—
“We were altogether 7 children, I was the youngest. Number 3 in the order
of the children corresponds to my sister A., and 5 to my brother L.; both of
them were my enemies. As a child I used to pray to the Lord every night
that He should take out of my life these two tormenting spirits. It seems to

me that I have fulfilled for myself this wish: ‘3’ and ‘5,’ the evil brother and
the hated sister, are omitted.”
“If the number stands for your sisters and brothers, what significance is
there to 18 at the end? You were altogether only 7.”
“I often thought if my father had lived longer I should not have been the
youngest child. If one more would have come, we should have been 8, and
there would have been a younger child, toward whom I could have played
the rôle of the older one.”
With this the number was explained, but we still wished to find the
connection between the first part of the interpretation and the part following
it. This came very readily from the condition required for the last digits—if
the father had lived longer. 42 = 6 × 7 signifies the ridicule directed against
the doctors who could not help the father, and in this way expresses the
wish for the continued existence of the father. The whole number really
corresponds to the fulfilment of his two wishes in reference to his family
circle—namely, that both the evil brother and sister should die and that
another little child should follow him. Or, briefly expressed: If only these
two had died in place of my father![71]
Another analysis of numbers I take from Jones.[72] A gentleman of his
acquaintance let the number 986 come to his mind, and defied him to
connect it to anything of special interest in his mind. “Six years ago, on the
hottest day he could remember, he had seen a joke in an evening newspaper,
which stated that the thermometer had stood at 98·6° F., evidently an
exaggeration of 98·6° F. We were at the time seated in front of a very hot
fire, from which he had just drawn back, and he remarked, probably quite
correctly, that the heat had aroused his dormant memory. However, I was
curious to know why this memory had persisted with such vividness as to
be so readily brought out, for with most people it surely would have been
forgotten beyond recall, unless it had become associated with some other
mental experience of more significance.
“He told me that on reading the joke he had laughed uproariously, and that
on many subsequent occasions he had recalled it with great relish. As the
joke was obviously of an exceedingly tenuous nature, this strengthened my
expectation that more lay behind. His next thought was the general
reflection that the conception of heat had always greatly impressed him,

that heat was the most important thing in the universe, the source of all life,
and so on. This remarkable attitude of a quite prosaic young man certainly
needed some explanation, so I asked him to continue his free associations.
The next thought was of a factory stack which he could see from his
bedroom window. He often stood of an evening watching the flame and
smoke issuing out of it, and reflecting on this deplorable waste of energy.
Heat, flame, the source of life, the waste of vital energy issuing from an
upright, hollow tube—it was not hard to divine from such associations that
the ideas of heat and fire were unconsciously linked in his mind with the
idea of love, as is so frequent in symbolic thinking, and that there was a
strong masturbation complex present, a conclusion that he presently
confirmed.”
Those who wish to get a good impression of the way the material of
numbers becomes elaborated in the unconscious thinking, I refer to two
papers by Jung[73] and Jones.[74]
In personal analysis of this kind two things were especially striking. First,
the absolute somnambulistic certainty with which I attacked the unknown
objective point, merging into a mathematical train of thought, which later
suddenly extended to the looked-for number, and the rapidity with which
the entire subsequent work was performed. Secondly, the fact that the
numbers were always at the disposal of my unconscious mind, when as a
matter of fact I am a poor mathematician and find it very difficult to
consciously recall years, house numbers, and the like. Moreover, in these
unconscious mental operations with figures I found a tendency to
superstition, the origin of which had long remained unknown to me.
It will not surprise us to find that not only numbers but also mental
occurrences of different kinds of words regularly prove on analytic
investigation to be well determined.
Brill relates: “While working on the English edition of this book I was
obsessed one morning with the strange word ‘Cardillac.’ Busily intent on
my work, I refused at first to pay attention to it, but, as is usually the case, I
simply could not do anything else. ‘Cardillac’ was constantly in my mind.
Realizing that my refusal to recognize it was only a resistance, I decided to
analyse it. The following associations occurred to me: Cardillac, cardiac,
carrefour, Cadillac.

“Cardiac recalled cardalgia—heartache—a medical friend who had recently
told me confidentially that he feared that he had some cardiac affection
because he had suffered some attacks of pain in the region of his heart.
Knowing him so well, I at once rejected his theory, and told him that his
attacks were of a neurotic character, and that his other apparent physical
ailments were also only the expression of his neurosis.
“I might add that just before telling me of his heart trouble he spoke of a
business matter of vital interest to him which had suddenly come to naught.
Being a man of unbounded ambitions, he was very depressed because of
late he had suffered many similar reverses. His neurotic conflicts, however,
had become manifest a few months before this misfortune. Soon after his
father’s death had left a big business on his hands. As the business could be
continued only under my friend’s management, he was unable to decide
whether to enter into commercial life or continue his chosen career. His
great ambition was to become a successful medical practitioner, and
although he had practised medicine successfully for many years, he was not
altogether satisfied with the financial fluctuations of his professional
income. On the other hand, his father’s business promised him an assured,
though limited, return. In brief, he was ‘at a crossing and did not know
which way to turn.’
“I then recalled the word carrefour, which is the French for ‘crossing,’ and
it occurred to me that while working in a hospital in Paris I lived near the
‘Carrefour St. Lazarre.’ And now I could understand what relation all these
associations had for me.
“When I resolved to leave the State Hospital I made the decision, first,
because I desired to get married, and, secondly, because I wished to enter
private practice. This brought up a new problem. Although my State
hospital service was an absolute success, judging by promotions and so on,
I felt like a great many others in the same situation, namely, that my
training was ill suited for private practice. To specialize in mental work was
a daring undertaking for one without money and social connections. I also
felt that the best I could do for patients should they ever come my way
would be to commit them to one of the hospitals, as I had little confidence
in the home treatment in vogue. In spite of the enormous advances made in
recent years in mental work, the specialist is almost helpless when he is
confronted with the average case of insanity. This may be partially

attributed to the fact that such cases are brought to him after they have fully
developed the psychosis when hospital treatment is imperative. Of the great
army of milder mental disturbances, the so-called border-line cases, which
make up the bulk of clinic and private work and which rightfully belong to
the mental specialist, I knew very little, as those patients rarely, or never,
came to the State hospital, and what I did know concerning the treatment of
neurasthenia and psychasthenia was not conducive to make me more
hopeful of success in private practice.
“It was in this state of mind that I came to Paris, where I hoped to learn
enough about the psychoneuroses to enable me to continue my specialty in
private practice, and yet feel that I could do something for my patients.
What I saw in Paris did not, however, help to change my state of mind.
There, too, most of the work was directed to dead tissues. The mental
aspects, as such, received but scant attention. I was, therefore, seriously
thinking of giving up my mental work for some other specialty. As can be
seen, I was confronted with a situation similar to the one of my medical
friend. I, too, was at a crossing and did not know which way to turn. My
suspense was soon ended. One day I received a letter from my friend
Professor Peterson, who, by the way, was responsible for my entering the
State hospital service. In this letter he advised me not to give up my work,
and suggested the psychiatric clinic of Zurich, where he thought I could
find what I desired.
“But what does Cadillac mean? Cadillac is the name of a hotel and of an
automobile. A few days before in a country place my medical friend and I
had been trying to hire an automobile, but there was none to be had. We
both expressed the wish to own an automobile—again an unrealized
ambition. I also recalled that the ‘Carrefour St. Lazarre’ always impressed
me as being one of the busiest thoroughfares in Paris. It was always
congested with automobiles. Cadillac also recalled that only a few days ago
on the way to my clinic I noticed a large sign over a building which
announced that on a certain day ‘this building was to be occupied by the
Cadillac,’ etc. This at first made me think of the Cadillac Hotel, but on
second sight I noticed that it referred to the Cadillac motor-car. There was a
sudden obstruction here for a few moments. The word Cadillac reappeared
and by sound association the word catalogue occurred to me. This word

brought back a very mortifying occurrence of recent origin, the motive of
which is again blighted ambition.
“When one wishes to report any auto-analysis he must be prepared to lay
bare many intimate affairs of his own life. Any one reading carefully
Professor Freud’s works cannot fail to become intimately acquainted with
him and his family. I have often been asked by persons who claim to have
read and studied Freud’s works such questions as: ‘How old is Freud?’ ‘Is
Freud married?’ ‘How many children has he?’ etc. Whenever I hear these or
similar questions I know that the questioner has either lied when he made
these assertions, or, to be more charitable, that he is a very careless and
superficial reader. All these questions and many more are answered in
Freud’s works. Auto-analyses are autobiographies par excellence; but
whereas the autobiographer may for definite reasons consciously and
unconsciously hide many facts of his life, the auto-analyst not only tells the
truth consciously, but perforce brings to light his whole intimate personality.
It is for these reasons that one finds it very unpleasant to report his own
auto-analyses. However, as we often report our patients’ unconscious
productions, it is but fair that we should sacrifice ourselves on the altar of
publicity when occasion demands. This is my apology for having thrust
some of my personal affairs on the reader, and for being obliged to continue
a little longer in the same strain.
“Before digressing with the last remarks I mentioned that the word Cadillac
brought the sound association catalogue. This association brought back
another important epoch in my life with which Professor Peterson is
connected. Last May I was informed by the secretary of the faculty that I
was appointed chief of clinic of the department of psychiatry. I need hardly
say that I was exceedingly pleased to be so honoured—in the first place
because it was the realization of an ambition which I dared entertain only
under special euphoric states; and, secondly, it was a compensation for the
many unmerited criticisms from those who are blindly and unreasonably
opposing some of my work. Soon thereafter I called on the stenographer of
the faculty and spoke to her about a correction to be made in my name as it
was printed in the catalogue. For some unknown reason (perhaps racial
prejudice) this stenographer, a maiden lady, must have taken a dislike to me.
For about three years I repeatedly requested her to have this correction

made, but she had paid no attention to me. To be sure she always promised
to attend to it, but the mistake remained uncorrected.
“When I saw her last May I again reminded her of this correction, and also
called her attention to the fact that as I had been appointed chief of clinic I
was especially anxious to have my name correctly printed in the catalogue.
She apologized for her remissness and assured me that everything should be
as I requested. Imagine my surprise and chagrin when on receiving the new
catalogue I found that while the correction had been made in my name I
was not listed as chief of clinic. When I asked her about this she was quite
puzzled; she said she had no idea that I had been appointed chief of clinic.
She had to consult the minutes of the faculty, written by herself, before she
was convinced of it. It should be noted that as recorder to the faculty it was
her duty to know all these things as soon as they transpired.[75] When she
finally ascertained that I was right she was very apologetic and informed
me that she would at once write to the superintendent of the clinic to inform
him of my appointment, something which she should have done months
before. Of course I gained nothing by her regrets and apologies. The
catalogue was published and those who read it did not find my name in the
desired place. I am chief of clinic in fact but not in name. Moreover, as the
appointments are made only for one year, it is quite likely that my great
ambition will never be actually realized.
“Thus the obsessive neologism cardillac, which is a condensation of
cardiac, Cadillac, and catalogue, contains some of the most important
efforts of my medical experience. When I was almost at the end of this
analysis I suddenly recalled a dream containing this neologism cardillac in
which my wish was realized. My name appeared in its rightful place in the
catalogue. The person who showed it to me in the dream was Professor
Peterson. It was when I was at the first ‘crossing’ after I had graduated from
the medical college that Professor Peterson urged me to enter the hospital
service. About five years later while I was in the state of indecision which I
have described, it was Professor Peterson who advised me to go to the
clinic of psychiatry at Zurich where through Bleuler and Jung I first became
acquainted with Professor Freud and his works, and it was also through the
kind recommendation of Dr. Peterson that I was elevated to my present
position.”

I am indebted to Dr. Hitschman for the solution of another case in which a
line of poetry repeatedly obtruded itself on the mind in a certain place
without showing any trace of its origin and relation.
Related by Dr. E.: “Six years ago I travelled from Biarritz to San Sebastian.
The railroad crosses over the Bidassao—a river which here forms the
boundary between France and Spain. On the bridge one has a splendid
view, on the one side of the broad valley and the Pyrenees and on the other
of the sea. It was a beautiful, bright summer day; everything was filled with
sun and light. I was on a vacation and pleased with my trip to Spain.
Suddenly the following words came to me: ‘But the soul is already free,
floating on a sea of light.’
“At that time I was trying to remember where these lines came from, but I
could not remember; judging by the rhythm, the words must be a part of
some poem, which, however, entirely escaped my memory. Later when the
verse repeatedly came to my mind, I asked many people about it without
receiving any information.
“Last year I crossed the same bridge on my return journey from Spain. It
was a very dark night and it rained. I looked through the window to
ascertain whether we had already reached the frontier station and noticed
that we were on the Bidassao bridge. Immediately the above-cited verse
returned to my memory and again I could not recall its origin.
“At home many months later I found Uhland’s poems. I opened the volume
and my glance fell upon the verse: ‘But the soul is already free, floating on
a sea of light,’ which were the concluding lines of the poem entitled ‘The
Pilgrim.’ I read the poem and dimly recalled that I had known it many years
ago. The scene of action is in Spain, and this seemed to me to be the only
relation between the quoted verse and the place on the railroad journey
described by me. I was only half satisfied with my discovery and
mechanically continued to turn the pages of the book. On turning the next
page I found a poem the title of which was ‘Bidassao Bridge.’
“I may add that the contents of this poem seemed even stranger to me than
that of the first, and that its first verse read:
“‘On the Bidassao bridge stands a saint grey with age, he blesses to the
right the Spanish mountain, to the left he blesses the French land.’”

II. This understanding of the determination of apparently arbitrarily selected
names, numbers, and words may perhaps contribute to the solution of
another problem. As is known, many persons argue against the assumption
of an absolute psychic determinism by referring to an intense feeling of
conviction that there is a free will. This feeling of conviction exists, but is
not incompatible with the belief in determinism. Like all normal feelings, it
must be justified by something. But, so far as I can observe, it does not
manifest itself in weighty and important decisions; on these occasions one
has much more the feeling of a psychic compulsion and gladly falls back
upon it. (Compare Luther’s “Here I stand, I cannot do anything else.”)
On the other hand, it is in trivial and indifferent decisions that one feels sure
that he could just as easily have acted differently, that he acted of his own
free will, and without any motives. From our analyses we therefore need
not contest the right of the feeling of conviction that there is a free will. If
we distinguish conscious from unconscious motivation, we are then
informed by the feeling of conviction that the conscious motivation does
not extend over all our motor resolutions. Minima non curat prætor. What is
thus left free from the one side receives its motive from the other side, from
the unconscious, and the determinism in the psychic realm is thus carried
out uninterruptedly.[76]
III. Although conscious thought must be altogether ignorant of the
motivation of the faulty actions described above, yet it would be desirable
to discover a psychologic proof of its existence; indeed, reasons obtained
through a deeper knowledge of the unconscious make it probable that such
proofs are to be discovered somewhere. As a matter of fact phenomena can
be demonstrated in two spheres which seem to correspond to an
unconscious and hence to a displaced knowledge of these motives.
(a)It is a striking and generally to be recognized feature in the behaviour of
paranoiacs, that they attach the greatest significance to the trivial details in
the behaviour of others. Details which are usually overlooked by others
they interpret and utilize as the basis of far-reaching conclusions. For
example, the last paranoiac seen by me concluded that there was a general
understanding among people of his environment, because at his departure
from the railway-station they made a certain motion with one hand. Another
noticed how people walked on the street, how they brandished their
walking-sticks, and the like.[77]

The category of the accidental, requiring no motivation, which the normal
person lets pass as a part of his own psychic activities and faulty actions, is
thus rejected by the paranoiac in the application to the psychic
manifestations to others. All that he observes in others is full of meaning, all
is explainable. But how does he come to look at it in this manner? Probably
here as in so many other cases, he projects into the mental life of others
what exists in his own unconscious activity. Many things obtrude
themselves on consciousness in paranoia which in normal and neurotic
persons can only be demonstrated through psychoanalysis as existing in
their unconscious.[78] In a certain sense the paranoiac is here justified, he
perceives something that escapes the normal person, he sees clearer than
one of normal intellectual capacity, but his knowledge becomes worthless
when he imputes to others the state of affairs he thus recognizes. I hope that
I shall not be expected to justify every paranoic interpretation. But the point
which we grant to paranoia in this conception of chance actions will
facilitate for us the psychologic understanding of the conviction which the
paranoiac attaches to all these interpretations. There is certainly some truth
to it; even our errors of judgment, which are not designated as morbid,
acquire their feeling of conviction in the same way. This feeling is justified
for a certain part of the erroneous train of thought or for the source of its
origin, and we shall later extend to it the remaining relationships.
(b) The phenomena of superstition furnish another indication of the
unconscious motivation in chance and faulty actions. I will make myself
clear through the discussion of a simple experience which gave me the
starting-point to these reflections.
Having returned from vacation, my thoughts immediately turned to the
patients with whom I was to occupy myself in the beginning of my year’s
work. My first visit was to a very old woman (see above) for whom I had
twice daily performed the same professional services for many years.
Owing to this monotony unconscious thoughts have often found expression
on the way to the patient and during my occupation with her. She was over
ninety years old; it was therefore pertinent to ask oneself at the beginning of
each year how much longer she was likely to live.
On the day of which I speak I was in a hurry and took a carriage to her
house. Every coachman at the cabstand near my house knew the old
woman’s address, as each of them had often driven me there. This day it

happened that the driver did not stop in front of her house, but before one of
the same number in a near-by and really similar-looking parallel street. I
noticed the mistake and reproached the coachman, who apologized for it.
Is it of any significance when I am taken to a house where the old woman is
not to be found? Certainly not to me; but were I superstitious, I should see
an omen in this incident, a hint of fate that this would be the last year for
the old woman. A great many omens which have been preserved by history
have been founded on no better symbolism. Of course, I explain the
incident as an accident without further meaning.
The case would have been entirely different had I come on foot and,
“absorbed in thought” or “through distraction,” I had gone to the house in
the parallel street instead of the correct one. I would not explain that as an
accident, but as an action with unconscious intent requiring interpretation.
My explanation of this “lapse in walking” would probably be that I
expected that the time would soon come when I should not meet the old
woman any longer.
I therefore differ from a superstitious person in the following manner:—
I do not believe that an occurrence in which my mental life takes no part
can teach me anything hidden concerning the future shaping of reality; but I
do believe that an unintentional manifestation of my own mental activity
surely contains something concealed which belongs only to my mental life
—that is, I believe in outer (real) chance, but not in inner (psychic)
accidents. With the superstitious person the case is reversed: he knows
nothing of the motive of his chance and faulty actions, he believes in the
existence of psychic contingencies; he is therefore inclined to attribute
meaning to external chance, which manifests itself in actual occurrence, and
to see in the accident a means of expression for something hidden outside of
him. There are two differences between me and the superstitious person:
first, he projects the motive to the outside, while I look for it in myself;
second, he explains the accident by an event which I trace to a thought.
What he considers hidden corresponds to the unconscious with me, and the
compulsion not to let chance pass as chance, but to explain it as common to
both of us.
Thus I admit that this conscious ignorance and unconscious knowledge of
the motivation of psychic accidentalness is one of the psychic roots of

superstition. Because the superstitious person knows nothing of the
motivation of his own accidental actions, and because the fact of this
motivation strives for a place in his recognition, he is compelled to dispose
of them by displacing them into the outer world. If such a connection exists
it can hardly be limited to this single case. As a matter of fact, I believe that
a large portion of the mythological conception of the world which reaches
far into the most modern religions is nothing but psychology projected into
the outer world. The dim perception (the endo-psychic perception, as it
were) of psychic factors and relations[79] of the unconscious was taken as a
model in the construction of a transcendental reality, which is destined to
be changed again by science into psychology of the unconscious.
It is difficult to express it in other terms; the analogy to paranoia must here
come to our aid. We venture to explain in this way the myths of paradise
and the fall of man, of God, of good and evil, of immortality, and the like—
that is, to transform metaphysics into meta-psychology. The gap between
the paranoiac’s displacement and that of superstition is narrower than
appears at first sight. When human beings began to think, they were
obviously compelled to explain the outer world in an anthropomorphic
sense by a multitude of personalities in their own image; the accidents
which they explained superstitiously were thus actions and expressions of
persons. In that regard they behaved just like paranoiacs, who draw
conclusions from insignificant signs which others give them, and like all
normal persons who justly take the unintentional actions of their fellow-
beings as a basis for the estimation of their characters. Only in our modern
philosophical, but by no means finished, views of life does superstition
seem so much out of place: in the view of life of pre-scientific times and
nations it was justified and consistent.
The Roman who gave up an important undertaking because he sighted an
ill-omened flock of birds was relatively right; his action was consistent with
his principles. But if he withdrew from an undertaking because he had
stumbled on his threshold (un Romain retournerait), he was absolutely
superior even to us unbelievers. He was a better psychologist than we are
striving to become. For his stumbling could demonstrate to him the
existence of a doubt, an internal counter-current the force of which could
weaken the power of his intention at the moment of its execution. For only
by concentrating all psychic forces on the desired aim can one be assured of

