" If it is asked why the ego does not also attempt to withdraw from the tormenting criticism of the super-ego, the answer is that it does manage to do so in a great number of instances. There are obsessional neuroses in which no sense of guilt whatever is present. In them, as far as can be seen, the ego has avoided becoming aware of it by instituting a fresh set of symptoms, penances or restrictions of a self-punishing kind. These symptoms, however, represent at the same time a satisfaction of masochistic impulses which, in their turn, have been reinforced by regression. "

― Sigmund Freud , Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety