ABSTRACT
There is a peculiar kind of mistake in which one erroneously supposes that one has made a mistake. Such ‘supposititious’ mistakes are by no means infrequent. Normally, as is well known, consciousness controls the approach to the motor end of the psychic apparatus. In certain cases, however, it seems to be arranged, even in the unconscious, that the actions repudiated by consciousness shall in no circumstances come into being; consciousness could then occupy itself all the more securely with the—of course negatively toned—aggressive phantasies. This behaviour recalls the freedom of phantasy of the dreamer, for whom the sleeping state inhibits all action in general. The technique of the ‘mistaken mistake’ is also comparable with that of the ‘dream within a dream’. Both protect themselves by a sort of reduplication against the too utterly repudiated manifestations of the unconscious.