perfect success. How does Schiller’s Tell, who hesitated so long to shoot the
apple from his son’s head, answer the bailiff’s question why he had
provided himself with a second arrow?
“With the second arrow I would have pierced you had I struck my dear child
—and truly, I should not have failed to reach you.”
IV. Whoever has had the opportunity of studying the concealed psychic
feelings of persons by means of psychoanalysis can also tell something new
concerning the quality of unconscious motives, which express themselves
in superstition. Nervous persons afflicted with compulsive thinking and
compulsive states, who are often very intelligent, show very plainly that
superstition originates from repressed hostile and cruel impulses. The
greater part of superstition signifies fear of impending evil, and he who has
frequently wished evil to others, but because of a good bringing-up has
repressed the same into the unconscious, will be particularly apt to expect
punishment for such unconscious evil in the form of a misfortune
threatening him from without.
If we concede that we have by no means exhausted the psychology of
superstition in these remarks, we must, on the other hand, at least touch
upon the question whether real roots of superstition should be altogether
denied, whether there are really no omens, prophetic dreams, telepathic
experiences, manifestations of supernatural forces, and the like. I am now
far from willing to repudiate without anything further all these phenomena,
concerning which we possess so many minute observations even from men
of intellectual prominence, and which should certainly form a basis for
further investigation. We may even hope that some of these observations
will be explained by our present knowledge of the unconscious psychic
processes without necessitating radical changes in our present aspect. If still
other phenomena, as, for example, those maintained by the spiritualists,
should be proven, we should then consider the modification of our “laws”
as demanded by the new experience, without becoming confused in regard
to the relation of things of this world.
In the sphere of these analyses I can only answer the questions here
proposed subjectively—that is, in accordance with my personal experience.
I am sorry to confess that I belong to that class of unworthy individuals
before whom the spirits cease their activities and the supernatural

disappears, so that I have never been in position to experience anything
personally that would stimulate belief in the miraculous. Like everybody
else, I have had forebodings and experienced misfortunes; but the two
evaded each other, so that nothing followed the foreboding, and the
misfortune struck me unannounced. When as a young man I lived alone in a
strange city I frequently heard my name suddenly pronounced by an
unmistakable, dear voice, and I then made a note of the exact moment of
the hallucination in order to inquire carefully of those at home what had
occurred at that time. There was nothing to it. On the other hand, I later
worked among my patients calmly and without foreboding while my child
almost bled to death. Nor have I ever been able to recognize as unreal
phenomena any of the forebodings reported to me by my patients.
The belief in prophetic dreams numbers many adherents, because it can be
supported by the fact that some things really so happen in the future as they
were previously foretold by the wish of the dream. But in this there is little
to be wondered at, as many far-reaching deviations may be regularly
demonstrated between a dream and the fulfilment which the credulity of the
dreamer prefers to neglect.
A nice example, one which may be justly called prophetic, was once
brought to me for exhaustive analysis by an intelligent and truth-loving
patient. She related that she once dreamed that she had met a former friend
and family physician in front of a certain store in a certain street, and next
morning when she went down town she actually met him at the place
named in the dream. I may observe that the significance of this wonderful
coincidence was not proven to be due to any subsequent event—that is, it
could not be justified through future occurrences.
Careful examination definitely established the fact that there was no proof
that the woman recalled the dream in the morning following the night of the
dream—that is, before the walk and before the meeting. She could offer no
objection when this state of affairs was presented in a manner that robbed
this episode of everything miraculous, leaving only an interesting
psychologic problem. One morning she had walked through this very street,
had met her old family physician before that certain store, and on seeing
him received the conviction that during the preceding night she had
dreamed of this meeting at this place.

The analysis then showed with great probability how she came to this
conviction, to which, in accordance with the general rule, we cannot deny a
certain right to credence. A meeting at a definite place following a previous
expectation really describes the fact of a rendezvous. The old family
physician awakened her memory of old times, when meetings with a third
person, also a friend of the physician, were of marked significance to her.
Since that time she had continued her relations with this gentleman, and the
day before the mentioned dream she had waited for him in vain. If I could
report in greater detail the circumstances here before us, I could easily show
that the illusion of the prophetic dream at the sight of the friend of former
times is perchance equivalent to the following speech: “Ah, doctor, you
now remind me of bygone times, when I never had to wait in vain for N.
when we had arranged a meeting.”
I have observed in myself a simple and easily explained example, which is
probably a good model for similar occurrences of those familiar
“remarkable coincidences” wherein we meet a person of whom we were
just thinking. During a walk through the inner city a few days after the title
of “Professor” was bestowed on me, which carries with it a great deal of
prestige even in monarchical cities, my thoughts suddenly merged into a
childish revenge-fantasy against a certain married couple. Some months
previous they had called me to see their little daughter who suffered from
an interesting compulsive manifestation following the appearance of a
dream. I took a great interest in the case, the genesis of which I believed I
could surmise, but the parents were unfavourable to my treatment, and gave
me to understand that they thought of applying to a foreign authority who
cured by means of hypnotism. I now fancied that after the failure of this
attempt, the parents begged me to resume my treatment, that they now had
full confidence in me, etc. But I answered: “Now that I have become a
professor, you have confidence in me. The title has made no change in my
ability; if you could not use me when I was instructor you can get along
without me now that I am a professor.” At this point my fantasy was
interrupted by a loud “Good evening, Professor!” and as I looked up there
passed me the same couple on whom I had just taken this imaginary
vengeance.
The next reflection destroyed the semblance of the miraculous. I was
walking towards this couple on a straight, almost deserted street; glancing

up hastily at a distance of perhaps twenty steps from me, I had spied and
realized their stately personalities; but this perception, following the model
of a negative hallucination, was set aside by certain emotionally
accentuated motives and then asserted itself in the apparently spontaneous
emerging fantasy.
A similar experience is related by Brill, which also throws some light on the
nature of telepathy.
“While engrossed in conversation during our customary Sunday evening
dinner at one of the large New York restaurants, I suddenly stopped and
irrelevantly remarked to my wife, ‘I wonder how Dr. R. is doing in
Pittsburg.’ She looked at me much astonished and said: ‘Why, that is
exactly what I have been thinking for the last few seconds! Either you have
transferred this thought to me or I have transferred it to you. How can you
otherwise explain this strange phenomenon?’ I had to admit that I could
offer no solution. Our conversation throughout the dinner showed not the
remotest association to Dr. R., nor, so far as our memories went, had we
heard or spoken of him for some time. Being a sceptic, I refused to admit
that there was anything mysterious about it, although inwardly I felt quite
uncertain. To be frank, I was somewhat mystified.
“But we did not remain very long in this state of mind, for on looking
toward the cloak-room we were surprised to see Dr. R. Though closer
inspection showed our mistake, we were both struck by the remarkable
resemblance of this stranger to Dr. R. From the position of the cloak-room
we were forced to conclude that this stranger had passed our table.
Absorbed in our conversation, we had not noticed him consciously, but the
visual image had stirred up the association of his double, Dr. R. That we
should both have experienced the same thought is also quite natural. The
last word from our friend was to the effect that he had taken up private
practice in Pittsburg, and, being aware of the vicissitudes that beset the
beginner, it was quite natural to wonder how fortune smiled upon him.
“What promised to be a supernatural manifestation was thus easily
explained on a normal basis; but had we not noticed the stranger before he
left the restaurant, it would have been impossible to exclude the mysterious.
I venture to say that such simple mechanisms are at the bottom of the most

complicated telepathic manifestations; at least, such has been my
experience in all cases accessible to investigation.”
Another “solution of an apparent foreboding” was reported by Otto
Rank[80]:—
“Some time ago I had experienced a remarkable variation of that ‘peculiar
coincidence’ wherein one meets a person who has just been occupying
one’s thoughts. Shortly before Christmas I went to the Austro-Hungarian
Bank in order to obtain ten new silver crown-pieces destined for Christmas
gifts. Absorbed in ambitious fantasies which dealt with the contrast of my
meagre means to the enormous sums in the banking-house, I turned into the
narrow street to the bank. In front of the door I saw an automobile and
many people going in and out. I thought to myself: ‘The officials will have
plenty of time for my new crowns; naturally I shall be quick about it; I shall
put down the paper notes to be exchanged, and say, “Please give me gold.”’
I realized my mistake at once—I was to have asked for silver—and awoke
from my fantasies.
“I was now only a few steps from the entrance, and noticed a young man
coming toward me who looked familiar, but whom I could not definitely
identify on account of my short-sightedness. As he came nearer I
recognized him as a classmate of my brother whose name was Gold and
from whose brother, a well-known journalist, I had great expectations in the
beginning of my literary career. But these expectations had not
materialized, and with them had vanished the hoped-for material success
with which my fantasies were occupying themselves on my way to the
bank. Thus engrossed I must have unconsciously perceived the approach of
Mr. Gold, who impressed himself on my conscience while I was dreaming
of material success, and thereby caused me to ask the cashier for gold
instead of the inferior silver. But, on the other hand, the paradoxical fact
that my unconscious was able to perceive an object long before it was
recognized by the eye might in part be explained by the complex readiness
(Komplexbereitschaft) of Bleuler. For my mind was attuned to the material,
and, contrary to my better knowledge, it guided my steps from the very
beginning to buildings where gold and paper money were exchanged.”
To the category of the wonderful and uncanny we may also add that strange
feeling we perceive in certain moments and situations when it seems as if

