This paper is a report of an analysis of a boy about six years old with a speech defect. The child began to talk at twelve months. At eighteen months he fell and cut his tongue and did not talk again until he was two and a half years old, and from that time on he had a speech defect which disappeared during treatment. Analysis showed that speech was to him an aggressive weapon, and that the trauma acted as a punishment, for the aggression, as a result of which the aggression became defused and he reacted to all situations masochistically.