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The author presents four principal rules which should be applied in psychoanalytic interpretation to guarantee the utmost validity to interpretive findings. First, the recording of all facts and their careful phenomenologic study, awareness of problems behind each reaction which is not strictly referable to an outward stimulus. Second, strict avoidance of interpreting an actual behavior pattern by attributing it to a conjectured infantile conflict prior to the appearance of the latter in the material. Third, scrutiny of patient's reaction to interpretation. Fourth, reversing the interpretation by reconstructing the original data from the results of interpretation which should be in accordance with the results of past real observation in other fields. A general quality of psychoanalytic interpretation identical with the theories of science is set forth: all purely logical conclusions drawn out of the interpretations should be controllable in actual experience. These reflections do not enter the conscious mind of the experienced psychoanalyst in his work. In regard to the actual work of the psychoanalyst, the word of Charcot is still valid: 'One should contemplate matters long enough until they appear to explain themselves'. The reading of this theoretical paper is further rendered enjoyable by repeated witty comparisons of psychoanalytic interpretation with the technique of a detective.