we had already had exactly the same experience, or had previously found
ourselves in the same situation. Yet we are never successful in our efforts to
recall clearly those former experiences and situations. I know that I follow
only the loose colloquial expression when I designate that which stimulates
us in such moments as a “feeling.” We undoubtedly deal with a judgment,
and, indeed, with a judgment of cognition; but these cases, nevertheless,
have a character peculiar to themselves, and besides, we must not ignore the
fact that we never recall what we are seeking.
I do not know whether this phenomenon of Déjà vu was ever seriously
offered as a proof of a former psychic existence of the individual; but it is
certain that psychologists have taken an interest in it, and have attempted to
solve the riddle in a multitude of speculative ways. None of the proposed
tentative explanations seems right to me, because none takes account of
anything but the accompanying manifestations and the favouring conditions
of the phenomenon. Those psychic processes which, according to my
observation, are alone responsible for the explanation of the Déjà vu—
namely, the unconscious fantasies—are generally neglected by the
psychologists even to-day.
I believe that it is wrong to designate the feeling of having experienced
something before as an illusion. On the contrary, in such moments
something is really touched that we have already experienced, only we
cannot consciously recall the latter because it never was conscious. In short,
the feeling of Déjà vu corresponds to the memory of an unconscious
fantasy. There are unconscious fantasies (or day dreams) just as there are
similar conscious creations, which every one knows from personal
experience.
I realize that the object is worthy of most minute study, but I will here give
the analysis of only one case of Déjà vu in which the feeling was
characterized by particular intensity and persistence. A woman of thirty-
seven years asserted that she most distinctly remembered that at the age of
twelve and a half she paid her first visit to some school friends in the
country, and as she entered the garden she immediately had the feeling of
having been there before. This feeling was repeated as she went through the
living-rooms, so that she believed she knew beforehand how big the next
room was, what views one could have on looking out of it, etc. But the
belief that this feeling of recognition might have its source in a previous

visit to the house and garden, perhaps a visit paid in earliest childhood, was
absolutely excluded and disproved by statements from her parents. The
woman who related this sought no psychologic explanation, but saw in the
appearance of this feeling a prophetic reference to the importance which
these friends later assumed in her emotional life. On taking into
consideration, however, the circumstance under which this phenomenon
presented itself to her, we found the way to another conception.
When she decided upon this visit she knew that these girls had an only
brother, who was seriously ill. In the course of the visit she actually saw
him. She found him looking very badly, and thought to herself that he
would soon die. But it happened that her own only brother had had a serious
attack of diphtheria some months before, and during his illness she had
lived for weeks with relatives far from her parental home. She believed that
her brother was taking part in this visit to the country, imagined even that
this was his first long journey since his illness; still, her memory was
remarkably indistinct in regard to these points, whereas all other details, and
particularly the dress which she wore that day, remained most clearly before
her eyes.
To the initiated it will not be difficult to conclude from these suggestions
that the expectation of her brother’s death had played a great part in the
girl’s mind at that time, and that either it never became conscious or it was
more energetically repressed after the favourable issue of the illness. Under
other circumstances she would have been compelled to wear another dress
—namely, mourning clothes. She found the analogous situation in her
friends’ home; their only brother was in danger of an early death, an event
that really came to pass a short time after. She might have consciously
remembered that she had lived through a similar situation a few months
previous, but instead of recalling what was inhibited through repression she
transferred the memory feeling to the locality, to the garden, and the house,
and merged it into the fausse reconnaissance that she had already seen
everything exactly as it was.
From the fact of the repression we may conclude that the former
expectation of the death of her brother was not far from evincing the
character of a wish-fantasy. She would then have become the only child. In
her later neurosis she suffered in the most intense manner from the fear of

losing her parents, behind which the analysis disclosed, as usual, the
unconscious wish of the same content.
My own experience of Déjà vu I can trace in a similar manner to the
emotional constellation of the moment. It may be expressed as follows:
“That would be another occasion for awakening certain fantasies
(unconscious and unknown) which were formed in me at one time or
another as a wish to improve my situation.”[81]
V. Recently when I had occasion to recite to a colleague of a philosophical
turn of mind some examples of name-forgetting, with their analyses, he
hastened to reply: “That is all very well, but with me the forgetting of a
name proceeds in a different manner.” Evidently one cannot dismiss this
question as simply as that; I do not believe that my colleague had ever
thought of an analysis for the forgetting of a name, nor could he say how
the process differed in him. But his remark, nevertheless, touches upon a
problem which many would be inclined to place in the foreground. Does the
solution given for faulty and chance actions apply in general or only in
particular cases, and if only in the latter, what are the conditions under
which it may also be employed in the explanation of the other phenomena?
In answer to this question my experiences leave me in the lurch. I can only
urge against considering the demonstrated connections as rare, for as often
as I have made the test in myself and with my patients it was always
definitely demonstrated exactly as in the examples reported, or there were
at least good reasons to assume this. One should not be surprised, however,
when one does not succeed every time in finding the concealed meaning of
the symptomatic action, as the amount of inner resistances ranging
themselves against the solution must be considered a deciding factor. Also it
is not always possible to explain every individual dream of one’s self or of
patients. To substantiate the general validity of the theory, it is enough if
one can penetrate only a certain distance into the hidden associations. The
dream which proves refractory when the solution is attempted on the
following day can often be robbed of its secret a week or a month later,
when the psychic factors combating one another have been reduced as a
consequence of a real change that has meanwhile taken place. The same
applies to the solution of faulty and symptomatic actions. It would therefore
be wrong to affirm of all cases which resist analysis that they are caused by
another psychic mechanism than that here revealed; such assumption

requires more than negative proofs; moreover, the readiness to believe in a
different explanation of faulty and symptomatic actions, which probably
exists universally in all normal persons, does not prove anything; it is
obviously an expression of the same psychic forces which produced the
secret, which therefore strives to protect and struggle against its elucidation.
On the other hand, we must not overlook the fact that the repressed
thoughts and feelings are not independent in attaining expression in
symptomatic and faulty actions. The technical possibility for such an
adjustment of the innervations must be furnished independently of them,
and this is then gladly utilized by the intention of the repressed material to
come to conscious expression. In the case of linguistic faulty actions an
attempt has been made by philosophers and philologists to verify through
minute observations what structural and functional relations enter into the
service of such intention. If in the determinations of faulty and symptomatic
actions we separate the unconscious motive from its co-active physiological
and psychophysical relations, the question remains open whether there are
still other factors within normal limits which, like the unconscious motive,
and in its place can produce faulty and symptomatic actions on the road of
the relations. It is not my task to answer this question.
VI. Since the discussion of speech blunders we have been content to
demonstrate that faulty actions have a concealed motive, and through the
aid of psychoanalysis we have traced our way to the knowledge of their
motivation. The general nature and the peculiarities of the psychic factors
brought to expression in these faulty actions we have hitherto left almost
without consideration; at any rate, we have not attempted to define them
more accurately or to examine into their lawfulness. Nor will we now
attempt a thorough elucidation of the subject, as the first steps have already
taught us that it is more feasible to enter this structure from another side.
Here we can put before ourselves certain questions which I will cite in their
order. (1) What is the content and the origin of the thoughts and feelings
which show themselves through faulty and chance actions? (2) What are the
conditions which force a thought or a feeling to make use of these
occurrences as a means of expression and place it in a position to do so? (3)
Can constant and definite associations be demonstrated between the manner
of the faulty action and the qualities brought to expression through it?

I shall begin by bringing together some material for answering the last
question. In the discussion of the examples of speech blunders we found it
necessary to go beyond the contents of the intended speech, and we had to
seek the cause of the speech disturbance outside the intention. The latter
was quite clear in a series of cases, and was known to the consciousness of
the speaker. In the example that seemed most simple and transparent it was
a similar sounding but different conception of the same thought, which
disturbed its expression without any one being able to say why the one
succumbed and the other came to the surface (Meringer and Mayers’
Contaminations).
In a second group of cases one conception succumbed to a motive which
did not, however, prove strong enough to cause complete submersion. The
conception which was withheld was clearly presented to consciousness.
Only of the third group can we affirm unreservedly that the disturbing
thought differed from the one intended, and it is obvious that it may
establish an essential distinction. The disturbing thought is either connected
with the disturbed one through a thought association (disturbance through
inner contradiction), or it is substantially strange to it, and just the disturbed
word is connected with the disturbing thought through a surprising outer
association, which is frequently unconscious.
In the examples which I have given from my psychoanalyses it is found that
the entire speech is either under the influence of thoughts which have
become active simultaneously, or under absolutely unconscious thoughts
which betray themselves either through the disturbance itself, or which
evince an indirect influence by making it possible for the individual parts of
the unconsciously intended speech to disturb one another. The retained or
unconscious thoughts from which the disturbances in speech emanate are of
most varied origin. A general survey does not reveal any definite direction.
Comparative examinations of examples of mistakes in reading and writing
lead to the same conclusions. Isolated cases, as in speech blunders, seem to
owe their origin to an unmotivated work of condensation (e.g., the Apel).
But we should be pleased to know whether special conditions must not be
fulfilled in order that such condensation, which is considered regular in the
dream-work and faulty in our waking thoughts, should take place. No
information concerning this can be obtained from the examples themselves.

But I merely refuse from this to draw the conclusion that there are no such
conditions, as, for instance, the relaxation of conscious attention; for I have
learned elsewhere that automatic actions are especially characterized by
correctness and reliability. I would rather emphasize the fact that here, as so
frequently in biology, it is the normal relations, or those approaching the
normal, that are less favourable objects for investigation than the
pathological. What remains obscure in the explanation of these most simple
disturbances will, according to my expectation, be made clear through the
explanation of more serious disturbances.
Also mistakes in reading and writing do not lack examples in which more
remote and more complicated motivation can be recognized.
There is no doubt that the disturbances of the speech functions occur more
easily and make less demand on the disturbing forces than other psychic
acts.
But one is on different ground when it comes to the examination of
forgetting in the literal sense—i.e., the forgetting of past experiences. (To
distinguish this forgetting from the others we designate sensu strictiori the
forgetting of proper names and foreign words, as in Chapters I and II, as
“slips”; and the forgetting of resolutions as “omissions.”) The principal
conditions of the normal process in forgetting are unknown.[82] We are also
reminded of the fact that not all is forgotten which we believe to be. Our
explanation here deals only with those cases in which the forgetting arouses
our astonishment, in so far as it infringes the rule that the unimportant is
forgotten, while the important matter is guarded by memory. Analysis of
these examples of forgetting which seem to demand a special explanation
shows that the motive of forgetting is always an unwillingness to recall
something which may evoke painful feelings. We come to the conjecture
that this motive universally strives for expression in psychic life, but is
inhibited through other and contrary forces from regularly manifesting
itself. The extent and significance of this dislike to recall painful
impressions seems worthy of the most painstaking psychologic
investigation. The question as to what special conditions render possible the
universally resistant forgetting in individual cases cannot be solved through
this added association.

