THE COMPENSATORY MECHANISM OF DELUSIONS AND HALLUCINATIONS

Delusions and hallucinations are not senseless and accidental psychical phenomena. Like the symptoms of purely physical disease they too serve a definite purpose as defense mechanisms established during the history of the Psyche. Just as fever is no symptom of any definite disease so a certain delusion or hallucination is no indication of a definite mental conflict, and just as certain groups of symptoms often indicate a specific disease so a certain group of delusions and hallucinations frequently indicate a definite mental conflict. Delusions of persecutions and reference coupled with ideas of great efficiency, powers of invention, and history of heterosexual abstinence in a majority of cases indicate homosexuality and impotence.