A different factor steps into the foreground in the forgetting of resolutions;
the supposed conflict resulting in the repression of the painful memory
becomes tangible, and in the analysis of the examples one regularly
recognizes a counter-will which opposes but does not put an end to the
resolution. As in previously discussed faulty acts, we here also recognize
two types of the psychic process: the counter-will either turns directly
against the resolution (in intentions of some consequence) or it is
substantially foreign to the resolution itself and establishes its connection
with it through an outer association (in almost indifferent resolutions).
The same conflict governs the phenomena of erroneously carried-out
actions. The impulse which manifests itself in the disturbances of the action
is frequently a counter-impulse. Still oftener it is altogether a strange
impulse which only utilizes the opportunity to express itself through a
disturbance in the execution of the action. The cases in which the
disturbance is the result of an inner contradiction are the most significant
ones, and also deal with the more important activities.
The inner conflict in the chance or symptomatic actions then merges into
the background. Those motor expressions which are least thought of, or are
entirely overlooked by consciousness, serve as the expression of numerous
unconscious or restrained feelings. For the most part they represent
symbolically wishes and phantoms.
The first question (as to the origin of the thoughts and emotions which find
expression in faulty actions) we can answer by saying that in a series of
cases the origin of the disturbing thoughts can be readily traced to repressed
emotions of the psychic life. Even in healthy persons egotistic, jealous and
hostile feelings and impulses, burdened by the pressure of moral education,
often utilize the path of faulty actions to express in some way their
undeniably existing force which is not recognized by the higher psychic
instances. Allowing these faulty and chance actions to continue corresponds
in great part to a comfortable toleration of the unmoral. The manifold
sexual currents play no insignificant part in these repressed feelings. That
they appear so seldom in the thoughts revealed by the analyses of my
examples is simply a matter of coincidence. As I have undertaken the
analyses of numerous examples from my own psychic life, the selection
was partial from the first, and aimed at the exclusion of sexual matters. At

other times it seemed that the disturbing thoughts originated from the most
harmless objection and consideration.
We have now reached the answer to the second question—that is, what
psychologic conditions are responsible for the fact that a thought must seek
expression, not in its complete form but, as it were, in parasitic form, as a
modification and disturbance of another. From the most striking examples
of faulty actions it is quite obvious that this determinant should be sought in
a relation to conscious capacity, or in the more or less firmly pronounced
character of the “repressed” material. But an examination of this series of
examples shows that this character consists of many indistinct elements.
The tendency to overlook something because it is wearisome, or because
the concerned thought does not really belong to the intended matter—these
feelings seem to play the same rôle as motives for the suppression of a
thought (which later depends for expression on the disturbance of another),
as the moral condemnation of a rebellious emotional feeling, or as the
origin of absolutely unconscious trains of thought. An insight into the
general nature of the condition of faulty and chance actions cannot be
gained in this way.
However, this investigation gives us one single significant fact; the more
harmless the motivation of the faulty act the less obnoxious, and hence the
less incapable of consciousness, the thought to which it gives expression is;
the easier also becomes the solution of the phenomenon after we have
turned our attention toward it. The simplest cases of speech blunders are
immediately noticed and spontaneously corrected. Where one deals with
motivation through actually repressed feelings the solution requires a
painstaking analysis, which may sometimes strike against difficulties or
turn out unsuccessful.
One is therefore justified in taking the result of this last investigation as an
indication of the fact that the satisfactory explanation of the psychologic
determinations of faulty and chance actions is to be acquired in another way
and from another source. The indulgent reader can therefore see in these
discussions the demonstration of the surfaces of fracture in which this
theme was quite artificially evolved from a broader connection.
VII. Just a few words to indicate the direction of this broader connection.
The mechanism of the faulty and chance actions, as we have learned to

know it through the application of analysis, shows in the most essential
points an agreement with the mechanism of dream formation, which I have
discussed in the chapter “The Dream Work” of my book on the
interpretation of dreams. Here, as there, one finds the condensation and
compromise formation (“contaminations”); in addition the situation is much
the same, since unconscious thoughts find expression as modifications of
other thoughts in unusual ways and through outer associations. The
incongruities, absurdities, and errors in the dream content by virtue of
which the dream is scarcely recognized as a psychic achievement originate
in the same way—to be sure, through freer usage of the existing material—
as the common error of our everyday life; here, as there, the appearance of
the incorrect function is explained through the peculiar interference of two
or more correct actions.
An important conclusion can be drawn from, this combination: the peculiar
mode of operation, whose most striking function we recognize in the dream
content, should not be adjudged only to the sleeping state of the psychic life
when we possess abundant proof of its activity during the waking state in
the form of faulty actions. The same connection also forbids us assuming
that these psychic processes which impress us as abnormal and strange are
determined by deep-seated decay of psychic activity or by morbid state of
function.[83]
The correct understanding of this strange psychic work which allows the
faulty actions to originate like the dream pictures will only be possible after
we have discovered that the psychoneurotic symptoms, particularly the
psychic formations of hysteria and compulsion neurosis, repeat in their
mechanisms all the essential features of this mode of operation. The
continuation of our investigation would therefore have to begin at this
point.
There is still another special interest for us in considering the faulty, chance,
and symptomatic actions in the light of this last analogy. If we compare
them to the function of the psychoneuroses and the neurotic symptoms, two
frequently recurring statements gain in sense and support—namely, that the
border-line between the nervous, normal, and abnormal states is indistinct,
and that we are all slightly nervous. Regardless of all medical experience,
one may construe various types of such barely suggested nervousness, the
formes frustes of the neuroses. There may be cases in which only a few

symptoms appear, or they may manifest themselves rarely or in mild forms;
the extenuation may be transferred to the number, intensity, or to the
temporal outbreak of the morbid manifestation. It may also happen that just
this type, which forms the most frequent transition between health and
disease, may never be discovered. The transition type, whose morbid
manifestations come in the form of faulty and symptomatic actions, is
characterized by the fact that the symptoms are transformed to the least
important psychic activities, while everything that can lay claim to a higher
psychic value remains free from disturbance. When the symptoms are
disposed of in a reverse manner—that is, when they appear in the most
important individual and social activities in a manner to disturb the
functions of nourishment and sexual relations, professional and social life—
such disposition is found in the severe cases of neuroses, and is perhaps
more characteristic of the latter than the multiformity or vividness of the
morbid manifestations.
But the common character of the mildest as well as the severest cases, to
which the faulty and chance actions contribute, lies in the ability to refer the
phenomena to unwelcome, repressed, psychic material, which, though
pushed away from consciousness, is nevertheless not robbed of all capacity
to express itself.

INDEX
Actions—
Accidental, 192
Chance, 215
Symbolic, 210
Symptomatic, 178, 215, 235
Collection of, 238
Examples, 216, 217
Grouping of, 219
Adler, 283, 287
Amnesia, 139
Infantile, 62
Temporary, 35
Analysis of—
Aliquis, 18
Castelvetrano, 50
Ode to Apollo, 29
Signorelli, 4
Young, 44
Anticipations, 72
Association, 11
Auditifs, 63
Awkwardness, accidental, 209

Bed-wetting, 150
Behaviour of paranoiacs, 304
Bernheim, 161
Bleuler, 38, 120, 303, 319
Blood miracle, 20

Blunders, speech, 74
Boileau, quoted from, 114
Brantôme, 93
Breaking of objects, 184, 186, 187, 189
Brill, 19, 29, 32, 101, 102, 103, 130, 147, 169, 170, 197, 241, 249, 258,
293, 316

Chance, 277
Chance numbers, 282, 283
Charcot, 63, 157
Child, intellectual accomplishments of, 62
Childhood activities, trace of, 62
Combined faulty acts, 265
Examples of, 266, 267
Complex—
Ambition, 100
Family, 40
Œdipus, 198
Personal, 38, 49
Professional, 40
Self-reference, 52
Compromise formation, examples of, 81
Consciousness, 10
Bringing hidden ideas to, 19
Contaminations, 72
Contradiction from repression, 26
Counter-will, 170
In resolutions, 170

Damaging things, 190, 191

Darwin, 154
Dattner, B., 129, 232, 233, 239
Daudet, 156
Death and sexuality, 7
Déjà vu—
Explanation of, 321
Phenomenon of, 320
Delusions, formation of, 155
Denials, 149
Determinant, inner, 13
Determinism, 277
In mental life, 278
Psychic, 302
Displacement, 4, 10, 57
Retro-active, 58
Disturbance of newly emerging theme, 6
Don Quixote, 202
Dream, prophetic, 312

Element, suppressed, 11
Erroneously carried-out actions, 177, 278, 332
As an expression of self-reproach, 184
Examples of, 178, 179, 180
Errors, 249
Examples of, 250, 251, 253
Of memory, 249
Mechanism of, 256
Examples arbitrarily chosen, 279, 281

Fall, 191

False recollection, 4
Faulty acts, 192
Actions, 326
Faulty actions—
Explanation of, 322
In relation to nervousness, 337
The psychoneurotic symptom, 337
Memory, mechanism of, 10
Relation to the dream, 335
Ferenczi, 33, 43, 46, 98, 204, 324
Folk-lore, 154
Forebodings, 312
Fore-sounds, influence of, 78
Forget, disposition to, 11
Tendency to, 17
Forgetfulness, 168
Due to disturbances of pain, 27
Excusing power of, 165
Psychic mechanism of, 3
Temporary, of proper names, 3, 29, 45
Forgetting—
As a spontaneous process, 135
Defensive tendency of, 153
Examples of, 139, 140, 141, 148, 149
Intentional, 8
Mechanism of, 52, 330
Of experiences, 138
Of foreign words, 17
Of impressions, 135, 138
Of intentions, 159
Of knowledge, 139
Of names, 29, 39, 40, 155, 324
Of resolutions, 135, 173, 332

Pain motive of, 155
Preference for proper names, 3, 4, 11
Psychologic analysis of, 136
Purposive, 24
The order of words, 29, 33, 34
Through neglect, 163
Free will, 303
Freud, 43, 300

Gross, Hans, 154, 304

Hallucination, 313
Henri V. and C., 61
Hitschman, 301

Identification, 100
Impotence, psychic, 34
Injury, self-inflicted, 199, 201
Intention, 159
Intentions—
Forgetting of, 160
Secondary, 163
Interchangings, 72

Jones, E., 31, 51, 97, 109, 127, 129, 148, 151, 155, 163, 179, 221, 239,
267, 290, 292
Jung, C. G., 32, 43, 292

Keys, 179, 180

Lapses in reading, 117, 278
In speech, 117, 256, 278
In writing, 120, 278

Lapsus calami, 122

Maeder, 179, 236, 258
Mayer and Meringer, 71, 177
Memories—
Childhood, 57, 61, 211
Concealing, 57, 58, 64
Cause of, 58
Formation of, 59, 60
Painful, 154
Memory—
Control of, 137
Disturbance, examples of, 155, 157
Psychologic theory of, 135
Reproduction, 10
Tenaciousness of, 136
Meyer, 278
Military service, 161
Mishandling, 192
As a sacrifice, 192
Mislaying—
Analysis of, 145, 146
Examples of, 146, 147
Significance of, 143
Misstep, 191
Mistakes in reading, 71, 117
Examples of, 117, 118
In speech, 71
In writing, 117
Of importance, 195, 197
Of normal persons, 194
Moteurs, 63

Motives, unknown, 277
Motor insufficiency, 209

Name—
Incorrect substitutive, 12
Reproduction of lost, 4
Names—
Causes of forgetting of, 52
Distortion of, 97
Escaped, 4
Falsification of, 99
Forgetting of, 4
Substitutive, 4, 13, 98
Negative hallucination, 316
Neologism, analysis of, 293
Nietzsche, 153

Œdipus Complex, 198
Legend, 196
Omissions in writing, 129

Paranoiac interpretation, 306
Personality, over-estimation of, 30
Peterson, 32, 240, 298
Phonetic laws, 95
Phonetics, psychic value of, 72
Pick, A., 152
Playful actions, 227
Occupations, 220
Post-hypnotic suggestion, 161
Potwin, 61

Printers’ errors, 124, 125
Prophetic dream, analysis of, 313
Psychic—
Action, faulty, 277
Apparatus, 153
Determinism, 302
Function, failure of, 3
Psycho-analysis, 65
Psychology of the unconscious, 309

Rank, O., 105, 108, 242, 269, 272, 318
Recollection—
Faulty, 12, 155
Substitutive, 23
Remember, inability to, 8
Reminiscences, childhood, 61
Repressed material, character of, 334
Repression, motivated by, 12, 13
Reproduction—
Disturbance of, 25
Faulty, 29
Resistances, 152
Riklin, 38
Robitsek, Alf., 93

Sachs, 180, 231, 234
Self-betrayal, 101
Examples of, 102
Self-criticism, 184
Self-mutilations, 198

Self-reference, 41
Shakespeare, quoted from, 109, 122
Speech blunders, 74
Psychology of, 329
Disturbance, 75
Lapses in, 177, 256
Mistakes in, 71
Examples of, 81, 82
Showing identification, 94
Substitutions in, 77
Stekel, W., 88, 126, 194
Substitutive formation, 60
Suicide, unconscious, 202
Supernatural forces, 312
Superstition, 306
Motivation of, 309
Origin of, 311
Unconscious motives of, 311
Superstitious beliefs, 277
Person, 308
Suppression, process of, 11
Symptomatic actions, 215, 326

Telepathic experiences, 312
Telepathy, nature of, 316
Traditions, 154
Traumatic hysteria, 192

Unconscious activity, 188
Material, 76
Skill, 147

Van Emden, 206
Visuels, 63

Weiss, 267
Wertheimer and Klein, 304
Wisdom, 169
Word-forgetting without substitutive recollection, 23
Words, disfigurement of, 96
Wundt, 79, 130

FOOTNOTES:
[1] Monatsschrift f. Psychiatrie.
[2] This is the usual way of bringing to consciousness hidden ideas. Cf. The
Interpretation of Dreams, pp. 83-4, translated by A. A. Brill, The Macmillan
Company, New York, and Allen, London.
[3] Finer observation reduces somewhat the contrast between the analyses of
Signorelli and aliquis as far as the substitutive recollections are concerned. Here,
too, the forgetting seems to be accompanied by substitutive formations. When I
later asked my companion whether in his effort to recall the forgotten word he
did not think of some substitution, he informed me that he was at first tempted to
put an ab into the verse: nostris ab ossibus (perhaps the disjointed part of a-
liquis) and that later the word exoriare obtruded itself with particular distinctness
and persistency. Being sceptical, he added that it was apparently due to the fact
that it was the first word of the verse. But when I asked him to focus his attention
on the associations to exoriare he gave me the word exorcism. This makes me
think that the reinforcement of exoriare in the reproduction has really the value
of such substitution. It probably came through the association exorcism from the
names of the saints. However, those are refinements upon which no value need
be laid. It seems now quite possible that the appearance of any kind of
substitutive recollection is a constant sign—perhaps only characteristic and
misleading—of the purposive forgetting motivated by repression. This
substitution might also exist in the reinforcement of an element akin to the thing
forgotten, even where incorrect substitutive names fail to appear. Thus, in the
example Signorelli, as long as the name of the painter remained inaccessible to
me, I had more than a clear visual memory of the cycle of his frescoes, and of the
picture of himself in the corner; at least it was more intensive than any of my
other visual memory traces. In another case, also reported in my essay of 1898, I
had hopelessly forgotten the street name and address connected with a
disagreeable visit in a strange city, but—as if to mock me—the house number
appeared especially vivid, whereas the memory of numbers usually causes me
the greatest difficulty.
[4] I am not fully convinced of the lack of an inner connection between the two
streams of thought in the case of Signorelli. In carefully following the repressed
thought concerning the theme of death and sexual life, one does strike an idea
which shows a near relation to the theme of the frescoes of Orvieto.
[5] The Psychology of Dementia Præcox, translated by F. Peterson and A. A.
Brill.
[6] The Psychology of Dementia Præcox, p. 45.
[7] Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse, I. 9, 1911.
[8] “Analyse eines Falles von Namenvergessen,” Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse,
Jahrg. 11, Heft 2, 1911.

[9] Published in the Monatsschrift f. Psychiatrie u. Neurologie, 1899.
[10] “Enquête sur les premiers souvenirs de l’enfance,” L’Année psychologique,
iii., 1897.
[11] “Study of Early Memories,” Psychological Review, 1901.
[12] I assert this as a result of certain investigations made by myself.
[13] The examples are given by the editor.
[14] Those who are interested are referred to pp. 62, 73, and 97 of the author’s
work.
[15] Neue Freie Presse, August 23, 1900: “Wie man sich versprechen kann.”
[16] Völker psychologie, vol. i., pt. i., p. 371, etc., 1900.
[17] Italics are mine.
[18] It turned out that she was under the influence of unconscious thoughts
concerning pregnancy and prevention of conception. With the words “shut up
like a pocket knife,” which she uttered consciously as a complaint, she meant to
describe the position of the child in the womb. The word “earnest” in my remark
recalled to her the name (S. Ernst) of the well-known Vienna business firm in
Kärthner Strasse, which used to advertise the sale of articles for the prevention of
conception.
[19] Similar mistakes dealing with Officer 666 were recently reported to me by
other psycho-analysts.
[20] It may be observed that aristocrats in particular very frequently distort the
names of the physicians they consult, from which we may conclude that
inwardly they slight them, in spite of the politeness with which they are wont to
greet them. I shall cite here some excellent observations concerning the
forgetting of names from the works of Professor E. Jones, of Toronto: Papers on
Psycho-analysis, chap. iii. p. 49:—
“Few people can avoid feeling a twinge of resentment when they find that their
name has been forgotten, particularly if it is by some one with whom they had
hoped or expected it would be remembered. They instinctively realize that if they
had made a greater impression on the person’s mind he would certainly have
remembered them again, for the name is an integral part of the personality.
Similarly, few things are more flattering to most people than to find themselves
addressed by name by a great personage where they could hardly have
anticipated it. Napoleon, like most leaders of men, was a master of this art. In the
midst of the disastrous campaign of France in 1814, he gave an amazing proof of
his memory in this direction. When in a town near Craonne, he recollected that
he had met the mayor, De Bussy, over twenty years ago in the La Fère Regiment.
The delighted De Bussy at once threw himself into his service with extraordinary
zeal. Conversely, there is no surer way of affronting some one than by pretending
to forget his name; the insinuation is thus conveyed that the person is so
unimportant in our eyes that we cannot be bothered to remember his name. This
device is often exploited in literature. In Turgentev’s Smoke (p. 255) the
following passage occurs: “‘So you still find Baden entertaining, M’sieur—
Litvinov.’ Ratmirov always uttered Litvinov’s surname with hesitation, every
time, as though he had forgotten it, and could not at once recall it. In this way, as

well as by the lofty flourish of his hat in saluting him, he meant to insult his
pride.” The same author, in his Fathers and Children (p. 107), writes: “The
Governor invited Kirsanov and Bazarov to his ball, and within a few minutes
invited them a second time, regarding them as brothers, and calling them
Kisarov.” Here the forgetting that he had spoken to them, the mistake in the
names, and the inability to distinguish between the two young men, constitute a
culmination of disparagement. Falsification of a name has the same signification
as forgetting it; it is only a step towards complete amnesia.”
[21] Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse, ii., Jahrg. I. Cf. also Brill’s Psychanalysis: Its
Theories and Practical Application, p. 202. Saunders, Philadelphia and London.
[22] Jones, Papers on Psycho-analysis, p. 60.
[23]

“Ce qu’on conçoit bien
S’énonce clairement,
Et les mots pour le dire
Arrivent aisément.”

Boileau, Art Poétique.
[24] The Interpretation of Dreams, p. 208.
[25] Bleuler, Affektivität Suggestibilität, Paranoia, p. 121, Halle. Marhold, 1906.
[26] A similar situation occurs in Julius Cæsar, iii. 3:
“Cinna. Truly, my name is Cinna.
“Burgher. Tear him to pieces! he is a conspirator.
“Cinna. I am Cinna the poet! not Cinna the conspirator.
“Burgher. No matter; his name is Cinna; tear the name out of his heart and let
him go.”
[27] Ethyl alcohol is, of course, the chemical name for ordinary alcohol.
[28] Jones, Psycho-analysis, p. 66.
[29] Zentralbl. f. Psychoanalyse, i. 12.
[30] In the course of the conference the details of the previous first visit return to
consciousness.
[31] Brill, loc. cit., p. 197.
[32] If we inquire of a person whether he suffered from luetic infection ten or
fifteen years ago, we are only too apt to forget that psychically the patient has
looked upon this disease in an entirely different manner than on, let us say, an
acute attack of rheumatism. In the anamneses which parents give about their
neurotic daughters, it is hardly possible to distinguish with any degree of
certainty the portion forgotten from that hidden, for anything that stands in the
way of the girl’s future marriage is systematically set aside by the parents, that is,
it becomes repressed. A man who had recently lost his beloved wife from an
affection of the lungs reported to me the following case of misleading the doctor,
which can only be explained by the theory of such forgetting. “As my poor

wife’s pleuritis had not disappeared after many weeks, Dr. P. was called in
consultation. While taking the history he asked among others the customary
questions whether there were any cases of lung trouble in my wife’s family. My
wife denied any such cases, and even I myself could not remember any. While
Dr. P. was taking leave the conversation accidentally turned to excursions, and
my wife said: ‘Yes, even to Landgersdorf, where my poor brother lies buried, is a
long journey.’ This brother died about fifteen years ago, after having suffered for
years from tuberculosis. My wife was very fond of him, and often spoke about
him. Indeed, I recall that when her malady was diagnosed as pleurisy she was
very worried and sadly remarked: ‘My brother also died of lung trouble.’ But the
memory was so very repressed that even after the above-cited conversation about
the trip to L. she found no occasion to correct her information concerning the
diseases in her family. I myself was struck by this forgetting at the very moment
she began to talk about Landgersdorf.” A perfectly analogous experience is
related by Ernest Jones in his work. A physician whose wife suffered from some
obscure abdominal malady remarked to her: “It is comforting to think that there
has been no tuberculosis in your family.” She turned to him very astonished and
said, “Have you forgotten that my mother died of tuberculosis, and that my sister
recovered from it only after having been given up by the doctors?”
[33] During the days when I was first writing these pages the following almost
incredible case of forgetting happened to me. On the 1st of January I examined
my notes so that I could send out my bills. In the month of June I came across
the name M——l, and could not recall the person to whom it belonged. My
surprise increased when I observed from my books that I treated the case in a
sanatorium, and that for weeks I had called on the patient daily. A patient treated
under such conditions is rarely forgotten by a physician in six months. I asked
myself if it could have been a man—a paretic—a case without interest? Finally,
the note about the fee received brought to my memory all the knowledge which
strove to elude it. M——l was a fourteen-year-old girl, the most remarkable case
of my latter years, a case which taught me a lesson I am not likely ever to forget,
a case whose upshot gave me many painful hours. The child became afflicted
with an unmistakable hysteria, which quickly and thoroughly improved under
my care. After this improvement the child was taken away from me by the
parents. She still complained of abdominal pains which had played the part in the
hysterical symptoms. Two months later she died of sarcoma of the abdominal
glands. The hysteria, to which she was greatly predisposed, took the tumour-
formation as a provocative agent, and I, fascinated by the tumultuous but
harmless manifestations of hysteria, perhaps overlooked the first sign of the
insidious and incurable disease.
[34] A. Pick (“Zur Psychologie des Vergessens bei Geistes- und Nervenkranken,”
Archiv. f. Kriminal-Anthropologie u. Kriminalistik, von H. Gross) has recently
collected a number of authors who realize the value of the influence of the
affective factors on memory, and who more or less clearly recognize that a
defensive striving against pain can lead to forgetting. But none of us has been
able to represent this phenomenon and its psychologic determination as
exhaustively, and at the same time as effectively, as Nietzsche in one of his
aphorisms (Jenseits von Gut und Böse, ii., Hauptstück 68): “‘I have done that,’
says my Memory. ‘I could not have done that,’ says my Pride, and remains
inexorable. Finally, my Memory yields.”

[35] Cf. Hans Gross, Kriminal Psychologie, 1898.
[36] Darwin on forgetting. In Darwin’s autobiography one finds the following
passage that does equal credit to his scientific honesty and his psychologic
acumen: “I had during many years followed a golden rule, namely, that
whenever a published fact, a new observation or thought, came across me which
was opposed to my general results, to make a memorandum of it without fail and
at once; for I had found by experience that such facts and thoughts were far more
apt to escape from the memory than favourable ones” (quoted by Jones, loc. cit.,
p. 38).
[37] Cf. Bernheim, Neue Studien über Hypnotismus, Suggestion und
Psychotherapie, 1892.
[38] Young men of education who can pass the examination and pay for their
maintenance serve one instead of two years’ compulsory service.
[39] In Bernard Shaw’s Cæsar and Cleopatra, Cæsar’s indifference to Cleopatra
is depicted by his being vexed on leaving Egypt at having forgotten to do
something. He finally recollected what he had forgotten—to take leave of
Cleopatra—this, to be sure, is in full accord with historical truth. How little
Cæsar thought of the little Egyptian princess! Cited from Jones, loc. cit., p. 50.
[40] Women, with their fine understanding of unconscious mental processes, are,
as a rule, more apt to take offence when we do not recognize them in the street,
and hence do not greet them, than to accept the most obvious explanation,
namely, that the dilatory one is short-sighted or so engrossed in thought that he
did not see them. They conclude that they surely would have been noticed if they
had been considered of any consequence.
[41] Dr. Ferenczi reports that he was a distracted person himself, and was
considered peculiar by his friends on account of the frequency and strangeness of
his failing. But the signs of this inattention have almost all disappeared since he
began to practise psychoanalysis with patients, and was forced to turn his
attention to the analysis of his own ego. He believes that one renounces these
failings when one learns to extend by so much one’s own responsibilities. He
therefore justly maintains that distractedness is a state which depends on
unconscious complexes, and is curable by psychoanalysis. One day he was
reproaching himself for having committed a technical error in the psychoanalysis
of a patient, and on this day all his former distractions reappeared. He stumbled
while walking in the street (a representation of that faux pas in the treatment), he
forgot his pocket-book at home, he was a penny short in his car fare, he did not
properly button his clothes, etc.
[42] E. Jones remarks regarding this: “Often the resistance is of a general order.
Thus a busy man forgets to mail a letter entrusted to him—to his slight
annoyance—by his wife, just as he may ‘forget’ to carry out her shopping
orders.”
[43] For the sake of the unity of the theme I may here digress from the accepted
classification, and add that the human memory evinces a particular partiality in
regard to money matters. False reminiscences of having already paid something
are often very obstinate, as I know from personal experience. When free sway is
given to avaricious intent outside of the serious interests of life, when it is
indulged in in the spirit of fun, as in card playing, we then find that the most

honourable men show an inclination to errors, mistakes in memory and accounts,
and without realizing how, they even find themselves involved in small frauds.
Such liberties depend in no small part also on the psychically refreshing
character of the play. The saying that in play we can learn a person’s character
may be admitted if we can add “the repressed character.” If waiters ever make
unintentional mistakes they are apparently due to the same mechanism. Among
merchants we can frequently observe a certain delay in the paying out of sums of
money, in payments of bills and the like, which brings the owner no profit and
can be only understood psychologically as the expression of a counter-will
against giving out money. Brill sums it up with epigrammatic keenness: “We are
more apt to mislay letters containing bills than cheques” (Brill, Psychanalysis, its
Theories and Practical Application, p. 197).
[44] Translated by A. A. Brill.
[45] A second publication of Meringer has later shown me how very unjust I was
to this author when I attributed to him so much understanding.
[46] Jones, loc. cit., p. 79.
[47] Alas! the Venus of Medici is lost!
[48] The Œdipus dream as I was wont to call it, because it contains the key to the
understanding of the legend of King Œdipus. In the text of Sophocles the relation
of such a dream is put in the mouth of Jocasta (cf. The Interpretation of Dreams,
pp. 222-4, etc.).
[49] New York Medical Journal, September, 1912. Reprinted in large form as
Chapter X of Psychanalysis, etc., Saunders, Philadelphia.
[50] The self-inflicted injury which does not entirely tend toward self-
annihilation has, moreover, no other choice in our present state of civilization
than to hide itself behind the accidental, or to break through in a simulation of
spontaneous illness. Formerly, it was a customary sign of mourning, at other
times it expressed itself in ideas of piety and renunciation of the world.
[51] The case is then identical with a sexual attack on a woman, in whom the
attack of the man cannot be warded off through the full muscular strength of the
woman because a portion of the unconscious feelings of the one attacked meets
it with ready acceptance. To be sure, it is said that such a situation paralyses the
strength of a woman; we need only add the reasons for this paralysis. Insofar the
clever sentence of Sancho Panza, which he pronounced as governor of his island,
is psychologically unjust (Don Quixote, vol. ii. chap. xlv). A woman hauled
before the judge a man who was supposed to have robbed her of her honour by
force of violence. Sancho indemnified her with a full purse which he took from
the accused, but after the departure of the woman he gave the accused
permission to follow her and snatch the purse from her. Both returned wrestling,
the woman priding herself that the villain was unable to possess himself of the
purse. Thereupon Sancho spoke: “Had you shown yourself so stout and valiant to
defend your body (nay, but half so much) as you have done to defend your purse,
the strength of Hercules could not have forced you.”
[52] It is evident that the situation of a battlefield is such as to meet the
requirement of conscious suicidal intent which, nevertheless, shuns the direct

way. Cf. in Wallenstein the words of the Swedish captain concerning the death of
Max Piccolomini: “They say he wished to die.”
[53] “Selbstbestrafung wegen Abortus von Dr. J. E. G. van Emden,” Haag
(Holland), Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse, ii. 12.
[54] “Beitrag zur Symbolik im Alltag von Ernest Jones,” Zentralb. f.
Psychoanalyse, i. 3, 1911.
[55] Psychoanalytic research, with the penetration of infantile amnesia, has
shown that this apparent precocity is a less abnormal occurrence than was
previously supposed.
[56] The term “medical questions” is a common periphrasis for “sexual
questions.”
[57] Cf. Oldham’s “I wear my pen as others do their sword.”
[58] Maeder, “Contribution à la psychologie de la vie quotidienne,” Arch. des
psychologie, T. vi. 1906.
[59] Here is another small collection of various symptomatic actions in normal
and neurotic persons. An elderly colleague who does not like to lose at cards had
to pay one evening a large sum of money in consequence of his losses; he did
this without complaint, but with a peculiar constrained temper. After his
departure it was discovered that he had left at this place practically everything he
had with him, spectacles, cigar-case, and handkerchief. That would be readily
translated into the words: “You robbers, you have nicely plundered me.” A man
who suffers from occasional sexual impotence, which has its origin in the
intimacy of his infantile relations to his mother, relates that he is in the habit of
embellishing pamphlets and notes with an S, the initial of his mother’s name. He
cannot bear the idea of having letters from home come in contact with other
unsanctified correspondence, and therefore finds it necessary to keep the former
separate. A young woman suddenly flings open the door of the consulting-room
while her predecessor is still present. She excused herself on the ground of
“thoughtlessness”; it soon came to light that she demonstrated her curiosity
which caused her at an earlier time to intrude into the bedroom of her parents.
Girls who are proud of their beautiful hair know so well how to manipulate
combs and hairpins, that in the midst of conversation their hair becomes
loosened. During the treatment (in a reclining position) some men scatter change
from their pockets and thus pay for the hour of treatment; the amount scattered is
in proportion to their estimation of the work. Whoever forgets articles in the
doctor’s office, such as eyeglasses, gloves, handbags, generally indicates that he
cannot tear himself away and is anxious to return soon. Ernest Jones says: “One
can almost measure the success with which a physician is practising
psychotherapy, for instance, by the size of the collection of umbrellas,
handkerchiefs, purses, and so on, that he could make in a month. The slightest
habits and acts performed with a minimum of attention, such as the winding of a
clock before retiring to sleep, the putting out of lights before leaving the room,
and similar actions, are occasionally subject to disturbances which clearly
demonstrate the influence of the unconscious complex, and what is thought to be
the strongest ‘habits.’”
In the journal Cœnobium, Maeder relates about a hospital physician who, on
account of an important matter, desired to get to the city that evening, although

he was on duty and had no right to leave the hospital. On his return he noticed to
his surprise that there was a light in his room. On leaving the room he had
forgotten to put it out, something that had never happened before. But he soon
grasped the motive of this forgetting. The hospital superintendent who lived in
the same house must have concluded from the light in the room that he was at
home. A man overburdened with worries and subject to occasional depressions
assured me that he regularly forgot to wind his watch on those evenings when
life seemed too hard and unfriendly. In this omission to wind his watch he
symbolically expressed that it was a matter of indifference to him whether he
lived to see the next day. Another man who was personally unknown to me
wrote: “Having been struck by a terrible misfortune, life appeared so harsh and
unsympathetic, that I imagined that I had not sufficient strength to live to see the
next day. I then noticed that almost every day I forgot to wind my watch,
something that I never omitted before. I had been in the habit of doing it
regularly before retiring in an almost mechanical and unconscious manner. It was
only very seldom that I thought of it, and that happened when I had something
important for the next day which held my interest. ‘Should this be considered a
symptomatic action? I really cannot explain it.’” Whoever will take the trouble,
like Jung (The Psychology of Dementia Præcox, translated by Peterson and
Brill), or Maeder (“Une voie nouvelle en Psychologie—Freud et son ecole,”
Cœnobium, Lugano, 1906), to pay attention to melodies which one hums to
himself aimlessly and unconsciously, will regularly discover the relation of the
melody’s text to a theme which occupies the person at that time.
[60] “Das Verlieren als Symptom-handlung,” Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse, i. 10-
11.
[61] Translated by A. A. Brill. The Macmillan Company, New York; George
Allen Company, London.
[62] This is not a perfect error. According to the orphic version of the myth the
emasculation was performed by Zeus on his father Kronos.
[63] Loc. cit., p. 191.
[64] Nouvelles contributions, etc., Arch. de Psych., vi. 1908.
[65] Loc. cit., p. 42.
[66] Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse, ii. 9.
[67] Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse, ii. 5.
[68] This continued action in the unconscious manifested itself once in the form
of a dream which followed the faulty action, another time in the repetition of the
same or in the omission of a correction.
[69] Alfred Adler, “Drei Psychoanalysen von Zahlen einfällen und obsedierenden
Zahlen,” Psych. Neur. Wochenschr., No. 28, 1905.
[70] As an explanation of Macbeth, No. 17 of the U. L., I was informed by Dr.
Adler that in his seventeenth year this man had joined an anarchistic society
whose aim was regicide. Probably this is why he forgot the content of the play
Macbeth. The same person invented at that time a secret code in which numbers
substituted letters.

[71] For the sake of simplicity I have omitted some of the not less suitable
thoughts of the patients.
[72] Loc. cit., p. 36.
[73] “Ein Beitrag zur Kenntnis des Zahlentraumes,” Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse,
i. 12.
[74] “Unconscious Manipulation of Numbers” (ibid., ii. 5, 1912).
[75] This is another excellent example showing how a conscious intention was
powerless to counteract an unconscious resistance.
[76] These conceptions of strict determinism in seemingly arbitrary actions have
already borne rich fruit for psychology—perhaps also for the administration of
justice. Bleuler and Jung have in this way made intelligible the reaction in the
so-called association experiments, wherein the test person answers to a given
word with one occurring to him (stimulus-word reaction), while the time
elapsing between the stimulus word and answer is measured (reaction-time).
Jung has shown in his Diagnostische Assoziationsstudien, 1906, what fine
reagents for psychic occurrences we possess in this association-experiment.
Three students of criminology, H. Gross, of Prague, and Wertheimer and Klein,
have developed from these experiments a technique for the diagnosis of facts
(Tatbestands-Diagnostik) in criminal cases, the examination of which is now
tested by psychologists and jurists.
[77] Proceeding from other points of view, this interpretation of the trivial and
accidental by the patient has been designated as “delusions of reference.”
[78] For example, the fantasies of the hysterical regarding sexual and cruel abuse
which are made conscious by analysis often correspond in every detail with the
complaints of persecuted paranoiacs. It is remarkable but not altogether
unexpected that we also meet the identical content as reality in the contrivances
of perverts for the gratification of their desires.
[79] Which naturally has nothing of the character of perception.
[80] Zentralb. f. Psychoanalyse, ii. 5.
[81] Thus far this explanation of Déjà vu has been appreciated by only one
observer. Dr. Ferenczi, to whom the third edition of this book is indebted for so
many contributions, writes to me concerning this: “I have been convinced,
through myself as well as others, that the inexplicable feeling of familiarity can
be referred to unconscious fantasies of which we are unconsciously reminded in
an actual situation. With one of my patients the process was apparently different,
but in reality it was quite analogous. This feeling returned to him very often, but
showed itself regularly as originating in a forgotten (repressed) portion of a
dream of the preceding night. Thus it appears that the Déjà vu can originate not
only from day dreams but also from night dreams.”
[82] I can perhaps give the following outline concerning the mechanism of actual
forgetting. The memory material succumbs in general to two influences,
condensation and disfigurement. Disfigurement is the work of the tendencies
dominating the psychic life, and directs itself above all against the affective
remnants of memory traces which maintain a more resistive attitude towards
condensation. The traces which have grown indifferent merge into a process of

condensation without opposition; in addition it may be observed that tendencies
of disfigurement also feed on the indifferent material, because they have not
been gratified where they wished to manifest themselves. As these processes of
condensation and disfigurement continue for long periods during which all fresh
experiences act upon the transformation of the memory content, it is our belief
that it is time that makes memory uncertain and indistinct. It is quite probable
that in forgetting there can really be no question of a direct function of time.
From the repressed memory traces it can be verified that they suffer no changes
even in the longest periods. The unconscious, at all events, knows no time limit.
The most important as well as the most peculiar character of psychic fixation
consists in the fact that all impressions are on the one hand retained in the same
form as they were received, and also in the forms that they have assumed in their
further development. This state of affairs cannot be elucidated by any
comparison from any other sphere. By virtue of this theory every former state of
the memory content may thus be restored, even though all original relations have
long been replaced by newer ones.
[83] Cf. here The Interpretation of Dreams, p. 483. Macmillan: New York; and
Allen: London.

UNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED, THE GRESHAM PRESS,
WOKING AND LONDON

Transcriber’s Note

Original copyright information has been retained, but this book is in the public domain in
the country of publication.
In the printed version of this text, footnotes were positioned at the bottom of each page.
In the printed version, each chapter began with a page containing only its title, followed
by a blank page. The chapter title was then repeated at the start of the chapter text. The
first occurrences of the chapter titles have been removed, and the table of contents and
index have been changed to reflect this.
The following changes were made by the transcriber:
Title page, “A. A Brill” changed to “A. A. Brill”.
Page 35, “‘Man created God in His own image.” changed to “‘Man created God in His
own image.’”
Page 48, “tyranically” changed to “tyrannically”.
Page 93, end-quote added after “adultérer”.

Page 117, ““Music Phantoms,”” changed to ““Music Phantoms”,”.
Page 147, “f” was skipped in the list of case studies in the printed text; this has been
corrected.
Page 170, “had suddenly became” changed to “had suddenly become”.
Page 179, “Il est arrivé a” changed to “Il est arrivé à”.
Page 233 appears to introduce a list of examples with the numeral “I.”, but there are no
following terms before the chapter ends. This was probably an error, but has been left
uncorrected here.
Page 236, “hereuse” changed to “heureuse”.
Page 266, end-quote added after “Saturday!”.
Missing comma inserted after “187” in index entry for “Breaking of objects”.
Missing comma inserted after “3” in index entry for “Forgetfulness, Temporary, of proper
names”.
Standardised indentation of “Psychology of” under index entry for “Speech Blunders”.
Footnotes 1 and 9, “Monatschrift” changed to “Monatsschrift”.
Footnote 34, “Geistesund Nervenkranken” changed to “Geistes- und Nervenkranken”;
“Jenseits von Gut und Bosen” changed to “Jenseits von Gut und Böse”, and “Haupstuck”
changed to “Hauptstück”.
Footnote 42, the concluding end-quote has been added.
Footnote 58, “Contribution a la psychologie” changed to “Contribution à la psychologie”.
Footnote 59, end-quotes added after “habits” and “explain it”.
Footnote 81, “Ferençzi” changed to “Ferenczi”.

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